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obama Tag

Posted by David Gerstman on March 15, 2014 11 Comments
During the past year, three English speaking heads of state have spoken in Israel. Nearly a year ago, President Barack Obama addressed the people of Israel in the Jerusalem's International Convention Center. In January, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper addressed the Knesset. This week British Prime Minister David Cameron did too. The contrasts between the President Obama's speech and those of Harper and Cameron are striking. First of all, President Obama chose to forego addressing the Knesset on his first state visit to Israel. According to Jay Carney, “The president will speak to all of the Israeli people in front of an audience of young Israelis who … have it within their hands the power to shape Israel’s future." In other words, President Obama doesn't like the direction Israel is taking (Israel held election two months earlier) and will seek to engage Israelis who may be more receptive to his message that Israel's elected leaders. Although the president was addressing university students, he refused to allow students from Ariel University attend his speech. To be sure, President Obama said many of the right things in his speech. He even acknowledged that Israeli efforts at making peace resulted instead in being "... faced terror and rockets." But these professions of sympathy come across as perfunctory.

Posted by David Gerstman on January 08, 2014 12 Comments
At the end of October the New York Times hailed President Obama's foreign policy as "pragmatic," while largely ignoring the consequences. The two month old article was written by the White House reporter, but a recent article written from Beirut, Power Vacuum in Middle East Lifts Militants paints a somewhat less flattering picture of the administration's foreign policy.
For the first time since the American troop withdrawal of 2011, fighters from a Qaeda affiliate have recaptured Iraqi territory. In the past few days they have seized parts of the two biggest cities in Anbar Province, where the government, which the fighters revile as a tool of Shiite Iran, struggles to maintain a semblance of authority. Lebanon has seen two deadly car bombs, including one that killed a senior political figure and American ally.

Posted by David Gerstman on January 03, 2014 3 Comments
When I was almost fifty four, it was a very good year It was a very good year for kindly faced clerics Whose Justice Minister was an executioner And Defense Minister waged an anti-American war When I was almost fifty four.
Nearly two years ago Jeffrey Goldberg interviewed President Obama about how he would deal with the threat from Iran. Given Goldberg's support for Israel, the interview was part of an administration campaign to tell Israel and Israel's supporters in the United States that "we've got Israel's back." It's unsettling now, that Goldberg has declared that For Iran, 2013 Was a Very Good Year.
Remember that interim Iranian nuclear agreement forged in Geneva on Nov. 24, the one accompanied by blaring trumpets and soaring doves? Would it surprise you to know that the agreement -- a deal that doesn’t, by the way, neutralize the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear program, just freezes the program, more or less, in place -- has not yet been implemented? Would it surprise you to learn that this deal might not be implemented for another month, or more? Or that in this long period of non-implementation, Iran is free to do with its nuclear program whatever it wishes? And that one of the things it is doing is building and testing new generations of centrifuges? Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Agency, recently said , “We have two types of second-generation centrifuges. We also have future generations which are going through their tests.” Happy New Year, everyone.

Posted by Anne Segal on September 04, 2013 19 Comments
Have you noticed another skirmish brewing, not in the Middle East but among Republicans over support for Obama's Syrian debacle? David Axelrod must be twirling his mustache with delight over his latest manipulation of the leaderless Republican party as they provide cover for Obama's latest fail. Of course, Obama's Syrian problem isn't about Congress, it's about his own failures as a leader -- in this case the logical extension of his worldwide apology tour presidency. Enter Axelrod (if he ever was off stage). August 30 Axelrod puts New York Times, et al., on notice of what the talking point will be -- "this is up to Congress": https://twitter.com/davidaxelrod/status/373320824473673729 A gleeful tweet on August 31: https://twitter.com/davidaxelrod/status/373871738032910336 Sept. 2, a thank you to the New York Times for pitching in: https://twitter.com/davidaxelrod/status/374719590124630016 I imagine a phone call from Axelrod to Obama, perhaps sometime Friday night, with Obama pouting about his off-teleprompter "red line" comment. Axelrod has an idea. Foment a little diversion by foisting Obama's Syrian debacle onto hapless Republicans.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on August 31, 2013 28 Comments

Not the indecision and delayed decision about the use of force in Syria. The Golf immediately after the Rose Garden statement. Right after shipping responsibility for authorizing an attack on Syria, President Barack Obama returned to his comfort zone: The golf course. Obama’s motorcade left the White House at...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on April 02, 2013 25 Comments

The policy here has been that the children of politicians are off limits to criticism, even when they do stuff that otherwise might be newsworthy. That policy has been invoked as to the Obama children, consistent with our criticism of the left's despicable and vile attacks...

Posted by Anne Segal on October 05, 2012 42 Comments

Obama supporters lined up to greet the president in Madison, Wisc., on Thursday. While there, they were asked by Rebel Pundit if they thought it was fair that Obama didn't have his teleprompter at the debate this week. Pure video gold: ...

Posted by Joel Engel on September 19, 2012 28 Comments

Apologies to Wikipedia: Whereas the reign of Marcus Aurelius George W. Bush had been marked by almost continuous warfare, that of Commodus Obama was comparatively peaceful in the military sense but was marked by political strife and the increasingly arbitrary and capricious behaviour of the emperor...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on August 10, 2012 12 Comments

No one gets rich on his own. No one. In Obama's case, Tony built it. Romney helped a couple buy house? Big deal, so did Tony Rezko nytimes.com/2012/08/10/us/…— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) August 10, 2012 ...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on August 03, 2012 18 Comments

Love and kisses from the RNC, via The Hill: The Republican National Committee (RNC) sent the Democratic National Committee (DNC) a birthday cake on Friday, but the DNC sent it back. The cake read "you didn't bake this" over a picture of President Obama. Text written in...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 31, 2012 77 Comments

CNN is hyping this story, but when you dig into it, there's no firm evidence, only piecing together assumptions and conjecture. Obama's family tree connection to first African American slave (emphasis mine): His family tree has been linked to Brad Pitt, Sarah Palin and both Presidents Bush but...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 01, 2012 33 Comments

Via @DrMartyFox: Via Newsbusters: And the laughs continue: Obama Budget chief Jack Lew refuses under intense Chris Wallace grilling to admit Obamacare funding mechanism is a tax. Telling.— Brit Hume (@Kimsfirst) July 1, 2012 ...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on June 26, 2012 57 Comments

I have not devoted nearly enough space to the Fast and Furious scandal and cover up.  It is a potential Achilles' Heel exposing the "above the law" attitude of this administration. From The Daily Caller: A single internal Department of Justice email could be the smoking-gun  document...

Posted by Anne Segal on June 25, 2012 26 Comments

The University of Chicago, the once prestigious home to Milton Friedman and Art Laffer and birthplace of the "Chicago School" of free-market economics, is now flirting with the idea of becoming the future home to a quite different type of thinker--Keynesian Barack Obama. University of Chicago...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on June 17, 2012 34 Comments

There is very little chance I'll end up reading David Maraniss' biography of Obama, although by all accounts it is a very detailed work which punctures much of Obama's self-portryal (you remember the "composite" girlfriend revealed in a pre-release excerpt). Ben Smith has read the book,...

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