01-23-2017, 03:29 PM
(This post was last modified: 01-23-2017, 03:33 PM by Eric the Green.)
(01-23-2017, 12:39 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:(01-22-2017, 11:43 PM)taramarie Wrote: They still have a lot of work to do. What is horrifying to me is how some Americans admire them. What do they admire?
Putin is a strong leader who puts the interests of his nation ahead of the interests of the rest of the world. Some people like that, after eight years of what they see as a weak President who seems to think his own nation is the bad guy.
Some people like that. Of course, Putin is just a tyrant and an oligarch, not to mention a murderous war criminal, and I suppose a majority of Americans don't like that, and don't approve of behavior in that direction by Donald Trump. I and many Americans found Obama's recognition that our nation has made mistakes to be a strong and honest position. Characterizing Obama's foreign policy as "weak" is very inaccurate. If anything, he was too "strong" in sending drones to "kill terrorists" which also killed innocent people. He was very tough on Osama bin Laden and on the Taliban. He pulled out of Iraq according to the agreement reached with Iraq by George W Bush, and which the Iraq government insisted on. That was not "weak," and did not cause the rise of the IS. Obama and Hillary were not the "founders of ISIS" as Trump claimed; George W Bush arguably was. And so was Maliki. Obama stood up to Russian aggression in Ukraine too; a "stronger" approach might have meant starting a war with Russia, which it was not our perogative to do according to our alliance treaties. And he just sent troops into Eastern Europe to deter Russian aggression against NATO, which Trump may well reverse. So which would be "weak" in that case, pray tell?
Obama was too weak on Syria, in my opinion. Pundits focus on the "red line" that wasn't enforced, but that is unfair; not only did he get Syria with Russia's encouragement to get rid of chemical weapons, which was the objective of the red line to begin with, but when he asked congress for support, the Republicans that now complain about his "weak" foreign policy were weak themselves by not backing him up. Who knows what bombing would have accomplished anyway. But he should have sent more support earlier to the Syrian rebels, and maybe establish safe zones. The Left and anti-Hillary folks complain about US participation in the Libyan Revolution by protecting civilians subject to genocide by the dictator; something the US refused to do in Syria, with genocidal results. But in that Libyan case, again, that's a complaint that Obama and Hillary C's policies were too "strong," not too "weak."