Obama on "National Service"

The Washington Post reports on Senator Obama's speech Wednesday in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
During that speech Senator Obama uttered the following:

"We were ready to step into the strong current of history and to answer a new call for our country, but the call never came," he said. "Instead of a call to service, we were asked to go shopping."

Of course the greatest danger to the nation after the attacks on 9/11 was that the economy would collapse because aircraft travel had been curtailed and citizens were unsure about leaving their homes. A collapse of the economy would naturally have had a devastating effect and was the kind of force multiplier that al Qaeda was seeking with their 9/11 attacks. The exhortation to 'go shopping' was a request for direct and effective personal action which more than any other could and did counteract the threat posed by the attacks. Either Senator Obama is incapable of recognizing this or is deliberately distorting the meaning of those events.

On a greater scale, democrats have used this line to try to get the administration to demand more sacrifices from the American people, not for the value of the sacrifice but to engender greater opposition to the war. The ultimate poster child for this greater sacrifice was to reinstitute the draft. This was the gold standard for rapidly increasing opposition to the war and recreating the conditions the left recalled so fondly from the 60's. That Obama reintroduces this canard here, betrays his close tie to the extreme left both in political and military terms. Patriotism indeed.