Taylor Marsh » diplomacy

Falkland Islanders Vote to Stay British, Now There’s a Shock!

AA Birch — Tue, 12 Mar 2013 21:00:20 +0000

This was a hatchet job. Make no mistake about it. A British Overseas Territory, full of British citizens, votes to remain under Britain’s umbrella of sovereignty. The result would have pleased even the most despotic of dictators; 1513 of the 1517 voters who bothered to show up decided Britain was a more attractive proposition than Argentina. I’d never of guessed. The four who didn’t vote yes must be feeling pretty weird right now. Maybe Argentina could make them honorary citizens? That’d be four off the islands, leaving about 1,700 to go.

I make light of this because to my mind the whole situation a little bit farcical. There is nothing funny about war or the threat of it, Falkland Islanders of a certain age know that all too well, but conducting this kind of vote still doesn’t serve a purpose. It won’t stop the recent resurgence of vitriol by Argentina’s government against the islands, known in Spanish as Islas Malvinas. We remain in the same position as we were before the vote. Nothing is going to change the current make up. Argentina is not going to invade again and physically lay claim to a group of islands only a handful of people really, honestly, care about. The fact that Argentina still whines about Britain taking the islands in 1833 is all a bit pathetic. Get over it. Move on.

But Argentina refuses to. Argentina says the vote doesn’t change anything. Now there’s is something we can agree on. But Argentina’s reasoning is different to mine. They say the islanders’ views don’t count, and that this is a dispute between themselves and Britain over what amounts, going back in history, to colonial rule. I can imagine the reaction at the UN when “any other business” comes around. Argentina’s hand shoots up, while everyone else groans at the thought of another nonsensical “debate”. Part of me wishes Britain (in fact everyone) would just ignore Argentina when it mentions the Falklands. Or maybe just point to a Union Flag before putting a finger to the lips. Anything to stop what will end up being a glorified attempt at a nationalistic shouting match.

The islands are home to under 3,000 people, the majority being native Falkland Islanders. At least as native as you can be. Leave them alone. They are about as unobtrusive as anyone could possibly be. The Argentine government should stop deflecting attention away from it’s real problems at home, and the British authorities should stop rising to it. Concentrate on important issues, not on a small collection of islands in the south Atlantic, and definitely not on a hatchet job of a referendum.

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Pres. Obama’s Deficit Debacle, National Security, and Warmaking

Taylor Marsh — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 04:11:07 +0000

I’ve been reading a lot about the Pentagon’s possible budget hit, with analysis all over the map. What this proves conclusively is that no one knows what will happen. That’s the real rub in Obama’s debt ceiling debacle. No one can possibly know the specifics in outlying years. There are too many unknown unknowables, to paraphrase big spender Rummy, which is proven by reading the myriad of opinions on what might manifest.

William Hartung, Director, Arms Security Project, Center for International Policy*:

“In the short-term, the budget deal crafted by the president and the congressional leadership gives the Pentagon virtually a free ride. It reduces projected Pentagon spending by less than one percent. These proposed reductions are further diluted by the fact that they will be counted against a broad ‘security’ category that will include the Department of Homeland Security and other agencies beyond the Pentagon proper. These miniscule reductions are unacceptable. Real cuts in Pentagon expenditures can be imposed without reducing our security. Any longer-term deal should reflect this reality.”

Andrew Bacevich, Professor, Boston University:

“The prospect of defense cuts ought to concentrate some minds in Washington. To avoid reductions that are arbitrary and capricious requires clarity of strategic purpose. The really big question is not how many billions should come out of the Pentagon’s bloated budget. No, the big question is this one: given our straitened economic circumstances and in light of the monumental catastrophes of the past decade, what is America’s proper role in the world? Simply reciting cliches about ‘global leadership’ won’t cut it. The time to make hard choices is at hand.”

Winslow Wheeler, head of the Strauss Military Reform Project at the Center for Defense Information, via Josh Rogin:

…said that the whole notion of the cuts is misleading anyway, because the numbers are being compared projections that were inaccurate in the first place.

“There will be reductions … but the actual figure is also masked by the fact that the debt deal is compared to a ten year CBO ‘baseline,’ which is [the fiscal] 2011 spending levels adjusted according to arcane rules and inflated by a highly unreliable projection of long term future inflation,” he said.

“The debt deal kicks the defense budget can down the road for this and future Congresses. People should not read precision and certainty into a political deal specifically designed to be uncertain and indistinct.”

From McClatchy:

Rather than cutting $400 billion in defense spending through 2023, as President Barack Obama had proposed in April, the current debt proposal trims $350 billion through 2024, effectively giving the Pentagon $50 billion more than it had been expecting over the next decade.

With the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan winding down, experts said, the overall change in defense spending practices could be minimal: Instead of cuts, the Pentagon merely could face slower growth.

“This is a good deal for defense when you probe under the numbers,” said Lawrence Korb, a defense expert at the Center for American Progress, a left-leaning research center. “It’s better than what the Defense Department was expecting.”

[...] But the bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform — known as the Bowles-Simpson proposal, for its two chairmen — proposed far deeper reductions last fall, saying the military could still maintain its power.

Korb, who studies defense budgets, said Congress could cut the defense baseline budget by $100 billion annually over the next decade and still spend more than it did during the height of the Cold War, adjusted for inflation. He noted that the baseline defense budget has climbed every year for 13 years, a record increase.

Anthony H. Cordesman from CSIS on the debt ceiling deal:

There is good reason why anyone who cares about the current legislation on the budget deficit should care about its near-term impact on national security:

The entire debate reflected a total disregard of the need for the State Department and other civil departments to play a major role in consolidating our victory in Iraq, supporting a transition to Afghan control in 2014, and preparing for the United States to play a major role in supporting democracy and political change in the Middle East.
This pressure comes at a time when the Defense Department has had years of growth in real spending, does little or no realistic long-term force planning, cannot control its manpower and procurement costs, and was already seeking cuts in programs between $78 billion and $400 billion. Even before the president added the goal of cutting the budget by $400 million over the next 12 years (long before the present debate), the Defense Department had planned to eliminate all real growth in defense spending after FY2013—which would reduce the total defense budget from $708 billion in FY2011 to $661 billion in FY2016—even if one assumes that the United States will still be spending $50 billion a year on its wars.
Not one word of the debate addressed the rise in the total interagency homeland defense budget to over $70 billion a year, a massive new effort that has grown with minimal efficiency and without adult supervision.
The new legislation layers a whole new set of cuts over the existing cuts forced on the defense secretary in preparing the FY2012 budget submission, which means massive new short-term pressure to find cuts—any cuts—in defense spending.
The debate that led up to the legislation produced a totally dishonest proposal for cuts in wartime spending amounting to $1 trillion dollars. This was matched by an equally dishonest Future Year Defense Program submission for FY2012 from the Defense Department, which claimed that the total cost of Afghanistan, Iraq, and the global war on terrorism would suddenly drop from $159 billion in FY2011 and $118 billion in FY2012 to a constant level of $50 billion in FY2013–2016. The real cost of our wars has to be over $75 billion in FY2013, and no one knows the out-year costs. As for the $1 trillion in savings, it would take 20 years to achieve a $1-trillion savings at a rate of $50 billion a year, and that would mean two decades in which the United States could not spend a dime on any overseas contingency.

But, the legislation is not going to survive in ways that have any real mid- or long-term impact. This becomes clear the moment anyone examines the real-world nature of the supposed longer-term plans for defense cuts in the legislation.

First, there is no way to usefully assess what the numbers involved actually mean or to regard them as politically credible. We are talking about making cuts to nonexistent plans and budget baselines some 12 years into the future.

Second, these cuts are to be made in undefined dollars, where no one can yet define current or constant dollars for the time period involved or estimate the extent to which the cost of defense rises faster than the average rate of future inflation.

Third, the cuts are purely political numbers that do not reflect any analysis of national security needs, where the cuts would come from, or the risk involved. They make no allowance for new contingency requirements. They are to be carried out over more than a decade without regard to future developments in the U.S. economy and competing needs for federal spending.

Fourth, the cuts are not based on any serious examination of the priority of national security spending relative to other discretionary spending and entitlements programs and sources of revenue. They do not look at the fact that national security—which everyone agrees is a legitimate priority for federal activity—costs less than 5 percent of a $14 trillion dollar economy even though we are still involved in two wars. They totally ignore the fact that it is the rising cost of medical treatment (rising from 5 to 6 percent of GDP in the past toward 19 percent) and the needs of an aging population (rising from 12 to 20 percent of the total) that is the key area that has pushed up our debt and deficit and where we need sound national programs—not simply budget cuts.

Fifth, the deadlines that could trigger the massive additional cuts are absurd. There is no credible way that the Special Joint Committee can really address the cuts that should be made in our national security efforts by November 23, 2011, or that the Congress as whole could properly evaluate the result for an up-or-down vote by December 23, 2011.

Lawrence Korb, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress; former Assistant Secretary of Defense*:

”The proposed deal does not go far enough in reining in a military budget which in real terms is higher than at any time since World War II. In fact, the total reductions over the next decade are likely to be less than the $400 billion proposed by President Obama.”

Heather Hurlburt, Executive Director, National Security Network*:

“If a congressional commission includes a serious, bipartisan review of defense strategy and expenditures, and abides by its recommendations, this is an opportunity for all sides to show they’re serious about constructing an American defense strategy that is effective and affordable for our times.”

ABC News:

On first blush it appears the $2.1 billion debt ceiling compromise hits the Pentagon’s budget pretty hard in the next decade, but the reality is that in the short term the $350 billion in defense cuts is smaller than what Pentagon officials had been preparing for. However, the deal also holds out the possibility that in the long term there could be even deeper cuts in defense spending if a bipartisan committee is unable to come up with an additional $1.2 trillion in savings by the end of this year.

…and just in case you haven’t been paying attention, which plays into Pres. Obama’s hands on national security, as well as obliterates the line between Democrats and Republicans, secrecy still rules (n/t Noah Shachtman of Danger Room).

The Senate Intelligence Committee rejected an amendment that would have required the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence to confront the problem of “secret law,” by which government agencies rely on legal authorities that are unknown or misunderstood by the public.

The amendment, proposed by Sen. Ron Wyden and Sen. Mark Udall, was rejected on a voice vote, according to the new Committee report on the FY2012 Intelligence Authorization Act.

“We remain very concerned that the U.S. government’s official interpretation of the Patriot Act is inconsistent with the public’s understanding of the law,” Senators Wyden and Udall wrote. “We believe that most members of the American public would be very surprised to learn how federal surveillance law is being interpreted in secret.”

Finally, Adm. Dennis Blair, former United States Director of National Intelligence in the Obama administration, for all you wonks (substance starts at 3 min. in). Blair starts with a terrific quote from John Cleese, which is pretty perfect considering the absurdity we’ve all had to endure the last weeks.

*TM Note: Attribution on this quote has been changed.

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Let’s Play ‘Who’s More Pro-Israel?’

Taylor Marsh — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 04:01:17 +0000

Let’s see, Gaza or gossip, which shall it be? For almost every news outlet this week it was the latter, while the former is where the action is. From James Zogby writing over at Huffington Post:

When it comes to issues involving Israel, politicians in Washington can become quite hysterical, making the dumbest remarks or doing the most illogical things. Evidence of such bizarre behavior abounds, and this week provided several examples.

Taking top prize would be newly-elected Republican Senator Mark Kirk of Illinois. Kirk wants the U.S. to use military assets to stop the humanitarian flotilla on its way to Gaza. He wrote that the United States should “make available all necessary special operations and naval support to the Israeli Navy to effectively disable flotilla vessels before they can pose a threat to Israeli coastal security or put Israeli lives at risk”.

[...] … All this might just be dismissed as “political pandering” or more “harmless hot air” from politicians who specialize in both. But it is dangerous and has consequences. In the first place, actions and statements like these send absolutely horrible messages overseas about the inability of American politics to deal fairly with any Middle East issue that involves Israel. And so these behaviors end up undercutting U.S. diplomacy. Secondly, these actions, and the bizarrely skewed, one-sided politics they reflect, tie the hands (or, at times, force the hands) of Administrations, negatively impacting the ability of policymakers to act. And finally, in the end, these comments and actions embolden hardliners in Israel and the Arab World, who both come to believe that there are no restraints on Israeli behavior and no way that Arab concerns will be heard or respected in U.S. policy debates.

However, it’s just not on the radar of the American media. Too dangerous. Controversial. Inflammatory. It makes network heads uncomfortable.

Instead it’s all about Who’s more pro Israel?, one of the most dangerous political games we play in this country. But at every presidential election, play it we do. Stacy has an “In the News” diary up about Sec. Clinton announcing administration talks with the Muslim Brotherhood, which on cue is freaking out the Right.

There’s nothing more serious than Middle East politics and it shouldn’t be treated as a political parlor game, but that’s exactly what Politico did this week. In a long, gossipy piece, Ben Smith traded on 2008 canard that Obama is an iffy friend of Israel by mining staunchly pro Clinton Jewish quarters to stir the currents of discontent. It’s a continuation of the conservative campaign to discredit Pres. Obama and portray him as soft on Israel, which is a falsehood, but some media outlets just can’t resist.

Smith has written about this before. Here’s an example of the well from which Smith drew his alleged proof:

“I’m hearing a tremendous amount of skittishness from pro-Israel voters who voted for Obama and now are questioning whether they did the right thing or not,” said Betsy Sheerr, the former head of an abortion-rights-supporting, pro-Israel PAC in Philadelphia, who said she continues to support Obama, with only mild reservations. “I’m hearing a lot of ‘Oh, if we’d only elected Hillary instead.’”

Even Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who spoke to POLITICO to combat the story line of Jewish defections, said she’d detected a level of anxiety in a recent visit to a senior center in her South Florida district.

[...] The qualms that many Jewish Democrats express about Obama date back to his emergence onto the national scene in 2007. Though he had warm relations with Chicago’s Jewish community, he had also been friends with leading Palestinian activists, unusual in the Democratic establishment. And though he seemed to be trying to take a conventionally pro-Israel stand, he was a novice at the complicated politics of the America-Israel relationship, and his sheer inexperience showed at times.

Why does being “friends with leading Palestinian activists” make Obama less pro-Israel?

It takes a friend to tell you the truth sometimes, with Obama’s stance on Israeli settlements something that most experts agree must be dealt with by PM Netanyahu, though on the denial goes.

All of this precipitated by anxieties from a very small but vocal minority, with all hell breaking loose again when Pres. Obama stated, then defended, that Israelis and Palestinians should begin with the 1967 borders, with land swaps.

Now it appears Obama’s supporters are readying to hit back at this continuing media meme. From Greg Sargent:

A group of well-known figures in the Jewish community has been in discussions with senior Obama adviser David Axelrod about how to respond to the criticism, which is expected to intensify as the campaign heats up. Among them: Alan Solow, the former head of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations; former Congressmen Mel Levine and Robert Wexler; and executive Penny Pritzker.

“We will have highly credible spokespeople and surrogates speak out in a general manner in support of what this administration has done, and articulate it in a way that we think will resonate with voters who care about this issue,” Solow said in an interview. “We will meet with supporters who have expressed concerns or want to be briefed on these issues on a one-on-one basis.”

“We got close to 80 percent of the vote among Jewish Americans in 2008, but we had to aggressively bat down efforts to divide the community and to inflame,” David Axelrod told me. “Plainly we have to be at least as assiduous about it this time. If we’re passive in response it would be a mistake.”

Politico’s Smith got in the usual comments, with divisions quickly revealed or satisfied when the name of Dennis Ross is invoked:

The qualms that many Jewish Democrats express about Obama date back to his emergence onto the national scene in 2007. Though he had warm relations with Chicago’s Jewish community, he had also been friends with leading Palestinian activists, unusual in the Democratic establishment. And though he seemed to be trying to take a conventionally pro-Israel stand, he was a novice at the complicated politics of the America-Israel relationship, and his sheer inexperience showed at times.

A Philadelphia Democrat and pro-Israel activist, Joe Wolfson, recalled a similar progression.

“What got me past Obama in the recent election was Dennis Ross — I heard him speak in Philadelphia and I had many of my concerns allayed,” Wolfson said. “Now, I think I’m like many pro-Israel Democrats now who are looking to see whether we can vote Republican.”

Pres. Obama has deep challenges for 2012, but “pro-Israel Democrats” voting Republican isn’t a main one.

Our media is incredibly juvenile when it comes to covering the Middle East. Intramural political gossip substituting for serious mining of the challenges in the region continue to be the norm.

James Zogby noted what’s said around here a lot.

And so, far from being harmless hysteria or just plain dumb, all this posturing can be damaging and dangerous. It is a good part of the reason why we are in the mess we are in the Middle East and why a just resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict appears to be so intractable.

Every time the media chooses gossip over big stories like what’s happening surrounding the Gaza flotilla, solving problems in the Middle East gets a little further away, which doesn’t help anyone, especially Israel.

That President Barack Obama would have popularized the phrase “audacity of hope,” after which we named our boat, now seems a cruel hoax, particularly as many of us recalled the high hopes we had once harbored for Obama the candidate. Instead of an “audacity of hope,” Obama the president has often displayed a “paucity of courage.” – Ray McGovern

The politics of “Israel versus the Palestinians,” which is the way the U.S. media reports on this region, as well as how our politicians play it, puts Pres. Obama in an untenable position.

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Israel Drops Threats Against Journalists Covering Gaza Flotilla

Taylor Marsh — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 18:50:04 +0000

If there was anything dumber for the Israeli government to do I don’t know what it could have been. Threatening journalists who are covering the Gaza flotilla backfired, as it should.

Netanyahu said in a statement that the policy for journalists covering the flotilla should not be the same as against infiltrators and those who enter Israel illegally.

Members of the Israeli media and international journalists will be embedded in Israeli Navy vessels in contact with the flotilla “in order to create transparency and credible coverage of the events,” said a statement issued Monday from the Prime Minister’s Office.

“We are pleased to see that Israel has recognized the value of allowing reporters to cover an important news event, and understands that journalists should be treated differently from political activists. We urge the government to continue to do its utmost to promote freedom of the press as core values of a democratic society,” the Foreign Press Association said Monday in a statement. It had previously criticized the threats made to journalists covering the flotilla.

Max Blumenthal has written a piece over at Mondoweiss about the extremist Rev. Hagee funding the group Shurat Hadin, among others, trying to sabotage the mission of “The Audacity of Hope.” Max covers the story below in detail, complete with video exposing Hagee.

Sources in the Shurat Hadin (Israel Law Center) on Sunday took responsibility for lodging an anonymous civil complaint against the American-flagged ship, The Audacity of Hope, which is a part of the flotilla expected to sail towards Gaza later this week, Army Radio reported. The complaint, filed to Greek harbormasters, alleged that the boat was not seaworthy and accused the organizers sailing the ship of aiding terror, according to the report. – Group says its responsible for flotilla complaint

From the Christian Science Monitor:

This flotilla is attempting to reach Gaza in a dramatically changed regional context from May 2010, before the uprisings collectively known as the Arab spring. With the chance for real democratic change in Israeli neighbors like Egypt, organizers are hoping to press home their argument that the Palestinian residents of Gaza are as deserving of basic freedoms as any of their neighbors. “It’s even more relevant this year,” says Robert Naiman, a US activist waiting to board in Athens. “There’s a revolution of popular expectations and we’re playing out on a stage in which governments in the region feel more pressure to respond to public opinion.” – Intense Israeli lobbying stalls Gaza flotilla

Gaza flotilla activists on one ship are alleging sabotage:

One of the ships due to participate in the Gaza flotilla was deliberately tampered with while it was docked in Greece’s Piraeus port, Gaza flotilla activists told Haaretz on Monday. The ship, due to carry Greek, Norwegian, and Swedish passengers to Gaza, was found with its propeller shaft broken, the ship’s spokesman Israeli activist Dror Feiler told Haaretz.

There’s also a story in Haaretz about Turkey and last year’s flotilla worth reading:

Turkey has asked Israel to agree to a toned-down version of the UN Secretary-General’s report on last year’s flotilla to Gaza, according to a senior government official in Jerusalem.

According to the official, the Turks are “very worried” about the harsh criticism of Turkey they expect the report to contain, and want Israel to agree to a softened version as part of a package deal to end the crisis between the two countries over the flotilla, which took place in May 2010.

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Hillary Clinton & McConnell Illustrate the Worst Side of Foreign Policy Politics

Taylor Marsh — Fri, 24 Jun 2011 14:29:31 +0000

When Sec. Clinton was first chosen for her job at State some were skeptical she’d have Pres. Obama’s back when it was needed. There was never a doubt in my mind, however, that she would not only be a team player, but one of Pres. Obama’s strongest advocates. It’s who she is, because she knows what a president needs and expects from those inside his administration, especially when he gets himself in trouble.

The rhetorical tactic Clinton uses to make her case on Libya while in Jamaica during a question and answer period, which the State Dept. chose to highlight in a video clip that can’t be embedded, is unbefitting a person of her stature, as she suggests those in Congress questioning Obama on Libya check his or her loyalties.

So I know we live in a hyper-information-centric world right now, and March seems like it’s a decade ago, but by my calendar, it’s only months. And in those months, we have seen an international coalition come together unprecedented between not only NATO, but Arab nations, the Arab League, and the United Nations. This is something that I don’t think anyone could have predicted, but it is a very strong signal as to what the world expects to have happen, and I say with all respect that the Congress is certainly free to raise any questions or objections, and I’m sure I will hear that tomorrow when I testify.

But the bottom line is, whose side are you on? Are you on Qadhafi’s side or are you on the side of the aspirations of the Libyan people and the international coalition that has been created to support them? For the Obama Administration, the answer to that question is very easy.

This is the type of reprehensible rhetoric that Sen. Clinton abhorred when she was criticizing Pres. George W. Bush. But now that it’s a Democratic president, she hypocritically chooses the cowards way out by challenging critics in a way that she wouldn’t if Obama was a Republican.

It’s always been clear to me that Libya could come back to haunt Pres. Obama and those who helped him make this disastrous decision, which includes Sec. Hillary Clinton, along with Samantha Power and U.N. ambassador Dr. Susan Rice, among others. So, it’s circle the wagons time. People are obviously getting nervous, with TIME magazine showing the dangers as the Libya misadventure drags on.

Even if NATO can accomplish its objective or drives Gadhaffi out, it still doesn’t make Pres. Obama’s decision right or legal.

More from John Burns in the New York Times from earlier this week:

Originally envisaged as lasting a matter of weeks, the air campaign is now into its fourth month. It has seen NATO conduct nearly 12,000 air missions over Libya, about one-third of them involving strikes by bombs or missiles, some of them seemingly intended to kill the Libyan leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.

The airstrikes have virtually obliterated Colonel Qaddafi’s Bab al-Aziziya command compound in Tripoli, the Libyan capital, and reduced the fighting capacity of the Libyan forces by about 50 percent, according to Pentagon estimates. But there has been no sign that the Qaddafi government is at risk of crumbling under the pressure, at least not soon.

Much of the pressure NATO is facing over the Libyan operation comes from the dissent within NATO itself, with some member nations saying the campaign has gone beyond the mandate given by a United Nations Security Council resolution in mid-March that approved NATO action to enforce a no-fly zone over Libya and to undertake other missions to protect the country’s civilian population from the Qaddafi forces.

As Clinton’s bookend and to illustrate the political gamesmanship going on from all quarters, let’s also look at Sen. Mitch McConnell’s remarks:

MCCONNELL: The only thing I can tell you at this point is that there are differences. I’m not sure that these kind of differences might not have been there in a more latent form when you had a Republican president. But I do think there is more of a tendency to pull together when the guy in the White House is on your side. So I think some of these views were probably held by some of my members even in the previous administration, but party loyalty tended to mute them. So yeah, I think there are clearly differences and I think a lot of our members, not having a Republican in the White House, feel more free to express their reservations which might have been somewhat muted during the previous administration.

Now you know why Congress and the Executive Branch don’t work like the founders intended, which is why this country is so profoundly screwed up. It’s all petty politics depending on if your side is being hit and is in power or not. Sec. Clinton and Sen. McConnell openly representing the worst of this example in their comments, proving the juvenile leadership being affllicted on foreign policy decisions, among others.

Sec. Clinton is obliged to make her case for Libya however she wants, but diplomatically it’s sheer amateurism to set your sights on critics who expect the Executive Branch to inform Congress when embroiling this country in a military misadventure that isn’t of strategic importance to the United States.

This is what cost her the nomination, as she deferred to George W. Bush, then tried to make up for her vote on Iraq by criticizing him.

Whose side are you on? Sec. Clinton’s got a lot of nerve asking this question to Americans who expect more transparency from the Executive Branch.

To put a finer point on it, Sec. Clinton is wrong.

If Condoleezza Rice had tried this tactic she’d have been flayed in the media and deservedly so.

Sec. Clinton is too smart not to know how this sounds as she sits in Jamaica pontificating about congressional loyalties. Suggesting critics are on the side of Gadhaffi if we believe Pres. Obama operated in an unwise and possibly illegal manner in his decision on Libya is a low for Sec. Clinton.

I’m sure the boss appreciates it and her critics can finally see what I said from the start, which is when Clinton joins a team she’ll defend it against all manner of wrong and embarrassment, even if it costs her credibility. She’s as loyal as they come, sometimes to her own detriment, which is certainly the case here.

Foreign policy became a political football a long time ago. It’s wrong no matter who’s doing it and dangerous to U.S. interests, with both Clinton and McConnell offering examples of amateur statesmanship from the Democratic and Republican benches.

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New York Times: Pakistan Arrests CIA Bin Laden Informants

Taylor Marsh — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 21:00:58 +0000

With friends like these…

Pakistan’s top military spy agency has arrested some of the Pakistani informants who fed information to the Central Intelligence Agency in the months leading up to the raid that led to the death of Osama bin Laden, according to American officials.

Pakistan’s detention of five C.I.A. informants, including a Pakistani Army major who officials said copied the license plates of cars visiting Bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, in the weeks before the raid, is the latest evidence of the fractured relationship between the United States and Pakistan. It comes at a time when the Obama administration is seeking Pakistan’s support in brokering an endgame in the war in neighboring Afghanistan. [...]

The Pakistanis are denying it.

But it’s no wonder we couldn’t “find” Osama bin Laden all these years. Our relationship with the Pakistanis has been duplicitous for a long time, with Pakistan’s own leadership threatened by internal challenges, making the entire endeavor to maintain a stable channel of communication a nightmare.

We need a bigger diplomatic stick. Time to do another mangoes for nukes deal with India?

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Testosterone, Weinergate, Women and Leadership

Taylor Marsh — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 19:34:04 +0000

“We inject less libido… We don’t necessarily inject our own egos…” – Christiane Lagrande, French Foreign Minister (possible IMF replacement for Strauss-Kahn)

Foreign policy studies find that when women are included in a nation’s national dialogue that country has not only a better chance of stability, but it’s the only way developing nations can thrive. There are now studies that women make companies more economically successful when they’re in the lead. On ABC’s “This Week” yesterday, Christiane Amanpour teed up the topic with Cecilia Attias (ex-wife to Pres. Sarkozy), Torie Clarke, Claire Shipman.

Rush Limbaugh was even more unhinged than usual today because of this subject. Limbaugh talked about the “chick-i-fi-cation” of the U.S. One female caller said that women today having affairs with politicians are “greedy,” because in the old days they’d keep their mouth shut. Classic example of Rush’s female audience. This same caller opined that men should run the household, while Rush blamed liberal women for the fate of a bullies, Weiner and everything that ails the male populace.

After all these years of tuning in to Rush, however briefly when I can. I’m still amazed that his criteria for a successful woman includes marriage, children, heterosexualism, but especially beauty.

But while countries and corporations need women to thrive and succeed, there are other examples where women haven’t made any difference at all.

Where foreign policy, diplomacy and militarism meet, women still fail as miserably as men, because they’re intent on channeling what any man would do or say. Sometimes, of course, foreign policy answers aren’t gender based, with the obvious answer showing itself no matter the gender. But in tough geopolitical situations, so far women still have not found their own way.

Let’s remember who was at the forefront of Obama’s decision to get involved in Libya, which began with Samantha Power and Dr. Susan Rice, but also Sec. Clinton, who was convinced bombing Libya was the right move. It wasn’t.

There is no evidence whatsoever of women being more restrained, thoughtful or less militaristic. See Liz Cheney, Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, but also women like Anne-Marie Slaughter, who wrote an op-ed entitled “Fiddling While Libya Burns.” You could also add Sec. Madeleine Albright’s comment that Colin Powell recalled in his memoir: “What’s the point of having this superb military you’re always talking about, if we can’t use it?” It blew his mind.

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Phillippe Reines, Clinton’s Champion

Taylor Marsh — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 13:37:31 +0000

“Patti fired me,” Reines recalled, adding with a smirk, “I just sort of ignored it, like George Costanza. I was in the office the next day at 7 a.m.” He said that Clinton had known about the profile before it ran and that she decided to keep him on. “Ultimately, the organization was and is run by one person,” he said. “One person wanted me there.” Solis Doyle declined to comment on the incident. … The prize destination for Clinton’s Senate staffers was campaign headquarters in Arlington, but Reines wasn’t welcome there. Adding insult to injury, Clinton hired Reines’s rivals in Schumer’s press office. They disparaged him as the “purse holder,” after the New York Times described Reines toting Clinton’s handbag.

Reines was patient. “I knew that the first ones in are not always the last ones out,” he said. – Washington Post

Patti Solis Doyle firing Reines is laughable, but everything about her leadership inside Hillaryland could go under that heading. As if being canned by anyone but the boss would matter to Reines.

I’ve traded innumerable emails with Reines over the last years. We’d been attempting to meet for cocktails for months and when a time opened up we could both book, at the time, I still didn’t navigate Washington, D.C. very well. I got so lost that I was over an hour late, something that never happens to me, texting him my travails as I tried to find a hotel that was in the center of everything. Mortified when I showed up at the hotel bar, there he sat waiting patiently in the back, with another Clinton confidante. He was gracious and even bought a round of drinks.

One of the things we talked about was McChrystal’s implosion in Rolling Stone, which I found untenable for him and explained why. Reines clearly disagreed, but didn’t show Sec. Clinton’s hand while staying loyal to the administration until the inevitable ax came down.

It’s fitting that as Sec. Clinton enters the shank half of her secretary of state tenure, the man who’s served her unfailingly as the dogged political lineman of Hillaryland gets drawn out.

In the end, the buck always stops with Hillary:

On Sept. 26, 2007, Clinton met her campaign team for a debate preparation session at the Phoenix Park Hotel. In the middle of the session, she excused herself for an appointment on the Hill and then, to the horror of her campaign, voted for a measure to designate Iran’s Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization — a disastrous move for a candidate looking to shed a hawkish reputation in a Democratic primary. Her campaign’s senior strategist, Mark Penn, fired off an e-mail to Reines, one of the 859,200 Senate and campaign e-mails Reines has saved, expressing frustration that the Senate staff didn’t tell the campaign that the vote was coming. “We didn’t know she was leaving prep to vote,” Reines wrote at the time. “And were surprised when she did.”

Former campaign officials still blame Reines for failing to flag the vote. Reines places the blame elsewhere. “In fairness to her,” Reines said of Clinton, “she did what she always does; she looked to other people to see how they were voting. So she looked at Chuck. Chuck voted for it. She looked at Harry Reid. Harry Reid voted for it. She looked at Carl Levin. Carl Levin voted for it. It was the first time that a vote had become so charged” in the run-up to the 2008 election.

After the primaries of 2008, Howard Wolfson landed in Mayor Bloomberg’s office. Where Phillippe Reines lands after Clinton leaves State is anybody’s guess.

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Daniel Levy on Assad Brutality, Israel and Preferred Devils

Taylor Marsh — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 13:42:56 +0000

Daniel Levy wrote a very important post for Foreign Policy yesterday, After Golan clashes, is Israel rethinking the Assad (or Palestine) file? Here’s a snippet:

[...] And Israel is none-too-enamored of the alternatives in Damascus. One alternative to the Assad regime — a democratic Syria with greater soft power diplomatic heft and perhaps with Islamists as part of a governing coalition — is as unappetizing a prospect for an Israel intent on maintaining its belligerent posture to the Palestinians and to the region (including its occupation of the Golan heights), as the Egyptian version of the same is shaping up to be. Another alternative — that of Syria becoming a largely ungoverned chaotic space and forming an arc of fitna (or sectarian strife) with Iraq and Lebanon is also unattractive.

For the peace rejectionist government of Prime Minister Netanyahu, the survival of an embattled, desperate, and thoroughly discredited Assad regime apparently hits that Goldilocks sweet spot — just the right outcome.

If you take the time to read the whole piece carefully what Daniel reveals is the reason for U.S. policy being so hopelessly skewed and interminably incoherent, even as events continue to unwind. From Levy:

At least until Sunday’s events, Israel’s position on revolution in Syria hued closely to the status-quo conservatism that has so characterized the shared Israeli-Saudi response to the Arab Spring. Both Israel and Saudi had been critical of the “premature” abandonment of the Mubarak regime, especially by the U.S. Unlike Mubarak, of course, Assad is not an ally (for either the Israelis or the Saudis), but he is part of an ancien régime for which Israel had effective management strategies in place.

Fox News contributors take whacks at Sec. Clinton for her, let’s call it a softer approach to Assad, but considering Israel’s own stance it’s rather ironic conservatives don’t get what’s going on.

On Sunday, June 5, marking Naksa Day (the Arab “setback” in the 1967 war), protesters — mostly Palestinian refugees and their descendents — marched to the Israel/Syria disengagement line representing the border between Syria and the Israeli occupied Golan Heights. According to reports up to 22 unarmed Syrian-Palestinian protesters were killed when Israeli forces apparently resorted to live fire (Israeli laid mines may also have been detonated and may have caused causalities, the exact unraveling of events remains sketchy). In most respects, this Sunday’s events were a repeat performance of the outcome of May 15′s Nakba Day commemorations (which Palestinians mark as the anniversary of their catastrophe in 1948).

Israel’s initial response to the wave of regional anti-regime protests reaching Syria was, according to reliable reports, to privately root for the “devil we know” approach — encouraging allies, including the U.S., to go easy on the Assad regime.

The backdrop for all of this is the notion of a U.N. vote for Palestinian statehood this fall, which will change nothing without negotiations, something that the “peace rejectionist government of Prime Minister Netanyahu,” Daniel’s description that I am hereby adopting, has no intention of engaging seriously.

But if anyone thinks this is good news for Israel they’re wrong.

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Ryan Lizza: Obama is a ‘Consequentialist’

Taylor Marsh — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 04:22:17 +0000

One reaction among liberals to the Bush years and to Iraq was to retreat from “idealism” toward “realism,” in which the United States would act cautiously and, above all, according to national interests rather than moral imperatives. The debate is rooted in the country’s early history. America, John Quincy Adams argued, “does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to freedom and independence of all,” but the “champion and vindicator only of her own. In 1966, Adams’s words were repeated by George Kennan, perhaps the most articulate realist of the twentieth century, in opposing the Vietnam War. …The use of force to stop human-rights abuses or to promote democracy, they argue, usually ends poorly.” – Ryan Lizza

Consequentialist? Say what?

Mike Allen led with Ryan Lizza’s story in the New Yorker yesterday in his Playbook, logging it under “West Wing Must Read.”

It requires hip-waders.

Philosophically speaking, Lizza contends that whether a decision by a president is moral or right depends on the consequences of that action, which he concludes makes Pres. Obama’s evolving doctrine “consequentialist.” By that theory isn’t every president’s doctrine consequentialist by nature?

Oy, some experts…

Read it anyway, at least then you’ll understand Libya.

If there is such a thing in foreign policy as a “consequentialist” doctrine, Harry Truman might agree, though his interpretation of Lizza’s theory would be far different from Obama’s, because Truman believed the buck stopped in the White House. John F. Kennedy, a president who doesn’t resemble our current one at all, wouldn’t agree at all with Lizza, because imagining Kennedy bombing Libya requires enormous feats of mental acrobatics, regardless of the consequences.

Libya is doing for Pres. Obama exactly what I warned would happen.

Interesting premise pulled out of thin air to try to unwind whatever it is Pres. Obama is attempting to do on foreign policy, which is hardly clear at this point. Unfortunately, Obama’s actions also reveal timidity to declare U.S. intent, because admitting an altered U.S. policy based on Lizza’s “consequentialist” theory would cause political havoc for Obama in 2012.

From Lizza’s article:

Nonetheless, Obama may be moving toward something resembling a doctrine. One of his advisers described the President’s actions in Libya as “leading from behind.” That’s not a slogan designed for signs at the 2012 Democratic Convention, but it does accurately describe the balance that Obama now seems to be finding. It’s a different definition of leadership than America is known for, and it comes from two unspoken beliefs: that the relative power of the U.S. is declining, as rivals like China rise, and that the U.S. is reviled in many parts of the world. Pursuing our interests and spreading our ideals thus requires stealth and modesty as well as military strength. “It’s so at odds with the John Wayne expectation for what America is in the world,” the adviser said. “But it’s necessary for shepherding us through this phase.” – The Consequentialist – How the Arab Spring remade Obama’s foreign policy.

Ah, China, but first America has to wean itself off of our Middle East obsession, which includes that we can create an outcome by anything we do. But the take away on this one is “leading from behind,” with the notion of a “humanitarian hawk” haunting U.S. foreign policy in a very real way, the latest in Libya, neoconservative unilateralism replaced with righteous certainty of America the savior in countries that are not of strategic interest, meanwhile we can do nothing in Bahrain, with sanctions on Syria coming in 3… 2… … .. 10… 9… 8… Oh, and just try to do anything in the Middle East by pissing off the Saudis.

David Drezner’s take:

On the structure – despite Lizza’s 9,000 words, and despite Obama’s stated intention to reorient American foreign policy to be less Middle East-focused, the essay…. is totally focused on the Middle East. I’m not saying that the Middle East is unimportant, but I’d have liked to have read something about how the Obama administration is dealing with the rest of the world. Indeed, Lizzaa notes that Obama visited South America during the opening days of the Libya operation precisely “to show that America has interests in the rest of the world.” Despite this effort, the thrust of the article demonstrates its futility during the start of a war. New military conflicts crowd out attention that should be paid to other arenas of foreign policy. It would have been nice to see how the administration’s strategy is playing/affecting the rest of the world.

The inside elite from Pontificate Hill, of which Ryan Lizza is certainly one on foreign policy, lays down that Obama is a consequentialist, which is really just shorthand for making stuff up as he goes along, moving from crisis to crisis with no guiding light, except outcome. Good God.

Brzezinski, too, has become disillusioned with the President. “I greatly admire his insights and understanding. I don’t think he really has a policy that’s implementing those insights and understandings. The rhetoric is always terribly imperative and categorical: ‘You must do this,’ ‘He must do that,’ ‘This is unacceptable.’ ” Brzezinski added, “He doesn’t strategize. He sermonizes.”

Then Mike Allen says Lizza’s is “West Wing Must Read,” which sends the message.

All it means to me is that if Lizza and Allen are correct we’re in bigger trouble than I thought we were and I didn’t think that was possible.

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Does Bradley Manning Deserve a Fair Trial?

Taylor Marsh — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 16:00:23 +0000

It’s hard to know what possesses Pres. Obama at moments like this, but for a commander in chief to weigh in on a soldier being held indefinitely and before his hearing is the height of unconscionable if you ask me.

To remind everyone, Mr. Manning has not yet been convicted of any crime.

You can have whatever thoughts you want on the act that got Manning in this mess, the leaking of U.S. combat video and hundreds of thousands of classified State Department to Wikileaks, but isn’t he entitled to a fair trial?

We thought he would be in the Obama era, but that’s turning out not to be the case.

Via Firedoglake comes the transcript and the video:

OBAMA: So people can have philosophical views [about Bradley Manning] but I can’t conduct diplomacy on an open source [basis]… That’s not how the world works.

And if you’re in the military… And I have to abide by certain rules of classified information. If I were to release material I weren’t allowed to, I’d be breaking the law.

We’re a nation of laws! We don’t let individuals make their own decisions about how the laws operate. He broke the law.

[Q: Didn't he release evidence of war crimes?]

OBAMA: What he did was he dumped…

[Q: Isn't that just the same thing as what Daniel Ellsberg did?]

OBAMA: No it wasn’t the same thing. Ellsberg’s material wasn’t classified in the same way.

For Pres. Obama to say Bradley Manning “broke the law” not only prejudices the upcoming proceedings but makes a mockery out of them. As a constitutional lawyer, Pres. Obama has committed rhetorical malpractice.

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Since Arming Afghanistan Worked So Well, Why Not Libya?

Taylor Marsh — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 16:36:41 +0000

UPDATED… REUTERS Exclusive: Obama authorizes secret support for Libya rebels. Also, Clinton said in a classified briefing to House members what I’ve already written, which is that Obama would have ignored any war resolution rebuffs and all attempts to inhibit executive power on Libya.

President Barack Obama has signed a secret order authorizing covert U.S. government support for rebel forces seeking to oust Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, government officials told Reuters on Wednesday. Obama signed the order, known as a presidential “finding”, within the last two or three weeks, according to four U.S. government sources familiar with the matter. Such findings are a principal form of presidential directive used to authorize secret operations by the Central Intelligence Agency. The CIA and the White House declined immediate comment.

___________________ORIGINAL COLUMN BELOW______________

But some administration officials argue that supplying arms would further entangle the United States in a drawn-out civil war because the rebels would need to be trained to use any weapons, even relatively simple rifles and shoulder-fired anti-armor weapons. This could mean sending trainers. One official said the United States might simply let others supply the weapons. [...] It also carries echoes of previous American efforts to arm rebels, in Angola, Nicaragua, Afghanistan and elsewhere, many of which backfired. The United States has a deep, often unsuccessful, history of arming insurgencies. – Washington in Fierce Debate on Arming Libyan Rebels

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is rationalizing that regardless of the arms embargo on Libya, the Obama administration could decide to arm the rebels, because the UNSC resolution has enough wiggle room to allow us to do it legally.

When people of my generation hear “trainers” we automatically think of Vietnam. But if trainers go in I guess the Obama administration can still say we have no “boots on the ground.” But it will be our trainers, because this goes well beyond the UN mandate.

Eli Lake is reporting “freelance jihadists” have now joined the Libyan “rebels” fighting Gadhafi’s forces.

Rebels have also now ceded territory they’d gained, with the only reason they won them in the first place being U.S. intervention, which will become more important as Gadhafi’s forces flex what power they have, which isn’t very impressive against the U.S.

If past is prologue, arming the Libyan rebels is a very bad idea.

However, now that Pres. Obama is committed he’s got little choice if this goes bad and Gadhafi starts surging. American prestige has been put on the line and with the 2012 election coming Pres. Obama cannot afford a loss of the rebels losing.

War is politics by another means, but you have to be committed when you let the dogs out. It’s even more important to know the territory and those willing to fight your adversary. That last criteria is why John Brennan, SecDef Gates and others were against this liberal interventionist misadventure, because these guys knew that a humanitarian crisis could actually spiral into something even uglier where U.S. interests, capital, and attention required are concerned.

Meanwhile, V.P. Joe Biden remains muzzled and mute.

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Steve Clemons on Jon Huntsman Presidential Run

Taylor Marsh — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 14:44:13 +0000

Ben Smith has a piece up on Steve Clemons.

I know Steve a bit, have been to his forums, parties and heard him speak innumerable times. He’s one of the few making sense on Libya.

What people do not realize about Clemons is that not only is he a tough foreign policy realist, which I share with him, though we split on Afghanistan until McChrystal’s implosion, he’s also a pragmatic thinker when it comes to political considerations. He proves it again in a quote he gave Ben on Obama’s departing ambassador to China:

“I think Jon Huntsman is terrific,” he said in a recent email. “I do and have talked with him on many occasions. Last met him at his office in Beijing but looking forward to seeing him soon at his new home in Kalorama. He reminds me of Chuck Hagel — and I might support him if he runs. I think he’d make a great president.”

Read the story on Steve, because of all the people buzzing around Washington, no one deserves the profile more.

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Obama Speaks to Nation on Libya Tonight

Taylor Marsh — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 13:27:27 +0000

**UPDATED**

Pres. Obama was forced political to speak tonight. It’s the last thing he wanted to do. His Saturday address gives you the foundation on where he’s likely to begin tonight. What he won’t say is that without sustained military efforts the Libyan “rebels,” the make up of which we haven’t a clue, won’t last.

The good news for Pres. Obama as he prepares to talk to we the people is that U.S. military actions have pushed the rebels to a better position, something they could not have come close to doing on their own. But the news that NATO has taken control of Obama’s war of choice in Libya quickly transitioning to them all aspects of the war is a huge help to Pres. Obama.

Unfortunately, because Obama entered into a misadventure not in U.S. vital interests he’s got some real challenges ahead, which he he won’t be able to answer tonight.

For instance, what’s next?

Pres. Obama stated “Gadhafi must go,” but in the same breath, as is seen in the video above, says he started a war with Libya on humanitarian reasons. You can’t reconcile these two objectives, neither of which were in consultation of Congress, though that’s hardly anything new.

Congress has become a neutered, not equal branch of government, so it’s never any sweat for a president to ignore them.

The other real problem is that it’s clear Pres. Obama, Sec. Clinton, Dr. Rice and Samantha Power, the pro-Libya war crowd, hasn’t thought through who would replace Gadhafi when he’s ousted.

That looming question has the potential of destabilizing a region, but also derailing Egypt’s progress, far more than what Gadhafi threatened to do to his own people.

Thousands of North Koreans starve, with girls in China being killed for years simply because they are not boys, so I find the Obama-Clinton pro-Libya axis unconvincing when it comes to the ultimate goals of what we’re doing in Libya, but also our overall foreign policy strategy that has now become incoherent.

Our military is also once again being stretched to breaking, with families expected to always give more for other nations, which when not in our strategic interests is an unconscionable thing to ask and beyond what they signed up to do.

I don’t think Pres. Obama will come close tonight to explaining what comes after the humanitarian crisis he went in on ends, because he didn’t map it out before he ordered the U.S. military into action.

Vision isn’t his thing.

UPDATE: From the New Yorker: “they have perhaps only a thousand trained fighters.”

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Women War Hawks Win on Libya

Taylor Marsh — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 01:35:01 +0000

The Pentagon says 114 Tomahawk cruise missiles have been launched from U.S. and British ships in the Mediterranean, hitting more than 20 Libyan targets along the Mediterranean coastline. Navy Vice Adm. William E. Gortney, director of the Pentagon’s Joint Staff, told reporters the Tomahawk cruise missiles were fired from one British submarine and a number of American destroyers and subs. He said the success of the mission was not immediately clear, adding that additional attacks would commence later. – Qaddafi’s Air Defenses ‘Severely Disabled’ Following Military Strikes

screen capture via Huffington Post

Never having fallen for what Ann Althouse writes about today, I don’t find it remotely surprising that it’s women who guided Pres. Obama to act in Libya. Some of you might remember this column. It’s not the first time women have channeled the masculine on foreign policy, because there has yet to be a convincing competing narrative created by any woman. Is it because on war and peace gender doesn’t apply? If anything, it’s Pres. Obama who has offered the feminine side of the equation so far.

Margaret Thatcher and Golda Meir showed how it was done, with Hillary Rodham Clinton, as well as Sarah Palin, the latest to take up that charge, though Clinton actually has power, while Palin offers pontifications from abroad.

In a Paris hotel room on Monday night, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton found herself juggling the inconsistencies of American foreign policy in a turbulent Middle East. She criticized the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates for sending troops to quash protests in Bahrain even as she pressed him to send planes to intervene in Libya.

Only the day before, Mrs. Clinton — along with her boss, President Obama — was a skeptic on whether the United States should take military action in Libya. But that night, with Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s forces turning back the rebellion that threatened his rule, Mrs. Clinton changed course, forming an unlikely alliance with a handful of top administration aides who had been arguing for intervention.

[...] The shift in the administration’s position — from strong words against Libya to action — was forced largely by the events beyond its control: the crumbling of the uprising raised the prospect that Colonel Qaddafi would remain in power to kill “many thousands,” as Mr. Obama said at the White House on Friday.

The change became possible, though, only after Mrs. Clinton joined Samantha Power, a senior aide at the National Security Council, and Susan Rice, Mr. Obama’s ambassador to the United Nations, who had been pressing the case for military action, according to senior administration officials speaking only on condition of anonymity. Ms. Power is a former journalist and human rights advocate; Ms. Rice was an Africa adviser to President Clinton when the United States failed to intervene to stop the Rwanda genocide, which Mr. Clinton has called his biggest regret.

Now, the three women were pushing for American intervention to stop a looming humanitarian catastrophe in Libya. [...]

This is the same type of action that helped kick Hillary Rodham Clinton off the presidential path, regardless of the reality that Sen. Barack Obama had virtually the same voting record on matters of war and peace as Sen. Clinton, minus his ducking out on a measure on Iran where he couldn’t get away with voting “present,” which has been his problem the past few weeks as well.

As much as I wanted and applaud Pres. Obama for waiting for word from the Arab League and the UNSC, both of which finally came, I am astounded at the lack of consideration on who is going to pay for the military action Clinton, Rice and Power wanted, and Obama now backs.

Let me also ask a question no one seems to be asking: Where the hell are the Saudis and the Egyptians? The Saudis have a fierce fighting force, with Obama having completed the largest sale in U.S. history to them last fall, $60 billion, and we give Egypt $1.3 billion a year. So why is the U.S. so willing to foot the bill for a military action that isn’t in America’s vital interests no matter how you look at it?

Trying to salve the wounds of past mistakes doesn’t make what’s happening in Libya “genocide.” It’s a civil war citizens of Libya are waging against their leader, which however excruciating to watch isn’t any of our business.

While we’re at it and talking about vital interests, why aren’t we getting involved in what’s happening in Bahrain where the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet is stationed? (Good post on why Saudi Arabia’s involved in Bahrain.) Sec. Clinton has issued a warning to Iran.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned Iran on Saturday to stop meddling in Bahrain and other Arab states in the Persian Gulf, but also called on the kingdom’s leaders not to use force against anti-government protesters.

Clinton said the United States “has an abiding commitment to Gulf security” and that “a top priority is working together with our partners on our shared concerns about Iranian behavior in the region.”

“We share the view that Iran’s activities in the Gulf, including its efforts to advance its agenda in neighboring countries, undermines peace and stability,” she told reporters after an international conference on the crisis in Libya. At that meeting, she met with numerous Arab officials who complained that Iran was fomenting unrest Bahrain and elsewhere.

Bahrain’s Sunni minority monarchy is facing growing opposition from the Shiite-majority population and has called in security forces from neighboring Sunni states such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates to deal with escalating protests.

[...] The Gulf force underscores the deep worries about Bahrain’s stability among the region’s Sunni kings and sheiks. They fear any stumble by Bahrain’s leaders could embolden more challenges to their own regimes and possibly open room for Shiite heavyweight Iran to make political inroads.

The U.S., which counts Bahrain as a centerpiece of its Gulf military framework, has sent top envoys to meet with the embattled monarchy and has been criticized by Shiite opposition groups for not coming to their support.

And where the hell is Congress where Libya is concerned? Did we learn nothing from preemptive war in Iraq?

Once again, this time goaded by females, Pres. Obama is unleashing the winds of war without thinking through the exercise completely, even if cautious deliberation is where he began. It does, however, give more proof that if he was in the Senate at the same time as Clinton Obama would have very likely joined the other presidential hopefuls in wanting to oust Saddam Hussein.

Obama’s declaration was stunning:

“Left untouched,” Obama said, “we have every reason to believe Gadhafi would commit atrocities against his people.” – USA Today

That’s our military foreign policy standard? Hardly, because it sure as hell didn’t apply in Darfur.

Pres. Obama, after being correct to wait, is now sounding astoundingly hypocritical.

American politicians have proven their bankruptcy once again through talking about military intervention as the U.S. economy sputters, austerity talks continue, entitlements suggested for targeting, with the U.S. military budget and our policies never being included in the reality scenarios.

You cannot talk about cutting entitlements while sanctioning military action in the Arab world and not also demand the Saudis and Egyptian government step in to use their massive military might, which we’ve made possible.

As for the women who continue to lead like men, I’ve written about it many times before, so none of this surprises me at all. Perhaps that’s why a woman has never been elected president, because no female has ever offered an alternative vision for the world and what it would mean for America in terms of war and peace.

That Pres. Obama has gone from deliberative and waiting for Arab nations and the world to join in, while not demanding more in the war of financial participation, as he also shrugs off Congress, reveals anything but “change we can believe in.”

Instead it’s here we go again.

This column has been updated, bumped.

UPDATE 3: Pres. Obama has announced no ground troops will be sent to Libya. So, time to revisit Gen. Wesley Clark’s warning this past week, “Libya isn’t worth the risk.” Clark remembers words that then Pres. Clinton said at the time, with there being a huge difference, part of which I mentioned today:

In 1999, when we launched the NATO air campaign against Serbian ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, President Bill Clinton had to state publicly that he didn’t intend to use ground troops. He did so in an effort to limit the costs of an initiative that the public and Congress did not consider to be in our nation’s vital interest. The administration and I, as the NATO commander in Europe, were in a difficult position, and Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic knew it. But what Milosevic didn’t understand was that once we began the strikes — with NATO troops deployed in neighboring countries and the Dayton Peace Agreement to enforce in Bosnia — NATO couldn’t afford to lose. And the United States had a vital interest in NATO’s success, even if we had a less-than-vital interest in Kosovo.

[...] It is hard to stand by as innocent people are caught up in violence, but that’s what we did when civil wars in Africa killed several million and when fighting in Darfur killed hundreds of thousands…

UPDATE 2: Wikileaks reveals Anti-American extremists likely among those we’re going to undeclared war to protect.

UPDATE: Michael Moore eviscerated Pres. Obama’s decision today on Twitter. Meanwhile, congressional progressives are livid.

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