"On Sunday night, Mr. Obama gave Pakistan faint praise for some unspecified cooperation, but the facts are damning: The most hunted man in the world was living in a $1 million compound, an hour’s drive from Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital, and close to both a military training academy and a large military base.
On Monday, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was doing the diplomatic thing, we suppose, by talking about how the United States is committed to its partnership with Pakistan. We hope that she and the president are a lot tougher in private with Pakistani officials and doing some very hard thinking about how they will manage this relationship.
After this, how can anyone keep a straight face — or keep from screaming — when Pakistani officials claim they have no idea where the Taliban’s Mullah Muhammad Omar or dozens of other extremist leaders are hiding?"
"Keep a straight face" or "keep from screaming"? No need to smirk or get angry. How about just withholding several billions of dollars in aid until the U.S. feels certain that it has Pakistan's cooperation in the war against terror? That should get their attention.
What about Obama? His decision to assault the compound on the ground was indeed courageous and could have ended disastrously if the U.S. team had encountered resistance from the Pakistani military, but has the president learned from this experience to distinguish between friend and foe?
Obama came to the White House with a coterie of leftist aides determined to prove that by showing kindness and understanding to the world's tyrannies, they could be brought into the fold. We can only hope that his experiences with Iran, Syria and Pakistan have brought some realism to the White House.
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu will be visiting Washington later this month, and it will be interesting to see whether Obama receives this democratically elected official from a trusted ally in a less frosty manner.
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