Pollyanna Foreign Policy

Asymmetric warfare took down the World Trade Center, changing our country irrevocably. Civil liberties took a hit too, though one most Americans are prepared to live with, given the alternative. Congress still hasn't fixed FISA, which one of Obama's own foreign policy advisers has warned about, but if we listen to the Chicago Tribune's Steve Chapman (no wonder we see stories like this) I guess we have nothing to worry about. The mad mullahs in Tehran don't want to be incinerated themselves--they're rational actors, according to Mr. Chapman--they just send others out to do their dirty work and meet their virgins, and escape culpability. I think it's called asymmetric warfare.

That's what we're talking about here. We're talking about a "tiny" threat writ large in death and destruction. We're talking about deterring a 25 year (let's see, Iran took over our embassy during the Jimmy Carter appeasement administration and held our hostages for 444 days--one of the players? Student leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.) state sponsor of terror that is developing nuclear weapons, in defiance of UN sanctions and endless EU parleys.

On the occasion of Israel's 60th birthday, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad referred to Israel as a "stinking corpse", doomed to disappear. And in fact, a supposedly more level-headed Iranian leader, the Ayatollah Rafsanjani, has actually said that if they nuke and destroy Israel they can sustain a retaliatory hit. This was written a year ago. The situation is even more urgent today. Democrats remain the party of the weak horse.

I wouldn't rely on Professor Juan Cole as a reliable indicator of Iran's benevolent intentions. He can't even translate Persian properly, and he hates America too. Mr. Chapman keeps trotting out these ivory tower professors. As far as the NIE report supposedly downplaying Iran last December, Director of Intelligence Michael McConnell testified to Congress back in February:

At a hearing yesterday of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, the intelligence director, Michael McConnell, said, "If I had 'til now to think about it, I probably would change a few things." He later added, "I would change the way we describe the Iranian nuclear program. I would have included that there are the component parts, that the portion of it, maybe the least significant, had halted."

Mr. McConnell was referring to the specific Iranian program to design potential nuclear warheads, which the December estimate said had halted in 2003. But in his opening testimony, Mr. McConnell noted that two other components of the nuclear program were moving ahead — the enrichment of uranium, which he said was the most difficult part of making a bomb, and the development of long-range missiles capable of hitting North Africa and Europe.

Mr. McConnell resume here. In part:

From 1992 to 1996, McConnell served as Director of the National Security Agency (NSA). He led NSA as it adapted to the multi-polar threats brought about by the end of the Cold War.

I wouldn't think a Pollyanna world view vis a vis Iran is one anyone in America should adopt, whether a newspaper columnist in the Second City or a presidential candidate of a supposedly major party. Pollyanna won over hearts and minds in her small town with the charm of her smile--but at least she had good works to back it up. Should we send a sweet girl like Pollyanna out to conduct our foreign policy?

There was an admirable woman who went to Tehran, let's see, what did they do to her?

The massive injuries suffered by Canadian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi while in Iranian custody were so disturbing to the doctor who examined her that he felt compelled to flee the country to expose what happened.

"I am a physician who is sworn to save peoples' lives," said Dr. Shahram Azam, through an interpreter at a news conference in Ottawa Thursday. "When I saw with my own eyes someone who has been tortured, without any doubt it affected my mental state."

Azam listed the injuries he discovered on Kazemi:

• A broken nose.
• A large bruise on the right side of her forehead extending to the side of her head.
• A bloody lump on the back of her head.
• Evidence of internal bleeding of the brain.
• A ruptured left ear drum.
• Deep, long scratches on the back of her neck and calves.
• Evidence of broken ribs.
• Bruises on her abdomen and on her knees.
• Evidence of flogging on her back.
• Broken fingers and nails missing.
• A smashed toe.
• Bruised and swollen feet, possibly the result of a flogging.

As a male doctor, he was not allowed to examine her genitals, but a female nurse who did told him of "brutal damage."

Azam said a neurosurgeon said a brain scan showed she had a skull fracture and extensive injuries to her brain tissue.

Doctors were unable to operate because her condition was too unstable. Kazemi had a respiratory arrest the next day and later died.

UPDATE: Obama gaffe after gaffe. Even noted in The Oregonian, David Reinhard on talking to axis of evil heads of state:

Team Obama isn't even clear what its own candidate favors. Obama adviser Susan Rice told CNN that Obama never said he'd meet with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, of Israel-is-a-stinking-corpse-and-must-be-wiped-off-the-map fame. He only said he'd meet with the appropriate Iranian leaders. An odd response in and of itself, but no sooner had she spoken then around came the YouTube video of Obama telling reporters last fall that he would meet with . . . Ahmadinejad.

None of this seems to matter to Obamaniacs, but it should to the rest us. It certainly makes it hard to conduct a real debate. Tuesday, for example, Obama chided McCain for misrepresenting his Cuba policy. "His charges aren't serious," Obama said. "That's the problem. I have never said that I was prepared to immediately normalize relations with Cuba."

But this is how Obama replied to a question on whether he supported normalization in a 2003 candidate's questionnaire: "Our longstanding policies toward Cuba have been a miserable failure."

Robert Novak calls some fellow journalists on the carpet, some of whom are already moving to officially work for the Obama campaign. Karl Rove wonders whether Barack Obama has a secret plan.

UPDATE: Ed Morrissey at HotAir makes the point that Barack Obama still describes domestic terrorist Bill Ayers as "mainstream". It's no wonder Obama doesn't have the judgment to know where to draw the line with the axis of evil.

UPDATE: Andrew Sullivan cites James Baker's series of meetings with Syria's Assad. As far as I know James Baker wasn't president. The results were dubious. And Syria isn't openly developing nuclear weapons. Not even covertly any more. Barack Obama is pretty sloppy with his words. Don't they mean anything Barack? From Rove's piece on strategy and timing, kind of important details:

Mr. Obama's Sunday statement grew out of a kerfuffle over his proclaimed willingness to meet – eagerly and without precondition – during his first year as president with the leaders of Iran, Syria, North Korea, Venezuela and Cuba. On Monday, he said it was a show of confidence when American leaders meet with rivals; he insisted he was merely doing what Richard Nixon did by going to China.

I recommend that he read Henry Kissinger's book, "The White House Years." Mr. Obama would learn it took 134 private meetings between U.S. and Chinese diplomats before a breakthrough at a Jan. 20, 1970 meeting in Warsaw. It took 18 months of behind-the-scenes discussions before Mr. Kissinger secretly visited Beijing. And it took seven more months of hard work before Nixon went to China. The result was a new relationship, announced in a communiqué worked out over months of careful diplomacy.

The Chinese didn't change because of a presidential visit. In another book, "Diplomacy," Mr. Kissinger writes that "China was induced to rejoin the community of nations less by the prospect of dialogue with the United States than by fear of being attacked by its ostensible ally, the Soviet Union." Change came because the U.S. convinced Beijing it was in its interest to change. Then the president visited.

Foreign policy is a key issue this year, whether the Obama camp likes it or not. And a key constituency (same story in the NY Times today) in a key state just may make the difference in November. RCP Blog. It was no coincidence that Sen. Joe Lieberman appeared at Sen. McCain's side in Chicago on Monday when McCain went after Barack Obama for his ill-considered, reckless remarks on Iran. And on the way home, I tuned in Rush, who got a call from a very emotional Holocaust survivor from the Wiesel family.

UPDATE: R. Emmett Tyrrell, The American Spectator:

As for Senator Obama, he is still trying to wriggle out of an answer he gave to a question asked him during a debate last summer. Would he as president "without preconditions" meet with the anti-American, anti-Semitic, and seemingly delusional president of Iran, he was asked. "I would," he answered in the sanctimonious tone that always suggests incense is burning nearby. So maybe we can understand why he and the Democratic leadership are so anxious to transform yesteryear's failed policy of appeasement into a hate term.