A reader sent me an e-mail exchange he had with Larry Schweikart, the University of Dayton history prof who appeared on Hannity the other night and declared, among other things, that President-elect Obama doesn't have any wars to deal with. First, the reader e-mail to Schweikart:
You said, when talking about Obama "stealing" Lincoln's shtick,
"Lincoln, though, had a war to deal with. Obama doesn’t."
Please explain what you mean by saying Obama doesn't have a war to deal with. Are you agreeing that the Iraq fiasco is an occupation and not a legitimate "war"? Or are you suggesting that the situation in Iraq is no longer a concern for the United States?
And Schweikart's reply:
I didn’t get to finish my comments.
a) Iraq is not a fiasco, it’s what we call a VICTORY, and the looney libs know it. That’s why they are trying to get out before it’s clearly obvious to everyone (as it is already obvious to the Iraqis).
b) I was referencing spending. 99% of Lincoln’s spending went for war. 99% of Obama’s spending will go for pork, bailouts, social programs, and utter nonsense unrelated to national security. But I didn’t get to finish that point.
c) Actually, no, Iraq is no longer a “concern” for us because we won. It’s sort of like Sicily in 1944.
Now, since I can pretty well tell where you are coming from, you are hereby blocked. Good evening.
A few things here. First, Schweikart's quite the jagoff, no?
As for his points (a) and (c), there's no way to define "victory" in Iraq. How do we know this? General Petraeus said so.
On point (b), Lincoln also instituted the income tax to help pay for the war. A bit of fiscal responsibility that's entirely foreign to Schweikart, Hannity, President Bush and many other so-called conservatives. Then there's the very liberal strong central government, anti-states-rights position of Lincoln, and on and on.
Oh, and closing his e-mail with the internet equivalent of "shut his mic off!" was particularly O'Reilly-ish of him.