Obama Gets a Powerful Endorsement - Democratic Underground

Ethelk2044

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Sat Sep-01-07 10:28 PM
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Obama Gets a Powerful Endorsement

A fellow that many of you youngsters may know nothing about, Ted Sorensen was featured on Charlie Rose last night. During the interview he laid out the factors he felt are the most important in voting for a Democratic candidate in the upcoming primaries.

His list of qualities is a lengthy one, but the most significant factor for Mr. Sorenson is judgment.

Granny Doc's diary :: ::
In a review of past decisions and the performance of the current crop of top tier Democrats Ted Sorenson kept coming back to the history of decisions made by Barak Obama.

Obama's public rejection of the Bush led, Neo-Con War in Iraq, led the discussion. As an example of the judgment and strength of purpose Obama demonstrated Sorensen related an episode during the Cuban Missile Crisis, wherein President Kennedy disregarded the fervent enthusiam of his military staff for a confrontation with the Soviets, in favor of a more reasoned approach. For Sorensen this was a tipping point in the Cold War, and laid the ground work for all subsequent negotiations.

Kennedy's refusal to collapse in the face of drum beating and rah-rah war mongering, was a critical judgment that most likely avoided World War III.

Those of us close to the military at that time know just how close we came. I got a phone call from my pilot husband at 6:30am with the following message - No "Hello", no "How are you and the kids?", nothing but this cryptic warning:

"If the phone rings 3 times only, and you hear no one on the line, grab the kids, get in the car and head for the mountains immediately. Do not wait for anyone or anything. Just go. This may be it." Then he hung up. It was 6 days before I saw or heard from him again. He was on stand-by, could not leave the base.

Others of you, of a certain age, have similar stories. If not for the recognition of the President that war was a tool of last resort, those of us that survived might still be clinging to the caves and cliffs of the High Sierras.

Judgment is the most critical component of that set of skills a US President needs to negotiate the complex and dangerous world we have created for ourselves. First of all, the judgment to recognize that war should never be a first option, and rarely a second.

(If you doubt the scope of the current danger, check out this Summary of an event carried on C-SPAN this last Thurday.)

Sorensen points out that judgment about the Iraq War has been shown only by Barack Obama. None of the other candidates, with the exception of John Edwards, will even admit that they may, might, just possibly, could have been wrong. And even in the case of Edwards, he did, infact, vote for the war. The rest are spending all of their time trying to cover their asses for their terrible lack of judgment and fear of being labled surrender monkeys.

There are a lot of things I don't know about Obama - things I will have to get busy and learn. But when, at the end of the interview, Charlie Rose asked Ted Sorensen if this was an endorsement of Obama, Sorensen said, "Yes."

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/9/1/132053/7528