…..and in so doing casts the US (not Obama, but the Republicans!) as mean-spirited, unwelcoming obstructionists.
It is fascinating to me that once again Obama is not the target of the criticism. When the George W. Bush Administration was wisely not moving quickly enough (security concerns!) for the humanitarian industrial complex agitators pushing to resettle Iraqi refugees, it was all about that bad George Bush.
Now that it is Obama’s own Dept. of Homeland Security which says it can’t properly screen Syrians, it isn’t Obama’s fault, it’s the Republicans in Congress that are the meanies.
I hate to say it, but Obama has the legal authority to immediately open the flood gates and Congress can’t do much about it (nor do I think the Republican leadership has the will to do anything).
Invasion of Europe news…….
Here is Deutsche Welle on Obama’s praise for German Chancellor Angela Merkel:
Barack Obama publicly lauded German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s European leadership role in the Syrian refugee crisis. But the US president’s praise also draws attention to his own country’s meager record on the issue.
It does not happen every day that the White House puts out a statement explicitly praising a foreign leader for his or her actions on a certain issue. By doing so and by singling out Berlin’s decision to suspend the so called Dublin rules to allow more Syrian refugees to come to Germany, President Obama was providing crucial support for the chancellor, who has faced criticism at home for being too slow to act.
“I think the US is trying to put their political weight behind that leadership that she is showing,” said Elizabeth Collett, director of the Migration Policy Institute Europe.
Obama’s presidential praise came on Wednesday. Hours earlier, Chancellor Merkel was booed by far-right protesters during a visit to a refugee center in a German town at the center of a recent wave of anti-foreigner violence.
Is Obama starting a conversation back home?
Despite all those efforts and notwithstanding the political and security obstacles Obama is facing, said Betts, the administration’s reaction to the Syrian refugee crisis could have been much stronger than it has been. And in that way, he added, Obama’s remarks regarding Merkel were perhaps also intended as a conversation starter back home.
“Conferring praise on Germany is making a domestic political statement on the need for the US to do more.”
Much more here.
Get ready!
I think Obama will do something dramatic in his last year in the White House. Will it be to open the flood gates to 65,000 Syrians? In order to head this off, the subject of Syrian resettlement to the US must become a topic of conversation in the 2016 Presidential election contest—before Obama moves on it! For those of you in early primary states being treated to many visits from candidates, please bring up the issue of refugee resettlement!
See our complete ‘Invasion of Europe’ news archive here. Go here for many posts on Germany’s migrant crisis.