politics
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
view the rest of the comments
I could sit here and type a paragraph about how much worse the trump and bush admins were about middle eastern military conflicts, mentioning the USA hasn't officially declared war since WWII, but that would detract from my previous argument that he was decent even without comparisons. The major policy change of his admin was respecting older mutually drawn borders that led to a lot of peace talks and diplomacy with his administration which frankly didn't exist before. Obama was single-handedly responsible for multiple nuclear disarmament deals and treaties, notably Iran. When he tracked down and killed Osama Bin Laden with a strike team to minimize excess casualties, he received praise from Muslim religious leaders.
Gaddafi took power in 1969 via violent coup and US Ambassadors were recalled in 1972. He started revolutions and funded rebels in like 8 countries, including the perpetually unstable country of Chad. Sanctions briefly relaxed after 9/11 in return for nuclear disarmament. Blaming Obama for the Libyan Protests and Rebellion, as a result of the Arab Spring, is like blaming the single extra straw for breaking the camel's back.
Did Obama live up to the expectations set by his 2009 speech in Cairo, Egypt? No. Did he sometimes side with monarchs and dictators? Yes. Did he do a good job? I think so, I can't imagine doing anything differently.
EDIT: Replaced some pronouns with names for clarity.
Bush was indeed far worse than Obama. Yet Obama continued everything Bush started. Obama did not save the middle east, he ruined it even more by starting three extra wars. It's two sides of the same coin on foreign policy.
The only time Trump went Obama tier full idiot on foreign policy was when he drone striked the Iranian general Suleimani, he claims israel had a role in that. Luckily this didn't lead to major escalations in the region.
Aside from that Trump just continued drone striking Syria, a war that Obama started.
Many middle eastern leaders aren't the friendliest dudes. Gadaffi certainly wasn't. But the questions that every American forgets to ask is "if we kill this guy, will the next guy be better or worse"? If you look at the state that Iraq, Libya etc are in now, it was certainly many times better before America destroyed it.
Of course that is an irrelevant moral question. The only real reason America kills leaders in the middle east is when they stop abiding the rules of the American Oil Cartel.
From wikipedia: