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I think your example of chairman Mao is brilliant. He was even more of a social engineer than Stalin and he was also a supreme narcissist which is the one element I would add to your analysis of Obama. His narcissism uses his communism as the go to rationale to sustain itself.

Incidentally, I have been posting for years on these threads that this narcissism means Obama is potentially not a pacifist in the style of Jimmy Carter but potentially someone who can commit us to war to sustain his own narcissism rather than pursuit of legitimate national interests. In other words, we should not mistake the character of Barack Obama, he can be very, very dangerous.

The alternative hypothesis:

For decades in America politicians appealed to the Irish vote by twisting the British lion's tail, I think much the same has obviously transpired in American politics. When that happens it's analogous to government running a business, profit is not the motive and everything goes awry. If the politicians are pandering to an ethnic group concerning foreign policy you can bet the national interests of the country become secondary.

I agree with your assessment of President Obama. People shouldn’t underestimate his ability to muck things up. I would not be the slightest bit surprised to see him do something crazy like send the military to defend Ukraine. Some people foolishly make fun of President Obama’s red lines, but do we really, really want this president to start defending those lines with American blood?

For decades in America politicians appealed to the Irish vote by twisting the British lion's tail, I think much the same has obviously transpired in American politics.

I think such an analogy, while conceptually valid, is too small to adequately reflect the American-Israeli dynamic. No one was going to advocate for honor killing based on which part of the Anglospere they favored.

You are not talking about just an ethnic group, here. An overt turn against Israel would be a repudiation of our very civilization, and a de facto invitation to the proselytizing barbarity that is Islam.

So far, we have managed to preserve a tense but workable balance. I do not believe it would be in the interest of our American Way Of Life to convincingly present ourselves as a "friend" to Islam for fear of the liberties such a friendship would invite.