[speechlesstx]

Perhaps Obama's first foreign policy goal should be to learn something about the countries he's dealing with.

President Obama has devoted a lot of time to foreign policy this past week, focusing like a laser beam on three countries that begin with the letter “I.” He gave star billing in Washington to the prime minister of Ireland (who was treated a lot better than British Prime Minister Gordon Brown), during which each read the other’s prepared text, perhaps a new departure in international diplomacy. He also sent a letter to Italian President Giorgio Napolitano (a member of the now defunct Communist Party), expressing confidence that the United States and Italy would work together “to overcome the current global political and economic hardships and build a safer world.” The only problem with the letter was that the Italian president does not make policy; that power resides with the prime minister and his cabinet. Perhaps the White House czars have issued an ukaz stipulating that the American president writes only to his peers, and thus instead of addressing himself to Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, President Obama wrote to a man who holds an almost entirely ceremonial position.

This imprecision produced the predictable kerfluffle in Rome, as the leftist media and intellectuals pondered the event and concluded that Obama had deliberately stiffed Berlusconi. The Italian prime minister thus joins his British counterpart in wondering what hope they are supposed to find in the recent change in diplomatic protocol in Washington.

Then the president turned his charm on the Iranian mullahs, releasing a video message to everyone celebrating Persian New Year, Norooz (or Nowrooz). He began by explaining the holiday to the Iranians:

“This holiday is both an ancient ritual and a moment of renewal, and I hope that you enjoy this special time of year with friends and family.”

If he was trying to make nice to the mullahs, he should have omitted the “ancient ritual” reference, since that ritual–featuring bonfires (symbols from the ancient Zoroastrian faith) through which people leap and around which they dance–is banned in Iran, and anyone who engages in the ancient ritual is subject to beatings, arrest, and torture. So, rather like the unfortunate “overcharge” button that Secretary of State Clinton gave the Russian foreign minister, the hoped-for change in our “relationship” with Iran got off to an unfortunate start.

The president continued with warm words for the Iranian people:

“Nowruz is just one part of your great and celebrated culture. Over many centuries your art, your music, literature and innovation have made the world a better and more beautiful place. “

True enough, but the whole idea of the Message to Iran was political, and he might have mentioned the long tradition of great and celebrated Persian political thought. After all, the first known human rights “document” came from Cyrus the Great, and its message is daily rejected by the regime of the Islamic Republic.

Then he provided his vision of the Iranian peoples’ belief in hope and change. “You will be celebrating your New Year in much the same way that we Americans mark our holidays,” he earnestly intoned, “by gathering with friends and family, exchanging gifts and stories, and looking to the future with a renewed sense of hope.”

NOT. Most Iranians look to the future with a deepening mood of despair. The mullahs have long since wrecked the economy, and things are getting worse now, what with the price of oil at one-third its recent highs. The single word that best describes the state of the Iranian people–to whom Obama explicitly directed these words–is “degradation.” The drop in Iranian birth rates during the reign of the mullahs is the most dramatic in the history of fertility statistics, and is now below replacement. The level of opiate addiction is five times that of China at the time of the Opium Wars. Any Iranian hearing the American president talk of renewed hope, would wonder if he was thinking of the Iranians in Beverly Hills, who rule the place.

[speechlesstx]

MAN, BIDEN IS A GAFFE WITH LEGS: during his meeting with Spain's primer minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero in Chile yesterday, Biden thanked Zapatero for his effort... in Iraq (link in Spanish, haven't found this detail in any English-language media).

As everybody knows, the first decision Zapatero made after his unexpected win in 2004, right after the Madrid train terrorist attacks, was to abruptly and unilaterally pull out from Iraq. So either Biden made a gaffe, or he was thanking Zapatero for angering Bush...

UPDATE. When I wrote the post I didn't remember to add this, which makes things even worse: shortly after ordering the withdrawal of Spanish forces from Iraq, Zapatero called the other countries to follow the example. Some help, Biden.

I guess that puts the administration's foreign policy in line with Muqtada al-Sadr, who also praised Zapatero for his "help" in Iraq.

[tomder55]

While these are amusing ,they illustrate that we have a perfect storm erupting with an apprentice Captain Ahab guiding the ship .

Perhaps this deserves another posting .
It will be interesting watching him try to keep a coalition of his own party supporting his recently announced Afghan policy ;supplying the mission year after year,after year,after year,after year ,etc. He is talking of winning while reducing resources and finding exit strategies.

What I have not heard yet is a rational for expanding the effort there to focus on enhancing “the military, governance, and economic capacity of Afghanistan and Pakistan.”. What is our strategic interest in Afghanistan ? I'm inclined to think that VP Biden's minimalist idea of picking off bad guys counter-terrorism is the better policy . But I'm more than willing to be persuaded .

[galveston]

All this stuff is integrated; foreign policy, economic, etc.

O's foreign policy is apparently "speak softly and lose the stick".

Everywhere we look, it is the same. I don't believe it is possible for this crew to be so consistently stupid, so I am thinking that it is a co-ordinated conscious effort to destroy this country so that the Socialists can rebuild on the ruins as suits them.

Maybe that is too dark of an outlook, but then, maybe not. Time will tell.

[speechlesstx]

Seems Europe is on to Obama's arrogance.

US President Barack Obama says Turkey's future is in the European Union. Not everyone agrees. Numerous politicians in Germany have gone on the attack, and even French President Sarkozy is unimpressed. Turkey's role at the NATO summit has soured the mood.

During his stay in Europe, everybody seemed eager to be President Barack Obama's friend. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi threw his arm around the US leader. French President Nicolas Sarkozy seemed to be on Obama's heels wherever he went during the G-20 meeting in London, the NATO summit in Strasbourg and the EU get-together in Prague. Even Russian President Dmitry Medvedev seemed to be enjoying his proximity to the American superstar.

Now that Obama is in Turkey, however, some political camps -- particularly in Germany -- have discovered the political efficacy of Obama bashing. While in Ankara, Obama reiterated his support for Turkish membership in the European Union, a position he first voiced on Sunday in Prague. That doesn't sit well with some.

"Turkey is bound to Europe by more than bridges over the Bosporus," Obama told the Turkish parliament on Monday. "Centuries of shared history, culture and commerce bring you together. And Turkish membership would broaden and strengthen Europe's foundation once more."

It is a sentiment not universally shared in Europe. On Monday, a number of politicians, particularly in Germany, went on the offensive. "It is a meddling in the internal affairs of Europe," Bernd Posselt, a member of the European Parliament from Bavarian's conservative Christian Social Union (CSU), blustered in an interview with SPIEGEL ONLINE. "The EU is not Obama's plaything. ... He should accept Turkey as America's 51st state instead," he continued.

Markus Ferber, the CSU's lead candidate in European Parliament elections set for early June, echoed his party colleague. "There is no question that the US has a voice in NATO. But when it comes to membership in its own club, the EU decides by itself," he said. "We don't need any tutoring from abroad."

Yep, a vote for McCain was a vote to continue alienating our allies through diplomatic arrogance. (Hat tip Glenn Reynolds)

[tomder55]

His mere presence should've convinced them. At least they are aware that they are having difficulty assimilating their existing Muslim populations. A Turkish entry into the EU would end any pretense of a unique European culture.

[speechlesstx]

Fresh off his Turkey tour ( in which Obama thinks America is a much younger nation than Turkey, founded in 1923), his envoy not only came up in empty handed in Pakistan, but was met with a demand to turn over drone operations to them.

Pakistan rejects U.S. plan, wants drones

U.S. envoys met with Pakistani leaders on Tuesday to ensure that the $7.5 billion that President Obama plans to send their way over the next five years will be used to achieve common goals in the fight against extremism.

But according to a Pakistani newspaper, regional envoy Richard Holbrooke and Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen came up empty-handed and received a "rude shock" when a proposal for joint operations against al Qaeda and Taliban forces in the volatile tribal regions was rejected.

Dawn newspaper reported that Pakistan also asked the U.S. to turn over the unmanned drone missions over the territory to them, saying that the drone strikes were fueling extremism.

And The Independent published an interview with Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari on Wednesday in which he said Pakistan would go after high-value targets on their own if the U.S. would hand over its drone technology and intelligence.

"President Obama once said that he would act if we weren't willing and able," Zardari said. "We certainly are willing and with international support we will become even more able."

President Obama's plan to battle extremism in Afghanistan includes sinking $1.5 billion each year for the next five years into neighboring Pakistan, up from the current aid of $500 million. But the plan is being watched with a skeptical eye by legislators who doubt the ability of Pakistan — which recently brokered a deal with Taliban in the North-West Frontier Province that allows the militants to impose their brutal interpretation of Islamic law on the populace — to use that money as intended.

Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said during a hearing last week that there was "ambivalent evidence" to suggest that Pakistan would rein in extremism to America's satisfaction.

Mullen and Holbrooke's two days of talks in Pakistan seemed aimed at reassuring those who may doubt the expenditure on an unstable government.

"It's got to be that we are supporting Pakistan policies, because if we appear to be buying something they otherwise would not pursue, it is counterproductive," Levin said at the hearing.

But support for the Taliban peace deal will be thin considering the human-rights ramifications that come along with it. Two-week-old video from Pakistan's Swat Valley — of which control was relinquished to the Taliban in the peace deal — showed Taliban flogging a 17-year-old girl for reportedly refusing a marriage proposal, drawing outcry from the human-rights community and a muted response from the White House.

The human-rights offenses under the new Islamabad-sanctioned Taliban rule could vex Obama's Afghanistan strategy in a manner similar to the way that human-rights concerns in Afghanistan have been among the reasons for NATO's reluctance to contribute troops to Obama's planned surge.

A new law in Afghanistan, applying only to the Shiite minority, states that women need "a legitimate purpose" to leave the house and must submit to their husbands' sexual advances.

“We are there to defend universal values and when I see, at the moment, a law threatening to come into effect which fundamentally violates women’s rights and human rights, that worries me,” NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said at the recent summit where Obama tried to rally more volunteers. “I have a problem to explain to a critical public audience in Europe, be it the UK or elsewhere, why I’m sending the guys to the Hindu Kush.”

Obama has stressed that the aid to Pakistan will come with strings attached and won't be a "blank check."

Reacting to the no-blank-check vow, Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said during a joint press conference with Holbrooke, "We neither accept nor give one."

You'll remember of course that we can thank Dianne Feinstein for complicating things when she blabbed about the drone ops. What was that you were saying about Bush "fueling extremism" ex?