Putin vs. Obama

Over the past week or so, Barack Obama has been negotiating with Vladimir Putin, President of Russia.  A former part of the USSR, the Ukraine, has had a revolt and civil unrest recently, and Putin has taken the opportunity to send in Russian troops to end the revolt.  It appears that his goal is to regain Russian control of the Ukraine.

News reports say that Mr. Obama had a 90 minute telephone call with Putin, trying to convince him to get the Russian military out of the Ukraine.  Was Obama begging?  How long can it take to tell Putin that he has no business interfering in a conflict in a neighboring country?

Now President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry have started to threaten Russia with more of their "serious consequences."  What consequences are we talking about?  Do the Russians have anything to fear from the USA these days?  Our military is involved in Afghanistan and Iraq already.  Our commander in chief didn't even have enough confidence in our military to strike back against terrorists in Benghazi that killed our ambassador and three others.  In fact, our Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, and the President apologized to the terrorists and others that we may have offended.  Then, the President drew a "line in the sand" with Syria.  He said that this little nation would face "serious consequences" if they used chemical weapons.  They did use chemical weapons, and Obama backed down and did nothing.

How could this have been handled better?  It seems that our role will have to be one of condemnation of these sorts of aggressive acts.  If we don't plan to back up our words with action, then we shouldn't lay down any ultimatums or draw any lines in the sand.

All of this has been preceded by a request by our Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel, to reduce the US military force as our conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan come to an end.  He is talking about eliminating new weapons programs.  This is typical of Democratic administrations.  The Republicans have been complaining that we need to cut spending, so let's cut the military spending.  We can't cut the social programs for the poor and unemployed.  We can't even cut the waste from these and all other government programs.  Instead, we need to cut our defense when the world is in a dangerous state that is on the edge of chaos.

Once again, the MessAPolitico is proving its ineptitude at dealing with anything and everything.  Logic has once again gone out of the window.  If hot air is a greenhouse gas, then maybe man-made global warming is for real.  In fact, Washington, DC is the number one area on the planet for producing hot air.  Please join me in the upcoming primaries to replace the incumbents on the tickets with new faces.  The career politicians have made this a MessAPolitico for far too long.