GOP candidates running for Dubya's Third Term

Even before the Fall of Ramadi the GOP presidential candidates were foaming-at-the-mouth war hawks. It'll only get worse.

The message itself is coming through clearly—at the “summit” of presidential hopefuls last month in Nashua, N.H., where Ted Cruz roused the audience with his vow to “destroy” ISIS, and last week in Greenville, S.C., where Marco Rubio demanded that “the strongest military power in the world” resume its cocky posture and put its enemies on notice (“We will find you and we will kill you,”) and Scott Walker lamented the lack, in Obama, of “a leader who is willing to take the fight to them before they take the fight to us.”
If it all sounded familiar, so does the revived fervor for “moral clarity” and “the American idea,” not to mention promises of a (tax-free) military buildup and an attitude of indifference bordering on contempt for every ally but Israel.
It is the language—need it be said?—of George W. Bush, who is suddenly relevant again.

George W. Bush never really went away. He's still dishing out "advice" about why it's a bad idea to talk with Iran.
Not to mention the fact that brother George has the ear of leading candidate Jeb.

“If you want to know who I listen to for advice, it’s him,” meaning George.

In fact, almost all of the Republican candidates think that Dubya's record is just hunky-dory. In fact, with the notable exception of Rand Paul, the field of Republican candidates seem to have forgotten why Bush was not popular by 2008.

In remarks last week to the Council on Foreign Relations, Marco Rubio, who has said Bush 43 “did a fantastic job as president over eight years,” called for a new president “who will set forth a doctrine for the exercise of American influence in the world.”

Except for Rand Paul, in every case the GOP candidates go back to their old saw of "if it's not working then push harder" method. For instance, Obama might be bombing six different nations right now, but if that isn't getting the proper results then it must be because he his penis isn't large enough.

The uproar on the right was especially remarkable given that hawkish foreign policy has become something of a litmus test in the Republican primary. At the recent South Carolina Freedom Summit, Rubio summed up his strategy toward global terrorism by quoting Liam Neeson’s character from the movie “Taken”: “We will look for you, we will find you, and we will kill you.” In addition, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker — who previously suggested that his crackdown on Wisconsin’s public-sector unions prepared him to take on the Islamic State — told the crowd that the United States needs “a leader who is willing to take the fight to them before they take the fight to us.”
“None of the candidates seems willing to grapple with the possibility that there are unintended consequences to military action that we need to be wary of,” writes Paul Waldman in The Post. “And when you listen to them talk about Barack Obama’s foreign policy record, the word they use over and over again is ‘weak.’ ” The problem is never that some situations we confront offer no good options, or that our decisions can backfire, or that there are places where the United States may not be able to set things right to the benefit of all. The problem is always weakness, and strength is always the solution.

Republicans don't do "complicated". Saying that something is complicated is a cop-out. They learned everything they needed to know from knocking down the class nerd on the playground in 3rd grade.
Or in the case of this crew, abusing initiates during Pledge Week at their Frat.
Talking is for weaklings and egg-heads.

Last year a New York Times/CBS News poll said that 75% of the public thought that the Iraq War had not been worth the loss of American lives.
Yet we see the Republican candidates drooling at the prospect of sending the troops back in.

To be fair, Rand Paul is giving a very, very different foreign policy message.

The exception among GOP candidates is Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.), who responded to Bush by saying, “I think there’s a consistent theme here that every candidate should be asked, and that is: Is it a good idea to go into the Middle East, topple governments and hope for something better out of the chaos? Recent history seems to suggest you get something worse.” As a result of his views, Paul has been labeled “the chief cheerleader of Obama’s foreign policy” by Rubio, “to the left of Barack Obama” by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), and “wrong and dangerous” by Republican attack ads that greeted his campaign announcement.

Paul makes the mistake here of pointing out provable facts and making a common sense conclusion to guys who think Dirty Harry was a model policeman.

Hillary Clinton, being in a more enviable position of not having to pander to these mouth-breathing sociopaths, was able to admit being wrong about Iraq. "I got it wrong. Plain and simple."
That being said, Hillary also unfairly threw Obama under the bus last year when it came to not doing regime change in Syria. So one has to wonder if Hillary has actually learned the right lessons from Bush's foreign policy failures.

With the Fall of Ramadi there's going to be a lot of speculation by the candidates about who is to blame for the current mess in Iraq. Almost everyone will be pointing at Obama.
However, the truth is more complicated, because the truth is that the fault mostly wasn't an American politician.

Ramadi fell because of the horrendous state of the Iraqi army, and all the American training in the world isn't going to change that. It's rotten to the core.
As for Iraq itself, the lion's share of the blame can be put on the government in Baghdad. It's built-in sectarianism is what has divided Iraq society and allowed a home for Daesh.

That being said, there is still the question of whether the current strategy is working. (this is, assuming that we even have a strategy) The answer to that is: it hasn't been working since Dubya was president, and nothing has changed.
The White House's refusal to admit the failure of the current strategy will open it up for ridicule.

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OLinda's picture

I recall the tough talk during the 2004 race. Didn't even John Edwards say we would hunt them down and kill them? Not bring them to justice, but kill them. I recall being shocked at the time at the language. Now it's normal.

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Pluto's Republic's picture

…is Vicious Nuland's husband (a PNAC author).

Just to keep it real, here.

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
Big Al's picture

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Unabashed Liberal's picture

June 16, 2014
Neocon Kagan: Hillary Clinton Is One Of Us

Here is the reason why Hillary Clinton should never ever become President of the United States.

A (sympathetic) New York Times profile of neocon Robert Kagan has this on Clinton II:

But Exhibit A for what Robert Kagan describes as his “mainstream” view of American force is his relationship with former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who remains the vessel into which many interventionists are pouring their hopes.

Mr. Kagan pointed out that he had recently attended a dinner of foreign-policy experts at which Mrs. Clinton was the guest of honor, and that he had served on her bipartisan group of foreign-policy heavy hitters at the State Department, where his wife worked as her spokeswoman.

“I feel comfortable with her on foreign policy,” Mr. Kagan said, adding that the next step after Mr. Obama’s more realist approach “could theoretically be whatever Hillary brings to the table” if elected president.

“If she pursues a policy which we think she will pursue,” he added, “it’s something that might have been called neocon, but clearly her supporters are not going to call it that; they are going to call it something else.”

[Boldface and paragraphing is mine, for emphasis.]

I posted a screenshot (here) recently--according to Bob Gates on Face The Nation, May 17, she was to his right on matters of foreign intervention, in some instances.


"Every time I lose a dog, he takes a piece of my heart. Every new dog gifts me with a piece of his. Someday, my heart will be total dog, and maybe then I will be just as generous, loving, and forgiving."

Mollie

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Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.

Big Al's picture

"something that might have been called neocon".

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