Anyone who reads this blog certainly knows I am no fan of Barack Obama\’s.
But, regardless of my low opinion of his capabilities and performance I root hard for him every day. It does neither me nor anyone else any good if President Obama fails. It will therefore be my absolute pleasure if he succeeds.
And he has a major opportunity to do so right now.
There appears to be no doubt at all that Russia supplied the SAM missile which took down Malaysia flight MH17, with its loss of about 300 people, including some number of US passengers (as I write this we still do not know the exact number – I suspect this is because next of kin are in the process of being notified). Everyone seems to agree the missile was Russian and that the person who fired it and/or the missile technician who advised/guided that person on how to do so were Russian as well.
President Obama must – must – act against Russia. And I mean right now,.
Not by making threats, which putin will ignore because he has no respect for President Obama and will assume they will never be acted on. but action. Immediate, decisive action.
What President Obama does now may well shape the rest of his presidency and the way he will be viewed by future generations.
If all he does is make threats, or implement a few sanctions that appear significant on the surface but don\’t actually change anything, it will be “round up the usual suspects” time, and putin will laugh him off.
If he mobilizes our allies, very much including our European allies, and leads a united front with specific, significant sanctions that will truly damage Russia, with the understanding that they can only be ended by Russia pulling out of the Ukraine and demonstrating in some tangible way that it will no longer pursue this war either directly or through the Ukrainian separatists, putin will be forced to cut his stonewalling, his lying, his general BS, and deal with the situation.
A guarantee of major negative consequences is what a KGB thug like vladimir putin understands. Nothing less.
Which will it be, Mr. Obama? Are you a President or a pitiable, laughable pretender?
The time is now.
