
 |
|
May 20, 2013
Melissa Healy: Genetic copies of living people from embryos no longer science fiction
Jewz in the Newz by Nate Bloom : Jews Inducted into Rock Hall of Fame; Anton Yelchin co-stars in New "Trek" film; Kutcher (but not Kunis) visits Israel; Jewish TV Star Praises Jewish Rap Star
The Kosher Gourmet by Cathy Pollak: WARNING: This WALNUT CAKE WITH PRALINE FROSTING, perfect for afternoon coffee, is addicting
May 13, 2013
Rabbi Nathan Lopes Cardozo: Why the giving of the document that would permanently change the world could only be done in desolation
David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church
May 10, 2013
Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be
May 8, 2013
Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas
Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate
Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility
May 6, 2013
May 3, 2013
Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine
April 29, 2013
Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust
Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?
Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA
April 26, 2013
Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty
April 24, 2013
|
| |
Jewish World Review
Nov. 3, 2012/ 18 Tishrei, 5773
Obama's foreign policy follies
By
Jonah Goldberg
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
We're now entering the fourth week of the "CSI: Benghazi" hostage crisis. That's how long an FBI forensic team has been trying to gain access in Libya to what the State Department still calls a crime scene -- the Obama administration's preferred term for the location of the first assassination of a U.S. ambassador since 1979 and the first successful al-Qaeda-backed attack on U.S. soil since the 9/11 strikes. (Our embassies and consulates are sovereign U.S. territory.)
It is perhaps not accidental that the State Department cites the need to complete the investigation as an excuse to stay silent on the whole matter. "You're not going to hear anything from here unless my guidance changes," explained Victoria Nuland, the State Department spokeswoman. "When we open a criminal investigation in the United States, generally, we don't brief out in pieces until the investigation is complete so we don't prejudice the outcome. I have to respect their process, obviously."
Obviously.
There's more helpful news for an administration that doesn't want to say anything about terrorism or the Middle East other than "Osama bin Laden's dead" and "the Iraq war is over."
"There's a chance we never make it in there," a source described as "a senior law enforcement official" told The New York Times.
"Never" may be unacceptable even to this White House, but anything past Nov. 6 will do just fine.
Unfortunately, the rest of the administration's PR operation isn't going nearly as well. It's not clear whether U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice lied or made a fool of herself -- and the administration -- when she unequivocally blamed a YouTube video for the Sept. 11 Libya attack and denied that the administration's security precautions were scandalously insufficient.
On a slew of Sunday shows on Sept. 16, Rice said the two former Navy Seals who were also killed were providing security for Ambassador Christopher Stevens. Former Navy SEAL bodyguards do not die in safe houses far from the person they're protecting, just as spontaneous mobs do not orchestrate a sophisticated ground assault complete with rocket-propelled grenades. Stevens was not, in the words of columnist Mark Steyn, "asphyxiated by a spontaneous class-action movie review."
The Libya follies are merely the most visible flashpoint of the larger unraveling of the Obama administration's foreign policy. The U.S.-Israel relationship has become a bad soap opera. Afghanistan is slipping away, as our troops are being killed by the men they're supposed to be training for the handover. Egypt is now run by the Muslim Brotherhood. Russia casually mocks and defies us. China is rapidly replacing us as an Asian hegemon and rattling sabers at our ally Japan.
Most troubling, as Fred and Kimberly Kagan document in the current issue of National Review, Iraq is rapidly becoming an Iranian vassal state. When President Obama entered office, we had nearly 150,000 troops in Iraq and much sway over the course that nation took. Now we have 150 and almost no sway. Sectarian violence is up, and al-Qaeda in Iraq is resurgent.
Meanwhile, note the Kagans (the intellectuals who helped craft the Iraq surge strategy), Iraqi airspace has become a "critical lifeline for the vicious regime of Bashar Assad," as he kills thousands of his own people in Syria.
They also note that Iraq has become an essential pathway for Iran to circumvent the sanctions intended to prevent it from pursuing a nuclear bomb.
There's a dark irony to all of this. At least until the killing of bin Laden, Obama kept foreign policy out of the headlines so he could concentrate on domestic policy. Even after bin Laden's death, when Obama started to tout foreign policy to compensate for a sputtering economy, the message was that under Obama, there's no drama.
The quiet yet massive increase in drone-strike killings, the reluctance to support democratic regime change in Iran, saying yes to the Afghan surge while insisting on an expiration date, his unwillingness to push for a continued presence in Iraq, his capitulation to Bush policies on Guantanamo Bay and domestic terror trials, the administration's reflexive spinning of thwarted and actual terrorism attacks (the Times Square and "underwear" bombers, the Fort Hood shooting) as "isolated incidents" -- all gave the impression there was nothing to worry about with Obama at the helm.
But making problems easy to ignore isn't the same thing as solving them. How fitting, then, that the game of kick-the-can faltered just five weeks from Election Day.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
To comment on JWR contributor Jonah Goldberg's column
click here.
include "/home/jwreview/public_html/t-ssi/jwr_squaread_300x250.php"; ?>
Jonah Goldberg Archives
© 2006 TMS
|
|

Arnold Ahlert
Mitch Albom
Jay Ambrose
Michael Barone
Barrywood
Lori Borgman
Stratfor Briefing
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Richard Z. Chesnoff
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Suzanne Fields
Christine Flowers
Frank J. Gaffney
Bernie Goldberg
Jonah Goldberg
Julia Gorin
Jonathan Gurwitz
Paul Greenberg
Argus Hamilton
Victor Davis Hanson
Betsy Hart
Ron Hart
Nat Hentoff
A. Barton Hinkle
Jeff Jacoby
Paul Johnson
Jack Kelly
Ch. Krauthammer
David Limbaugh
Kathryn Lopez
Rich Lowry
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Ann McFeatters
Dale McFeatters
Dana Milbank
Jeanne Moos
Dick Morris
Jim Mullen
Deroy Murdock
Judge A. Napolitano
Bill O'Reilly
Clarence Page
Kathleen Parker
Star Parker
Dennis Prager
Wesley Pruden
Tom Purcell
Sharon Randall
Robert Robb
Cokie & Steve Roberts
Heather Robinson
Debra J. Saunders
Martin Schram
Greg Schwem
Culture Shlock
David Shribman
Roger Simon
Lenore Skenazy
Michael Smerconish
Thomas Sowell
Ben Stein
Mark Steyn
John Stossel
Cal Thomas
Dan Thomasson
Bob Tyrrell
Diana West
Dave Weinbaum
George Will
Walter Williams
Byron York
ZeitGeist
Mort Zuckerman

Robert Arial
Chuck Asay
Baloo
Lisa Benson
Chip Bok
Dry Bones
John Branch
John Cole
J. D. Crowe
Matt Davies
John Deering
Brian Duffy
Everything's Relative
Mallard Fillmore
Glenn Foden
Jake Fuller
Bob Gorrel
Walt Handelsman
Joe Heller
David Hitch
Jerry Holbert
David Horsey
Lee Judge
Steve Kelley
Jeff Koterba
Dick Locher
Chan Lowe
Jimmy Margulies
Jack Ohman
Michael Ramirez
Rob Rogers
Drew Sheneman
Kevin Siers
Jeff Stahler
Scott Stantis
Danna Summers
Gary Varvel
Kirk Walters
Dan Wasserman

Tech Q&A
Mr. Know-It-All
Ask Doctor K
Richard Lederer
Frugal Living
On Nutrition
Bookmark These
Bruce Williams
|