Obama Defends Rogue Leader Talks
Those Who Cannot Remember The Past ...
By California Yankee Posted in 2008 | Obama — Comments (16) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
MSNBC’s Firstread reports Obama is on the defense over his promise to talk to the leaders of rogue states:
The campaign's surrogates have slowly been walking back his initial declarations and the RNC and McCain folks have been pouncing hard on him.
The Associated Press reports that the issue, and Obama's morphing position, isn't as simple as Obama wants voters to think it is:
Obama gets cheers at his rallies when he declares there is nothing to fear, and potentially much to gain, from talking to enemies as well as friends.
But U.S. diplomacy is not that simple and neither is his position.
This week, Obama qualified his past statements that he would meet the Iranian leadership directly and without precondition by saying he did not necessarily mean Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's hardline, anti-American president.
Nor is it certain lately at what point he, as president, would speak personally with some of the dictators he says should be engaged.
This, despite months of assertions that his willingness to sit down with foes sets him apart from Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton and now McCain, the likely Republican presidential nominee, who challenges Obama on that point.
Read on, there is more.
Yesterday, I took Obama for task for relying upon President Kennedy's disastrous talks with Khrushchev as precedent and justification for Obama's Carter-like naive promise.
Today, in the New York Times, Nathan Thrall and Jesse James Wilkins take up the theme that Obama should learn something from the Kennedy experience. In an opinion piece entitled, "Kennedy Talked, Khrushchev Triumphed," they write:
Although Kennedy was keenly aware of some of the risks of such meetings — his Harvard thesis was titled “Appeasement at Munich” — he embarked on a summit meeting with Khrushchev in Vienna in June 1961, a move that would be recorded as one of the more self-destructive American actions of the cold war, and one that contributed to the most dangerous crisis of the nuclear age.
Senior American statesmen like George Kennan advised Kennedy not to rush into a high-level meeting, arguing that Khrushchev had engaged in anti-American propaganda and that the issues at hand could as well be addressed by lower-level diplomats. Kennedy’s own secretary of state, Dean Rusk, had argued much the same in a Foreign Affairs article the previous year: “Is it wise to gamble so heavily? Are not these two men who should be kept apart until others have found a sure meeting ground of accommodation between them?”
But Kennedy went ahead, and for two days he was pummeled by the Soviet leader.
[. . .]
A little more than two months later, Khrushchev gave the go-ahead to begin erecting what would become the Berlin Wall. Kennedy had resigned himself to it, telling his aides in private that “a wall is a hell of a lot better than a war.” The following spring, Khrushchev made plans to “throw a hedgehog at Uncle Sam’s pants”: nuclear missiles in Cuba. And while there were many factors that led to the missile crisis, it is no exaggeration to say that the impression Khrushchev formed at Vienna — of Kennedy as ineffective — was among them.
If Barack Obama wants to follow in Kennedy’s footsteps, he should heed the lesson that Kennedy learned in his first year in office: sometimes there is good reason to fear to negotiate.
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. -- George Santayana
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You are sooo right. At least if McCain went to Tehran, he would call them Arabs (even though they aint) then take a nap in the corner.
Wait, you mean like if Barack went to Afganistan and tried to talk Arabic to them? Since all our Arbic translators are stuck in Iraq.
I don't know if Barack speaks Arabic, but since all the Army kicked out all of its Arabic translators because they happened to be gay, we are in a bind, aren't we?
Parents, you better send your sons and daughters off to the military, cuz McCain's gonna need them for about another 100 years or so.
"Land of the Free and Home of da Whopper" Peter Griffin...Family Guy
conform and celebrate diversity....or else!!!
I'm guessing you don't know whats going on in politics either then cause that point went way over your head.
however Obama will have many a sleepless night wondering why he ever made an issue out of Bush's speech at the Knesset. Along with the articles you mentioned, I also recommend Robert Novak's piece about the manner in which McCain is attacking Obama...
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/05/mccain_not_disarmed.ht...
We as Reps can only hope the rest of this election is spent exploring who of the two has the better foreign policy vision. Obama has quickly found himself in John Kerry territory where the position is not so much nuanced but frankly just confused.
Dick Morris (one of my favorite analysts for observations just like this) once said that the best position for any politician to take is the one that is easiest to explain. McCain won't negotiate with the Iranians until they give up and verify that their nuclear program is through, stop supporting insurgents in Iraq, stop threatening Israel, etc.
What is Obama's position? No one is really sure and it takes paragraphs to explain. He can't decide if Iran is or isn't a threat. He will meet with "leaders" but not necessarily Ahmadinejad. He won't have pre conditions but will have preparations. Or maybe, he will have preconditions. Who knows? The position has turned into something no one can understand. That is a bad place to be in politics.
That's why McCain refuses to let it go, it's because this is now his biggest winner.
Furthermore, once your position is muddled, then your opponents are left to define it as they please. That's why McCain is repeating ad nauseam that Obama has promised to meet with Ahmadinejad without preconditions in his first year. That is Obama's weakest position, and McCain is going to continue to exploit it. Now, Obama is stuck trying to defend himself by trying to explain the nuanced differences between meeting with Ahmadinejad in the first year, and what he really means, which frankly even he doesn't know.
This is the definition of a mess for him.
I just finished a piece on my own site about the troubles this will cause him
Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor
What is Obama's position? No one is really sure and it takes paragraphs to explain. He can't decide if Iran is or isn't a threat.
Perhaps McCain could pin Obama by quoting some of Obama's own supporters on Iran, and asking Obama directly if he agrees with those stands or not.
Joseph Cirincione, one of Obama's advisers, had ventured that a "Grand Bargain" with Iran would include a promise by Iran not to develop nukes, in exchange for Israel voluntarily dismantling all her own nukes. Does Obama agree with Mr. Cirincione or not?
On Daily KOS, the prevailing attitude is "Iran is not a threat to America; America is a threat to Iran and Iran has the right to develop nukes in her own defense against America." Does Obama agree with them about that or not?
Till now, Obama has been playing only to peacenik audiences. They cheer every time he talks about avoiding war. But he's never talked to any audiences who care more about avoiding appeasement than avoiding war, and who would actually boo a policy of appeasement. In fact, he's hoping there aren't any.
This will be an issue we see Obama distort over the next 6 or so months. He'll claim its no different then what Bush wants, even though we get nothing from Obama's deal.
Much like Kennedy I can see Obama saying "Well having all the greater US getting destroyed is better then having war."
"No matter how much lipstick you put on the taxation pig, it's still a pig... and it's currently snout-down in your wallet." - Michael Fisk
The whole reason why Obama is sticking to his guns on this, is because he's trying to run against Bush.
Here's the dynamic: Every time McCain attacks Obama for wanting to appease Iran, Obama comes right back with "Anything would be an improvement over Bush's intransigence." That's his argument and his ploy: Keep drumming it into the public that Bush tried forcefulness and it hasn't produced results. For example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQ2yJqWguCU
You can observe that dynamic there: First, denounce some of Ahmedinijad's statements as "odious." And then comes the pivot: Bush failed so we need to try something that's totally different.
That's Obama's entire theme: I'm not Bush, not Bush, not Bush, not Bush.
"but since all the Army kicked out all of its Arabic translators because they happened to be gay, we are in a bind, aren't we? "
We couldn't send them to the Middle-East, they would be killed by having heavy stones rolled on them (Unless they were young enough and boyish enough that the local Imams wanted them for their harems).
"You should talk to James Baker, remember HW's Sec of State?"
Why? He thinks we should be talking with the the ratbag governments. We are (at a lower level. At the same time we stopped talking to the parliamentry opposition. The Iranians and Syrians are now beating up on the opposition.
Oh! The Syrians loved Pelosi's and Carter's visits so much they decided to take over Lebanon to they could take them to the beach the next time they visited.
According to this article Obama never claimed he would meet with Ahmadinejad himself as he is not actually the supreme leader of Iran. McCain gave some interesting replies when asked about this.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/20/mccain-confronted-with-ne_n_102...
Stop it.
I have read the text of an Obama response where he says he would meet with Ahmadinejad (And no I am not going to spend any time looking for a link - you already know this).
This was of course before the appologists got to the stage of saying that Ahmadinejad was not the leader. Indeed, it was before they decided to say that no-preconditions did not mean minion not working on pre-conditions before a meeting.
Lord help us all if Obama actually wins. He will go to Tehran, they will see what an absolute fool he is, and then they will prepare their invasion of Israel knowing that Obama doesn't have the guts to stand up to them. Oh, and a dirty bomb or two for the streets of Chicago or Miami.