Joel Pollak: We Must Not Fear the Tyrants of Tripoli
[Joel Pollak was the GOP nominee for U.S. Congress in Illinois's 9th district in 2010.]
The favored excuse for President Obama's inaction on Libya is that there were hundreds of Americans stranded on a ferry in Tripoli for several days, waiting for weather conditions to improve before they could leave for Malta. Apparently, President Obama was concerned that any action by the United States -- even direct verbal criticism of dictator Muammar Gaddafi -- could provoke him to take Americans hostage, or worse.
Was that really the reason? If so, there is no better illustration of how President Obama's foreign policy is weakening America. Never mind whether we can -- or should -- use our military to affect events in Libya or anywhere else in the Middle East. Put aside the tortured question of whether we ought to promote our democratic principles abroad. What is at stake is more fundamental: our ability to protect American citizens from harm.
This is not the first time Americans have been threatened by a tyrant from Tripoli. In the early days of our republic, pirates controlled by Tripoli and other Barbary Coast states attacked U.S. ships and kidnapped American sailors. When President Thomas Jefferson refused to pay tribute, Tripoli declared war in 1801. Jefferson asked for, and received, Congress's authority to use the new U.S. Navy to protect American shipping and lives....
Read entire article at American Thinker
The favored excuse for President Obama's inaction on Libya is that there were hundreds of Americans stranded on a ferry in Tripoli for several days, waiting for weather conditions to improve before they could leave for Malta. Apparently, President Obama was concerned that any action by the United States -- even direct verbal criticism of dictator Muammar Gaddafi -- could provoke him to take Americans hostage, or worse.
Was that really the reason? If so, there is no better illustration of how President Obama's foreign policy is weakening America. Never mind whether we can -- or should -- use our military to affect events in Libya or anywhere else in the Middle East. Put aside the tortured question of whether we ought to promote our democratic principles abroad. What is at stake is more fundamental: our ability to protect American citizens from harm.
This is not the first time Americans have been threatened by a tyrant from Tripoli. In the early days of our republic, pirates controlled by Tripoli and other Barbary Coast states attacked U.S. ships and kidnapped American sailors. When President Thomas Jefferson refused to pay tribute, Tripoli declared war in 1801. Jefferson asked for, and received, Congress's authority to use the new U.S. Navy to protect American shipping and lives....