Deaf to His Charms
The Kyrygz say 'nyet' to Obama.
Not to deny President Obama's diplomatic charms, but they seem lost on the world's harder cases. The latest is Kyrgyzstan, a Central Asian nation of five million that has been home to a U.S. air base at Manas, a critical transit center to supply troops in Afghanistan.
In February, hours after securing $2 billion in aid from Russia, Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev announced -- in Moscow no less -- that the U.S. will have to leave by August 18. Mr. Obama this week sent a confidential letter to the Kyrgyz leader implicitly asking him to reconsider by "expressing his gratitude to the nation and government of Kyrgyzstan for its efforts to stabilize the situation in Afghanistan and in the fight against international terrorism and narcotics trafficking," according to a summary released by the Kyrgyz government yesterday.
The Kyrgyz quickly shot those hopes down. "The decision to abolish the agreement on the military air base, Manas, has been made, and there is no turning back from this," Foreign Minister Kadyrbek Sarbayev told a Kyrgyz news agency.
Russian fingerprints are all over this U.S. setback. Like many other authoritarians, Vladimir Putin's regime in Moscow derives its legitimacy in part from anti-Americanism. No "restart" in relations promised by Mr. Obama can easily change that. And for Russia, in its neighborhood, the policy consequence is to push America out and prop up local dictators. That's true whether the U.S. President is named Obama or Bush. Perhaps this young Administration can learn with experience that goodwill alone gets one only so far in the real world.
Perhaps, but what about goodwill and Chicago thuggery? That should be a winning combination for sure!
With each passing day I become more convinced that the gangsta-in-chief is not only not the brilliant, nuanced guy the media would have us believe, he is just not very smart. Seriously...who does stupid things like writing "confidential" letters to countries that are owned by Russia, expecting them to remain confidential? Don't forget, this isn't the first time Zero has gotten burned by his attempts to make sneaky deals with the
Once burned, twice stupid, Barry? Just not a great strategy for leading a nation, little buddy. The mindless hordes of unthinking, uninformed American voters may buy your cute little hope and change act, but you don't have a prayer against men like Putin. Ole Vlad wrote the book on sneaky...your kindergarten ploys just don't stack up against the KGB. I'm sure he finds you a useful idiot...perhaps you can take some solace from that.
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