Who Will Teach Palin Foreign Policy?

August 30, 2008

McCain’s choice for co-runner does know little about foreign policy. But there will soon be events in which she will have to debate Joe Biden, a foreign policy old timer who met more international folks than Palin met moose. That will not be a beauty pageant as she will be asked about her position on several hot issues.

Jim Lobe checked her public record:

John McCain has repeatedly defined “the battle and struggle against radical Islamic extremism” as “the transcendent issue of our time.”
[…]
I just did a Nexis search for anything Sarah Palin may have said or written about that issue — I searched her name with “Muslim” and “Islam” or any variant of those words — and didn’t find a single citation. Of course, there probably aren’t many Muslims in Alaska and she doesn’t profess any foreign policy expertise. But if this is indeed “the transcendent issue of our time” on which just about every national political figure has said something in the last couple of years, …well, I leave you to reach a conclusion. (She hasn’t said anything noted by Nexis about Israel in the last two years either.)

Someone will have to teach Palin the right codewords, train her to recognize the various complicate names of various countries and foreign leaders and indoctrinate her with the Bush / Cheney / McCain / AIPAC War of Terror believes. That will be an intensive and intimate endeavor.

There are several folks who left the Bush administration and would love a job in a McCain one. The Palin trainer job would open that perspective. Perle, Wolfowitz, Bolton, Libby, Feith, Ledeen are all available. Who else?

While Palin is now an empty vessel foreign policy wise, within a few days she will have to say something about Israel, Russia, the nuclear deal with India, Pakistan border fights and other issues. So who will bring her up to speed?

And yes, she is red meat for the fringe and may try to turn any discussion into ‘value voter’ and ‘culture war’ stuff. But real politics do not stop there.

Bush is now trying to make sure that his War of Terror legacy survives his presidency and will be a theme of the election contest:

Tucked deep into a recent proposal from the Bush administration [..]: an affirmation that the United States is still at war with Al Qaeda.

[…]
The language [..] goes beyond political symbolism. Echoing a measure that Congress passed just days after the Sept. 11 attacks, it carries significant legal and public policy implications for Mr. Bush, and potentially his successor, to claim the imprimatur of Congress to use the tools of war, including detention, interrogation and surveillance, against the enemy, legal and political analysts say.

Some lawmakers are concerned that the administration’s effort to declare anew a war footing is an 11th-hour maneuver to re-establish its broad interpretation of the president’s wartime powers, even in the face of challenges from the Supreme Court and Congress.

Usually the Democrats would predictably fold over Bush’s request. But to do so now would be deadly for their candidates. They can not avoid a discussion about this by passing it silently through congress. Therefore discussions over renewed war powers for the War of Terror will be a big part of the showdown over next 60+ days.

Palin will have to talk about this and its foreign policy implications. With Biden on the other side that will not be an easy task. Who will tell her what to say?

Posted by b on August 30, 2008 at 18:20 UTC | Permalink

Comments

The same folks, in spirit, if not actually physically the same, that taught the moron Bush what to say. The majority of American people are very forgiving when it comes to this, obviously. Just look at the results. They elected the severely inarticulate and barely educated Bush to not one, but two terms in office. He was, and still is, a blundering buffoon when it comes to oration, but that’s part of his mystique, and what makes him so endearing to the common man. He’s the ultimate Anti-Intellectual. Plus, she’s only a VP, so the stakes aren’t nearly as high, and her guffaws not nearly as relevant.

Posted by: Karl | Aug 30 2008 19:01 utc | 1

you’re fast b, i was just headed over to post raw story’s cover of the second link

As the nation focuses on Sen. John McCain’s choice of running mate, President Bush has quietly moved to expand the reach of presidential power by ensuring that America remains in a state of permanent war.
Buried in a recent proposal by the Administration is a sentence that has received scant attention — and was buried itself in the very newspaper that exposed it Saturday. It is an affirmation that the United States remains at war with al Qaeda, the Taliban and “associated organizations.”
Part of a proposal for Guantanamo Bay legal detainees, the provision before Congress seeks to “acknowledge again and explicitly that this nation remains engaged in an armed conflict with Al Qaeda, the Taliban, and associated organizations, who have already proclaimed themselves at war with us and who are dedicated to the slaughter of Americans.”
The New York Times page 8 placement of the article in its Saturday edition seems to downplay its importance. Such a re-affirmation of war carries broad legal implications that could imperil Americans’ civil liberties and the rights of foreign nationals for decades to come.

re palin dkos diary points out her earlier ’00 endorsement of Buchanan.

Accidentally voting for Pat Buchanan instead of Al Gore is something that brings up a lot of emotion in South Florida. Not just because the people there feel disenfranchised and upset that their vote helped Bush, but also because instead of voting for the ticket with the first Jew (I know, we all know now about Lieberman), they voted for someone they perceived to be an anti-semite:
Several were distraught. There was something confusing about the ballot, they said. They weren’t sure if they had actually voted for Al Gore and Joe Lieberman. In keeping with the demographics of Delray Beach, the town where the mall was located, virtually all of the volunteers were elderly and many were Jewish. They had been especially motivated to support Lieberman, who was the first Jew to be nominated by a major party for vice president. What made the problem especially upsetting was that some of the volunteers thought they had voted for Pat Buchanan, a man they regarded as an anti-Semite. What, they wondered, could they do?

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2008 19:18 utc | 2

Re: Buchanan –
Interesting attack angle of one Dem AIPAC asset on Palin: Congressman: Choosing Palin an insult to Jews

WASHINGTON – Is Sarah Palin pro-Israel or anti-Israel? Democratic Congressman Robert Wexler lashed out at John McCain’s running mate Sarah Palin, saying the choice was a an insult to Jewish Americans because of her support for Pat Buchanan. However, Jewish sources familiar with Palin dismissed the attack, saying Palin maintains strong ties with the Jewish community.
“John McCain’s decision to select a vice presidential running mate that endorsed Pat Buchanan for President in 2000 is a direct affront to all Jewish Americans, “Wexler’s announcement said. “Pat Buchanan is a Nazi sympathizer with a uniquely atrocious record on Israel, even going as far as to denounce bringing former Nazi soldiers to justice and praising Adolf Hitler.”
Earlier, Buchanan said that Palin indeed backed him in the past.

Posted by: b | Aug 30 2008 19:40 utc | 3

It doesn’t matter if dear Sarah isn’t up to speed on foreign policy, because she has been anointed by the chosen one, the protector of America. Father Saint John in all his wisdom and strength will protect dear Sarah like she was (is) his daughter. Her virgin purity and sublime beauty will not be defiled by the iconoclastic forces of the dark one, hell bent on soiling the fabric of the nation. Together they will form an unquestionable and inpenatratible bastion of integrity, strength, honor and tradition in the minds of the people. They will run as the symbolic family of America.
Or at least that seems to be the idea.

Posted by: anna missed | Aug 30 2008 19:46 utc | 4

Posted by: anna missed | Aug 30 2008 19:54 utc | 5

the last link in lobe’s post leads to a recording of her voice. what are the chances she will drop the ‘eye’rack pronunciations while running during the presidential campaign. it grates in my ears so.

Posted by: annie | Aug 30 2008 19:55 utc | 6

Foreign policy? Heck, Russia is just across the straits from Alaska, Palin had it in her own backyard.
But seriously, this is a heckuva a briliant tactical move, something that Karl Rove could only be proud of. The issues of abortion, oil drilling, gun control and creationism are all right there – the Republicans don’t even need to embarass themselves by discussing them out loud, they just let Palin personify them every time she appears at Mccain’s side.

Posted by: ralphieboy | Aug 30 2008 19:57 utc | 7

Was that last baby really mine?

Posted by: Sarah | Aug 30 2008 20:01 utc | 8

@anna missed – great picture – but not oil on wood. Watercolors? How long until the colors will fade?

Posted by: b | Aug 30 2008 20:13 utc | 9

@8: i heard it was your seventeen year old daughter’s baby, sarah. how very desperate housewives. by the way, i think you’ll make a wonderful president of the “free world” once old John has his heart attack.

Posted by: Lizard | Aug 30 2008 20:58 utc | 10

Agree it was a smart move by the Repubs. Cover your women voters, the fundies, and abortion (all weak points for McCain) in one move. On top of that she almost neutralises the abortion issue with her down’s syndrome child store. I got the below from Alexander Cockburn in Counterpunch.

And as for Palin’s absolute views on abortion, what can Biden throw against Palin’s simple statement apropos her having a baby identified in the womb as having Down syndrome, “I chose life”.

Throwing rocks at the Republican position on abortion will be complicated when going up against that.
If Cockburn’s contention that she is actually quite sharp is correct then teaching her foriegn policy well enough to get through a VP debate should not be too hard. Just show her a map of the world and make her memorise the 20 or so most recognisable muslim countries, and the dozen or so eastern European ones.
Then drill the next five points into her head,
European country you recognise: Call it a wimp
European country you only just heard of: Demand acceptance into NATO
Muslim: Bomb it
Israel: Lay on the flattery until you feel like puking (then a bit more)
Anything else: Threaten to bomb it
That will avoid her making any mistakes that the public could understand. The only thing the public really cares about is being too nice to the wrong country. Threaten to bomb Luxembourg and she’ll look tough while looking dumb. The American public doesn’t mind that.

Posted by: swio | Aug 30 2008 22:35 utc | 11

Indeed. It’s testimony to the sad situation of the US people that Biden won’t be able to call her cruelty, since willingly bearing a kid with Down’s syndrome is just and exactly that, cruelty, and crass ideology on par with Lyssenko’s.

Posted by: CluelessJoe | Aug 30 2008 23:29 utc | 12

Excuse the deviation from the topic. Support requested for our Cuban brothers and sisters!

Gustav howled into Cuba’s Isla de Juventud as a monstrous Category 4 hurricane on Saturday while both Cubans and Americans scrambled to flee the path of the fast-growing storm.
Forecasters said Gustav was just short of becoming a top-scale Category 5 hurricane as it powered its way toward mainland Cuba, where authorities were hurriedly evacuating more than 240,000 people from the nation’s tobacco-rich western tip.

Posted by: D. Mathews | Aug 31 2008 0:43 utc | 13

Wondering,
Re: the “I chose LIfe” line from Pain.
How did Pain know the fetus had Downs’Syndrome unless she had pre-natal testing done??
Why would she have pre-natal nesting done is she is anti-abortion?
??

Posted by: Fighting Bob | Aug 31 2008 1:22 utc | 14

Well I think we have had two VP candidates in training for a while now, and there will be plenty of pitches to take things off news rumination on her credentials or what noise comes down the pike on Biden. The noise machine will mix her story around plenty, and she can just be sharp and make a hard poke now and again to be liked, since being an a**hole is the primary requirement. I’m surprised to see the machine isn’t yet acting against Biden, no one has said he ate their pants or whatever, yet. A news scandal of any BS meme is like the anthrax mailings, easy if you’re the producer. Maybe they are trying to settle down consumer activity, slow down the economic downturn, so are not throwing any rocks in the water.
I’d like to see the two suicidings (of the US anthrax lab guy and DC madam) of late get MSM play, but they are too busy selling bridges too gno-where. I’m sure 60 minutes is working on that right now, haha, but maybe this election they’ll run with something more like ‘dogs of our great leaders’. Such good pets they are to Sumner Redstone, he sharp with the leash.

Posted by: aumana | Aug 31 2008 1:51 utc | 15

what can Biden throw against Palin’s simple statement apropos her having a baby identified in the womb as having Down syndrome, “I chose life”.
Everybody women must have the right to chose.

Posted by: b | Aug 31 2008 4:50 utc | 16

Foreign policy experience:

Ms. Palin appears to have traveled very little outside the United States. In July 2007, she had to get a passport before she visited members of the Alaska National Guard stationed in Kuwait, according to her deputy communications director, Sharon Leighow. She also visited wounded troops in Germany during that trip.

Posted by: b | Aug 31 2008 6:01 utc | 17

Obviously Palin is unqualified, except for one thing: she’s the person McCain wants to work with. And for three reasons:
1.) he’s always worked well with right-wing women; he depends on them, and not for money alone;
2.) he hasn’t always worked well with male colleagues, who’ve been known to involve him in lots of trouble (the Keating Five being one example among others);
3.) he has watched Cheney manhandle Bush for eight years (or so it might have seemed to him); and he may have thought, not unreasonably, that Romney (for example) would really crowd his space (McCain is actually a control-freak–over other people, not over himself).
I think these three reasons alone would override any other criterion; and If I were McCain, I’d make the same choice for those very same reasons–though I might prefer someone like Hutchinson or Liddy Dole (preferring older women as I do).

Posted by: alabama | Aug 31 2008 8:06 utc | 18

“…he has watched Cheney manhandle Bush for eight years.”
And that brings me to the most amazing aspect of this ill-fated choice. It’s putting ideology ahead of competence just like the grand mistakes of the first Bush term. They have not learned. “You’re doing a bang-up job Sarah!”
But what amuses me is the change of culture this will force on the Republican White House for the next four years if Americans vote for McCain and commit suicide. McSame will have to have some one walking with her every minute in Cheney’s old office warning her that those button on his desk are not for the air conditioner. They blow up the world!
No. It won’t work. The Republicans in this case have cooked themselves to the bone. Obama has his problems and so does Biden. But I think we can survive four years of that. Maybe the Constitution will too. But after that? If Obama does not deliver, there will be a strong third party voice in 2012.

Posted by: Diogenes | Aug 31 2008 10:37 utc | 19

Oh….and who will teach her foreign policy? No need to worry. She has the Old Testament.

Posted by: Diogenes | Aug 31 2008 11:13 utc | 20

The first poster in this thread actually wrote:
“They elected the severely inarticulate and barely educated Bush to not one, but two terms in office. He was, and still is, a blundering buffoon when it comes to oration, but that’s part of his mystique, and what makes him so endearing to the common man.”
Bush was elected? That is some news to me and the rest of the world. Bush lost both elections. “Barely educated…” Wrong again. “…endearing to the common man.” Say what? You need to do some serious research on the current American regime.

Posted by: James Crow | Aug 31 2008 14:06 utc | 21

Much is being made about Palin’s lack of foreign policy knowledge and experience… Is this important, did Presidents Carter, Reagan, Cinton, or George W. Bush have much in the way of foreign policy chops before being elected? What about experience? Is a long resume a good judge of effectiveness? Prior to becoming Vice President, Richard Bruce “Dick” Cheney had a ton of experience – as did Gore, Mondale, George H.W. Bush, Spiro Agnew. Yet Agnew resigned in disgrace, the American people rejected Mondale and Gore as President, and Dick Cheney’s fingerprints have been all over every single failure of the Bush administration! Only George H.W. Bush was elected (and to a single term, which the American people saw fit not to extend!)
If ‘distance from the Presidency’ is that all-important, then presumably most people haven’t spent much time thinking about the Presidential line of succession. If something were to happen to the President & VP the next in line for the Presidency would be Nancy Pelosi (D-CA, elected by 148,435 Californians), followed by Senator Robert Byrd (D-Antediluvian, sorry, actually D-WV and former Exalted Cyclops of the KKK), then Condoleezza Rice, and Henry Paulson (the last two not having been voted for by a single person)…
http://ph2dot1.blogspot.com/2008/08/veep.html

Posted by: Dumass | Aug 31 2008 22:09 utc | 22

Mr. Crow, I think you should read #1 again and rethink what you said. By the way, a c average at Yale is barely educated. Shrubya was granted a pass all the way through his schooling years, and it shows. He was a silver-spooned party boy, and it shows. As far as elected is concerned, I agree, there certainly appears to be a strong case that he lost the first election and the second was rigged, but that’s not how history has recorded it, is it? Even if he didn’t rightfully win both elections, they were still damn close, meaning 50% of those who voted in this country found him more attractive than his opponent. Of that 50%, plenty of them were individuals who don’t talk high and fancy like those East Coast Intellectuals, and find great favor in a Prezdent who talks like them. I’ve done plenty of research on the current regime. Perhaps it’s you who needs to further educate themselves on nuance, another thing Bush’s 50% despises.

Posted by: Jimmy Doesn’t Get It | Aug 31 2008 23:12 utc | 23

Of that 50%, plenty of them were individuals who don’t talk high and fancy like those East Coast Intellectuals, and find great favor in a Prezdent who talks like them.
oh please.
he lost the first election and the second was rigged, but that’s not how history has recorded it, is it?
i think the history will definitely reflect the shinigans in ohio and florida and how it has been recorded during the administration of the war crimes president is hardly a case for how it will go down in history.
Even if he didn’t rightfully win both elections, they were still damn close, meaning 50% of those who voted in this country found him more attractive than his opponent.
allegedly. when you have voting machines that are programed to flip results by outside sources one would be prudent to assume they were programmed that way to be used that way.
one thing you are spot on about is your tag, you don’t get it jimmy.
as for the first poster that’s part of his mystique, and what makes him so endearing to the common man.
bush has no reputation for mystique. and if you are referring to the elite who are his base along w/ the dregs of society that support him, they aren’t ‘the common man’. the common man in america is disgusted w/george bush and do not find him endearing in the least.
#22 Is this important, did Presidents Carter, Reagan, Cinton, or George W. Bush have much in the way of foreign policy chops before being elected?
none of them were elected when we were mired in the worst foreign policy fiasco in our history. people are more concerned w/foreign policy chops right now, especially for a would be president who has a history of cancer and is 72 years old.

Posted by: annie | Sep 1 2008 0:40 utc | 24

So let me ask you, Annie. If they can steal an election that easily, and Obama is the “outsider” you claim him to be, then why even bother voting? If I hear you and James Crow correctly, it’s a rigged game, so what’s the point?
Also, I’m not sure who you surround yourself with day in and day out, but rednecks and evangelicals (those two overlap, by the way) love Shrubya’s inarticulation. They love it, and don’t think Rove didn’t have Shrubya play that up.
No, sorry Annie, any shenanigans in the 2000 and 2004 elections will be overlooked, just as they’ve been overlooked since Merica’s been electing Presidents. Maybe you’ve forgotten, Annie, but JFK cheated his way into office by virtue of his father’s mob ties. Show me that one in the History books.
See, Annie, you don’t get to write history, the victors do. The victors are the Plutocrats, and as far as they’re concerned, it never happened. If you want to change anything, it has to start with naked honesty.

Posted by: History’s Written By The Victors | Sep 1 2008 2:29 utc | 25

to History’s Written By The Victors , it aint over til the fat lady sings and who the victors are remain to be seen.
If they can steal an election that easily, and Obama is the “outsider” you claim him to be
source?
it’s a rigged game, so what’s the point?
some people would prefer a little reality w/their morning coffee.
rednecks and evangelicals (those two overlap, by the way) love Shrubya’s inarticulation.
last i heard the latter is disenchanted w/their boychild. i live in one of the most prosperous areas of the nation and neither reside here in multitudes. but regardless of where i live his ratings are the worst in history so i don’t think that bodes well for high numbers in the ‘love lack of articulation’ column.
any shenanigans in the 2000 and 2004 elections will be overlooked
ha.ha.ha. au contraire it will always be remembered hauled out time and again to release the future americans from their responsibility for the end of their empire. in no way can you compare this w/kennedycamelot regardless of the bloodbath that followed in his wake.
that is not comparable to the future, make no mistake bush/cheney will not be the beginning of any future fortune. it would take some massive spin or downright genocide to erase the memories. plus, we have the internet.
If you want to change anything, it has to start with naked honesty.
so why don’t you be nakedly honest and tell us wtf you are doing here at this site? btw, the term ‘history was written by the victors’ originated back in the days when information was transfered by horseback. get w/the program.

Posted by: annie | Sep 1 2008 3:06 utc | 26

whoops on the bold.

Posted by: annie | Sep 1 2008 3:07 utc | 27

just chipping in with the obvious already mentioned:
Well really, what does Bush know about history or geography?
He confused APEC with OPEC, Austria and Australia, ex USSR countries often, Tibet with Nepal (if I remember right), etc. etc. it is too tiresome to list.
Could he find Micronesia, New Zealand, Greenland, Berlin on a map?
Does he know what happened in the French Revolution?
No problem for being elected – twice.

Posted by: Tangerine | Sep 1 2008 12:55 utc | 28

Tell it to Annie, Tangerine. She/He is having a hard time grasping the concept.

Posted by: Anonymous | Sep 1 2008 14:12 utc | 29

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