That is the question I keep asking and so far do not have an acceptable answer.  So I was not going to go there, but since few others are maybe I can help start the conversation.

Barack Obama’s vague campaign promises of “change” are rapidly evaporating as the key positions in the next administration are filled with veterans of the US political establishment. Far from ending war abroad and social reaction at home, Obama’s choices underline the essential continuity with the policies of the Bush administration.

Nothing expresses the right-wing orientation of Obama’s foreign policy more than the confirmation Tuesday that he will retain Bush’s defense secretary, Robert Gates, in his post when the new foreign policy team is formally announced after the Thanksgiving holiday. Gates, who took over from Donald Rumsfeld in late 2006, has been responsible for the continued bloody prosecution of the US wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Gates will stay on in a line-up that is stacked with proponents of US militarism. Hilary Clinton, who supported the criminal invasion of Iraq from the outset and notoriously declared that the United States should “obliterate” Iran if it attacked Israel, is to become the secretary of state.

Retired Marine General James Jones, a former NATO commander and current executive at the US Chamber of Commerce, is to be installed as national security adviser. After a 40-year military career, he served last year as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s special envoy on Middle East Security and conducted a congressional investigation into the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. His view that the war in Iraq caused the US to “take its eye off the ball” in Afghanistan is in line with Obama’s insistence that US military operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan must be intensified.

Far from bringing an end to US militarism as tens of millions of American voters hoped for, the Obama administration is preparing to consolidate a US presence in Iraq and escalate the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The prospect of a dangerous new war looms as Obama’s advisers lay out their plans for confronting Iran.

The foreign policy heavyweights who supported Obama for president clearly hope to extend this “brilliance” in duping people onto the world stage as the US continues to aggressively pursue its economic and strategic interests.

Someone needs to step forward and bring this to the attention of the people who, in good faith, voted for Obama and his anti-war agenda.