The Obama administration seems not to have learned from its mistakes in Egypt, where the president trod carefully instead of throwing his support behind the democracy upheaval that ousted Hosni Mubarak.
Yesterday, in his first public statement concerning the Libyan protests that started Feb. 15, the president condemned Libya's violent crackdown but did not mention Gaddafi by name. "[The] suffering and bloodshed is outrageous, and it is unacceptable," he said. While Obama went on to say that the United States would support "accountability for the perpetrators, and stands with the Libyan people," but he did not mention specific sanctions. In comparison, French President Nicolas Sarkozy called for the European Union to adopt immediately a set of sanctions against Libya. The Washington Post also reported that the United States' delegate to the U.N. remained uncharacteristically quiet during the debates over the resolution that passed unanimously Tuesday.
The administration continues to struggle to balance its security interests with its support of popular reform uprisings. As Matthew Yglesias argued in the Prospect shortly after the Egyptian uprising, the United States should strongly support emerging grassroots movements and the eventual upheaval of long established -- if friendly -- autocratic regimes. These are opportunities for the United States to illustrate to the Middle East and North Africa that the democracy-promotion song-and-dance routine isn't just for show but rather is really part of American ideals. The U.S. is on the wrong side; from here on out it is going to be about damage control.
