Obama’s Free Lunch Is Over
posted by Josiah Garber on August 28, 2009
in Politics, War & Peace
by Philip Giraldi
I am one of those conservatives who has been inclined to cut President Barack Obama some slack on foreign policy and national security issues. I believe that he inherited a “worst possible” international situation with the United States universally hated, two wars being lost and a third one waiting in the wings, an “ally” in Israel with an elected government that was both racist and heedless of the national interest of its great benefactor, and anti-American populism on the march everywhere in Latin America. To be sure, Obama has moved quickly to change the “tone” of the conversation, restoring civility with many of America’s neighbors and friends. He has demonstrated that he is serious about a Palestinian state and has established the principle that it is better to negotiate with adversaries than to start preventive wars.
All of that granted however, President Obama has failed to carry out the change that he promised when he was running for office. If one assumes that he won the presidency due to the votes of people who wanted an end to wars in the Middle East and Central Asia and who wanted a rollback of legislation that has enabled the government to spy on its own citizens and lock them up without appeal, then he has been a complete disappointment. Every feature of the Bush Administration security and surveillance state remains in place, including secret prisons, military tribunals, arbitrary arrest, and monitoring of citizens. Iraq continues to simmer with no end in sight and AfPak, as the other expanding war is now called, is exploding even though a growing body of opinion appreciates that it is a conflict that cannot be won. Under Obama, missile strikes from predator drones have actually increased, killing more insurgents but also many more civilians and shaking an already unstable Pakistan.
Email This Post