Obama doubles down in clash over violent extremism

[mystery-ak]

http://thehill.com/policy/defense/233221-obama-doubles-down-in-clash-over-extremism

By Martin Matishak - 02/19/15 11:54 AM EST

President Obama sought Thursday to rally world leaders behind his push to stop extremist groups like the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), while doubling down on terminology that has sparked fierce criticism from conservatives.

"The notion that the West is at war with Islam is an ugly lie. And all of us, regardless of faith, have a responsibility to reject it,” Obama said during a speech at the State Department to representatives from more than 60 countries.

The speech largely echoed a keynote address the president gave on Wednesday to the White House’s Summit on Countering Violent Extremism where he defended his administration’s refusal to say the U.S. is at war with Islam.
 
And for the second straight day, his remarks drew swift fire from the Republicans.

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.) responded to Obama’s “lie” comment in a tweet.
 
“The notion that radical Islam isn't at war with the West is an ugly lie,” he said.

Obama looked to move beyond the fight over how to define the enemy, charging that the world must remain “unwavering” in the fight against terrorist groups like ISIS and promising that the U.S. “will not relent” in its campaign to eradicate the organization that still controls large swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria.
 
"We all have a responsibility to ensure the security, the prosperity and the human rights of our citizens," Obama said. "We are here today because we are united against the scourge of violent extremism and terrorism."
 
He also urged nations to break the “cycles of conflict,” especially sectarian conflict that have become “magnets” for extremists, citing the years-long civil war in Syria
 
Obama again called on nations to “address the grievances that terrorists exploit," such as poverty, government corruption, religious crackdowns and lack of education.
 
He urged more dialogue, not just across countries and faith, but within them as well.
 
"Let us share the truth of our faiths,” Obama told the audience.
 
He skewered “the existing news cycle” that can “give a very distorted impression” of Muslims and said a “painful truth” was that the Muslim community in many countries was not large enough for someone to know a person of that faith.

“Groups like al Qaeda and ISIL peddle the lie that some of our countries are hostile to Muslims,” but he said “we can’t allow cycles of suspicion to tear at the fabric of our cultures.”
 
"We come from different countries and different cultures and different faiths … [but] we are all in the same boat,” Obama said. “We have to help each other to get out of this crisis."

[Relic]

Obama is a malicious idiot. However, why do we insist on hyperventilating over the wrong things?

Even if you believe islam to be fatally flawed, as I do, you can't argue with someone saying the West is not at war with islam, (all of islam). To be at war with islam would mean you have an enemy that is 1.5 billion strong. What would you do? Kill them all?

[truth_seeker]

Muslims of all stripes worldwide, have the guy with the biggest megaphone in the entire world, doing their bidding.

He can claim he is doing something, without doing enough. "Peaceful muslims" can claim doing something, without doing enough.

Since the day that the naïve of America elected him, he has been part of the problem, not the solution.

Unfortunately in our system, the opposition voices are diffused and diluted, and get little notice.

If we had the British parliamentary system he would have been out by now; if not in 2010, or in 2012, surely in 2014.

If we discuss constitutional conventions, we ought to consider early dismissal for gross incompetence.

[rb224315]

Obama is a malicious idiot. However, why do we insist on hyperventilating over the wrong things?

Even if you believe islam to be fatally flawed, as I do, you can't argue with someone saying the West is not at war with islam, (all of islam). To be at war with islam would mean you have an enemy that is 1.5 billion strong. What would you do? Kill them all?

Right now I'd be happy to have a president who is willing to utter the words "Radical Islam".

[Relic]

If we discuss constitutional conventions, we ought to consider early dismissal for gross incompetence.

We'd have to figure out how to dismiss 50% of the public first.

[Relic]

Right now I'd be happy to have a president who is willing to utter the words "Radical Islam".

No one but the right notices, or cares.

It will take something horrible to make most of the public take notice. Something that touches all of us, not just something like 9/11 where most Americans can go back to sleep and pretend it didn't happen.

[alicewonders]

No one but the right notices, or cares.

It will take something horrible to make most of the public take notice. Something that touches all of us, not just something like 9/11 where most Americans can go back to sleep and pretend it didn't happen.

All we can do is continue to be "Paul Revere" and keep trying to warn people what is happening.  When that horrible event happens that may eventually wake a country in deep slumber - maybe they will remember that we tried to warn everyone.

[Fishrrman]

Relic wrote above:
[[ Even if you believe islam to be fatally flawed, as I do, you can't argue with someone saying the West is not at war with islam, (all of islam). To be at war with islam would mean you have an enemy that is 1.5 billion strong. What would you do? Kill them all? ]]

I posted this once before in another thread.

Think back to Abraham Lincoln, who once said that if he could preserve the Union by freeing none of the slaves, he would do it. If he could save the Union by freeing some of the slaves, he would do it. But if necessary to preserve the Union by freeing ALL of the slaves, he would do that, too.

From Lincoln's perspective there was a goal, and he would do WHATEVER was necessary to achieve it.
Just something to think about.

Something else to think about:
It is not 1.5 billions muslims that we need "to kill".
Rather, we must kill the evil belief system that holds them within its thrall.

We must purge it from them, in the same way we purged Nazism from the Germans through World War II and "de-Nazification" afterwards.

Just as we demonstrated to the Germans that their Fuhrer was a false god, we must reveal to islam that their "god" is a false one, as well.

That doesn't mean destroying a billion muslims.
It DOES mean destroying their god.

[alicewonders]

Relic wrote above:
[[ Even if you believe islam to be fatally flawed, as I do, you can't argue with someone saying the West is not at war with islam, (all of islam). To be at war with islam would mean you have an enemy that is 1.5 billion strong. What would you do? Kill them all? ]]

I posted this once before in another thread.

Think back to Abraham Lincoln, who once said that if he could preserve the Union by freeing none of the slaves, he would do it. If he could save the Union by freeing some of the slaves, he would do it. But if necessary to preserve the Union by freeing ALL of the slaves, he would do that, too.

From Lincoln's perspective there was a goal, and he would do WHATEVER was necessary to achieve it.
Just something to think about.

Something else to think about:
It is not 1.5 billions muslims that we need "to kill".
Rather, we must kill the evil belief system that holds them within its thrall.

We must purge it from them, in the same way we purged Nazism from the Germans through World War II and "de-Nazification" afterwards.

Just as we demonstrated to the Germans that their Fuhrer was a false god, we must reveal to islam that their "god" is a false one, as well.

That doesn't mean destroying a billion muslims.
It DOES mean destroying their god.

I like the way you have explained it here and I agree with you.  We don't need to kill everyone, but we do need to kill the thing that tells them to kill innocent people in barbaric ways.