High and Outside

On Monday, at Nationals Park in Washington, the O-man continued a tradition that began exactly 100 years ago when William Howard Taft tossed the first ball for the Washington Senators season opening game.

A rather insignificant act in the grand scheme of O-man agenda items, but notable all the same.

On Tuesday, he again continued tradition, by issuing revised US Nuclear Weapons guidelines, as Presidents since Kennedy have done for over fifty years.

And, based on his revisions to the guidelines, it appears that he considers nuclear policy to be a rather insignificant part of his agenda as well.

At the ballpark, the O-man went to the mound clad in a scarlet Washington Nationals jacket (and minus the "mom jeans" of a year ago), earning the temporary appreciation of the many Nationals fans in attendance, while at the same time angering the many Phillies fans in the stands.

It's no secret the Nationals, with one of the worst records in baseball, can use all the support they can get, especially from someone as powerful as the president.

Just like some of our allies around the world, like Israel, Afghanistan, and other countries that have come to depend on the perceived might and protection of the US when it comes to their sworn enemies.

But just as he reached the mound, the O-man, in a classic "reveal of the hidden man" move, unfolded from his glove a Chicago White Sox cap, and proudly donned it, giving the metaphoric finger to not just the Phillies fans, already annoyed at the jacket, but the National fans as well.

In one simple move, he angered the home team, and the visitors.

And then, he proceeded to finish the job.

Rearing back and throwing, the O-man managed to toss a balloon ball in the general direction of the plate, causing the catcher to jump up, move wide and to the right, and eventually catch the high, outside pitch.

Totally embarrassing and angering the very White Sox fan base he had pandered, and who generally deserve better than to be associated with a pitcher of his caliber.

But back to the nukes.

On Tuesday, the O-man said the United States will pledge not to use nuclear weapons against most non-nuclear countries -- no matter what they use against us.

The declaration came out of the O-man's administration's revised nuclear policy, under which the United States is also committing not to develop or test any new nuclear weapons.

That revision is aimed at leading the world in reducing nuclear stockpiles, though many experts are concerned the O-man could put the country in danger if others don't follow.

Gordon Chang, author of "Nuclear Showdown: North Korea Takes on the World," called the policy announced Tuesday a "dramatic departure" -- and said it will work only if other nuclear states follow the U.S. lead.

"We could end up in sort of a ... situation of strategic inferiority, because everyone else is improving and we're not doing anything," he said.

A number of commentators from both sides of the media said that removing the "strategic ambiguity" from the nation's nuclear policy opens the door for terrorists or enemy states to use non-nuclear (read "chemical" or "biological") weapons against the U.S. without fear of nuclear retalliation.

Concern about this latest initiative is shared across party lines.

Amitai Etzioni, who served as a senior strtegic arms adviser to the Carter administration, writes at Huffington Post that "eliminating nuclear stockpiles in the United States and Russia does not eliminate the nuclear threat".

"I predict (and it takes very little foresight to make this prediction) that the American and Russian moves toward zero will have no discernible effect on any of these burning issues regarding nuclear weaponry in Iran, North Korea, Pakistan and in the hands of terrorists", he wrote.

But the widest concern is revealing itself among our allies.

Recently, the O-man publicly humiliated Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, in a highly visible manner during his White House visit.

That angered US Jews, and supporters of Israel around the world, including several other key European allies.

But it also brought solace to some of the O-man's liberal base, who have long felt the US is too identified with Israel to foster better relations in the Arabic world.

Israel has long enjoyed the benefits of what has been called a "first strike shield", in which the US has vocally announced that anyone attacking Israel would be subject to the full retalliation of the US military, up to and including nuclear options.
 
That same assurance has been extended to European countries, especially the volatile areas of Eastern Europe like Poland and the Czech Republic, among others.
 
Up until yesterday, when the O-man wiped it out with a single stroke of the pen, in what many feel is a moment as revealing as the unfolding of the White Sox cap in Nationals Park.
 
Because by removing that protective umbrella from Israel, the O-man also had to remove it from several of the Liberals shining stars in the realm of developing countries, including several former Russian republics, who are attempting to stay free of Russian influence as they develop modern socialist governments.
 
Add to the problems that the O-man left a caveat in the agreement that says all bets are off if your country isn't living up to existing treaties, and the he has angered everyone, just as he did at the ballpark, because hard line leftist Libs were hoping for full US nuclear disarmament.
 
Poland, the Czech Republic, Israel, and other allies aren't usually much on watching US baseball.
 
Perhaps if they were, they would have reconized the glaring similarities between the O-man's pitching and his foreign policy.
 
In both cases, his actions can be seen as "high" and "outside".
 
 
"No game in the world is as tidy and dramatically neat as baseball, with cause and effect, crime and punishment, motive and result, so cleanly defined." ---- Paul Gallico
 
"Baseball is an allegorical play about America, a poetic, complex, and subtle play of courage, fear, good luck, mistakes, patience about fate, and sober self-esteem." ---- Saul Steinberg