--- Joe Biden, quoted by Ned Temko in Biden in Saudi Arabia: The strategy behind ‘making nice’, CSMonitor, July 13, 2022.
From the piece"
It’s a maxim coined by Joe Biden a dozen years ago, when he was still vice president. But it might just as well be emblazoned on Air Force One as he embarks on his first presidential visit to the Middle East: “Life is a matter of really tough choices.”
Back then, he was talking about a political trade-off on tax-cut legislation. Now, however, he’s had to face a much tougher choice on a larger stage: a world seismically jolted by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
The result: an even more difficult, and controversial, trade-off. It’s between the emphasis on democracy and human rights he has placed at the core of his foreign policy, and his campaign to build and sustain international support to isolate Mr. Putin and deny him victory.
