First of all apologies for the somewhat hit and miss posting from me recently for reasons which all you regulars can guess at. Also, for the same reason, I have been somewhat lax in joining in with the conversations that go on in the comment threads. However, the 'Memsahib' is coming along nicely and as I gradually get myself into a routine with all this cooking/nursing/housekeeping shit duty I hope to be more attentive here at D&N.
I can't say that I have studied the news as assiduously as usual during the last week or so but I do gain the distinct impression that 'The One' may be getting it right in the Middle East. He received a great deal of 'incoming' for his unfortunate - but truthful! - admission that he didn't have a strategy for dealing with IS. However, the fact is that no-one else did either, and that includes, I suspect, the Pentagon - and what is laughingly known as our Ministry of Defence. There is nothing much new about IS, they are simply the latest bunch of bloodthirsty scallywags to erupt in Arabia, their only difference being that that their eye-balls swivel even more alarmingly than their predecessors, that they have a very clear aim and purpose and that they are twice as ruthless - for the moment! I add that last phrase because, of course, so far they have not yet come up against real opposition. When that happens we'll see what they are made of!
Anyway, poor old Barack got in the neck as a chorus from the Right-wing commentariat erupted, all of them moaning about 'lack of leadership', etc, etc. However, none of them seemed to define, exactly and precisely, what was the American national interest in the Middle East and, if there was one, what they would do to pursue it - short of bombing everyone back to the middle ages - not too difficult to achieve in the Middle East! Yes, chopping the heads of defenceless prisoners is very nasty but in the great global scheme of nastiness in which just about every nation in the world has indulged from time to time, it is a mere pinprick - and a stupid one, too, because it simply aggravates your potential enemies.
So, it appears that between the 8th and the 16th hole, Obama decided that the whole IS problem is a Middle East problem not an American problem! If some of those fat, scurvy, corrupt and equally cruel Middle East tyrants are running scared at this eruption of fundamentalist jihadis - which some of them helped to finance in the first place - then by all means, Obama is saying, we'll lend you some fighter bombers on an hourly rate but only if you do something for us in return - like stop your home-grown extremist preachers and stop persecuting the half of your population that, for obscure reasons lost in the mists of history, only kneel to pray sixteen times a day instead of twenty four - or whatever!
When faced with a pit full of angry, agitated vipers it is best to avoid it altogether but if necessity prevails then use a very long stick!