OBAMA LEGACY IN THE REAL WORLD

Apparently, there was an article published in the New Yorker magazine written by David Remnick; at least that was the subject of a segment on Morning Joe (MSNBC) this morning. The general tone of the article was that Obama’s legacy would be one of non-accomplishment. There was some verbiage about how congress had blocked everything he tired to do, which was twisted to mean that it was the presidents fault because of a lack of not being a close friend congressional representative in either the Senator or the House of Representatives. In addition to getting this all wrong, the author, as a guest willing to say disparaging things about Obama, was welcomed on the show by Joe with open arms,. Remnick said during the interview, almost in passing, that since Obama has become president, no one in the world fears us. That really bothered me because it shows a deep lack of understanding as to what has been wrong with our foreign policy before Obama. It is not just the foreign policy of the United States, but of all countries.

To understand this, we have to start with #Henry Kissinger and his “realpolitik”, which is diplomacy based on power and material factors, which is a nice way of saying exploitation of the weak by the powerful and morality be damned. Republicans refer to this international version of trickle down economics as realism and pragmatism. From this, we have to move to consider the motives of an inexperienced person, perhaps a student, dressed in a black hat and trench coat carrying an assault rifle. He is looking for respect. The lack of maturity is obvious because he does not understand the difference between fear and respect. Our State Department, the department in charge of our foreign policy was under past presidents, which unfortunately have always had the same problem as the immature student. However, it was not a lone student but a massive military dressed in combat uniforms and carrying bigger and more terrifying weapons; “we the people” of the U.S. were proud to be the most powerful country in the world. #Teddy Roosevelt was an executive that was a classic example of this American dichotomy; he stole #Panama from #Columbia and started a war with horrible war with Spain under false pretenses to gain control of territory yet historians seem to consider him to have been our most progressive president in domestic affairs until #Obama.

The Obama foreign policy is building respect for our country because we treat other countries with equality and play fair and honest in trade negotiations. There are revolutions taking place in South and Central America because this policy has left a power vacuum in some countries where the United States had supported dictators, such as Venezuela. Other countries followed the lead of Cuba and were able to shake off their dictator but unfortunately, they chose a dictator to replace a dictator; there is no gain in that. Honduras is an exception, which is where Republican Senator, now ex-senator Jim De Mint, went there to do his dirt with a delegation to depose their duel elected President and to install a military substitute, who was friendly to the U.S. textile industry.

Essentially the same thing is happening in the Middle East. Various countries are trying to install democracy in countries torn apart by 200 year old battles by religious sects fighting to fill the opening they want to fill with democracy; Obama is fighting to allow “democracy” to happen. Of course, the bomb, bomb McCain, with the moneyed interests support, is acting as the leader of the drive to restore the diplomacy of “realpolitik”  where multinational corporations can negotiate at the diplomatic level and use the Untied States military to force to back up their demands in forcing these countries back into submission. They are quick to point out the turmoil as an excuse to justify their proposed aggression; in fact, they are doing that already. If the people of the Untied States are foolish enough to vote in a republican majority in congress but especially vote in a Republican President, we will have multiple repeats of the Iraq debacle. You don’t believe me? Did you notice that Romany’s pick for his cabinet, had he been elected, were all radical neo cons, the same people who started the Iraqi war. 

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