President Obama declared last night that we are now in the midst of a “Sputnik moment.” Trouble is Obama doesn’t have a world-view or a grasp of history to understand what that really means.
Sputnik grew out of the profound belief that the Soviet Union had shot ahead of us in the space race and that this was a direct challenge to American supremacy. As the Washington Times points out, this was not some abstract exercise in education investment. It grew out of a belief that (a) the Soviet Union presented a serious threat to the American way of life, (b) technological prowess, no, superiority, was an essential component of national greatness and (c) America was #1 and should remain #1. it is pretty easy to believe that if Obama had been in politics in 1957, he would not have embraced any of those beliefs. Indeed, today, he finds it hard to call our “enemies” enemies, does not believe that America is “exceptional” any more than Great Britain or Greece is “exceptional,” nor does he believe in the notion of national greatness.
Obama using the “Sputnik moment” line is more about advancing his domestic spending agenda than it is about meeting America’s global challenges. Like the Soviet satellite named Sputnik, Obama’s ideas need to be shot out into space.
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