Eight years is a long time for a political mistake to continue. Victor Davis Hanson looks at Obama and the Middle East in a post on Speak Loudly And Carry A Twig. That Obama has continually sought to aid and abet the most radical of the Islamists in every one of the theatres of war ought to make clear whose side he’s on. Yet it remains merely a series of errors and examples of poor judgement. No one in Israel or Egypt misunderstands even in the slightest, but it still cannot be said that Obama sides with the Muslim Brotherhood. Here is one of the examples Hanson gives.

The Egyptian military junta tried to explain to the Obama administration that it had no choice but to abort the one-election/one-time Islamization efforts of Mohamed Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood. President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi is baffled that Egypt’s opposition to radical Islam has not softened American anger, but apparently only cemented the estrangement.

The only thing that baffles him is that Obama could get elected and that his policies have not brought the house down on his head. It’s now just about waiting it out since whoever is next is bound to be better. But then again, it might be Hillary Clinton or even Bernie Sanders so “better” might need to come with the modifier “slightly”. And even if it’s not, everyone now understands that the US cannot be the long-term anchor. Security must be found elsewhere. As Hanson says:

The only upside is an emerging de facto alliance between Israel and the so-called moderate Arab monarchies. That odd coupling assumes that Iran threatens both more than they do each other, and that the United States is no longer a reliable patron to either.

The US under Obama has not been “unreliable”, it has been positively hostile. This is a lesson learned, but we are not living in a better world as a result.