Thoughts on Obama/McCain on Georgia/Russia

In response to the fifth comment on the Jon Voight post from a couple weeks ago, this one regarding Barack Obama's approach to the Russia/Georgia conflict. To said commenter (who was alas anonymous), thank you for breaking my writer's block. For those who come here purely for the geeky movie news, please re title this post - 'Steve Rogers vs Tony Stark against Dr. Doom' (or, perhaps 'Hawk Vs. Dove against Black Adam').

I prefer Barack Obama's diplomatic approach to John McCain's saber rattling when he knows full well that we have no saber to rattle. Besides, John McCain's absolute support for Georgia is a conflict on interest, since his chief campaign adviser, Randy Scheunemann, was until recently a paid lobbyist for Georgia. Fortunately, this is slowly coming out in the mainstream media. Neither are perfect solutions and this is a terrible situation that has been bubbling for years under the 'watchful' eye of Bush and alleged Russian expert Condoleezza Rice.

For the record, Vladimir Putin is, pardon the simplification, a power-mad wannabe dictator, and I've said so for nearly a decade. I've constantly joked that he had an internship under Blofeld in his college years and took Dr. Evil under his wing in grad school. His hard-line counter terrorism tactics ('if terrorists don't kill their hostages, we will!') showed that he had absolutely no regard for human life, to the point where it made Bush look like a tree-hugging pacifist hippie. He is popular because, after a good fifteen years or so of post USSR economic misery, he made Russia look and feel large and strong again (Reagan's popularity in the 1980s similar). Never mind that he has more or less ended democracy in Russia and put a serious dent in the capitalistic systems and the free press, he made Russia look tough and most of them loved him for it. No wonder he and Bush got along so well at the beginning.

But remember, this is a situation that was at least partially caused by the Bush administration. Georgia's future actions that brought this on were apparently condoned or at least acknowledged by Rice and company during a visit last month, or at least not . Neither the US or Georgia expected Putin to retaliate so brutally. And while Georgia did 'cross the line' first, and they are responsible for the initial deaths of civilians and Russian peacekeepers, it is also correct that Putin used this as an excuse to show off how powerful Russia was and how impotent the rest of the world was in response.

As for the lessons of World War II, I personally think that the lessons of World War I apply in a far more disturbing sense. If Georgia had been allowed into NATO, this would have been considered an act of war against all of the allies of NATO and we would have had World War I again. So does that mean it's good that Georgia wasn't in NATO? Maybe, or maybe if Georgia had been in NATO they wouldn't have engaged in the initial aggression and/or Russia wouldn't have come down on them so hard.

Obama's performance in this moment has not been his finest hour, on that we can all agree. He seemed ill-at-ease, unsure of himself, and not terribly confident in the strategy he was laying out (he also should have worn a suit for the occasion). Still, just because he gave a lousy speech doesn't mean the contents of that speech were incorrect. He understands that we can't really threaten Russia with force, since all of our army is in Iraq and Afghanistan. He knows that we can't really condemn Russia for invading a sovereign nation and attempting regime change, because the US has been engaged in that for years and it was likely the invasion of Iraq that convinced Putin that he could get away with his present actions. Israel's crushingly disproportionate response in Lebanon two years ago probably didn't help either.

What Barack Obama also should have said is that this was a perfect example of blow back from the foreign policy of the Bush administration, emboldening both sides of an armed conflict and then being more or less helpless to resolve that conflict. In the same way that the invasion of Iraq, a country with no nukes, has restarted an arms race in the Middle East, our immoral and illegal acts of aggression (spying, invasions, torture, rendition, etc) has shown to the world that this kind of behavior will more or less be tolerated on the world stage. And, John McCain's all-but declaration of war against Russia, despite our current tactical disadvantage, is a sign that John McCain will really give us more of the same.

Of course, that's what Obama should have said. He's not the perfect candidate and he won't always say exactly the right thing. Heck, he wasn't even my top pick in the primary (my favorite candidate was Chris Dodd), but I still mostly agree with him on the issues and vigorously disagree with McCain's outlook on the world, which if anything seems more draconian, militaristic, and authoritarian than Bush. Despite what Clinton said back in 2002 in regards to US voters, I'd rather have a president who is weaker but right, rather than one who is stronger but wrong.

Here's an article with samplings of reactions to the candidates' performances on this new development. So far, it's still advantage McCain. I guess Clinton may be right.

Scott Mendelson