After spending the better part of four years excoriating his predecessor’s foreign policy, who would have guessed that just eight months into Barack Obama’s presidency, some of the liberals who clamored for a new direction in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the War on Terror would advise their dear leader to seek the advice of the anti-Christ?
Newsweek, a center-left magazine, is saying just that. In an opinion piece published today, the magazine suggested President Obama dismiss Middle Easy envoy George Mitchell and replace him with, you guessed it, George W. Bush.
Isn’t the irony positively scrumptious?
Not that Gregory Levey speaks for the entire liberal movement, but this particular liberal (and Newsweek) should be applauded for mustering the cojones to break with ideological orthodoxy.
And the best part: it isn’t even a bad idea.
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Newsweek? Really, dude?
Are you going to fisk the latest issue of Reader's Digest for us next?
Since when is this an ideologue rag?
Did you completely miss this paragraph? He's not serious. The writer set up a faux situation to present how Obama should handle Israel:
Of course, this is all just a fantasy. Bush isn't about to become anybody's envoy, let alone promote Obama's agenda. And Obama wouldn't squander the capital he has accrued from Arabs and Muslims by making Bush his front man. (After all, what rendered Bush popular in Israel rendered him unpopular in the rest of the Middle East.)
Alex,
You are delusional. Obama is furthering what has traditionally been a leftist foreign policy. The policy of Wilson, FDR, Truman, JFK and LBJ, and Clinton has been one of constant foreign intervention. Bush abandoned a prudent conservative foreign policy and adopted Wilsonian democracy-building nonsense.
The petulantly vacant mugs of college republicans, befuddled at the sight of Obama adopting Bush's terrible foreign policy, is almost worth the hellhole this country is being driven into.
Try reading a book and coming up with some sort of unique perspective on these events, Alex. People will just laugh at you if you keep taking your cues from GOP talking points.
Anonymous 3,
All that paragraph says is that it's not politically feasible for Obama to appoint Bush. That's obvious.
Pat,
Your rant is a little perplexing. You seem to have all this pent up anger, and you sound off on me for absolutely no reason. You think just because I said it wouldn't be a bad idea to appoint Bush that I fully endorse Bush's foreign policy. This couldn't be further from the truth. Honestly, I don't support "nation-building," "pre-emptive war" or any other neoconservative buzzword. I also didn't support Obama on the campaign trail when he talked about immediate withdrawal. There's a viable middle ground. So next time you try to insult my intelligence, try asking me what my actual views are.
"Not that Gregory Levey speaks for the entire liberal movement, but this particular liberal (and Newsweek) should be applauded for mustering the cojones to break with ideological orthodoxy"
..and to break with anything remotely resembling intelligence. Mustering the absurd and foolhardy to fulfill the public's idea of "cojones" isn't any substance for heroics. In fact, it is, wait for it.. exactly what got Bush into the clusterfuck of our past decade. De ja vu Internationale.
Gregory Levey is not a liberal, he's a Zionist, and because of that, would throw away the rest of his ideals to further the Zionist cause.
So an article written in Newsweek by an Israeli, suggesting that Obama appoint Bush as Middle East envoy for reasons entirely limited to Bush's political appeal among Jews in Israel, becomes a humiliating about-face by "some of the liberals who clamored for a new direction in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the War on Terror."
I dunno how familiar you are with op-eds, but they are never (ever ever ever) vetted for ideological content by the editors of a magazine. So what we have here, at most, is one Israeli* acknowledging that Bush is sort of credible among Israeli Jews. This is the New Heterodoxy? This is a coup for foreign policy conservatives? Piss off.
* I don't know about Levey's politics, but that's largely irrelevant to the point that you're trying to make Mount Everest out of pebble.
To be blunt, Bush is guilty of heinous crimes that he would have already been imprisoned for in most countries. But here, he gets off without so much as a warning save for his shattered reputation. I hope that he has to live with the 3,000 American lives and the tens of thousands of Iraqi lives that were lost because of his war. He has blood on his hands and he knows it
Pat,
President Obama has his own agenda, forgiven policy or otherwise. He has adopted a few of Bush's policies because of the mess Bush left us in. He's going to pull our troops out of Iraq he is trying to be diplomatic with countries that Bush screwed with and labeled as enemies and he will eventually see to it that the innocent people in Guantanamo receive fair trials to say nothing of having a more open dialogue with people in this country instead of lying left and right.
You're just angry cause we don't have some pathetic excuse for a President like Bob Barr or something
the last two Anons.
1)Really, you're going to pull the Bush is a war criminal argument? But of course you didn't bring up one idiom of evidence, you just rattle off your far-out talking points and sit there in your parents house smug that you really showed that fascist war-monger. Bravo, the editors at Mother Jones will be very pleased with you.
2) Its hard for you to argue about credibility when you are hiding behind "anonymous".
Alex,
I'm not concerned with your deepest darkest foreign policy convictions. I'm concerned with what you wrote.
You wrote that it was somehow "ironic" that a leftist president was continuing a leftist foreign policy. You also said it was "not a bad idea" to appoint GWB to such a position. To suggest that the man that has distorted and debilitated the right and undertaken one of the most idiotic and destructive interventions in American history should hold ANY position puts your judgment in question.
And for the anonymous commenter who addressed me, you're a bit blinded by your respect for the president. How is escalating the conflict in Afghanistan consistent with his peaceful rhetoric? How is killing civilians in Pakistan consistent with said rhetoric. And his plans to withdraw from Iraq include a plan to keep 50 to 100 thousand troops there, stationed in the largest embassy in the world.
We're begging to be attacked again with such arrogance.
Pat and Anons,
Your rabid hostility toward viewpoints that even whiff of neoconservative or attempt to portray Bush as anything other than an evil war criminal is quite unbecoming. You're not interested in having a conversation about Bush's foreign policy. You take your opinion for granted and as undisputed fact. Having an honest discussion is one thing, but calling me delusional and the wost blogger and questioning my ethics and integrity has no place here, especially when your claims are unsubstantiated.
"Honestly, I don't support "nation-building," "pre-emptive war" or any other neoconservative buzzword. I also didn't support Obama on the campaign trail when he talked about immediate withdrawal. There's a viable middle ground. So next time you try to insult my intelligence, try asking me what my actual views are."
Alright, Alex. Fire away.
Given that, in your post, you dismiss people "clamored for a new direction in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the War on Terror," what are your views on pre-emptive war and nation-building? How would you describe the "middle ground" that you support?
Newsweek is arguing that Israelis have greater trust in Bush than Obama, but that--despite Obama's softer, more diplomatic rhetoric--Bush would have identical policy goals to the current administration.
In this case, Alex, what about appointing Bush would be “a break with ideological orthodoxy,” even if it’s a break with party lines? To me, the only real irony here is that the man who made his fame by criticizing Bush’s war would end up pursuing a foreign policy indistinguishable from Dubya's.
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