http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=OTNhNGM0ZjY1ZTFhNzQwNmJhYjRkMzYwYzg0MzMxZGQ=
Why Honor Promises to an "Impulsive" United States? [Victor Davis ]
Secretary Clinton just reminded North Korea to live up to past promises and accords. But why should they, when for the last week the world has been reminded how the past administration caused much of the problems we face today? If Secretary Clinton loudly announces that the U.S. has been too "impulsive" and "ideological", perhaps North Korea agrees with her — and now has no reason to abide by any past accords enacted in such a pernicious climate.
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NzFlMzAyY2E3MDExN2ZhNWJhMWFlYjdiNTk0ZTAwODY=
The Coming Storm [Victor Davis Hanson]First, President Obama in his al-Arabiya interview castigated past American foreign policy, suggested the onus of poor Islamic-Western relations was on the United States, and promised a new foreign policy of dialogue and listening. Then Joe Biden went to Munich and blathered on about hitting the reset button of foreign-policy, using more of the platitudes of “Bush did it” that we’ve come to associate with the first months of the Obama administration. Secretary of State Clinton completed the trifecta on her first tour when she cleared her throat with the now customary “too often in the recent past . . . (fill in the blanks with being too ideological, unilateral, insensitive, etc.).”
So the world can now expect a break with the awful past, and the start of some brilliant new multilateral approach? Instead, I think, it will quickly assume that the healer Barack Obama, as the new messiah, will vote “Present!” on many of the crises to come, and would no more wish to play the role of global enforcer than he would have impolitely walked out of one of Rev. Wright’s hate-filled sermons.Will Obama and company, through inspired diplomacy, solve any lingering tension from the Bush administration over missile defense in Europe, the soon-to-be Iranian bomb and missiles, or the European so-so role in Afghanistan? Will they find a novel, kinder, and gentler way to thwart possible al-Qaeda Mumbai-copycat killers here at home, to defang North Korea, to talk sense to the Russians to stay in their confining borders, and to persuade Hamas to act more like Fatah?
I seriously doubt it. Instead, this serial apologizing, promising a new age of listening and togetherness, and trashing the Bush administration will have two consequences: Enemies will begin to think there is a tad less likelihood now that the U.S. will respond forcefully to a terrorist attack (since “Bush did it” in the past) without first consulting allies, trying to find a diplomatic solution, or going to the U.N.; and, second, friends will slacken a bit, knowing that our prime interest is in the means of multilateralism rather than any objective ends: one now “dialogues” over troops in Afghanistan, and “discusses” whether to follow through on missile defense, and “listens” to “all the parties” like Syria and Iran for “constructive” suggestions about Middle East peace. In short, a bad idea to trash the past when much of it was good, and point happily to the future when it may well be far worse.
We are setting ourselves up for a repeat of Jimmy Carter’s “Our kindness and intellect will save the world,” but this second time as farce.
Suspension of Disbelief Redux [Victor Davis Hanson]
On her initial tour abroad, Sec. Clinton announced that she would follow an approach that "values what others have to say": "Too often in the recent past, our government has acted reflexively before considering available facts and evidence or hearing the perspectives of others." And then she promised a policy "neither impulsive nor ideological."
At some point the unifying, bipartisan Obama team should cease all this ad nauseam "Bush did it" since this perpetual campaign mode, when taken abroad, is not healthy for the country in all too many ways:
1) it assures enemies that their past problems with the U.S. were largely of our own making due to our impulsiveness or ideology, not the fault of their own, or intrinsic differences;
2) it assures allies that there are not so much honest differences in our relationship as much as agreement that Bush et al were toxic (as if Germany otherwise would have fought well in Afghanistan, and now of course will);
3) it has a short shelf life: we are into the second month of the Obama administration and have seen really nothing new abroad other than the "we're not Bush";
4) it only sets up more of the same hypocrisy of what we have seen—hubris leading to nemesis—as inevitably in the bad/worse choices to come, Ms. Clinton will find herself often simply continuing existing (Bush) policy, and so like Obama on rendition, FISA the Patriot Act, Iraq, etc. adopt what she trashed;
5) very quickly Team Obama is using up their good will, as the American people are now quite aware of the tired modus operandi—talk of unity, togetherness, bipartisanship, and then trash your predecessor to lower expectations and magnify your own agenda.Time to get a life...
I wonder if she would be believing this if she were one of the blindfolded captives of AlQuida about to be beheaded?
When I look at the whole Democratic Leadership, from the Pres. down, they look just stupid