Obama’s Evolving Position on Talking to Iran

Obama has a different position to please any audience. The man just can’t come up with a consistent policy.
A puppet who needs his strings pulled. Who can believe a word that comes out of his mouth?

If McCain can have an EVOLVING position on the war in Iraq going from staying in Iraq for 100 years to “winning” by end of 2013 than I suppose that Obama can have an “evolving” position on talking to Iran.

Anyone without blinders can read the two statements above and see the difference. In 2004 they called it flip-flopping with our liberal candidate of the day…what will they use this year?

This is a clarification of his position to sound bite judgementalism.
Well done Obama

It doesn’t sound like Obama’s position has changed at all. The two statements you posted completely reconcile, and are completely consistent with each other. NEITHER ONE mentions anything about pre-conditions. The latter statement just adds a notion that when he does talk to them, he’s not going to do it just for the sake of ‘talking’.

A reminder of what was said by a close fellow of Obama, Rev. Wright said “Obama is a typical politician who would say what he has to win” That’s the same case here, he doesn’t care about Israel as much as he care about winning comes November. Obama flip flops again and again and again. We can’t afford to have an inexperienced leader run the White House.

Obama’s hope must be that nobody questions the ludicrous details of his positions on complex issues.
Originally, he said he’d have the troops out by the end of April, ’08. Now, he’s in for the long haul.
Originally, he said he’d meet with ANY of the heads of state of our enemy without preconditions. Now, he adds conditions.
A puppet on a string. A bag of hot air!

To “listen”:
Thanks for that clarification…I am sure you can now explain what “tough and principled” diplomacy means, since you failed to do so in your post.
He does talk about using this technique, whatever it may be, to unify the entire middle east to our side, but what I am interested in is the “how.”
How is he going to “persuade other nations such as Saudi Arabia to recognize common interests with Israel in dealing with Iran,” for example…

so he is a typical politician, since he is changing the message of hope and new politics to the same old same old. to me sounds like he is what he so much critized while on the road to the nomination a typical politician disguised in a fake mantra of hope and change.

OBAMA’S PROMISE: A new kind of politics — not politics as usual.
THE REALITY: SOSDD

Barry’s massive experience as a, well, no one really knows, is really making everyone feel good about the future of America in his massively experienced hands.
But he’s black! Change you can believe in, and stuff.

Justin
Obama said what he said.
Why do you feel the need to insert something into their meaning that wasn’t there? Can’t your puppet speak for himself or do you have dame bramage?

You want a man that does not understand the what the words “without precondition” to be the leader of this country. Obama is a well educated, intelligent man. He knew what that meant and his clarification is nothing but a contradicition to his original statement. It is amazing how those will believe what ever he says.

Job loss under Obama will be tremendous. He and the Unions will see to it. the price of gas will skyrocket because he won’t drill here. We will be at the mideast’s beck and call.

Obama = gut the military, raise interest rates to 20%, gas lines, tolerance of terrorists,oh wait that was Carter. ok Carter = Obama

Obama must really think Americans, and specifically Jewish Americans, have short memories. It apparently doesn’t occur to him that people exercise recall, and can remember his originally stated positions.
It’s as if every time he speaks (or gaffes), he thinks it’s all brand new- a fresh idea, and that everything he’s stated previously will magically evaporate.
Business as usual for Obama- say or do anything for political expediency.

He is still not as dumb as bush.So he has evolved his position. If this currentpresident evolved his position this country would probably not be in the mess it is in now.Flip flop or whatever. The man may and obviously has recognized his mistakes.He is tweaking his position.Let me ask you a question? Have you or anyone you know ever made a misunderstood statement.

CHAOS – The same conditions were in both statements. Advancing the interests of the United States is assumed. What else would we do?

Why are you scared Babs? He cannot do any worst that the current administration.

Pretty soon Obama will be copying McCains positions just like he did Clinton’s. The “man” (I still think he’s gay)is an idiot.

This post is beyond stupid.
Here is an example of a pre-condition: demanding that Iran do some thing (such as, “stop enriching uranium”) before agreeing to speak with them. You see, it is a PRE-condition because you condition a meeting even taking place on some sort of action or agreement BEFORE you are willing to sit down and talk.
Obama’s statement that he would only meet with Iran’s leaders if it were in the interests of the U.S. is not a pre-condition at all. It makes no specific demands that Iran would have to meet or agree to before speaking to them. Rather, it is a completely unsurprising and uncontroversial idea that the President should do things that are in America’s interests, and thus would not sit down to talk to Iran’s leaders if he didn’t think it was in those interests.
Another way of saying this is that he is not proposing to sit down in his first year with every rogue leader in the world just for the sake of sitting down with him. He is also not demanding (as do Bush and McCain) that there be some demands met before he would be “willing” to speak with them. It is hard for me to believe that anyone who can’t understand both these things is not just willingly trying to misunderstand Obama.

Well, he apparently wants both no preconditions and preconditions with Cuba:
Obama said about Cuba:
“I will maintain the embargo. It provides us with the leverage to present the regime with a clear choice:
IF
you take significant steps toward democracy, beginning with the freeing
of all political prisoners,
[THEN](ed.)
we will take steps to begin normalizing relations. That’s the way to bring about real change in Cuba – through strong, smart and principled diplomacy.” (emphasis added).
In your words, Spenser, a precondition is:
“demanding that Iran do some thing… before agreeing to speak with them.”
Isn’t that a set of preconditions with regard to Cuba? Why wouldn’t Obama ask something of Iran while he develops his “aggressive diplomacy?”

First Obama said he’d meet with the President of Iran without any preconditions the first year of his presidency. There are some reports that people like Sam Nunn, and possibly Colin Powell, told him this was a mistake. He began to talk about preparations. One of the network reporters said he had always supported preconditions. The same day, Obama’s spokesman attacked people who don’t understand the difference between preconditions and preparations, even though Obama himself had elided the difference. Supposed Clinton backer Jane Harman (who is sounding like an Obama backer) stuttered about meeting with the president of Iran and defended it by saying he didn’t have to meet with the president, but could meet instead with the religious leader of Iran, who is really in charge. This is the same guy who just said it’s immoral for any nation to acquire nuclear weapons but no one should stop Iran’s nuclear program, while Iran continues to pursue nuclear weapons–something even the watchdog committee is more willing to admit seems to be occurring.

MELANI; Perfectly said

Yes, Obama is going to teach the world the intricacies of diplomacy that he learned in all his years as a community activist.

Eric:
Like most liberals, you seem to have a flimsy grasp on history. In Bush’s 2002 State of the Union address, he included Iran in the Axis of Evil along with Iraq and North Korea. That designation screams “enemy” to me, or do you refer to your friends as “evil?”
As for the current situation, our military has known for years that Iran has been supplying a large percentage of the weapons that kill our soldiers in Iraq. Again, that sounds like an enemy to me.
As far as lying goes, I can’t believe anyone is taken in by Obama’s lies that he was recently shocked by his longtime friend and pastor’s anti-American, racist beliefs. That must be drugged Kool-aid!

Principled Standards do not need to be explained, evolved, or nuanced they are not relative but concrete and based on truth, honor, and justice. The problem is that we do not know what Obama’s principles are, I don’t think he knows either at least enough to last from one audience to the next.

Mr. Karl,
You are very confused. Don’t you realize that Obama is the official Democratic nominee now? It is time for all his fellow travelers in the media to get behind him and slam McCain. You have done your career a disservice. Don’t listen to those right-wings fools about balance: it’s time to stand together.

Dumbest analysis ever. “If it advances our interest” is a GIVEN in negotiations. Thats the president’s job. Negotiating with our enemies does advance our interests, because by definition, negotiations involve us making DEMANDS of our opponents.
The only “precondition” that matters is whether we demand Iran stop enriching uranium before we talk, thus eliminating the need for talks at all and subsequently ensuring that no progress is made because they aren’t going to accept that… Or we make their nuclear program the SUBJECT of talks, which it logically should be.
To see an “evolution” of Obama’s position here is ridiculous.

Wade,
If I understand your post, you imply that “embargo” means “will not speak to.” It doesn’t, it means:
1. an order of a government prohibiting the movement of merchant ships into or out of its ports.
So (assuming the accuracy of your quotes) I take Obama’s position to be that allowing (more) economic trade with Cuba is leverage to try to get them to make political concessions. I’m not sure how this has anything to do with making preconditions to negotiations.

CHAOS: “How all of a sudden is Iran ‘THE ENEMY’? Iran wasn’t ‘THE ENEMY’ in 2002, when Bush was lying to the world to convince everyone IRAQ was ‘THE ENEMY’. In fact, we never heard a peep about Iran as ‘THE ENEMY’ back then. But now that Bush has occupied Iraq , he and McCain simply replace the word ‘Iraq’ with ‘Iran’, and now, magically, Iran is ‘THE ENEMY’.”
I guess CHAOS missed that little State of the Union Address in early 2002 about the Axis of Evil – Iran, Iraq and North Korea.

Obama should run with her as v.p. and then after the elections and after the NY Governer will appoint a other senator he should just fire her as his vice president , so he should first get her supporters to vote for him and then get rid of her as soon as possible i think she would do so anyway

Funny that people would accuse Obama of flip-flopping when McCain clearly takes the cake in this area (tax cuts, ethics reform, etc etc).
It’s really simple, but it seems that most people here just want to believe something else. Nonetheless, I’m going to put it as clearly as I can:
Obama is willing to talk to leaders of “enemy” countries without preconditions, AS THEY’VE COME TO BE DEFINED FOR ALL INTENTS AND PURPOSES UNDER THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION. For those of you who really don’t know what those preconditions are, let’s take Iran as an example. The Bush administration says that it won’t talk to Iran until Iran certifiably abandons its nuclear power program (which is suspected to include a nuclear weapons component, contrary to Iranian claims). That’s the precondition.
Now, here’s the tough part, so I need you to concentrate hard… Obama WILL talk to Iran WITHOUT that precondition, or other preconditions along those lines. Is he going to talk w/ an Iranian leader right away without any preparation leading up to it (in the form of low level diplomatic contact and setting a rigid agenda for a presidential meeting)? Of course not. If you want to call that a precondition and be self-satisfied in having your “proof” that Obama’s a flip-flopping hypocrite, knock yourselves out. It’s not going to get you too far.

Thanks for the hearty discussion! :)
If you read the transcript of the speech, he is refuting the idea that he ever stated that he would not require preconditions to “talks” only a few paragraphs before. (well, he did, but…he was eager to make an impression as a peacemaker and jumped a bit quickly in the debate, I will forgive him)
In my mind “normalizing relations” would likely include “meeting,” at first not lifting the embargo. This is included, not completely different from normalizing relations.
What you both suggest here is that IF Cuba takes steps toward democracy, THEN Obama will begin “normalizing relations” by lifting the embargo. That doesn’t seem like it would immediately mean lifting the embargo, but rather would be start meetings and the like, which he had just been speaking about in his speech.
You both bring up a good analysis of Obama’s statements, but I think he is playing at sophistry after his blunder about meeting with leaders in Cuba, PDRK, Iran, etc. in the debate last year.
There is a difference between preconditions and preparations, and all diplomacy requires “preparations,” so Obama’s conflation of the two is meant to distract from his mistake. He clearly meant preconditions in the sense that the US would not make conditions on another entity prior to “normalizing relations,” which usually starts with low-level meetings.
In my opinion, he is too clever by half. Any president will require some kind of effort from the other side before initiating talks. I think Obama would require some preconditions, and that’s okay.
I just get the feeling that no matter what Obama says, many will always see him as being “entirely consistent.”
Keep in mind that I do respect your support of Obama, he is a serious candidate, a good politician, and has a good shot at the White House. I just believe all candidates deserve an equal amount of intense scrutiny.

Well, at least Obama is learning on the job… or maybe learning while not doing his job (ie. the job he was elected to do as an Illinois Senator). THIS IS AN EXAMPLE OF OBAMA’s FOREIGN POLICY. Off the cuff, operating on a pure whim and nothing from experience. Obama probably got beat up pretty good by his advisors for his previous real truth speak on Iran. What is coming out of his mouth now is what his advisors have schooled him on.
I can see it now with Obama at the negotiating table with Ahmadinejad. Obama with an earpiece hooked up with Georgie Soros in Brussells telling him what to say and Ahmadinejad on his yellow satellite phone getting his marching orders from the mullahs!!! LOL, the whole world is in trouble.

What do the Obama supporters really think that they are getting with his guy?

So who is dumber, the Harvard lawyer or the Harvard MBA?

I hate this guy Obama. Literally want to throw up when I see his face on TV. He reminds me of Bush in so many ways, it’s scary. Compulsive liar. “Big picture” guy, meaning he frequently gets his facts wrong. Ambitious beyond his abilities and experience. Arrogant and naive. In short, it’s not McCain who is Bush II — it’s Obama.

If McCain can have an EVOLVING position on the war in Iraq going from staying in Iraq for 100 years to “winning” by end of 2013 than I suppose that Obama can have an “evolving” position on talking to Iran.
We’re still in Japan and Germany after 60 years.
This is why I despise liberals.