For a thoughtful, intelligent and knowledgeable answer to that question you should read Charles Moore in The Telegraph today. For a 'grunt-rumble' summary you can glance at this. Suffice to say that the only praise you can offer in support of Barack Obama is that he makes Jimmy Carter look quite effective! Obama is like those three monkeys rolled into one, he hears no evil, sees no evil, speaks no evil. Perhaps I have the wrong animal metaphor because rather like a swan he drifts along effortlessly with his head held aloof on his long neck and the only difference is that he rarely dips his head into the dark and muddy waters that surround him. As Moore indicates in his article, this so-called 'peace' president is the begetter of more wars than his so-called war-mongering predecessor. The only difference is that Obama's wars are not of his doing but his lack of doing! He has gone for the cheap and popular policy of 'bringin' our boys home' and as the inevitable murder and mayhem break out in the vacuums he has left behind he gives no thought to a future American grand strategy which will have to be conducted in isolation as erstwhile allies look elsewhere for friends, or even worse, seek to bend the knee to rising powers.
We all enjoyed a good laugh, well some of you did, at Dubya's cowboy strategy which indeed did have its faults but at least, if you were some middle eastern scallywag, you had to take into account possible American re-actions to anything you might do. The Left have cheered America's retirement from the field but, as I warned some time ago, beware of what you wish for. Today, the teacher has left the playground, the big kids beat up the little kids and anything goes. And what of, er, 'Great' Britain? Charles Moore sums it up precisely:
Alert readers who have got this far will notice that I have not mentioned Britain’s role in all these unsettling changes. This is because we have barely got one.
