Monday, September 01, 2014

What to do with ISIS? Obama hasn't a Clue

By Douglas V. Gibbs

According to Republican Congressman Mike Rogers of Michigan, the whole reason for the rise of violence around the world is a direct result of President Obama's overall foreign policy failure that is empowering rival nations. “It’s all related,” Rogers told “Fox News Sunday." “The world sees the United States as withdrawn.”

Rogers said the president’s apparent disengagement or slow response is the reason China has engaged U.S. pilots and Russian President Vladimir Putin has moved into eastern Ukraine without fear of consequence.

“U.S. foreign policy is in free fall,” he said. “Traditional allies are saying maybe the United States is not the best to lead us.”

President Obama is seeking the opinions of others, travelling to Europe for a NATO summit where he can feel-out what they think, and perhaps get international support in the form of a coalition to stop Islamic State.

Remember, as Obama showed us with Libya, he places the opinions of leaders of foreign nations above that of his own cabinet, Congress, or the American populace.

Rogers said he doesn’t believe White House Press Secretary Josh Ernest when he said last week that military options are “still being developed.”

Rogers said the president was presented with a range of military options at the start of the 2011 uprising in Syria to overthrow the regime of President Bashar Assad, a movement that Rogers believes gave rise to Islamic State.

“There have been plans on the table,” Rogers said. “The president just didn’t want to get engaged. That is a decision. That is foreign policy.”

No decision is a decision.

As for Obama seeking a coalition at the NATO meeting?  The decision, according to Rogers, isn’t “wrong,” just “late” because the U.S. now has fewer, safer options in the efforts to stop Islamic State before it strikes on American soil.

Rogers estimated that “hundreds” of Americans have already traveled or trained with Islamic State at least once.

Senator Ted Cruz of Texas has presented a more decisive approach to the problem with ISIS.

"Bomb them back to the Stone Age."

As a potential 2016 presidential candidate, with questionable eligibility credentials in regards to his connection to Canada, Cruz wanted to make it clear that the way to deal with evil is to approach the problem head-on.

"They want to go back and reject modernity," he said. "Well, I think we should help them. We ought to bomb them back to the Stone Age."

Cruz, an influential voice among conservatives, tackled other issues in that same speech.  “In the year 2017, a Republican president in the Rose Garden is going to sign a bill repealing every word of ObamaCare," he said.

Cruz joked about inviting President Obama to the southern border to see where thousands of unaccompanied immigrant children have poured into the country. The president declined such an invitation from Perry.

"I figured out the only way there is a chance in heaven he might come (is if) I'm inviting him to come to a golf course," Cruz said.

A crowd of more than 3,000 at a hotel ballroom serenaded him with calls of "Run Ted, Run."

Obama's lack of foreign policy strategy has been a focal point of attack by many republicans, especially in regards to the violent militant terrorism of the Islamic State attacking cities in Iraq, and threatening to launch terrorist attacks against Israel, Europe, and the United States.

"Yesterday, the president admitted he had no strategy to deal with ISIS," Texas Governor Rick Perry said, drawing hoots and hisses from a packed convention hall. "The deepening chaos in Iraq, Syria, Gaza, and Ukraine is all the clear and compelling evidence the world needs of a president one step behind, lurching from crisis to crisis."

Paul Ryan fired up the audience by suggesting that Obama's lack of leadership showed he'd been on the job too long.

The size of America's international footprint, and the actual firepower of the GOP's traditional muscular foreign policy, has been up for debate among republicans, not as a disagreement in whole, but where we should be by degree.  Some voters are war-weary, and others prefer a more aggressive American role in world affairs.  In the end, it will come down to what the donors prefer, because we all know that with anything connected to politics, you follow the money.

As for this writer, with my ear to the ground, and an eye on the Constitution, I believe peace is achieved through strength, but we must pick our battles carefully.  We must determine which would be nothing more than foreign entanglements, and which would be moves directly protecting American interests.

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