In case you weren't aware, there's some shit going down in the Middle East, and somebody better tell the president.
In late January, Islamist parties secured nearly three-fourths of the still-forming Egyptian government's Parliament--led by 47 percent support for the caliphate-friendly Muslim Brotherhood, whose slogan reads in part: "Qo\uran is our law. Jihad is our way."
The military remains in control, prompting more protesting, aggression and 74-casualty soccer riots, its council balancing ill-won power with the Brotherhood, Israel and the U.S. while trying not to kill too many civilians.
Syria's even worse. They've got all the beatings and killings and shelling of entire cities without so much as an election to show for it.
At least 3,000 have died since uprisings began nearly a year ago, the nation's leaders surely flattered by China and Russia's veto Sunday of a U.N. resolution condemning mass killings the day before.
Who doesn't love a good proxy war?
Iraq is no closer to stability than the day after Saddam was hanged--six years ago. We can all breathe a collective sigh of "told you so" on that one.
But that's not all. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is saying Israel could attack Iran this spring; Israel is saying Iran is developing missiles to strike the U.S.; and Iran is saying, "Sure took 'em a while."
The point is, the entire region is in shambles and rife with civil war, the Arab Spring nothing more than an excuse to oust reticent anti-American and anti-Israeli leaders in favor of vocal anti-American and anti-Israeli leaders.
I wrote in The Plainsman a year ago that the situation presented an opportunity for America to clarify its message to the Arab peoples--to make the case for democracy not rooted in religious fanaticism and the destruction of a people--but no such thing has occurred.
Instead, the American left paid homage to the Arab Spring by copying it and its violence with acts of Occupation. It praised Obama for ending a war in Iraq, killing Osama bin Laden and interfering in a war in Libya, but has remained silent on the president's passivity toward Syrian atrocities, a crumbling Afganistani power structure and unprecedented tension between increasingly agitated Muslim states and New Jersey-sized and rocket-surrounded Israel.
For a year this administration's message has been cripplingly incoherent, mixed or nonexistent.
While Obama admittedly cannot do much to effect change in the region, he can at least apply standards grounded in the principles of freedom and humanity, rather than adopt a politically expedient ad hoc decision process.
In his pre-Super Bowl interview Sunday, Obama said he "derserves" another term. I say he deserves to be ousted like the leaders he's called on to step down, or hasn't called on--which is it again?
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