Soap Box

Vladimir Putin breezed into New York, did a 60 Minutes interview, addressed the United Nations General Assembly, announced what amounts to a takeover of the leadership role in the Middle East and left Barack Obama standing on the sidelines with his hat in his hand.

If you've read this column with any degree of regularity, you know that I am not a fan of Obama's policies and handling of foreign affairs and may think that I take glee in watching his humbling before the international community.

Nothing could be farther from the truth, it's embarrassing for any patriotic American to see our nation's hard won international influence, prestige, respect and superiority disappear like smoke in a wind and see a megalomaniacal, power-mad, strutting peacock like Putin fill the void without so much as a strategy in place to stop him.

Obama's time to exert influence in the Middle East has come and gone, nobody trusts him, nobody fears him, nobody respects him in that troubled part of the world, his red lines have been crossed so many times, his promises to find and punish those responsible for Benghazi and other atrocities have gone unfilled and his words ring empty and futile.

His refusal to deal with ISIS in any effective way has allowed that organization to grow, attracting radical minded young people from around the world until an evil that should have been destroyed in it's infancy is maturing into a major force.

And to think that our old - and present - nemesis is the one who is going to lead the fight against them is unthinkable, especially knowing that ISIS could have been dealt with by a hand full of elite American special forces a few short years ago, had our president just had the political cojones to send them, or had listened to his military advisors and left a residual force when we pulled out of Iraq.

Obama and Putin find themselves on opposite sides in Syria. Putin supports the al-Assad regime and Obama says he has to go.

Actually, al-Assad could have been taken out a few years ago, but in typical Obama fashion, our president twiddled his thumbs until now. Al-Assad has got a powerful ally who is moving modern military hardware into the region, and as we all know, where Russia goes, Russia stays.

So, the face of the Middle East will change drastically over the next few years as Russia becomes the dominant player and the U.S. is reduced to the role of weak sister, lodging complaints with the United Nations and moaning about Russian expansionism, and believe me, Russia will never be content until it spreads its influence over the entire region.

Of course Israel will never accept Russian interference and will be in even more danger than they already are. All this on top of the disastrous deal Obama and Kerry just brokered with Iran
which already had Israel stretched over a barrel. 

How did Obama paint himself - and America - into such a volatile corner?

My guess: inexperience, naivety, surrounding himself with idealistic flower children types who view the world through a rainbow prism with the attitude that America has just pushed her weight around way too much in the last two centuries and if we'll just show our humane and pliable side we can work things out without all that military stuff.

Well, Mr. Obama, I hope you've learned a lesson here.

You created a power vacuum in the Middle East. Where there is a vacuum somebody rushes in to fill the void, and in this case it's your worst nightmare.

Before you had only the �tin pot� dictators and rag tag militias to deal with in the Middle East.

Now there's a new kid on the block and he's a bully. 

What do you think?

Pray for our troops and he peace of Jerusalem.

God Bless America

� Charlie Daniels

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