Although he has written several books about himself and will surely write many more, Obama never served in the military and never learned that you don't abandon troops in the field.
Concerning the four Americans still being held by Iran, Dana Milbank, in a Washington Post opinion piece entitled "Obama’s news conference was a case for American weakness," recounts yesterday's interchange between Obama and Major Garrett of CBS News:
Garrett: "Thank you, Mr. President. As you well know, there are four Americans in Iran, three held on trumped-up charges according to your administration and one whereabouts unknown. Can you tell the country, sir, why you are content with all the fanfare around this deal to leave the conscience of this nation, the strength of this nation unaccounted for in relation to these four Americans?"
. . . .
Obama: "I’ve got to give you credit, Major, for how you craft those questions. The notion that I’m content as I celebrate with American citizens languishing in Iranian jails, Major, that’s — that’s nonsense, and you should know better. I've met with the families of some of those folks."
Yup, Obama met with the families of some of "those folks," yet he still left them to rot in Iranian prisons. Obama's explanation as noted by Milbank: "the president . . . didn’t link the American captives to nuclear talks because doing so may have made Iran think 'we can get additional concessions out of the Americans,' and would have made it 'much more difficult for us to walk away' from a deal."
Indeed, Iran probably could have wrung more concessions from the US, because Obama, Kerry & Friends never had any intention of walking away from a deal, no matter how bad. As was observed by deputy White House national security adviser Ben Rhodes (who is now claiming, "We never sought in this negotiation the capacity for so-called anytime, anywhere [inspections]" - he was lying, but today lying is in fashion):
"This is probably the biggest thing President Obama will do in his second term on foreign policy. This is healthcare for us, just to put it in context."
Why, according to Milbank, couldn't the US insist upon the return of the American prisoners as part of the deal? Milbank believes that America no longer has "the clout to enforce its will" and concludes his op-ed by stating:
"[M]ostly what came through was a defense of what future historians may describe as the Obama doctrine: an America that recognizes the limits of its power and acts less ambitiously.
'No one suggests that this deal resolves all the threats that Iran poses to its neighbors or the world,' he said, returning repeatedly to the argument that none of his critics has 'presented to me or the American people a better alternative.'
He’s right. And this is why it was, sadly, a powerful case — for American weakness."
Indeed, Obama has made a powerful case - not just yesterday, but throughout his presidency - for American impotence, and in case you didn't happen to notice, the flag pin in Obama's lapel yesterday was no longer red, white and blue. Instead, it was solid white.
