Krauthammer’s Take From Monday night’s Fox News All-Stars.
On President Obama’s speech on Iraq:
The withdrawal of the troops, the drawdown, was something negotiated by the Bush administration, incidentally, in response to Iraqi demands, not as a concession to the American left. He made his decisions on what he thought were the American national interests.
Also, the surge was something that Obama had opposed, and the success of the surge is the only reason why we’re now in a position that we can draw down.
However, what’s really disturbing is that in Obama’s speech he spoke about ending the war four times. He didn’t use the word “success” or anything of the sort, and he did not speak about a vision for a future of America and Iraq together.
The Iraqis only hear the words “end the war” from the president. A president who has not given a single speech on Iraq. A president who’s essentially washed his hands of the war. All he’s ever spoken about is ending it and getting out.
The only influence he‘s exerted is by sending Biden over into the region. That is not exactly exerting his authority. The warring parties — the five who are disputing who’s going to rule Iraq now — are not taking any orders or influence from Washington.
The problem is this: The Saudis are exerting influence on the parties, the Iranians are exerting influence, and the Turks are, the Americans have not. Because the Iraqis understand all this administration wants is out rather than shaping a future. …
Obama had one task. [It was] not succeeding in the surge — that already happened. [It was] not announcing a timetable — that was already established. He had one task — getting elections done and having a stable government established. On that he has not succeeded — it’s not all his fault, the majority of the fault lies with the Iraqis themselves – but … as a result, the entire enterprise, with all the blood and the suffering involved, is now in jeopardy.
On Defense Secretary Gates’s remarks on the softness of the July 2011 deadline for Afghanistan:
Unless you have the Afghans with you as well, you’re going to not win. The administration has spent six months walking around and back the president’s statement about a withdrawal in July of 2011. A peasant in Kandahar is not watching “This Week” on ABC. What he knows is when the president announced last year the surge in Afghanistan, the next sentence was about a withdrawal, and that’s a message that the president himself has to undo. Nobody else can.
On Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli’s opinion on immigration status:
Stopped or arrested — here’s what I think the attorney general was changing [of] the existing status quo. As I understand it, up until this ruling, if you took someone into custody you could ask them at that point [about] their [immigration] status.
What Cuccinelli is doing, I think, is to say you can ask before arrest — when you merely stop someone, let’s say, for a traffic violation.
I’m — I think that’s OK as a policy but I have a problem with the process. I think if you change immigration procedure it ought to be done by the legislature. It is not something that ought to be done administratively.
Last week here I criticized the Obama administration for a Homeland Security memo which would loosen immigration laws by the fiat of the administrators, by the bureaucrats, which would allow illegal immigrants who are here to stay who otherwise under existing law would be expelled. I thought that was wrong.
And I think it is wrong also if it’s done on the other side even in pursuit of a policy which I would otherwise support.
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/242382/krauthammers-take-nro-staff
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