socialmedian: America to the World: Grow Up

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America to the World: Grow Up

Source: RealClearWorld - Blog

Nov 04, 2009

Summary

Scot Wilson's piece on Obama's foreign policy in the Washington Post echoes some familiar themes and quotes an administration official on the over-arching strategy of trying to win international cooperation by emphasizing shared interests:

"There is no naivete here," said Ben Rhodes, the deputy national security adviser for strategic communications who helped Obama write many of his foreign policy speeches. "The president knows that nations do not always live up to their responsibilities -- otherwise this would be easy. But if you walk away from the basic bargain that all nations have rights and responsibilities, then you have less ability to marshal the cooperation to resolve these issues, too."

That doesn't sound naive, but it sure sounds arrogant. Another way to say what Rhodes said is that the president knows that nations do not always have the same interests as the United States, but it's up to us to try to find some common ground. Instead, Rhodes suggests that other nations - like adolescents - don't always understand what's expected of them by the adult ...Read the full article

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