One might think that the foreign policy disasters of the Jimmy Carter presidency would be enough to permanently retire his National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski from the league of  presidential candidate gurus. But Barack Obama, who publicly discussed invading Pakistan and ruling out use of our nuclear arsenal, seems to have found a soul mate of sorts in Zbig. The alliance of the icompetent?

The former national security advisor to Jimmy Carter introduced Obama at Ashford University in Iowa today, after decrying what he called the Bush administration's colonialist policies in a postcolonial world, adding the Administration had "used mendacity" to justify the war and that "it has discredited America as a whole."
 
For Brzezinski, 79, support for Obama means support for a radical change in direction of American foreign policy. But some argue Brzezisnski's support could hurt Obama, particularly with Jewish voters. The Politico today wrote Brzezinski came under fire this summer for an essay he wrote in the journal Foreign Policy, "defending a controversial new book about the power of the ‘Israel Lobby' in American politics."

"The fact of the matter is that I'm part of the only administration that brought about peace between Israel and its neighbors," Brzezinski said in an interview with NBC News/National Journal in Iowa on the day Obama delivered his Iraq policy speech, which he said he did not have a direct hand in. "And so I'm proud of my record in the Middle East."

Senator Obama is standing by one of his top foreign policy advisers, Zbigniew Brzezinski, despite concerns that aligning with the former aide to President Carter will undermine Mr. Obama's support with the pro-Israel community. [....]

A Harvard law professor and supporter of Senator Clinton, Alan Dershowitz, said Tuesday that Mr. Obama had "made a terrible mistake" by aligning with Mr. Brzezinski.

A spokeswoman for the Obama campaign, Jennifer Psaki, yesterday pointed to the fact that Messrs. Brzezinski and Obama both opposed the Iraq war from the beginning, unlike Mrs. Clinton, and she suggested the Clinton camp was trying to smear Mr. Brzezinski.