Obama, the New Jimmy Carter

It has taken Mr. Obama just over nine months to reach the point it took Jimmy Carter four years to achieve. In the latest Fox News/Opinion Dymanic poll, the news is all bad. Hit the title link for a PDF of the survey itself. On foreign policy, the results are, to be blunt, stunning. When asked who they trusted more to make decisions for the next steps in Afghanistan, 66 percent of the respondents said military commanders, while only 20 percent said Mr. Obama. Surprisingly even Democrats have far more faith in the judgement of military commanders, 45 to 37 percent. On Iran, a huge majority, 69 percent, say Mr. Obama has not been nearly tough enough, including a shocking 55 percent of Democrats polled. Sixty-one percent favor a U.S. military action to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Another shocker is that 51 percent of those polled, Republican, Democrat and Independents believe Mr. Obama apologizes for American far too often.

To quote Jennifer Ruben in commentary (link follow: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/blogs/index.php/rubin/112352

Less than a year into his presidency, this is a remarkable and widespread loss of confidence in the president’s handling of national security. This should actually come as no surprise. Neither his rhetoric or his decision-making to date has projected strength. He spent months arguing that we should close Guantanamo and dump the terrorists into the U.S. or into other countries. The voters disagreed. He dithers on Afghanistan, and the voters no longer see him as the best person to set our course. He sends video valentines to the mullahs, delighting in the notion that we can talk them out of their nukes, and waits for Russia and China to climb onto the Obama bandwagon (or Israel to do the dirty work for us). And Americans overwhelmingly see his performance as weak.

Mr. Obama has achieved what it took Jimmy Carter his four years in office to attain:

the conviction of a large majority of the American people that he is not protecting our interests or performing adequately as commander in chief. He can either stiffen his resolve to confront America’s foes or continue his decline. World events are unlikely to help him–they will only highlight his shoddy performance as our adversaries, seeing exactly what Americans do, begin to test and challenge the U.S. at every turn.

Joe Biden, during the election, had a incredibly accurate insight during the campaign: He said that Mr. Obama’s would be tested, and “it’s not going to be apparent that’s we’re right.” For once in his too long career, Mr. Biden has been proven to a master of understatement.