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February 13, 2012
Binyamin Rose: Back to the Bunker: How a life-risking act by a Christian family during the Holocaust saved a family and built a thriving community a world away
Menachem Wecker: Business Schools Teach Real Estate Despite Troubled Housing Market
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Lisa M. Krieger: Man with defibrillator demands access to his own heart's information
David G. Savage: Why activists may not be in a hurry to have High Court rule on alternative marriage
February 9, 2012
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Kimberly Palmer: How to actually enjoy -- relaxing, financially -- your vacation
February 8, 2012
Warren Richey: Why momentous Prop. 8 ruling might not satisfy gay-rights groups
Menachem Wecker: Though Controversial, LL.M.'s Can Lead to Specialized Legal Jobs
The Kosher Gourmet byDana Velden: Going to the bother of making soup? You know it better be good. This CREAM OF TOMATO SOUP certainly is! And it's a cinch to make, too (Includes techinques and serving secrets)
February 7, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Caught off-guard? President's Super Bowl interview with Matt Lauer gives those who need a reason not to vote for him, a darn good one
Suzanne Bohan: Leaping lizards! Tiny reptiles advancing robot design
February 6, 2012
Jonathan Tobin: Iran Threatens Israel With Destruction, But the New York Times Doesn't Hear It
Jeffrey Fleishman: In newly democratic Egypt, tens of democracy activists jailed, to stand trial; their groups are 'threatening the stability of the homeland'
Julie Deardorff : Researchers say antioxidants may not be that effective and could do more harm than good
Mark Clayton: How did Anonymous hackers eavesdrop on FBI and Scotland Yard?
February 3, 2012
Edmund Sanders : Israeli official says Iran is creating missile that could reach East Coast of US
Victoria Kim: Immigrant-smuggling ring used black drivers to avoid racial profiling
February 2, 2012
Jim Carney: Wrong number call may have saved her life
Reza Kahlili : Ex-CIA spy in Iran's Revolutionary Guard: What Obama doesn't grasp about striking deals with Tehran
Tina Susman: For woodchuck rescuer, every day is Groundhog Day
February 1, 2012
Brian Bennett: US officials see increasing threat of domestic attack from Iran
Emily Brandon: How to Take Advantage of New 401(k) Fee Disclosures
January 31, 2012
January 30, 2012
Paul Richter and Ramin Mostaghim: Misreading Teheran's limits -- deadly and economically devastating as they may be -- is a risk administration, Europe seem willing to take
Suzanne Bohan: Warning: Nap-deprived tots missing more than sleep, study finds
Meg Handley: Banks Revamping Rewards Programs to Woo Customers
January 27, 2012
Caroline B. Glick: Obama: Of course I intend to prevent a nuclear holocaust . . . in a few months
Yochonon Donn: In liberal New York City, fervently-Orthodox Jews may soon be getting a district to call their own
Jeannine Stein: An inflated ego and thinking you're 'all that' doesn't just make others sick of you, it can make you ill
Katy Hopkins: New budget rules may affect how much money you get for college
January 26, 2012
Ed Koch: To the New York Times, calling for the murder of Jews by those capable of having their incitement taken seriously isn't news
Jeannine Stein: Mental illness struck one in five U.S. adults in 2010: Report
January 25, 2012
Richard Simon: House passes two bills endorsing the use of religious symbols at military memorials
Fred Weir: Putin: Multiethnic Russia cannot survive as a US-style 'melting pot'; must find its own way
Susan Johnston: 5 Sneaky Coupon Strategies Consumers Should Watch Out For
January 24, 2012
Carol Clark: The price of your soul: How your brain decides whether to 'sell out'
Caroline B. Glick: America lost most in 'Arab Spring'. Sadly, many voters still don't grasp the extent
Warren Richey: Drug criminal scores win in GPS ruling from conservative-leaning high court
Erika Bolstad: Black conservatives gather to talk about gaining strength
January 23, 2012
Melissa Dribben: Jewish voters to play a key role in Florida's Republican primary
Jordan Rau: In quest to grow, Catholic hospital system will announce this morning its break from church
Ali Safi: U.S. envoy gives Taliban terms for peace talks
January 19, 2012
January 18, 2012
January 17, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney Jr.: No-kidding red lines: U.S. response to an Iranian nuke may be bluster, but Israel's won't be
David G. Savage: They sued their principals after slandering them online --- now the cases are headed to the Supreme Court
David Francis: Where to Invest in 2012: With stocks expected to rebound, opportunity abounds for investors
January 13, 2012
Ben Lynfield: Israeli lawmakers move to annex Jewish Judea, one museum at a time
Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz: Thriving through touch: Gentle massage helps older people with low mobility improve in mind and body
January 12, 2012
Warren Richey: Landmark Supreme Court ruling a 'resounding win' for religious groups
Warren Richey: Supreme Court says no to new rule on eyewitness testimony
John Fauber : Statins found to raise diabetes risk in postmenopausal women
Katy Hopkins : Consider This Before You Pay for an Online Degree
The Kosher Gourmet by Joseph Erdos: This mushroom and barley soup has an intense -- almost nutty -- flavor that mixes robust with Middle East. It has creaminess without cream
January 11, 2012
Shari Roan: Millions of atrial fibrillation sufferers at risk for devastating, but preventable, stroke
Tom Hussain: Pakistan -- recipient of more than $21 billion in civilian and military aid -- speeds pursuit of Iranian pipeline, defying US
David G. Savage: High court signals it won't be loosening TV's 'indecency' rules
Stephen Ceasar: Oklahoma's Islamic law amendment can't go into effect, court rules
January 10, 2012
Reza Kahlili: From an ex-CIA spy: US must exploit new split in Iran's Revolutionary Guard
Karen Kaplan: Study: Nicotine replacement products ineffective when used in real-life situations
January 9, 2012
Michael Doyle: Put through legal hell over dream home, couple fought back hard --- all the way to Supreme Court
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Jewish World Review
Nov. 19, 2009
/ 2 Kislev 5770
Obama Bows, but the World Refuses to Bow Back
By
Michael Barone
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
On his 10-day trip to Asia and in his 10th month in office, Barack Obama is beginning to encounter limits on his ambition to change the world. Even as he bowed to the king of Saudi Arabia last April and to the emperor of Japan last week, the world refuses to bow back.
This is not how it was supposed to be. "I am absolutely certain that generations from now," he said on the night he clinched the Democratic presidential nomination in June 2008, "we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last best hope on earth."
We're still working on a lot of that. The Democrats are having a problem passing a health care bill in the Senate (though somehow a lot of sick people are being cared for), and those good jobs will have to wait, it appears, for the December "jobs summit." Whether the rise of the oceans has begun to slow is unclear to me; we had a cool summer and a warm fall here in Washington.
As for the planet beginning to heal, well, that's not clear. Obama evidently expected that his election would change not only America's image in the world but the policies of nations both friendly and unfriendly. In saluting the fall of the Berlin Wall, on videotape, he made no mention of Ronald Reagan or Margaret Thatcher, Lech Walesa or John Paul II, Mikhail Gorbachev or Vaclav Havel, but cited as a world-changing event his own election in the United States 19 years later.
Obama has often said that all the world's nations have shared interests, and during his campaign he made clear his willingness to meet with leaders of enemy countries in order to reach agreements. His idea seemed to be that his own eloquence and his own example would make the scales fall from their eyes and enable them to see that it was in their interest to do what he would like.
So far, not so good. The mullahs of Iran have consented to something in the nature of negotiations, but their agreement in principle to allow the enrichment of nuclear fuel in France has, like many agreements in principle, turned out to be no agreement. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the mullahs have proved no more moveable by Obama's emollient and respectful tones than by George W. Bush's Texas twang.
Nor have we made any discernible progress on settling issues between Israel and the Palestinians, the first priority of Obama's national security adviser. Obama's insistence on a stop to natural growth of Israeli settlements — no new spare rooms for grandma or the new baby — seems now to have been abandoned. Israelis are distrustful of the U.S., and the West Bank Palestinian leader is threatening to quit.
Obama's unilateral concession to the Russians — abandonment of missile defense plans in Poland and the Czech Republic — has evoked statements from Russian President Dmitri Medvedev that sanctions against Iran may someday be necessary. But it's beginning to look like Medvedev is Lucy, sanctions are the football and Obama is Charlie Brown.
The leaders of China, despite Obama's refusal to meet the Dalai Lama, are sticking to their peg to the dollar and, like the leaders of India, have shown zero willingness to damage their growing economy by raising energy prices to avert the global warming that will supposedly bring catastrophe 50 years from now. So Obama at the APEC summit was forced to concede that there will be no agreement on a global climate treaty next month in Copenhagen.
Obama's election was indeed a major event, as the election of every American president is, and the election of our first African-American president was a landmark in our history, as John McCain noted on election night. But it didn't change the world.
All nations may have the same interests in some platonic sense. But all nations' leaders don't. George W. Bush didn't cause all our foreign policy problems, and Obama's ascension and appeasement don't seem to be solving them.
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.
Comment by clicking here.
JWR contributor Michael Barone is senior political analyst for The Washington Examiner.
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© 2009, Washington Examiner; DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.
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