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The Obama Administration’s disturbing negligence in foreign affairs

A disturbing attitude from America’s Commander-in-Chief and his appointees was in full view during the past week.

On Capitol Hill, former Secretary of State Clinton testified that she didn’t see and wasn’t informed of numerous, desperate pleas for additional security at the Benghazi facility. It’s a lose-lose situation for her; either she was negligent in her oversight responsibilities, or her judgment was so poor in the matter that it led to a disastrous result.

There was little or no discussion of why the Administration helped topple former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, who had moved to the same side as the U.S. in fighting al Qaeda and the Moslem Brotherhood. This pointless and counterproductive move gave rise to the conditions which resulted in the chaos that gave rise to the Benghazi attack, just as the President’s reckless and premature withdrawal of troops from Iraq gave rise to the conditions that allowed ISIS to come to power which, in turn, resulted in Iran’s huge growth of influence in the Middle East as the only force on the ground willing to take them on.

At the White House, Mr. Obama threatened to veto what is, essentially, his own defense spending bill in an effort to close the Guantanamo Bay prison, where terrorists are housed in a setting where no American civilians can be harmed. He also seeks to use his veto threat as a way of forcing Congress to comply with his effort to shift funds from the defense budget, which is substantially smaller than when he took office, (and accounting for only 18% of the federal budget and a significantly lower share of GDP than it has for decades) to entitlements (although not social security) which have expanded greatly, without any success in reducing poverty.  Speaking of things Cuban, the President has also failed to explain why, one month after Havana agreed to allow the Russian Navy to return to its cold war base on the island nation, he, strangely, rewarded this threatening action by restoring relations with Castro’s government.

The President, it has been noted, has failed in the past to regularly attend his own staff’s national security briefings. He appears uninterested at a time when troubling events, some of which are the results of his own inattention, are placing the world in greater danger than at any time since the conclusion of the Second World War.

Throughout the tenure of the current White House and throughout the stewardship of both Secretaries of State Clinton and Kerry, there has been an almost childlike attitude towards international affairs. The President and his appointed Secretaries of State seem to believe that if they simply pretend a threat doesn’t exist, it will go away. Those who disagree with this reality have only one alternative explanation: the President believes that it is America that is causing the world’s problems, a conviction that is contrary to the facts. In this line of thinking, it better to let others—Russia, Iran, etc., take the lead. If this is, indeed, his belief, he has not had the honesty or the courage to share this view with his constituency.
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Mr. Obama is determined to pursue his expensive (and so far, unproductive) domestic agenda at all costs. But presidents do not have the luxury of simply ignoring 50% of their responsibility.  They can neither focus on domestic affairs to the exclusion of foreign affairs, nor vice-versa. They do not have the moral or Constitutional right to completely reverse course on key areas of policy and practice, in this case national defense and foreign affairs, without a candid disclosure of intention to Congress and the people.

Since the current administration came to power, and as a specific result of White House actions, the already weakened American military has shriveled to a dangerously low level, unprecedented since before the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Additionally, relations with allies have deteriorated to an extraordinary degree. The United Kingdom, Poland, Philippines, and Israel are all prime examples.  There is staggering loss of trust in the dependability of Washington as a partner for safety and peace.

Truly bad actors on the international stage seem to have been given carte blanche to engage in the type of actions that has typified aggressors throughout history.   Russia clearly seeks to regain the full international power of the Soviet Union, with a new military that is far more efficient and modern.  China, having benefited from its acquisition of American technology (President Clinton’s allowance of a sale of a Cray supercomputer in the 1990’s, as well as cyber-theft) moves confidentially and illegally to exert control over the Eastern Pacific and Indian Oceans. North Korea and Iran move forward with advanced missile and nuclear technology. Terrorist forces, not just in the Middle East but also in Latin America, Africa and Afghanistan have attained unprecedented levels of power and influence.

As all this occurs, the President focuses on boutique ideological issues such as the closing of Guantanamo Bay and continuing his give-away programs to his core constituency.