Foreign policy is hard. Managing foreign relationships is difficult. However, some areas of policy are more difficult than others and some relationships are more frought with problems than others. For example, getting our policy on Russia is hard and managing that relationship difficult.
While, getting our policy on the U.K. is relatively straight-forward and managing that relationship is not that difficult. In fact, for all the modern talk of diversity and the global community, you don't have to be in the official foreign policy establishment for very long before you come to know the four countries we more-or-less have no problems with and with whom we co-operate very closely.
Canada - Australia - New Zealand - United Kingdom
That makes sense to me and I'm sure it makes sense to you. Which is why I'm finding this Administration's ability to pick fights with the U.K. so damn disturbing. The American press is, as usual, useless on the matter, but it doesn't take a long time reading the wider British press before one realizes that we have a problem.
It's always true that if you read the Guardian or a Brit of the sort like Robert Fisk you get the usual and knee-jerk anti-Americanism. You'll find the same, slightly different anti-Americanism is the pro-Euro wing of the Conservative Party, like in Kenneth Clarke. That is to be expected.
But what I'm seeing now is nothing less than warnings from that much larger section of the British political establishment that matters. Here are some samples, just from today:
Lord Tebbit:
"At least on the other side of the Atlantic the conduct of President Obama over the great oil spill is explicable, even if despicable. The whole might of American wealth and technology is displayed as utterly unable to deal with the disastrous spill – so what more natural than a crude, bigoted, xenophobic display of partisan political presidential petulance against a multinational company?
It is time that our American friends were reminded that they sang a different tune when the American company Union Carbide killed many thousands of Indians at Bhopal. Not to mention when the American company Occidental killed 167 people on a North Sea oil rig in 1988.
"At the very least, the president might acknowledge that the company directly responsible for the Gulf disaster was American, not British. He may be holding on to some Democratic Party votes, but he is storing up a great deal of ill will that he might regret at some time. "
Peter Hitchens:
"I doubt if Barack Obama could fix a dripping tap in his bathroom. So I tire of his aggressive anti-British attitude towards BP as it struggles with the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico.
"Twice now – once over the Falklands and now over BP – the White House has shown it has no gratitude for our presence in Afghanistan, and has even placed our troops under US command. We should leave as soon as a withdrawal can be organised. "
Iain Dale:
"I don't know about you but I am getting increasingly irritated by President Obama's somewhat faux outbursts of fury against BP. Every day he seems to be thinking how he can seem angrier than the last. He's clearly worried that this deeply unfortunate incident could be his 'Katrina', but instead of blustering he might do better to think how his administration could actually help BP in its quest to stop the oil flowing. He unjustifiably accuses BP of doing little while doing very little himself to help the situation beyond go on TV to express his rather synthetic looking anger.
"I see no sign of BP hiding from its responsibilities but see every sign of a company struggling to find a solution in incredibly difficult circumstances. A bit of recognition of that from Obama wouldn't go amiss. Instead of coming out with anti British and anti oil company sentiment and pandering to populism, Obama should roll up his sleeves and give BP his and his government's support in the clear up operation.
"And isn't it interesting how Obama constantly refers to the company as "British Petroleum", a name it hasn't used for decades. Why would he do that, I wonder. I think we know."
I expected three things from President Obama: 1) An end to the war in Iraq; 2) An end to the war in Afghanistan; and 3) A return to traditional American foreign policy.
Instead, what we've gotten is: 1) An open admission that the *BEST CASE* scenario Obama envisions for Iraq is for us to continue to provide Eqypt level aid packages for at least 25 years (Note: I heard this directly from the President's point man at an open, unclassified briefing); 2) an expansion of the war in Afghanistan; and 3) no significant changes in foreign policy, except now in addition to pissing unconvincingly on our enemies we are now also pissing on our friends and important allies.
Ladies and Gentlemen, this will not end well.
"I doubt if Barack Obama could fix a dripping tap in his bathroom."
ReplyDeleteI love it! I already think the President is a moron. I'm glad that other are realizing this, too.
"He unjustifiably accuses BP of doing little while doing very little himself to help the situation beyond go on TV to express his rather synthetic looking anger."
Just look at his leadership: he tells Congress to get a jobs bill to his desk. He never offered one. Nor did he have a health care bill. He just went with what Congress offered up, talking about how great it was and what it contained -- which he didn't really know because he never read it, much less write it.
Barack Obama will go down in history as the "Pretend President."
He did graduate from Harvard, right? How many of those folks could fix a dripping faucet? Or better yet would even have the desire to do so.
ReplyDeleteIt was inevitable from the beginning, but it is a shame in my mind that the Executive has become the voice of the people when viewed by those far from these shores. Yes, to refer again to that 52% or so who brought this man into office, that was the voice of the people. The thing that needs to be realized and seldom is in my opinion is that it is a short voice. Four years. You can't determine long term trends with a four year sample.
I'd like a simple declaration of purpose from the US government. One that not only addresses our own citizens but those in the world who see our Stars and Stripes as freedom. One that could not be substantially changed by any one President.
I'm thinking it could be three or four sentences, tops.
A Declaration of Commitment let's call it.
Simpler yet... our word, as a people.
Yeah, I'm a Utopian, much to my chagrin.
It must pain Barack Obama when he sees Chavez and Lula and Ahmadi-Nejad embrace and declare common goals.
ReplyDeleteIt must pain him, because he'd like nothing so much as to join them. Which he cannot do. Yet.
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I would point out that a Chavez-style expropriation of BP's assets would be pretty popular in this country.
I yield to no one in my support for the rights to private property, but even I can feel where that "just take it from them" impulse comes from.
That said: while I admit I started out with a cynical bias against Obama, he's done but re-enforce that.
The whole "smart diplomacy to make peace with our allies and restore our place in the world" rhetorical gambit has been exposes as just so much bilge water.
It all depends on how you define "our allies."
ReplyDeleteIf they are "our allies" weren't we already at peace with them?
ReplyDeleteWhat am I missing here?
Those whom you and I consider allies are not whom The Messiah considers allies.
ReplyDeleteThanks. Great Post.
ReplyDeleteI'm a Brit and I take succour from the words of our finest statesman, Winston Churchill:-
ReplyDelete"Americans will always do the right thing, after they have exhausted all the alternatives."
I include your present President out.
Obama promised change, and is doing his very worst to accomplish that change in areas that the majority of Americans do not want, and would not probably have voted him in for.
ReplyDeleteAmong those areas is a near-complete restructuring of US foreign policy, to reduce our closeness with the very core of western nations, which, only by coincidnece, I am sure includes Great Britain, Australia, Canada, and to move us much closer to the middle-eastern countries.
Part of that, of course is to greatly increase our distance from our only true friend & ally in that region, Israel.
I rather like Luther's idea of a national statement of aims and beliefs for our dealings with the rest of the world, that is above the presidents powers to conduct his own foreign policy.
Thanks for the link on your blog Travelgall, it certainly generated a lot of hits for us today.
ReplyDeleteNice place you've got over there.
Travelgall, also welcome to you - please come back and look around - other interesting stuff is often posted.
ReplyDeleteHi Travelgall; I love your place, and especially "moderat1e opinions, immoderately put". Thanks for the link!
ReplyDeleteAlso, welcome to you, selseysteve.