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Mr. President, the Campaign is Over
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08/03/09 09:26 AM ET
President Barack Obama, from his inaugural onward, has sought the advice and followed a game plan for reelection in 2012.
The result has been a series of episodic legislative and foreign policy initiatives that has no coherent strategy. They are all designed depending on the day of the week to appeal to one constituent group or another.
The net result is chaos, domestically and abroad.
Take the case of Iran. The president first makes overtures of engagement, specifically extending his hand to Muslims. When the response is frosty, he then sets a deadline for Iran to begin dismantling its nuclear program or confront the possibility of war, economically or otherwise. There is the hint that an air strike on Iran's nuclear establishments by Israel or the United States might be the next step in an escalating clash. With the domestic convulsions in Iran over the latest presidential elections, Obama turns back to a Sphinx-like silence to avoid any appearance of wishing to affect Iran's internal politics. That is the opposite message delivered a few weeks earlier about an ultimatum over Iran's nuclear weapons program.
The result is the appearance of a hard line on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and a soft line on Tuesdays, Thursdays and weekends. With such massive confusion, miscalculations are inevitable. Look for our relations with Iran to head South sooner and not later. Political maneuvers guided by the election cycle are no substitute for governing the nation.
When does Obama plan a changing of the guard from campaign loyalists to long-headed and seasoned statesmen?
Visit www.armstrongwilliams.com .
The result has been a series of episodic legislative and foreign policy initiatives that has no coherent strategy. They are all designed depending on the day of the week to appeal to one constituent group or another.
The net result is chaos, domestically and abroad.
Take the case of Iran. The president first makes overtures of engagement, specifically extending his hand to Muslims. When the response is frosty, he then sets a deadline for Iran to begin dismantling its nuclear program or confront the possibility of war, economically or otherwise. There is the hint that an air strike on Iran's nuclear establishments by Israel or the United States might be the next step in an escalating clash. With the domestic convulsions in Iran over the latest presidential elections, Obama turns back to a Sphinx-like silence to avoid any appearance of wishing to affect Iran's internal politics. That is the opposite message delivered a few weeks earlier about an ultimatum over Iran's nuclear weapons program.
The result is the appearance of a hard line on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and a soft line on Tuesdays, Thursdays and weekends. With such massive confusion, miscalculations are inevitable. Look for our relations with Iran to head South sooner and not later. Political maneuvers guided by the election cycle are no substitute for governing the nation.
When does Obama plan a changing of the guard from campaign loyalists to long-headed and seasoned statesmen?
Visit www.armstrongwilliams.com
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