Recommended: Amateur Hour at the White House,

Leslie Gelb is a former correspondent for The New York Times and is currently President Emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations. He served as an Assistant Secretary of State in the Carter Administration from 1977 to 1979. He is author of the recent New York Times best-seller Power Rules: How Common Sense can Rescue American Foreign Policy (about which more in a later post). He knows what he is talking about.

I recommend his recent article Amateur Hour at the White House, in which he points out that for all of President Obamas traveling the globe and glad-handing world leaders, not much of substance is resulting, and for good reason. As his book Power Rules points out, nations don't respond to high-minded appeals or charismatic personalities -- they never did. They respond to national self-interest, and deals come about when carrots and/or sticks change their perception of their national interests.