{"id":4091,"date":"2009-01-13T14:00:29","date_gmt":"2009-01-13T14:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jesuscreed\/2009\/01\/obama-and-foreign-relations.html"},"modified":"2009-01-13T14:00:29","modified_gmt":"2009-01-13T14:00:29","slug":"obama-and-foreign-relations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jesuscreed\/2009\/01\/obama-and-foreign-relations.html","title":{"rendered":"Obama and Foreign Relations"},"content":{"rendered":"

Victor Davis Hanson<\/a>, a philosopher of international relations from a neoconservative viewpoints, queries if the optimism about Obama and international relations is more hooplah and than reality. Here is an excerpt of his piece:<\/p>\n

T<\/span>here is great hope that President-elect
\nObama will change the course of U.S. foreign policy, create far greater
\ngoodwill toward America, and thereby ease world tensions. Such optimism
\nis not based on former Sen. Obama’s foreign-policy experience. In
\nessence, he has none.<\/p>\n

Nor does improvement hinge on Obama’s
\npast career in Chicago politics or his U.S. Senate tenure — the former
\nwas problematic at best, the latter cursory. <\/p>\n

Instead, our great expectations derive from four rosy, but heretofore unquestioned assumptions:<\/p>\n

1) Most of the current Bush policies are not merely wrong, but inflammatory: ipsis factis<\/em><\/p>\n

2) Obama’s singular eloquence, youth, charisma, and “presence” will win
\nover the world in the manner it swept the American electorate,
\nproviding a welcome change from the “smoke ’em out” Texas global
\nturn-off of the past; <\/p>\n

3) Obama’s exotic name, his
\nmultiracial background, the Muslim faith of his father, and his
\ndalliance with hard-left politics as a student and community-organizer
\nwill all coalesce to sort of “flip” the image (if not the reality) of
\nthe U.S., as the world’s superpower transmogrifies from an oppressive
\nto a sympathetic international player; <\/p>\n

4) The reemergence of
\nClintonites such as Hillary, Emanuel, Panetta, Podesta, Susan Rice, and
\nothers will bring back successful advocates of “soft power,”
\n“multilateralism,” and “engagement,” who reflect Obama’s worldview, but
\nbring a gritty realism to the implementation of an often heretofore
\nutopian rhetoric.<\/i> <\/p>\n

<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What does Hanson think will happen? <\/p>\n

All Americans in bipartisan fashion should hope that Obama will get
\nthough successfully the perilous first six months at a time when the
\nU.S. economy is shaky, the Commander-in-chief unproven, and our enemies
\neager to test our president’s mettle. Yet I suspect that conservatives
\nwill more likely than liberals forgive the fact that Obama’s governance
\nat times will come to resemble just what he used to caricature in
\nGeorge W. Bush.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Victor Davis Hanson, a philosopher of international relations from a neoconservative viewpoints, queries if the optimism about Obama and international relations is more hooplah and than reality. 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