President of Syria: "Obama has shown himself to be a man of his word,"

[Clio the Leo]

The president of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, is eager to meet President Obama, Reuters reports.

Reuters: “Assad, in an interview with Italian newspaper La Repubblica published on Wednesday, also confirmed he was ready to resume peace negotiations with Israel but expressed concern about the political climate there.

“‘With the pullout in Iraq, the will for peace, the closing of Guantanamo, has shown himself to be a man of his word,’ he said, referring to the U.S. naval base in Cuba where hundreds of suspected Islamist militants have been held, most for years without trial.”

http://www.politico.com/politico44/perm/0309/assad_invites_85dcc490-06ef-4495-a405-1ff7ababd4b7.html

Yet another reassurance that I pulled the right lever on election day.

[HamdenRice]

1. Great news! Why weren't we talking to Bashar al-Assad all along???

Compared to his father, there were extensive signals that he is a reformer. He was very helpful after 9/11 and even with Iraq -- until we started bombing his border posts.

Oh, I forgot. Completely insane, morons were in charge the last 8 years.

[karynnj]

6. We are

Senator Kerry spoke to him during the last recess on his Middle Eastern trip. He said publicly that there was a chance they could be part of getting a solution (with all the requisite wording on things they need to stop doing) A few weeks later, the Obama administration (announced by HRC) sent two career diplomats to Syria.

It is better to first have the quiet low level discussions where ideas can be worked out or meetings with Congress which are arms length away from Obama - meaning that he can use any ideas or results, but he can distance himself if he wants to.

[sailor65]

2. Worthless endorsement

isn't Syria the one country that recently wrote against the UN gay rights thing? Obama doesn't need to be associated with this guy.

[Renew Deal]

3. Isn't the USA the other country that didn't support the UN "gay rights thing?"

:shrug:

[butterfly77]

5. What does foreign policy have to do with sex?

:hi:

[karynnj]

7. There are reasons to question Syria's role in the Middle East - gay rights is not one of them

Assume that Syria had both the desire and the power to significantly make things better in the middle East tamping down the violence and moving to a fair resolution - would you say that we should NOT engage them because of their position on gay rights? Or, should we engage and in parallel make our case on gay rights independent of the other issue?

[Chulanowa]

10. Some people have the same mentality as the last administration...

That diplomacy is a reward, and we shouldn't ever talk to people who do stuff we dislike, until they stop doing whatever it is we dislike.

Yeah, Syria's position on human rights is pretty bad. Is that going to change if we don't engage them? Some people seem to think so. It's rather silly, but what can you do.

[The Backlash Cometh]

4. Whereas Bush was a lying sack of shit.

I think it was his strategerie to keep us off balance.

It worked.

[Cha]

8. I know I pulled the right lever

on Election Day..no matter how much whining is going on in corporatemediawhoredom and the attacks from the jelly fish.

[cooolandrew]

9. ...