How They React

I'm not a fan of President Obama. I think that is clear. And I say that even as I repeatedly concede that he has been much better on foreign affairs than I feared. So far he has stayed in Iraq and he has even surged in Afghanistan. I'm thankful for that.

But my unease remains because I fear the president's heart just isn't in these--or any--fights and that he'd abandon them in a second if he felt it would help him. The president, I figured, believed he couldn't afford to be blamed for defeat in either Iraq or Afghanistan, and so would go through the motions of doing the right thing so the buck wouldn't stop at his Oval Office.

I just don't trust President Obama's instincts the way I trusted that George W. Bush was trying to defend America abroad even when I wondered what the heck he was doing, on occasion. (Domestic policy was another matter, of course.)

The Zelaya Affair in Honduras was two years ago (tip to Instapundit). Remember? I do. It was clear to me from the beginning that Zelaya was the bad guy in this drama, yet the new Obama Administration sided with him in the affair.

The Obama administration, when it had no time to calculate costs and benefits to President Obama and had to rely on instinct to react to an unfolding crisis, sided with the aspiring tyrant Zelaya and his Axis of El Vil pals in Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. Even as facts came out that were damning for Zelaya, the administration stubbornly stuck with efforts to get Zelaya back in power.

Fortunately, Honduras stuck with their defense of democracy and Zelaya lost. And we eventually backed down in our efforts to destroy Honduran democracy.

That was a key moment in cementing my fears of how the Obama administration viewed foreign policy. While I recognize that not everything they do is wrong, I just don't trust their judgment.