Democratic presidential hopeful Barak Obama on Wednesday stressed the need for the U.S. and Pakistan to be “constructive” allies in fighting al-Qaida, but softened earlier talk in which he pledged to unilaterally hunt down terrorists in the south Asian nation.

Obama and his spokesman offered measured criticism of the Bush administration’s actions and policies on Pakistan. The candidate declined an opportunity to explain the difference between his proposals and the White House’s, but he expressed sympathy for Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who faces a growing militant backlash in his Muslim nation.

“President Musharraf has very difficult job, and it is important that we are a constructive ally with them in dealing with al-Qaida,” Obama, a U.S. senator from Illinois, said. ~AP

Fred Thompson may have a bit of a conjured image and a thin record, but I don’t believe that he was 100% produced in a factory, specifically for consumption by whatever conservative Republican primary voters  don’t have access to Google, the ability to distinguish between black and white, or a memory that extends beyond two weeks ago. ~Liz Mair

George Ajjan did yeoman’s work in actually suffering through the Sunday GOP presidential debate.  He offers some excellent commentary on that and recent events in Lebanon here.  He quotes a priceless Romney answer on promoting democratisation:

I think when there’s a country like Lebanon, for instance, that becomes a democracy, that instead of standing by and seeing how they do, we should have been working with the government there to assure that they have the rule of law, that they have agricultural and economic policies that work for them, that they have schools that are not Wahhabi schools [bold mine-DL], that we try and make sure they have good health care [bold mine-DL].   

Those universal mandates aren’t just for schlubs in Massachusetts anymore–now the Bekaa Valley can also benefit from Romney’s grand vision!  “Great Society on the Mekong” ring any bells, Willard? 

George makes many fine points about Lebanon in particular.  For starters, he notes that representative government in Lebanon did not begin in 2005, and U.S. support for the government did not seem to extend to defending it when it opposed the Israeli bombing campaign of Lebanon last summer.  U.S. acquiescence in the Israeli attacks on all of Lebanon contributed directly to the weakening of the Siniora government and the wreckage of major infrastructure.  We “stood by” all right, but in such a way as to ensure that the forces within Lebanon that the government supports would be harmed the most and those the government loathes would be strengthened.  Also, if huge numbers of your people are refugees who have been driven from their homes or into neighbouring countries, “economic policies that work for them” are not quite as important as they might otherwise be.  After watching the appropriate outrage over the I-35 bridge collapse this past week, it occurs to me that Americans might be even slightly more agitated if a foreign government blew up the port of Long Beach, knocked out the runways at O’Hare, took out multiple bridges across the Mississippi, bombed some of our military installations and displaced 25% of our population in the name of self-defense and helping the American government with its internal security.

I would have thought that Romney’s remark about Lebanon having schools that are “not Wahhabi schools” would have merited some comment from George.  I’m not saying that Saudi/Wahhabi influence in Lebanon doesn’t exist, but it is a rather strange thing to focus on in a country where Sunnis make up perhaps 25% of the population.

U.S. Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama has been trying to burnish his foreign policy credentials.

So it didn’t help when he called Canada’s leader a “president” during a debate Tuesday in Chicago.

Asked what he’d do about the North American trade deal, Obama said it needs changes, so he’d “immediately call the president of Mexico (and) the president of Canada.” ~The Edmonton Sun

But, remember, folks, he was an international studies major and has lived overseas–that’s what counts!

The soundtrack to Fanaa was playing in the background, and I was finishing reviewing the most recent Arabic lesson’s vocabulary when I was reminded of another Arabic loanword found in Sayat Nova’s poetry.  His Doon en hoorin is (You Are A Nymph) has a line where he says:

Toor, indzi spane, ikhtiar unis!

I believed that this translated roughly as, “Come (lit., give), kill me, you have the right.”  The modern Eastern Armenian translator renders ikhtiar as iravunk’, which is where my translation of ikhtiar as “right” comes from.  In the context of the poem, this rendering might make perfect sense, since the gusan is talking about the authority of the beloved to order his death, where she plays the role of a khan or some other powerful figure.  Yet my Arabic lesson tells me that the primary meaning of ikhtiar is “choice” and the dictionary confirms that it means selection, preference or even free will in certain usages.  Fortunately, there is a way out of this contradiction.  

Ikhtiar (or ikhtiyar as Hans-Wehr transliterates it) can also mean “option” in Arabic, which would also fit the context of the poem.  It would not, however, bear out the translator’s decision to use iravunk’.  This rendering does manage to convey some of the meaning, but does not capture exactly what the poet was saying.  Still, I can appreciate the translator’s quandary, since the main Armenian word for choice is entrut’yun, which is a bit more cumbersome.  So, eight weeks in intensive Arabic have at least brought me some new insight into Sayat Nova.  Park’ Astutso!

So says Niall Stanage.

Hugo Chávez is rubbing his hands. He has a plan, and Colombian intelligence is aware of it. It seems he convinced the drug-trafficking, communist-leaning guerrillas to collaborate in a strategy that will lead the so-called Democratic Pole to victory in the next elections.

The Venezuelan colonel is willing to spend whatever is needed: $10 million, $50 million, $100 million. The gush of petrodollars is enough to bankroll those imperial spasms. After the triumph in Colombia, Peru will fall of its own weight in the next elections, maybe by the hand of Ollanta Humala — and the conquest of the Andean arch will be complete: 100 million people. ~Carlos Alberto Montaner

There is something a bit odd about describing a string of left-populist victories in democratic elections as the “conquest of the Andean arch,” as if Pisarro were back in the saddle overthrowing the Incas.  From the perspective of the backers of the populists, they are finally reclaiming their countries from the people that have (mis)ruled them.  That their policies will bring on disaster and economic ruin is all but certain, but that is actually their affair.  If more of Latin America is on the verge of sliding into democratic despotism, this is the result of the flaws of mass democracy, which might make us reconsider the importance of such “democratic values” in the first place and think on whether their disappearance from the continent–if indeed they are going to disappear in some places–would be a cause for lament. 

It seems to me that when Venezuelophobes cast their eyes across the Atlantic, the toppling of dominoes in supposedly “people-powered” revolutions is viewed as being all to the good.  Why?  The obvious reason is that the new oligarchs who take power in Georgia or Ukraine or Lebanon are believed to be U.S. puppets to one degree or another, as indeed they are.  When a democratic wave crashes, even if promoted and funded by foreign agents and pushed by foreign NGOs, these enthusiasts for democracy are supposed to be very pleased about it.  Not so when the people involved live in this hemisphere and vote for the ‘wrong’ sorts.  When foreigners aid ostensibly pro-Western forces to seize power, er, win elections, this is supporting the liberation of a longsuffering, heroic people from the domination of exploitative elites; when people who are not on “our” side aid forces in another country to win elections, this is nefarious imperialism.  I would be perfectly willing to acknowledge right now–and I do acknowledge–that Venezuela is engaged in power projection and a kind of soft imperialism, just as Washington has been doing for some time.  In fact, I consider both policies dreadful and misguided, but it would be refreshing if those warning against the growing menace of Venezuela could acknowledge that Chavez is implementing the same kinds of tactics and pursuing the same goals of power projection that our government pursues.  If we could just drop all the pious chatter about the glory of democracy or the impending collapse of democracy, we might start to understand and manage foreign affairs a bit better.   

Of course, I would argue that the prevalence of Chavista and left-populist types in Latin American politics today is good evidence that democracy is not necessarily the best form of government for every country, and it isn’t necessarily that good of a form of government in any country.  Even so, if the spread of mass democracy in Latin America ultimately means a turn towards demagogic despotism and the collapse of representative government in favour of authoritarian populism, it is unclear what shoring up the Uribe government with some military aid will matter one way or the other.  Montaner speaks of a coming hurricane, and then recommends that we help Uribe set up a nice tent on the beach.  If Montaner is right about the almost certain unsustainability of democracy in Latin America, backing Uribe’s government will be of little use in preventing the collapse of this kind of government there. 

We are supposed to be deeply shocked that Chavez is meddling in the elections of a neighbouring country (because the overthrow of Milosevic, Shevardnadze, Yanukovych et al. were all purely local operations, you see, in which no outsiders were involved).  Certainly, it would be better if Chavez didn’t do this, but he has already been backing and funding FARC rebels for years, so pushing an electoral option is a less bloody means to the same goal.  This is possibly better for the Colombian peasants who have been caught in the middle of the civil war for all these years (not that many people in favour of perpetuating the military alliance with Colombia care much for their welfare).

Ruben Navarette should stick to his reliable shtick of “nativist”-bashing and leave the foreign policy talk to someone else.  First, he hasn’t got his facts straight:

But Obama wasn’t hatching an invasion. He was talking about going into Pakistan if our military was in hot pursuit of “high-value terrorist targets.”

In fact, the speech that caused all of this was not referring to “hot pursuit” across the border, but included talk of a “sanctuary” that would be attacked in the event that Musharraf “failed” to do so.  In other words, Obama would launch an attack into Pakistani territory, whether or not the Pakistani government gave its approval, and with no apparent concern for the aftermath of such an action.  Specifically, he said:

If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will. 

Navarette enlightens us:

There is no target of higher value than Osama bin Laden, and our intelligence agencies say that he’s in the remote tribal areas of western Pakistan. Most Americans would probably agree that this is one person we have the right to pursue to the ends of the Earth. That includes going into Pakistan.

This is typical.  Having so personalised all our conflicts and focused them on individual evil masterminds, we as a nation persuade ourselves that any action, no matter how ill-conceived or destructive it may be, would be justified for the sake of killing the archnemesis.  There is, naturally, the appeal to the mob in the final resort, since there are not many good policy arguments to hand about doing what he proposes. 

Let’s be clear: of course, Bin Laden should pay for what he and his have done.  Virtually no one in this country questions the legitimacy or rightness of this.  But, to follow Navarette’s view, this apparently trumps all other considerations and outweighs all other costs.  It’s as if Navarette says, “Who cares if the action doubles or triples the strength of pro-Taliban forces?  Why worry whether it helps bring about the fall of the government in Kabul or causes another coup in Islamabad?  If you can take a shot at Bin Laden and company, it’s all good.”  Such is the stellar strategic thinking of the Obamas and Navarettes of the world.  This is exactly the kind of short-sighted, overly personalised vendetta-as-strategy that has mired us in Iraq and which continues to exacerbate the jihadi threat.  What earns Obama’s proposal applause on some parts of the left and scorn across most of the spectrum is that it is somewhat unlike Bush’s current policy, which has plenty of its own problems.  However, simply because a policy differs from the extremely poor policies of this administration does not mean that it makes sense.   

This is a foreign policy approach that does not gauge a proposal by its merits, but rather by the people it annoys.  If a really stupid policy idea happens to annoy neocons and Mr. Bush, Obama and company might think that it is a great idea because it is simply different from what has been done.  This is actually to mimic the worst habits of the neocons.  For years, neocons operated by arguing something like the following: “If someone with regional knowledge says something that we disagree with, it is obviously biased, left-wing and self-serving, so we must actively ignore people who know something about this part of the world.  ‘Arabists’ and Foreign Service people are not on board with our agenda, and are therefore wrong about virtually everything.  Whatever “realists” recommend, we must strive to do the opposite, especially when it involves stirring up conflict and overthrowing foreign governments.  Wherever Clinton was too hemmed in by international rules and institutions, we will cast them off and do whatever we please.  Knowledge and expertise are overrated; moral clarity is what matters.”  Of course, I might very well find problems with the “realist” agenda as well, but that doesn’t mean that any and all critiques of the “realists” are equally smart or all alternatives are equally desirable.  This should be obvious, but there are some Obamaphiles who are having difficulty grasping it. 

Navarette continues: 

But the Pakistani ambassador to the United States insists that, if the U.S. military went into Pakistan after bin Laden, it would destabilize the region and hurt relations between the two countries. In fact, Mahmud Ali Durrani told CNN’s Suzanne Malveaux that if the United States were to locate and kill bin Laden inside Pakistan it would so inflame the Pakistani people that it could actually hurt the war on terror.

Huh? Killing bin Laden would hurt the war on terror? And some presidential hopefuls consider these folks our friends, and others think these matters ought not even be discussed?

Suddenly, Barack Obama seems like the least-naive person in the race. 

This is pretty straightforward: when the ambassador of a country that enjoys major non-NATO ally status with the United States says that X will harm relations between the two countries, it actually will harm relations between the two countries.  This is not an empty threat, as our worsening relations with Turkey over the past four years because of Iraq should show.  If the ambassador says that X will destabilise the region (which it probably would do in this case), you have to take that seriously, even if you end up deciding in favour of X.  You might be able to argue that, taking all things into account, it is worth the risk, but to actively ignore the risk or pretend that there is no risk is absurd.  To deny that Obama said what he, in fact, said is even more absurd, and that seems to be Navarette’s tack here. 

Naturally, the Pakistani government is not going to encourage foreign military action on its territory.  There is a significant measure of self-interest in all of this, but anyone who understands even a little about the politics of western Pakistan understands that the ambassador is not simply talking to protect his job.  American military action on any large scale will stir up even more support for pro-Taliban forces, which represent a more enduring danger to the U.S.-backed government in Kabul.  Provoking an even larger groundswell of support for pro-Taliban forces, or perhaps even triggering a major insurrection, inside a major allied state would be mad.  What Obama proposed in his speech would risk doing this very thing. 

Navarette muddles the issue again with this talk of “friendship.” Allied nations are not “friends.”  States do not have “friends.”  There are plenty of people in every U.S.-allied state who are not friendly towards our government or our interests, which is what you would expect, especially in light of recent events.  The Pakistani government is telling us, quite plainly, that making these threats will weaken the position of the government there, worsen the scale and scope of the threat and ultimately make the government less reliable than it already is in fighting jihadis.  That strikes me as a pretty good list of reasons why it is a very questionable proposal. 

I would add one other thing: Obama is actually drawing a bit from the Clinton ’92 playbook in running “to the right” of the administration by issuing bold statements on foreign policy that try to paint current policy as weak or servile.  Remember when Clinton was attacking Bush the Elder for “coddling the dictators” in Beijing?  Who was it who then became one of Beijing’s most useful fools once in office?  Naturally, it was Clinton.  Supposing for the moment that this is electoral posturing, designed to make a Democratic candidate look “tough” and “serious” enough (while managing to have the exact opposite effect), we might expect any Obama Administration to be as blind to the flaws of Pakistan as Clinton’s was to those of China. 

There is a new TAC coming out with my Pakistan column in it.  Once it is out, I’ll talk a bit more about what I think our Pakistan policy should be.

Update: Musharraf explicitly rejects the possibility of U.S. strikes inside Pakistan, and is now contemplating declaring a state of emergency.  This would be the place that Obama wants to take “action” in.  According to the AP, Obama has some small part in this latest fit of panic:

Tariq Azim, minister of state for information, said some sentiment coming from the United States, including from Democratic presidential hopeful Barak Obama, over the possibility of U.S. military action against al-Qaida in Pakistan “has started alarm bells ringing and has upset the Pakistani public.” 

Of course, the government is bound to blame someone else for their internal problems, many of which the Pakistani government has exacerbated through its heavy-handed handling of marginal regions.  Nonetheless, the possibility that careless and stupid remarks by candidates in our election might worsen already tense situations should be sobering.

Everyone’s favourite, Katherine Harris, made a small splash by having a total of four campaign managers during her Esther Resurrection Tour highly eccentric, error-ridden run for the Senate, but it seems as if Fred intends to outmatch her in sheer personnel turnover.  At the present rate, he should leave her in the dust.  He has already dropped one manager and two “temporary” co-managers and moved on to yet another, Bill Lacy.  All this comes before his much-delayed, not so highly anticipated and no longer very interesting announcement in September that he will start officially running.  Once he begins to campaign properly, we should start seeing campaign managers move in and out on a weekly basis.  Given that Bill Lacy is a veteran of Thompson’s first Senate run, he may stick around a little longer, if only for old times’ sake, but if I were mounting a bid for the Presidency I think the last person I would call on would be the one who worked as a strategist for Dole and for the Dole ’96 campaign.