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U.S. At Risk Of Being Laughed Off Stage

Jim_S

Gone But Not Forgotten
GOLD Site Supporter
U.S. At Risk Of Being Laughed Off Stage
MARK STEYN

Syndicated columnist
letters@ocregister.com

For generations, eminent New York Times wordsmiths have swooned over foreign strongmen, from Walter Duranty's Pulitzer-winning paeans to the Stalinist utopia to Thomas L. Friedman's more recent effusions to the “enlightened” Chinese Politburo. So it was inevitable that the cash-strapped Times would eventually figure it might as well eliminate the middle man and hire the enlightened strongman direct. Hence Vladimir Putin's impressive debut on the op-ed page this week.


It pains me to have to say that the versatile Vlad makes a much better columnist than I'd be a KGB torturer. His “plea for caution” was an exquisitely masterful parody of liberal bromides far better than most of the Times' in-house writers can produce these days. He talked up the United Nations and international law, was alarmed by U.S. military intervention, and worried that America was no longer seen as “a model of democracy” but, instead, as erratic cowboys “cobbling coalitions together under the slogan ‘you're either with us or against us.'” He warned against chest-thumping about “American exceptionalism,” pointing out that, just like in America's grade-school classrooms, in the international community everyone is exceptional in his own way.

All this the average Times reader would find entirely unexceptional. Indeed, it's the sort of thing a young Sen. Obama would have been writing himself a mere five years ago. Putin even appropriated the 2008 Obama's core platitude: “We must work together to keep this hope alive.” In the biographical tag at the end, the Times editors informed us: “Vladimir V. Putin is the President of Russia.” But by this stage, one would not have been surprised to see: “Vladimir V. Putin is the author of the new memoir, 'The Audacity of Vlad,' which he will be launching at a campaign breakfast in Ames, Iowa, this weekend.”

As Iowahawk ingeniously summed it up, Putin is “now just basically doing donuts in Obama's front yard.” It's not just that he can stitch him up at the G-8, G-20, Gee-don't-tell-me-you're-coming-back-for-more, and turn the leader of the free world into the planet's designated decline-and-fall-guy, but he can slough off ****py third-rate telepromptered mush better than you community-organizer schmucks, too. Let's take it as read that Putin didn't write this himself, any more than Obama wrote that bilge he was drowning in Tuesday night, when he took to the airwaves to argue in favor of the fierce urgency of doing something about gassed Syrian moppets but not just yet. Both guys are using writers, but Putin's are way better than Obama's – and English isn't even their first language. With this op-ed, Tsar Vlad is telling Obama: The world knows you haven't a clue how to play the Great Game or even what it is, but the only parochial solipsistic dweeby game you do know how to play I can kick your butt all over town on, too.

More at:
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/putin-526010-obama-america.html
 

Doc

Bottoms Up
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
At Risk? Seems like it's already happened, whether we realize it or not.
 

muleman

Gone But Not Forgotten
GOLD Site Supporter
Trust me, it happened quite a while ago. Started with the bowing and hand kissing.
 

tiredretired

The Old Salt
SUPER Site Supporter
At Risk? Seems like it's already happened, whether we realize it or not.

Trust me, it happened quite a while ago. Started with the bowing and hand kissing.

Took the words right off my keyboard. :yum: We are already there boys & girls. The only ones now that are afraid of the USA are conservatives and libertarians. A sad, sad state of affairs, but just exactly the way the false prophet wants it I am afraid.
 

Mr. Bill

New member
Im no Obama fan but Im feeling that Obama may have outsmarted everyone. The reason why I think this is because he first said we can strike Syria with out any permissions or agreements. He managed to get Democrats and Republican to act together in saying they were in support of disarming chemical weapons from Syria. He managed to get Russia to take a lead in negotiations with Syria who did agree to sign the chemical weapons treaty.

While all this is happening, behind the scenes the USA has deployed Navy, Marines, Army and Air Force all around the region.

So while every one is talking a peaceful solution it looks like the USA has a big stick over all involved.
 

mla2ofus

Well-known member
GOLD Site Supporter
Im no Obama fan but Im feeling that Obama may have outsmarted everyone. The reason why I think this is because he first said we can strike Syria with out any permissions or agreements. He managed to get Democrats and Republican to act together in saying they were in support of disarming chemical weapons from Syria. He managed to get Russia to take a lead in negotiations with Syria who did agree to sign the chemical weapons treaty.

While all this is happening, behind the scenes the USA has deployed Navy, Marines, Army and Air Force all around the region.

So while every one is talking a peaceful solution it looks like the USA has a big stick over all involved.

As we say out here in the west, BO's all hat and no cattle. I'll be the first to admit I'm wrong if he does something now. He's about two yrs late to do anything.
Mike
 
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