Obama Suddenly Talks About NATO And Europe
This post is written by an angry European who has had enough of Barack Obama’s silly rhetoric. Perhaps Americans should elect a non-diplomatically disabled person?
Better late than never I suppose. Jeralyn reports that “[a]fter last week’s debate when Barack Obama acknowledged he hadn’t held a single hearing on Nato and Afghanistan during his year as chair of the European Affairs subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee because he was running for President, he’s now giving lectures to Europe in his campaign speeches.”
Yeah, we won’t notice that you never mention us nor that you ever held a hearing on this subject Barack. We’re like that: we tend to ignore bad information like that coming from America.
We don’t of course.
And then when he finally mentions us look at what he has to say:
[He said] European governments had to pull their weight in Afghanistan and not rely so much on the United States to do the “dirty work” against Taliban fighters…..
He said the US needs more support from its NATO allies in Afghanistan and implied Germany should lift its ban on combat operations in the dangerous south.
He’s great diplomatically isn’t he? “pull their weigh”? “not rely so much on the United States to do the dirty work”?
What an arrogant sun of a gun you are. Perhaps you should thank the Netherlands for once for all the work we’re doing in Afghanistan, prick. Our soldiers die there, while you are walking around as if you were the second coming of the Messiah.
And you dare talk about doing the “dirty work.” You? The man who hasn’t done one day of “dirty work” in his life? The man who’s treated with gloves because any and all criticism may hurt his precious feelings?
And if the above isn’t enough, there’s this:
[He] set a new tone on his campaign plane by telling reporters there had to be more give and take between Washington and its NATO allies.
“I’ve been very clear that we do need more support from them,” he said, referring to NATO countries with troops in Afghanistan. “We also may need to lift some of the constraints that they have placed on their forces there.”
He didn’t name any countries. But Germany, Italy and Spain have been under pressure from NATO and the administration of US President George W. Bush (more…) to devote more soldiers to risky missions in Afghanistan.
What the heck do you think you’re doing B.J.C. Obama? “Pressure”? “More support”? Or what huh? What you gonna do? Talk trash about us?
Listen carefully: we don’t respond to “pressure” very well, especially not when we’re actually already helping you out.
Instead of blasting us (talking about Europe in such sweeping terms isn’t very smart either, you unexperienced [...]) perhaps you should thank us and talk to the families of Dutch soldiers who have died fighting in Afghanistan. How’s that for a change? You know, the families of those who were actually willing to sacrifice their lives for their country? You know, the ones who are actually fighting on the frontlines?
Arrogant, unexperienced amateur.
Great choice Democrats! You had one diplomatically disabled president for eight years and now you’re trying to ram another one down are collective European throats. What’s the matter, you couldn’t find a real cowboy to nominate?
Good. Fantastic. And to think that there actually people supporting this diplomatically disabled man.
We’re watching you America. We elected many pro-America politicians in recent years, how about you electing someone who actually understands foreign policy for a change?
Unfortunately, the race / class /gender netroots of the Democratic Party contributed to this situation, with a little help from their friends in the media. There were qualified Democratic candidates, like Richardson, but they failed to get much support from the netroots, or coverage in the media. The enthusiasm for Obama has had a lot of support from the anti-war crowd from the beginning, with his anti-Iraq vote in the Senate. Add his race, and his generally liberal voting record to his genial and optimistic persona, and he is a compelling candidate for the many in the media and the liberal spectrum of the party. Especially those playing racial identity politics.
Senator Clinton also pulls some serious netroots support, especially from the people arguing that it is a ‘woman’s turn’ to be president - the gender argument. That is not as convincing as it might be, if she were Margaret Thatcher. Or even Representative Pelosi - who at least has numerous years of experience in Congress. However, aside from the true believers in the field of gender politics, Senator Clinton’s negatives are as high as President George W. Bush’s if not higher. This is before one looks at her actual accomplishments in government, which are quite meager.
This leaves the nation with the probable Republican candidate, John McCain as the only plausible candidate with any real experience in government, and any working knowledge of foreign affairs. Senator McCain is not an ideal candidate from a foreign policy perspective, but I think he is still a better choice than the two currently dueling over the Democratic nomination.
I believe that the United States has not been good about reaching out to work with Europe for the past eight years, and that it has missed many opportunities because of the refusal to be a team player. I agree, the US does not help itself to appear like a willing team player when it treats the Europeans as if they are fools or children. While I suspect some Europeans may think that is how American perceive them, the current administration strikes me as being guilty of ineptitude, indifference and unpreparedness more than actual malice and ingratitude toward Europe. Either way, President Bush wasted many opportunities to work collaboratively with the EU and NATO to resolve the mess in Iraq, and to continue to pressure Iran and N. Korea to move away from nuclear weapons. This has not been helpful to world security, or to the defense of the USA or Europe. Considering how many Europeans, Britons, and Australians have died in this war, American treatment of their allies has been quite shabby. I blame this in part on the worst elements of partisan politics, combined with the worst elements of a sound-bite oriented media. The fringe elements pushed to the bases - and the media helped, because it made for a more exciting story line, and better sound bites than thoughtful comments about how the candidate planned to work with both parties, and with the allies to address problems which have become global, rather than local.
Orson, that’s a very thoughtful comment. Well said.
Michael, first of all, as an American, I greatly appreciate your country’s service in Afghanistan. The Netherlands has played a disproportionately large role there, and even though I’m not a fan of Obama myself, I can assure you that his criticism was not aimed at the Dutch. I’m very sorry that he offended you because allies like the Dutch are few and far between, and we greatly value them. Let me assure you that, those of us who are aware of NATO efforts will not forget the huge Dutch contribution - nor will we forget the names of the countries that have failed to carry their share of the combat burden. Just for the record. I do plan to vote for someone who truly understands foreign policy: John McCain.
To be fair to Barack he did commend Prince Harry and Britain, so it wasn’t a blanket condemnation of Europe.
"What an arrogant sun of a gun you are. Perhaps you should thank the Netherlands for once for all the work we’re doing in Afghanistan, prick."
A suggestion: Set an automatic 24-hour delay for every post you write so it doesn’t publish right away. After your initial emotional temper tantrum has passed, go back and reread what you wrote. You’ll probably decide to edit your language so you don’t sound like such an obnoxious jerk. You might have a valid point buried somewhere in these slurs, but it’s not worth rereading to find out.
The irony: You are utterly offended that Obama would chastise Europeans and tell them what to do, yet you chastise Americans and are presumptuous enough tell them how to vote in their own election.
I don’t tell them who to vote for, I suggest they’d finally vote for someone with some understanding of the world. Or is that too much to ask (considering that Americans do the same thing with other countries as well?).
And thanks for your feedback. As usual, I appreciate it. On the other hand, if you visit this blog regularly you also know that I actually never use words like that to describe someone. I chose to do so this time because Obama’s words called for it. My own nephew has served in Afghanistan and will serve there once again. Perhaps Barack "Messiah" Obama should take it into account that others are fighting and dying.
As for you ’suggestion,’ let me return it a bit: stop telling people how to run their blog. They seldom enjoy it. What’s more, perhaps it’s also not smart to tell them how to run their blog while using degrading language.
I know how to run my blog Elyas. In fact, without me this blog wouldn’t even exist (logically). We all have different styles, we all have different opinions. That’s wonderful. But I don’t go to your blog time and again to tell you how to run it either. That’s called decency.
Appreciate the feedback, but there’s no need to tell someone who created a blog out of nothing (before this the van der galien gazette) how to run his own blog. Especially not time and again.
If you don’t like what I write or how I write it, don’t read it. That’s simple enough I take it. End of discussion.
LOL! That’s just great. Just continental Europe then huh?
You know what makes this worse: it’s that this man hasn’t organized one meeting about Europe in a year time or so, nor has he ever spoken about Europe and then, when he finally does, he decides to insult all of us.
Utterly amazing.
Dohorty: I’m not so sure about that. Frankly, it would surprise me if Obama even knows that the Dutch are fighting (and indeed, doing more than their / our share) in Afghanistan. He’s that unexperienced and that ignorant when it comes to foreign policy.
Bombing Pakistan, alienating Europe. Great foreign policy.
Diplomacy is a lost art to American political leaders, it would seem. That is really dangerous, as the world has many complex issues going on that are almost certainly better addressed as part of a group, rather than alone.
Unfortunately, the recently announced decision to buy air tankers from an EU / US consortium may not be utilized as an avenue of approach to more close work with the EU and NATO, though it would seem that this might be an opportunity. The Washington state congressional delegation were spluttering in their coffee this morning. Again, this is an unfortunate case of treating an issue as strictly local, rather than global. Boeing has done well world wide, but they got complacent, and tried to fix the bid process instead of depend on a quality bid package for this project. Too bad, better luck next time folks. Capitalism works both ways, and this allows the USA to build better relations with nations and firms that are our allies. If the US is serious about competing in the global economy, it has to recognize that it does not automatically receive contracts. We may learn something from working with Airbus; they may learn something from working with the US subcontractor. We all may actually want to consider how we make NATO and the EU and the USA work well as a team, because we have greater similarities of interests than differences. The USA would be well advised to really consider that we need to be working closely with our allies as the world economy shifts. The Chinese and the Russians are becoming economically important - Russia as an energy supplier, China as a technology supplier. We and the EU need to cooperate to compete with the Russians and Chinese; we also have to look to protecting our mutual concerns for stable, democratic, and economically secure developing nations in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. We are NOT going to do all that by ourselves. I would like to hear more from the candidates about these mutual concerns, and less about is Clinton’s TV ad a rip-off of the LBJ "Daisy" ad, or are McCain supporters sexist because its her turn now. The media, unfortunately, like the sensational, rather than the substantive. It sells advertising.
Obama’s popularity is fascinating to this American. He is a blank man (that’s b-l-a-n-k); he’s been a law professor, a state legislator (not a position of prominence here in the States) and briefly a U.S. Senator from Illinois. He hasn’t been around long enough to do anything or be identified with anything. He’s handsome and an inspiring and lyrical speaker. Put these things together and the American voters are able to see him as whatever they want him to be. He just says "Yes we can" and "Change" and those prone to hysteria start applauding and sending in money. For the last 5 years we’ve been utterly saturated "Bush lied people died" "Bush is evil" "BusHitler" (that one’s especially ironic because most of my fellow Americans today couldn’t tell you anything about Hitler other than he was German and apparently caused some trouble in Europe a while ago) blah blah blah…. Even people who supported Bush are sick of hearing how much others hate him; so even these former supporters will be happy to see him leave office. All of the above adds up to a deep desire for change (whatever the hell that means to them) for the sake of change alone. Into this perfect storm comes our blank-man Obama. He’s young and therefore exudes energy; he’s easy on the eyes and easy on the ears (partly because he says nothing) and his skin color gently attracts throngs of guilt-laden whites the way nuts like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton could never hope. Add to the above that Obama’s opponent Hillary Clinton has been unmasked as the decidedly un-nice and un-warm person some of us always suspected she was, and you’ve got a perfect storm for blank-man. God help us and you all in Europe if "Mr. Empty" wins in November. He will either be paralyzed by indecision, or he will punch our allies in the face while at the same time sucking up to the maniacs in N Korea and Iran. I can barely imagine what somebody like Vlad Putin could do to him in an arms negotiation.
Michael, you should maybe mentioned to the gathered audience that you aren’t exactly typical for a European. Maybe they’d like to know that Europeans are mostly rooting for Obama, and that they ESPECIALLY want it to be a Democrat, while you likely would rather it be McCain, so your view, which you’re entitled to, is not exactly what’s going to be the standard European reaction.
You’ve waaayyy overreacted to the statement. I understand irritation, Spain is also in Afghanistan, but I think you fail to prove that any other candidate in the field is going to be better. You know as well as I do that a Republican president would be the worst thing for European to American relations, so are you endorsing that the US elects a Democrat?
It’s not that simple at all Claudia. You know that. Dutch conservatives have more sympathy for someone like McCain than for someone like Obama (with his talks about talking to Iran, while withdrawing from Iraq ASAP).
Aside from that, it’s also important to note that when it comes to this issue, my reaction is fairly typical; you and I both know that this kind of criticism isn’t welcomed in European countries, especially not because Obama makes such sweeping statements, disregarding the very real sacrifices some European countries have given.
We disagree on that. This man never talks about Europe, didn’t hold one meeting, but when he finally does so he decides to play the popular theme (stolen from others at that). He insults our sacrifices and he ignores the fact that Dutch young lads are brought back home in bodybags because they’re fighting their butts off against the Taliban in one of the most dangerous provinces of this country.
This is Rumsfeld (old and new europe) all over again. If you look at the past few years, you should know that these things aren’t taken lightly in Europe.
Michael, I’m not saying that I agree with the statement, I’m saying that you’ve shown no evidence that Clinton or McCain are immune to this attitude, sadly very prevalent in the US. I don’t appreciate the attitude either, especially considering Spain has lost some young people in Afghanistan too, and that helping the US with the country was an act of collaboration with a friendly nation, not any obligation we have. But now think of some of the things that European politicians, even conservative ones, say about the US, it’s people and it’s leaders sometimes, and ask yourself if the less-than-fortunate statements is a one way street. The difference is that when an American politician says something bad about Europeans, we get mad, while Americans are unlikely to even find out, let alone care, if a European politician says something bad about the US:
You say that Dutch conservatives would prefer McCain. That might well be, but I think it’s not too much of a stretch to say that the bulk of Europe wants a Democrat, and would be very disappointed if the US AGAIN chose a Republican considering what the last Republican was like. My feeling is that additionally they’d prefer Obama to Clinton, but I think that this feeling is quite mild, meaning they’d be ok with either one as president, just as long as it wasn’t McCain (not for himself, just because he’s a Republican).
Claudia: perhaps uninformed Europeans have a kneejerk attitude like that (GOP= bad!), but I’d like to think that there are more intelligent Europeans as well. After all, if they look at their own internal politics they know that individuals within each party can be quite different in temperament and on policy.
And perhaps some Europeans are feeling as some Americans are starting to feel about Obama and the Democrats in general; that their rhetoric about wanting to change the cowboy diplomacy of GWB isn’t backed by a more informed view of how diplomacy works. Instead, it seems that politicians like Obama believe that the new direction in diplomacy should be to be nicer to our enemies and harsher with our friends.
Claudia: well, I think that McCain has already shown that he understands it’s never wise to insult one’s allies (for instance with regards to NAFTA). Not only that, McCain and Clinton sometimes actually talk about Europe and NATO whereas Obama doesn’t mention us for a year, and then when he does he decides to generalize and insult us.
Initially, most Europeans indeed want a Democrat. In the Netherlands, 65% or so want a Democrat and 70% of them want Hillary Clinton (numbers out of my head, not figures available right now, newspapers did research). The media might be another story, but the people want Clinton.
But Europeans’ loyalty only goes so far. They initially prefer a Democrat but when this Democrat never mentions us, only to insult us when he finally does mention us, that attitude quickly changes (you and I both know this as well I bet).
Exactly Christine.
There’s certainly a bias here, but it doesn’t take all that much for Europeans to think "well, that Obama is an arrogant little cowboy too isn’t he?"
As we get into the general election, it’ll be less easy for the Dem candidates to be able to sell themselves just on a vague basis of being ‘not Bush’. McCain will force them to be more specific on how they’d intend to take the country in a different direction, and the more they begin talking about the details, the more the initial support for Dems (domestically and abroad) will wear thin. The problem for them is that some coalitions of voters want the next president to be different from Bush in one way, while others want a completely different direction- so they can’t please one opposition group without alienating another.
In the midterm election, the public was willing to go along with "anything but Bush" platforms from the Dem candidates; I don’t think that will work in ‘08.
Of course McCain has a related problem too; he’ll need to highlight some of his (very real) differences with Bush, but he’ll have to make sure he doesn’t alienate the 20 something percent who still support Bush.