Obama's Foreign Policy has been a Joke!

Weekly Opinion Editorial

INCONSISTENCY OF OUTRAGE!

by Steve Fair

     In seventeen days, Donald Trump is scheduled to be inaugurated as the 45^th President of the United States.  If you would have made that prediction in January 2016, most would have thought you were out of your mind.  Trump defied the conventional wisdom to win the primary and then won the general election by changing the electoral map for the first time in over thirty years.  To say Trump’s win was a surprise, would be an understatement.  Since November 8^th, Trump has been busy filling his cabinet positions and it would be fair to say his picks have been pretty much the exact opposite of those President Obama appointed.  That probably means a lot of the governmental intrusion the Obama administration imposed will be walked back by Trump. One big decision Of Obamas that Trump will likely reverse if the expulsion of 35 Russian diplomats in retaliation for hacking attacks on the Democrat National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign.   

     On December 29^th, President Obama told the Russians to get out of the country by January 1^st.  Both the timing of the expulsion and its urgency were interpreted in Russia as last-minute petty revenge from the departing Obama team, on behalf of Obama’s former Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton.  Sean Spicer, the incoming White House communications director, suggested Sunday that President Obama’s imposing Russian sanctions related to email hacking was politically motivated, considering China recently did far worse without punishment. Obama defended the action.  “There is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections that we need to take action," the POTUS said. Four observations: 

    First, America has been interfering in other countries’ elections for over a century.  Administrations- Democrat and Republican- have been picking winners and losers throughout the globe for decades.  The most recent example was the Obama administration doing everything possible to defeat the Brexit election in the UK.  Perhaps the UK should send our diplomats home as punishment.

      Second, the Clintons have a lot of nerve to talk about foreign influence.  They have received millions of dollars in donations to the Clinton foundation from foreign governments, much of it while Hillary Clinton was the sitting Secretary of State.  Pay-to-Play has been alleged and Congress has vowed to investigate if access to Clinton when she was SOS was predicated on donating to the Clinton Foundation.

     Third, in 2015 China hacked 4 million government workers personal information.  They also hacked health insurance providers Anthem and Premera Blue Cross.  The Obama administration did nothing- no sanctions, no expulsion of diplomats, nothing, not even a statement on the hack.  Some believe it had something to do with Bill Clinton getting $750,000 for two speeches paid for by a business controlled by the Chinese government while Hillary was Secretary of State.  Where was President Obama’s outrage on hacking then?

     Fourth, the information the Russians hacked and released to the American people hasn’t been discounted as false.  That’s important.  Neither the Clintons nor the DNC have denied the accuracy of the WiKi Leaks emails.  If the Russians had not found it, would we have knowns the DNC was tilting the pinball machine in the primary to help Clinton?  Would we have known that President Obama knew that Clinton was using a private server?  Would we have known that Hillary wants completely open borders?  Would we have known that Hillary had ‘private’ and ‘public’ positions on issues that differed?  Where was the mainstream press?  Why didn’t they do their job and find out these inconsistencies? Why didn’t they do real reporting instead of sensationalizing every move that Trump made?  The answer is they were in the tank for Hillary.  Fact is the Russians did America a favor by finding the information and exposing the Clintons for the political hacks they are.

     The righteous indignation President Obama displayed by kicking out the Russians is inconsistent.  He has been a joke in how he has conducted his foreign policy.  Just last week, the Obama administration stabbed Israel in the back and this week it was Russia.  America has little respect in the world because of this inconsistency.

     Obama recently arrogantly said that he would have beaten Trump if he would have been on the ballot in November.  It’s a moot point because of the 22^nd amendment(limits POTUS to eight years), but it is what is most likely a certainty is that much of what Obama has done in the past eight years will be undone in the next four years.