FOXNews and the Washington Post bring us this disturbing tidbit this morning:
The Obama administration has ordered an end to use of the phrase “Global War on Terror,” a label adopted by the Bush administration shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday.
In a memo sent this week from the Defense Department’s office of security to Pentagon staffers, members were told, “this administration prefers to avoid using the term ‘Long War’ or ‘Global War on Terror’ [GWOT.] Please use ‘Overseas Contingency Operation.’”
Overseas Contingency Operation? Seriously? Could they have found a less-offensive, more vanilla way to cover up the nature of the threat the civilized Western world faces?
This is proof that Obama and his administration completely misunderstand the goal, actions, abilities, and potential of the terrorists. They just don’t get it. Overseas contingency operation. Contingency for what? Making contingency plans is something you do for a hurricane or a snowstorm. It’s what sports teams do when one of their star players gets injured. It is not how you deal with jihadists who have as their goal a global caliphate and will kill anyone standing in their way to achieve it.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:24 am
Well at least we can all thank our lucky stars that we have Obama instead of Romney. Everybody now knows that Romney was secretly supporting timetable for conversion to Islam!
March 25th, 2009 at 9:34 am
1 – This video is a great example of the post 9/11 mentality. Romney’s ad on jihad forces uncontrollable laughter without even being edited.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoU41UwL5LI
Here is another version of the same ad that was edited to mean something a little different.
***DISCLAIMER*** It is a bit PG-13 in nature…but all in good fun.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43ZQQzp93eA&feature=related
March 25th, 2009 at 9:34 am
Obama is nothing but a pussy.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:35 am
Un-be-freaking-lievable… It’s amazing to watch the Obama administration spread its wings and fly… Scary!
March 25th, 2009 at 9:36 am
What exactly does Overseas Contingency Operation even mean? This man is a danger to the fabric of our civilization.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:46 am
Good point Jersey.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:48 am
Wow, this time the Romnuts threadjacked on the very first comment. Is that a new record?
More seriously, it’s revealing in a way, of Obama’s mindset. Obama seems to feel that appearances are all that matter (how else to explain the fact that he’s president?), and therefore may feel at some level that if he avoids use of the word “war” then we can be at peace.
Or perhaps it’s just silly.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:51 am
I actually cannot total blame Dan on this one. Anti-Romneyites went a bit too far yesterday.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:52 am
#4 and #5, Friggin lawyers in the White House.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:57 am
Thanks Joe, it was really meant for early morning humor.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:04 am
Can we all agree at least that the phrase “Global War on Terror” was completely stupid?
March 25th, 2009 at 10:07 am
11 – maybe if you can argue why you think it was stupid?
March 25th, 2009 at 10:07 am
No more stupid than it was for those clowns to fly airplanes into the towers and whatever else stunts they pulled through the years.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:10 am
Actually it explains exactly what it was, in pretty clear and simple terms. We waged war on global terrorism. Obama is the most dangerous of people because he is more worried about his own popularity amongst his fringe far leftist groups than he is in keeping this country safe. What kind of message does this send to the terrorist camps around the world?
March 25th, 2009 at 10:16 am
SteveS wants to change the term “Global recession” to
“political opportiunity for President Obama”.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:19 am
Yeah, who caused the global recession? The Democrats on the banking commitee.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:21 am
The name “Global War on Terror” is stupid because…
1)Terror is a tactic, not an enemy.
2)It by definition is never-ending, and therefore so are the war-like powers seized by the executive in order to conduct this “war”.
3)It is overly-broad. It implies that we have to go to war anywhere any time if it means that bad people are using “terror”, whether or not it is in our nation’s national strategic interests.
Think the war on drugs, the war on poverty, etc. Any time you declare war on a “concept”, you pretty much are certain to never “win”.
That being said, I’m not sure what the appropriate name for this is. Even Bush acknowledged late in his term that “the war on terror” was not a good name.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:30 am
I like to call it a war on Islamofascism.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:36 am
18 – Don’t, you’ll make Jersey bust a gut. He finds it hilarious for some reason.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:37 am
This morning I recieved a memo from WH staff instructing me to refer to it as “The Long Group Hug.” Just passing it on.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:41 am
20, thanks for the good laugh
March 25th, 2009 at 10:42 am
Absolutely correct, SteveS. It was always a dumb, red-meat to the lowest common denominator sort of thing.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:50 am
20 – actually I don’t find it hilarious but the watchers of SNL apparently do. If you paid attention to my post it was a criticism of the American public’s ability to ease back into a pre 9/11 mentality in a post 9/11 world. But I also do find that commercial kinda funny because the entire ad takes place in this sterile, fabricated world. The tone of his voice is calm and reassuring, there’s soft music in the background, but the message behind his words carry a message of fear mongering…it is absurd and satirical and quite frankly a bad campaign ad…one he doesn’t seem to believe.
March 25th, 2009 at 10:50 am
19 – Jersey was bashing the people who made that…
March 25th, 2009 at 10:53 am
Apparently, we’re not allowed to refer to acts of terror as acts of terror anymore either.
March 25th, 2009 at 11:04 am
[...] up on MattC.’s post… this little piece of news went unnoticed last [...]
March 25th, 2009 at 11:04 am
“it is absurd and satirical and quite frankly a bad campaign ad…one he doesn’t seem to believe.” I think that is going a bit too far. Look, I am not a Romneyite myself, but I trust him that he is serious about fighting terrorism. Is he the best person to fight terrorism? Who knows? Is he as serious as he could be? Who knows. I do not blame Mr. Romney for the laughter. Again, I am a non-Romneyite, but we make ourselves look foolish if we paint him as some nut with regards to terrorism and national security. Though I prefer Mrs. Palin on those issues, I fear it is folly to get dragged into such a silly contest with the Romney camp. This could back-fire big time and if it gets out of hand it may not be in our country’s interests, nevermind our party.
March 25th, 2009 at 11:25 am
To be a fair to Bush, we’ve always dressed up our wars as being what they are – a struggle of liberty against oppression. Everyone saw the world wars in those terms, Reagan understood the Cold War in those terms, and Bush understood the recent Mideast conflicts in those terms. No one doubted that those responsible for the terror of 9/11 were going to be fought, at that time, and we came together marvelously – nearly the entire country. The strategy for that war’s been much disputed and had plenty of politically-injected flaws, but no one should really doubt the need to reassert ourserlves against a few lunatics disappointed that their time is at an end. They’ve got to be shown the door.
We’re America for goodness sake, not some sanitized European democracy. We have ideals – freedom from tyranny, repression, and terror – and those make us the nation we are. Terrorism is in direct opposition to them.
And Obama’s terminology just plain sucks. I don’t mind if he thinks a change in strategy is in order. In many ways it is. But I’m yet to be convinced that his new way of doing things is going to pay any dividends. You’ve got to be both diplomatic and iron-fisted, willing to fire if pushed. Obama had better understand the latter.
March 25th, 2009 at 1:17 pm
I kind of agree with this, although I don’t know about calling it an “Overseas Contingency Operation”. A real war is when nation state(s) fights another nation state(s) with a specific victory goal in mind. You don’t have a real war against certain behaviours, but against nations. The GWOT is more like the “War on Crime”, “War on Poverty”, or “War on Drugs” than any real war. Even Bush admitted in the ’04 election that we’re not going to win the war on terror. Calling our fight to prevent terrorism, a war would be fine, except that neocons tend to want to use this as an excuse to treat our liberties like we’re in a war with imminent danger, when the fact is that this struggle is a long term necessary action of the government, not a one time emergency.
March 25th, 2009 at 3:15 pm
23 – What makes you think this video is from SNL? Some YouTube poster made it. SNL gets their clips removed from YouTube in about an hour, tops.
March 25th, 2009 at 3:16 pm
27 – Ohio, I didn’t mean that Romney is not serious about fighting global terrorism, I meant that the ad was so full of fear mongering propaganda that I don’t believe he bought his part in the ad. The ad felt like a 1950′s health film. Of course Romney is strong on the fight against terrorism…his campaign just put out a bad ad…IMO. But I digress…the real point of me posting that ad/SNL skit is that, by the reaction from the audience, their is a shift in the mindset of Americans and their attitude toward terrorism…how easy some people forget!!!
March 25th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
Because they didn’t technically make this ad…it’s a Romney ad they showed as is. They cannot own and control something they didn’t make.
March 25th, 2009 at 4:22 pm
Reaction from the audience? It was a laugh track. They say in the description of the video it is a laugh track. That means canned, pre-recorded laughter. You could add that to anything. Nowhere does it say it is from SNL.
March 25th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
33 – at the end of the video it has the SNL logo…which states it’s from SNL. The laugh track is questionable. Does SNL add laugh tracks to their commercials or is it the reaction of the live audience…I was always under the impression it was the live audience but I could be wrong. I think you’re nit picking the wrong points of my argument…actually I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make?
March 25th, 2009 at 8:42 pm
My point is that just cause some liberal anti-war Obamatroll YouTubers make fun of Mitt’s ad doesn’t invalidate the message or the messenger. You’ll find them doing the same every time Bush said anything about terrorism. Again, the person who posted it, and agreed with your take on it, said it was a laugh track. Read the video’s description.
March 25th, 2009 at 8:59 pm
I understand what the video’s description said. The person who posted it did not create the video. The person who posted it did write the description. The description says there is a laugh track. If he had created the video and he had first hand knowledge that a laugh track was used then I’d agree with you. I know SNL mikes their audience, so this leads me to believe that it is not a laugh track but it is the reaction of the audience. It’s still a silly ad though…nothing to do with the message or the messenger…it’s about the nuances of the ad. I think I may have seen a bird fly by in the background. But again my point originally and still is the pre 9/11 mentality in a post 9/11 world is scary but I’m afraid it is a fact. Look at the critiques Rudy received for mentioning 9/11 in his campaign ads and he had a direct link to 9/11. The tone has changed about terrorism in this country and I am afraid it will probably take another terrorist attack before the people wake up. If you noticed I originally was replying to Dan’s #1 post to add a little bit of levity to this horrific announcement that they changed the phrase of the Global War on Terror.
March 26th, 2009 at 2:31 am
Obama is annoying me no end! I can’t stand another 46 months of this!
March 26th, 2009 at 4:57 am
In any event, you are correct Jersey, it is sad that either people would laugh at 9/11 or they would play a laugh track. This is a shame rather than a laughing matter.