My argument is that Obama isn't serving the US's real interests and is thus contributing to, and perhaps hastening the US's decline in influence in world affairs.  Most of that decline is being driven by the US's relative economic decline (vis a vis Asia, Iran, Latin America etc.).  But some of it is also caused by a foreign policy which is only a little less delusional that Bush's in effect, if not in intention.

Yes, but firstly I would re-state my view that our idea of what is in the long term interests of the US and theirs is probably larger than we imgine.

Equally, politics is the art of the possible. To illustrate Obama's dilemma, let's use the I/P situation. We might argue that arranging policy to arrive at a two-state solution is in Israel's long term interest. However, the reality of the coalitions within Israeli politics are such that either they don't agree that this is a long term solution or the short term appeasements make this long term issue more distant or even unachievable without outside imposition.

Given the voting arrangement of the Senate and the various special interests that must be appeased (eg Aipac), the gap between what is possible and what is, even in their terms, the US' actual long term interests is colossal. there will always be a majority for war, but for anything else, particularly anything that could be painted by Obama's political enemies as making america weak (ie anything that isn't a military solution) there will only be resistance.

Now we could argue that Obama is good at the emotional vision thing, the Hope and the Change, but he's never created a narrative of what Hope and Change are intended to achieve. That was probably a deliberate campaign decision, specifics are bad on the trail, but when you arrive in office you'd better know what you're there for, what your actual bottom lines are, where you're heading. It's this where Obama seems to almost flail around looking for a cause on which to hang his hat.

For example, he wanted "health care" as a campaign phrase, but at no point did he grab hold of the policy by the scruff of the neck and push it through. He has slogans, but he doesn't really have a narrative or a vision for the future of America. That's where the incoherence comes in. He has a destroyed economy and numerous domestic problems, even before BP threw a spanner in his energy policy, his is a presidency of damage limitation. Foreign policy is just a version of "carry on as before". And before was Bush.

keep to the Fen Causeway