Obamatopia

One wonders whether President Obama, for all the soaring rhetoric, grasps why certain nations really do hate us. Does he think a Grozny, Darfur, Rwanda, Serbia, or Tibet happen in reaction to US global sinful conduct? Does he appreciate why hot spots like Cyprus, Taiwan, or Georgia, do not boil over—or under what conditions they might? Does he really believe that in the pre-Bush era we all got long (cf. his al-Arabiya interview); then Bush’s strutting, unilateralism, and preemption, presto, caused anti-Americanism?

Take Iran. It wants to be the preeminent regional power in the Middle East, and win for the Persian Shiites the mantle of Islamic frontline leadership in the long war to destroy Israel. That requires oil revenue, sponsorship of terror, and nuclear weaponry.

Despite Bill Clinton’s past ramblings, it is not democratic; instead, prescreened, preapproved candidates are confirmed by plebiscites, and civil liberties are nonexistent as we know them. The history of Khomeinism is one of executing thousands of Shah-supporters, sending tens of thousands to their deaths in mass wave attacks in Iraq, and using surrogate Hezbollah and Shiite operatives to blow up Americans from Lebanon to Iraq. In other words, a democratic internationalist America stands in the way of their megalomaniac aspirations.

After the Carter humiliations, the Reagan disaster with Iran-Contra, the Clinton feeble attempts at appeasement, Americans gave up on the Khomeinists, and more or less hoped to distinguish the Iranian people from their theocracy, talk up democratic change, and contain the mullahs’ terrorist aspirations. We can do this adroitly or clumsily, but existential differences will remain nonetheless—until a change in ideology on their or our part. Either they reenter the family of nations, or we redefine the family of nations to include thugocracies.

And now? What is there to negotiate over? How soon they can have the bomb? Triangulation with them over Israel? Promises to quit sending shaped charges into Iraq to kill more Americans?

Why does Hugo Chavez hate us? Is it because Bush’s ‘dead or alive’ed him or ‘with us or against us”ed him? Hardly. Chavez wants to end democracy in Venezuela for good, turn it into a Cuba-like communist dictatorship, use his oil revenues to whip up liberationist, anti-Yanqui feelings throughout South America, and end up with himself as some sort of messianic caudillo of the entire socialist continent. Sound crazy?

No more crazy than the daily Chavez communiqués. Again, by good or bad diplomacy we can soothe or excite him–but otherwise his aims are antithetical to the notion of democratic, capitalist states, with close ties to the North American democracies.

We can ditto all this with North Korea, Cuba, Russia, Syria, etc. So far all the Obama apologies for the sins of his own country (note always before he came on the scene), the serial “Bush did it” invective, the promises of a brave new Obama transnational world, the evocation of his middle name, and non-traditional lineage, and shared demagoguery against “them” (Wall Street, the greedy, the unpatriotic who make over the mythical trip wire $250,000), have not, and will not, change much abroad. Has Cuba promised to release prisoners, or apologized for all those killed? Has Chavez vowed to restore constitutional governance and quit subversion of his neighbors?

Thanks for posting.

Imho, the Iranian regime, adheres to a rigid world view and set of parameters which color the way they think and receive information - they are similar to any number of “regimes”, and even manipulated democratically elected governments like Chavez (and US) or even in the individual who adheres and clings to their own way of thinking with blinders to independent information and feedback. This unique lack of self awareness limits them immensely.

But then again, besides world view, there is the fact that it's all about the natural resources, isn't it? Who controls the resources controls the world.

Does he think a Grozny, Darfur, Rwanda, Serbia, or Tibet happen in reaction to US global sinful conduct?

The short answer is "yes, he does," or at least he did until his accession to office. And why not? Everywhere he had been up to that point holds that point of view with religious fervor and he hadn't been anywhere, especially in terms of foreign experience, to disabuse him of that comfortable little bit of progressive ideological shorthand. Part of the reason certain progressives are so dismayed at his reluctance to "change" certain policies they so relished pinning on Bush is that lo and behold! when he gets the same intel reports that Bush did it all starts to make sense after all.

I honestly believe he did not know any of that going into office. Mid-40's, no military experience, no diplomatic experience, hell, even Clinton had been Governor of a state prior to office. Obama is the least qualified, least experienced, most ideology-bound, naive, and misguided a President since Warren Harding and that's even unfair to Harding. Were his staff anything but the Chicago ward-heelers and wildly mis-assigned Clinton retreads they are, he might get away with it. He isn't. He's winging it. And it's showing.

And so we have the spectacle of him kissing the ring at the Americas conference - Huey Chavez, Daniel Ortega, all those soi disant revolutionaries that are so very romantic on the campuses where Obama got what little he has in the way of foreign experience. His function and that of his lamentably unqualified Secretary of State appear to be basking in the curses of the America-haters. They seem to think that apologizing for America is apologizing for Bush and the rest doesn't apply to them. Chavez, Ortega, et al beg to differ.

Any hope that Obama will "grow into" the office as a toddler grows into her big-girl panties are dashed on the rocks of the equally lamentable spectacle of one Jimmy Carter, who never did. This is bad and it's likely to get worse. We Americans truly do have a President to admire as a staunch and defiant defender of freedom. Unfortunately for us, it's the President of France.

They seem to think that apologizing for America is apologizing for Bush and the rest doesn't apply to them. Chavez, Ortega, et al beg to differ.

I'm suspicious that he doesn't think that this stuff is real. All he has to do is travel the world speaking vague platitudes. He gets flattery and adoration in return. His point of view is informed by limited experience and no known accomplishment. His ignorance of the world around him is illustrated everytime he speaks. His enemies are Americans, his sympathisers are those who wish us ill. Eurpean officials weren't impressed, but they are pros and know a shit sandwich when one is served. These Latin American caudillos have been around too, but they can see opportunity in a fellow traveler in the white House. Especially a vain and inexperienced one. They have four years to make communism a permanent feature of Latin American society, and I think they aim to exploit it.

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