” he's talking about actually meeting with our enemies”

For what purpose? To achieve what, exactly?

Guess we better just kill em all. I'll meet you at the military recruiting station tomorrow. How does 10 am sound?

For what purpose? To achieve what, exactly?

As I've posted before, parties like the Syrians will agree with us, then proceed to continue doing whatever they want to do. The Iranians cheat routinely on nuclear and other agreements. Why do so many people insist on remaining ignorant and insist on maintaining blind, fully superstitious and emotional faith in Feeling Good Together and Trusting The Other Party who has proven it cannot be trusted and who is misbehaving and acting against us and our interests?

It goes beyond the rabid, stupid, Bush hatred and typical leftist anti-US-West disease. It really is as if people are that naive or starry-eyed they believe all can easily be well.

[sigh]

Ditto.

Having to scroll past so much nonsense can be irrittating.. and what annoys can not convince. A waste of time for everyone, the commenter included.

RE:”The USA has no strength in this region. Has nothing the Iranians or anyone else in the region wants. We have nothing. These people in the middle east want Israel gone, want the USA out of the Middle east and they want to impose their own agenda in this region and there is nothing the USA can offer them that will change this.:”

Following this very logic, then, there is nothing the US can do except impose its own will by occupying the entire ME, including Lebanon.
That being impossible,, let's stop talking pie-in-the-sky and explore what actually can be done. in the real world.

No one in the region wants Iraq to explode, not even Iran, because they are afraid of the spillover across borders. . At present, Iran can enjoy the benefits of Iraq's difficulties without assuming any responsibility for them. That uneven situation would change if the US were to leave, and Iran would be the one responsible. That already is one area ripe for negotiations.

The Sunni nations are also hiding behind US skirts to avoid regional troubles froom affecting them. As long as the US acts like a protective parent enabling others in the region to avoid the responsibilities of adulthood, we are not acting like responsible allies to anyone and certainly not acting in the inrerests of the US.

How you can say that the US has no power and in the same breath insist that we act as if we do, is beyond me..

Here's the kicker. Terrorism can not be defeated by military force alone.
That's been demonstrated over and dover and over.

Negotiations DO NOT imply a refusal to use force. They imply not using force in ways that can only bakcfire, and prevent more effective tools from being used in the interim.

This 'appeasement ' talk is nothing but sand thrown in the eyes to prevent clear vision.
It rises with every election cycle.
I guarrantee Cheney will have more to say as Nov. draws nearer.

Agreed. If you negotiate from strength. The United STates and its allies negotiated from a position of strength. We had something the North Koreans needed and therefore it was not appeasement but rather negotiation in which both sides conceded to reach a consensus.

The USA has no strength in this region. Has nothing the Iranians or anyone else in the region wants. We have nothing. These people in the middle east want Israel gone, want the USA out of the Middle east and they want to impose their own agenda in this region and there is nothing the USA can offer them that will change this.

I ask all those who are swooning over Barak Obama's foreign policy to give me anything that he can give them in order to reach an agreement that will be anything less then apeasement?

Pulling out of Iraq and turning the nation over to the Shia which is a minority of Arabs in the region is a victory for the region? No Its appeasement. Anything for a deal.

The only progress he can report is with N.Korea, and that's because he decided to appease them by negotiating.

I know in his heart of heart Bush really would like to be FDR, valiantly leading a nation into battle against a world threatening power with utter moral justification. Unfortunately today is not the 1930's, and terrorists are a crimal organization of saboteurs not a mighty unified industrial nation capable of dominating the globe. Its really pathetic when he feels the need to couch everything in terms of the glory days when things were just so simple. I can't wait till we get a grown up in the Oval Office.

Bigger ain't gonna get the keys to the car this time around.

Obama isn't talking about appeasement, he's talking about actually meeting with our enemies. Do you know what the difference is? Bush hasn't actually met with them. It's not about fighting versus appeasement. It's about skipping diplomacy and going straight to war, or introducing yourself at the very least to the people you intend to bomb.

Neocons don't want peace, they want world domination muahahahahaha!

So we are left with a idealistic foreign policy approach that is certainly championed by the progressive movement within the Democratic party. It is a similar idealistic approach that failed in the 30's. Failed in the 70's and there is no evidence that it will succeed in the 21st century.

Idealistic foreign policy is what it is. Appeasement for the sake of agreements. It was tried by Bill Clinton with North Korea and we saw what the results turned out to be. When dealing with rogues who are idealistic in their own right it is very hard to replace their version of idealism for our version. This is what the world tried in the 30's, the 70's and now the 21st century and it will fail.

I for one do not believe that it will work. I do not believe that GWB and his neocon approach to the world will or can work. I believe that the foreign policy of realism practiced by Bill Clinton and adhered to by Hillary Clinton is the right way to go in a world that is rapidly going mad.

Realistic approaches to foreign policy are based in facts….not hopes and dreams and change and whatever BS Obama throws out there to continue to convince the voters as did Jimmy Carter that “If only I could talk to them”.

Dream on. It certainly is the basis for Idealistic foreign policy.