Posted on 10/24/2016 9:05:10 AM PDT by SJackson
JERUSALEM — After a presidential campaign dominated by reality-show-style insults and put-downs, the winner of next month’s American election will wake up the following morning to find a far more daunting reality waiting: a Middle East awash in conflict and disarray, desperate for American leadership.
The 45th president will inherit problems associated with the region that are vastly more challenging than any in a generation as the old order has given way to a kaleidoscopic mix of alliances, rivalries and overlapping crises. In the past, presidents have viewed the region through the prism of the Cold War, terrorism or Israel, but those paradigms have shifted dramatically.
Today there is no single overarching issue but multiple ones. Syria, Iraq and Yemen are caught up in war. Turkey and Jordan are inundated by refugees. Russia has reasserted itself as a major player in the region. Libya is searching for stability after the fall of its longtime dictator. The Kurds are on the march. Egypt is fighting off a terrorist threat at home. And Saudi Arabia and Iran are waging a profound struggle for the future of the region.
“In truth, the Middle Eastern order is so fragmented right now that grand visions are utterly unrealistic, if they ever were,” said Emile Hokayem, a senior fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies based in Bahrain. “Circumstances, not mere preferences, dictate policy making, and circumstances are dire.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
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A splintered economy too. The Times, of course, would recommend a continuation of the policies that got us here.
So hand the reins to the woman who splintered it.
I should think the violence and disarray in our own country will take precedence when Hillary loses.
CC
The Mideast is “desperate for US leadership” like the septic tank a few hundred feet away from my door is desperate for leadership. It is not a single entity wanting anything coherent from anyone other than our destruction and its own martyrdom, in that order.
If our choice is to become embroiled in endless wars and collapsed states like Syria and Libya under the brilliant stewardship of the likes of Hillary Clinton or to leave them to their own devices, my suggestion is we allow them to kill each other off. They are or will be nuclear armed within the next decade and will likely have the means to deliver same to CONUS. There’s nothing there for us. We have tried to do good, we have tried to do evil, and the result is inevitably the same thing, death and destruction. It’s simply a craphole and will always be a craphole until enough people die so they give up their craphole ideology. That is potentially millions and millions of deaths away, sad but true.
Beginning with Reagan in Beirut 33 years ago, we have believed that we can fix the Arab world. It is unfixable. Best we can do is keep it from spilling out into the rest of the world.
Oh, wait...
The Trump campaign is the "choirboy" here. Donald Trump, the private American Citizen businessman decided it was time to throw out the Corrupt Washington Establishment and the Clinton Crime Family and take on the real issues of illegal immigration, government fraud etc.
The Trump campaign has successfully exposed Hillary Clinton for what she is: HILLARY IS ABOVE THE LAW is a corrupt politician and has been for all her political career. If this is reality show and insults, so be it.....America is waking up to the fraud that is our government.
Imagine if you can what a government under the Clinton's, that;s right, Clinton's...three for the price of one....imagine what our government will be under this group who are ABOVE THE LAW....under Obama, freedom of speech is at a premium, under the Clinton's it will lawless as well.
In the past, presidents have viewed the region through the prism of the Cold War, terrorism or Israel,
That statement misses
1) Oil
2) Religion
3) Rivalry between Saudi and Iran.
All three of which have been alleged to be the driving force of policy.
So leading from behind didn't work? Really?
Nuke it from orbit. Hillary is crazy enough to do it. But she'll probably start with Russia. Now if we can only stop her from bringing in those pesky "refugees"...
OIL. Were it not for OIL, we would have cared mega-less about the middle east, except for honey and wool. And they would still be living in tents. OIL.
We need energy independence. And to give them piles of short range conventional land-land missiles.
Oil? No, we are going to use solar and wind power from now on...like concrete shoes on a ballerina...so we can compete with the rest of the world at THEIR level....on a level playing field...
Agreed on energy independence. But from Jimmy to Bushie the neo-cons had a mindset that maintaining inter-dependency with Saudi types was good for world peace.
The neo-cons did not want us to become energy independent because then we would lack inter-dependency with the Saudis.
Not quite. Henry Kissinger was famous for his "shuttle diplomacy" in 1974-75, a futile effort to negotiate a mideast peace.
Pump it out.
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