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The Absurdity of Meeting the Enemy
RCP ^ | May 23rd, 2008 | Charles Krauthammer

Posted on 05/22/2008 10:54:40 PM PDT by The_Republican

When the House of Representatives takes up arms against $4 gas by voting 324-84 to sue OPEC, you know that election-year discourse has gone surreal. Another unmistakable sign is when a presidential candidate makes a gaffe, then, realizing it is too egregious to take back without suffering humiliation, decides to make it a centerpiece of his foreign policy.

Before the Democratic debate of July 23, Barack Obama had never expounded upon the wisdom of meeting, without precondition, with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Bashar al-Assad, Hugo Chavez, Kim Jong Il or the Castro brothers. But in that debate, he was asked about doing exactly that. Unprepared, he said sure -- then got fancy, declaring the Bush administration's refusal to do so not just "ridiculous" but "a disgrace."

After that, there was no going back. So he doubled down. What started as a gaffe became policy. By now, it has become doctrine. Yet it remains today what it was on the day he blurted it out: an absurdity.

Should the president ever meet with enemies? Sometimes, but only after minimal American objectives -- i.e. preconditions -- have been met. The Shanghai communique was largely written long before Richard Nixon ever touched down in China. Yet Obama thinks Nixon to China confirms the wisdom of his willingness to undertake a worldwide freshman-year tyrants tour.

Most of the time you don't negotiate with enemy leaders because there is nothing to negotiate. Does Obama imagine that North Korea, Iran, Syria, Cuba and Venezuela are insufficiently informed about American requirements for improved relations?

There are always contacts through back channels or intermediaries. Iran, for example, has engaged in five years of talks with our closest European allies and the International Atomic Energy Agency, to say nothing of the hundreds of official U.S. statements outlining exactly....................................................................................................................................................................................

(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: appeasement; democrats; isolation; meetingwithenemy; obama; socialism

1 posted on 05/22/2008 10:54:40 PM PDT by The_Republican
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To: The_Republican

Sigh. Idiots, all. All. That is sooooo depressing.


2 posted on 05/22/2008 10:57:30 PM PDT by rlmorel (Clinging bitterly to Guns and God in Massachusetts...:)
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To: The_Republican

The Hammer hammers B Hussein Obama!


3 posted on 05/22/2008 11:03:26 PM PDT by Rummyfan (Iraq: it's not about Iraq anymore, it's about the USA!)
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To: The_Republican
An excellent overview of why Obama is overqualified to be President. He's full of it - and doesn't to understand the difference between meeting a friend and meeting an adversary. We can't afford a President who can't distinguish between good and evil in world politics.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

4 posted on 05/22/2008 11:06:26 PM PDT by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives In My Heart Forever)
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To: The_Republican
Great column - Obambi is a helpless deer in the headlights.

NOT QUALIFIED to be POTUS. Period.

Although he is qualified to serve "Jimmy Carter's 2nd Term" -- but that is not a predicament we want for this nation or the world.

Will anyone in the MSM grill him on all his preposterous, foolish 'ideas' and mis-statements?

==========================================================

"Obama cited Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman as presidents who met with enemies. Does he know no history? Neither Roosevelt nor Truman ever met with any of the leaders of the Axis powers. Obama must be referring to the pictures he's seen of Roosevelt and Stalin at Yalta, and Truman and Stalin at Potsdam. Does he not know that at that time Stalin was a wartime ally?

During the subsequent Cold War, Truman never met with Stalin. Nor Mao. Nor Kim Il Sung. Truman was no fool.

Obama cites John Kennedy meeting Nikita Khrushchev as another example of what he wants to emulate. Really? That Vienna summit of a young, inexperienced, untested American president was disastrous, emboldening Khrushchev to push Kennedy on Berlin -- and then near fatally in Cuba, leading almost directly to the Cuban missile crisis. Is that the precedent Obama aspires to follow?

5 posted on 05/22/2008 11:26:21 PM PDT by Enchante (Barack Chamberlain: My 1930s Appeasement Policy Goes Well With My 1960s Socialist Policies!)
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To: All

I want to see Barack Obama humiliated. I want to see him brought to his knees. I want his political career ruined.

............................

Check out this awesome video:

The same kind of terrorists who support Obama did this:
http://www.frugalsites.net/911/attack/
Never apologize for them.
Never appease them.
Never forget.


6 posted on 05/23/2008 8:36:38 AM PDT by cyberella
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