So Obama will talk with any dictator

but it doesn't mean that he will be speaking honestly:

The accommodating Canadian Embassy nonetheless tried to smooth things over yesterday with a statement saying that "there was no intention to convey, in any way, that Senator Obama and his campaign team were taking a different position in public from views expressed in private, including about NAFTA." Which is too bad, because the apparent revelation that Mr. Obama doesn't believe his own trade rhetoric is the best news we've heard about the Illinois Senator's economic policy.

In Mr. Goolsbee's defense, we too have recognized a language barrier separating the U.S. and Canada, particularly when we enjoy watching NHL games on television. In their understated manner, Canadian analysts describe blows to the head as "messages" and sticks to the face as "taking liberties." So perhaps Mr. Goolsbee's obligatory nod toward the benefits of trade was interpreted in Canada as a passionate defense of free markets.

Like I said, Barack Obama is starting to remind me of Bill Clinton.

UPDATE: And, as Bret Stephens reminds, Jimmy Carter:

In 1977, Jimmy Carter told Americans to get over their "inordinate fear of communism." This year, expect to be told to get over your "inordinate fear" of terrorism.

Two years after he expressed a merely ordinate fear of communism, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. "History teaches, perhaps, very few clear lessons," Mr. Carter said in his response. "But surely one such lesson learned by the world at great cost is that aggression, unopposed, becomes a contagious disease." Mr. Carter learned that the hard way. Let's hope Mr. Obama won't have to learn the same lesson, the same way.

Oh, yeah.

UPDATE: More cred issues:

"When it came time to make the most important foreign policy decision of our generation the decision to invade Iraq Senator Clinton got it wrong," Obama said.

He said that Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a fellow Democrat from neighboring West Virginia, had read the intelligence estimate as a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee and had voted against the war resolution.

Rockefeller, who is now chairman of that committee, endorsed Obama on Friday and campaigned with him on Saturday.

Just one problem: As blogress Clarice Feldman points out, and as the Senate roll-call confirms, Rockefeller voted for the war. We guess it was too good to check!