Yes, there is an Obama doctrine

Ed Morrissey has put together a very useful post summarizing various liberal media attempts to understand the Obama doctrine.  Morrissey concludes at the end that, try as hard as one likes, “There really is no doctrine.”

Morrissey is correct that there is no doctrine if one is looking for a verbally articulated doctrine.  Obama says everything, and Obama says nothing, and Obama says it all as boringly as possible.

The mere fact that the greatest communicator since Abraham Lincoln (that’s sarcasm, by the way) is incapable of articulating a doctrine, though, doesn’t mean he doesn’t have one.  Indeed, if one buys for one minute into the whole greatest communicator shtick, it’s pretty clear that, as I said in my earlier post, that Obama intentionally obfuscates in his speeches because he doesn’t want people to know what the doctrine is.

Fortunately, because actions speak louder than words, we can arrive at the Obama Middle Eastern doctrine without any actual verbal help from Obama.  Here goes:

America can no longer selfishly engage in wars that directly affect (i.e., improve) her national interests.  To prevent her from doing so, she must always sublimate her sovereignty to the U.N.  A small number of U.N. players, most notably Europeans who are dependent on Libyan oil, have decided that Qaddafi must go.  Even though the number is smaller than the number that joined with Bush on Iraq, they’re the “in” crowd, so Obama must follow where they lead.  Hewing to the popular kid theory, these “cool” U.N. players matter more than the American Congress, which is made up of rubes and hicks, who lack that European savoir faire, even the useful idiots who hew to Obama’s political ideology.

A subset of this Obama doctrine is that, while America must never mine or drill her own energy resources, it is incumbent upon America to dig into her pockets to enable other countries to get to their energy resources, which America will then buy back at a premium.  This is American charity at its best.  If you want to feed a man for a day, buy him a fish.  If you want to feed him for a lifetime, teach him to fish, buy all his fishing equipment, stock the lake with trout, break all your fishing equipment, make it illegal to fish in your own lakes, and then buy that man’s fish back from him at the highest possible price.

And whatever else you do, make sure you kick Israel around . . . a lot.  That will make the cool kids (e.g., the Euro-trash and the Mullahs) happy.  It never pays to lose sight of your true constituency.

A behind the scenes deal?

Call me cynical, but….

I’ve opined frequently that, when push comes to shove, Obama will always hew to the strong man.  (Witness his dream of being President of China.)  With that in mind, consider this paragraph in John Podhoretz’s savage dissection of Obama’s press conference:

And what about doing something to help resolve the Libyan crisis in a way that might calm the oil markets? Oh, we are, we are! For example, we got our embassy personnel out of there. And we are making it clear to Khadafy that the “world is watching,” because, as we know, the Libyan maniac is very concerned about his global Gallup numbers.

Khadafy must be quaking in his boots to hear that the president “has organized a series of conversations about a wide range of options that we can take.” A series of conversations — now there’s something to strike fear in the heart of a merciless, murderous, monstrous dictator out to crush a rebellion.

But not to worry, America, we are “slowly tightening the noose” around Khadafy. This must be coming as news to Khadafy — since militarily he’s in better shape than he was five days ago. And not just militarily: Far from sounding more resolute yesterday, the president seemed to be signaling that he is prepared for Khadafy to remain in power.

Do you think that there’s a chance that this is more than just weak rhetoric but, instead, actually represents a deliberate plan to ensure that Khadafy remains in power? Recall that the Brits had a nice behind-the-scenes agreement with Khadafy to send the perfectly healthy Lockerbie bomber back home.

Does Obama’s bizarre, weak behavior regarding Libya represent his natural passivity, a passive-aggressive attempt to keep a strong man in power, or something arrived at working with Khadafy? The result is the same regardless, but I do wonder about the mechanics.