FACEBOOK
TWITTER
A Victory of Sorts
Our economy is recovering. A decade of war is ending. A long campaign is now over. And whether I earned your vote or not, I have listened to you. I have learned from you. And you’ve made me a better President. With your stories and your struggles, I return to the White House more determined and more inspired than ever about the work there is to do, and the future that lies ahead.
~~ President Obama, Election Night, Nov.06, 2012 ~~
But now the task is to reform Mr. Obama. I would suggest that conservatives try to convince the president to alter course…
by Philip Giraldi
The Obamas and Bidens celebrate reelection in Chicago last night. Image Credit: Reuters
The American Conservative – The defeat of Mitt Romney is a victory for those of us who seek sane foreign and defense policies based on the traditional conservative principles that government policies should always serve clearly defined U.S. national interests while avoiding unnecessary interventionism overseas. Romney was truly an empty suit on foreign policy and it should be assumed that he would have continued the worst parts of the Obama program while adding some particular wrinkles of his own. His victory would have meant a return of the neocons to the front stage coupled with a more generally aggressive military-based posture overseas which could easily have led to a war with Iran and heightened tension with Russia and China. It would also have resulted in major donors like Sheldon Adelson having a voice in policy formulation relating to the Middle East.
But now the task is to reform Mr. Obama. I would suggest that conservatives try to convince the president to alter course in the following areas:
- Not all Islamists are radical and not all radicals Islamists are terrorists who actually threaten the United States. The United States has a duty to respond effectively to those who wish to harm the American people but it also has to learn to live with political Islam.
- A loss vs. gain assessment must be done on drone attacks, in Pakistan most particularly. The evidence suggests that drones make more new enemies than they succeed in killing and they destabilize the governments where they take place. They have been universally condemned but they have nevertheless increased in number under the current administration. Their efficacy as a counter-terrorism tool should be challenged and the government must make a clear case if they are to continue.
- A realistic assessment of the situation in Afghanistan should be made. It would likely conclude that the situation is beyond repair and that a settlement that includes the Taliban as a party of government is inevitable, so serious negotiations to that end are a sine qua non rather than continued pledges of support for the corrupt Karzai government.
- The United States should accept and openly state that Iran does not currently pose any serious threat. It should accept that Iran is interested in getting out from under sanctions and should negotiate in good faith to reduce the punishment that is being inflicted commensurate with agreements by Iran to modify some aspects of its nuclear program. The threat to intervene military should be taken off the table and Israel should be informed that attacking an Iran that does not have nuclear weapons is not in the U.S. interest.
- Humanitarian interventionism under Obama has not worked any better than preemptive attacks under George W. Bush. The necessary lesson in that respect has been learned in Libya and Obama should be encouraged to maintain his reticence over getting more heavily involved in Syria.
- Obama should recognize that Russia and China will only become actual enemies again if the United States continues to criticize and even intervene in their internal politics. The internal politics of any nation, unless there is negative impact on actual U.S. interests, have nothing to do with Washington.
There should be an understanding that a preemptive foreign policy based on the potential use of force has essentially failed and has nearly bankrupted the United States. A new foreign policy should be shaped that is commensurate with and responsive to actual U.S. interests worldwide. Large overseas presence in the form of military bases should be eschewed and scaled back in exchange for a less muscular policy that would be cheaper, more welcomed by potential friends overseas, and ultimately capable of making the United States more secure.
I am sure that TAC readers can come up with some other suggestions.
Also see:
Short URL: http://www.veteransnewsnow.com/?p=217643
Posted by Phillip Giraldi on Nov 7 2012, With 0 Reads, Filed under Civil Liberties and Freedom, Corruption, Cost to the US, Editors' Picks, Expert Viewpoints, Foreign Relations, Government, Israel Lobby in Action, Legislation, Politico. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
COMMENTS
To post a comment, you must login using Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, or Hotmail in the box below.Don't have a social network account? Register and Login direct with our site and post your comment.
Before you post, read our Comment Policy - Legal Notice
“The defeat of Mitt Romney is a victory for those of us who seek sane foreign and defense policies based on the traditional conservative principles that government policies should always serve clearly defined U.S. national interests while avoiding unnecessary interventionism overseas”.
Hard to beat that, the key being “serve clearly defined US interests”. If one can assume that the one-sided relationship with the Zionists in Tel Aviv and thick on the ground in the US, then it would be a wonderful start to a new Presidency. Really, that by itself may be enough to make the US a respected nation again and could easily turn around the attitudes of half the world who have been impacted by the Zionist penetration into their lives, directly or as a result of the US and its responses to the pressures of Israel and their well promoted marketing plans to take over the world’s most powerful, but bankrupt country.
“Avoiding unnecessary interventionism overseas” would follow as a matter of course. It is now a well accepted fact that Bush and his cabal of neocons led the country that gives them a home into both the Iraq war and now the Afghanistan war and with a cattle prod applied to the rear ends of both candidates hoped to start a battle with Iran.
That may be on hold as Romney, a totally subservient Zionist follower has been relegated to the pages of sad history, rightly so, regardless of the comments by some writers that he would have been a better choice.
At least with Obama, you know what you have. A rhetorical empty suit now in his last four years as a top political player. He can either do things to make Israel just another country, by fighting the compromised Congress and the likes of Schumer, Liebeman, Cantor, McCain and the like, eventually making the welfare of the US his prime responsibility. What a refreshing change that would make.
The spotlight is on Obama who is clearly in the hot seat, like never before.
At the risk of laboring the comment by Philip, it needs to be said again…..
“government policies should always serve clearly defined U.S. national interests while avoiding unnecessary interventionism overseas”.
However, a success by Romney could have taken the world back to the cold war eras which lasted from 1945 to 1989 based on the continuing need to maintain military dalliances throughout the world designed to expand US military hegemony and contribute to US employment which could rise to 15% without such defense spending. The US bases overseas should be seen by the world as an example of Empire out of control and by anyone in the US with fiscal management responsibility as an indulgence they cannot afford. There alone, as a single item, is a major contribution to the mandatory reduction in US debt.
We have accepted that Presidential nominees are seldom, if ever, the best candidates in the US but have now become the by-products of a flawed two party electoral system, dominated by corporate funding, now devoid of the past ‘one person one vote’ philosophy that has served the US well and now sadly capable of polarizing public opinion by adding to the difficulties of achieving a consensus for needed change of direction. Until the PAC’s are eliminated from US life, nothing will change.
There has been little achieved in the past four years of benefit to the average American and this is unlikely to change in the coming period. Consensus in anything will be an impossible task like never before with elected members so influenced by lobby groups and living in fear of a loss of their comfortable seats and generous lifestyle that they will not in the future and do not now truly represent their electorates, as in the past..
More of the same for 48 months, probably under the threat of another JFK solution should there be any sign of a moving of mountains against the insidious influences of the self-serving state of Israel and its fellow travelers, posing as patriotic Americans..
Well said Rex. I was not impressed with his performance in the first half either, he was utterly hamstrung politically from doing anything about his true feelings, which I still think were expressed in his Cairo speech. In reality, after that he has done more for Israel than his predecessor, and like the spoiled bratty bully Israel is, nothing will ever be enough. Wish those damn Egyptian chariots had been a little bit faster….