Reply With Quote
And?
SEOUL, South Korea — At the tail end of his 90 minute meeting with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev Monday, President Obama said that he would have “more flexibility” to deal with controversial issues such as missile defense, but incoming Russian President Vladimir Putin needs to give him “space.”
The exchange was picked up by microphones as reporters were let into the room for remarks by the two leaders.
The exchange:
President Obama: On all these issues, but particularly missile defense, this, this can be solved but it’s important for him to give me space.
President Medvedev: Yeah, I understand. I understand your message about space. Space for you…
President Obama: This is my last election. After my election I have more flexibility.
President Medvedev: I understand. I will transmit this information to Vladimir.
And?
A reasonable interpretation of these comments could be:
"Once I get re-elected I can go ahead and do what the people wouldn't want me to do. If I did this now I couldn't get re-elected."
Really, how many votes do you think hinge on this?
I'm not sure many want a renewed nuclear arms race with Russia.
Probably not many votes in New York or California. But probably plenty of votes in Ohio and Florida.
I'm not sure many want a president who refuses to take a stand on the issue simply because it would not be in his political interest.
Perhaps he is out Romneying Mitt.
Ohio is afraid of being nuked by Russia?
Then no one should ever be elected president. What a stupid thing to say.I'm not sure many want a president who refuses to take a stand on the issue simply because it would not be in his political interest.
Ohio isn't afraid of being nuked by Russia?
You do not want a sitting president, when faced with a foreign national security issue, to address said issue, but instead, wait until there is less political consequence. What a stupid thing to think.
Why not just abdicate the presidency for the next 8 months? Well, I guess that is technically what is happening. The president has effectively become the Queen of England for the interim.
Even worse, he is just the campaigner in chief. Being President requires making tough decisions about what is in US best interest. He can't let that get in the way of being re-elected.
Meh. The average voter can't find their own country on a map, let alone give you a single tangible detail about the foreign policy and military implications of missle defenses.
Nor can they be bothered with such details.
Do you think this kind of talk is limited to Democratic presidents?
Yes, they are building fallout shelters and doing duck and cover drills at schools.
Every president running for reelection does this.You do not want a sitting president, when faced with a foreign national security issue, to address said issue, but instead, wait until there is less political consequence. What a stupid thing to think.
Why not just abdicate the presidency for the next 8 months? Well, I guess that is technically what is happening. The president has effectively become the Queen of England for the interim.
Every one.
It's very stupid to think otherwise.
Should it be limited to any president?
It's a matter of Ohio nuclear defense!
It's electoral politics.
If one wants an autocrat, one can say so.
Elections have been affecting our domestic and foreign policies since, well forever.
This whole thing is just more Coolaid for the converted.
The "outrage du jour" served up by the right wing Fake Outrage Machine, if you will.
Press a button, get a steaming hot cup of phony outrage about Obama.
There are a of a lot of genuine things to be irritated about Obama, but instead, we get like this? Really?
From what I heard, Obama's plan was pretty ambitious as announced. If he were completely cowed by the election, I doubt anything like tactical nukes would have been brought up at all.
Who would have thought about that? New political ground!
Oh wait, same old politics we've ever had.
Repugs are running on killing the EPA/OSHA/Clean Water, which is NOT what Repug voters want them to do.
Hilarious thread.
People defending or accusing in this would be doing the EXACT opposite if GWB had been caught saying this (except Chump, he probably would have just remained silent).
Way to tribe up guys.
My opinion:
Yes, a Republican might have said something similar - and obviously ALL political participants modify their actions during an election year. Is it wrong? Of course; politicians should take stands and stick to them; elections be damned.
http://www.theamericanconservative.c...sy-vs-reality/James Joyner has one of the most sensible responses to the “flexibility” non-controversy:Similarly, if reelected, the president isn’t going to do a complete 180 on missile defense–but he’d have more breathing room without having to make policy under a campaign microscope. That’s just reality.Of course, it’s true that elections constrain what any elected leader can do during the run-up to an election, and electioneering sometimes requires more hard-line posturing for the benefit of domestic audiences (which incidentally accounts for the recent intensified official criticism of the U.S. inside Russia ahead of Putin’s election). Viewed this way, Obama is just stating the obvious about the limitations that exist during an election year. The overwrought response to these remarks from some Republicans helps prove the point. If Obama is re-elected, there will be less political pressure at home after the election is over, but it doesn’t mean that there will be no constraints on what Obama does. As James says, it doesn’t mean that Obama is going to turn on a dime on an issue where he has been fairly uncompromising. The people most convinced that Obama’s “flexibility” comments mean something are the ones who already believe (wrongly) that Obama has abjectly sold out U.S. and allied interests to the Russians from day one. Meanwhile, in the real world Obama has been persistent in pursuing missile defense in Europe despite Russian complaints.
What no one else seems to be considering is that these remarks were little more than throwaway lines used to placate the Russians. The reason so many people seem ready to attach so much significance to these “flexibility” comments is that they were captured by a live microphone and they weren’t supposed to be public. However, as Drezner pointed out again recently, just because something was intended to be kept private doesn’t make it true.
Even if true, it doesn’t follow that Obama’s reference to “flexibility” means what confirmed opponents of his “reset” policy think it does. When a Russian skeptic hears Obama say that he just needs to win re-election before he can be more “flexible” on missile defense, he probably assumes this is just a way to blow off Russian concerns without giving unnecessary offense. Based on Obama’s actual record on missile defense (and not the fantasy version circulated by partisan opponents), this would probably be the right way to interpret the remarks.
So he was just blowing off the Russians?
Fair enough.
But now THAT cat is out of the bag.
perhaps. discretion is the better part of valor, etc., etc..
http://www.theamericanconservative.c...-for-legacies/Dan Drezner reviews the records of second-term Presidents to show that re-election doesn’t normally mean a more ideological second term:What’s striking, however, is that recent second-termers have not reverted to their ideological bliss point — if anything it’s been the reverse. Part of this was cir stances. Reagan had, in Gorbachev, a real negotiating partner. Bush had to be more cir spect on Iran and North Korea after the cost of Iraq and Afghanistan. All three presidents had less favorable legislatures in their second term than their first.That makes sense, but what Drezner doesn’t discuss enough here is the extent to which second-term administrations really are freed from the constraints imposed by their own party bases. Granting for the sake of argument that the second Reagan and Bush terms were more “liberal” than their first (a very debatable proposition in Bush’s case), the reason for that is obvious enough: they no longer had to appeal to their core cons uencies, and they were free to ignore them even more than they had before because they no longer needed them to win an election. Many movement conservatives found the second Reagan and Bush terms to be very disappointing for just this reason.
What gives? I’d argue that precisely because presidents have fewer foreign policy constraints than domestic ones, they feel free to pursue their preferred set of policies from day one. Reality, however, quickly determines which ideas are working and which do not have any staying power. Over time, therefore, presidents change tack until they hit on a more successful formula. This usually means overcoming one’s personal ideology and embracing new ideas.
If not for presidential term limits, a second-term administration might very well become more ideologically ambitious. Woodrow Wilson’s second term stands out as a calamitous example of what could happen under the pre-22nd Amendment system. Since modern second-term presidents don’t have to keep their party bases particularly motivated and happy, they will usually look for something that will give them a legacy regardless of the backlash from the party base.
http://www.theamericanconservative.c...-criticism-ii/Pete Wehner jumps on the manufactured outrage bandwagon over Obama’s “flexibility” comments:
And can anyone guess what it means when Obama says he’ll have “more flexibility” after his “last election”? A hint: This is a president who shelved his predecessor’s plan to build a missile defense shield in Poland and the Czech Republic in order to “reset” our relations with Russia – and Obama did this without receiving any concessions from Russia in advance or since. (Russia has, in fact, been a consistent thorn in our side.) This action was also (rightly) seen as a betrayal by our allies in Eastern Europe. We can only imagine what a second Obama term would mean in terms of unwise concessions and reckless agreements with Russia, Iran, North Korea and countless other nations.I’m sure Wehner can imagine all sorts of things. The “betrayal” of eastern European allies is imaginary, and Wehner’s description of the concessions the U.S. has received from Russia also has nothing to do with reality. Most Poles didn’t support Bush’s plan anyway, and the radar installation in the Czech Republic was wildly unpopular. In fact, Poles favored Obama’s decision by a wide margin as good for Poland. The Polish and Czech governments were understandably annoyed about how they were informed of the decision, but that is a different matter. The idea that adopting a different missile defense plan represents a “betrayal” of allies when the U.S. is currently cooperating with eastern European allies on the new plan is absurd. Russia has obviously been cooperative on issues related to Afghanistan and Iran. It is this cooperation that so infuriates opponents of the “reset” because they prefer relations with Russia to be adversarial. Wehner’s summary of the last three years is revealing in that it shows how much he relies on accusations from three years ago that weren’t true at the time.
2009 SpursTalk thread:
http://www.spurstalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=135188
I'm not an Obama supporter in the least... but this truly a case of "much ado about nothing"...
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
