North Korea: saying so don't make it so

[tongodeon]

Six years after Bill Clinton left office they're still blaming him for the current administration's failures.

Q Okay, just one quick follow-up. When you hear from your allies on Capitol Hill and elsewhere who were in favor of the preemptive doctrine, and they are critical of the administration, they think the administration is not doing enough in

Comments

[tongodeon]

Just because there is one solution that gives satisfactory results doesn't necessarily mean that there isn't a different solution that gives equally satisfactory or possibly even more optimal results.

True, ikkyu2 made that point already and I agreed.

it seems, in my not particularly well-informed opinion, that the White House abandoned a policy that has worked for years without making any discernable effort to replace the policy with another working solution.

I disagree that this is a "working solution". This solution is "not working". Or at least it's "not working as well". During Clinton, North Korea was bound by the NPT and Agreed Framework and complying with both treaties' terms. Since being provoked by Bush's "bold action" they've openly withdrawn from the Agreed Framework, they've *also* withdrawn from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, they're openly brandishing what they claim are nuclear weapons, and they're openly developing and demonstrating delivery systems.

I don't consider the present situation evidence of a "working solution" but there are some shades of grey. What exactly would be a "nonworking solution"? If they were openly launching attacks which only hit Alaska and Hawaii and were unable to hit California would *that* be evidence that Bush's plan was still marginally "working"?

[cactusthesaint]

True, ikkyu2 made that point already and I agreed.

I had clicked reply many hours prior, became distracted before composing my reply, but failed to check if anyone else had replied when I did finally get around to it.

I disagree that this is a "working solution".

I think you misunderstood me or I wasn't sufficiently clear. I wrote:

it seems [...] that the White House abandoned a policy that has worked for years without making any discernable effort to replace the policy with another working solution.

I intended that to mean what you wrote in your inital post, namely:

[C]linton's policies didn't fail. The current policy is a failure.

We're in agreement. I (and ikkyu2) just didn't like part of your argument.

[tongodeon]

I agree that my argument was flawed in theory but not, unfortunately, in practice. Every day I hope that Bush proves me wrong and finds some way to make his presidency less of a failure than Clinton's.

[cactusthesaint]

Just out of curiosity, have you previously written much about your opinions of Clinton's Presidency? There aren't many posts from you tagged billclinton

[tongodeon]

I started writing in 2003, three years after Bill Clinton left the White House. I probably won't be writing much about George Bush in 2011 either.

At least I hope not. God help us if he's still a factor in world politics at that point.