not wanting to horn in (too much) on JF's platform, I thought I'd throw this in as a cautionary tale for you young'uns.Jesus Freak wrote: ...I was also thinking of going on a rant about "experience". ...
In 1961 the recently elected Jack Kennedy went to a summit in Vienna with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/cwr/17378.htm
Senator Obama has cited Kennedy's willingness to engage in this meeting as support for his own statement that he would meet "without preconditions."
However, more than anything, Kennedy's trip to that summit exposed the dangers of that kind of engagement, rather that the wisdom of it.
(from here.)Scott Johnson wrote:Kennedy first addressed the subject of a possible summit with the Soviet Union in the second Kennedy-Nixon debate. Unlike Obama, Kennedy expressly rejected a summit without preconditions. Indeed, Kennedy expressed his agreement with Nixon that he "would not meet Mr. Khrushchev unless there were some agreements at the secondary level--foreign ministers or ambassadors--which would indicate that the meeting would have some hope of success, or a useful exchange of ideas." In the third debate, Kennedy suggested that the strengthening of American conventional and nuclear forces should precede any summit with the Soviet Union.
Once in office, Kennedy more or less discarded his previously expressed conditions for a summit. In a letter written in February and secretly delivered to Khrushchev in March 1961, Kennedy expressed his willingness to meet Khrushchev "before too long" for an informal exchange of views.
The aftermath of this meeting is also described in a recent International Herald Tribune article:
(emphases mine)Senior American statesmen like George Kennan advised Kennedy not to rush into a high-level meeting, arguing that Khrushchev had engaged in anti-American propaganda and that the issues at hand could as well be addressed by lower-level diplomats. Kennedy's own secretary of state, Dean Rusk, had argued much the same in a Foreign Affairs article the previous year: "Is it wise to gamble so heavily? Are not these two men who should be kept apart until others have found a sure meeting ground of accommodation between them?"
But Kennedy went ahead, and for two days he was pummeled by the Soviet leader. Despite his eloquence, Kennedy was no match as a sparring partner, and offered only token resistance as Khrushchev lectured him on the hypocrisy of American foreign policy, cautioned America against supporting "old, moribund, reactionary regimes" and asserted that the United States, which had valiantly risen against the British, now stood "against other peoples following its suit." Khrushchev used the opportunity of a face-to-face meeting to warn Kennedy that his country could not be intimidated and that it was "very unwise" for the United States to surround the Soviet Union with military bases.
Kennedy's aides convinced the press at the time that behind closed doors the president was performing well, but American diplomats in attendance, including the ambassador to the Soviet Union, later said they were shocked that Kennedy had taken so much abuse. Paul Nitze, the assistant secretary of defense, said the meeting was "just a disaster." Khrushchev's aide, after the first day, said the American president seemed "very inexperienced, even immature." Khrushchev agreed, noting that the youthful Kennedy was "too intelligent and too weak." The Soviet leader left Vienna elated - and with a very low opinion of the leader of the free world.
Kennedy's assessment of his own performance was no less severe.
Only a few minutes after parting with Khrushchev, Kennedy, a World War II veteran, told James Reston of The New York Times that the summit meeting had been the "roughest thing in my life." Kennedy went on: "He just beat the hell out of me. I've got a terrible problem if he thinks I'm inexperienced and have no guts. Until we remove those ideas we won't get anywhere with him."
The point is, diplomacy can be a good thing, but the lesson of history is that just any attempt at diplomacy is not necessarily a good thing at all, and can actually be a very bad thing if it is particularly poorly bungled. Now, I was just a wee lad of five back in 1961, but I do remember living through the aftermath of this (the aggressive Soviet bogeyman, "duck and cover" drills in grade school, etc. Oh, and Vietnam.) So it is not a small thing that Obama's experience has been called into question in this matter.
Oh, an Joe BIden's protestations to the contrary, it is a simple fact that Senator Obama DID say that he would meet "without preconditions".
I get the impression from looking at Obama's stare out into space body language while Hillary Clinton is responding to the same question (that she would NOT meet without preconditions) that he gets a sense that he may have just stepped in something.
One of the things that has easily grated on me the most in this election is Matt Daemon's interview on Sarah Palin. Hollywood twerp with illusions of self-importance.
