by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
NRO’s\u00a0The Corner<\/em><\/p>\n Reflections on the Speech to Congress<\/strong><\/p>\n If one were to sum up the Obama speech to the joint session of Congress, it is the same old, same old formula: “I am a uniquely post-American fresh start; the era of Bush and our dreadful past is over; and because this is our moment, you, the world, owe me attention and support for my redefining America more to your tastes.”<\/p>\n The problem with all this is endless:<\/p>\n (1) most existing problems predated Bush and transcended him, as Obama is discovering with Iran, radical Islam in America, North Korea, Russia, etc.;<\/p>\n (2) By separating himself from the past, Obama sends the implicit message to allies (like Israel, India, Columbia, the Maliki government, eastern Europe, Sarkozy, Merkel, etc) that there must have been something wrong with them to have allied themselves with the U.S. during the Bush years \u2014 and to enemies and belligerents that their anti-Americanism is perhaps understandable given a shared antipathy for the Bush regime;<\/p>\n (3) By staking out the messianic, prophetic ground, and his strident anti-Bush credentials, observers are going to note his serial hypocrisies, such as keeping the Patriot Act, rendition, tribunals, Predator attacks, the Petraeus plan in Iraq, wiretaps, intercepts, etc., and in fact anything that smacks of a transnationalist protecting U.S. interests first, and global ones, second.<\/p>\n (4) By throat-clearing every speech with “Bush did it” and his own historic ascension to the presidency, Obama has given hope to unsavory characters \u2014 as the likes of everyone from a supportive Ch\u00e1vez to Castro have enthusiastically noted \u2014 that the United States has now “flipped,” moving away from a Britain or Israel and more closely aligning itself with revolutionary figures on the West Bank or the exiled Zelaya, and thereby giving the impression that the prior regional order was flawed, and necessary change either will not, or cannot, be stopped by the U.S. \u2014 and indeed may be silently encouraged by America. In hopes of sowing short-term good will to Obama himself, the president is sowing long-term problems ahead for his country, the United States. There are lots of areas \u2014 Iran and its environs, the free former Soviet Republics, Taiwan, the 38th Parallel, Venezuela\/Colombia, the borders of Israel, Cyprus, Eastern Europe, the Balkans, etc. \u2014 where tensions are scarcely restrained, and major aggressive players could easily try to change the existing order, if any thought the United States either did not care to intervene, could not intervene, or supported their efforts.<\/p>\n The key question is at what point will the American people sense that the Obama feel-good magic comes at the expense of long-term American interests \u2014 and that making some unsavory characters like our president now, will mean only trouble ahead for the country itself and its friends abroad.<\/p>\n A Loyal Opposition<\/strong><\/p>\n 1) It is false to suggest that Obama is a multilateralist, while Bush and his supporters were preemptive unilateralists. Bush worked well with allies, especially in the second term, and had close relations with Merkel, Sarkozy, and Blair, as well as with India and China. Most of these unilateralist charges were exaggerated, and based on elite anger in the West over the Iraq War and the European street over his Texanisms and skepticism of cap-and-trade. In contrast, Obama has lurched to the left of France (as we saw in Sarkozy\u2019s Iran worries), left the Eastern Europeans bewildered, tried to dump Gitmo detainees on allies, slapped a tariff on China, and is stimulating\/inflating the U.S. economy in ways that make our debtors very nervous. So we should get beyond the notion that anyone who doubts the Obama outreach approach is de facto not desirous of working with allies or prefers military action.<\/p>\n 2) Obama will buck public opinion if it is for a liberal-base issue, such as healthcare and cap-and-trade. But his problem on Afghanistan is that it is both unpopular with the public and an anathema to his base. Moderates and conservatives will support him on Afghanistan, since they think stabilizing the country is necessary, humane, and doable, but there are those whom he has so far ostracized and caricatured on other issues, and may not wish to reach out to. So his options and time are limited. For all the acrimony and hysteria, the truth is that Afghanistan has endured for eight years, American casualties have been by historical standards kept to a minimum, and we have attrited al Qaeda to a great degree. We are in a lot better shape than we were during December 1950 or right before the surge in Iraq, crises when most wanted out, but persistence saved the theater.<\/p>\n 3) To doubt Obama\u2019s tactics on Iran, with Russia, or concerning radical Islam and terrorism is not to suggest there are easy answers in these bad\/worse choices or that when he was inaugurated he was in any way responsible for the problems. The issue instead is whether he mitigates crises or worsens them by a) blaming them on his predecessor with the monotonous \u201creset\u201d refrain; b) suggesting that his own novel presidency is a way of unlocking preexisting suspicions in a way that seems to allow some very bad actors to excuse their past and present behavior; c) employing moral equivalence in such a fashion that blends the existential differences between, say, a Syria and an Israel, a Honduras\/Colombia and a Venezuela, or a Poland and a Russia.<\/p>\n There are alternatives to reaching out to talk with Iran without bombing them, alternatives to constantly pressuring the Israelis without giving them a green light on more new settlements, and alternatives to enticing Putin without going back to the Cold War.<\/p>\n 4) Listening to the three lunatic speeches at the U.N., we are reminded that oil or cash reserves or both allow Ahmadinejad, Ch\u00e1vez, and Gaddafi to be what they are, and Russia and China to snub efforts to stop proliferation. Recent oil discoveries in Alaska, California, the Gulf, and the Dakotas remind us we can do a lot to help lower the world oil price, and save money by using our own resources to augment much needed conservation and alternative energy. Saving money, balancing our budget, and curbing borrowing from abroad would help as well, and give us far more leverage with those who intend us no good.<\/p>\n \u00a92009 Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Victor Davis Hanson NRO’s\u00a0The Corner Reflections on the Speech to Congress If one were to sum up the Obama speech to the joint session of Congress, it is the same old, same old formula: “I am a uniquely post-American fresh start; the era of Bush and our dreadful past is over; and because this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[651],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-Ai","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6457,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/predictably-misleading\/","url_meta":{"origin":2250,"position":0},"title":"Predictably Misleading","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 12, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/\u00a0NRO's The Corner\u00a0 The one requisite in a presidential speech is honesty. Without it, nothing else matters. The president\u2019s speech last night was incoherent in its call to be ready at some future day to use force that he just recently insisted must be used immediately.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Commentary"","block_context":{"text":"Commentary","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/commentary-obama-administration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2080,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/obamas-bad-war\/","url_meta":{"origin":2250,"position":1},"title":"Obama’s Bad War","author":"victorhanson","date":"December 11, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson NRO's\u00a0The Corner The president said some good things, but unfortunately, his long academic lecture on the nature of war itself had all the characteristics of what we have come to accept from an Obama sermon: 1) Verbosity (4,000 words plus!) and extraneousness (he finally even referenced\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "December 2009"","block_context":{"text":"December 2009","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2009\/december-2009\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1853,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-usual-straw-men\/","url_meta":{"origin":2250,"position":2},"title":"The Usual Straw Men","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 5, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson NRO's\u00a0The Corner Cap-and-trade, statist healthcare, and an end to \u201cdon\u2019t ask, don\u2019t tell\u201d for thee. And for thou, Obama the tax cutter, Obama the gas-and-oil driller, Obama the budget freezer, Obama the anti-lobbyist reformer, Obama the bipartisan healer? This half-hearted pivoting was quite transparent: Obama made\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "February 2010"","block_context":{"text":"February 2010","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2010\/february-2010\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8598,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/obama-tougher-on-congress-than-on-khamenei-read-more-at-httpwww-nationalreview-comarticle422339obamas-unpresidential-iran-speechtargetauthortid900280\/","url_meta":{"origin":2250,"position":3},"title":"Obama: Tougher on Congress than on Khamenei","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 11, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Obama's Unpresidential Iran Speech:\u00a0The speech was mean-spirited and dishonest \u2500 and may have been counterproductive. by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Online President Obama\u2019s speech last week advocating congressional approval of the Iran deal was mostly made-up history mixed with invective. 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