U.S.-NATO Missiles/Bombs on Syria within 15 to 25 days . . .

[sonofdaxjones]

Obama: The president who moved us off the top spot in international arms sales.

Seems like a pretty solid accomplishment, one that should be welcomed by anti-warmongers and Obama-bot zombies alike. I'd say we all come out winners as Americans on this one.

We're not even close to being off the top, but Vlad is making the effort.

[felix rex]

You mean Obama is NOT making the effort to preserve our dominance of warmongering. Important, peace-prizing distinction. He will not be baited into a new cold war arms race, and I applaud him for that.

[sonofdaxjones]

You mean Obama is NOT making the effort to preserve our dominance of warmongering. Important, peace-prizing distinction. He will not be baited into a new cold war arms race, and I applaud him for that.

Obama may not be, but the U.S. defense industry is doing all they can, with Gov't blessing.   Good news, the Koreans appear to be about ready to purchase 60 Boeing Silent Eagles, and the arms are pouring into Saudi Arabia.

Looks like we're gonna maintain that 4 or 5% world market share lead in 2013!!

[sonofdaxjones]

Plus, let's not forget Felix, 2012 was a blockbuster year in U.S. exports, twe-nty billion above the t-en year average, come on, even Gordon Gekko can't expect that kind of growth to be sustained.

[felix rex]

Trending down, tho

[Institutional Control]

10 more days and we'll have the answer to the poll question.  Looks like those who voted "nope" have the advantage.

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

You mean Obama is NOT making the effort to preserve our dominance of warmongering. Important, peace-prizing distinction. He will not be baited into a new cold war arms race, and I applaud him for that.

Baited? Have you forgotten that his stupid ultimatum is what got us into this in the first place?

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

If President Obama was a Republican, the right wing herd would be talking about how he just bluffed Putin into taking action on Syria, without spending a single dollar or dropping a single bomb.

God bless the herd.

No, we wouldn't you rough ridin' dunce. And again, Putin is the one who is bluffing. This won't accomplish a damned thing.

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

But, if he had bombed Assad, you would also be critical, right?

You mean that "teeny tiny incredibly limited so small you won't even feel it" military action promised by our SoS on national TV? The one we only would have done so Obama could save face for Syria crossing an ultimatum he never intended to enforce? Yeah, I would have been critical of that. Obama put himself (and us) in this box, so I'm critical of either outcome.

[bubbles4ksu]

Obama got Russia to disarm it's own proxy state. What a rough ridin' hero.

[sonofdaxjones]

Obama got Russia to disarm it's own proxy state. What a rough ridin' hero.

How would you define disarm?

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

. What a masterstroke of diplomacy. 

[bubbles4ksu]

Obama got Russia to disarm it's own proxy state. What a rough ridin' hero.

How would you define disarm?

take from them the weapons that people don't want them to possess.

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

Obama got Russia to disarm it's own proxy state. What a rough ridin' hero.

How would you define disarm?

take from them the weapons that people don't want them to possess.

Cool, and you think that's really going to happen? Srsly? Hans Blix better pack his suitcase.

[bubbles4ksu]

This is just like when JFK stared the Ruskys down over Cuba. Now we have Dax's 15 to 25 days in Aug.-Sept.

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

Maureen Dowd gets it.

WASHINGTON — Vladimir Putin, who keeps Edward Snowden on a leash and lets members of a riotous girl band rot in jail, has thrown President Obama a lifeline.
 
The Russian president had coldly brushed back Obama on Snowden and Syria, and only last week called John Kerry a liar.

Now, when it is clear Obama can’t convince Congress, the American public, his own wife, the world, Liz Cheney or even Donald “Shock and Awe” Rumsfeld to bomb Syria — just a teensy-weensy bit — Pooty-Poot (as W. called him) rides, shirtless, to the rescue, offering him a face-saving way out? If it were a movie, we’d know it was a trick. We can’t trust the soulless Putin — his Botox has given the former K.G.B. officer even more of a poker face — or the heartless Bashar al-Assad. By Tuesday, Putin the Peacemaker was already setting conditions.

Just as Obama and Kerry — with assists from Hillary and some senators — were huffing and puffing that it was their military threat that led to the breakthrough, Putin moved to neuter them, saying they’d have to drop their military threat before any deal could proceed. The administration’s saber-rattling felt more like knees rattling. Oh, for the good old days when Obama was leading from behind. Now these guys are leading by slip-of-the-tongue.

Amateur hour started when Obama dithered on Syria and failed to explain the stakes there. It escalated last August with a slip by the methodical wordsmith about “a red line for us” — which the president and Kerry later tried to blur as the world’s red line, except the world was averting its eyes.

Obama’s flip-flopping, ambivalent leadership led him to the exact place he never wanted to be: unilateral instead of unified. Once again, as with gun control and other issues, he had not done the groundwork necessary to line up support. The bumbling approach climaxed with two off-the-cuff remarks by Kerry, hitting a rough patch in the role of a lifetime, during a London press conference Monday; he offered to forgo an attack if Assad turned over “every single bit of his chemical weapons to the international community” and promised, if they did strike, that it would be an “unbelievably small” effort.

A State Department spokeswoman walked back Kerry’s first slip, but once the White House realized it was the only emergency exit sign around, Kerry walked back the walking back, claiming at a Congressional hearing Tuesday that he did not “misspeak.”

The president countered Kerry’s second slip with NBC’s Savannah Guthrie Monday night, declaring that “The U.S. does not do pinpricks,” which Kerry parroted at the hearing Tuesday, declaring that “We don’t do pinpricks.” For good measure, Obama, in his address to the nation Tuesday night, made sure the world knew: “The United States military doesn’t do pinpricks.”

But don't take Maureen's word for it - watch the timeline video linked above.

[john "teach me how to" dougie]

Obama got Russia to disarm it's own proxy state. What a rough ridin' hero.

How would you define disarm?

take from them the weapons that people don't want them to possess.

Its not really going to happen. Putin being Putin.

[felix rex]

You mean Obama is NOT making the effort to preserve our dominance of warmongering. Important, peace-prizing distinction. He will not be baited into a new cold war arms race, and I applaud him for that.

Baited? Have you forgotten that his stupid ultimatum is what got us into this in the first place?

I'm not entirely sure you're following what's going on around here right now.

[sonofdaxjones]

Vlad's no dummy, taking away Assad's Iraqi produced chemical and nerve weapons only means that he can sell the regime more conventional weapons.

They're only 4 or 5% points (which still equates to billions) away from the #1 spot, and with the U.S. blowing it out in 2012 and a few months left in the year.   

[michigancat]

Dax is at his best in this thread

[Dugout DickStone]

Dax is at his best in this thread

And KSU Wildcats.

I have never voted for Obama so I think he is kind of screwy BUT if you think absolutely everything he has ever done, ever is a horrible idea and you just repeat "Obamabot" and "Libtard" over and over this is the thread where you can gorge yourself like a vulture at a carcass

[ben ji]

So is Syria turning their chemical weapons over for good? Does whoever wins the civil war get the weapons back?

I'm confused.

Bump

[Institutional Control]

So is Syria turning their chemical weapons over for good? Does whoever wins the civil war get the weapons back?

I'm confused.

Bump

Don't be silly, benji.  They go to al qaeda. On the 12 year anniversary no less!!!

[sonofdaxjones]

I don't think everything that Obama has done has been bad, not by a long shot.

But what's the endgame in Syria, what was the endgame in Libya . . . the same for Iraq (Not Obama)?

Destroyed/destabilized countries don't pose a threat and easier to control (as long you control the right people)??   That's a serious game of, pardon the pun, Russian Roulette.   Because only a dummy can't see what can be fermented in the rubble.  This also really has nothing to do with Democracy.   For me, Brzezinski's "Grand Chessboard" is the primer for all of this, control of Central Asia, thwarting the influence of Russia and China and their proxies of which Iraq, Syria and Iran are/were the biggest.  JMO

[CNS]

So is Syria turning their chemical weapons over for good? Does whoever wins the civil war get the weapons back?

I'm confused.

Bump

benji, CNN story yesterday said that they would be turned over "...and eventually destroyed".  Didn't really say who would destroy them or timing, or anything.

That said, who would want this responsibility?  I mean, think of how secure of a location you would have to have to make this feasible and the level of threat you would be taking on from others by simply possessing them.  No thanks.