Let me get reelected first

Current policy in Ukraine is reflected in a conversation between President Obama and then Premier Dimitri Medvedev in March 2012.  It was captured on an open microphone and explains more of U.S. behavior than any event since.  Here is the quote from a Washington Post article 

[  Caught on open mike, Obama tells Medvedev he needs ‘space’ on missile defense, 26 March 2012 ]  

" But in an unscripted moment picked up by camera crews, the American president was more blunt: Let me get reelected first, he said; then I’ll have a better chance of making something happen."  

Letting the Russians succeed in Ukraine, which is not part of NATO and was discouraged by the U.S. from entering, seems to be one of those things he was talking about.  Let's be friends after I am elected, was largely ignored by the U.S. electorate.  Now, it has come back to haunt them.  

We have to wonder what else was lumped into that deal.  Maybe that "humanitarian aid" that flows into the Ukraine, instead of the TOW missiles they need to defend themselves, was part of it.  

In an eloquent defense of the Administration policy given on 9 February, a spokesperson echoed the liberal defense of "We don't want to start a proxy war with Russia".  I'm trying to figure out where this logic entered into public discussion because it infers that any support for the Ukraine government is support for a proxy war with Russia.  Nothing could be further from the truth, and the Russians are fighting somebody in the east.  Who would that be?  Putin already said he could be in Kiev in 3 days, but he seems intent on not rushing.  Who is he fighting?  Who will the countries in the New Russia be? We certainly have to believe he is at war with someone and it is a proxy war of his own making.  The U.S. State Department still believes Russia is a friendly country where we can "make something happen".