Statues for Putin?

The biggest winners on the international stage lately have been Putin and Rouhani and the biggest losers have been Obama and Netanyahu.  As with Blair, Cameron exists only to polish Obama's shoes and Merkel is as ineffectual as ever.

Obama's egregiously stupid position on Syria leads me toward a measure of sympathy toward George Bush and the idiocy of his invasion of Iraq as I wonder if the President is more a pawn of the military than it appears.  Obama's aggression was neither part of his position nor his philosophy and yet he was ready to bomb Syria based on evidence that was rather less than credible in precisely the same way as Bush went into Iraq.

Obama had already made a fool out of himself over Syria and Putin saved him from doing any worse.  This exchange was extraordinary as no-one had any particular respect for Putin going into it but now people are suggesting he should be nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.  I agree with that as he was the clear voice of reason in an increasingly hysterical crisis.  Obama had even arrayed a naval force near Syria in readiness for yet another Iraqi shock and awe campaign (i.e. blitzkrieg).

The other golden boy to make a fool out of himself in the world stage lately has been Netanyahu with his presentation that Rouhani is a wolf in sheep's clothing.  That's an interesting position to take when you're holding more nuclear weapons than the rest of the Middle East combined.  Netanyahu's never-ending intransigence is as much of a cause of the ongoing combat as anything else as his response to demands for Palestinian statehood is to go into the West Bank and build yet more settlements.  This can't possibly have any effect other than provocation.  When the Palestinians react he waltzes away while pointing back and telling everyone to watch how those vicious Muslims attack him.

I'm not in any way anti-Semitic as a position that Israel should be eliminated is as stupid as any idea of the elimination of Muslims.  The state of Israel was created after World War II and so be it.  Now the question is how to make it work as Jews have just as much right to be there as Muslims.  They have lived with Muslims in the region for millennia so any talk of eliminating anyone is just mindless extremism.  The only option is how to make it work and yet Netanyahu tries to provoke more confrontation rather than doing anything toward resolving the problems.

It seems now the question is whether Putin can save Netanyahu from making any more of a fool of himself.  If he is successful in that regard, he won't only take home a Nobel Peace Prize, they will be building statues of him around the world.

Nothing will save England as one in four jobs being created currently in that country is in real estate and they're blowing up a land bubble in exactly the same way as did so much damage to the U.S.  When that one bursts it will likely be the final end of the British Empire as even a second-rate world power.

Just as with Cameron in England, Merkel's ineffectual leadership is doing nothing more than a tap dance while the European Union heads toward failure.  It's interesting to me as the EU is much like the Jeffersonian model for the United States as an organisation of independent republics.  Given the financial chaos in both of those organisations today, it remains to be seen whether either will survive but only time will answer that one.