Posted on 08/12/2008 9:36:13 AM PDT by McGruff
PRESIDENT Bush's assurance back in 2001 that he looked into Vladimir Putin's soul and liked what he saw was the international equivalent of his "heckuva job" boosterism of Federal Emergency Management Agency Director Michael Brown in the immediate wake of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
Bush's endorsement of Putin was partly a matter of calculation; when he says glowing things about foreign leaders in public, he tells those leaders in private how he expects them to deliver. But with Putin, Bush seemed to be playing Ned Flanders to the Russian's Tony Soprano.
John McCain's assessment stands up much better: He said that, looking at Putin, he "saw three letters: a K, a G and a B."
Putin's neo-Soviet state has launched a nakedly illegal invasion of neighboring Georgia. The Russian press is pumping out absurd lies about Georgian acts of genocide, even as the Russian military indiscriminately bombs and shells Georgian cities.
The Bush administration made twin mistakes with Russia. It overpersonalized relations, with Bush hoping to coax out Putin's better side, and tiptoed around Moscow in the hopes that gentle treatment would encourage it to act responsibly. The irony is that Barack Obama - with his commitment to personal diplomacy and a gentler US footprint around the world - wants to make those two tendencies centerpieces of his foreign policy.
The Bush and Obama statements in the immediate wake of the crisis could have been issued by a joint campaign:
* Bush's spokeswoman urged "all parties," both Georgians and Russians, "to de-escalate the tension and avoid conflict."
* Obama declared that "now is the time for Georgia and Russia to show restraint."
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
But Barry came off the Hawaiian golf course and requested a cease fire and the Russians complied...Tim Kaine actually told the Friends this morning that he was pleased about this. I kid you not.
“It overpersonalized relations, with Bush hoping to coax out Putin’s better side”
We did the same thing with the Soviets. Every one of their leaders since Brezhnev has been a KGB man, with the exception of Yeltsin. Don’t expect magic out of a new Russian leader. They continue to follow the same authoritarian policies and designs.
It has been the position of the Bush administration to withdraw from the ABM treaty and allow former republics of the former SSR into NATO. It is not like Bush has not done anything against the wishes of Comrad Putin (like going into Iraq).
That is a very good question. A pledge to clean up that snake pit -- and the CIA as well -- would go a long way in getting McCain more of the conservative vote.
I'll admit it was a little but Bush should have never trusted Putin. Maybe he guilty of being a little naive. Remember "Trust but Verify".
LOL
Bush is about to leave office. Before he heads off into retirement, it would be appropriate for the President to take another look into Putin's eyes and adjust his 2001 statement about Putin having a soul. Putin is a bully. He wants to turn Mother Russia back into the USSR. The invasion of Georgia is step #1 towards that goal. Instead of being nice, Bush should have been less friendly with Putin. This guy is a hardcore commie. Period.
Putting Bush's response aside. You got to face facts Bush was caught of guard by this whole thing. How could our intel not know something was about to go down? Forces like that are not massed over night. And where is Rice in all this? She was supposed to be the expert on Russia. More knowledgeable on Russia than any SOS before her.
The "everyone knows this stuff" attitude is a very dangerous one. There are a lot of people who do not know much at all about it. And even when they do, they are hardly aware of the ever important details. And, for this, you can thank Rush, Hannity, O'Reilly, Ingram, etc. None of them ever get into any real detail of who these various groups and individuals are. In fact, Sean Hannity STILL only refers to Bill Ayers and the Weather Underground as "domestic terrorists" (not communist revolutionaries). He does the same thing with Reverend Wright's Black Liberation Theology. Never, except for one very rare Friday night edition of Hannity's America, did he do a show where it was exposed (by two guests, not him) for what it really is: a revolutionary communist ideology. After that program, which few likely saw, he's gone back to ignoring it again. In fact, when he interviewed Rev Wright back in March 2007 on H&C on the subject of Liberation Theology and Black Liberation Theology, Wright practically made a fool of him, because he (Hannity) didn't know squat about it. Anyway, for much more on all this, including partial transcripts of both of the Hannity programs I mentioned, please visit my FR home page, at:
http://www.freerepublic.com/~etl/
That is the truth. Want to think Russia is in the right? That is your privilege, however you will be called on it on FR. Russia is a scumbag nation and they always have been, they lie, cheat and murder.
McCain is the real Churchill of our time versus the
wannabe Bush and his statue of churchill in his office.
Maybe Bush can get a statue of Chamberlain.
Norman Bates pointed out to me that it was excerpted on McCain's website here: Following McCain’s Lead on Russia, Iraq
Most of them are either themselves Russians, Serbs or other Orthodox, or paleocon-isolationists. The sad thing about the Serb and several of the Orthodox (not all) Freepers is that they deny Georgia's (also Orthodox) exactly the rights they claim for Serbia. They've lost all their credibility.
“**(MCCAIN THE ONLY GROWNUP ON GEORGIA)**
Agree, although I think the President took a strong stand too.”
I agree with all of the above.
McCain's judgment benefits from years of marinating in national-security issues and traveling and getting to know the key players; from a hatred of tinpot dictators and bloody thugs that guides his moral compass - and from a flinty realism (verging at times on fatalism) that is resistant to illusions about personalities, the inevitable direction of History or the nature of the world.
I keep hearing, "Why would you vote FOR McCain, not just AGAINST Obama?"
Well, here's why.
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