VLADIMIR TOTALLY DEVOURS BARACK'S LUNCH!

VLADIMIR HANGS TOUGH WHILE BARACK HANGS
 IN THE DIPLOMATIC WIND

It was just yesterday that Secretary of State John Kerry, when asked how Syria could avoid an American military strike, replied in a tongue-in -cheek answer that Bashar al-Assad "...could turn over every bit of his chemical weapons to the international community in the next week, turn it over, all of it, without delay, for a full and total accounting."  Obviously, Kerry was assuming that such compliance would never occur. However, Russia's foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, followed up immediately by indicating Russia's willingness to undertake such a mission and to transport (supposedly for disposal) the concerned chemical weapons to Russia.

On Monday, the Syrian foreign minister was in Moscow and followed up with assurances that his country was quite willing to go along with the Russian proposal.  Once again, Vladimir Putin has one-upped the U.S. president, gaining an edge in the game of international credibility, a game in which increasingly the American president appears amateurish.

So now, once again, American diplomacy has painted itself into a corner.  Plainly, Russia would not be one's first choice to dispose of its ally Syria's arsenal of chemical weapons, but now Barack Obama must at least acknowledge this masterful move in a diplomatic chess game with all sorts of strategic implications.

With Obama leading the charge of the boys and girls of what is clearly a diplomatic and foreign affairs "B" team, we have gone from demands for Assad to depart from Syria, to the "phony" red-line, to threats of a military strike, to inability to gain support at the G-20 summit, and now to a national address tonight that is mind-boggling in terms of just what the president can realistically say about his latest blunder.

In terms of a quick review of disasters, let's look back to Libya and Egypt.  In Libya, if you will recall, the words "leading from behind" emerged as questionable verbiage to describe international collaboration in terminating the Ghadafi. regime.  It has been almost 2 years since the Libyan dictator's death in October of 2011, and Libya is now in far worse shape than it was before Ghadafi's demise, continuing to exist as a North African magnet for Islamists of all sorts of radical shades.

As for Egypt, our highly vaunted diplomacy felt that it could dispense with Hosni Mubarak, the Egyptian dictator, because the "moderate" Muslim Brotherhood, after all, would be a unifying force for democracy.  After a year of the Brotherhood's incompetence, Egypt was on the verge of imploding.  And now the Foggy Bottom folks can't make up their minds as to whether a military coup has occurred in Egypt; and, if it has, what to do about it.  In the meantime, Egypt's Christian minority of 10 million has become the  focus of the wrath of the Muslim Brotherhood and other religious extremists.

Now, U.S. naval units are in the eastern Mediterranean, in close proximity to Russian war ships.  Also there is a Chinese amphibious war ship the size of two football fields in the general area. Putin has declared that Russia will provide a rocket shield if U.S. missiles are launched against Syria.  Has the possibility of conflict been minimized simply because John Kerry misspoke?  It is a bit frightening to dwell on it, but how can we count on President Obama and his "B" team, given their history of foul-ups, to keep us secure and to heed to a stable course internationally?  And, quite frankly, it is terribly embarrassing to be asking these questions.

Perhaps it's time for a presidential sabbatical.  A few weeks as an understudy to President Putin in Moscow. might just do President Obama a world of good.  We couldn't be in much worse shape with "Uncle Joe" minding the shop in Washington while Barack does some remedial work in Russia.  Maybe Vladimir could begin by demonstrating how his iron-fisted policies have worked with Russia's Muslim population, most of whom have learned by now that Vladimir is not a very politically correct fellow.  In that regard, Barack might benefit from a field trip to Chechnya.  You know, the more I think about this, the better and better the idea seems!  And it also might be a wonderful idea for Barack to return that Nobel  Peace Prize on the way over to  Moscow.