Thursday, January 21, 2010

Obama Admits He's Clueless on Foreign Policy

Not exactly, but he might as well have when he made these statements about the Israeli-Palestinian situation.
"This is just really hard … This is as intractable a problem as you get. If we had anticipated some of these political problems on both sides earlier, we might not have raised expectations as high."
Obama is just now figuring out that the differences between Israelis and Palestinians constitute an intractable problem. It only took an entire year as president.

"I think the Israelis and Palestinians have found that the political environment, the nature of their coalitions, or the divisions within their societies were such that it was very hard for them to start engaging in a meaningful conversation," said Obama. "And I think that we overestimated our ability to persuade them to do so when their politics ran contrary to that."

Look at how he describes the situation. He still appears pretty clueless. A "meaningful conversation"? "Contrary" politics? Who does he even think he's talking about? A couple of factions in the Illinois state legislature? According to the Guardian, Obama "underestimated the political obstacles involved." It's difficult to imagine how anyone with even a basic understanding of the issues between Israelis and Palestinians could underestimate the problems involved in working out any lasting, peaceful solution. 

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