Steve King and Barack Obama

On Friday, Rep. Steve King of Iowa announced his plans to run for reelection.

He also made some comments about Barack Obama that drew the Obama campaign's ire. King used the H-word.

John McCain's campaign rebuked the Republican for his remarks.

From The Hill:

"I will tell you that, if he is elected president, then the radical Islamists, the al Qaeda, the radical Islamists and their supporters, will be dancing in the streets in greater numbers than they did on Sept. 11, because they will declare victory in this war on terror,” King said, as reported in The Daily Reporter in Spencer, Iowa.

King added: "Additionally, his middle name (Hussein) does matter. … It matters because they read a meaning into that in the rest of the world. That has a special meaning to them. They will be dancing in the streets because of his middle name. They will be dancing in the streets because of who his father was and because of his posture that says: Pull out of the Middle East and pull out of this conflict."

Of course, our enemies would rather have Obama than McCain in the White House. Obama pledges to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq immediately, leaving a vacuum.

From Obama's website:

Bringing Our Troops Home

Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months. Obama will make it clear that we will not build any permanent bases in Iraq. He will keep some troops in Iraq to protect our embassy and diplomats; if al Qaeda attempts to build a base within Iraq, he will keep troops in Iraq or elsewhere in the region to carry out targeted strikes on al Qaeda.

Obama's foreign policy plans are very different from McCain's positions. Read McCain's "Strategy for Victory in Iraq" and his plan for "National Security."

If Islamic radicals were given the choice to vote for Obama or McCain, I think Obama would win in a landslide.

I don't think the radicals would declare victory in the War on Terror or dance in the streets if Americans voted Obama in to be the next president, but I do think it would be to their benefit.

It's Obama's policy positions regarding the War on Terror that I think our enemies would find attractive, not Obama's middle name.

Imagine that McCain was John Hussein McCain. Because of his tough stance on terrorism, I don't think Islamic radicals would welcome him as the next president of the United States on the basis of Hussein.

What McCain would do as president is what would matter, not his middle name. The same goes for Obama. Obama is weak on national security. That's the issue. Hussein is completely irrelevant.

King is goofy for suggesting that a middle name matters when it comes to war and peace.

...King reiterated his comments Saturday evening in an interview with Geraldo Rivera on the Fox News Channel.

“I reject [McCain’s] disavowal and I reject the Democrat web pages that call me the names that they have,” King said. “I’d ask them to point to the quote that I have said that offends them. And if I am wrong, Geraldo, and we elect Obama to the presidency and he declares defeat, if they don’t dance in the streets, I will come and apologize to you and everybody in America. But I’m saying, I’m right.”

Obama’s campaign called on McCain to repudiate King. McCain’s campaign downplayed any connection between King and the campaign and said it rejects the kind of politics King was taking part in.

So, King won't back down.

That's his right. If the people he represents don't like what he said, they can vote him out of office.

Obama called on the McCain campaign to repudiate King and it did. McCain isn't responsible for King's remarks. All that McCain's campaign needed to say about this has been said.

Obama can't continue to point fingers at McCain when King is saying that McCain is wrong. He said, "I reject [McCain’s] disavowal."

This isn't a matter of the McCain campaign downplaying any connection with King. King himself rejects McCain's disapproval of his comments. There's no connection to downplay. If anything, King is distancing himself from McCain.

Hopefully, Obama won't be elected and King will never be in the position to either apologize to Geraldo and everybody in America or say to them, "I told you so."