House of Eratosthenes

Clinging to the Obama campaign’s talking points like a drunk to a lamppost, [New Mexico Governor and former Ambassador and Presidential Candidate Bill] Richardson said this crisis proves the wisdom of Obama’s zest for diplomacy, and that America should get the U.N. Security Council “to pass a strong resolution getting the Russians to show some restraint.” Apparently Richardson was ambassador to the U.N. for 19 months without noticing that Russia has a Security Council veto.

Now, your paragraph. It is roughly paraphrasing the outburst I had yesterday when I heard on the radio about Sen. Obama calling for a cease fire. Which made the veins stand out in my neck and forehead. You might not understand that in the moment in which you read this sentence; but the paragraph below will make it all clear.

Begin paragraph.

Republicans talk to people as if they’re talking to teenagers; democrats talk to people as if they’re talking to little tiny kids. When you talk to a teenager, you essentially say “you do what you want, but if you do this then these are the likely results, and if you do that then those are the consequences.” You do not do this when you talk to little kids. When you talk to little kids you are responsible for weighing consequences yourself, and then you say “do this…don’t do that.” Normal kids eventually mature to the point where they can weigh cause-and-effect on their own — but democrats don’t seem to think that is the case. They talk down to people, cradle-to-grave, saying do this…don’t do that. You see it in Senator Obama. The man seems to have a medical condition. He can’t stop telling people what to do and what not to do. The folly of this communications tactic in foreign policy is evident when democrats achieve positions of power, and conceive new doctrines that consist of telling recalcitrant foreign powers “do this…don’t do that.” They do this even against history’s backdrop, in which it’s fair to assert that every foreign policy success has been a direct result of conducting diplomacy in the style one conducts diplomacy with a teenager. They do this in situations in which it has been proven that the teenage-diplomacy is the only viable option, short of military force. They don’t seem to be capable of rising to this challenge, intellectually. They dispense instructions…they form their foreign policy around the dispensation of instructions…like teaching a preschool class…and then the policy crumbles, inevitably, the day it comes up against a foreign head of state who defeats it handily with a single syllable, simply by saying: “No.” We’ve seen this happen, again and again and again.

End paragraph.

I would further add one more thing:

As ethereal and sloppy a definition the word “conservative” has managed to achieve in domestic issues, with foreign policy the definition has remained crisp, clear and distinctive. It means, quite plain and simply, to elevate the cost of being our country’s enemy by any means necessary, and to reduce the cost and enhance the benefits of being our friend. Liberalism is quite the opposite; liberalism, with regard to other countries, is very much like the slutty woman who spurns the likable nerd who brings her chocolates and flowers and carries her piano up the stairs on moving day, and then talks her mother into taking out a second mortgage on her house so she can buy truckloads of beer for her other boyfriend who bruises her face and dreams of one day getting the band back together.

When a liberal runs the United States, you know how to get the United States to do what you want. Just say you don’t like the United States. The liberal will come running to drink tea with you at Camp David, and find out what your “demands” are. If you go on record calling yourself an “ally” then the liberal won’t give a rat’s ass what you want. Liberalism means only bending over backwards for people who don’t like your country.

And so left-wing diplomacy is always doomed to fail. By saying “do this…don’t do that” what it is saying is “if you want to be our friend then do this and don’t do that.” But then, it says, you’re only going to be treated decently if you’re our enemy.

In a sane world, the “do this don’t do that” people would make it a worthwhile proposition to be on friendly terms with us — so that there would be some motivating agent to get foreign powers to do things. In reality, it is quite the reverse. Don’t ask me to explain it. Ask them.

Cross-posted at Right Wing News.

In a nutshell, liberals equal wimps.
- tim | 08/13/2008 @ 12:49
[Former Governor, Ambassador and Presidential Candidate Bill] Richardson…

Ummm… Billy-Boy is still the guv’nor of My Fair State, AFAIK. Unless something happened overnight.

(signed) The Resident Picker of Nits.
- Buck | 08/13/2008 @ 15:25
Ah, yes. Well, whatever’s said about him, it ought to be technically correct.

I’ve made the necessary corrections.
- mkfreeberg | 08/13/2008 @ 16:47

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