Obama & The Art of Revision

To paraphrase Mark Twain, the benefit of political candor is that it doesn't require a precise memory.  Telling the truth in a forthright way that avoids the art of nuance wins votes.  In contrast, people instantly recognize when candidates tap dance around previous pronouncements to recast ill-considered opinions in a more favorable light.

Today is the 60th anniversary of the founding of the state of Israel and President Bush delivered remarks to Knesset, which included the following:

Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared:  ‘Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.’ We have an obligation to call this what it is — the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.

You will recall that Senator Obama pledged to unconditionally enter talks with the world's dictators, including Cuba's Castro and Iran's Ahmadinejad.  Yet, he has the temerity to deny his own assertions, responding to the president with the following desperate revision:

Instead of tough talk and no action, we need to do what Kennedy, Nixon and Reagan did and use all elements of American power — including tough, principled, and direct diplomacy — to pressure countries like Iran and Syria.  George Bush knows that I have never supported engagement with terrorists, and the president’s extraordinary politicization of foreign policy and the politics of fear do nothing to secure the American people or our stalwart ally Israel.

Well, Obama has, indeed, stated that he would "engage" with terrorists, because that is precisely what the Iranian regime constitutes.  Notice the glaring distinction between liberals who are always running from their records on national security and conservatives, who are pleased to tell you that Iran must be confronted--militarily, if necessary--to prevent it from becoming a nuclear power.

There are countless stories during World War II of diplomats who yearned to negotiate with Hitler, convinced as they were that their unique powers of persuasion would create a sea change.  As John Bolton cogently argues in his book about the State Department, Surrender Is Not An Option, there's a pathology among career diplomats which begins with the predicate that the opposing nation is superior and that the goal for the diplomat is to aggressively inhibit America's influence and power projection.

Although Obama's vaunted intelligence and adroit oratorical skills are admirable, they carry the usual liability, a foible that naively encourages him to rush in where angels fear to tread.  He wouldn't be the first to think that good faith and a willingness to reach consensus can carry the day.  That's a richly obtuse pedigree which has its modern roots in Neville Chamberlain, and whose modern example is Jimmy Carter, who bungled his way along the foreign policy trail with North Korea and ended his disastrous presidency with the Iranian hostage crisis.

With assistance from Republicans, American voters will be reminded of Obama's pledge to schedule coffee klatches with the world's despots, because a candidate's words do matter, regardless of how deftly they rework them to suit circumstances.