WarSclerotic

(The thrust of this article, headlined in the Drudge report is that there is nothing Obama can do to demonstrate his “leadership” effectively before the November elections.  This is incorrect.  While the economy my offer no options for that, Iran does.  Strong action against Iran together with Israel will be supported by all Americans excepting fringe leftists.  If Obama concludes that action is necessary, doing it by September could well save the house from going Republican and save his presidency from the “Jimmy Carter Syndrome” it is suffering from now.)

FT.com / US & Canada – Obama faces growing credibility crisis.

By Edward Luce in Washington

Published: July 13 2010 18:51 | Last updated: July 13 2010 18:51

Robert Gibbs, Barack Obama’s chief spokesman, got into hot water this week for daring to speak the truth – that the Democrats could lose control of the House of Representatives in November. But it could be even worse than that.

Contrary to pretty much every projection until now, Democratic control of the Senate is also starting to coming into question. While Mr Obama’s approval ratings have continued to fall, and now hover at dangerously close to 40 per cent according an ABC-Washington Post poll published on Tuesday, the fate of his former colleagues in the Senate looks even worse.

In the past few days polls have shown Republican challengers taking the lead over previously safe Democratic incumbents, such as Barbara Boxer in California and Russ Feingold in Wisconsin. Indeed, given the uniformly negative direction in the numbers, it is now quite possible the Republicans could win the Senate seats formerly held by both President Obama in Illinois, and Joe Biden, vice-president, in Delaware.

Add to that the continuing woes of Harry Reid, the Senate Democratic majority leader, in Nevada, where the Republican party’s recent nomination of Sharron Angle, a far-right and highly eccentric Tea Party supporter, appear to have had no positive effect on Mr Reid’s prospects, and the Grand Old party has a good shot at taking control of both houses of Congress. Worse for Mr Obama, political scientists say that at this stage in the calendar, there is almost nothing he can do about it.

“If you ask me where the silver lining is for President Obama, I have to say I cannot see one,” says Bill Galston, a former Clinton official, who has been predicting for months the Democrats could lose the House. “Just as BP’s failure to cap the well has been so damaging, Obama’s failure to cap unemployment will be his undoing. There is nothing he can do to affect the jobless rate before November.”

The direction of the data could hardly be worse. According to Democracy Corps, a group headed by Stanley Greenberg, a liberal pollster who is a close friend of Rahm Emanuel, Mr Obama’s chief of staff, a majority of US citizens see Mr Obama as “too liberal”.

Astonishingly, 55 per cent of citizens think Mr Obama is a “socialist” against only 39 per cent who do not share that diagnosis. The same poll shows 48 per cent support for Republicans against just 42 per cent for Democrats. The numbers are eerily similar to 2006, except that it was George W. Bush’s Republicans who were on the receiving end four years ago.

“The bottom line here is that Americans don’t believe in President Obama’s leadership,” says Rob Shapiro, another former Clinton official and a supporter of Mr Obama. “He has to find some way between now and November of demonstrating that he is a leader who can command confidence and, short of a 9/11 event or an Oklahoma City bombing, I can’t think of how he could do that.”

In private, informal advisors to Mr Obama are almost as negative. According to one, the US public’s loss of confidence in Mr Obama’s leadership is a factor above and beyond their dissatisfaction over the state of the real economy, which continues to slow as last year’s $787bn stimulus starts to run dry. The adviser, who asked to remain anonymous, said the public did not know what Mr Obama really believed. Examples include his lukewarm support last year for a public option in the healthcare bill and his equally lukewarm support today for a Senate bill that would extend unemployment insurance and aid state governments to keep teachers in their jobs.

In both cases, Mr Obama has offered only token, negotiable, support. “I never thought I would say this, but even I’m unsure what President Obama really believes,” says the adviser. “Instead of outsourcing decisions to Congress, he should spell out his bottom line. That is what leaders are for.”

Next week, Mr Obama is likely to sign a historic Wall Street re-regulation bill into law. Earlier this year he did the same for healthcare. But polls show the public either does not care, or even opposes these otherwise big reforms. “The longer this goes on, the more it looks like Obama wasted his first year on healthcare,” said the outside adviser. “It’s still the economy, stupid.”

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Middle East Views | The Ambassador’s Talk on Attacking Iran!.

Abdul Rahman al-Rashed

I read the thirty page final statement of the stormy conference [that took place in Aspen, Colorado] during which the UAE Ambassador to the US, Yousef al-Otaiba, roused Iranian anger after he was quoted as saying that the benefits from attacking Iran today would outweigh the short-term consequences of this and the threat represented by a nuclear Iran tomorrow.

Iran responded with a barrage of insults, despite the fact that the UAE Foreign Ministry said that the ambassador’s quote was not accurate and had been taken out of context.

So long as this storm is raging, there is nothing wrong with taking a closer look at the situation. Was it inappropriate for somebody in this ambassador’s position to say what he allegedly said? Was he wrong in his political understanding of the situation? More important, after the ambassador said what he said – whether we believe this is accurate or not – is this statement useful or harmful?

The fact is that we have gotten used to the officials and affiliates of the Iranian regime freely expressing their views and opinions, and indeed issuing insulting remarks against the Gulf States with or without provocation, and in fact these officials do not hesitate even to make threats, which is the worst and most dangerous thing that can take place through the media. Just two weeks ago, Iranian officials said that they plan to inspect vessels that are traveling to Arab Gulf States in response to a UN Security Council resolution to inspect vessels making port in Iran, if there are suspicions over its cargo. Iran did not dare threaten to inspect US or European or Russian vessels in the regions, of which there are many, however they did threaten the Gulf, even though they had nothing whatsoever do with this resolution and no Gulf State sits on the Security Council. Prior to this, Iranian officials announced that Iran would attack Gulf States in the event of any Israeli or US attack against them. In such a poisonous climate, it is natural for an Arab politician or diplomat to say that a nuclear Iran represents a threat to us. Speaking from a protocol standpoint, both parties must work together to avoid throwing rotten tomatoes at one another, or allowing everybody to do so.

Politically, what Ambassador Yousef al-Otaiba was eloquently quoted as saying is also true. He said that we are in trouble with regards to what Iran is doing in the region today, so just imagine what Tehran will do when it has nuclear capabilities! Indeed imagine Iran’s mentality and behavior after it gains nuclear capabilities and realizes that no country in the world is capable of entering a war with it. Therefore what is truly wrong is the reluctance of our politicians to express their opinions and concerns towards the most dangerous threat that is facing our region in a hundred years, not the opposite!

This answers the second question, for the ambassador’s words, even if they are beyond the bounds of [political] protocol, are politically correct. Therefore imagine for just one moment that Iran has nuclear capabilities; the Iranians will not attack Israel because the Israelis would respond by burying them with a hundred nuclear bombs, wiping them off the map, while still having an arsenal of hundreds of nuclear bombs. Iran will similarly not attack the US, because it is geographically too far away, and Washington would also respond by targeting Iran with a hundred nuclear bombs, while still having a remaining five thousand nuclear warheads in its arsenal. The Iranians may not attack the Gulf States with nuclear weapons, but it would certainly seek to dominate them, and perhaps takeover a number of Gulf States, in the knowledge that no major power in the world will dare to interfere as they are protected by their nuclear arms. Therefore, what’s the problem in a Gulf ambassador saying that attacking Iran today is cheaper than living with a nuclear Iran tomorrow?

Finally, I am not enthusiastic about being drawn into verbal conflict with Iran; however this conflict is present because the Iranians continue to throw rotten tomatoes at us. The ambassador’s words have an educational value, for the majority of people – including many of our intellectuals – only understand one viewpoint in the dispute over a nuclear Iran. Let them listen to another viewpoint this time!

* Published in the London-based ASHARQ ALAWSAT on July 13. Abdul Rahman Al-Rashed is the general manager of Al Arabiya television.

James Woolsey and Rebeccah Heinrichs: Iran and the Missile Defense Imperative – WSJ.com.

U.S. intelligence now sees Tehran developing intercontinental missiles by 2015. If we continue our current strategy, we will not be able to counter the threat.

By R. JAMES WOOLSEY AND REBECCAH HEINRICHS

In a June 27 interview on ABC’s “This Week,” CIA Director Leon Panetta warned that it could be a mere two years before Iran is able to threaten other states with nuclear warheads mounted on ballistic missiles. When discussing the new U.S. sanctions against Iran recently signed into law by President Barack Obama, Mr. Panetta said, “Will it deter them from their ambitions with regards to nuclear capability? Probably not.”

Three months ago the Defense Intelligence Agency reported that by 2015 Iran, with help from North Korea or Russia, could field an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of reaching the East Coast of the United States. This is by no means far-fetched. In early 2009, the Iranians successfully launched their first homegrown satellite into orbit. In March of that same year, Gen. Michael Maples, then-director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, told a Senate panel that Iran’s successful satellite launch “shows progress in mastering the technology needed to produce ICBMs.” Earlier this year Iran successfully orbited a second satellite with an ICBM-class ballistic missile.

Gen. Maples is right. If you can launch a satellite into orbit you are very close to being able to hit a target half way around the world. That’s why the Soviet launch of Sputnik so shocked the U.S. intelligence community in 1957. When a country is the most active state sponsor of terrorism, and its leaders routinely endorse slogans like “Death to Israel” and “Death to America,” we should take it seriously when they pursue the capabilities to make their dreams a reality.

A December 2009 missile launch proved Iran has already obtained the ability to reach Israel. Given President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s and other Iranian leaders’ millenarian fanaticism, it would be most imprudent to rely on nuclear deterrence alone to protect us. If Tehran were to achieve a nuclear missile capability, it could hold American cities hostage—unless, that is, the U.S. builds a robust and comprehensive ballistic missile defense.

Our current missile shield will have 26 ground-based interceptors based in Alaska, in addition to the four based in California, by the end of this year. These are part of an initial defense architecture designed to protect against missiles launched from North Korea. These interceptors could provide some protection from missiles launched from Iran toward our East Coast, but the margin for error would be unacceptably small.

Moreover, once Tehran can build one or two functioning ICBMs, it can build many more. As Defense Secretary Robert Gates testified before a Senate panel on June 17, “If Iran were actually to launch a missile attack on Europe, it wouldn’t be just one or two missiles, or a handful.” We need a defensive system that has full coverage, especially of the U.S. homeland, and that can add interceptors easily to cope with an Iranian ICBM buildup.

That’s why the Bush administration proposed building a missile-defense site in Europe in addition to those already in place in Alaska and California. This would provide cities on the East Coast, our troops abroad, and our allies in Europe added protection from an Iranian missile attack.

But last September the Obama administration scrapped the Bush plan and replaced it with one called the Phased Adaptive Approach, which is less capable of dealing with threats against U.S. territory. This plan entails deploying mobile systems to Europe to intercept short-range missiles. The Defense Department would gradually upgrade these systems, but the plan offers no added protection for the U.S. until 2020. That’s almost certainly too little too late.

Our vulnerabilities don’t stop there. If Iran were to launch a nuclear-armed missile from a ship near one of our coasts—say a primitive SCUD from a fishing boat—we would have very little warning and no protection. Defending the homeland against this threat would require a substantial deployment in and near the U.S. of the type of mobile systems that the administration plans to deploy in Europe.

Further, if the Iranians were to detonate even a primitive nuclear warhead over the United States, it could send out an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) destroying the electric grid and electrical systems across a wide swath of U.S. territory. Iranian military writings show the mullahs recognize the potential of this kind of attack. Depending on where it occurred and how large the warhead was, an EMP attack could cause large-scale fatalities and unimaginable economic devastation. Defending against this kind of threat requires defensive systems that can intercept an attacking ballistic missile while it is still ascending. But the Obama administration has no specific plans to develop and deploy ascent-phase interceptors in Europe.

Given the growing Iranian threat, the Obama administration should re-evaluate its missile-defense strategy. The U.S. should deploy as many interceptors as possible in Alaska and should plan for an emergency deployment of a third site either in Europe or on the East Coast. Moreover, as Iran continues to improve its missiles, and the White House negotiates agreements to host radars and other missile-defense assets in Europe, the administration should make contingency plans for rapid deployment of mobile defenses, including ascent-phase interceptors, to protect us here at home.

Above all the Obama administration should clarify to the U.S. Senate and the Russian government that neither the new U.S.-Russian Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty nor commitments made during the negotiation process will in any way limit our ability to protect ourselves against an Iranian nuclear attack.

Mr. Woolsey is a former director of Central Intelligence and a board member at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, where Ms. Heinrichs, a former manager of the House Bipartisan Missile Defense Caucus, is an adjunct fellow.