CSotD: Did somebody just blink?
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One of the advantages of web commentary over syndicated commentary is the speed with which you can change directions. It's a little unclear where things are going in Syria, and, while people determined to hold onto their set opinions don't have a problem, rethinking an issue on deadline can get tricky.
Still, a few syndicated cartoonists managed to catch at least the basics of the new wrinkle.
Clay Bennett addresses the unforeseen possibility that we might not have to blow anything up after all (But I was all dressed for the occasion!) with this suggestion, which I think is solid within a fairly limited scope.
That is, Assad doesn't want the US to step in and is willing, most likely with a bit of prompting, to concede a point in order to avoid whatever was about to happen to him.
Which, as the president noted last night, was yet to be determined, though I kind of chuckled over this section:
Others have asked whether it's worth acting if we don’t
take out Assad. As some members of Congress have said, there’s no point
in simply doing a “pinprick” strike in Syria.
Let me make something clear: The United States military
doesn’t do pinpricks. Even a limited strike will send a message to
Assad that no other nation can deliver. I don't think we should remove
another dictator with force — we learned from Iraq that doing so makes
us responsible for all that comes next. But a targeted strike can make
Assad, or any other dictator, think twice before using chemical weapons.
Within the context of that limited goal, Bennett's cartoon suggests that what Obama wanted to achieve may well have come to pass.
When I say I chuckled, it was the chuckle of "well played, sir!" as the president both addressed the issue of sufficiency and that of regime change.
His remarks were relatively economical, which is fine, because he wasn't going to dissuade the True Believers on either side, no matter how long he spoke and how detailed his explanation.
But if I chuckled to myself over that neat riposte, I nearly laughed aloud over this:
In part because of the credible threat of U.S. military action, as well
as constructive talks that I had with President Putin, the Russian
government has indicated a willingness to join with the international
community in pushing Assad to give up his chemical weapons.
I had, less than two hours before the speech, been talking to someone and posited the opinion — which I characterized as a bit of a fantasy — that the whole thing may have been a dumb show in which the Russians were being urged to take a more active role in things, and that, within this fantasy, there may have not simply been threat-and-response but a little backroom conversation.
To which it was pointed out to me that Obama and Putin had pointedly avoided conversation at the G-20 summit in Moscow this past week.
To which I had said, "Well, I didn't personally follow them around the full time, did you?"
Thanks for the back-up, Mr. President.
Even Glenn McCoy, a dedicated Obama-hater, suggests that the evil shark of Russia may be saving the president's bacon this time, though, of course, he wouldn't join in my suggestion that there might have been any sort of intention at work.
Was there? Who knows? And, more to the point, would it do any good to suggest it?
I'm reminded (stop reading, Mom) of an off-off-campus party my sophomore year in college. I was sitting on the couch in a candle-lit, patchouli-filled, mandala-decorated livingroom talking to an attractive young woman I had just met, when my best friend's girlfriend, who was that evening greatly enhanced and digging the colors and also not particularly inhibited in the first place, came into the semi-dark room and, in its center, began a pirouette, but, as she faced the couch, stopped mid-spin, her arms still raised, and delightedly declared, "Oh, Pete! You've found a girl to go to bed with!"
Which, up until that moment, I thought perhaps I had.
But I sure as hell hadn't anymore.
I would put this well-intentioned, indelicate, and stunningly counterproductive exclamation on a level with GWB's 2002 announcement that he had a new best friend, which Ann Telnaes ably dissected at the time, Telnaes being a bit more politically astute than Mr. Bush.
One of the foundation stones of diplomacy is that you should never miss a good opportunity to shut up.
I would also point out that, whatever you think of "spiking the football in the end zone," you get penalized both in the NFL and in politics for spiking the football before you've carried it into the end zone.
Assuming the very big assumption that the Russians are able to carry off this diplomatic coup, which would have to include not only announcing a solution but then implementing it with credible transparency, then how it came about doesn't matter anyway.
If this is simply a case of carrying a big stick and making the world believe you are willing to use it, then Obama has taken the pot with a low pair. If he was really going to do it, well, that's fine, too.
And, if US credibility has been all-but-destroyed by the outrageous lies with which we paved the path to Iraq twice, and with which we reported on stories like those of Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman, maybe this is how to take advantage of the not-unreasonable worldwide assumption that our foreign policy is totally batshit.
Whatever. You have to carry the big stick you have, not the one you wish etc etc etc
At the moment, it seems that maybe there's a way out of this mess that doesn't involve surgical strikes or pinpricks or total war, but also doesn't leave Syrian civilians lying dead in the streets or frothing and convulsing in hospitals.
That would be a very good thing.
As Jeff Danziger points out, it's not exactly the same thing as bringing peace to the region, no.
No, it's not.
But it's better than a pinprick in the eye.
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