Smartest President Ever?

The things I feared most when Barack Obama was elected to a second term are unfolding.

Last Friday night, Obama said: “There will be costs” if Russia invades the Crimea. Hours later, Russian soldiers moved in. Remember that 3 AM phone call Hillary Clinton warned us about in 2008? Remember Saturday Night Live’s satire about it? “This is hard!” said the actor playing Obama about being president. Indeed it is. The man who is accustomed to voting “present” when hard decisions are necessary is on the spot now.

President Vladimir Putin of Russia, one of the world’s many thugs, believes our president is spineless - and is taking advantage. A lot can happen in the three years remaining in Obama’s second term, and the invasion of the Crimea is one of many to come. It’s another vision of the world as it is becoming during the Great American Decline. It’s another test for “the most intelligent man ever to become president,” according to presidential historian and sycophant Michael Beschloss. Obama should ace it, right? Maybe not. Could Beschloss possibly have been mistaken? We’ve never seen any of Obama’s grades because won’t release his records.

Expect ever-more-difficult tests right up until January, 2017. Will Putin cut off natural gas to Ukraine? Will he invade the mainland? Does he have his eye on the Baltic States? Does anybody really expect it’s all going to stop here?

So far, President Obama has issued statements. His chief diplomat, John Kerry, talks about crossing lines. The world remembers what Obama said about a red line in Syria last year: “A red line for us is we start seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized,” he said. Syria did both, and what did Obama do? He said, “I didn’t set a red line. The world set a red line.”

For years, Obama has gotten away with contradicting himself like this on the American political stage. The mainstream media had never gone after him the way they went after the cowboy, and maybe he thinks he can get away with it on the world stage too. That’s how he’s always handled whatever challenges have come his way. “Get out the teleprompters!” he’d say. “I’m going to make a speech!” The mainstream media lauded him for his brilliance every time. How is that working with Putin? Not good. Rather than expel Russia from the G-8, Obama threatens to expel Russia from the G-8. Does he really think that’s going to scare Putin?

Try to think of it this way: A bully is walking down the beach and sees a cowboy and a community organizer. Which one is he going to kick sand at? I can just picture it. Can you? Obama stands up rubbing his eyes and draws a line in the sand with his toe. Putin crosses it. Obama backs up and says, “Oh yeah? Well how would you like me to issue a statement?” When that doesn't work, he says: “All right, that’s enough! I’m doing to tell Chris Matthews to call you a racist!”

The rest of the world is watching too. China said Monday it agrees with what Russia did in the Crimea. Remember: China has always wanted Taiwan back, and the United States has pledged to protect it. China also wants some islands in the Sea of Japan, and it could prompt Kim Jong Un to invade South Korea again. What would Obama do about any of that? I read a report in Stars and Stripes that our troops stationed in Okinawa are gearing up by having a stage show on base in which our gay soldiers perform in drag. That ought to scare ’em. The best defense is a good offense, and what better way to offend communist troops than a drag queen performance? The community organizer really knew what he was doing when he repealed “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

Sunday’s Washington Post quoted Andrew C. Kutchins of the Center for Strategic and International Studies: “If you are effectively taking the stick option off the table, then what are you left with? I don’t think that Obama and his people really understand how others in the world are viewing his policies.”

Thinking now of Kerry’s recent statement about global warming being the “most dangerous weapon of mass destruction.  . . . The science is unequivocal, and those who refuse to believe it are simply burying their heads in the sand.” Now that he has to deal with thugs like Putin, perhaps he’ll change his mind about that. Like Obama, Kerry thinks he’s wicked smart, even though his grades at Yale weren’t quite as good as those of the cowboy president Democrats believed was so dumb.

At a time when America needs real leaders, we’re left with Obama and Kerry. Putin is eating their lunch.