Hard Bargaining

[monk222]

This week already saw some pyrotechnic explosions between the Republicans and Obama, starting off with Bush's speech at the Knesset in which he chides those who suggest that diplomacy and negotiation can be meaningful with figures such as Ahmadinejad, presumably chiding Obama in that net. Much of the mainstream media seemed to favor Obama's will to pursue a more diplomatic tack, but Mark Steyn highlights why Obama's proposed approach toward the Middle East is not unproblemsome:

This will be the fault line in the post-Bush war debate over the next few years. Are the political ambitions of the broader jihad totalitarian, genocidal, millenarian – in a word, nuts? Or are they negotiable? President Bush knows where he stands. Just before the words that Barack Obama took umbrage at, he said:

"There are good and decent people who cannot fathom the darkness in these men and try to explain away their words. It's natural, but it is deadly wrong. As witnesses to evil in the past, we carry a solemn responsibility to take these words seriously."

Here are some words of Hussein Massawi, the former leader of Hezbollah:

"We are not fighting so that you will offer us something. We are fighting to eliminate you."

One can appreciate better Hillary's position, which is that any negotiations will remian on a lower diplomatic level before she sits with an Ahmadinejad. Why lend more credence to active sponsors of terrorism? In any case, Obama needs to elaborate on what he hopes to achieve with his diplomacy, including how he would keep such leaders honest - the equivalent of President Reagan's 'trust but verify'. We need to get something real from the diplomacy and bargaining.