Obama not tough enough w/ Iran, N.Korea

DUH!


The Poll

The Article

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Most Americans -- including majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents -- say President Obama has not been tough enough on North Korea and Iran.

A FOX News poll released Monday finds more than two-thirds of Americans say Obama has not been tough enough on North Korea (69 percent), while some 15 percent think his actions have been "about right" and 3 percent think he has been too tough.

Sizable majorities of Democrats (65 percent), Republicans (78 percent) and independents (61 percent) agree Obama should be tougher on North Korea. Among those voters who backed Obama in the 2008 presidential election, 59 percent say he has not been tough enough.

North Korea test-fired short-range missiles on two separate occasions in May. President Obama denounced the tests as a "grave threat to the peace and security of the world." And last week, in response to the tests, the United Nations Security Council expanded international sanctions against North Korea.

On Iran, the findings are almost identical: 66 percent overall say Obama has not been tough enough, including 57 percent of Democrats, 80 percent of Republicans and 59 percent of independents.

Opinion Dynamics Corp. conducted the national telephone poll of 900 registered voters for FOX News from June 9 to June 10 -- before the results of Iran's presidential election were announced and the ensuing civil unrest in that country. The poll has a 3-point error margin.

People are most concerned North Korea will sell nukes to terrorists. Twice as many say their main concern is North Korea selling nuclear weapons (41 percent), as say attacking the United States (18 percent). For 1 in 10 the top concern is North Korea attacking a nearby country (10 percent) such as Japan or South Korea. Nearly a quarter of Americans (24 percent) says they are equally concerned about all of these possibilities.

On Iran, again the top concern is selling nuclear weapons to terrorists (35 percent), followed by attacking Israel (23 percent) and attacking the United States or Europe (15 percent). The remaining 22 percent say "all."

Closing Gitmo

There is widespread belief that President Obama made a mistake by announcing he was going to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay before having a plan for what would happen to the detainees.

Fully 77 percent of Americans think the president made a mistake, including almost all Republicans (94 percent) and independents (81 percent), as well as a majority of Democrats (61 percent).

A growing majority of Americans think the military prison at Guantanamo Bay should stay open. Some 60 percent say they think Gitmo should not be closed, up from 53 percent in April and 45 percent in January.

Republicans (82 percent) are more than twice as likely as Democrats (40 percent) to say the prison should stay open. Among independents, 62 percent think it should stay open.

The results are similar on the question of whether the prisoners should be transferred to prisons in the United States. Overall, 60 percent of voters are against moving the prisoners to the United States, up from 55 percent last month and 52 percent in January.

CIA versus Pelosi

On the issue of the CIA briefing Congress on interrogation techniques used on terrorist suspects, who do Americans believe -- the CIA, who says House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was briefed on the techniques or Nancy Pelosi, who says she was not briefed?

By 56 percent to 22 percent Americans believe the CIA over Pelosi.

Most Republicans (78 percent) and independents (56 percent) believe the CIA. Democrats are divided -- 38 percent believe the CIA and 38 percent Pelosi, while 10 percent say there is "some truth to both.

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Eight years of "toughness" left us with a nuclear NK and Iran on the brink (allegedly). You want more of the same?

(BTW, your poll also shows America clearly in favor of Obama's so called apology tour, 55%-36%. Does that mean you're wrong about it, D?)

I no even see big stwick.

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Originally Posted by Winehole23

Eight years of "toughness" left us with a nuclear NK and Iran on the brink (allegedly). You want more of the same?

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"Bring it on!" [/TOUGH]

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Originally Posted by FaithInOne

I no even see big stwick.

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Somebody dun went an stuck it in de mud.

http://img75.imageshack.us/img75/8601/zni7.jpg

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Originally Posted by FaithInOne

I no even see big stwick.

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Naturally a Progressive Republican president is alluded to. Why aren't you quoting the last one? That would be more relevant.

What do you mean by "get tough"?

It's a nice platitude but it means absolutely nothing.

It means real Americans want the bombs to start dropping, 'cept this time let's totally pound their ass into submission!

We freed Vietnam that way -- why would this be any different?

Right?

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Originally Posted by Marcus Bryant

It means real Americans want the bombs to start dropping, 'cept this time let's totally pound their ass into submission!

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yeah but but but that would mean war and and and and then his budget will be all screwed up

and he would be proven he speaketh with forked tongue

Hey, maybe a break from more wars to stop more wars wouldn't be so bad.

peace in our time! WHOOO!


couldn't resist myself.

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Originally Posted by angrydude

peace in our time! WHOOO!


couldn't resist myself.

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Hitler and Tojo would've been mere bad guys without large, prosperous, culturally homogeneous nation states at their backs. And massive, methodically developed war machines.

The question is not whether there are world leaders who match Hitler for evil and depravity. I have little doubt there are. The crucial question is whether the nations they lead have military might comparable to Germany and Japan in the 1930's.

I see none besides the USA.

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Originally Posted by Winehole23

Hitler and Tojo would've been mere bad guys without large, prosperous, culturally homogeneous nation states at their backs. And massive, methodically developed war machines.

The question is not whether there are world leaders who match Hitler for evil and depravity. I have little doubt there are. The crucial question is whether the nations they lead have military might comparable to Germany and Japan in the 1930's.

I see none besides the USA.

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it was a joke.

and who needs military might when you have a nuke?

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Originally Posted by angrydude

it was a joke.

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Yes. A rather lame and hackneyed joke.

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Originally Posted by angrydude

and who needs military might when you have a nuke?

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Besides the USA, who all has dropped the bomb? Has anyone, besides the USA, ever used nukes to take control of another country?

What more do people want us to do to NK? They are threatening war with the sanctions that are in place now. I'm pretty sure we don't even have the manpower to sustain 2 more theaters of operation. With Iran we might be able to spare some aircraft... but not any boots. I think we have about 35-40K troops in SK, and with the SK army already more powerful than the NK army that might prove to be sufficient.

What is the end game with you people?

We are bogged down in Afghanistan. Trying to maintain order in Iraq.

Now people want to provoke two top 20 military powers? Let's just be in a perpetual state of war for the indefinite future! YAY!

Just because I think the Govts of NK and Iran should go doesn't mean I think we should go to war with them right now. Especially Iran, I don't think you have to with Iran. Yeah if push comes to shove you want to have the ability to go into Iran and shut it down, but that doesn't mean you think it's a great option are this particular time, or perhaps ever.


I think the entire reason we went into Iraq is to get closer to Iran and increase our pres in the ME to make things difficult for them, I mean afterall, we don't want Iran emerging as the ME superpower. But even taking that into account, that Iraq was always about Iran as much as it was Irag from the day we went into Iraq, I don't think the plan was ever an immediate war with Iran...


As for North Korea, there is no way to get rid of North Korea, I don't give a damn how mighty you think our military is, it is no match for a conventional war with 3 billion fucking Chinese and their resources.


Sanctioning doesn't work either, they've had the living shit sanctioned out of them for 60 years now and the only ones suffering are the people of NK.


IF anyone has a solution for NK by all means let's hear it. I think that's the one we should say fuck it on. I mean Chinese Communism isn't as virulent as the Soviet kind was and the Chinese are doing good to stay communist, in some ways they are more capitalist than we are.


All the sanctions do is create those starving North Korean pictures they always show.

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Originally Posted by jman3000

Now people want to provoke two top 20 military powers? Let's just be in a perpetual state of war for the indefinite future! YAY!

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I am beginning to think this is what people want. That and democratic socialism, though to be honest, I don't think we can afford both.

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Originally Posted by whottt

Just because I think the Govts of NK and Iran should go doesn't mean I think we should go to war with them right now. Especially Iran, I don't think you have to with Iran. Yeah if push comes to shove you want to have the ability to go into Iran and shut it down, but that doesn't mean you think it's a great option are this particular time, or perhaps ever.


I think the entire reason we went into Iraq is to get closer to Iran and increase our pres in the ME to make things difficult for them, I mean afterall, we don't want Iran emerging as the ME superpower. But even taking that into account, that Iraq was always about Iran as much as it was Irag from the day we went into Iraq, I don't think the plan was ever an immediate war with Iran...


As for North Korea, there is no way to get rid of North Korea, I don't give a damn how mighty you think our military is, it is no match for a conventional war with 3 billion fucking Chinese and their resources.


Sanctioning doesn't work either, they've had the living shit sanctioned out of them for 60 years now and the only ones suffering are the people of NK.


IF anyone has a solution for NK by all means let's hear it. I think that's the one we should say fuck it on. I mean Chinese Communism isn't as virulent as the Soviet kind was and the Chinese are doing good to stay communist, in some ways they are more capitalist than we are.


All the sanctions do is create those starving North Korean pictures they always show.

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We could go all Soviet Union on them and introduce McDonald's to them. That line of thinking would be we'd actually have to ease tensions between us. Help them create jobs, give their poor some hope. Money has a funny way of softening up ideology... at least for the people... not necessarily the power structure.

With a totalitarian regime as absolute as NK's it's pretty hard imagining that working though. Perhaps if this "Brilliant Comrade" character is a retard and his surrogates think he's weak, some type of coup could occur.

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Originally Posted by whottt

Just because I think the Govts of NK and Iran should go doesn't mean I think we should go to war with them right now. Especially Iran, I don't think you have to with Iran. Yeah if push comes to shove you want to have the ability to go into Iran and shut it down, but that doesn't mean you think it's a great option are this particular time, or perhaps ever.


I think the entire reason we went into Iraq is to get closer to Iran and increase our pres in the ME to make things difficult for them, I mean afterall, we don't want Iran emerging as the ME superpower. But even taking that into account, that Iraq was always about Iran as much as it was Irag from the day we went into Iraq, I don't think the plan was ever an immediate war with Iran...


As for North Korea, there is no way to get rid of North Korea, I don't give a damn how mighty you think our military is, it is no match for a conventional war with 3 billion fucking Chinese and their resources.


Sanctioning doesn't work either, they've had the living shit sanctioned out of them for 60 years now and the only ones suffering are the people of NK.


IF anyone has a solution for NK by all means let's hear it. I think that's the one we should say fuck it on. I mean Chinese Communism isn't as virulent as the Soviet kind was and the Chinese are doing good to stay communist, in some ways they are more capitalist than we are.


All the sanctions do is create those starving North Korean pictures they always show.

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The only solution is to incite revolution. The easiest way in theory would be to provoke NK into a war against the world. Easy enough. At this point, NK gets no aid from anyone. Weapons, ammo, and especially food. The people starve, including the army, and a military coup takes place in the face of an un-winnable war.

The problem? Obvious. China.

The best we can do may be to keep nudging china towards a full democracy, at which point they would turn on NK.

History has a little quirk. Modern democracies don't go to war with other democracies (except one case in WW2 when democratic Finland allied with Germany). People are quick to point out examples in WW1, Russia, and former soviet satellites, but none of those were a true democracy.

NK now has senior citizens that have spent their entire lives under the current system, it's arguable that anyone in NK even knows what a revolt is anymore, at least, not anyone in any position to do anything about it.

I was actually thinking earlier about how motivated the people would be if all the top brass were assassinated or something. I'm sure that people have such a hard time just feeding themselves that they don't think about an uprising. The military would have to do something as the officers are most likely upper class that actually get food and an education.

I think it's inherent in human biology to feel the need to fight back when you feel wronged. It's a natural sense of justice. The problem is, that with a population as suppressed, starving, weak, and clueless as NK's, you don't have the catalyst for any action on a large scale to happen.

It can't go on forever. Their birthrate is pretty much stagnant at this point, and with a high infant mortality rate, and potentially millions of deaths due to starvation on the horizon, something has to give.

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Originally Posted by whottt

Just because I think the Govts of NK and Iran should go doesn't mean I think we should go to war with them right now. Especially Iran, I don't think you have to with Iran. Yeah if push comes to shove you want to have the ability to go into Iran and shut it down, but that doesn't mean you think it's a great option are this particular time, or perhaps ever.


I think the entire reason we went into Iraq is to get closer to Iran and increase our pres in the ME to make things difficult for them, I mean afterall, we don't want Iran emerging as the ME superpower. But even taking that into account, that Iraq was always about Iran as much as it was Irag from the day we went into Iraq, I don't think the plan was ever an immediate war with Iran...


As for North Korea, there is no way to get rid of North Korea, I don't give a damn how mighty you think our military is, it is no match for a conventional war with 3 billion fucking Chinese and their resources.


Sanctioning doesn't work either, they've had the living shit sanctioned out of them for 60 years now and the only ones suffering are the people of NK.


IF anyone has a solution for NK by all means let's hear it. I think that's the one we should say fuck it on. I mean Chinese Communism isn't as virulent as the Soviet kind was and the Chinese are doing good to stay communist, in some ways they are more capitalist than we are.


All the sanctions do is create those starving North Korean pictures they always show.

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Hear hear! Whottt making some sense.

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Originally Posted by Winehole23

I am beginning to think this is what people want. That and democratic socialism, though to be honest, I don't think we can afford both.

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War is peace on one side and debt is surplus on the other? :D

I guess this means the Bush's foreign policy was failure since all of these issues were progressing right under his nose...

Thanks for clearing that up! :lmao

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Originally Posted by George Gervin's Afro

I guess this means the Bush's foreign policy was failure since all of these issues were progressing right under his nose...

Thanks for clearing that up! :lmao

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Curious you'd find that funny since it's basically an admission that Obama's foreign policy is a failure too.

This whole deal of talking tough when the reality is they know that we know that they know we won't do shit because of the Bush clusterfuck is pretty lame.

I'm all for U.S. not being world police, (F the rest of the world is a F-N-1 policy) but we all know where this game is going on a nuclear persistent N Korea. It's only a matter of time before shit hits the fan and we all know we will take the peaceful approach until then.

Either go black or white. Grey does nothing in this situation.

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Originally Posted by coyotes_geek

Curious you'd find that funny since it's basically an admission that Obama's foreign policy is a failure too.

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8 yrs vs 6 months.. equal terms..:lmao

Damn, even the hardcore libbies at Slate think Obama should take a stronger stance w/ Iran.

Disengagement with Iran

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It's time for President Obama to rethink his policy of "engagement" with Iran.

Given the near-certainty that Iran's election was fixed and the documented fact that protesters are being brutalized, there is no way that Obama or Secretary of State Hillary Clinton could go to Tehran and shake hands with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, much less to expect that any talks would be worthwhile.

The issue here is not one of realpolitik vs. democratic idealism. Rather, it's a question about what course of action is simply realistic (in the conversational, as opposed to ideological, sense of the word).

A classic international realist, in the tradition of Henry Kissinger, might shrug off the call for a revision in outlook and policy. After all, it's nothing new or unusual for the United States, or any other power, to cultivate diplomatic relations with illegitimate regimes. If there hadn't been an election, Obama would have proceeded to open a dialogue. And the nature of the Iranian government, which isn't really run by the president, anyway, is basically the same now as it was last week.

But, in fact, something has changed. The blatant fraudulence of the election has mobilized the Iranian people in a way that hasn't been seen since the 1979 revolution, which led to the overthrow of the Shah of Iran. The shah seemed to control Iran back then as tightly as the Islamic mullahs do today. The decisive moment in '79 occurred when middle-class merchants—the heart of the shah's political support—joined the students and the radicals in revolt.

What social group might now play the same role that the merchants played then? This is where today's situation differs from that of 30 years ago. There might very well be no such group. Rural conservative peasants form the main base of support for Ahmadinejad and the mullahs, and there's no reason to believe they'll join the young men and (especially) women protesting in the streets of the capital city.

Unless the violence widens the fissures in Iranian society to an unprecedented—almost unimaginable—degree, the agitation could simply peter out in the coming days and weeks as more and more protesters are beaten, detained, and even killed, with no effect on the regime's survival. In this case, it may well be, as a story in today's New York Times predicted, that the hardliners wind up more firmly in control than ever.

Yet reports have circulated in recent months suggesting that some Iranian clerics, even a few in high places, are displeased with Ahmadinejad's harsh rhetoric and his mishandling of the economy. Some evidence of electoral fraud has reportedly been leaked from dissidents from within Iran's interior ministry.

The supreme leader has ordered the Guardian Council to investigate allegations of fraud—this after publicly ratifying the election's results (without, suspiciously, observing the three-day waiting period that Iranian law requires)—though it may be that this order is mere subterfuge and that the investigation will be just as fraudulent.

In other words, it is possible (how likely it might be, no one can say) that the popular revolts might sharpen the fissures within the circles of Iran's ruling elite. Of course, those circles are so opaque that few outsiders can tell whether there are fissures, much less what their boundaries are. Does the CIA or the National Security Agency know? I hope so, but I don't know.

his is a common problem in analyzing dictatorships. In the October 1964 issue of a now-defunct USIA-sponsored journal called Problems of Communism, a prominent Kremlinologist named William Griffith, who had extensive CIA ties, wrote a savage critique of the notion, propagated by a few scholars at the time, that rival power factions were quarreling within the Kremlin. Griffith proclaimed that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev's power was as unchallenged and absolute as Josef Stalin's had ever been. The very month that the issue was published, Khrushchev was overthrown by a rival faction.

Whatever is going on inside Tehran's ruling circles, now is not the time for Obama to engage in outreach. Rather, it's time to up the ante, to make the mullahs—especially those who might be inclined to cast off Ahmadinejad—realize that if they're going to play democracy, they can't rig the deck and violate the will of their people, at least not so blatantly.

Some "smart sanctions" against Iran have had a modicum of success in the past: freezing financial transactions and foreign bank accounts; severely cutting back on capital investment; and banning the export of oil-refining equipment, which the Iranians painfully need. The Europeans have been reluctant, out of economic self-interest, to go along with these steps in the past. Perhaps moral shaming, to which they're sometimes more vulnerable than we are, can be piled on.

The problem with former President George W. Bush's policy of "democracy promotion" was threefold. First, it was hypocritical: He supported dissidents in certain countries and dictatorships in others. Second, it sought, at least rhetorically, to impose Western-style democracy without regard to a country's political terrain. Third, in places where a civil society had not yet developed, elections could exacerbate violence and harm U.S. interests. (Case in point: the Palestinian territories.)

The situation with Iran is different. The movement for change is arising from within. What sort of politics the protesters advocate isn't clear. And the protesters seem to be more aligned with Western interests: Journalists who have traveled in Iran and talked with reformers say that they're among the most pro-American people they've ever met.

This is not to say that we should send in spies or special-ops troops to provide covert aid to the protesters or their favored candidate, Mir Hossein Mousavi. The discovery of American fingerprints would spur a backlash, raising memories of the CIA-backed coup of 1953. Nonetheless, it wouldn't be a bad idea for someone with a knack for subtlety to probe the fissures for possibilities of new leaders rising to power.

Meanwhile, according to NPR's Deborah Amos, U.S. officials visiting Damascus in the past few days—in the wake of Lebanon's more satisfying election—have emerged with happy faces from meetings with their Syrian counterparts. The details aren't yet clear, but this might be an opportune moment to start luring Syria away from its Iranian alliance. Without its Syrian middlemen, Iran would have a much harder time influencing events in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.

Obama has backed the idea of diplomacy with Iran because Iran is too powerful in the region to ignore. Ahmadinejad said, after he was officially declared the winner, that his victory was the harbinger of a further hardening of foreign policy. So if diplomacy is likely to be futile as well as unseemly, an alternative course might be to take steps to make Iran less powerful, its rulers less comfortable. Hold out the prospect of normal relations if a new election, or at least a real vote count, is held. But in the meantime, tighten the screws.

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Originally Posted by George Gervin's Afro

8 yrs vs 6 months.. equal terms..:lmao

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So in other words the only difference between Bush and Obama is time. Glad to see you're happy about that.

Ooh, targeted sanctions....

Get tough!

Why is it that whenever anybody gives suggestions as what to do with Iran they use words like "get tough", "tighten the screws", "get harder on them"? Why so vague? What is it that people really want to see happen?

The right is gonna say sanctions are too light. The left is gonna say war is too extreme. But that seems like the only 2 options that we're throwing around.

Seriously... what is it that people want to happen?


and :lmao at Obama killing that fly during that interview. He looked so damn intense as he was about to slap it.

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Originally Posted by jman3000

Why is it that whenever anybody gives suggestions as what to do with Iran they use words like "get tough", "tighten the screws", "get harder on them"? Why so vague? What is it that people really want to see happen?

The right is gonna say sanctions are too light. The left is gonna say war is too extreme. But that seems like the only 2 options that we're throwing around.

Seriously... what is it that people want to happen?


and :lmao at Obama killing that fly during that interview. He looked so damn intense as he was about to slap it.

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War isn't an option. Obama won't consider it as one, which is the right call on his part because frankly we couldn't afford it even if he were considering it. As I see it, here are Obama's options. None are pleasant.

1) more sanctions
2) bluff war
3) buy them off
4) back off

Sanctions haven't worked so far and North Korea is threatening to retailiate if they do get subjected to more sanctions.

North Korea and Iran know that we can't afford a war so that bluff would be called.

Buying them off only encourages them to come back for more. Plus it makes him look bad.

Backing off also makes him look bad because then Iran and North Korea feel emboldened that they stood face to face with the big bad U.S. and we blinked.

It's pretty much a no-win scenario for him. But tough shit for him. He wanted the job. So Mr. President, what's it going to be?

Obviously "get tough" means a military invasion, so both sides of the political duopoly in these United States can bitch about it for the next 4 to 8 years, with roles reversed from the last 8 years.

There are a lot of shitty governments in the world. Maybe the one we have should focus on not being one of those.