The New York Post has recently announced that President Barack Obama is canceling his forthcoming Moscow trip, where he was due to meet with the Russian leader, President Vladimir Putin.
It is speculated, recent tensions, centering around the National Security Agency leaker, Edward Snowden, have been responsible for the rare and unanticipated cancellation. It seems the Obama administration is becoming increasingly frustrated by Russia’s decision to provide the NSA leaker with temporary asylum.
Appearing on Jay Leno’s The Tonight Show, Obama vented his spleen:
“I was disappointed… Even though we don’t have an extradition treaty with them, traditionally we have tried to respect if there’s a law breaker or alleged law breaker in their country, we evaluate it, and we try to work with them.”
President Obama continued, accusing the Russian administration of slipping back to “… Cold War thinking and Cold War mentality…” No doubt, this latest move will be seen as a rather inflammatory act in the eyes of Moscow, and will certainly not ease the growing discontent between the two countries.
If Obama’s discontent wasn’t already clear enough, we are also to understand that the U.S. president will attend the Group of 20 (G20) summit, to add to discussions over the imminent economic agenda, which will be held in St. Petersberg, Russia. It is alleged, however, that Obama has no intention of discussing any political issues with President Putin, on a face-to-face basis.
Alternatively, this September, Obama will rearrange his itinerary, replacing the Moscow trip with a stopover in Sweden.
The U.S. administration’s plans to shutter the Moscow meeting also comes in the wake of considerable debate over a number of key, diplomatic issues, including Moscow’s crackdown on Kremlin critics, Russia’s alleged involvement in aiding the Syrian president, Bashar Assad, wage civil war, and America’s installation of a missile shield in Eastern Europe.
By: James Fenner
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4 Responses
The Incredible Shrinking President.
Instead of digging into claims that our own Government is trashing the First and Fourth Amendments, and invading our personal lives with the collaboration of major information industries — and doing something about it — Obama chooses to hunker down and throw in with the criminals … and then blame Putin for protecting from certain abuse, even death, the one American with the courage to blow the whistle for all of us!
Every poke from the right wing, he jumps a mile. Every criticism from his “own” center — he has no left — he retreats into Strong Man-ism. We are really bereft in America, at drift as our President appears unable to share priorities that are his people’s, only those of the rich, powerful, reactionary, and militaristic. What a sad, sad situation, with little hope for the future of America. This could go on now for decades.
Russia is a big disappointment in most areas, but they did the right thing by granting Snowden temporary asylum. Obama needs to stop his witch-hunt of whistleblowers. For the reasons why, see http://rationalexaminer.com/snowden-whistle-blowing-outlaw/