President Obama’s general foreign policy record has not been too much of a success. He’s been gutsy in some areas and naive and stupid or even dangerous in some others, especially in the long term.
Even to those eager to defend the President’s policies and the President’s overall conduct in handling American foreign affairs – it’s a difficult task. Justifying his record remains shady to a degree that they are left with no choice but to break up analysis into regional, specific areas, in a way that dismantles the overall understanding or argument that President Obama has a strong, commanding lead on foreign policy issues.
The best example is David Brooks opinion in the NY Times, in which he starts off praising President Obama’s overall conduct in implementing a new, flexible foreign policy approach. Nonetheless, he points out the significant failures that may have an impact on US national security, the stability of the Middle East region and the future of democracy in the Arab World.
In the op-ed titled – “Where Obama shines” – Brooks starts of by praising the new approach Obama brought to the table. “It should be noted that Barack Obama has been a good foreign policy president. He, Vice President Joseph Biden, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the rest of his team have created a style of policy making that is flexible, incremental and well adapted to the specific circumstances of this moment.
Following a foreign policy hedgehog, Obama’s been a pretty effective fox,” he writes.
All well, until the details are reviewed.
Here’s where even Brooks comes to the conclusion of “OK, but…”.
“No one knows what will happen if Israel or the U.S. strikes Iran’s nuclear facilities. Confronted with that shroud of ignorance, Obama has properly pushed back the moment of decision-making for as long as possible, just in case anything positive turns up. This has meant performing a delicate dance — pressing Israelis to push back their timetable while, at the same time, embracing their goals….”
“There have been failures on Obama’s watch, of course. Some of these flow from executive hubris. Obama believed that he could help resolve the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. He proceeded clumsily, pushed everybody into a corner and now peace is farther away than ever.
“Some failures flow from excessive politicization. An inexcusable blunder by Obama was to announce the withdrawal date from Afghanistan at the same time he announced the surge into Afghanistan. That may have kept the Democratic base happy, but it sent thousands of soldiers and Marines on a mission that was doomed to fail…“
As a consequence of Obama’s foxy foreign policy approach, the possibility of a Mideast regional war in the summer, and Iran capable of threatening Israel with nuclear weapons is no longer theoretical, rather demonstrable.
Events and tragedies speak for themselves. No spin or argument will cover up for the rise of the Muslim brotherhood in Egypt and in Libya, the horrific situation in Syria, the resurgence of Hezbollah, and the Iranian proxies reaching the moment of obtaining chemical weapons and dirty bombs.
It’s time to wake up.
It’s Mitt Romney’s time. [tweetable]
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Jacob Kornbluh, is a political operative in Brooklyn, New York. He also serves as the political correspondent for the Jewish Voice newspaper in Brooklyn and a contributor for various publications. Kornbluh regularly interviews political analysts, newsmakers and top government officials from Israel, the United States and elsewhere. Jacob also offers his own unique insight regarding the burning issues of the day along with penetrating commentary from well known policy makers, on his Blog (http://jacobkornbluh.com) and weekly online radio show (http://Romneyradio.us).
As much as i hate some of W Bush’s let’s destroy and then let’s stay to rebuild it policy, i also hate equally Obama’s one size fits all democracy, the wait and see moment policy. Obama’s “we’re a world citizen” campaign propagnda didn’t work. We’re not well liked under his presidency at all. Where is the love, the world harmony towards US? Just another hope, change craps.
I hope the Romney Presidency will have a different approach.
Get out from Afghanistan the sooner the better-it is not worth losing precious life and spending $$$$$$$$$$….
STOP drone attacks on innocent children and family. Why the innocent children has to die just to kill one stinky bad guy?
Gov Romney=Strong defense, Strong militay!
Good post Jacob!
Mr. Obama is not a leader. His foreign policy reflects the fact. If there is any projected at all from the United States, it is from Secretary Clinton, but even then, we are weak as a nation in that promotion internationally.
Obama seeks consensus on just about any decision he makes. Why? Because to actually make a decision on his own means he takes risk and he owns the decision. If a consensus decision fails, he can point to the group decision. It is classic weak-leader thinking.
One little example: Think of Syria. Over 15,000 innocents have been slaughtered. Obama wants an international response and he does not want to take action without “legal authority.” Hogwash! Did we ever hear that kind of weak rhetoric from Kennedy during the 13-day Cuban missile crisis? No! He gave a few warnings to Kruschev, stared him down, and took action as Commander in Chief. Had Kennedy taken the time to lobby for international support, the nuclear missiles would still be firmly planted in Cuban soil, or worse, we would have been the recipients of a nuclear explosion decades a go.
Obama is weak by any standard of measure.
we should stay out of Syria
We are on the brink of a huge Mid-East crisis.
Syria isn’t a direct threat as was Cuba missles incident.
Syria, northern part of Africa stability is very important for that part of the region especially, for Isreal. Children are dying with chemical weapon everyday in Syria. Whatever happend to US compassion for human life?