President Obama called on long time White House correspondent Helen Thomas saying to laughter, “All right, Helen. This is my inaugural moment here. I’m really excited.”

Little did he know that the veteran newswoman was about to hit him with the hardest question of the night.

“Mr. President, do you think that Pakistan are maintaining the safe havens in Afghanistan for these so-called terrorists? And also, do you know of any country in the Middle East that has nuclear weapons?”

I jumped out of my seat, ‘Damn, let’s see how he answers this question!”

Answer Question 1. (easy)

“Well, I think that Pakistan — there is no doubt that in the FATA region of Pakistan, in the mountainous regions along the border of Afghanistan, that there are safe havens where terrorists are operating. And one of the goals of Ambassador Holbrooke, as he is traveling throughout the region, is to deliver a message to Pakistan that they are endangered as much as we are by the continuation of those operations. And that we’ve got to work in a regional fashion to root out those safe havens. It’s not acceptable for Pakistan or for us to have folks who, with impunity, will kill innocent men, women and children. I believe that the new government of Pakistan and Mr. Zardari cares deeply about getting control of this situation. We want to be effective partners with them on that issue.”

Inaudible question

“Well, Mr. Holbrooke is there, and that’s exactly why he is being sent there, because I think that we have to make sure that Pakistan is a stalwart ally with us in battling this terrorist threat.”

Answer to questions 2. (hard)

With respect to nuclear weapons, you know, I don’t want to speculate. What I know is this: that if we see a nuclear arms race in a region as volatile as the Middle East, everybody will be in danger. And one of my goals is to prevent nuclear proliferation generally. I think that it’s important for the United States, in concert with Russia, to lead the way on this. And, you know, I’ve mentioned this in conversations with the Russian President, Mr. Medvedev, to let him know that it is important for us to restart the conversations about how we can start reducing our nuclear arsenals in an effective way so that — so that we then have the standing to go to other countries and start stitching back together the nonproliferation treaties that, frankly, have been weakened over the last several years.

“Why do we have to speculate –”

THE PRESIDENT: Okay, all right.

“on who (inaudible)?”

He then moves on to the next question.

I think he did the best he could do with that question and perhaps gave us some insight into his think on the point of Ms. Thomas question. I am sure most people totally missed this question. The little news coverage I’ve heard or seen did not comment on it.

So who does have nuclear weapons in the Middle East? Some people may say Pakistan and India, but that would not be correct because they are not in the region traditionally called the Middle East. And more to the point, it is widely known that both of those countries have nuclear weapons. Ms. Thomas was asking a real political question not a trivia question.

Caren Bohan of Reuters earlier asked a question about Iran. In his response the President reprimanded Iran for, “their development of a nuclear weapon, or their pursuit of a nuclear weapon…” Notice that the President distinguished between development and pursuit of nuclear weapons.

Ms. Thomas question was pointed directly at Israel. President Obama did not want to and did not answer the question. Unfortunately for him the little he did say confirms that the U.S. either does not know if Israel has nukes and has decided not to do something about it or our government has confirmed they have nukes and has decided to do nothing about it. To raise this point Ms. Thomas attempted to ask why do he need to speculate? Either there is a country with nukes in the Middle East or there is not. If you are not sure shouldn’t we be talking why you are not sure and what countries might have them? Iran has already been ruled out. So tell me again where is the speculation?

Why is this important? The U.S. claims that our biggest problem with Iran among others is their pursuit of nukes. It is widely know that Israel might have nukes. Their official policy is one of nuclear ambiguity also known as nuclear opacity. They have neither confirmed nor denied their possession of the weapons. Why should Iranians take serious the prospect that it is OK for Israel to have nukes or be ambiguous about it and not OK for Iran to have nukes? Or whatever kind of nuclear program they want to have perhaps short of nukes? These are real question and impinge on other aspects of credibility when dealing with nations in the region who are in conflict with Israel. Nuclear opacity turns out to be the game Saddam Hussein was playing and was invaded by the U.S. as an result. We seem ready to invade or pressure all nations who play that game but Israel. Not a good place to start when calling for strengthening the Nuclear Proliferation  Treaty. Notice that Obama’s answer spoke directly to the treaty and his intention to gain more credibility by working with Russia to diminish the U.S. ad Russia stockpiles. It may also give him more room to approach Israel behind the scences and as well as Iran.

I think Obama was caught off guard a bit by the question. I speculate that it was the first time as President he found that if he tried to answer a question directly he would need to lie and he was not prepared to do that. All Presidents lie. It comes with the job. He will have to get use to it.

Press conference transcript.
http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2009/02/obamas_first_white_house_press.html