A Parting of the Ways

Foreign Affairs, Human Rights, RML, Social Justice — By cmulready on June 18, 2009 at 4:46 pm

President Obama has poured billions of tax dollars into a government take-over of the Auto Industry. Fair Enough. He is pushing through a Socialist agenda for a national healthcare system, which will effectively strip us of our options with regard to our medical care, while simultaneously creating a shortage for the care available. Que Sera, Sera. He has nominated for the Supreme Court a Justice who is clearly a racist, but being a person of color is not called to account for her evil views. Such is life.

As disastrous as I believe President Obama’s domestic policy to be, it pales when compared to his foreign policy with regard to the “elections” in Iran; a foreign policy that would be generously described as tepid, insincere, passionless, or even disinterested.

Let me be clear: with regard to the sham elections and the violent fallout that has arisen as a result, the position of the Leader of the Free World should be a full-throated denouncing of the criminal tactics of Ahmadenijad and his ilk, and unwavering support of the protestors and a call for outside, neutral investigations and recount.

Perhaps President Obama is simply nervous about inserting the full power of the US government into delicate and difficult circumstances. Still, he has felt no compunction about telling Israel how it should handle the delicate situation in Gaza. As we are some of Israel’s last allies, a scolding from our Commander-in-Chief is hardly the kind of support a nation under almost constant terrorist attack needs. And his domestic policy would certainly suggest that there is little he believes the US government is unable to fix. But that is for another post.

Yet for all of this, somehow the best we can manage when the democratic process is ignored in a state already on the edge of an international confrontation for its nuclear program, combined with its rampant anti-Semitism, and it’s support of multiple terrorist organizations, is this, “It is not productive, given the history of US and Iranian relations to be seen as meddling in Iranian elections.”

It remains unclear how stating that injustice is being done to an entire populace is “meddling” and apparently even President Obama’s own administration finds his inarticulate defense of free and fair elections to be less than appropriate. While I recognize that care is necessary when dealing with the internal politics of any other nation, especially a nation such as Iran, I think it is ridiculous that any President would feel the need to tip-toe around publically denouncing the killing of political protestors, or the violent repression of a free election. It is not redundant to state publically what we are for, and what we oppose, especially in a case such as this. For the people of Iran, the powers that be all seem to have conspired against them; why should we flinch from demonstrating how different we are?

Perhaps we could forgive Mr. Obama; after all, this is only the second time in less than a year that the cause of freedom and liberty have been challenged while he had access to the largest microphone in the civilized world. Or, perhaps the President is simply not comfortable being the spokesman for Freedom, Justice, and Liberty. One begins to wonder exactly which basic principles of our society, if any, he is comfortable promoting.

54 Comments

Evelyn Baker Lang says:
July 24, 2009 at 11:08 am
smmtheory,
Once again, you insist on ascribing to me views I do not hold. When you’re ready to listen to what I say rather than make me the straw man for your cathartic raving, then I’ll be happy to have a conversation about Iran, Honduras, or any number of political topics. But if you decide that I would approve of military intervention in Honduras (and imply that I would have approved, had I known(which of course I do), of the re-installation of the shah in the 1950s), you’re wrong and we can’t really have a conversation.
Roger,
Of course the US doesn’t import oil from Iran – but the oil-rich nature of the region has elevated it above others due to its overall economic importance. I was actually agreeing with a statement you made earlier when I said that.
And while I think the anti-western bias in Iran is fairly justified by idiotic actions taken by the US and Britain especially, at no time did I say that all of Iran’s problems are the western powers’ fault. I just wish we’d try to understand the history of our relationship with Iran and use that knowledge to try to make better diplomatic decisions in the future instead of doing the same thing over and over again while expecting a different result.
Clearly the men in charge of Iran are power-hungry jerks who don’t have the people’s best interest at heart and who are willing to enact violence upon the people to maintain power. But just as clearly, as we’ve seen in the last two months, there are men and women in power who are reasonable and seem to seek democratic reforms for the country.
We need to find a way to support the reasonable people while opposing the tyrants. But our history with the country makes it a dicey thing, diplomatically-speaking.
Which is why we need to acknowledge our history with the country and its impact on the country’s current state. It’s not mea culpa, it’s going into things with our eyes open.
smmtheory says:
July 24, 2009 at 1:06 pm
Evelyn, here’s what you said:
America’s been messing with Iranian politics for the latter half of the last century (most disastrously with Mossadeq through Operation Ajax), and they were really only joining the British, who’d been meddling and exercising economic imperialism for much longer than that. The resentment is deeply-entrenched and, sadly, fairly justified.
I didn’t ascribe that view to you… you did it to yourself. It certainly looks as if you are starting out with the viewpoint that anything done in the national interest of this nation or our allies is by default a bad thing compared to things done in the national interests of the Communist bloc. Do you really assume that the Communist bloc was mischaracterized and maligned, that they did not try to exert influence in direct opposition to us, that they did not attempt to foster anti-Western bias in that region? Maybe when you display a healthy reduction in naivete I’ll be ready to listen to what you have to say.
Evelyn Baker Lang says:
July 24, 2009 at 5:47 pm
smmtheory,
All my statement implies is:
Due to meddling in Iranian affairs done by the US and Britain, the anti-western bias in Iran is not only explicable, it is fairly justified. We have meddled to their detriment in the past. It seems logical to assume we may do so in the present as well.
It does not claim:
1. All problems in Iran are due to the US.
2. Any action taken by the US in its own interest are necessarily bad.
3. Iranian leaders do not take advantage of the existing, fairly justifiable anti-western bias to do bad things that are unjustified. In fact, many times, I’ve said that’s exactly what they’re doing and it’s a very bad thing.
And just by the by, Iran is not and never was part of the Communist bloc.
Roger says:
July 25, 2009 at 6:16 am
Lang,
Sorry for the last response. I accidently excluded the first paragraph when I copied and paste the script into EO.
I probably should not have posted. My reply was a knee-jerk response to a simple theme often stated in the US that we have cause all problems in the Middle East. However, your response indicates that this in not your view.
I am rather disappointed in President Obama for not doing anything at this time. I think that “A Time for Silence” has passed. The structure of the Iranian is government is dissolving down to – I don’t know – a dictatorship?
President Obama went to Egypt to mend relationships. So, we could say that the US stepped up to the plate. Now, it is time for the Middle East countries, and perhaps world community (United Nations) to step up to the plate regarding the sham Iranian election. One would think that with the President’s unique personal background (in comparison to other Presidents) he could come up with a dynamic response to this matter.
This is a clear example of how the Middle East countries (and International community) are responsible for allowing a government regime to brutalize its own citizens – in their own back yard. This is a clear example of how a government can dissolve down to something less – becoming a system that is more difficult to negotiate with on important issues. These factors have nothing to do with Christianity or negative influences from the West.
And, unfortunately, President Obama is doing nothing. At this time, has he contributed to this deterioration in Iran and shown a lack of leadership? The answer is leaning towards ‘yes’. This doesn’t look like the “Change we need” in the Middle East.