Bryan Preston:
There is not a great deal to say about President Obama’s speech. He delivered an address to sell an action he has no intention of taking, knowing that the American people, the Congress, and the world are against him. He seemed to visibly shrink while he delivered his 15-minute address.
Obama gets very little right these days. Two years ago he stuck his nose into Syria’s civil war by declaring that Assad must go. He said no such thing when Iranians demonstrated against their government and many of them died, in 2009. Why? His choice of conflicts in which to engage remains baffling. Yes to knock off Gaddafi, who posed no threat to the US, yes to knock off Mubarak, who was our ally, yes to knock off Assad, who again posed no threat to the US, but no to knocking off Assad’s puppet masters in Tehran, who do pose a growing threat to the US. Knock them off and you change everything.
A year ago Obama answered a hypothetical question regarding Assad’s possible use of weapons of mass destruction in a manner that was ill-advised and instantly put him and his credibility on the hook to act. Anyone who has ever engaged in communications professionally would coach against engaging hypothetical questions. There be dragons over that horizon. But Obama did, he declared a “red line” and here we are. A year later, he has put the credibility of the United States on the line because he unwisely engaged a hypothetical question and chose not to walk it back.
How should he have answered that question? Well, in the first place, he should not have made it US policy that Assad must go, after his lieutenants wined and dined Assad and called him a “reformer.” Assad was never a reformer and would never become one. He did nothing to earn that pat on the head from the United States. If anything emboldened Assad, it isn’t whatever happens after the alleged use of chemical weapons, it is how the Obama administration opened direct relations with Assad when he had done nothing to earn that honor. Obama’s election and re-election surely did more to embolden the Assads and Putins of the world than anything else.
But he did declare that Assad must go, and then he did engage the hypothetical question. After legitimizing Assad’s bloody rule. At every turn, Barack Obama has done the wrong thing.
So he is still doing the wrong thing, and making an illogical case in the process. He rightly decries the humanitarian toll in Syria’s civil war. It is terrible. But why only worry about the rebels, and not what the rebels are doing to the Christians there and what the Islamists are doing in Egypt? He says any US action would be so finely calibrated that it would not be a pin prick, because “the U.S. military doesn’t do pin pricks” he says (never mind how surgical the Special Forces can be) but not so great that it would topple Assad. But it would, somehow, degrade his ability to use chemical weapons. Without tipping the war any which way.
None of this makes any sense.
I despise the first strike limited act Obama is willing to talk about because it leads to God-knows-what next!
And what did he say about Israel IF his despicable war ”plan” leads to it being attacked?
They can defend themselves.
What????
What if Israel does MORE than defend itself?
What if Israel goes after whoever attacks it?
I can see that POS Obama taking the lead in calling down the evil of ”disproportionality” on Israel’s head!
And, immediately the rest of the world would pile on.
So, is this the real plan?
The Hot Air headline says it all “Desperate man tries to convince world he has faintest idea of what he’s doing”
http://hotair.com/archives/2013/09/10/open-thread-desperate-man-tries-to-convince-world-he-has-faintest-idea-of-what-hes-doing/
After reading parts of the speech, I am left with the impression Obama laments Iraq (mentioned 5 x) because the American People will not support his choices in Syria. Reading between the lines, his choice to go with the Russian plan is based solely on the idea that he has no political cover because George W Bush squandered military adventurism during his term! Barack Obama blames George W Bush for him not following through on firing missiles at Syria.
Obama admits he miscalculated support from the warmongering right just as he miscalculated support from the support Obama at any cost left. This miscalculation is based on Obama being a narrow minded left wing ideologue. And even then appeals to the warmongers to remind them they are giving up on a chance at killing people by not supporting his choice. He appeals to the left by reminding them he is their leader and solely gets to decide what issues their conscience should be stirred. He lost the right and the left because they refused to act in a manner he stereotypically expected them to in a parody of themselves. Thus Obama has become the parody of the ideologue by blaming people for not acting as his world view demanded.
It’s everyone’s fault and not Obama’s. And even though everyone didn’t act the way I expected them to act, it is through my actions that Syria is giving up chemical weapons. Barack Obama is what that speech was about.
So, what the hell do you wingnuts want? First he’s a chicken shit if he doesn’t invade, then he’s a traitor when he said he’d attack without Congress’ approval (becasue he DOES have the authority). Then when he goes to Congress, he’s weak. Either way the right was against spending the money to attack and even starting re-writing history with regard to Bush, THEN Syria agrees to give up their weapons with pressure from Putin.
Once again, Obama is masterfully playing the right to appear like the lunatic and hypocrites they are.
AP has fact-checked Obama’s speech and found it wanting where it matters most.
Obama failed to PROVE his case against Assad.
More here:
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/fact-check-obamas-syria-case-still-lacks-proof
@This one:
You are beyond help if you actually believe what you write.
@Mully: Not only that, Mully, but, if This One belives Obama is wise in making foreign policy, he must believe that painting oneself into a corner is genius!
Obama’s go-to gal, PhD Elizabeth O’Bagy was fired from The Institute for the Study of War today for FAKING her credentials!
She was the only one who kept saying the rebels were mostly moderate Muslims!
Now, there are none.
@This one:
You need to increase your antipsychotic medication dose. Please call your doctor.
Obama is a fool who has mishandled every foreign interaction of his horrible presidency. Giving tbe British monarch an ipod filled with his speeches? Sending back the bust of Churchill? Doing nothing to support the Iranian uprising against the mullahs, but supporting the jihadist overthrow of Libya, leading to the murderof our ambassador and three other Americans last year? Pissing off the vast majority of Egyptians by continuing to support the terrorist Muslim Brotherhood thugs that the people of Egypt just tossed out of power? And now his pathetic posturing on pointless missile attacks on Syria for allegedly using chemical weapons, when there is significant controversy over who actually used them?
Obama was never prepared to be president, and it was only the syncophantic media and koolaid swilling leftists who failed to recognize his intrinsic lack of actual ability.
Obama is a complete failure, and things are only going to get worse under his lack of compentency.