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Max Boot starts our look at diplomatic humiliation.
Forget “Where in the world is Carmen Sandiego?” The hottest real-time game in the world is: Where in the world is Edward Snowden? The rogue NSA techie—who, in the judgment of the NSA’s head, Gen. Keith Alexander, “has caused irreversible and significant damage to our country and to our allies”—has fled Hong Kong and wound up in Moscow. He was rumored to be heading to Ecuador via Havana but he didn’t make the Aeroflot flight he was expected to take, leaving a pack of journalists who bought tickets to photograph an empty seat. So presumably Snowden remains in Russia at least for the time being, with rumors swirling that Ecuador or possibly Venezuela remain his destination of choice. …
… It may well be that case that a Republican president—John McCain or Mitt Romney—would have had no more success in apprehending Snowden, but the equanimity with which other states rebuff our appeals for his apprehension makes clear that the U.S. is suffering a significant loss of respect. Quite simply, the U.S. is no more universally loved than it was prior to Obama’s ascension—and now we are less respected too. As anyone who consults Machiavelli will know, this is not a recipe for a prince’s success.
Peter Wehner notes the failure of “reset” diplomacy.
… The Syrian debacle comes in the aftermath of Obama scrapping in 2009 a missile-defense system the Poles and the Czech Republic had agreed to house despite Russian threats, as a way to pacify Putin. (“The U.S. reversal is likely to please Russia, which had fiercely opposed the plans,” CNN reported at the time.)
Add to that Putin’s support for Iran’s nuclear ambitions and his crackdown at home. (The Washington Post writes that in “an attempt to suppress swelling protests against his rigged reelection and the massively corrupt autocracy he presides over, Mr. Putin has launched what both Russian and Western human rights groups describe as the most intense and pervasive campaign of political repression since the downfall of the Soviet Union.”). Taken all together, you can see that the Obama “reset”–which at the dawn of the Obama administration was described as a “win-win” strategy for both nations–has been a rout for the Russians.
With the Snowden situation, Vladimir Putin seems intent not only defying America but embarrassing her. It turns out that an irresolute amateur like Barack Obama was the best thing that the brutal but determined Putin could have hoped for.
He’s cleaning Obama’s clock.
Power Line’s John Hinderaker sums up the last few weeks for the loser administration.
The goofy techie, of course, is Ed Snowden, and the question might seem hard to answer if the Obama administration’s incompetence were not on display for all to see. The international press, belatedly catching on to the fact that our president is a fool, is having fun with the U.S. Thus, Reuters headlines, with a snicker: “Questions turn to U.S. competence in Snowden saga.”
As well they might.
“The Obama administration has spent the past few weeks arguing it can wield power responsibly after Edward Snowden unveiled its sweeping spying programs. Now the administration must prove it can wield power effectively.”
Well, it certainly can domestically. Not only can it sic the IRS on its political opponents, it can buy whatever votes may be necessary with other people’s money. Dealing with foreign countries, where such powers come up short, is another story.
“As the 30-year-old leads the world’s lone superpower on a global game of hide and seek, U.S. government officials faced questions about whether they had botched the effort to extradite Snowden from Hong Kong to face charges related to his leak of classified information.”
Actually, they botched much more than that. How in the world could the NSA allow a random employee of a contractor, Booz Allen, who had been on the “job” for only a couple of months, such unfettered and apparently uncharted access to secret materials? The fact that the NSA did so is the best argument against that agency’s being a trustworthy custodian of Americans’ secrets.
“The latest wrinkle in the Snowden saga poses a different set of questions for an administration that has spent weeks fending off questions about whether it has abused its power to collect taxes, investigate criminal activity and fight terrorism.”
Abusive and incompetent! That’s Barack Obama. …
… Barack Obama has never been a real president. He has never led. He seems to view his job duties as an unfortunate distraction from golfing and partying with celebrities. How could anyone be surprised to learn that he is an inept, ineffective president? …
Jennifer Rubin sums it up.
President Obama’s foreign policy has taken on a pathetic quality. Russia ignores us on the return of Edward Snowden and on ending the rule of Bashar al-Assad in Syria. China ignores us on Snowden and on cyberterrorism. The Taliban ignores our demands as we flee Afghanistan (including not to allow terrorists to camp out there). Iran ignores us and proceeds with its nuclear weapons program. The Palestinian Authority ignores us in going to the United Nations for statehood and then firing Salam Fayyad.
To paraphrase Robert Kagan and Charles Krauthammer, decline is a choice and we have chosen it. It is remarkable that the president thought he could continue to remain relevant on the world stage after he “ended” (i.e. abandoned) wars, slashed defense, allowed Iran to run the negotiation schedule, kowtowed to the Chinese and cut the legs out from every ally from Poland and the Czech Republic (which lost anti-missile sites) to Israel (condemning its building and making Palestinian demands on bargaining the official policy of the United States).
As Kim Holmes puts it, “Overall, the defining characteristic of Obama’s foreign policy appears to be preventing overseas crises from distracting from his domestic agenda. He remains a committed liberal, at least in principle, but his foreign policy is highly influenced by political expediency, which causes him to want to avoid risking overseas interventions.” it is not so much “leading from behind” as it is hiding under the bed. …
For a change of pace, Barron’s test drives a Tesla, and then test drives the stock too. One didn’t fare well.
Google “Iron Man, Tony Stark” and within the first few results you’ll find Websites likening that superhero to Elon Musk, 41, the entrepreneur behind PayPal, the rocket maker SpaceX, and the electric-car sensation Tesla Motors. The comparison’s apt. Musk is smart and stylish, and he fights planetary threats like global warming by creating spacecraft and zero-emissions cars that shame NASA and the auto giants. He’s as rich as Iron Man’s armored billionaire, too. Tesla shares rocketed this year from $35 to $115 — lifting the Palo Alto auto start-up to a market value of $14 billion at May’s end — before easing back to a recent $102, where Musk’s quarter-interest in the company is still worth $3.4 billion.
It’s possible to admire Musk’s achievements, while still wondering if Tesla’s stock market fans are viewing its prospects through 3D glasses. The towering expectations now priced into the stock don’t account for the Grand Canyon leap that Tesla must make to reach its goal of cutting its car’s $90,000-plus sticker price in half. Electric-car batteries cost a heck of a lot, and today’s Tesla Model S owes its better-than-200-mile range to batteries costing tens of thousands of dollars. Industries and governments around the world have spent billions on battery research, but few expect to trim electric-car battery costs by more than 20%-30% by the planned 2016 launch of Tesla’s car for the Everyman. Perhaps Musk will confound the industry again, but if Tesla’s next-generation car can’t go the distance at half the price, its stock will head much lower.
One ingredient that fueled Tesla’s (ticker: TSLA) tripling this year was an epic squeeze of those comic-book villains who had doubted Musk and sold more than a third of free-trading Tesla shares short. That fuel seems spent, for the moment. Traders say that the recently unborrowable shares are available again and can be had for a single-digit interest rate, instead of last month’s 90% vig. With the shorts in retreat, Tesla should trade more in line with its fundamentals.
TESLA’S MODEL S SEDAN has won every car award in sight, and test drives by several Barron’s staffers convinced us the Model S deserves the accolades. …