Obama Counting the Angels on a Pinhead

Last night we heard President Obama explain his rationale for helping the Libyan rebels and his outline of what seems to be his policy of differentiating between situations engaging American vital interests, where unilateral intervention would be acceptable, and other situations where only coalition intervention would be acceptable because America’s vital interests are not engaged.

That sounds good, but it does not hold together when we examine the details.

And, just to confuse matters, the President offered a third option - that there are times when the rest of the world may look the other way, using the example of an impending massacre by Qadhaffi of the freedom fighters in Benghazi, and the humanitarian disaster that would have resulted from refugees flooding into Tunisia and Egypt. "To brush aside America's responsibility as a leader and -- more profoundly -- our responsibilities to our fellow human beings under such circumstances would have been a betrayal of who we are. Some nations may be able to turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries. The United States of America is different. And as president, I refused to wait for the images of slaughter and mass graves before taking action."

But, Mr. Obama chose to wait, and almost lost the Benghazi high ground.  Either :

1. Obama saw no need to respond to “fellow human beings” in Benghazi unilaterally because there was no “atrocity” in the making calling for unilateral action (as Mr. Reagan might have asked, if not in Benghazi, where?), or

2. somehow, Obama was able to juggle the moral time bomb even as the humanitarian crisis cried out for action because he needed a coalition before acting since America’s vital interests were not at stake.

It seems very much the parsing of a lawyer. Following Obama's logic :

1. Either America should have acted unilaterally because her moral values required that she save human beings being threatened with atrocities and murder by a madman, or

2. America should not have acted unilaterally because there was no perceived threat of atrocity touching her vital interests and so America needed a coalition to manage her international responsibilities.

We are no closer to an “Obama Middle East intervention policy.”

In fact, with each new humanitarian crisis in the Middle East, Obama will have to begin again :

1. Is it a humanitarian crisis and, if so, is it a humanitarian crisis that touches America’s vital interests? If so, unilateral action is required.

2. If it is not a humanitarian crisis, or at least not a humanitarian crisis touching America’s vital interests, then Obama will need to convince the America military, Congress and other nations to join a "non-vital" coalition so that America may act.