Out of Limbo

With tears welling in my eyes, I held my infant daughter in one hand, while turning up the television volume with the other. President Obama was speaking in the Oval Office for only the second time since he was inaugurated a year and a half ago. Even in his melancholy tone, the words he spoke were not only highly anticipated, but critical to the spirit of morale in reviving our ever so devastated economic status as a nation.

"It is time to turn the page," Obama said when declaring the U.S. combat mission in Iraq had ended.  "Operation Iraqi freedom is over and the Iraqi people now have lead responsibility for the security of their country."

Finally, the nightmare has ended, though not officially but idealistically. According to the president, the exit strategy has American troops out of Iraq by the end of next year.

While critics will harp on the notion that the war was never declared as won and the mission considered incomplete, the important fact is that the limbo phase is over.

Forgive me for only being 21 years-old, but seven years seems like an awfully long time to me, especially if it refers to the duration of a war that, ultimately, had no basis and turned out to have very little purpose in the long run.

Obama's presidency, following the failed eight-year George W. Bush experiment, reminds me a bit of the recent box office smash, Inception. If you haven't seen the movie, I will lose you with this for sure. But I'd have to consider that as more of your fault than mine.

For a moment, allow the War in Iraq to be thought of as what we all wish it was; a dream. First, President Bush made the dangerous mistake of using memories (terrorist attacks on 9/11) to create this dream. This blurred the perception of what was real and what wasn't. Point being, the attack from the Taliban was real, but the weapons of mass destruction and threat of Iraq to U.S. security were not.

But this leads to a bigger issue. Obama enters the dream as somewhat of an intruder. Now, not only is fantasy confused with reality, but Bush's projections (the Republican Party) begin to attack Obama for nothing more than simply being there. Still, Obama's mission is to plant an idea of peace and civility, not in the dreamer specifically, but in the world that has been created by the dream itself. Not easy stuff, I can only imagine.

Opposed to the War in Iraq from the beginning, Obama is now forced to endure criticism for handling a nasty situation that he knows for a fact to have been highly unnecessary. But unlike the movie I referenced, Obama knew exactly what he was getting himself into and has been resilient with his agenda.

He promised to pay attention to the dire health care needs of middle to lower-class Americans, who, in some ways, have been cheated of their civil liberties. The party to the right is still outraged over this. "What's wrong with that Obama," they frequently complain. "Spending all our taxpayer money on healthcare? We have healthcare and we like it." I know, he's just a horrible guy. It's funny how some Americans aren't willing to sacrifice for their own countrymen, but they support a war that compromises the entire nation, for the benefit of who exactly? The Iraqis? Or nobody?

Now, Obama wants to pull our troops from combat, one that cost the country $750,000,000,000 and the lives of more than 4,400 soldiers. What is he thinking, right? Perhaps, he is considering the other war we're fighting. The fight against Al-Qaeda has developed into our longest war since Vietnam. President Obama should be able to better focus on making sure we finish our mission there, since we actually know what we're over there fighting for. The economy is just as much a work in progress.

So, now that we're out of limbo, consider this as a dream deferred.