Random Thoughts    
Hoisted by One's Own Petard
by Gaurang Bhatt, MD 

 Another current front page story is the family of the little boy in Colorado, calling 911 and TV channels in panic that their six year old had drifted skywards in a tethered balloon that escaped its mooring. The boy was found in the attic of their home while the police and rescue helicopters frantically chased the drifting balloon. Some persons allege that the father was so obsessed with publicity that he staged the drama just for that. The matter is under investigation and the truth is unknown but likely to be discovered soon.

Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize bears an uncanny similarity to the above saga.

The Peace Prize and to some extent the Literature Prize have been used as arm twisters for political endorsement and machinations unlike the Chemistry, Physics, Biology and Economics Prizes. The Norwegian Committee gave Obama the prize to emphatically declare their horror and abhorrence for the idiot shrub’s unilateral aggressive preemptive war, economic, ecological and torture policies with complete disregard for international law, humane behavior, compassion and decency. The Norwegian’s did not want to bestow the prize on a genuine but unknown do-gooder from some unheard of third world country, as the Peace Prize was losing attention of the citizens of the Western World. Thus they gave it to Obama to garner publicity for the prize and themselves.

There was another ulterior motive and that was to influence the behavior of the US. They hoped that it would encourage Obama to put an end to the torture and Iraq War, as well as impede the war in Afghanistan and prevent a war with Iran. They spun the roulette wheel and so to say, bet their shirt on black to attenuate white supremacy and America’s aggressive options of war and violence. Not having any exposure to casinos in Norway and not being mathematically, inclined they miscalculated their odds of winning and were ignorant that they would lose not only if the ball landed on red, but also on zero and double zero.

Instead of riding high in the sky, they have sent Obama to hide in the attic. He has had to twist arms to declare Karzai’s victory fraudulent which it was, and force a runoff with Abdullah. This is another farce, as the Obama administration knows that Karzai will win the runoff and has acknowledged so publicly. It has given Karzai the opportunity to declare any runoff not leading to his victory as fraudulent and thrown a cloud of unreliable illegitimacy on any winner of any Afghan election and put US support of any Afghan government as propping up their corrupt and incompetent puppet. In addition, if Obama decides to send 40,000 more troops within a few weeks of receiving the Peace Prize, the Nobel Committee will be the laughing stock of the world.

UK’s Brown made a public announcement that he will send 500 more British troops to Afghanistan. This would suggest that he must have talked to Obama before committing himself and that Obama will send 40,000 more. The other possibility is Brown is applying counter-pressure on Obama to neutralize the Nobel Committee’s arm twisting. McChrystal by his London speech and by someone leaking his report to Bob Woodward who published it in the Washington Post, is also painting Obama into the corner of escalating the Afghan War. Even if Obama doesn’t send more troops but increases drone bombing or double zero McChrystal assassinations, the Peace prize decision will look ridiculous.

Obama is thus hiding in the White House attic and postponing his decision, while egging the Pakistani military to attack Waziristan, Taliban and Al Qaeda, hoping that the Pakistani army will save his rear end. The aid bill passed by the US Senate and signed into law by Obama is meant to give independence to the elected government, cut the power of the military and break the corrupt double dealing nexus between the militants and the Pakistani ISI, the conduit by which Pakistani military foments terror in Afghanistan, Kashmir, UK and the US. Corrupt Zardari and his cronies see a pot of honey and gold in the aid, the economy and common people of Pakistan see the aid as a necessity to prevent meltdown and starvation, but the army sees the constraints and clauses of aid as humiliating castration of its power, the beginning of a civil war and possibly even a mutiny. The mills of the US grind slowly but exceedingly small and the double crossing Pakistani military is finally due to get its just desserts.

The six hundred and forty billion dollar question is whether Obama lives up to his prize, his big words, his Democratic Party supporters and more importantly the welfare of the nation or whether he will make a Faustian bargain with his financiers, the foolish Republicans, false patriotism and his ego. His choices are his legacy and the nation’s future on one side and criticism and re-election on the other side. Will we find Obama hiding in the attic or soaring in the sky?

October 18, 2009

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