Pragmatism devoid of principle provides an inadequate basis for coherent strategy. At the end of the day, there is no avoiding what the elder George Bush once called "the vision thing": a conception of how the world works, where it is headed and the role the United States should play in getting it there.
Obama's sympathetic nod to "soft power" and willingness to listen rather than preach do not qualify as that vision. Nor does his pledge to engage the Islamic world in respectful dialogue while working toward the abolition of nuclear weapons. They are at best markers that may suggest the outlines of something larger.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/21/bacevich.obama.foreign/index.html?iref=mpstoryview
....Yet should our pragmatic president choose the easier course of dodging "the vision thing" -- in effect, taking on whatever problem happens to crop up next -- he and the country will simply muddle along, one crisis following another in endless succession. The resulting strategic drift will not bode well either for his presidency or for the rest of us.
Anyone disagree?
more than the 'un-Bush'
