WaPo: Obama at odds with every U.S. president since World War II

Does this mean that you think the following President's were setting an insane future for our country?

Harry Truman
John Kennedy
Lyndon Johnson
Jimmy Carter
Bill Clinton

 

This would probably be true if speeches were the sole determinant of a President's position.

In reality he's just the most intelligent speaker of them all. It's no wonder today's right wing hate him so much - he has succeeded where they've failed. He's convinced the average person that he's something different when his policies are just more efficient at achieving the same goals. I understand why they hate him, and I understand why he's such a champion of the blue team. But to make it out as if he's somehow not playing the same red vs blue team game is a joke. He's still that guy, and don't let your media make you think you've finally found someone who cares about you more than his/her own legacy within a race that has nothing to do with the humongous majority of Americans. Don't settle for this, you have better people IMO.

 

It certainly wasn't a win for Russia or Put in or the Russians in the Crimea . In fact it's been a disaster for them all

This is a very embarrassing reality for Putin and others who share his outdated paradigm - that of a 12 year old at a Risk board - to face. It's particularly so for those who rushed to adopt it in March like yourself.

 

/21st Century

 

I side more with the President on this. I don't like the idea of setting up a multi-billion dollar fund to fund the War on Terrorism abroad. I read that as setting up a fund to support indirect military interventionism abroad. If anything, the President should go further and opt to provide economic support to the people of war torn nations by increasing trade with them. If we can help people in other countries live a better life from an economic standpoint, I don't think we'd be seeing civil strife in the middle east. War is the anti-thesis of solving the economic problem. War does nothing but destroy. When we get rich off of our war apparatus at home, we do it at the expense of these nations that war is brought to. Free trade and economic cooperation are they way to bring peace and stability to the places in the world where there's strife. The conservatives and hawks are wrong because their interventionism becomes the cause for future conflict. How many of our wars have set the stage for future conflict? I'm glad that the President differs from the last century of Presidents in this regard.

 

Hillary will reverse this

 

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Watching a documentary on HBO ATM called JFK: A President Betrayed

Obama and JFK have many similarities in handling foreign policy. Junk article. Writer on the Pentagon dole?

http://youtu.be/UUjJa9jnynA

 

Seriously? Access to a "warm water port" and territory?

Heavens, next thing you know they'll be threatening our clipper ships and coaling stations. Is the ambergris trade safe?

And all this prize took was tanking their own economy and the addition of a permanent crimean anchor going forward. The Republicans are sure to take back the House of Lords now

 

You count it as a loss?

 

Voice of reason:

Fareed Zakaria
Opinion Writer

Obama’s leadership is right for today

“Because of his unsure and indecisive leadership in the field of foreign policy, questions are being raised on all sides,” the writer declared, adding that the administration was “plagued by a Hamlet-like psychosis which seems to paralyze it every time decisive action is required.” Is the writer one of the many recent critics of Barack Obama’s foreign policy? Actually, it’s Richard Nixon, writing in 1961 about President John F. Kennedy. Criticizing presidents for weakness is a standard practice in Washington because the world is a messy place and, when bad things happen, Washington can be blamed for them. But to determine what the United States — and Obama — should be doing, we have to first understand the nature of the world and the dangers within it.

From 1947 until 1990, the United States faced a mortal threat, an enemy that was strategic, political, military and ideological. Washington had to keep together an alliance that faced up to the foe and persuaded countries in the middle not to give in. This meant that concerns about resolve and credibility were paramount. In this context, presidents had to continually reassure allies. This is why Dean Acheson is said to have remarked in exasperation about Europe’s persistent doubts about America’s resolve, “NATO is an alliance, not a psychiatrist’s couch!”

But the world today looks very different — far more peaceful and stable than at any point in decades and, by some measures, centuries. The United States faces no enemy anywhere on the scale of Soviet Russia. Its military spending is about that of the next 14 countries combined, most of which are treaty allies of Washington. The number of democracies around the world has grown by more than 50 percent in the past quarter-century. The countries that recently have been aggressive or acted as Washington’s adversaries are getting significant pushback. Russia has alienated Ukraine, Eastern Europe and Western Europe with its recent aggression, for which the short-term costs have grown and the long-term costs — energy diversification in Europe — have only begun to build. China has scared and angered almost all of its maritime neighbors, with each clamoring for greater U.S. involvement in Asia. Even a regional foe such as Iran has found that the costs of its aggressive foreign policy have mounted. In 2006, Iran’s favorability rating in Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia was in the 75 percent to 85 percent range, according to Zogby Research. By 2012, it had fallen to about 30 percent.

In this context, what is needed from Washington is not a heroic exertion of American military power but rather a sustained effort to engage with allies, isolate enemies, support free markets and democratic values and push these positive trends forward. The Obama administration is, in fact, deeply internationalist — building on alliances in Europe and Asia, working with institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and the United Nations, isolating adversaries and strengthening the global order that has proved so beneficial to the United States and the world since 1945.

The administration has fought al-Qaeda and its allies ferociously. But it has been disciplined about the use of force, and understandably so. An America that exaggerates threats, overreacts to problems and intervenes unilaterally would produce the very damage to its credibility that people are worried about. After all, just six years ago, the United States’ closest allies were distancing themselves from Washington because it was seen as aggressive, expansionist and militaristic. Iran was popular in the Middle East in 2006 because it was seen as standing up to an imperialist America that had invaded and occupied an Arab country. And nothing damaged U.S. credibility in the Cold War more than Vietnam.

Obama is battling a knee-jerk sentiment in Washington in which the only kind of international leadership that means anything is the use of military force. “Just because we have the best hammer does not mean that every problem is a nail,” he said in his speech Wednesday at West Point. A similar sentiment was expressed in the farewell address of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, a strong leader who refused to intervene in the Suez crisis, the French collapse in Vietnam, two Taiwan Strait confrontations and the Hungarian uprising of 1956. At the time, many critics blasted the president for his passivity and wished that he would be more interventionist. A Democratic Advisory Council committee headed by Acheson called Eisenhower’s foreign policy “weak, vacillating, and tardy.” But Eisenhower kept his powder dry, confident that force was not the only way to show strength. “I’ll tell you what leadership is,” he told his speechwriter. “It’s persuasion — and conciliation — and education — and patience . It’s long, slow, tough work. That’s the only kind of leadership I know — or believe in — or will practice.”

Maybe that’s the Obama Doctrine.

 

exactly right!

 

Ukraine was the loss for Putin, He didn't see it coming, and can't do much of anything about it. Annexing Crimea and threatening invasion was his only way to save face within his own country. But he can't/won't invade Ukraine and Crimea is black hole of a dependent. It costs billions to support, he was building another Russian Black Sea port anyway, sanctions are edging Russia into a recession and the Chinese took advantage of the Europe's desire to move away from Russian gas to crush him in a deal for Siberian gas. He secured his tyranny domestically with renewed nationalism but relegated himself to a minor player internationally.

 

The Republicans have been squarely in that territory since January 24th (ish) of 2009.

 

This is terrible news for the Ottoman Empire.

 

al Qaida, as Bin Laden stated, wanted to bled America to the point of bankruptcy. After being agitated into two costly wars, Bush almost got us there. Obama isn't the same fool that Bush was. His foreign decisions has been what the US needed in the last 5-6 years. Go after the real terrorist directly involved in 911, wrap up the costly wars, not going to used by the world was their military arms, and instead of just empty words actually practice the use military very judiciously when it absolutely necessary and when it's truly the last option.

How wonderful it is for the USA that many of the international crisis that seek immediate US military interventions in the last few years end up working itself out through other means without any costly US involvement.

 

Remember: Obama is at once a bumbling, incompetent president unfit for the world stage AND a nefarious Manchurian candidate cunning enough to destroy America's global interests from the inside. When discussing President Obama with the likes of OP, you must accept both sides of the Obama coin.

 

The whole Ukraine affair is a clear win only for China. Russia now knows it can trust the US to break promises regarding expanding NATO and starting a new Cold War has decided to mend fences with China and start selling a lot of gas to them.

Obama is to blame for deciding to intervene in a Ukraine internal dispute on the Russia border, but at least he did not make it worse by sending US troops to the Russian border.