Sorry, I'm not buying it... Mac Donald is a very sharp gal, but in this instance I think she's overstating the argument. I will admit that I was pleasantly surprised that there are actually people in the State Department (Hillary Clinton's State Department, no less) who are actually standing up for their country. However, I'm not sure how much of that I'm willing to credit to Obama -- he's known to be generally disinterested in foreign policy, and leaving State on autopilot would be consistent with how he's handled Gitmo, rendition, and other foreign-related issues. Leftism to a huge extent is about building a fifth column in one's own country. The theory is that if you can bring down the society from within, then invasion becomes both trivial and largely unnecessary. (See: Warsaw Pact.) Foreign relations isn't that much of a priority for leftists.

The other thing is that undercutting Presidents of all stripes is a State Department specialty. They did it to JFK; they did it to Reagan, they did it to Clinton, they did it to W. The last President whom State was really on the same page with was Truman.

I'm not buying it, either. The bulk of the employees at State are in civil service, and they pretty much try to keep a certain status quo regardless of who is the President or Secretary. Let's face it: the political appointments will last tops 8 or so years before their service is no longer needed.

We have our own Mandarin class.

I don't see how either of you guys are faulting Mac: Isn't that exactly her point, that there's an entrenched bureaucracy with more inertia than a president can vector?

"... he's known to be generally disinterested in foreign policy ..."

By whom? What the hell are you talking about? He's been widely criticized (wrongly, in my opinion) for concentrating too much of his effort on foreign policy.

"...surprised that there are actually people in the State Department (Hillary Clinton's State Department, no less) who are actually standing up for their country."

Who are you? Glenn Beck?

This idea that President Obama and his administration isn't interested in the well being of the nation is really getting old and is completely asinine.

It's every bit as ridiculous as the conspiracy theories that the left was going bananas over while President Bush was in office.

Both men are good hearted, patriotic men who have served in very good faith toward what they believe is in the best interest of the country. Disagree all you want with what they think is in the best interest of the country. This nonsense about attacking the motives of well meaning, patriotic, quality Americans is really getting tiresome.

I'm becoming very concerned that my fellow countrymen are becoming so polarized by the likes of Fox News and MSNBC that, before long, there will be two kinds of voters: truthers and birthers. Otherwise known for the time being as complete, fucking idiots.

Anyone else getting sick of Obama waffeling back and forth on the tax cuts extension?

'I support them based on the recomendation f every economist I talked to

'I'm a hostage

'The reblicans are going to hae to explain their actions

'I am as opposed now to the tax cuts as I was two years ago

Jesus Christ man pick one fucking side of the argument and stick to it already

Dude, we've got to work the percentages. This last waffle worked out pretty well! If the man's got no sturdy ideological substructures, then we should hope he keeps flipping a coin. We'll do OK half the time.

Crid, maybe I missed Mac Donald's point... I thought she was trying to say that Obama has been secretly pushing an America-first policy in foreign relations. If he is, that's wildly at variance with his public foreign policy actions. Is it plausible that he would do that? Maybe, if he thinks that's what he has to do in order to keep the Democratic party base on board. But the thing is... I don't think he has it in him to pull that off. As Ed Driscoll said in a column yesterday, "Obama is a class warrior with ever fiber of his being."

And whistleDick, maybe I am an alias for Glenn Beck... if I am, so what? Is Obama patriotic? I don't think so. When Michelle Obama said she had never been proud of her country before, I doubt that she was seriously at odds with her husband's thinking on that. No, I'm not questioning Obama's patriotism. I'm dissing it.

Cousin Dave, it is certainly your right to feel any way you want to about the President.

I think you did miss the point of MacDonald's writing. To make it more clear, read it again while replacing "Dinesh D'Souza" with "Cousin Dave". (for the record, I don't know who Dinesh D'Souza is)

So, how about it? How do the leaked cables fit into your world view that the President is out to weaken the nation that he hates so much?

" ... that's wildly at variance with his public foreign policy actions."

No, it isn't. Only if you've been watching Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity and believe them to be credible.

Dick, what do you call bowing (a gesture of supplication) to foreign leaders? What do you call kowtowing to Iran's nuclear ambitions and abandoning the pro-democracy Iranian protesters? What do you call requiring our soldiers to Miranda-ize captured enemy fighters? Destroying the special relationship with Great Britain? Ignoring the invasion of our southern border by Mexican gangs, and prosecuting the people who try to stop it? Letting NATO go to pot, and abandoning Eastern Europe to the tender mercies of Russia? His acceptance of the status quo at the UN? His unwillingness to identify Islamic terrorism as a force operating in the U.S.?

Obama's foreign policy is mostly incoherent. To the extent that it has any philosophy motivating it, it's what Jeanne Kirkpatrick used to call "Blame America First".

> I thought she was trying to say that
> Obama has been secretly pushing an
> America-first policy in foreign relations.

Dammit, you're going to force me to follow the link, aren't you?

Allright, FINE.

(...)

Well, jeez... Heath' lost me in that first 'graph:

The good faith efforts on the part of our government representatives to honestly assess the complicated world in which we live are now pointlessly undermined.

And I'm all, like, Oh yeah? Really? That's all it took? A public release of gossip from the lowest tier of State service, a body of text already available to uncounted millions?

If that's all it takes to "undermine" our assessment of the world, then our assessment of the world isn't worth making.

And just like that, MacDonald joins the party of often-conservative commenters whose take on this makes no sense to me.

But as regards her second/nut graph (quoted in near-entirety by Amy), mostly she seems to be daring the twitchiest right-side commenters to explain how anything in these cables makes Obama seem especially dangerous or even unusual:

To the contrary, the cables demonstrate a continuity of American foreign policy and discourse from the Bush to the Obama administrations.

That's not the same as saying that Barry is a secret member of the John Birch society. Sure, his fellow lefties may not have been attentive to his inertia. Those of us who remember talk about withdrawal from the Middle East and the closure of Guantanamo have already noted it.

Sorry. "Uncounted millions" here.