Obama really is worse than Carter

Obama’s hands-off approach seems to be aimed at appeasing a domestic constituency that sees diplomacy, no matter how toothless, as the best way to maintain peace. A recent poll conducted by the Pew Research Project finds that an overwhelming 91% of “solid liberals” believe that “good diplomacy” is the best way “to ensure peace” while only 5% see “military strength” as having that effect.

But even “good diplomacy” is too much to expect from this administration. Over the past six years, no issue received more diplomatic attention from Obama, as well as Kerry and his predecessor Hillary Clinton, than the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Despite countless trips to the region from high-ranking American officials, the parties are further apart today then they were when Obama swore the oath of office.

Along with Israeli-Palestinian peace, global nuclear disarmament was the other grand Obama diplomatic project. This was always woolly-headed – but this goal, no matter how well-intentioned, was dealt a devastating blow with Russia’s invasion and annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. In 1994, Ukraine signed (with the U.S., Great Britain and Russia), the Budapest Memorandum, which stipulated that, in exchange for delivering its then-considerable nuclear weapons stockpile to Moscow, Kiev’s territorial integrity would be assured.

Now that Russia has blatantly violated the terms of that document, how can Obama convince a nuclear weapons-aspirant state like Iran that it does not need such an arsenal to ensure its own survival?