The Madera Tribune


Obama, in final UN speech, calls for world course correction

September 20, 2016


UNITED NATIONS — President Barack Obama conceded Tuesday that the United States and other world powers have limited ability to solve the most profound challenges facing the world, while calling for a "course correction" for globalization to ensure that nations don't retreat into a more sharply divided world.






In a less-than-subtle jab at Donald Trump, the Republican running to replace him, Obama said, "The world is too small for us to simply be able to build a wall and prevent (extremism) from affecting our own societies."


The president was unabashed in his critique of Russia as he laid out his diagnosis of the world's ills. Obama's longstanding differences with Russian President Vladimir Putin over his actions in Ukraine have accompanied intense disagreement over Syria's future and a series of failed attempts by Russia and the U.S. to resolve the civil war there together.






In the year since, Moscow's leverage in the conflict has strengthened significantly. Russia's military intervention in Syria has helped bolster Assad's standing without pulling it into the military "quagmire" that Obama had predicted.




It's a theme that Democrat Hillary Clinton has put at the forefront of her campaign for president, casting herself as the natural continuation of Obama's legacy. In another apparent reference to Trump, Obama bemoaned how terrorist networks had spread their ideology on social media, spurring anger toward "innocent immigrants and Muslims."




"This is the paradox that defines the world today," Obama said. "We must go forward, and not backward."


The president cited his administration's outreach to former adversaries Cuba and Myanmar as key examples of progress, along with global cooperation to cut emissions blamed for global warming. At the same time, he said he sought not to "whitewash" challenges across the globe, some of which he attributed to deepening anxieties about the profound shifts inflicted by technology and growing international interdependence.


"In order to move forward though, we do have to acknowledge that the existing path to global integration requires a course correction," Obama said.

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