Ralph Peters of the New York Post gives his sober assessment of Obama's reaction to Iran's election farce.
THE OBAMA EFFECTIt must have been the viewing angle: The despots who run Iran somehow missed the halo gracing President Obama during his recent sermon to the Muslim world.
The ruling mullahs' contemptuous handling of Iran's presidential election was their response to "the Cairo effect" announced a tad prematurely by the White House.
Our president's public flagellation of America only emboldened the junta in Tehran -- leaving Iran's power brokers more defiant, determined and dismissive than they've been in years.
And the strongest response Obama can muster to the blood in Tehran's streets is: "I am deeply troubled by the violence that I've been seeing on television." How bold, how manly, how inspiring . . .
Our president's speechwriters made the same mistake no end of diplomats and pundits made before them: They didn't pause to consider the enemy's viewpoint. Like Obama himself, they didn't bother trying to understand the mullahs' logic for acting as they do.
Obama believed that his rhetoric would change the strategic environment -- and his White House apostles wasted no time before declaring that his Cairo speech was responsible for Hezbollah's electoral setback in Lebanon a few days later.
Then administration spokespersons panted to take credit for the "inevitable" election of Mir Hossein Mousavi in Iran. But the men who run Iran didn't play along: Every Basij (regime-thug) baton cracking a demonstrator's skull in Tehran is a -- distinctly clenched -- fist shoved in Obama's face.
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3 comments:
I was in favor of Bush when he ran against Al Gore, but the realization that he was very soft on border security and wanted illegals to become citizens, made me change my mind.
I supported the invasion of Afghanistan right after 9/11, but opposed the invasion of Iraq.
These two things together - the betrayal on the border and the invasion of Iraq - made me very critical of the former president.
Now I realize that Obama domestically is a continuation of America's march towards socialism, but I do feel he may be able to solve some foreign policy issues a little better.
I was a huge Reagan fan (an even huger Goldwater fan), but those were the days of Soviet Empire, threatening Europe.
As a European I see a bigger threat against my continent in the islamization of it through immigration and the ongoing invasion of immigrants from the Third World. It actually threatens democracy more
than al Qaida or the Mullahs of Teheran. (Okay, them acquiring nuclear weapons is a worry.)
Goldwater and Reagan kept quite on immigration because in their time it was no big issue, while it has become probably the number one issue today.
So until the neocons and the GOP cleans up its immigration act I will lend an ear to the paleos even on foreign issues.
P.S. Sorry about the flawed grammar at the end there, but I was in a hurry (still am) and not paying attention.
Referring to "cleans up its immigration act" when it should have been "clean up their immigration act".
Oh, well, these things do matter.
P.P.S. From a nitpicker's point of view, I like to point out the flawed grammar in the title of this blog. ;-) It should be "doesn't make sense", right?
The End.
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