Meanwhile in the rest of the world

[B-Man]

Voting "present"...............................lack of leadership trickles down.

 

 

 

 

 

US ambassador to UN skips emergency Syria meeting

 

Samantha Power’s biggest qualification for her new position as US ambassador to the UN is her work on fighting genocide. She offered particular criticism for US inaction in Rwanda’s genocidal war in her Pulitzer Prize-winning book A Problem From Hell. With the second eruption — allegedly, anyway — of chemical-weapons use in Syria, the newly-confirmed replacement to Susan Rice had the perfect opportunity to act on her principles by forcing the UN to take some kind of action, at least in probing the claims.

 

Instead, Power sent a lower-ranking diplomat to the ultimately futile meeting:

 

Samantha Power, America’s new ambassador to the United Nations, skipped a major Security Council meeting Wednesday on the alleged chemical weapons attack in Syria, a move that drew sharp criticism considering her past comments denouncing the council’s inaction on the violence.

 

The strike early Wednesday could stand as the deadliest such incident since the country’s civil war began, with reports of hundreds dying. The U.N. Security Council called an emergency meeting Wednesday afternoon to debate the allegations, but ended up issuing a statement that fell far short of what the U.S. and its allies wanted.

 

Yet Power herself did not attend the emergency meeting. She was instead represented by career diplomat Ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo.

 

A U.S. mission official told Fox News that Power was on a “pre-arranged trip” and maintained that she was focusing closely on the Syria attack.

 

 

 

 

.

[DC Tom]

Voting "present"...............................lack of leadership trickles down.

 

 

 

 

 

US ambassador to UN skips emergency Syria meeting

 

Samantha Power’s biggest qualification for her new position as US ambassador to the UN is her work on fighting genocide. She offered particular criticism for US inaction in Rwanda’s genocidal war in her Pulitzer Prize-winning book A Problem From Hell. With the second eruption — allegedly, anyway — of chemical-weapons use in Syria, the newly-confirmed replacement to Susan Rice had the perfect opportunity to act on her principles by forcing the UN to take some kind of action, at least in probing the claims.

 

Instead, Power sent a lower-ranking diplomat to the ultimately futile meeting:

 

Samantha Power, America’s new ambassador to the United Nations, skipped a major Security Council meeting Wednesday on the alleged chemical weapons attack in Syria, a move that drew sharp criticism considering her past comments denouncing the council’s inaction on the violence.

 

The strike early Wednesday could stand as the deadliest such incident since the country’s civil war began, with reports of hundreds dying. The U.N. Security Council called an emergency meeting Wednesday afternoon to debate the allegations, but ended up issuing a statement that fell far short of what the U.S. and its allies wanted.

 

Yet Power herself did not attend the emergency meeting. She was instead represented by career diplomat Ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo.

 

A U.S. mission official told Fox News that Power was on a “pre-arranged trip” and maintained that she was focusing closely on the Syria attack.

 

 

 

 

.

 

 

That honestly surprises me; I've read her book, and I have a hard time believing she wouldn't be taking the situation in Syria seriously. Perhaps she sent a deputy precisely because it was an "ultimately futile" meeting with a result far short of what we wanted, and thus the administration wanted to disassociate us from it.

 

That would honestly surprise me, too, as it would be the first indication I've seen that the administration has put ANY thought into foreign policy.

[IDBillzFan]

That would honestly surprise me, too, as it would be the first indication I've seen that the administration has put ANY thought into foreign policy.

 

No foreign policy expert am I, but if you're specifically responsible for working with a group, and the group has an emergency meeting, sending a substitute teacher in your place because you have a scheduling conflict screams layers upon layers of incompetence.

 

I'm talking birddog incompetence. gatorman incompetence. THAT level of incompetence.

[/dev/null]

No foreign policy expert am I

Channeling Yoda?

[1billsfan]

No foreign policy expert am I, but if you're specifically responsible for working with a group, and the group has an emergency meeting, sending a substitute teacher in your place because you have a scheduling conflict screams layers upon layers of incompetence.

 

I'm talking birddog incompetence. gatorman incompetence. THAT level of incompetence.

 

Is it really incompetence if you don't even show up to do your job? I think Clint Eastwood perfectly summed up this embarrassing presidency...

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoqKdWY692k

[DC Tom]

No foreign policy expert am I, but if you're specifically responsible for working with a group, and the group has an emergency meeting, sending a substitute teacher in your place because you have a scheduling conflict screams layers upon layers of incompetence.

 

I'm talking birddog incompetence. gatorman incompetence. THAT level of incompetence.

 

If you're specifically responsible for working with a group, and the group has an emergency meeting, and you send a lower-level drone in your place with the specific intent of sending the message "I don't expect anything to come out of this meeting, because you people are useless," then yeah, that can actually be pretty competent. Sometimes people - even the UN Security Council - need to be smacked upside the head with a 2x4 to get the hint. I just did that this week. Sure it pisses people off...sometimes, that's what necessary.

 

Mind you, with this administration's craven "Will you be my friend? Here's a reset button. Please be my friend. Hugs?" approach to foreign policy and embarrassing lack of any coherent direction beyond "Let France do it," I'm not leaning towards any explanation involving competence. But I can't completely discount it in this case, either.

 

(Plus, it would reinforce Bush's "The UN risks irrelevancy" speech, which irony appeals to me.)

[IDBillzFan]

If you're specifically responsible for working with a group, and the group has an emergency meeting, and you send a lower-level drone in your place with the specific intent of sending the message "I don't expect anything to come out of this meeting, because you people are useless," then yeah, that can actually be pretty competent. Sometimes people - even the UN Security Council - need to be smacked upside the head with a 2x4 to get the hint. I just did that this week. Sure it pisses people off...sometimes, that's what necessary.

 

Mind you, with this administration's craven "Will you be my friend? Here's a reset button. Please be my friend. Hugs?" approach to foreign policy and embarrassing lack of any coherent direction beyond "Let France do it," I'm not leaning towards any explanation involving competence. But I can't completely discount it in this case, either.

 

(Plus, it would reinforce Bush's "The UN risks irrelevancy" speech, which irony appeals to me.)

 

Plus, I heard yesterday the WH was holding back because they were not sure if the videos were authentic.

 

Now, given this adminstration, that strikes me as more of an excuse than a reason, but I suspect it's plausible that someone would release that for the sake of getting the WH to react stupidly on a world stage.

[Chef Jim]

Plus, I heard yesterday the WH was holding back because they were not sure if the videos were authentic.

 

Now, given this adminstration, that strikes me as more of an excuse than a reason, but I suspect it's plausible that someone would release that for the sake of getting the WH to react stupidly on a world stage.

 

I thought Youtube videos were the reason for everything.

[DC Tom]

Plus, I heard yesterday the WH was holding back because they were not sure if the videos were authentic.

 

Now, given this adminstration, that strikes me as more of an excuse than a reason, but I suspect it's plausible that someone would release that for the sake of getting the WH to react stupidly on a world stage.

 

I thought this administration was supposed to be social media savvy.

 

You'd expect them to know "If it's on the internet, it's true." Odd.

[B-Man]

That honestly surprises me; I've read her book, and I have a hard time believing she wouldn't be taking the situation in Syria seriously. Perhaps she sent a deputy precisely because it was an "ultimately futile" meeting with a result far short of what we wanted, and thus the administration wanted to disassociate us from it.

 

That would honestly surprise me, too, as it would be the first indication I've seen that the administration has put ANY thought into foreign policy.

 

Mystery solved Tom.

 

Funny I have never taken a personal vacation 19 days after I assumed a position..............just brought up wrong I guess.

 

 

Found: Samantha Power in Ireland during urgent Syria meeting, sources say

 

Mystery solved. America's ambassador to the U.N. Samantha Power was in Ireland on a personal trip when she missed an emergency meeting on the alleged chemical gas attack in Syria, U.N. sources tell Fox News.

 

A day earlier, State Department officials were mum when asked for information on Power's whereabouts. She had come under fire for missing Wednesday's urgent U.N. Security Council meeting, where delegations weighed how to respond to charges that the Assad regime had just committed the deadliest chemical weapons attack in the country's two-year civil war.

 

The meeting, and her absence, came just 19 days after Power assumed the U.N. leadership post.

 

Power also did not attend a meeting Friday afternoon on Sudan -- another trouble spot that Power has focused on in the past -- though it is likely that such a meeting would have been attended by a deputy anyway.

 

But U.S. officials are defending Power, saying she was on a preplanned trip and could not have made it back in time. Power was born in Ireland, and her family is from there. The nature of the visit to her home country is not clear; officials say that since the trip was personal, they were safe-guarding her privacy.

 

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/08/23/found-samantha-power-in-ireland-during-urgent-syria-meeting-sources-say/#ixzz2cqS9e1Ig

 

 

Three more years and then perhaps we can get some adults back in government...............

[B-Man]

 

Ignorance is no defense........

 

The sources of Obama’s tragic Syria policy

 

Caroline Glick presents a powerful indictment of the Obama administration’s foreign policy. Perhaps the most damning part of her indictment pertains to Syria, where Obama’s impotence in the face of Assad’s crossing of a “red line” by engaging in chemical warfare represents a national embarrassment and humanitarian disaster.

 

President Obama’s impotence stems from his well-justified fear that intervening against Assad would bring radical Islamists to power. But according to Glick, it is Obama’s fault that radicals have come to dominate the Syrian opposition:

At the outset of the Syrian civil war two-and-a-half years ago,

Obama outsourced the development of Syria’s opposition forces to Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Erdogan. He had other options

. A consortium of Syrian Kurds, moderate Sunnis, Christians and others came to Washington and begged for US assistance. But they were ignored. . . .

 

Obama embraced Erdogan, an Islamic fascist who has won elections, as his closest ally and most trusted adviser in the Muslim world.

 

And so, with the full support of the US government, Erdogan stacked Syria’s opposition forces with radical Muslims like himself. Within months the Muslim Brotherhood comprised the majority in Syria’s US-sponsored opposition.

 

In other words, Obama’s decision to have Turkey form the Syrian opposition led inevitably to the current situation in which the Iranian- and Russian-backed Syrian regime is fighting an opposition dominated by al-Qaida.

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2013/08/the-sources-of-obamas-tragic-syria-policy.php

[Koko78]

 

Ignorance is no defense........

 

http://www.powerline...yria-policy.php

 

This is why leading from behind is an idiotic foreign policy strategy.

[Tiberius]

Let Syria Die??

 

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/25/opinion/sunday/in-syria-america-loses-if-either-side-wins.html?_r=0

 

 

Lincoln's masterful inactivity comes to mind here

But the Obama administration should resist the temptation to intervene more forcefully in Syria’s civil war. A victory by either side would be equally undesirable for the United States.

At this point, a prolonged stalemate is the only outcome that would not be damaging to American interests.

Indeed, it would be disastrous if President Bashar al-Assad’s regime were to emerge victorious after fully suppressing the rebellion and restoring its control over the entire country. Iranian money, weapons and operatives and Hezbollah troops have become key factors in the fighting, and Mr. Assad’s triumph would dramatically affirm the power and prestige of Shiite Iran and Hezbollah, its Lebanon-based proxy — posing a direct threat both to the Sunni Arab states and to Israel.

But a rebel victory would also be extremely dangerous for the United States and for many of its allies in Europe and the Middle East. That’s because extremist groups, some identified with Al Qaeda, have become the most effective fighting force in Syria. If those rebel groups manage to win, they would almost certainly try to form a government hostile to the United States. Moreover, Israel could not expect tranquillity on its northern border if the jihadis were to triumph in Syria.

[DC Tom]

Let Syria Die??

 

 

http://www.nytimes.c...-wins.html?_r=0

 

 

Lincoln's masterful inactivity comes to mind here

 

Inactivity would be an improvement over Obama's policy.

 

And this is the reason we have the IAF.

[B-Man]

"There’s a different leader in Syria now. Many of the members of Congress of both parties who have gone to Syria in recent months have said they believe he’s a reformer."

 

-- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, March 27, 2011.

 

 

 

 

 

I guess the mainstream media feels "What Difference Does That Make Now"