Politico’s Byers Wants to Dictate Conditions For Criticizing Obama’s Foreign Policy

March 19th, 2014 11:00 AM

On Wednesday, the Politico's Dylan Byers, imitating the president his web site so loves and adores, unilaterally decided ("new rule") that those of us who are making the self-evident observation that President Barack Obama's foreign policy performance has been weak can't do so unless we articulate what he should be doing.

How quaint. I don't recall seeing, hearing or reading of anyone at Politico or in the rest of the establishment press trying to place such firm conditions on those who opposed the Iraq War or how it was being conducted, the Bush 43 tax cuts, or any other performance, initiative, or idea during the previous presidential administration. Byers' tweet and several choice responses to it follow the jump (HT Twitchy):


First, the tweet:

DylanByersPoliticoTweet031814

Some responses were of the "you can't shut us up that easily, pal" persuasion, while others had plenty of specific ideas encompassing the entire five years the Obama administration has had to "reset" things:

"You mean like go back in time and undo the missile defense pullout from eastern europe?"

"So because 5 years of Obama's policies have left us with no good options, we aren't allowed to criticize him?"

"And what if this was the result of years-long weakness? Little to actually do now."

"And the award for douchiest tweet of the day goes to . . . . @DylanByers"

"C'mon. No fly zone in Syria. Missile defense in e. Europe. No loosening Iran sanctions w/o dismantling centrifuges. For a start."

"What other rules would our media betters like to give us?"

The best response: "New rule, @DylanByers: you don't get to set terms of debate by ignoring the Obama failures that led directly to this."

Given that fact that he has skipped two recent national security meetings, the best riposte to Byers' blather might be to point out that "Well, showing up at meetings might be a start."

It would appear that the administration's de facto PR flaks at the Politico are gettting rattled at just how obviously awful Obama's performance has been.

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.