Kathleen Parker has a column today that is a perfect answer to the Wesley Clark's of the world who say being shot down and captured by the North Vietnamese while flying a fighter plane is not a qualification for being President of the United States when she writes:
McCain isn't a hero because he was tortured. He's a hero because he declined an offer by his captors to be released, refusing to leave his fellow Americans behind.It may not take much effort to get shot down, but it must take a considerable act of will to consign oneself to more deprivation and torture. It must take a level of courage unknown to most to place concern for others above one's own interest.
Surely self-sacrifice, courage and loyalty figure somewhere in the calculus for selecting a president.
She then goes on to point out we can find no similar acts of self-sacrifice, courage and loyalty on behave of Barak Obama. She writes:
We can make no similar analysis of Obama, since he hasn't fought in any wars in his lifetime. But we have been given a glimpse at how Obama responds to external pressures and where he draws the line on loyalty and self-sacrifice. When it comes to family and friends, it seems Obama is first a survivalist.
She cites the example of how he accused his own white grandmother of making racist remarks in order to highlight "Obama's own remarkable transcendence."
Another example is his leaving his church and pastor of 20 years after they had served their purpose of establishing his "bona-fides" with the African-American community. When they became an obstacle to his ambitions they were as expendable as his grandmother.
She ends by asking who would you rather have covering your back in a foxhole......or as I would point out "holding the end of the line" as per the post above?
(To read her entire column click on the title for a link)
