Obama has been a [great] awful foreign policy president By <http://www.washingtonpost.com/jennifer-rubin/2011/02/24/ABbIUXN_page.html> Jennifer Rubin
<http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/20/opinion/brooks-where-obama-shines.html> David Brooks writes an odd column in the New York Times today citing foreign policy as a great strength for President Obama. As readers of Right Turn know, I take a very different view of the presidents track record. So lets see if we can spruce up Brookss column. It should only take a few edits. His original text is in brackets. My changes are in bold. It wont help him [win] lose many votes this year, but it should be noted that Barack Obama has been a [good] terrible 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] rigid , [incremental] chaotic and [well] poorly adapted to the specific circumstances of this moment. Following a foreign policy hedgehog, Obamas been a pretty [effective] incompetent fox. Some eras call for bold doctrines, new global architecture and Present at the Creation moments. This is not one of those eras. Today, the world is like a cocktail party at which everybody is suffering from indigestion or some other internal ailment. People are interacting with each other, but theyre mostly focused on the godawful stuff going on inside. Europe has the euro mess. The Middle East has the Arab Spring. The U.S. has the economic stagnation and the debt. The Chinese have their perpetual growth and stability issues. Its not multi-polarity; its multi-problemarity. As a result, this is more of an age of anxiety than of straight-up conflict. Leaders are looking around warily at who might make their problems better and who might make them worse. There are fewer close alliances and fewer sworn enemies. There are more circumstances in which nations are ambiguously attached. In this environment, you dont need big, bold visionaries. You need leaders who will pay minute attention to the unique details and fleeting properties of each regions specific circumstances. You need people who can improvise, shift and play it by ear. Obama, Clinton and the rest are [well] entirely unsuited to these sorts of tasks. Obama has shown [a good] no ability to combine a realist, power-politics mind-set with a warm appreciation of democracy and human rights. Early in his term, he responded poorly to the street marches in Tehran. But his administration has embraced a freedom agenda no more aggressively since then, responding fairly [well] incoherently to the Arab Spring, neither fully embracing nor rejecting those who wanted to stand by the collapsing dictatorships and using American power in a mostly successful humanitarian intervention in Libya. Obama has also shown no [an impressive] ability to learn along the way. He came into office trying to dialogue with dictators in Iran and North Korea. When that didnt work, he didnt learn [learned] his lesson and has been much more [confrontational] conflict-averse since. Early in his term, he tried half-hearted nation-building in Afghanistan. When that, unfortunately, didnt work, he [scaled back] gave our enemies a troop withdrawal schedule to undermine that effort. Obama has managed ambiguity [well] poorly. This is most important in the case of China. When the Chinese military was overly aggressive, he [stood up] caved to China and [reasserted] shrunk Americas permanent presence in the Pacific. At the same time, its misleading to say there is a single China policy. There are myriad China policies on myriad fronts, some of which are confrontational and some of which are collaborative. In other words, its a mess. Obama has also dealt with uncertainty pretty [well] poorly. No one knows what will happen if Israel or the U.S. strikes Irans nuclear facilities. Confronted with that shroud of ignorance, Obama has [properly] irresponsibly 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. The period of delay may be ending, but its been [useful] confusing so far. Obama has also not managed the tension between multilateral and unilateral action. No one can say he is hesitant to [work] defer [with coalitions] to multi-lateral bodies. Look at the Libyan action, or the Iranian sanctions. But when it comes to decimating Al Qaeda, the U.S. has been quite willing to go it alone only in the case of assassinating Osama bin Laden, although continuing and expanding many policies of George W. Bush. There have been failures on Obamas 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. Over all, though, the record is [impressive] horrific. Obama has moved more [aggressively] timidly both to defeat enemies and to champion democracy. He has demonstrated that talk of American decline is hooey if we can only get a competent commander in chief. The U.S. is still responsible for maintaining global order, for keeping people, goods and ideas moving freely. And, partly as a result of his efforts, the world of foreign affairs is relatively [uncontentious] chaotic right now. Foreign policy is not a hot campaign issue. Mitt Romney is having a great deal of [trouble] fun identifying profound disagreements. If thats not a sign of [success] failure, I dont know what is. By <http://www.washingtonpost.com/jennifer-rubin/2011/02/24/ABbIUXN_page.html> Jennifer Rubin | Thé Mulindwas Communication Group "With Yoweri Museveni and Dr. Kiiza Besigye Uganda is in anarchy" Kuungana Mulindwa Mawasiliano Kikundi "Pamoja na Yoweri Museveni na Dk. Kiiza Besigye Uganda ni katika machafuko"
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