The moral preening of the left about Syrian refugees

Walter Russell Mead:

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Goodhearted liberals have reacted with handwringing to the avalanche of dissenting governors. Some have earnestly quoted relevant Bible verses about taking in the poor and the afflicted, while the usual righteous tut-tutters have engaged in their usual righteous tut-tutting. “Everybody who disagrees with my proposal is a bitter-clinging xenophobe, not to mention a racist,” is the clear implication of the President’s supporters.
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To see the full cynicism of the Obama approach to the refugee issue, one has only to ask President Obama’s least favorite question: Why is there a Syrian refugee crisis in the first place?
Obama’s own policy decisions—allowing Assad to convert peaceful demonstrations into an increasingly ugly civil war, refusing to declare safe havens and no fly zones—were instrumental in creating the Syrian refugee crisis. This crisis is in large part the direct consequence of President Obama’s decision to stand aside and watch Syria burn. For him to try and use a derisory and symbolic program to allow 10,000 refugees into the United States in order to posture as more caring than those evil Jacksonian rednecks out in the benighted sticks is one of the most cynical, cold-blooded, and nastily divisive moves an American President has made in a long time.

Moreover, many of those “benighted” people were willing to sign up for the U.S. military and go to fight ISIS in Syria to protect the refugees. Many Americans who now oppose the President’s ill-considered refugee program have long supported the use of American power to create “safe zones” in Syria so the refugees could be sheltered and fed in their own country. If President Obama seriously cared about the fate of Syria’s millions of displaced people, he would have started to organize those safe havens years ago. And if he understood the nature of America’s role in Europe, he would have known that working with the Europeans to prevent a mass refugee and humanitarian disaster was something that had to be done.
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There is much more.

Mead goes on to explain how Obama's Syrian failure has been a tragedy not only for Syrians but also for Europe which is inundated with refugees because of his failure.  His moral preening on the issue is disgusting as is that for other liberals who are supporting this travesty of a policy such as Hillary Clinton.

See also Jonah Goldberg's:

Obama’s Strategic Bumbling Is Theater of the Absurd

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Obama’s dithering sparked the refugee crisis. He’s now using a smattering of refugees as a cynical prop to prove he’s the hero of his own morality tale. The reality is that he’s a villain in his own theater of the absurd. And we’re the suckers in the audience falling for it.