November 26, 2012

Forging Forward: Flexible Foreign Policy

It’s often said, “There’s no crystal ball to predict the future.” Filing documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission, even the Psychic Friends Network admitted: “Undue reliance should not be placed on the forward-looking statements because PFN can give no assurance that they will prove to be correct.”

While doubts attend the PFN, America’s foreign policy speaks for itself. With the election now behind him, President Obama can move forward with more flexibility. The world stage is set. Compliments of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, we have reengaged multilateral development institutions and rebuilt the United States Agency for International Development.

To affect fundamental transformation, Obama (in his words) is changing the way we do business. That said, after years of primary focus on the Middle East, President Obama took his lead, second-term international trip even further East to Asia for the East Asia Summit. Regional leaders gathered to establish the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) that, if successful, promises to create a trading bloc that covers almost one-third of the global economy.

Israel Passé

It’s accepted that the leader of the Free World will engage the world community but, in doing so, America’s sovereign interests must remain foremost. Arguably, America’s destiny is tied into that of Israel; therefore, Israel’s well being mustn’t be overlooked. Biblically, standing with Israel invites God’s blessing; but too often US foreign policy in Obama’s administration looks past Israel.

Coupled with a shared destiny to be blessed, our nation’s biblical roots were affirmed in 1892 by the US Supreme Court: “Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon the teachings of the Redeemer of Mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise; and in this sense and to this extent, our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian.”

A self-proclaimed Christian, Obama begs to differ. In 2006, he rightly noted increasing diversity of America’s population. He explained further, “Whatever we once were, we are no longer just a Christian nation; we are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers.” If every American has the right to exercise his religion freely, why in Obama’s America is it fine for the White House to host Iftar dinners in honor of Ramadan – but offensive to host events associated with the National Day of Prayer?

The Global Blueprint: Soft Law

While addressing dignitaries at the United Nations Headquarters in New York (September of 2010), Obama explicitly endorsed the UN Charter and Millennium Development Goals. Unfortunately, the UN’s global blueprint effectively supplants the supreme law of our land (the US Constitution) with soft law. At the global level, soft law represents unenforceable agreements between nations. By appearing to represent global consensus, these have a way of evolving slowly into enforceable international law in the form of agreements, conventions, declarations, executive orders, pacts, summits, and treaties.

Time Line and Strategy

For example, established after the United Nations Millennium Summit (2000), eight official Millennium Development Goals united member states (along with international organizations) to forge global partnerships for development and, by the year 2015, to achieve goals relating to poverty, women, children, health, and environmental sustainability.

Seemingly, theirs were noble goals; however, the United Nations Charter for Global Democracy decimates individual freedoms, private property rights, and sovereignty of nation-states. Its Criminal Court offers no guarantees of trial by a jury of one’s peers, right to face one’s accusers, or right even to know the charges being leveled.

“With 10 years down,” Obama noted, “just five years” remain “before our development targets come due." In the name of "a just and sustainable international order,” the US Global Development Policy (the first of its kind by an American administration) places said development at the center of national security. Additionally, it’s a core pillar of American power to be established by regional partnerships that “leverage the expertise and resources of others.”

Multi-Faceted Goal

At the Y2K Summit, the President admonished his audience to “move beyond the old, narrow debate over how much money we’re spending, and instead … focus on results.” “The work,” he added, “cannot be accomplished by any one government.” (Global government is required. And what’s a billion dollars, or two, anyway?) Mutually accountable governments, multilaterals, and nongovernmental organization (NGOs, or civil society) must all work together with a keen “sense of common purpose.” Remembering lessons learned from the so-called centerpiece of his recent trip that began in Bangkok and ended in Cambodia. While in Bangkok, Thailand, President Obama stood on “sacred grounds” in awe of the reclining Buddha. Curiously, when Obama spoke at Georgetown University (April 2009), he ordered a cover for a monogram symbolizing Jesus’ Name. Buddha he tolerates; Jesus, not so much.

Recall that in September 2012, the White House refused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s request, when visiting the US, to meet with Obama. “The president’s schedule,” he was told, “will not permit that.” Nevertheless, President Obama found ample time in Cambodia to visit Hun Sen, one-time communist “strongman” tainted by a sketchy human rights record. In fact, Obama was the first US president to set foot in Cambodia, once known for its Khmer Rouge “killing fields.” Cambodia’s 60-year-old Prime Minister perceived that “first” as a feather in his cap. Whether or not Netanyahu was offended by the President’s seeming snub isn’t the point. It’s this: In light of Hun Sen’s search for global respectability, Obama’s visit mattered a great deal.

Conclusion

This November, America made her choice, and now Obama can move forward with greater flexibility in realizing millennium goals and strategies. Accordingly, America’s interests, more likely than not, will take back seat to the common good; and international soft law will increasingly trump the US Constitution.

Financial overstretch will remain the Achilles heel of developed countries, and standards of living will continue to sink to that of the world’s lowest common denominator. Unless timely changes are made, American exceptionalism will soon have run its course.

Distinguished by a shared destiny, America’s long established partnership with Israel will bow to globally lucrative regional collaborations, starting with Southeast Asia. Sadly, as pan-religious tolerance supplants biblical ethic with its global civic counterpart, God’s blessings will be lifted.

In brief, our nation’s fundamental transformation is escalating the race to a long awaited Novus Ordo Seclorum, requiring consensus between international capitalism and Marxism. This, our current administration aims to deliver.

A prolific author, journalist, and educator, Debra contributes to a variety of Internet news magazines and is guest lecturer to groups of all sizes – secular and Christian; stateside and abroad. Along with Audrey Russo, Debra co-hosts WOMANTalk, Friday edition of Changing Worldviews with SharonHughes; and she hosts TRUTHTalk, its live first-Tuesday-of-the-month edition on BLOGTalk Radio. A longtime resident of the great Pacific Northwest, Debra serves as officer on the founding Board of Directors for Daniels’ Prayer Ministry in Olympia, Washington.

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