WaPo: Obama's Diplomacy Naive

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

Just over two years ago Barack Obama triggered the first and most enduring foreign policy debate of the presidential campaign when he was asked whether he would "be willing to meet separately, without precondition, during the first year of your administration, in Washington or anywhere else, with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea."

"I would," responded Obama. He later hedged a little but otherwise stuck to that stance through months of pounding by Hillary Rodham Clinton and later John McCain, both of whom called him naive. His advocacy of what he called "direct diplomacy" became a prime feature of his campaign; the suggestion was that this energetic and eloquent man could, as president, bring about breakthroughs in some of the toughest foreign policy problems through his personal diplomacy.

So it seems worth noting that as Obama heads into the homestretch of his first year he has yet to meet with any of the enumerated rogues -- a passing handshake with Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez at an inter-American summit notwithstanding. Nor is he likely to have any such meetings in the foreseeable future. In fact, one of the emerging lessons of the Obama administration's foreign policy might be summed up as follows: The idea that presidential "direct diplomacy" with actors such as Chávez, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Kim Jong Il or Fidel Castro is feasible or likely to produce results is, well, naive.

It's not that Obama hasn't tried. According to reports in the Iranian media he has dispatched two letters to Iran's supreme cleric, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. He has sent multiple high-level envoys to meet Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus. Shortly after the administration took office, a new special representative for North Korea publicly offered bilateral negotiations to Pyongyang; former president Bill Clinton later met dictator Kim with the administration's sanction. Obama graciously accepted Chávez's gift of a stridently anti-American book and later dispatched a new ambassador to Caracas. He lifted some sanctions on Cuba.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/06/AR2009090601186.html

I wonder if Obama will learn from his mistakes or if Hillary will be put on a shorter leash.

[DumbAss Tanker]

I wonder if Obama will learn from his mistakes or if Hillary will be put on a shorter leash.

I know where the smart money is on that one.

 

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

I know where the smart money is on that one.

 

We would be naive if we did not admit Obama is very smart but I think 1 thing could undo him:

His inner circle...they are yes men and those with their own leftist ideas who will propagandize Obama as much as us. Meaning they will mislead him if it allows them to experiment with their agenda. If Obama over-relies on them he is doomed.

I think his ego will cripple him in that he thinks he's picked the best and their compliments reaffirm his decision.

[vesta111]

We would be naive if we did not admit Obama is very smart but I think 1 thing could undo him:

His inner circle...they are yes men and those with their own leftist ideas who will propagandize Obama as much as us. Meaning they will mislead him if it allows them to experiment with their agenda. If Obama over-relies on them he is doomed.

I think his ego will cripple him in that he thinks he's picked the best and their compliments reaffirm his decision.

Smart does not in any way mean talent and diplomacy is a true art that takes years to master.

He is reaching way over his head to find a big problem he can fix and turn into another selling point for reelection.

As president he should be hell on wheels to repair our infrastructure, our bridges and roads, clamping down on inspections of our food sources, working to provide for cleaning up our polluted rivers and lakes. Insisting the Governors clean up their own city's, bull doze down the abandoned factory's and burned out areas.   Take the now empty space and turn it into comunity gardens for the poor, or anyone else interested in having a small plot to get them back to the land.

I cannot understand for the life of me why day workers are needed in farming comunities.  Our jails hold enough low level criminals to do that work and be paid a stipend for their labor.

Oh Yeah someone would compair working prisoners to the Korean work camps. 

Personally I thing Obama is toast or darn near cooked. Most everyone around him shows their butt as being more concerned with becoming a Hero to their so called people.

I have yet to see anyone reach out to people of another race and try to elevate them up the ladder.  Few white politicians give a darn about the rights of other whites, just their own ability to make them live as they wish them to.

Few Black Politicians give a thought to the Asian citizens that are born here, Few Latinos give a hoot about the Black, White or Asian people.

This has in fact become a race war at the very top of our administration.  These people have no excuse of being uneducated or poor, they are very well educated and rolling in the big bucks.