Obama's Moral Equivalence Problem

I guess we really shouldn't be surprised that Barack Obama sees no difference between our toppling of Saddam Hussein and Russia's invasion of Georgia. On an emotional level - which is where most liberals live and breathe - the comparison is attractive.

But on an intellectual level, it is stupid and deceitful. Powerline destroys Obama's rationale in three sentences:

So our "charging into" Iraq--with dozens of allies, supported by a U.N. resolution, as a last resort after six months of build-up and negotiations, to unseat one of the cruelest dictators of modern times who had twice invaded neighboring states, was in violation of more than a dozen U.N. resolutions and was responsible for the deaths of something like two million people, who was shooting at American aircraft and had tried to assassinate a former President of the United States, in Obama's childish mind, was just like Russia's "charging into" Georgia, which resembles Saddam's Iraq in no respect. And, of course, we invaded a horrifying charnel-house so as to establish a democracy, whereas Russia invaded a peaceful democracy that it wants to re-incorporate into its empire.

Is Obama an idiot? I don't think so, really. But one of the many problems with being a leftist is that it leads you to say lots of stupid things. Today, the Obama gaffe machine went into overdrive. By November, I suspect that most voters will have heard enough to know that Barack Obama is unqualified to be a middle-manager in a well-run company, let alone President of the United States.

 This was lefty dogma during the cold war - there is no difference between the US and the Soviets. For Obama to resurrect that notion is not surprising and indeed, predictable.

Is it a question of pacifism that Obama equates the two countries? Obama says he is not a pacifist but to believe there is a moral equivalency between America and Russia or Iraq and Georgia has a problem with their moral compass.