foreign entanglements entered with domestics politics as the driving feature … weak and morally questionable leadership.
Well, this idea that Obama's foreign policy has "domestics politics as the driving feature" is, as far as I'm concerned, just something dreamed up by his critics. As you say, it's by necessity a consideration. You can't lead if people aren't willing to follow. We may agree that that's a
good thing — an important check on presidential power and action.
The mindless, anti-Obama robots at Faux and other right-wing media outlets claim the The Obama Doctrine is Lead From Behind. As far as I know, that was employed in
one setting — Libya. I'd say we got a pretty good cost/benefit out of that. The "he's just a golf-playing, fundraising incompetent" chorus screams "
Benghazi!" I say yeah, Benghazi, an important city where thousands of innocent civilians would have been slaughtered if NATO hadn't run air strikes against loyalist armour and artillery that were moving on it.
I might agree that the Red Line thing with Syria was kinda clumsy, but we had to do something, right? And would we have been better off going after Assad at
that time? Seems t' me Syria is a real tough nut. I agreed with McCain very early on for carefully selected targeting of Assad's air defence assets in response to his attacks on civilian populations. But what do I know about it? Actions like that can certainly escalate into big trouble.
In my view, we're doing what we can with Iran. The new government there could be a big plus. I'd say we made it more likely that they would come to power by not being too hardline.
Ukraine? Very difficult. Seems clear t' me that the rest of Eastern Europe is safe. Putin is a pain in the ass, but may in the end be semi-reasonable if only for his own domestic economic and political limitations.
Egypt and Pakistan are major concerns. I do NOT think that a lot of happy talk about "projecting force around the world" is gonna help. The idea that "America is retreating from the world, creating a vacuum that will be filled by evil" sounds like foolish rhetoric t' me.
The Cold War is over. We won. I'd say that was pretty much an inevitability. I think we can win the fight to limit terrorism (good luck trying to
end it) if we play our cards right. I
do agree with Obama, and with the very much unfairly maligned James Earl Carter, that moral leadership is important.
You referenced "moral leadership" yerself. How is Obama falling short on that? How is he being "weak"?
