He's Really Not So Bad

In what looks to become one of the most ham-fisted diplomatic bungles of the decade, the Obama admin- istration has significantly toned down US pressure on Zimbabwe's batshit crazy military dictator Robert Mugabe by withdrawing a public demand for Mugabe to step down issued under the Bush administration. 

Reuters reports that anonymous US officials claimed that the move was because Obama had not yet picked his team of Africa experts, and thus felt that giving such a strong opinion would be unwise. This has led some Africans to wonder what kind of traumatic childhood Obama's soon-to-be high-level Africa experts had in order to conclude that Mugabe is actually a really swell guy. 

Another reason put forth by the administration's unnamed officials was to give Southern African officials "breathing space" in concluding a deal which would result in power-sharing. This amounts to overt appeasement. No one in South Africa actually wants to share power with Mugabe. Everyone and their mother realises that he's completely unfit to hold any kind of office, and the power-sharing deal is at best a grudging compromise extracted under extreme duress. What the USA needs to do is support Southern African countries in taking a harder line on Mugabe, not buttress their inability to do anything about him. 

Obama's administration may well change their line on this in the coming weeks, mostly because appeasing an 80 year old insane and murderous man to any extent is a really retarded thing to do.