International Political Will

I wonder how that appeasement tastes to Obama right about now.
First he boldly proclaims the US demands a freeze of Israeli settlements. Netanyahu and the Israeli right-wing tell the U.S. president to go f**k himself.

In only a matter of weeks, Obama bends over on the Israeli settlement issue and lets Netanyahu have his way with [...]

I believe the word is “appeasement.”
Obama, after first making an allegedly “bold” stand on the Israeli settlement issue a few months ago (even though his “bold stand” was the same as every other president that came before him…) has caved. Given in. Cried ‘Uncle.’ Bent over.
Appeased.
Except when the U.S. government whimpers and admits defeat to [...]

Thank God for Jimmy Carter.
But I still have to wonder why it’s Carter’s job to report facts – wasn’t that supposed to be the job of journalists?
After the “9/12” protests last week, the news media tried to convince us that this represented a legitimate argument again Obama’s policies. We were told these were “real” fears [...]

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who until now showed that he understood the folly of the preemptive war doctrine, just crossed the line into Rumsfeldian stupidity. Instead of addressing the context and forming a new paradigm of strategic policy for the world, Gates hearkened back to the failures of arming proxy-states to further U.S. interests.

Here’s [...]

Almost a full eight years into the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan, there are still three institutional sources of violence in the country: the Taliban, the warlords, and the foreign occupation. Each of these institutions feed off each other, generating a vicious cycle that Afghanistan appears unable to break.
The only winning strategy in Afghanistan is reconstruction. [...]