Obama Bloomberg Interview

This is an interesting, yet creepy article.

Obama did say they are expecting a framework in the next couple of months.  He didn't mention the year extension, I thought that was interesting, because that had been in the news.

It sounds like O is speaking from a mountain somewhere.  He likes Abbas, he and Kerry think Abbas is the best chance the Israeli's are going to get for a peace deal, and that the Jews are running out of time.

O is so tilted towards the Muslims, and away from the Jews.  There's no denying it. 

O waxed on about how wonderful Abbas was.  When they brought up Netanyahu, O abruptly just put it this way:

If he does not believe that a peace deal with the Palestinians is the right thing to do for Israel, then he needs to articulate an alternative approach. And as I said before, it’s hard to come up with one that’s plausible.

And of course Obama mentioned the settlement.  Here I thought he sounded pretty heavy handed:

But what I do believe is that if you see no peace deal and continued aggressive settlement construction -- and we have seen more aggressive settlement construction over the last couple years than we’ve seen in a very long time -- if Palestinians come to believe that the possibility of a contiguous sovereign Palestinian state is no longer within reach, then our ability to manage the international fallout is going to be limited.

GOLDBERG: Willingness, or ability?

OBAMA: Not necessarily willingness, but ability to manage international fallout is going to be limited. And that has consequences.



Here are a few other highlights I pulled out of the article:

This is O's view of Shia' Muslims in Iran.  I thought this was alarmingly sympathetic:

If, on the other hand, they are capable of changing; if, in fact, as a consequence of a deal on their nuclear program those voices and trends inside of Iran are strengthened, and their economy becomes more integrated into the international community, and there’s more travel and greater openness, even if that takes a decade or 15 years or 20 years, then that’s very much an outcome we should desire.

So again, there’s a parallel to the Middle East discussion we were having earlier. The only reason you would not want us to test whether or not we can resolve this nuclear program issue diplomatically would be if you thought that by a quick military exercise you could remove the threat entirely. And since I’m the commander in chief of the most powerful military on earth, I think I have pretty good judgment as to whether or not this problem can be best solved militarily. And what I’m saying is it’s a lot better if we solve it diplomatically.

GOLDBERG: So why are the Sunnis so nervous about you?

OBAMA: Well, I don’t think this is personal. I think that there are shifts that are taking place in the region that have caught a lot of them off guard. I think change is always scary. I think there was a comfort with a United States that was comfortable with an existing order and the existing alignments, and was an implacable foe of Iran, even if most of that was rhetorical and didn’t actually translate into stopping the nuclear program. But the rhetoric was good



GOLDBERG: What is more dangerous: Sunni extremism or Shia extremism?

OBAMA: I’m not big on extremism generally. I don’t think you’ll get me to choose on those two issues. What I’ll say is that if you look at Iranian behavior, they are strategic, and they’re not impulsive. They have a worldview, and they see their interests, and they respond to costs and benefits. And that isn’t to say that they aren’t a theocracy that embraces all kinds of ideas that I find abhorrent, but they’re not North Korea.



I'm always darkly amused by this notion that somehow Iran has won in Syria. I mean, you hear sometimes people saying, "They’re winning in Syria." And you say, "This was their one friend in the Arab world, a member of the Arab League, and it is now in rubble." It’s bleeding them because they’re having to send in billions of dollars. Their key proxy, Hezbollah, which had a very comfortable and powerful perch in Lebanon, now finds itself attacked by Sunni extremists. This isn’t good for Iran. They’re losing as much as anybody. The Russians find their one friend in the region in rubble and delegitimized. (emp mine elizabeth)

Thank you for your summary, Elizabeth ... nice job

It's funny, I sat down to read some scripture after reading this piece and The Lord laid Psalm 33 on my heart. I smiled when I got to vs. 10-12 which read:

[10] The LORD brings the counsel of the nations to nought;
he frustrates the plans of the peoples.
[11] The counsel of the LORD stands for ever,
the thoughts of his heart to all generations.
[12] Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD,
the people whom he has chosen as his heritage!

It's a little ironic that Obama's favourite word lately is "consequences", because he clearly doesn't understand the definition!

I appreciate the comprehensive breakdown of the article Elizabeth.