Whether you’re an American who loves or hates Sen. Obama, we should all agree that a foreign leader has no business trying to influence American elections. What PM Howard said about Sen. Obama was just plain stupid. I’m very disappointed that a patriot like Debbie would support PM Howard’s comments about an American Senator. At least the Democrats condemned Hugo Chavez’s remarks about Bush at the UN.
AND THAT’S WHY, CONVERSELY, I’M SURE YOU WERE UPSET WHEN BILL CLINTON GOT INVOLVED IN ISRAELI ELECTIONS, HELPING ELECT EHUD BARAK AND TRYING TO ELECT SHIMON PERES.
DEBBIE SCHLUSSEL

Norman Blitzer on February 13, 2007 at 2:50 pm

Absolutely. Bill Clinton was and is a compulsive liar. He had no business getting involved in Israeli elections if that’s what he did.

Norman Blitzer on February 13, 2007 at 3:24 pm

I agree that a comment immediately preceding an election is inappropriate, because it would be an attempt to influence the election. Such things always backfire (wasn’t there a town in England that tried to convince a town in Ohio to vote for Kerry?).
Anyway, given the time frame, it is not reasonable to think that the comment would impact the election. Rather, it is the debate, not the election, that PM Howard is trying to influence.
Foreign leaders criticize Bush all the time, and that is fair game. When these statements occurred before the 2004 election, nobody was accused of trying to influence an election. Foreign leaders should also be “allowed” to criticize statements made by Presidential candidates regarding the Iraq War given that those statements are part of the overall debate on policy.
The emphasis of the statement is on policy, and the likely result of a shift in policy. That Obama happened to be the speaker is secondary. PM Howard was asked about a statement made by Obama. PM Howard did no go out of his way to specifically comment on Obama, the Obama quote came up on the context of a discussion on policy.
President Bush is lame for doing anything short of supporting what PM Howard said. PM Howard is no dhimmi.

JSobieski on February 13, 2007 at 3:53 pm

One additional point: Australia shares in the risks of our Iraq policy as the third or fourth largest contributor of troups in Iraq(I forget if Poland is 3rd or if Australia is 3rd). So PM Howard has duty to his countrymen to keep the US from “going wobbly.”
Do you think Churchill tried to influence US policy in WWII before the U.S. entered the war?
I think it is pretty clear that PM Howard is speaking in support of the current policy, and against a withdrawal. He is not trying to throw the democratic nomination to Hillary, and he is not attempting to promote a Republican candidate.
If being allied with the US means that you can’t comment on the stupid things that presidential candidates say, who will ever want to be on our side?

JSobieski on February 13, 2007 at 4:33 pm

“if only Howard could be our president, instead of what we have.”
I agree. A man with backbone and balls!

AlturaCt on February 13, 2007 at 4:53 pm

howard and Bush have a lot in common. Not the least of which is being a chickenhawk. Howard was, and remains, a huge supporter of the Vietnam War and conscription as a young man and a leading political functionary but chose not to enlist although he was fully qualified to do so (being of military age, having completed tertiary education, being single and fit enough to play sports). However unlike George. he did not even join the reserve forces.

Not to be taken seriously on February 13, 2007 at 5:41 pm

Another asinine comment from Norman Blitzer–like we are going to base our votes in 2 years on Howard’s statement. No, none of us should sleep well tonight because Howard said this about BO.
Tell us Blitzer–where are YOU are on the demogogue statements of Chavez, Putin, Ackma-nutjob, Assad, Castro etc, etc–who trash Bush and US policy on a constant basis? Does it concern you so much that they are “trying to influence American elections?”
These Democrats you cite really agree with Chavez anyway–what do they disagree on?

BB on February 13, 2007 at 5:50 pm

I like what Howard said. Somebody that speaks their minds, you know, about how they feel. Few righteous men left like that.
President Reagan use to do that.
The radical Islamist do that (speak their mind) all the time, very graphically I might add, yet they face no criticism AT ALL by the left.

ReallyReallyStupid on February 13, 2007 at 6:08 pm

It seems a bit arrogant to me that we assume that a statement by foreign leader giving his opinion on a Presidential candidate is an attempt to influence the American people. Whether it is Howard, Chirac or Putin, they have their own constituents who are much more important to them than we are. I doubt Howard’s comment was intended for the American public.
Personally, I am much more outraged when American leaders like Kerry or Clinton go overseas and criticize the US in front of a foreign audience.

WillPower on February 13, 2007 at 6:45 pm

All of Radical Islam is hoping for an Osama Obama victory. He’s the Mecca (Manchurian) Candidate.

FreethinkerNY on February 13, 2007 at 7:37 pm

Norman Blitzer, you’re missing the point that we Australians have troops alonside yours in Iraq, and Afghanistan. Therefore, our domestic politics are intertwined with yours whether we like it or not. When Barak Obama criticises Bushes policies in Iraq, he is also criticising all of the US’s allies in that fight. Believe me, the press here will definitely use any anti Iraq war statement by the Democrats as a stick to beat Prime Minister Howard with. He has to take alot of flak in our press over his support for the US. Yet he has never accused Obama or any other US politician of interfering in our domestic politics. The only way to avoid your allies “interfering” in your domestic politics at this point would be for all your allies to abandon you to fight on your own, or for the Democrats to stop politicising the war in Iraq. Personally, I’d prefer the latter. God Bless America.

Heretic on February 14, 2007 at 5:57 am

Heretic, you’re missing my point. PM Howard went over the line when he said, “If I were running al Qaeda in Iraq, I would put a circle around March 2008 and be praying as many times as possible for a victory, not only for Obama but also for the Democrats.” It was a ridiculous thing to say because not only did it imply that Sen. Obama would be in cahoots with our enemies, but the whole Democratic party would also be in cahoots with our enemies. PM Howard can criticize the withdrawl policy all he wants, my objection is the manner in which he chose to word it.
Although to be a bit fair to PM Howard, he did not exactly say (at least in the news article that is linked to in Debbie’s article) “that terrorists in Iraq would be praying for Obama to become President of the U.S” as Debbie had put it in her blog article.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/02/11/australia.obama.ap/index.html
And also in that same news article, it is mentioned that Australia has 1,400 troops in and around Iraq and that “recent polls suggest voters are increasingly unhappy about his refusal to set a deadline for withdrawing Australian troops.”
BB posted:
[…like we are going to base our votes in 2 years on Howard’s statement.]
The presidential primaries are only 1 year away, and PM Howard made those remarks 1 day after Sen. Obama announced his presidential candidacy. The issue is not whether voters will remember it in 2 years, but that PM Howard said it and it’s on the record to be used against Sen. Obama in the presidential race.

Norman Blitzer on February 14, 2007 at 7:45 am

Norman Blitzer
Do you remember Vietnam or are you too young to remember when General Giap, Commander of the North Vietnamese Army and the Viet Cong, was interviewed by a Newsweek reporter.
He told the reporter that after TET (1968), the Viet Cong were no longer usable, and the North Vietnamese Army would take years to rebuild, and would not be able to mount another offensive.
The TET offensive of 1968 was an absolute failure for the North. They lost over 70,000 soldiers and Viet Cong. He stated that it was the protests in the United States that gave him hope. He stated he didn’t have to win, just hold on longer than the American people.
The South Vietnamese Government collapsed after the United States Congress cut off all funding. The United States Military won every single battle, but the media and the politicians lost the war.
Howard is just pointing out the obvious about the cut and run Democrats. Senator Obama is doing exactly what the left did during the Vietnam War by giving the terrorists hope that if the Democrat candidate gets elected they should circle 2008 when they will withdraw our forces. They just have to wait for Obama or Hillary to get elected to defeat America in Iraq.
Kudos to PM Howard for reminding us that History is repeating itself.

ScottyDog on February 14, 2007 at 11:04 am

A person doesn’t have to be working in cahoots with their enemies to still end up giving them exactly what they want. The fact is that Al Queda do want the allies, especially the US to withdraw from Iraq, it would be in their best interests. And Obama has promised them exactly that, whether or not he is doing if for them, the result will be the same. He will hand the enemies of freedom a massive victory. John Howard has been on record in our country for the last 3 years saying that withdrawl would be a mistake. He did not make his statement in a speach, he made it in a TV interview. When a journalist asked him “senator Obama who has just nominated for the presidency has stated that he will withdraw US troops by March, what do you think of that?” (I’m paraphrasing here, I don’t remember the exact line), what was Howard supposed to reply? He is guilty of being honest and sticking to his guns, something a few more politicians should try.

Heretic on February 14, 2007 at 3:33 pm

Furthermore, Obama well and truly crossed the line in his reply to Howard, when he refered to Howard as “George Bush’s ally”. Australia did not send troops to Afgahnistan, or Iraq to aid George Bush, we sent them to aid the US, as members of a mutual defense treaty called ANZUS. To suggest that the good fighting men of Australia are not in those far away hell holes for the good of the whole US, but only for George Bush is highly disrespectful not only to our country but also to your own. If you ever wonder why more countries around the world don’t rush to the aid of the US, you might want to look at behavior like that from your politicians. John Howard and Tony Blair already have to take enormous flak in their own press for being “Bushes lapdogs”, and statements like Obama’s just make it worse.

Heretic on February 14, 2007 at 4:00 pm