HE'S A CREATURE OF INSTITUTIONS...:

Obama Must Stop Neglecting India: The president should reach out quickly to the government in New Delhi. (Tunku Varadarajan, 05.18.09, Forbes)

[T]he one part of America's foreign policy that Obama can be argued to have flubbed so far is its relations with India. Since taking office in January, he has paid India scant attention. India--which for the first time in its history is in a position to regard the U.S. as its closest big-power ally, thanks to the evangelical efforts of George W. Bush--has noted Obama's froideur. It noted, too, that the one time the American president made an India-related public pronouncement, it was a critical (and fatuous) reference to India's role in the outsourcing of employment. (On May 4, he criticized the U.S. tax code for--in his view--saying that "you should pay lower taxes if you create a job in Bangalore, India, than if you create one in Buffalo, N.Y.")

There are two ways to read Barack Obama's neglect of India. The first reading--one that gives him the benefit of the doubt that he's not keen, by disposition, on India--is that he was maintaining a prudent distance from New Delhi as India went to the polls. [...]

The second, darker reading of Obama's coolness toward India rests on a sense that the president is punishing the Indian political establishment for its closeness to George W. Bush. Given the excellence of India's relations with the Bush White House--and clear indications from John McCain that India could expect no change in relations if he were to win--it was hardly surprising that New Delhi viewed candidate Obama as the less attractive.

Yet if there is any pique at all in Obama's approach to India, he needs to get over it fast. The alliance is too valuable to jeopardize.

...most of which don't understand what W did.

Posted by Orrin Judd at May 19, 2009 5:59 AM