Yes, I’m sure everybody else is writing about it, but it is tonight’s obligatory blog topic.
Colonel Moammar Gaddafi, the man whose name was spelled a dozen different ways, the comical dictator with the hot female security guards and the big tittied Ukrainian nurse, the guy behind
Moammar Gadaffi, June 7th 1942-October 20th, 2011
the Lockerbie bombing, the man with the golden gun, is dead.
It is, as Joe Biden once said about something else, a big fucking deal. I don’t know if it will really bring peace, prosperity and democracy to Libya. We’ll have to wait and see on that and, so far, there are plenty of reasons to be skeptical about the new leaders. But at least there’s a shot.
And Barack Obama made it happen. Let there be no doubt about that. Last March, when it looked like the revolution had fizzled and Gaddafi’s troops were ready to go into Ben Ghazi and just start slaughtering civilians, a lot of people were calling on him to get involved. I even signed a petition or two myself. Preventing a humanitarian crisis was the word of the day. And he got the NATO people together and said, well, maybe we can provide air cover and that will be enough to turn the tide. I guess it wound up being a little bit more than air cover, but basically, the foreigners stayed out, the humanitarian crisis was averted (provided the new guys don’t go on a revenge killing spree), and the goal was achieved. Gadaffi is dead.
So, Barack Obama gets major credit for this foreign policy achievement. Not from Republicans, though. Mitt Romney, John McCain, Lindsey Graham and several others released statements saying how great it was that Gaddafi was dead and the Libyans finally had control of their country, but they didn’t mention Barry at all. Michele Bachmann, who a couple of days ago famously said “Obama got us into Libya, and now he’s getting us into Africa” has been totally silent.
I’m not always happy with Obama, and I can’t always figure out his motives. He’s had this major success with Libya, but he seems to be pretty much ignoring the ongoing carnage in Syria and Yemen. He just sent troops into Uganda, to find some crazy guy out in the jungle who pretty regularly kills large amounts of people, but only about 100 of them in an advisory capacity so we don’t know how that will work out yet. It is how Viet Nam started, though. And he left the Iranians hanging when they were shouting Allah Akhbar from the rooftops.
But he shut down the Somali pirates. He got Bin Laden (the burial at sea made me suspicious, but OBL hasn’t resurfaced since then with a new videotape, so I guess he really is dead), and now Gadaffi.
So, give the man some credit.
www.gurukalehuru.com 
I said it earlier on FB, and I’ll say it again now: Maybe this is what the Mayan calendar 12/21/2012 thingie means– not some “cataclysmic end of the world” scenario, but the end of a certain mind-set… RISE UP, PEOPLE! RISE UP!
I think Obama has focused on success in foreign policy since the Republicans are determined to economically destroy our country anyway, at least for us 99 percent. Obama has done a great job in every area considering the mess Bush left our country in at home and in the world. I hope something can be done peacefully to help the Iranians gain their freedom, or the Republicans will have the excuse they so desire to go after Iran’s leaders. Obama has accomplished more objectives with less loss of American lives and with less money in less than 3 years than Bush accomplished in 8 crazy years.
Not to poop on the party, but: how much better off are any of these countries now? Really, how much better off is Iraq right now? Afghanistan? Egypt even? How much better off Libya will be remains to be seen. What ‘freedoms’ do they have now that are worth the free health care and education, freedom from hunger and even from taxes to which they’d been accustomed? What regime will fill the vacuum? The one that lynches fellow Africans because of the color of their skin? http://governmentagainstthepeople.wordpress.com/2011/08/14/how-american-liberals-came-to-support-libyan-lynch-mobs/ (warning: much of this is terribly graphic).
There are two sides to every story, but only the winner ever gets to write the ‘official’ version of what happened.
just sayin’ – war sucks and everyone loses something. The first thing to go is usually the truth. All is *not* fair in love and war, in fact, *nothing* is *fair* in either and everyone loses their innocence, if not their life, limb, conscience or dignity.
You’re not pooping on the party, Mike. It’s a legitimate point, and one well worth keeping an eye on.
Nonetheless, Gadaffi was a world class asshole and I, and I’m pretty sure a healthy majority of the Libyan people, are glad he’s gone.
Don’t get me wrong, Gaddafi was a nutcase and, yes, Libya is better off without him. There just seems to be an eventual disillusioned backlash following all of these victories, as the promises of hope and change remain unfulfilled. Kinda sounds familiar. Hopefully, the main ‘freedom’ that Libyans will now enjoy is freedom from fear and tyranny (which I consider essential to the survival of any people), but that is hard to achieve in times of uncertainty and upheaval. Under the dictator, Libya enjoyed a very high standard of living, a high rate of literacy, and a fairly booming economy (the large immigrant population is a testament to this), hopefully, now free of his iron fist, they can take their hard-won achievements (all this despite international sanctions) much further.