Breakthrough on U.S.-Russian Relations? “We’re Not Looking Into Anybody’s Soul,” Says U.S. Official, Previewing “Sober” Yet Optimistic Announcement

As long as President Obama doesn’t see his “soul” by looking into his eyes…we should be okay.

Obama just needs to refrain from looking into the eyes or souls of Medvedev and he’ll be fine…

Well, just so long as the US isn’t pointing a GUN at Russia’s head.

………People… get real before the world balance changes. Communism is NOT good. Where are guys like Kennedy and Reagan to make a stand when we need them to?
Posted by: Tim | Apr 1, 2009 8:27:37 AM
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The problem is, if only people of your likes had their ways there wouldn’t be a world to have its balance changes. Since you can only understand things in sounbite mode, you probably wouldn’t understand what they are trying to do here. I’m sure they’re taking too long for your taste.

How can one trip abroad require an entourage of 500 frickin people???? What did he do, invite the whole south side of Chicago? Who is picking up the tab for these people — we, the taxpayer??? What are they doing all day while he is at the summit??? I can imagine the bill for this trip — at a time when we are in the worst crisis of our lives….OMG!!

i wouldn’t bank on this it’s all up to putin he decides what will go on he’s the one in charge good luck mr.president your going to need it.

Ater this “meeting” we will be weaker and Russia stonger.

Some of you all would not recognize real leadership if it ran right up to you, and said come follow me. might as well be back in the good ole cowboy days when all they had to say was (LETS STRING HIM UP BOYS)you all are afraid of your own shadows, and because of your fear you won’t neg. with anyone that may be willing to sit down and talk.

this is potentially huge progress after the Bush Adminsitration nearly restarted the Cold War (among other major foriegn policy disasters)…fingers crossed we can stop antagonizing Russia and start to find common ground ….the West has humiliated them enough. Good work Mr, President.

“This scares me to death. Obama is totally naive and knows nothing about dealing with Russia, China or anybody who is a real threat. They are going to run over him using his naiveté and desire to be liked. Real leaders are respected, not liked but he doesn’t understand this.”
And some are even…liked *and* respected. GASP!

Understanding through communication is the key to bringing this world together. Obama undertands that. Those who disagree can create their own battlefields.

It’s the job of the president to pursue these agreements, and the job of Congress to oversee and give them a yes/no ratification before they are implemented. I am glad to see Obama quickly turning the presidency back to doing the job it lost of sight of during the past administration.

If Iran refuses to give up their nuclear weapons ambition, will Obama go ahead with the missile defense system in Europe or should he just cancel it to have “better” relationship with Russia?

I keep reading that China and Russia are rearming at a fast pace.

JHW539, when you have an agreement with someone and break that agreement what dose that say about you?

hkdakota:”when you have an agreement with someone and break that agreement what dose that say about you?”
If I agree to sell you the Brooklyn Bridge and you accept, what does that say about you AND me?
An agreement with the US is a treaty. Treaties MUST be approved by Congress. What treaty are you claiming we are violating with Eastern Europe by talking to Russia and continuing the decades long process of nuclear arms reduction? Specifically please.

jhw539, Also the President is commander and chief of the armed forces. While it may be good form to consult congress about troop and weapon deployment I don’t think it is constitutionally required.

…and finding a sustainable path for energy and dealing with some of the threats of climate change….
–PB0
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Our Greatest Smartest Clueless Leader thought he out-smarted the Russians, in a common interest of “finding a sustainable path for energy”.
Of course, the Russians are very much interested in selling us their oil from the Siberia, and PB0 is interested in buying it, paving a path more dependent on foreign oil, and pollution of the planet.

With economic ruin comes humility. I like it!

“What I said in the letter was that, obviously, to the extent that we are lessening Iran’s commitment to nuclear weapons, then that reduces the pressure for, or the need for, a missile defense system”
I repeat…what missile defense system? One does not exist.

Glad to see Concerned in OH’s biggest worry about our President is that his protocol secretary isn’t very good at his/her job.

Carol, the reason BO has to travel with an entourage is because he envisions himself as a P.Diddy/Kobe/Denzel character. As for “looking into Medvedev’s soul” Obama would get the calm reassuring feeling like looking into a mirror because they share the same core communist values.

kim:”that CO2 has been mistakenly demonized as a climate changer”
Not much to say when someone’s ranting is denying something that can, and regularly is, empirically proven in high school chem classes. The greenhouse effect is proven by simple reproducible experiment, the questions that have been being researched the last 15 years are what are the buffer forces at work.

“I was reading all of your comments people. It seems like nobody read the Bible. That’s what really scary!”
Lol. Yeah…*that’s* what’s scary. People not reading the bible.

“Is that Grand Fool actually thinking he can deal with Russia about climate?”
Well, gee…why bother trying then, huh?

jhw539: Sure, CO2 has a greenhouse effect, perhaps a half a degree Centigrade of warming per doubling of concentration. The IPCC has stampeded a panic by claiming that effect is 10 times as great, and the Grandest Fool Gore has layered on perhaps another order of magnitude of baloney. With the present cooling already disconfirming the IPCC’s predictions, and the present failure of the Global Climate Models, it is time for an honest discussion of the tradeoffs among energy options and policy. This we haven’t had so far.
The climate modelers made mistaken assumptions about the feedback effect of water vapor to the initial tiny forcing of CO2. The models also poorly parameterize convection and clouds. Check it out, you’ve nothing to lose but your ignorance and your fears.
Besides, if we are cooling for 20-100 years, as I believe, then the minimal warming effect, and the large fertiziling effect of CO2 on crops will feed and warm the teeming billions. We are being wrong-footed by the climate alarmist fools into mitigating a warming that isn’t happening, and fatally missing the chance to adapt to a cooling world. This will be a holocaust to the poor people of the earth. You, yes, I mean you, have a chance to change this. Educate yourself, or be sorry.
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“I ask for the third time, what is this “missile defense system?” Because historically that has referred to a yet-to-succeed surface-to-air missile used to shoot down ICBMs.”
Three strikes and you’re out. You would be further ahead by not asking such a ridiculous question, than fumbling around trying to defend it.

“Three strikes and you’re out. You would be further ahead by not asking such a ridiculous question, than fumbling around trying to defend it.”
What are you talking about?

kim:”The climate modelers made mistaken assumptions about the feedback effect of water vapor to the initial tiny forcing of CO2. The models also poorly parameterize convection and clouds. Check it out, you’ve nothing to lose but your ignorance and your fears.”
Write a paper with scientific evidence of your theory and you will be a millionaire overnight with your own lab and department at Exxon, guaranteed. Yet no one has, in the last twenty years this has been researched.
Sorry if I chose to listen to the IPCC, who themselves merely summarize the conclusions of the factual research performed by thousands of scientists over the last couple decades. Much like evolution vs creationism, at this point it’s not worth arguing with the anti-science fringe who seem to think Gore is a scientist to be refuted.

1. We would not like Russia Building a Missile Defense System in Cuba or Venezuela.
2. The Defense System is a Costly on.
3. Any Missile being Launched by a nation that does not have a [Nuclear Weapon] in this case Iran…
It would not be able to Reach our Shores, because of Defense and Allied Nation with Counter Nuclear Defense Systems would also be involved, their Nation’s could be harmed by such a Launch, that could go Deadly Wrong !!
4.Every Nation with Nuclear Weaposn are a Damn Threat !!
5. The intended Target[s] could go Deadly Wrong as well as the Nation that Launches a Nuclear Weapon, could do More Harm to Themselves…
Note: Some of are [[Hell Bent]] on being a part of the ..
[[First Nuclear War]]
I for one am not in that Number…
Reagan Hob Knobbed with Russian Leaders and Kennedy knew how far to go in Provoking Russia and Vis Versa…
Obama is doing a Great Thing…
No Nation or Leader wants the Repercussions of being in a …
Nuclear World War…
Because We’d … All [[LOSE

jhw539: The Exxon and Creationist fallacies are just that; poor, pitiful, and losing rhetoric. There are plenty of legitimate scientists arguing a skeptical position, among them Lindzen, Spencer, Svensmark, and Pielke. The science is NOT settled, and to believe it is so is blind ignorance.
CO2 is rising steadily, and over the last 10 years, global temperature has peaked, plateaued, and is now dropping. Observe the thermometers, the Argos oceanic buoys, and the satellite tropospheric temperature series, RSS, and UAH.
It is little known, but the scientific summaries in the IPCC’s reports are written by around 50 true believers. The summary for policymakers by an even smaller coterie of around a dozen. The IPCC reports are political documents rather than scientific ones.
Besides, Pachauri, head of the IPCC has publicly wondered if someone hasn’t gotten their sums wrong. He also supports the building of coal-fired power plants in India.
I urge you, check this out for yourself. There is no satisfactory explanation within the CO2=AGW paradigm for the present cooling of the earth.
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Has somebody successfully shot down a missile that I’m unaware of??? People keep talking about “missile defense” and “Star Wars Satelite Defense, remember and our Allied Nations with Counter Nuclear Defense Systems”…please help me out here. Was I asleep the week where this was in the news?

“People keep talking about “missile defense” and “Star Wars Satelite Defense, remember and our Allied Nations with Counter Nuclear Defense Systems”…please help me out here. Was I asleep the week where this was in the news?”
It must really be bothering you that you asked a silly question like “What missile defense system?”, as if there has been no discussion of a missile defense system. Of course it was a silly question and no amount of obfuscation changes that.

“CO2 is rising steadily, and over the last 10 years, global temperature has peaked, plateaued, and is now dropping. Observe the thermometers, the Argos oceanic buoys, and the satellite tropospheric temperature series, RSS, and UAH.”
Is the entire basis of this argument that instruments have detected a recent drop in temperature? Can fluctuation alone refute the premise that overall temperatures will most likely continue to rise?

“It must really be bothering you that you asked a silly question like “What missile defense system?”, as if there has been no discussion of a missile defense system. Of course it was a silly question and no amount of obfuscation changes that.”
I’m not being silly, I’m asking…WHAT MISSILE DEFENSE SYSTEM??? Somebody show me evidence…anything…of a system that has been proven to shoot down an ICBM. What other “defense” mechanism could there be?
“Star Wars has not been Tested in a Live Situation and the Government would not tell if it were to have been Tested, for fear it would cause [Mass Hysteria] among the Natives !!”
I have no idea what this means. Are you suggesting that the US has successfully shot a missile out of the air? You don’t think they’d let the world know it if they did?

“What other “defense” mechanism could there be?’
Patriot System for one. Aegis antimissile systems. Others is test and development.
Star Wars is here. Reagan was right and you are angry because he was right. Right?

frieda:I am getting tired of their constant references to Bush’s administration…
Can they talk about anything without bringing up the past and making fun of prior adminsitraions
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I completely agree.
Not only that, but they already have made their own share of silly errors, so harping on Bush’s just seems that much smaller.
They need to concentrate on governing, not sniping.

“Reagan was right and you are angry because he was right. Right?”
I couldn’t care less about the who. I think it’d be great if we could find a way to shoot down ICBMs.

I hope President Obama sees deep down inside and dosent let this war happen between the us and the russian. Theres alot of people praying for this not to happen i hope he reads this message and it touches his heart ill be praying for you with all my heart please im baging you not to let it happen i never been to close to the lord but know i really am i hope you dont let this go on i wish i could meet you so i could talk to you and tell you how i feel. So please dont let it go on i will be praying for you thank you.

Ah, skip, there is even more to your subtle and excellent question than I saw at first.
Yes, the globe has been warming for the last couple of hundred years, long before CO2 started to rise, and probably just as a result of recovery from the Little Ice Age.
The fact that the globe is now cooling in response to a periodic oceanic phenomenon demonstrates that the role of CO2 in determining climate has been exaggerated. CO2 continues to rise, presently, while the globe cools. That just doesn’t make sense within the dominant CO2=AGW paradigm.
What happens in 30 years when the globe starts warming again? Well, with any luck we will have figured out the true role of CO2 in climate by then and we can control it then if necessary. Besides, at some point fossil hydrocarbons will no longer be competitive in the energy market. Let’s let the market determine that, not let ourselves be shackled with government mandates and impoverished with government subsidies from unnecessary and regressive government taxes on carbon.
Lastly, the recovery from the Little Ice Age may be over. There is a researcher named Bill Livingston who is measuring the internal magnetism of the few sunspots we do see and finds them on a decline curve to become invisible by 2015, as apparently happened during the Maunder and Dalton Solar Minimums. This is not to say that the internal dynamo which produces spots is failing, only that they won’t be visible. Whether that translates into a cooling globe is another unsettled scientific controversy, one which even the finest solar physicists can’t answer at the moment. The globe cooled during the Maunder Minimum, but there also was a series of volcanoes which increased the reflectivity of the earth, or its ‘albedo’, allowing less energy to reach the surface.
These are interesting times, indeed. We truly need an honest discussion of the science of climate and the policy of energy, one which we are not having presently with likes of Gore and Hansen stampeding the ‘Maddened Crowd’ over a cliff with their fantastic error.
And remember, the Russians, the Chinese, and the Indians are not the least bit fooled. It is Americans and Europeans who are making this tragic mistake.
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“In addition, if the presently somewhat unusual behaviour of the sun is presaging a new Grand Solar Minimum, then we may well cool for a hundred years or so, as we did during the Little Ice Age.”
If the PDO is in a cooling phase then the buoys will show a drop in temperature. If the oceans are getting warmer overall different dynamics in the currents could be bringing colder water from deeper down up to the surface.
Solar activity is a big variable that we can’t possibly understand since we haven’t been watching it for near long enough. I have to agree that another Ice Age is more dangerous than global warming. If we really want to use CO2 as insurance against ice ages then we better be prepared to kiss Florida goodbye as part of the cost.

“We currently have space based platforms for intercepting ICBMs as envisioned by the Space Defense Initiative? ”
Reagan’s proposal involved using ground and space based systems to protect the United States from attack by nuclear ballistic missiles.
Today, we have missile defense technology using ground and space based systems similar to what Reagan proposed. Reagan had great vision, huh?

“Today, we have missile defense technology using ground and space based systems similar to what Reagan proposed. Reagan had great vision, huh?”
What’s your point with this Reagan business?

silky, I don’t really know what you two are talking about, but Putin and Russia almost didn’t sign the Kyoto Accord. Even then, the Russian scientists were skeptical of global warming. At least part of the reason that he did sign is related to my point here, that is that insofar as Kyoto was followed, it would hamper Western productivity more than that of Russia.
As we know, Kyoto was pretty much universally ignored, and Copenhagen will be also. The demands are simply not consonant with increasing industrialization, and the raising of standards of living around the world.
But back to my point; insofar as we do sign up for carbon encumbering, and insofar as we actually follow the guidelines, we will diminish, absolutely and relatively, our productivity. And for what? A chimera?
The globe is cooling, folks, for how long, even kim doesn’t know.
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I am more than a little tired by Obama and his minions pushing themselves up by constantly denigrating Bush. (And I don’t have a high opinion of Bush, mind you.) It’s as though they have no thoughts of their own — it’s simply being the anti-Bush.
Come on boys. Grow up.

Russia has learned nothing from their recent horrific past. Communism has only made the Russian govt/people even more cynical. The fall of communism did not pan out like they wished & they are hearkening back to the old days of communism as a solution.
Poland has every right to be fearful, as well as we should be.
Parallels could also be drawn with China.
These 2 countries are hungering for monumental power. They want their share of glory days in world power.
The cold war was NEVER over.

I’m sure the Obama administration can come to many agreements with Russia. The question is what are they giving up? it seems Obama is more then happy to abandon eastern Europe to the Russian sphere of influence. Keep in mind Eastern Europe wants a missile shield and their want has nothing to do with Iran. The fact we were going to base interceptors in Eastern Europe had nothing to do with Iran.
100 bucks says the obama administration’s announcement does nothing to prevent Russian interference in former republics like Georgia or Ukraine.

Kim: I agree that climate science is not settled, particularly when it comes to ocean acidification and its impact our food chain, something you have not mentioned. So, if as you suggest, CO2 is not responsible for the temperature rising, what about our oceans?
And even if you believe an attempt to trade Russian influence is foolish, why would re-engaging Russia be an act of “brain dead fools”?
According to Jeffrey Goldberg, a national correspondent for The Atlantic, nuclear proliferation experts he’s spoken with judge the chance of a terrorist detonation to be as high as 50 percent in the next 10 years. Two years ago Obama stated that the possibility of a terrorist group obtaining a nuclear weapon was “the No. 1 threat” facing America and he has made proposals to secure the world’s loose fissile material during his first term. Does that appear sensible even to a conservative?

Obama has already tipped the Russians to the fact that he is not serious about missile defense.
Clever strategery, that.

Well, just so long as the US isn’t pointing a GUN at Russia’s head.
Posted by: Mockingbird | Apr 1, 2009 8:01:18 AM
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You do know that all government is an exercise in the threat or use of force, right?
From jaywalking to ICBM treaties, force motivates actions of people and nations.

Another Bush bash, lovely. Always looking for a way to sneak that in there aren’t they.

I like all the comments about the ‘successful’ SDI program that Reagan supposedly fathered. There is no such thing, and if there’s a nuclear war, we’re all still dead.
It was a tragic waste of money that led to some of our current huge deficits. Where are you people getting your information?

CenterOne at 2PM. Ocean acidification is exaggerated. Increased CO2 in the ocean will do just as it does in the atmosphere, that is fertilize plant life. Furthermore, the action of CO2 on the oceanic biosphere, in conjunction with the sun, will increase the rate at which carbon is virtually permanently sequestered from the carbon cycle, decreasing the time estimated to remove the anthropogenic CO2 we are placing in the environment. Ocean acidification is not imaginary, just as climate warming from CO2 is not imaginary. Both effects are trivial, though, and they’ve been exaggerated in order to stampede the herd into expensive, unnecessary, and deadly policy changes. Policy changes which, incidentally, accrue great power to politicians, and disempower all other people, but poor people selectively more. Do you like that?
Obama is a brain dead fool to think putting the missile defense of Eastern Europe on the table as bargaining chip is going to be effective. The Russians are not as stupid as the Taliban who happily announce that efforts to engage them are insane and idiotic. I have no objection to Obama talking to the Russians, and the Chinese, or anyone for that matter. I do object to him giving away our strategic advantages in the vain hope that ‘hope and change’ are going to be persuasive to them. Those guys are realists, and appreciated Bush’s realism. They will be happy to cozy up to Obama’s foolish rhetoric as he gives away the farm.
I might be wrong, I even hope I’m wrong. But I don’t think I am. The world is populated with very smart people who understand power. Obama and crew don’t understand much but rhetoric and Western elite guilt.
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Yeah, just give Moscow what it wants now so maybe they won’t take too much in the future.
Good strategy there, Neville Obama.

One of the MOST embarrassong moments of the bush administration was “I have looked into his soul”…I still cringe when i hear it..it made america sound like we were the village idiots..

Kim, you inspired me to read more about global cooling and found this 2/11/07 article by Nigel Calder very interesting, at timesonline.
“[Svensmark] saw from compilations of weather satellite data that cloudiness varies according to how many atomic particles are coming in from exploded stars. More cosmic rays, more clouds. The sun’s magnetic field bats away many of the cosmic rays, and its intensification during the 20th century meant fewer cosmic rays, fewer clouds, and a warmer world…
.
“…Svensmark and his small team at the Danish National Space Center hit the jackpot in the summer of 2005. In a box of air in the basement, they were able to show that electrons set free by cosmic rays coming through the ceiling stitched together droplets of sulphuric acid and water. These are the building blocks for cloud condensation. But journal after journal declined to publish their report; the discovery finally appeared in the Proceedings of the Royal Society….”
***
You are so right, the CO2 global warming propaganda is purely political.
(PS – I’ve tried posting this twice, maybe third time lucky :)