Obama has been contradictory, erratic, and late in almost every breaking development from the Middle East the last 30 days. Only recently has he started to repeat principled support for consensual government, though with almost none of his usual hope-and-change zeal. One might have hoped to see President Obama voice anger with Qaddafi — not to mention offer massive humanitarian aid to Libyans and express willingness to coordinate no-fly zones — with the same passion that Senator Obama went after renditions, tribunals, Guantanamo, and the Iraq war — or the supposedly belated federal response to Katrina.

Just a year and a half ago, at a time of grassroots protests in the streets of Tehran, he gave the world a sermon about not meddling in the internal affairs of a theocratic, anti-American, and savage Iran — and juxtaposed it with an apology for supposed U.S.-inspired intervention a half-century earlier.

Continue reading Victor Davis Hanson at National Review Online

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