By Wesley Pruden,Washington Times
Reality is setting in over the West Wing
The White House is a risky place for on-the-job training,as Barack Obama and the rest of us are learning. But the president doesn’t deserve all the blame for the installation of a handsome but unprepared matinee idol in the toughest job in the world. The adoring cult,the 53 percent of the giddily oblivious electorate that took a flyer on Election Day,deserves most of it.
Matinee idols only do what matinee idols do,look pretty and inveigle softly with practiced seductiveness. Trouble arrives when the matinee idol and his public confuse role with reality. Reality arrives with the surprise and impact of a lemon-cream pie in the face.
Nasty surprises abound across the real world. Iran completes a third round of testing of Shahab-3 and Sajjil medium-range missiles capable of hitting not only Israel,Eastern Europe and several Middle Eastern countries but,if all that were not sobering enough,several U.S military bases as well. Venezuela boasts that it’s working with Russia and Iran in finding sources of uranium,the key ingredient of nuclear weapons technology. China says it will display new "upgraded missiles"in celebration of the 60th anniversary of the founding of Red China. India announces that it can now make nuclear weapons up to a strength of 200 kilotons,four times over the line that the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty pledges signing nations not to cross.