Cashman: President sends bad signal with no-show in Paris

The Nobel Peace Prize committee should ask President Obama for its 2009 award back.

History will remember that when the world came together in Paris on Sunday to march against terrorism, the president couldn’t get his act together.

The White House admitted yesterday they screwed up. The absence of the president at the march — or even Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry or even Attorney General Eric Holder, who was actually in Paris on Sunday — was a critical missed opportunity for America. You don’t often hear administration officials admit they’re wrong, but that’s not enough.

Some 44 world leaders managed to attend a march that drew more than a million people to the streets of Paris protesting the massacre at the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and a Jewish market. The two terrorist attacks left 17 innocent people dead.

The leaders in attendance were able to get their security detail in place, but the White House claims it was too much of a scramble, with White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest calling presidential security “onerous and significant.”

That didn’t stop Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas from setting aside their differences and showing up to march.

But the leader of the free world — who is supposed to help bring about peace globally — was stuck inside the White House. Was Air Force One not gassed up?

James Stavridis, a former navy admiral and dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, told me it’s a shame.

“The failure to have a senior representative at the ‘Je Suis Charlie’ march in Paris was significant and unfortunate,” Stavridis said.

“Of all the nations who would most want to be present at such a rally, the U.S. would be at the top of the list given our historic strong support for freedom of speech and counter-terrorism,” he said. “While the security concerns are understandable, it sent a very poor signal across the Atlantic, where our greatest pool of partners reside.”

This president may have ended two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, but he has also completely underestimated the power of Islamic terror groups like ISIS. Standing in solidarity with Parisians and other world leaders against terror would have been a photo op for the ages.

Jaclyn Cashman co-hosts “Morning Meeting” from 9 a.m. to noon on Boston Herald Radio. Follow her on Twitter at @JaclynCashman.