Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin appears to be doing a little dance around Hillary Clinton's table. It just feels like déjà vu all over again, with Putin’s KGB background rearing it’s ugly head, talk of missile defense systems in Eastern Europe, a nut case leader in Tehran and missives about nuclear disarmament. It feels like 1979.

In the past month President Obama signed on to a UN resolution calling for nuclear disarmament. A week later the administration announced that it was backing out of a U.S.-NATO agreement to build air defense systems, including Patriot missile interceptors and a radar station, in Poland and the Czech Republic. Both free nations still feel the threat of residual Cold War tensions. This air defense agreement between the U.S. our friends in Eastern Europe angered the Russians and was largely responsible for putting a chill on U.S.-Russia relations during the Bush administration.

Obama’s move to renege on the air defense system was clearly a concession to Russia, hoping to eventually win their support in the quest for international sanctions against Iran.

Today Putin upped the ante, firmly rejecting any part of sanctions against Iran for their duplicitous agenda towards uranium enrichment. Earlier in the year Iran claimed that the enrichment was only for the purpose of building nuclear energy facilities, that is until September, when they admitted that they might, possibly, sort of, depending on what the definition of “is” is, have a weapons grade enrichment plant in operation as well. Oops…was that wrong?

Putin, who most believe is the puppet master behind “President” Medvedyev, did a little two-step with Clinton this week, allowing her to amuse herself in “negotiations” with the Russian Foreign Minister, who appeared to be warming to the idea of joining in the sanctions against Iran. And dance they did! Headlines in major newspapers were highly anticipatory of Russia falling to Clinton’s charm and diplomatic finesse!

That naive hope came crashing down hours ago when a defiant Putin rejected any possibility of joining on with a U.S. led sanctions strategy. It's clear he smells weakness.

Why would he care about supporting our sanctions against Iran? That would put the U.S. back in the role as world "leader" and Putin is not going to do anything that smacks of taking orders from the U.S. Currently Russia and Iran enjoy some mutually beneficial trade arrangements to include oil, weapons and consumer goods. Russia has agreed to provide S-300 air defense systems to Tehran, though they have yet to actually deliver the systems, leaving the contract unfulfilled to date.

Obama's foreign policy is looking more like Pinocchio being led to Pleasure Island. He enjoyed the rock star treatment from Europe throughout his campaign and first one hundred days in office only to be bitch-slapped in Copenhagen after what was surely expected to be a heroic and winning pitch to the Olympic Committee. Then came the bizarre Peace Prize award that was little more than a shameless bootlick from Norway.

Such behavior from Europe seems unwarranted given the Obama administration's submissive, "I'm not George Bush" platitudes. He could not have been more gratuitous and apologetic at the United Nations. Shouldn't the world now seem like a more hospitable place to the U.S. now that we no longer practice “cowboy diplomacy?” Haven’t we played Beta-dog enough, tucking our tails, exposing our throats and offering self-deprecating apologies on the world stage?

Welcome to Pleasure Island. Expect to get smacked around and humiliated after accepting false promises from the likes of Ahmadinejad and Putin. It just never works when a foreign policy is motivated by the desire to be liked. The bullies smell weakness from afar and savor the role of watching us dance nervously on the world stage.
This is the “new tone” from Washington. We’ll put our hands up, drop our weapons, promise to remain defenseless in exchange for…..being liked? Even Hillary Clinton knows better than that.

Perhaps Hillary is learning what Bush instinctively knew, but Obama has yet to figure out, and that is the startling fact that no matter what we do, America stands alone. We can stand alone one of two ways: Either by maintaining our strength (inviting allies to join us along the way), while tolerating the whining and sniping from envious lesser nations, or we can end up alone and compromised due to our weakness and lack of vigilance, allowing someone else to dictate our direction.

The very worst thing we can do is act like we have authority with people who have no interest in playing fair. It makes us pawns to their game. Then again, I dig cowboys.