Charles Krauthammer on Obama’s foreign policy: Amateurish! Does that make Bush a Pro?

The Washington Post’s go-to naysayer Charles Krauthammer took a giant rhetorical dump on President Obama’s foreign policy thus far. Let’s see what he hates:

What’s come from Obama holding his tongue while Iranian demonstrators were being shot and from his recognizing the legitimacy of a thug regime illegitimately returned to power in a fraudulent election?

Nothing. But what would have come from saying anything? Hows the Balance of Power that Favors Freedom working out for all of us so far? Most importantly: would American condemnation do anything but allow the Ahmadinejad regime to actually demonstrate the link between the reform movement to subversive foreign elements, and consequently use it as justification for a harsher crackdown? Plus, have you ever considered the possibility that there was no fraud?

What’s come from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton taking human rights off the table on a visit to China and from Obama’s shameful refusal to see the Dalai Lama

The same dynamic at work here. Foreign criticism of human rights in China allows the CCP to create an ‘us vs them’ mentality that plays right into what human rights supporters are trying to avoid. Perhaps the best way to promote human rights is to blaze the trail as a shining example, not play international messiah make-believe.

What’s come from the new-respect-for-Muslims Cairo speech and the unprecedented pressure on Israel for a total settlement freeze?

Less of an ideological basis for terrorism recruitment. Pressuring Israel on illegal settlements is merely holding up international law as something that should actually be followed. Not doing so plays into the exceptionalism that jeopardizes a state’s credibility in terms of the aforementioned human rights pressure.

And what’s come from Obama’s single most dramatic foreign policy stroke — the sudden abrogation of missile defense arrangements with Poland and the Czech Republic that Russia had virulently opposed?

Two things. First, a more efficient appropriation of defense spending towards technologies with a wider basis of application, for example: theater missile defense. Second, a Russia that is if not cooperative, then tolerant to American interests, which one might deem important given Russia’s immense energy wealth. Russia is not pleased with America, and not because of any ideology. The reforms that America rammed down Russia’s throat in the perestroika days are still bitterly felt by the Russians. To pay heed to Russian security concerns is to attempt to mend that wound. To do so in such a symbolic and not substantive manner- that is, missile defense still exists and can be deployed if needed-is even more of a boon.

Ultimately, President Obama’s foreign policy has been the complete opposite of whatever move would be expected of President Bush, and he didn’t seem like to much of a pro to me.