Uncommon Commentary #353: Arab-Spring Fever

It's remarkable how seriously some otherwise-sensible commentators apparently take the notion of an "Obama Doctrine".  If Obama's approach to the upheavals in the Near East were consistent enough to be called a "doctrine", would he have reacted as inconsistently as he has?  After weeks of defying pressure to do something to aid the rebellion in Libya, he abruptly reversed his public stance and ended up taking the USA to war without a declaration of such; he denied that his administration was working toward Gaddafi's violent overthrow, and then claimed credit for the violent overthrow when it did occur; he spent two years resisting calls for intervention in Syria—this resistance included drawing a "red line" over the use of chemical weapons, the crossing of which he never made a precondition for joining the fight versus Gaddafi—before executing another Libya-style flip-flop, which so far has not led to anything but a promise to supply anti-Assad insurgents with small arms; and he has dithered over policy regarding Egypt in the wake of the Muslim Brotherhood's ouster, first calling for a "review" on whether to continue military aid, then justifying continuation of that aid by describing the (latest) coup d'état as a popular revolution, and presently holding up that aid, specifically, the delivery to Egypt of four F-16's that we promised to that country while Morsi and his ilk were still in power.
It seems obvious to me that, when President Obombast speaks of the election of radical Islamists as a "transitional phase" between secular despotism and secular "democracy", he's not elucidating a doctrine but merely pretending that the developments of the disastrous "Arab Spring" are proceeding just as he had planned.  Foreign-policy doctrines are only for presidents who sincerely try to serve in their country's best interests.

Miscellaneous Musing #55

The decrease in the annual reported number of induced abortions in this country, from approximately 1.6 million two decades ago to an estimated 1.2 million nowadays, is welcome news except for a caveat; note the word "reported".  For its data on abortions, the government relies on the very industry that performs them, which has obvious incentive to conceal the committing of the late-term foeticides that have been made illegal in the majority of States.  It seems unlikely that this alone could account for a 25 percent drop, but, of course, there may be other factors, such as the concurrent loss of stigma toward unwed motherhood.  Anyway, this is not an uncommon commentary but only a miscellaneous musing, and so my object here is not to state anything positively but merely to wonder what the truth is in this case.

Blatant Self-Promotion #1

My "epic novella" and "Christian historical fantasy-adventure" Vinland Viking: An Original Saga by Gary L. Doman is going on a "virtual book tour" next month; take careful note of the dates for the v.b.t., as this will be the most important occurrence in the history of mankind!

Monday, August 5^th

Book review at The Book Connection

Tuesday, August 6^th

Guest post at Literarily Speaking

Wednesday, August 7^th

Interview at Blogcritics

Thursday, August 8^th

Guest post at Lori’s Reading Corner

Friday, August 9^th

Guest post and giveaway at The Busy Mom’s Daily

Monday, August 12^th

Interview at Between the Covers

Tuesday, August 13^th

Guest post for Cheryl’s Christian Book Connection

Wednesday, August 14^th

Guest post at The Story Behind the Book

Thursday, August 15^th

Book review at A Year of Jubilee Reviews

Friday, August 16^th

Book spotlight at The Writer’s Life

Book spotlight at 4 the Love of Books

Monday, August 19^th

Interview at As the Pages Turn

Tuesday, August 20^th

Book review at Vic’s Media Room

Wednesday, August 21^st

Interview at Examiner

Thursday, August 22^nd

Book spotlight at My Devotional Thoughts

Friday, August 23^rd

Book review at Found A Christian by His Grace

Monday, August 26^th

Book spotlight at Review from Here

Wednesday, August 28^th

Interview at Broowaha

Friday, August 30^th

Interview at Pump Up Your Book

Book review at Blooming with Books

UC #352: Listen to Him Rave On About Trayvon!

President YoMama's (see the list of domanisms, below) statement that Trayvon [sic] Martin "could have been me [sic] 35 years ago" speaks no better of the punk-turned-"martyr" than what the police discovered on the deceased's telephone!

Uncommon Commentary #351: If They Really Think that They're All Just One Person, They Have Bigger Problems than I Thought

Pro-injustice demonstrators are bearing signs that read "We Are All Trayvon Martin".  If that message is true, God help them!  As was inevitable on the part of people who jump to race-based conclusions (or who simply don't care what the truth is, so long as they can satisfy their desire to hate), those who demanded that George Zimmerman (a Caucasoid who reportedly is Hispanic, and so doesn't qualify as "White" in our odd ethnic terminology) be tried and convicted for the killing of the Black Trayvon [sic] Martin have depicted the latter as a saint; photographs and text messages discovered on his cellular telephone—not "cell phone", please—give us rather a different portrayal.  The subjects of Martin's photographs, for instance, include marijuana plants, a hand "menacingly" holding a semi-automatic pistol, and even naked underage girls.  In contrast, Zimmerman (who, by the way, is part Black) and his wife mentored two (Black) children for no charge, and Reuters interviewers found that the accused's neighbors, no matter what their ethnicity, regarded him as caring deeply for them.
Also, I have a message for President Obombast: Martin's death obviously is a tragedy for him, but it is not "a tragedy for America [sic]".  (By the last of these words I assume that you mean the United States of America, not the entire New World, i.e., North and South America.)  The real tragedy for this country is that the response to what examination of the facts revealed to be a justifiable homicide, and to acquittal as the result of a trial that ought not to have even taken place—after all, the Sanford police chief declined to charge Zimmerman with any crime, and the local district attorney chose not to prosecute—demonstrates that, years after your election to the US presidency, We the People are still obsessed with race.

The Best of Uncommon Commentary

In view of this month’s developments in Egypt, and especially of the army’s explanation that (what obviously was, but which they deny was) its coup d'état came in response to the popular upheaval against Morsi's misrule, you may want to revisit UC #150.

Uncommon Commentary #350!: The List in Paragraph Two Also Includes Obama

According to a news item, President Obombast has "urged a quick return to elected civilian government" in Egypt, and said that "we are deeply concerned by the decision of the Egyptian Armed Forces to remove President Morsi and suspend the Egyptian constitution."  Shockingly, the same story relates that he "said [that he] had ordered a review of the legal implications for US aid to Egypt in the wake of the military's toppling of the elected leader".  Obama, then, renewed the USA's annual $1.3 billion in military aid to Egypt in May, when there was no indication that our enemy Morsi would fall from power, yet he considers there to be "legal implications" now as a result of the coup d'état?  Is he really so obtuse as not to perceive that this counterrevolutionary act is the best that we (and everyone else except the Islamists) could hope for in Egypt?
Mohammed Morsi was indeed "democratically elected", but so were the National Socialists ("Nazis"), the Hamas, Hugo Chávez, Yassir Arafat, Salvador Allende, Vladimir Putin, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and so forth; what has that to do with right and wrong?  I may be risking stoning by patriots in making this statement on 4 July, but I here assert that sovereignty resides not in the People but in our divine sovereign.  The Bible tells us, as in Romans 13:1, that rulers derive their authority from God; it has no qualification as to whether those leaders have attained power "democratically", and, indeed, none of them had, for Judæa was a province of the Roman Empire when St. Paul wrote that verse.  What we miscall "democracy" is no more inviolable than any other mere human institution.
I bid "Good riddance" to Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood theocrats, but there are plenty of equally dangerous radicals who could well gain power if the Egyptian military heeds our president's urging; fortunately, no one outside the USA still seems to pay much attention to anything that Obama says.

Miscellaneous Musing #54 Update

In Miscellaneous Musing #54, I wrote that Snowden "seeks asylum in polities which (save Iceland) are unfriendly to the USA"; since then, however, WikiLeaks [sic] has released the names of 19 more states to which he has made requests either for asylum or for assistance in seeking asylum.  The total list now comprises Austria, Bolivia, Brazil, the People's Republic of China, Cuba, Ecuador, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, India, the Republic of Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Nicaragua, Norway, Poland, Russia, Spain, Switzerland, and Venezuela; just one third of these, i.e., Bolivia, mainland China, Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Russia, and Venezuela, can really be considered US antagonists.