The great liberal death wish

The great liberal death wish
Exclusive: Samuel Blumenfeld analyzes Obama's 'pursuit of defeat' philosophy

Back in 1979, after a decade of Vietnam-era turmoil, Malcolm Muggeridge, the great British journalist, wrote an essay entitled "The Great Liberal Death Wish." He said:

"Searching in my mind for an appropriate name for the '70s, I settle for The Decade of The Great Liberal Death Wish. It seems to me that this process of death-wishing, in the guise of liberalism, has been eroding the civilization of the West for a century or more, and is now about to reach its apogee. … Systematically, stage by stage, dismantling our Western way of life, depreciating and deprecating all its values so that the social structure is now tumbling down, dethroning its God, undermining all its certainties, and finally mobilizing a Praetorian Guard of ribald students, maintained at public expense, and ready at the drop of a hat to go into action, not only against their own weak-kneed, bemused academic authorities, but also against any institution or organ for the maintenance of law and order still capable of functioning, especially the police."

I submit that The Great Liberal Death Wish has been resurrected, is now very much alive and well among Democrats in control of Congress, and hellbent on sending America into another tailspin of defeat. The liberals keep comparing the war in Iraq to the war in Vietnam, and they are determined to bring about the same defeatist consequences.

They forget about the million boat people who got on anything that would float just to escape the Communists. They forget the 2 million Cambodians killed by the Khmer Rouge, who achieved victory because of our withdrawal. And they have no concern for what would happen in the world if we simply left Iraq and permitted the terrorists and the Iranians to take control of that oil-rich country.

Perhaps the new most eloquent Pied Piper of that death wish is Barack Obama, whose mind-numbing socialist platitudes are gathering thousands of semi-literate Americans to his cause of defeat. He made his announcement for the presidency on the steps of the Illinois Capitol where Abraham Lincoln announced his candidacy back in 1859. Obama says he wants to unite the country as Lincoln did.

But he seems to have a very strange knowledge of American history. Lincoln's election led to the secession of the Southern states and a civil war that claimed a half-million lives and devastated the South. Lincoln did not shirk from his self-proclaimed God-given duty to preserve the Union. He was the last to plead "can we all get along?" He wanted the unconditional surrender of the Confederacy, and he believed in total victory.

Obama wants to unite Americans in the glorious pursuit of defeat. He wants us completely out by March 2008, regardless of the circumstances. Not exactly what Lincoln was all about. Obama opposed the war in Iraq from the very beginning, and that may have something to do with his own background.

Barack Hussein Obama was born in Honolulu in 1961. His father, Barack Hussein Obama Sr. of Kenya, and his mother, Ann Dunham of Wichita, Kan., met as students at the University of Hawaii. Both were atheists. They married and then separated when Barack was 2. After a divorce, his mother married an Indonesian student by the name of Lolo Soetoro. The family then moved to Jakarta where Barack attended school. He writes in his book, "Dreams from My Father":

"In Indonesia, I'd spent two years at a Muslim school, two years at a Catholic school. In the Muslim school, the teacher wrote to tell mother I made faces during Quranic studies. In the Catholic school, when it came time to pray, I'd pretend to close my eyes, then peek around the room. Nothing happened. No angels descended."

At the age of 10 he returned to Honolulu to live with his maternal grandparents. He graduated from the Punahou School in 1979. From there he went to Occidental College in Los Angeles. From Occidental he went to Columbia University in New York City, graduating in 1983. He then went to work for the Business International Corporation as an editor for a year, and then moved to Chicago to direct a nonprofit project assisting local churches in organizing job-training programs for poor students.

In 1988, Obama entered Harvard Law School, performed brilliantly and graduated in 1991. He then returned to Chicago where he directed a voter registration drive and worked for a large civil-rights law firm. In 1992, he married Michelle Robinson (Princeton and Harvard) whom he had met while working at Sidley Austin in Chicago. They have two daughters.

In 1996, Obama embarked on his political career and was elected to the Illinois senate. In 2002 he won re-election, and in 2004 ran for the U.S. Senate and won by a 70 percent margin. In 2004, he delivered the keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention and emerged as a future leader of the party. His theme: national unity.

By all accounts, Obama's rise to power and influence in Democrat party politics is breathtaking. Having had two Muslim fathers may have influenced his strong stand against the war in Iraq. Although he now considers himself a Christian, he still believes in the Democrat stands on abortion, universal health care, gay marriage and the pursuit of defeat. He is an intelligent and articulate spokesman for the liberal cause. He has established a leadership political action committee, Hopefund, for channeling financial support to Democrat candidates. We can expect that the Great Liberal Death Wish will be well financed.

Will Obama eclipse Hillary? Stay tuned.