Rhyming History With Barack Hussein O.

DURING THE NINETEEN FIFTIES the American people were terrified of the Soviet Union, and something called "communism", whatever that was. Hardly anyone in America at that time could define commmunism, but the corporate propaganda machine told them that it was a very bad thing, and that was sufficient. The U.S.S. R. developed an atomic bomb in 1949, and a hydrogen bomb in 1953, and the panic spread. President Dwight D. Eisenhower knew better. He knew that the Soviet Union was an economic hollowed out shell, still trying to rebuild its cities and economy from the devestation of World War Two, and was hardly in a position to contend militarily, or any other way, against the United States. But Harry Truman's cold war rhetoric had sunk in deep, and when Eisenhower tried to comfort the American people, and to assure them that all would be well, nobody believed him. He was described as a weak leader. Ensuing events proved Eisenhower correct; the United States need never have started the Cold War after all. Fast forward to Barack Hussein Obama and his confrontation with the Islamic State, which until recently we called "the self described Islamic State". Obama tries to reassure us that this Islamic State has no real military power, but only the power to propagandize and randomly kill, which is bad enough, but certainly not any existential threat to America. Nobody believes him. He is chastised for abandoning America's defense, for refusing to carpet bomb the middle east, for being a weak leader. History never repeats itself, it merely, as they say, rhymes.