NOT SO LUCKY OBAMA – AT 9:31 A.M. ET:  Maybe Obama isn't so lucky after all.  Being denounced by Louis Farrakhan (see post just below) is good fortune, but being denounced by a first-class historian is another matter entirely. 

Andrew Roberts isone of Britain's leading historians, and he is less than impressed with the current international performance of the president of the United States.  From London's Daily Mail:

Colonel Gaddafi is not a man from whom other world leaders would usually be advised to take guidance.

It was ironic, then, that last week, when pushed into a corner by the UN’s vote to take military action against his forces in Libya, he proved himself a swift decision-maker, claiming to have ordered an immediate ceasefire against his people.

The ceasefire was bogus, of course, but nonetheless it is instructive to contrast the dictator’s instantaneous response with that of President Obama’s hunched, furrow-brow in the Oval Office, allowing other nations to lead the way in forging a Western position on the crisis while he appeared to be paralysed by indecision.

That pretty much says it.

In a televised speech about the strike against Libya on Friday, Obama declared the US would not ‘stand idly by’ in the face of Gaddafi’s actions.

Bold words, but this was hardly Reagan, the Great Communicator. In contrast, Obama is becoming known as The Great Vacillator.

I suspect that this historian will not be invited to the White House.

Obama's dithering may have had the unintended consequence of ensuring that the Arab world, Russia and China did not vote against the UN resolution, which they might have felt compelled to do in the face of a decisive American lead. But that is no excuse for what is becoming an habitual inability to act.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton let slip last week she is planning to retire from politics in two years, a decision rumoured to stem from her frustration over Obama’s indecisive attitude to foreign policy. One report claimed she likened the White House to ‘a bunch of amateurs’ in their handling of Gaddafi.

The most honest thing Hillary ever said.

So why is it that a man who seemed to offer real change has proved so ineffectual in office?

Certainly, a large part of the answer lies in Obama’s personality. He is a cerebral man, prone to analysing problems dispassionately and from every angle, as he was taught during his former careers in law and academia. The American presidents who have been most successful at creating lasting change – Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, Reagan – all also used instinct and emotion to guide them to quick, decisive action.

Finally...

Perhaps, like Kennedy in the Sixties, Obama can learn from his setbacks in foreign policy and emerge as a stronger leader.

For all his reluctance to take the leap, he may find that having been pushed into doing so in Libya, it will be remembered as the moment he finally learned what his role involves.

As Sinatra might have put it, leave us we should hope so.

March 20,  2011