Was Barack Obama secretly selling out Eastern Europe to Russia’s Vladimir Putin last week when his words were picked up by an accidentally open microphone?
“On all these issues, but particularly missile defense, this can be solved, but it’s important for [Putin] to give me space,” he told Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.
“After my election, I will have more flexibility,” he said in Medvedev’s ear Monday.
Or, to translate: I’m the real Etch A Sketch man — so don’t believe what I say or do now. . . Just wait ’til I can shake things up after November.
Medvedev, always the loyal KGB case agent, shot back: “I understand; I will transmit this information to Vladimir.”
It is rather appalling that Obama appears to have shared with Putin his plans for a second term — at least insofar as they relate to Russia — while hiding them from the American public.
Voters deserve a full account of what the president has in mind if he should win a second term — especially if it means signing US allies over to Moscow’s hands.
Europeans, anyway, seem to get the gist of Obama’s tête-à-tête with Medvedev; Warsaw’s top-selling daily asked: “Were they trading Poland?”
There’s reason to worry: Poles have a long history of being dealt like chattel and sold out by world leaders — including Obama himself, who abandoned President Bush’s plans to install a missile shield there that could help keep Russia at bay.
So, we can only imagine what’s up next, once Obama doesn’t have to worry about getting elected ever again.
Russia, after all, runs a kind of Monroe Doctrine on steroids in Eastern Europe — which the Bear considers its den.
So when the White House tried to brush the incident off — Obama said he wasn’t “hiding the ball” — it only made the revealing slip that much more worrisome.
The image of a flexible Obama bending over backward for Putin is something less than appealing.
So some answers are needed.
Not next year, but right now.