The World as it is: Does Reality Count?
Obama, The Realist
More than five years into Obamas presidency, the single word that best sums up his foreign policy is realistin some cases, as one former adviser told me, hard-nosed, even cold realist.
Much can be explained by what might seem the most unlikely sourcehis truly seminal years as a community organizer in Chicago, working for an outfit modeled explicitly on the principles of Saul Alinsky....
Alinsky stressed this as his No. 1 rule: As an organizer I start from where the world is, as it is, not as I would like it to be.
That means working in the system.
We will start with the system because there is no other place to start from except political lunacy"
....This realismstarting with the world as it is, in order to make effective changesruns as a near-constant thread through Obamas presidency. He articulated this view early on, in a speech that, several aides say, he worked on the longest and wrote almost entirely on his ownhis Dec. 10, 2009, Nobel Peace Prize lecture in Oslo...
The instruments of war do have a role to play in preserving the peace, Obama said at one point. The global security of the post-World War II era, he added, was achieved not just by peace treaties, but by the blood of our citizens and the strength of our arms. To acknowledge the occasional necessity for force, he went on, isnt an act of cynicism but a recognition of history, the imperfection of man and the limits of reasonthe world as it is.