Egypt: How Obama Blew It
Folks,
Oh wow, this is really good!
Niall Ferguson is a history professor at Harvard - the original one - and he tears Obama a new one for the way he completely blew it in handling Egypt.
This clip is eleven and a half minutes long but it's worth every second to listen to. Among other things worth hearing and seeing is the complete degree of loss the MSNBC hosts are at what to say or how to respond to The One's being so vividly - and precisely - cut down. Nothing partisan here as Mr. Ferguson can not vote in our elections and his comments are on Obama's foreign "accomplishments."
Watch and enjoy...
Some of the juicier quotes:
Flip followed by flop. Followed by flip. One minute he wanted Mubarak out the next he wanted him to be part of an orderly transition. There was at least four different people saying four different things. In fact, I came to the conclusion that the United States had two foreign policies running concurrently; if it was Monday it was Secretary Clinton's, if it was Tuesday it was back to President Obama's. It was a shambles.
You have to have some kind of strategic concept.
You can not make up the foreign policy of a superpower as you go along.
They just looked like they hadn't a clue.
We haven't got a plan here and if we don't have a plan to build a secular democracy in Egypt it's not going to happen.
(On who amongst Obama's administration are foreign policy deep thinkers:)
None. None. The National Security Advisers have been mediocrities. Right now we have a National Security Advisor who's biggest claim to fame was that he was a lobbyist for Fannie Mae. It's embarrassing.
President Obama is one of the least experienced men in terms of foreign policy ever to occupy the White House. And yet he has advisers around him who are, frankly, second if not third rate. And you just can't do that. It's far too risky, it's far too dangerous a world. And some of us said this when he ran for election that it was a huge risk to put somebody with that kind of inexperience into a position like Commander in Chief of the United States.
Complete amateurishness of American foreign policy.
The simplest way to mobilize people in a relative poor and not very well educated country like Egypt, is to point to the alleged enemy within and then of course the enemy abroad. The scenarios that the Israelis are looking at involve a transition not to some kind of peaceful and amicable democracy but to Muslim Brotherhood dominated regime which then peruses an aggressive policy toward Israel. This is not a zero possibility scenario but a high probability scenario...
But at least George W Bush after 9/11 had a grand strategy. And the strategy was to use American power to promote democratization in the greater Middle East and to fight a war on terror.
As far as I can see, President Obama's strategic concept is: "I'm not George W. Bush; love me."
Mr. Obama's influence is completely absent.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Madoc
Oh wow, this is really good!
Niall Ferguson is a history professor at Harvard - the original one - and he tears Obama a new one for the way he completely blew it in handling Egypt.
This clip is eleven and a half minutes long but it's worth every second to listen to. Among other things worth hearing and seeing is the complete degree of loss the MSNBC hosts are at what to say or how to respond to The One's being so vividly - and precisely - cut down. Nothing partisan here as Mr. Ferguson can not vote in our elections and his comments are on Obama's foreign "accomplishments."
Watch and enjoy...
Some of the juicier quotes:
Flip followed by flop. Followed by flip. One minute he wanted Mubarak out the next he wanted him to be part of an orderly transition. There was at least four different people saying four different things. In fact, I came to the conclusion that the United States had two foreign policies running concurrently; if it was Monday it was Secretary Clinton's, if it was Tuesday it was back to President Obama's. It was a shambles.
You have to have some kind of strategic concept.
You can not make up the foreign policy of a superpower as you go along.
They just looked like they hadn't a clue.
We haven't got a plan here and if we don't have a plan to build a secular democracy in Egypt it's not going to happen.
(On who amongst Obama's administration are foreign policy deep thinkers:)
None. None. The National Security Advisers have been mediocrities. Right now we have a National Security Advisor who's biggest claim to fame was that he was a lobbyist for Fannie Mae. It's embarrassing.
President Obama is one of the least experienced men in terms of foreign policy ever to occupy the White House. And yet he has advisers around him who are, frankly, second if not third rate. And you just can't do that. It's far too risky, it's far too dangerous a world. And some of us said this when he ran for election that it was a huge risk to put somebody with that kind of inexperience into a position like Commander in Chief of the United States.
Complete amateurishness of American foreign policy.
The simplest way to mobilize people in a relative poor and not very well educated country like Egypt, is to point to the alleged enemy within and then of course the enemy abroad. The scenarios that the Israelis are looking at involve a transition not to some kind of peaceful and amicable democracy but to Muslim Brotherhood dominated regime which then peruses an aggressive policy toward Israel. This is not a zero possibility scenario but a high probability scenario...
But at least George W Bush after 9/11 had a grand strategy. And the strategy was to use American power to promote democratization in the greater Middle East and to fight a war on terror.
As far as I can see, President Obama's strategic concept is: "I'm not George W. Bush; love me."
Mr. Obama's influence is completely absent.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Madoc