The Sneaking Suspicion that Obama Doesn’t Really Support His Own Policies
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Morning Jolt September 12, 2014 The Sneaking Suspicion that Obama Doesn't Really Support His Own Policies Here's what I fear is going through the president's mind right now: I don't want to do this. I'm supposed to be the peacemaker president. I didn't become president to start wars. I've been telling people for years that there is no military solution to the problems in Iraq. Now somehow I've ended up telling people that I have a military solution for that and Syria.
We don't have any reliable allies on the ground. There are at least 14 different rebel groups, and they keep splitting into smaller groups, each one with a new name, and all of them sound the same. In March, a bunch of them formed the "Sham Legion." Just perfect. I'm supposed to go out and tell Americans, "Hey, let's give a bunch of weapons to the Sham Legion." This assumes that the Sham Legion or the Fake Brigades or whoever don't just drop their guns and run away, leaving the Islamic State even more American weapons to use. Why can't the Iraqis get their act together? We spent years and billions training the Iraqi army and they collapsed in their first real fight. I just went out and promised to do more training. Another couple hundred American soldiers over there, hoping to teach them how to fight. Is the Islamic State just going to sit and wait while we finish the training? Here's the first lesson, guys: Stop throwing down your guns and running away. Where the hell are our allies? I'm the exact opposite of Bush. I've talked about the importance of the multilateral approach until I'm blue in the face. You would think that in exchange for being consulted early and often, our allies would be more eager to help. Instead, every time I ask Susan Rice if the Germans are on board, all I hear is mother-blankers this and mother-blankers that. She did it while Rahm Emanuel dropped by and he asked her to tone down her language. It's almost as if most of our allies don't really mean it when they complain about not being consulted, like they just want to sit back and wait for somebody else to solve the problem. Egypt, Jordan, and Turkey have been screaming the loudest about the Islamic State, but now that we're coming to do something, they're tepid and not willing to make commitments. Heck of a job, Kerry. You know who's most warmly welcoming the U.S. arrival? The Assad regime in Damascus. Those bastards. I can't shake the feeling the Islamic State loves the idea of us coming after them. They're probably going to use some version of the Hamas playbook -- provoke a fight with a more powerful, more technologically advanced foe, hide among civilians, play up any civilian casualties, and then declare yourself the winner once the bombardment ends. Nobody wants to help. We're trying to bomb an army, in the kind of "whack-a-mole" policies I used to criticize. The Democrats in Congress don't want to touch this with a ten-foot pole. The Republicans will pounce on anything that goes wrong. The whole thing's a distraction from what I really want to do with my remaining two years . . . In short, I think Obama has talked himself into a policy that he doesn't really want to see through to the end. Which means that once it starts to go wrong — check Byron York for five ways this could go very wrong — President Obama will start having doubts. The moment flag-draped coffins start coming back to the United States, the public's doubts will start to grow. Opportunistic politicians will read from Obama's 2004 anti-war playbook. Read the following and then ask yourself how long until you start hearing the word "quagmire":
Then Obama will want to un-do this policy as quickly as he can. What happens when the United States tries to withdraw from a war "counterterrorism operation" in Iraq the second time? No Executive Amnesty, Ever? Hmm:
ADDENDA: Go figure. You know what the Islamic State did to America on September 11? Nothing. . . . Can you stand a bit of whining? Look, I know I'm a lucky guy in all of the most important ways, and I should count my blessings. I'm also blessed with a supportive readership. And as for The Weed Agency, every few days I check in on Amazon, and it's still at a decent sales ranking for a book that came out in early June. So whoever you are, thank you. But the one thing that didn't happen with the book that I had hoped was to garner some attention outside of the conservative media world. I thought the story, tone, and style had the potential to really reach people who aren't already reading me. I thought a review in The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Washingtonian or some other D.C.-centric non-conservative publication was a possibility — and if it happened, it would be a good thing. Didn't happen. Some conservative writers are convinced the book-review world is biased against them. But there are also other factors: Newspapers themselves are shrinking, the space for book reviews gets smaller, and each month a ton of books come out and review copies land on the editor's desk. Book-review editors undoubtedly have their own particular tastes. I find the book-review sections to be dominated by historical nonfiction and a smattering of 'literary fiction', which is great news if you like those genres. I had made my peace with it the lack of attention from some book-review sections – even the Post, where my book made a (short-lived) appearance on the bestseller list, and the topic — the federal bureaucracy, and life within it — seemed tailor-made for the that paper's audience. And then this week the Post reviewed three "office novels", books that "offer a glimpse of the contemporary workplace." Grumble grumble grumble. In better news, the Jim and Mickey Show is enjoying a warm welcome from the Internet audience. Our second show can be found here, and our third is on the way. Our pop-culture heavy, politics-on-the-side show is now airing on The 405 Media. The second show offers a discussion of why people are unhealthily obsessed with celebrities, Allen West's new tattoo, and why Sunday Morning political talk shows can be enjoyable if they're done right. Our third show features Mickey demonstrating she knows way too much about Jack the Ripper. Speaking of Sunday shows, I'm scheduled to appear on Howard Kurtz's Media Buzz on Fox News this Sunday morning.
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