Able leaders anticipate events, prepare for them, and act in time to shape them. My career in business and politics has exposed me to scores of people in leadership positions, only a few of whom actually have these qualities. Some simply cannot envision the future and are thus unpleasantly surprised when it arrives. Some simply hope for the best. Others succumb to analysis paralysis, weighing trends and forecasts and choices beyond the time of opportunity.

President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton traveled the world in pursuit of their promise to reset relations and to build friendships across the globe. Their failure has been painfully evident: It is hard to name even a single country that has more respect and admiration for America today than when President Obama took office, and now Russia is in Ukraine. Part of their failure, I submit, is due to their failure to act when action was possible, and needed.
– Mitt Romney (Loser) attacking Barack Obama (Winner) in Wall Street Journal, March 17, 2014

I’m no great fan of Barack Obama.

But even on a bad day I’ll take Obama over the sick whacko Mitt Romney whose wealth was built on making the lives of others miserable through leverage buyouts of companies and then gutting the acquired businesses by loading them up with debt, breaking them into pieces and firing workers.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed yesterday, Romney blasts Obama’s foreign policy for “terrible timing” on Ukraine/Crimea, on Afghanistan, on Iraq, on Syria, and on Egypt.

In short, Romney charges Obama with presiding over a series of foreign policy disasters.

Unsaid but implicit in Romney’s article is the premise that if only America had been smart enough to elect him, Russia wouldn’t be in Crimea and that things would be different in Egypt, Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and North Korea.

You know, for a loser (in political terms) Romney makes too much noise.

Loss of Credibility

Barack Obama has certainly contributed to America’s loss of standing in the global arena.

But America’s current loss of credibility is not something that happened overnight or during Obama’s tenure but has been decades in the making.

Economic collapse, illegal wars (Iraq), illegal domestic and foreign surveillance, unbridled Wall St excesses, worsening income inequalities, crumbling domestic infrastructure, targeted assassinations and mass incarceration of Blacks have eroded America’s credibility the world over and weakened its ability to respond to crises, both domestic and foreign.

A nation that has a hard time keeping its own house in order will have difficulty persuading others to follow its diktats.

Notwithstanding Romney’s delusions, Obama is only partially responsible for America’s loss of “potential to influence events.”

Obama inherited much of the mess we face today but to his discredit hasn’t done much to fix them either.

In any case, those who know history understand that Crimea belongs to Russia.