Diehl: A World Of Trouble For Obama

Comment: Sooner or later, no matter how politically incorrect it may be, reality becomes apparent. --JHD

WASHINGTON POST, 4/20/2009 by Jackson Diehl (H/t: John Detweiler) - New American presidents typically begin by behaving as if most of the world's problems are the fault of their predecessors -- and Barack Obama has been no exception. In his first three months he has quickly taken steps to correct the errors in George W. Bush's foreign policy, as seen by Democrats. He has collected easy dividends from his base, U.S. allies in Europe and a global following for not being "unilateralist" or war-mongering or scornful of dialogue with enemies.

Now comes the interesting part: when it starts to become evident that Bush did not create rogue states, terrorist movements, Middle Eastern blood feuds or Russian belligerence -- and that shake-ups in U.S. diplomacy, however enlightened, might not have much impact on them. Read more at the Washington Post... Read More......

Biden: "Mark my words"

Joe Biden: The McCain Campaign's Best Friend
The Loft at GOPUSA.com October 21, 2008, by Bobby Eberle

Leave it to Joe Biden to say in one speech what John McCain has been unable to say for an entire campaign. Yes, there is the issue of the economy. (Obama's ties with Fannie and Freddie have barely been mentioned by McCain.) Yes, there is the issue of taxes. (McCain can't seem to explain how cutting taxes for all is better than class warfare and socialism). Yes, there are a host of issues where McCain has a better plan, but one of the most important, especially in a time of war, is that John McCain is ready to be commander-in-chief from Day 1.

Obama has no foreign policy experience and is not ready. Thankfully, Obama picked Sen. Joe Biden as his running mate. This gives Biden plenty of time at the podium and plenty of opportunities to open his mouth. At a speech on Monday, he reminded everyone what the consequences will be by putting a foreign policy novice in charge of the world's strongest military...

During a speech in Seattle, Biden said, "Mark my words. It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy. The world is looking." Biden added, "Watch, we're gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy. And he's gonna have to make some really tough -- I don't know what the decision's gonna be, but I promise you it will occur." [Emphasis added]

Thank you, Joe Biden! Thank you for saying what we all know to be true. When Ronald Reagan became president was the world lying in wait to test him right away? As I remember it, the day Reagan was sworn in as president was the day our American hostages were released from 444 days of captivity in Iran. America wasn't tested, it was respected.

Obama's socialist agenda puts him on the wrong side of many issues, and foreign policy stands out like a sore thumb. He would hold friendly chats with leaders such as Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Venezuela's Hugo Chavez. Doing so, of course, would lend validity to the rhetoric and actions of these people, but that doesn't seem to sink in to Obama.

Then, there is Iraq. Following the success of the major combat operations, the war was not going well at all. Terrorists were moving in, taking control of key locations, and they were winning in their mission to disrupt the transition. McCain not only supported the surge strategy, he was also one of the strategy's strongest supporters. The strategy worked, and now we hardly hear about Iraq in the news at all. I guess if there's nothing bad to report, the media will simply move on to something new like digging up dirt on Joe the Plumber.

Obama, as we all know, opposed the surge. He had no plan of his own other than to simply get out. But retreat is not a plan. Leaving Iraq unstable and in the hands of terrorists is not a plan.

McCain followed-up on Biden's comments by saying, "We don't want a president who invites testing from the world at a time when our economy is in crisis and Americans are already fighting in two wars."

"What is more troubling is that Sen. Biden told their campaign donors that when that crisis hits, they would have to stand with them, because it wouldn't be apparent Sen. Obama would have the right response," added the Republican nominee, who was spending Tuesday in Pennsylvania, another battleground. "Forget apparent. Sen. Obama won't have the right response, and we know that because we've seen the wrong response from him over and over during this campaign."

We can all thank Joe Biden for bringing this up. His affinity for gaffes is legendary, and he may just be the best thing to happen to the McCain campaign. As compiled by Fox News, Biden's gaffes just keep on coming, including saying that Obama should have picked Hillary Clinton instead of him: "She's easily qualified to be vice president of the United States of America and quite frankly it might have been a better pick than me."

Biden also tried to score points during the economic crisis by saying, "When the stock market crashed, Franklin D. Roosevelt got on the television and didn't just talk about the, you know, the princes of greed." However, as noted by Fox News, "Herbert Hoover was president in October 1929 when the stock market crashed. FDR wasn't elected until 1932, and television made its debut a decade later, in 1939."

Speaking about coal, Biden said told Virginia mine workers, "Hope you won't hold it against me, but I am a hard coal miner -- anthracite coal, Scranton, Pennsylvania, that's where I was born and raised." But, of course, he was never a coal miner. Fox News reports, "While his great-grandfather was a mining engineer, his father ran a Delaware car dealership and worked in the oil business. His campaign tried to spin the comments as a joke."

Biden's gaffes are great to listen to, but his latest one is also quite serious. America is at war, and we need a president who is ready to lead. McCain has to make that message clear. McCain has a better tax plan, will appoint better judges, will not engage in class warfare, and will bring his wealth of foreign policy experience to the White House. We can't afford a president whom terrorists will look to "test." Read More......

Second Global Warming Skeptics Conference Announced

Heartland Institute - New York conference expected to draw up to 1,000 scientists and experts Global warming crisis "cancelled" by new scientific discoveries

The organizers of a March 2008 conference that brought together more than 500 scientists, economists, and other experts on global warming today unveiled plans to hold a second conference on March 8-10, 2009, once again in New York City.

The 2009 International Conference on Climate Change will serve as a platform for scientists and policy analysts from around the world who question the theory of man-made climate change. This year's theme, "Global Warming Crisis: Cancelled," calls attention to new research findings that contradict the conclusions of the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report.

Hosting the conference for the second consecutive year will be The Heartland Institute, a 24-year-old national nonpartisan think tank based in Chicago. "All of the event's expenses are being covered by individual and foundation donors to Heartland," said Dan Miller, executive vice president of the institute. "No corporate dollars earmarked for the event were solicited or accepted."

The 2008 conference featured presentations by more than 100 prominent scientists and economists from the U.S. and around the world, including Dr. Robert Balling (Arizona State University), Dr. Stanley Goldenberg (NOAA), Dr. William Gray (Colorado State University), Dr. Yuri Izrael (IPCC), Dr. Patrick Michaels (University of Virginia), Dr. Paul Reiter (Institut Pasteur, Paris), Dr. S. Fred Singer (Science and Environmental Policy Project), Dr. Willie Soon (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics), and Dr. Roy Spencer (NASA).

The 2008 event attracted extensive media attention in the U.S. and internationally, including news coverage by The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Associated Press, Reuters, National Geographic, ABC, BBC, CBS, NBC, Fox News, and others.

"Last March we proved that the skeptics in the debate over global warming constitute the center or mainstream of the scientific community, while the alarmists are on the fringe," said Heartland President Joseph Bast. "In the past six months, the science has grown even more convincing that global warming is not a crisis. Opinion polls and political events, including the defeat of 'cap-and-trade' legislation in the U.S. Senate, also suggest this 'crisis' is over. It has been cancelled by sound science and common sense."

In the coming weeks, Heartland will announce cosponsors and speakers and launch a Web feature to receive online registrations. For audio and video recordings of presentations made at the 2008 conference, visit The Heartland Institute Website. Read More......

Dangerous Times Demand Serious Leadership

By Senator Fred Thompson
Published August 14, 2008 at Townhall.com

This is no time to elect a president whose international experience is limited to speaking to adoring European crowds who want to see the United States retreat from the world...

My mind goes back to August 2002 in Tbilisi, as I visited Georgia with John McCain. I remember it feeling rather dark and secretive, with the former-Soviet Union’s heavy hand still making its presence felt. President Eduard Shevardnadze, formerly Soviet minister of foreign affairs, presented a friendlier face to the United States, but was beset by economic problems and corruption charges. At the time I did not fully appreciate the power of the democratic impulses that were just beginning to bubble up and would lead to the democratic Georgian government we now see threatened.
What has happened in Georgia since that time should not be surprising to anyone. Certainly Russia has tried to pretty itself up: it renamed the KGB and even gave its 21st century strongman Vladimir Putin a new title.

But for some time we’ve seen Russia sliding back to its authoritarian comfort zone. Murder, imprisonment and property confiscation are back in vogue for any perceived troublemaker. Former Soviet provinces have faced all forms of intimidation, from thuggish trade shakedowns to cyber attacks that shut down communications with the outside world. And whether a former satellite like Poland or a longtime western ally like Germany, Russia has made overt threats over plans to bring eastern European countries into NATO or to deploy a U.S.-provided missile defense system.

Russia is not above using anything at its disposal to make its point. It is a wealthy nation, built on a petro-economy that provides oil and gas to dependent European nations, which are petrified of having their energy supplies disrupted and are now in their own economic doldrums.

Given all this, Russia’s incursion into Georgia is a logical extension of Putin’s autocratic words and deeds and Russia’s regional ambitions, which must be leaving those nations closest to Russia’s borders – the Baltic states and Ukraine – nervous about a bitter and uneasy winter.

All the while, in Eastern Europe some of America’s staunchest friends are watching to see what the reaction of the U.S. and the west will be to Russia’s latest gambit. The U.S. and others use the word “unacceptable,” undoubtedly with the same effect that we get when we use it with the Iranians. So do we threaten Russia with denial of the membership in the World Trade Organization that it so covets? Do we expedite Georgia and the Ukraine’s entry into NATO? Do we cut off the tens of millions that we send into Russia to – hopefully – provide for security of nuclear materials? Everything should be on the table.

But the one thing we must not do is allow Russia to feel it can get away with, let alone feel rewarded for, this invasion of a sovereign democratic nation that has also loyally supported coalition efforts in Iraq.

While this crisis plays out we should also note that these events give evidence of a larger reality: the next American President is going to face an international landscape that is more difficult and treacherous than we have ever faced. By now most Americans appreciate the dangers of international terrorism and the fact that a small number of people can wreck unimaginable havoc upon our country and our people if they get their hands on the right kinds of weaponry. What is less understood is that some of the older, traditional kinds of threats are still very much with us, only heightened because of the increasing availability of nuclear weapons and other weapon technologies.

Who wasn’t impressed by the sea of Chinese performers, smiling and perfectly synchronized at the opening ceremony of the summer Olympics, demonstrating to the world their discipline and “organizational skills”? Or their ability to present to TV viewers beautiful fireworks displays that don’t really exist? What isn’t an illusion is that China is engaged in a rapid military buildup, the extent of which we do not know. With hundreds of missiles pointed toward Taiwan, experts say China is developing the capability to take Taiwan before the U. S. has the ability to respond.

Pakistan and India are still belligerently staring each other down over Kashmir. Both countries, of course, have nuclear arsenals, and Pakistan is of questionable stability with a segment of its intelligence community supportive of the Taliban.

The Iranian nuclear threat proceeds apace.

As Iraq stabilizes and our role there is reduced, there will continue to be a major debate within the United States as to how we deal with this increasingly dangerous world of new threats as well as old ones. Our military is stretched thin and worn down and it is clear to anyone who takes the time to study the matter that we cannot get by with the expenditure of 4% of our GDP on our military. The threats to our country are going to require a much more dedicated response. To what extent should we fill the role that we have filled pretty much since the end of World War II as the No. 1 friend of democracy and provider of stability in the world? How much in the way of resources are we going to be willing to devote to this endeavor?

The isolationist tendencies of the Democrats are not limited to trade agreements. Many are tired of the war in Iraq and will want to use any “peace dividend” on domestic purposes as future demands of our entitlement programs become more and more apparent.

Little help can be expected from our friends in Europe no matter how much it appears that their own interests are at stake. European countries spend even less of their GDP on their own defense than we do. They continue to trade with Iran, refusing to impose tough sanctions as Iran develops its nuclear capabilities. These are the weak reeds on which many would have us lean in our effort to fight global terrorism and the authoritarianism that threatens democratic countries.

So let’s recap: international terrorism; powerful nation states on a quest for hegemony, whether close to home or further afield and with a willingness to squelch freedom anytime the opportunity arises; less stable and no less dangerous countries with nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities; an alliance of democratic nations of questionable resolve and a debate at home over our future role in the world with a political party happy to create the impression of diminished resolve with little concern for the long term damage such an impression may cause.

Under these circumstances the old title “leader of the free world” takes on renewed meaning. He will have to guide the body politic at home toward resolution and in all likelihood engender resolve in a new alliance of democratic nations to deal with this broad array of challenges. In short it will require someone with experience and the courage to put his nation’s long term interest above his own.

I suppose it’s obvious where I’m going with this. This is no time to elect a president whose international experience is limited to speaking to adoring European crowds who want to see the United States retreat from the world … until they require our help in the next crisis that threatens them.

It has been instructive for the country to see the candidates’ reaction to the equivalent of Hillary Clinton’s 3 a.m. phone call. While he was vacationing in Hawaii, Barack Obama’s advisors scrambled into action and initially came up with the expected liberal bromides which equated the actions of Russia and Georgia and only ratcheted up the rhetoric when they began to actually understand what was happening.

It wasn’t that difficult for John McCain. For him Georgia was another little-known part of the world, whose leaders and history he is familiar with. And long before this Georgian crisis, he’s had the correct read on Russia, just as he’s had the right read on what we needed to do in Iraq. .

This crisis half a world away confirms what I’ve been saying for a while: This election cycle, the traffic in the world is very heavy …and dangerous; it’s no time to give a kid with barely a learner’s permit the keys to the car. Read More......