Via the Politico:
Is it just me or does this sound exactly like GWB when he purposed the Iraq “Surge”? Complete with troops numbers, benchmarks (which Obama opposed in the Senate) and timetables.
Several commentators have begun focusing on the growing discontent in the Arab world towards Obama. Fouad Ajami and Jackson Diehl do a pretty decent job of explaining why exactly this is occurring. Essentially, there are three main reasons:
1. Arabs expected Obama to gain deep concessions from Israel, Obama could not even get the Israelis to stop settlements. He has tried to sympathize with the Palestinians and the Israelis. However, their opinion of Obama and the United States are at all time lows.
2. Reformers expected Obama to help coax their regimes into changing towards openness and democracy. Indeed, the Bush administration loudly demanded allies (Egypt and Jordan) as well as foes (Iran) to change, but Obama has been mum. His attempt to both to be one with the people and one with the government has won him support of neither.
3. The Arab World is tried of Obama’s flowery rhetoric that is not backed up by substantive action. His apologist views of American actions were well received but have not been substantiated. Indeed, Obama has made America look ridiculous while accomplishing nothing.
Barack Obama has tried his best to play both sides on most issues. He has failed and lost support of both sides. If he is to succeed, Obama needs to stand for something. That something must be freedom and democracy He needs to do it now before he looses what little international support he has left.
Despite former President Manuel Zelaya’s insistence that the Honduran elections be boycotted, Hondurans elected a new president earlier this week. Early returns indicate that the conservative candidate Porfirio Lobo is poised to defeat liberal candidate Elvin Santos, who is of the same ruling party of both Zelaya and current acting President Roberto Micheletti.
One notable development in this election is the fact that President Obama decided to back the legitimacy of the elections. President Obama had immediately denounced Zelaya’s ouster without considering the legal arguments behind the Honduran decision. President Obama fortunately realized that Zelaya is not an illegally-deposed leader but rather a leftist Hugo Chavez-style populist who sought to undermine Honduran democracy. Chavez used his authority to circumvent the Venezuelan constitution to be able to run for unlimited terms in office. Because Zelaya sought a second term in violation of the Honduran constitution, he was immediately removed from power and stripped of his citizenship.
Hopefully this change in policy will be the first of many Obama foreign policy decisions that seek to uphold democracy and the rule of law instead of appeasing self-described opponents of the United States and its capitalist system. This may be too optimistic, but maybe President Obama will see the error of his ways and stand up to tyrannical regimes in Iran, Venezuela, and North Korea.
The true hero in this ordeal is Micheletti. Not only did he stand up to the ruler of his own party and the world’s greatest superpower, but he supported legitimate elections that saw his party lose power and influence. Honduras is one country where democracy reigns supreme.
NYT thinks so, at least. There’s going to be a “surge” if you will, followed by an eventual draw down, ala Iraq. The question remains, how strict will Obama and his administration take this. He’s making the speech at West Point, which is a brave move on his part. He will have to look in the eyes of those kids and tell them that they are getting sent into Afghanistan. The speech, unlike most of Obama’s speeches, is said to be chock full of specific timelines and policy goals. More on this as it develops.
1. Delaying his decision on Afghan troops-When running for the White House in 2008, President Obama called for an increased troop presence in Afghanistan to fight the Taliban and capture Osama bin Laden. Now that he is on office, he has barely met with his general, who insists that an increased troop presence will stabilize the region. Delaying his decision has both infuriated his general and reduced the morale of our soldiers fighting overseas.
2. Trying 9/11 terrorists in New York City-By trying 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in New York, President Obama is providing Mohammed with access to classified intelligence, a platform to espouse his anti-American views, and the possibility of an acquittal or a mistrial despite his confession and requests for a death sentence.
3. Denouncing the legitimate government of Honduras-When Honduran legistalors voted out former-President Manuel Zelaya after his illegal attempts to secure a second term in office, President Obama sided with Zelaya and declared the new government “illegitimate” without examining either the facts or Honduran law.
4. Investigating CIA officials for alleged torture-Criminalizing the work CIA officials who acted in good faith when conducting counterterrorism investigations to save American lives places a chilling effect on the CIA’s ability and willingness to defend American citizens from terrorist attacks.
5. Bowing to the Japanese Emperor, incorrectly-The fact that President Obama “bowed” to the Emperor shows not only an obsequiousness that the president should not carry, but also his botched execution is a metaphor for his countless foreign policy blunders-all are based on false assumptions.
This list could go on. I welcome my fellow bloggers to either add to this list or critique it…
Congratulations to Tedoro Obiang of Equatorial Guinea, November’s Dictator of the Month! Inspired by this website that is unfortunately no longer updated, I am profiling one current dictator each month (last month was Mswati III of Swaziland).
Obiang gained control of Equatorial Guinea in 1979 after staging a successful military coup against his uncle. Ironically, his military career blossomed because he suppressed a coup against his uncle earlier that decade, when he received a series of promotions up to that of Vice Minister of the Armed Forces and Lieutenant Colonel. In a similar fashion to other military dictators, Obiang was promoted to “Colonel” after his coup.
Obiang is a tyrant. Consistently re-elected with 97% of the vote in clearly-rigged elections, he has been accused of causing countless human rights abuses. These accusations range from suppressing dissent and controlling the media to torturing prisoners, conducting political assassinations, and even staging coups against himself that he can destroy in an efforr to scare anyone who would dare oppose him (if this is true, Obiang has read Machiavelli, who promoted such actions). Equatorial Guinea does have a major source of wealth that Obiang can use to his advantage: plentiful oil and natural gas reserves.
Because few people can even locate Equatorial Guinea on a map, and its oil and natural gas reserves are one of only a few reasons other countries would take any interest in her affairs, we can see why few people have heard of Obiang. Just remember that the next time you fill up your tank, the proceeds could line his pockets.
Brazil, one of the largest and most powerful emerging countries in the world, has arrived on the world stage. Brazil along with India and China has been a key negotiator in the World Trade Organization’s Doha Round and is vying for a UN Security Council Seat. Also, a few weeks ago, Rio de Jeneiro, surprisingly beat the odds by winning the Olympic bid for 2016. Now, it is flexing its political muscle by entering into the dark hole of Middle East politics.
Today, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is hosting the infamous Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran. In the last two weeks, Brazil has hosted President Shimon Peres of Israel and President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority. In his radio address, President Lula said “There’s no point in leaving Iran isolated,” rather “It’s important that someone sits down with Iran, talks with Iran and tries to establish some balance so that the Middle East can return to a certain sense of normalcy.”
This is a clear shot at the American approach, yet ever after Americans changed their approach and offered Iran a number of opportunities, Iran has refused to comply. Meanwhile, Brazil undercuts the United States’ effort and offers the embattled Ahmedinejad an air of legitimacy in the international community.
Can Brazil realistically broker peace? Possibly. If it is seen as a neutral party with the trust of both sides it maybe successful and add to Brazil growing international prestige. However, Russia and China, both of whom are on the table during P5+1 negotiations, are seen as neutral or even pro-Iranian and Iran is unwilling to meet their demands. Brazil may have arrived, but it needs to be careful where it goes from here.
The world has seen increased media coverage of pirate attacks of Spanish and English ships off of the Somali coast recently. This particular story details the release of Spanish hostages after the payment of a 3 million dollar ransom. Although the pirates were later captured, countless suspects still remain at sea, including pirates who are holding a British couple hostage for 7 million dollars.
The United States faced a crisis last spring when an American ship captain was held hostage on the high seas for days. Initial reports had indicated that he was killed, but we later learned that he survived thanks to a daring Navy SEAL operation. In this case, four pirates held the captain hostage, and SEAL snipers killed three of the pirates with simultaneous gunshots. The fourth pirate immediately surrendered and was transported to the US to face trial.
Some sympathizers may blame economic conditions as the cause for piracy (it may contribute) and therefore ask that ships either employ non-lethal tactics when responding to pirates or to pay off their ransom. These responses are flawed because they legitimize piracy as a profession. If Somali citizens saw that piracy was not a profitable profession but one with high risk of death, perhaps they would consider other means of making a living.
Despite his belief that he is a “citizen of the world,” President Obama showed once again how ignorant he is about the world around him. On a recent trip to Japan, President Obama met with the Emperor of Japan and “bowed” to him. While President Obama probably thought he was being respectful towards the emperor, this blogger (who is a Harvard professor) explains how Japanese customs are not like those Obama may have seen in Tom Cruise’s The Last Samurai.
President Obama is seen here bowing to the Emperor and shaking his hand at the same time, both of which were breaches of Japanese etiquette. First, international leaders are not expected to bow to the Emperor, but merely shake his hand (or maybe tilt their head down ten degrees). Second, if one chooses to bow for whatever reason, do not touch while bowing. President Obama may tout growing up in Indonesia as evidence of his international pedigree, but he clearly never bothered to learn that much about Japan before embarking on this trip.
Other writers see this bow as another example of Obama’s capitulation to “world opinion.” Obama has felt that he must apologize for mistakes the United States has made while simultaneously downplaying her triumphs. Therefore, some writers interpret this bow as another example of his subservicence to the rest of the world. As long as President Obama wants to bow, perhaps he should bow to the American populace who elected him.
President Barack Obama and top henchman Attorney General Eric Holder kept their promise that terrorists would be tried in civilian courts as part of an effort to “return to the rule of law.” Despite President Bush’s correct assessment that terrorists should be treated as enemy combatants and tried in military commissions, Obama sees terrorists as criminals who deserve access to our civilian court systems.
The problems with trying al-Qaeda members in civilian courts are numerous, and nobody explains these better than the National Review. While the New York Times and other prominent figures on the left believe that treating terrorists as criminals is the best strategy, NRO notes that this tactic did not work under Clinton’s administration in the 1990s as the courts exposed prosecutons to “the daunting disclosure and witness-confrontation rules that required government to disclose mountains of intelligence, the gargantuan expense of “hardening” courthouses and prisons to protect juries and judges, and the terrorists’ exploitation of legal privileges to plot additional attacks and escape attempts.”
Because al-Qaeda is a terrorist organization based overseas that has been responsible for terrorist attacks at home and abroad, it is reasonable to treat the entire organization and any and all attacks it organizes as matters for military courts. This article stresses that our military courts are well-equipped to balance both the rights of defendants and national security concerns that come with using classified evidence in a trial. It is unfortunate that President Obama does not see this.
National Security News
