Posted on 07/24/2014 4:56:21 PM PDT by Kaslin
WASHINGTON -- It did not take all that long, when you think about it, for America's Nobel Prize-winning statesman to bring the world to a boil. Perhaps our Nobel Prize-wining president was only a community organizer all along. He has brought the world to a boil not by his use of force but by his inattentiveness. He has been playing golf or lecturing the world from a higher plain. He has been picking fights with the Republicans or devising new ways to thwart the Constitution. He has not reacted to provocations around the world that threaten peace and our allies. The allies are beginning to worry.
The president has simply failed to respond to an outburst of violence around the world. It is an outburst that has not been seen since the 1970s. His only reaction is mere rhetoric, sometimes no rhetoric at all. Sometimes he changes the subject. Whether it be mobs of Central American children at our southern border or armed rebels in Ukraine shooting commercial aircraft out of the skies, there is only emollient talk from Washington. There is no alternative policy. Things are getting worse.
Last week at a White House press conference, as the Middle East was blowing up and violent outbreaks were reported around the globe, the president's press secretary, Josh Earnest, made the stupefying claim that President Barack Obama's foreign policy has actually increased the world's "tranquility." In response to a journalist's question about the "breadth of global instability," the ironically named Earnest said: "I think there have been a number of situations in which you've seen this administration intervene in a meaningful way, that has substantially furthered American interests and substantially improved the, uh, you know, the -- tranquility of the global community."
What is he talking about, Obama's vaunted red line in Syria? More recently, is he talking about Ukraine where the corpses from a commercial jet lay in an open field for days as a war goes on that could get worse? Is he talking about the Middle East where the Arab Spring has given way to chaos in such countries as Libya, Syria and large areas of Iraq, with the Iranians becoming more truculent and scheming by the day? And they seem to be behind a wide range of Middle Eastern mischief, with the Obama administration offering no push back. Or is the tranquility of which Earnest speaks along the border of Gaza and Israel where the terrorists from Hamas lob perhaps a thousand rockets at Israel. When the enlightened critics derided Ronald Reagan for his Strategic Defense Initiative, thankfully the Israelis did not share in the derision. Now they have their own strategic defense called the Iron Dome to protect them as they launch lethal missiles into Gaza and a ground attack to eliminate Hamas' rats nest of tunnels into Israel.
In the six years that President Obama has governed, the world has become more dangerous than many in America, Europe or the Middle East had imagined. Yet as things fall apart there are signs of hope. The other day when Israel invaded Gaza to close off Hamas's tunnels, an alignment of newly aroused Muslim states committed the heretofore inconceivable. They expressed open support of Israel's actions. They see Hamas as part of a dangerous coalition of violent forces often supported by Iran that could flood into their countries almost overnight. Yet when Washington figures such as Ambassador Ryan Crocker speak hopefully in the Washington Post of these moderates' implacable enemy, Iran, saying it "is no longer whether to work together but how to do so," these Muslim nations are perplexed. What are they to make of America when even relatively conservative people like Crocker suggest a diplomatic demarche with a regime that calls us the Great Satan?
In this time of international volatility, there are emerging surprising opportunities. Is it possible that Egypt, the Gulf States and Saudi Arabia can move closer to Israel? Actually they already have. They call for "stability" in the region, and live in wonder of what the United States is doing conjuring with the greatest force for instability there, Iran. Could it be that the legacy of the Obama years might be a new Middle East alignment of civilized nations with Israel while such backward polities as Syria, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, and terrorists such as Hamas continue to tear themselves apart? All with the conniving Iranians pulling the strings. We live in alarming times but also hopeful times.
It is going to take decades to reestablish alliances with other countries.
We all know what he’s playing with.
Heard on the news about an hour ago that Putin want to help broker a peace between Israel and Hamas.
Yeah he’s playing Tiddlywinks
Putin is playing chess. Iran is playing chess. China is playing Go. Obama is playing midnight basketball, and not for the team he’s supposed to be on.
I don’t think Obama is going to make any friends in the region by nuzzling up to Iran (of all countries). Even Erdogen won’t talk to him.
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Perhaps. And we'll help lead from behind as soon as Obama figures out which behind to kiss. That's what superpowers do.
Obama is a genius at agitation.
Saying that he has increased the world's "tranquility" agitates the hell out of those who know better.
You have to hand it to him. He is the supreme agitator.
Everyone who disagrees with him hates his effing guts...and that's what agitation is all about.
He has agitated the country. That's what he does.
But then in the end, he doesn't care about Americans, Black, White or Pink...he hates America because he is a muslim.
He has fooled us all...particularly his devout followers.
Even those commies who bragged that America would soon have a commie president were fooled.
Obama is a muslim (yes, a homo...but still a muslim).
I agree with that.
I would also say that Obama is not really playing to Win — he’s playing to Destroy. That’s much easier. All he really cares about is destroying the Christian West. America is the key nation that has upheld those values, so he has ruined our economy, destroyed our global power and reputation and brought us to the brink of a new civil war. I don’t think he cares who wins that war. He just wants to make sure we’re devastated and weakened.
Playing with his dingaling?
The United States is in a rather new and unique situation due to the increase (and potential increase) in domestic production of oil and natural gas, a position the Russians have enjoyed for more than a decade. What we do not have is an administration with imagination sufficient to exploit this. Instead we have internationalist State Department retreads under the guidance, if it can be called that, of superannuated campus radicals who appear to fantasize that we have at least reached the Age of Aquarius. The grotesque spectacle of our two preceding Secretaries of State, quite possibly the least qualified for the position in the country's history, careening off the various obstacles of geopolitical reality like bumpers in a pinball machine, all under the guidance of a Chief Executive for whom "foreign" policy means the South Side of Chicago; all of this has served to embolden our enemies and appall our friends. Little wonder that new coalitions are forming - they'd better, because the old ones are rotten at the core, and that core is us.
There are probably two people in that room that thinks something is funny. The rest are afraid not to laugh.
Pssst someone tell the Resident that a new exclusive golf course has just opened on the Tex-Mex border. I’m sure he would have to visit the border then. heehee
Academics should remain in the classroom and not in politics.
I live in the north-east and am thinking of hanging a Texas state flag out side of my home to show solidarity with those living in the line of invasion.
I heard on the radio the other day that BO refers to himself as “the bear” and has made comments such as “the bear is on loose” in reference to himself. I find that disturbing because as a political figure the bear refers to the Russian bear and would refer to Putin not the president of the U.S. When I think of our current resident I think of his dem party symbol the j***a**. But I guess it might be rude for himself to call himself one of those.
My daughter lives in TX and I have two Don’t mess with Texas coffee cups that I regularly use for my cup of coffee in the morning
Good insight. I always thought of the Bear mentioned in the Bible as representing Russia, what you just said gives me pause.
These are not hopeful times. Egypt has become a Russian ally thanks to Obama’s idiocy during the Mubarak ouster. Saudi Arabia and the UAE are only being driven to an alliance with Israel because they are rightly scared to death of the Caliphate and Al Baghdadi, who threatens to execute their monarchs and seize their wealth.
Iran thunders towards a nuclear weapon while all this is happening.
Guarantee the next thing will be a mass offensive by Beijing over the islands they want. They know nobody is at the controls in America. We have a fundraiser in chief.
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