Replies

Maggief: RE your “Obama discussed Russia’s ‘chemical handover’ proposal with President Putin during G20” http://on.rt.com/q7dwxj
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That was discussed by the Baier panel. I was looking for it and realized the subject was interwoven throughout the discussion of the All-Star panel. So.... it became a good reason to take some Cliff notes:

Hume: If this (getting Assad to remove chem weapons) is feasible, this changes everything. Reid cancelled Wed initial vote. Now put off til who knows when.

Krauthammer. Think Russians were play chess with a set of rank amateurs. That gaffe gave them the opening they wanted:

Two issues here: chems and Assad retaining power-—Iran/Hezbollah/Assad/Russia axis dominating the region.

Russia immediately saw that this enables them to keep Assad in power and retain their navel base and Assad’s air bases.

Russia gets everything they wanted and Obama saves face. That’s a high price to pay (for Obama) but he will seize it.

Liason: The IF is so huge. To even do this, experts say, you would have to have a ceasefire. Can barely do this in peacetime, let alone in midst of civil war.

I don’t see any prospect for this to actually happen

Tucker: The Adm’s policy in Syria is ad hoc. The Pres implied that this was all in the works, that at the G20 he and Pres Putin worked this out. That is ludicrous. They are making this up as they go along, and that’s obvious, I think

Second thing that is clear is that this strengthens Russia & humiliates the US. Putin is riding to Pres Obama’s rescue. He is entirely dependent upon the good will of Putin, who does not have our interests at heart.

Third thing that is obvious: America is weaker in the eyes of the world and that has real consequences....Weakness invites aggression...

Hume: I think Tucker is right as a practical matter, but as a domestic political matter...Syria blinked and sued for peace. Shows iny’l community acting together can accomplish great things....I can hear all the arguments in my head. They’re coming folks.
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Krauthammer: Obama has changed the terms to make them open-ended. Secondly, if this was an American idea as Obama implies, which I don’t believe for a second, then why isn’t it the American Proposal. Once you call it the Russian Proposal, then we are passive. We have to wait for the Russians, in their good time, to produce a proposal. We will have a counter-proposal. It will go on ad infinitum.

The Russian objective here is either to dismantle the weapons, which I think the likelihood of that is prob 1 in a 100. When Libya agreed to give up its weapons...the plan took 8 years. When the civil war broke out, the inspections stopped entirely.

Russian obj is either to do it over a long period of time or tie us up and the momentum for any strike, any American involvement will dwindle to 0. Obama knows this, and he sees it as a way out of a bluff he made that he cannot carry out.

Baier: The Pres did 5 other interviews, one of them with PBS in which he was asked specifically about this idea and whether he had had conversations about this with Putin and he said, “I did have those conversations and this [proposal] is a continuation of conversations I have had with Putin for quite some time.

[Panelists burst out laughing]

Liason: Well we haven’t heard about them. We haven’t about this proposal at all....T he policy of the US is to get Assad to the negotiating table. Why shouldn’t that be a requirement of this new proposal?

Krauthammer: Because we have conceded that who runs Damascus it not at issue here. Obama said so. The only issue here is the weapons, which is exactly what the Russians and Assad, the Iranians and Hezbollah have demanded.

Baier: But that isn’t what the McCain amendment and the resolution on the Senate side says...

Krauthammer: McCain lost the election. He isn’t the president.

Hume: Not only that. It was Kerry this morning reacting to the reaction to the McCain/Graham amendment...who was saying, “This is going to be unbelievably small.” That was for the purpose of stopping the hemorrhage of Democrats that was occurring..

[my snip of note-taking]

Hume said, “My sense is now that the Pres’ speech tomorrow night is kind of meaningless.

Liason: Does Obama continue to arm the vetted, moderate opposition at industrial-strength levels?
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Final thoughts:

Krauthammer: This is clearly a way to get Obama off the hook politically. The chances of these weapons being eliminated from Syria are less than the Cubs winning the World Series this year, and they are now mathematically eliminated....They are going to pretend this is a real option, which it isn’t

Tucker: The illusion of competence that surrounded this Adm has evaporated...We have 3 more years of this, and that’s bad for the country....(mentions Benghazi).

Liason: ...I don’t think Obama can pretend that the weapons have been turned over if they are not. There is an element of reality here and there is a civil war raging in that country and I don’t see how you do it.