No Nukes

It really is a throwback kind of autumn: OJ's in the news, the Phillies are in the playoffs, and the no nukes movement is back.

Make no mistake: we must always be prepared to use force to protect America. But the best way to keep America safe is not to threaten terrorists with nuclear weapons – it’s to keep nuclear weapons and nuclear materials away from terrorists. That’s why I’ve worked with Republican Senator Dick Lugar to pass a law accelerating our pursuit of loose nuclear materials. And that’s why I’ll lead a global effort to secure all loose nuclear materials during my first term in office.

But we need to do much more. We need to change our nuclear policy and our posture, which is still focused on deterring the Soviet Union – a country that doesn’t exist. Meanwhile, India and Pakistan and North Korea have joined the club of nuclear-armed nations, and Iran is knocking on the door. More nuclear weapons and more nuclear-armed nations mean more danger to us all.

Here’s what I’ll say as President: America seeks a world in which there are no nuclear weapons.

There's a slight hedge here (and rightly so) that Obama wouldn't disarm unilaterally, but a President with the courage and fortitude to stand up and call for an end to the spectre of nuclear weapons is one I'd like to see. It should be noted that Edwards called for this at some point as well.

What I liked even more about Obama's speech was this part:

As Ted Sorensen’s old boss President Kennedy once said – “the pursuit of peace is not as dramatic as the pursuit of war – and frequently the words of the pursuer fall on deaf ears.” In the fall of 2002, those deaf ears were in Washington. They belonged to a President who didn’t tell the whole truth to the American people; who disdained diplomacy and bullied allies; and who squandered our unity and the support of the world after 9/11.

But it doesn’t end there. Because the American people weren’t just failed by a President – they were failed by much of Washington. By a media that too often reported spin instead of facts. By a foreign policy elite that largely boarded the bandwagon for war. And most of all by the majority of a Congress – a coequal branch of government – that voted to give the President the open-ended authority to wage war that he uses to this day. Let’s be clear: without that vote, there would be no war.

Some seek to rewrite history. They argue that they weren’t really voting for war, they were voting for inspectors, or for diplomacy. But the Congress, the Administration, the media, and the American people all understood what we were debating in the fall of 2002. This was a vote about whether or not to go to war. That’s the truth as we all understood it then, and as we need to understand it now. And we need to ask those who voted for the war: how can you give the President a blank check and then act surprised when he cashes it? [...]

We thought we learned this lesson. After Vietnam, Congress swore it would never again be duped into war, and even wrote a new law -- the War Powers Act -- to ensure it would not repeat its mistakes. But no law can force a Congress to stand up to the President. No law can make Senators read the intelligence that showed the President was overstating the case for war. No law can give Congress a backbone if it refuses to stand up as the co-equal branch the Constitution made it.

That's a direct attack on the Democratic establishment who helped sell and authorize this failed war. Obama gets some credit for standing up against the war when it was unpopular, but he hasn't exactly led a movement while in the Senate to end our involvement in Iraq. His moves have been cool and measured. However, this is a very bold stance, and it does sharpen the differences between a Clinton dynasty and a new direction in an Obama Administration.

Also, the RNC are a bunch of fools.

"In a world with terrorists trying to acquire nuclear technology and with Iran and Syria threatening their neighbors, it is difficult to comprehend that a major presidential candidate wants to eliminate our nuclear arsenal. This is yet another example of Senator Obama playing to the fringe elements of his party and failing to understand the threat America faces," says (RNC) spokesman Danny Diaz.

The plan Obama has signed on to was drafted by those fringe extremists George Schultz, William Perry, Henry Kissinger and Sam Nunn.

Nonproliferation would be a great legacy of a Presidential term in office. It certainly would be better than endless caution.