Is Obama Ready to Be Commander in Chief?

by Brendan Steinhauser ~ August 20, 2008

The first chapter of the book is my analysis of Senator Barack Obama’s views on foreign policy, which are of supreme importance in understanding what kind of commander in chief he would be. One’s worldview about geopolitics shapes his policy decisions. That is why when Obama was asked how we should deal with evil in the world, his answer was so important. While Obama said we should “confront” evil, John McCain replied that we should “defeat” it.

I was not surprised by these two answers, given Obama’s worldview on foreign affairs. Here is a brief excerpt from the first chapter of the book, from a section where I look at his views on the “root causes” of terrorism.

He writes, “Since extremely poor societies and weak states provide
optimal breeding grounds for disease, terrorism and conflict, the United
States has a direct national security interest in dramatically reducing
global poverty.” His remedy is a $2 billion Global Education Fund to
reduce the “education deficit” in the world. Obama seems to be treating
terrorism as the byproduct of disaffected youth that did not have the
opportunity to go to college. But since Mohammed Atta, Dr. Ayman
al Zawahiri, Ramzi Yousef and many other notorious Islamist terrorists
were far from “uneducated,” (they attended Western universities and
come from families with high income backgrounds) Obama’s rationale
for spending billions of dollars on the education of foreign populations
is misguided.