Campaigning on foreign policy among those who don’t care about it

Five thoughts on the politics of Obama’s foreign policy | Daniel W. Drezner

“As president, I have to address both domestic policy and foreign policy. Because of the way that the commander-in-chief role has evolved, I have far fewer political constraints on foreign policy action than domestic policy action. So let’s think about this for a second. On the foreign stage, America’s standing has returned from its post-Iraq low. Al Qaeda is now a shell of its former self. Liberalizing forces are making uneven but forward progress in North Africa. Muammar Gaddafi’s regime is no longer, without one American casualty. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are winding down. Every country in the Pacific Rim without a Communist Party running things is trying to hug us closer.

“Imagine what I could accomplish in domestic policy without the kind of obstructionism and filibustering that we’re seeing in Congress — which happens to be even more unpopular than I am, by the way. I’m not talking about the GOP abjectly surrendering, mind you, just doing routine things like sublecting my nominees to a floor vote in the Senate. I’ve achieved significant foreign policy successes while still cooperating with our allies in NATO and Northeast Asia. Just imagine what I could get done if the Republicans were as willing to compromise as, say, France.”

2 comments on “Campaigning on foreign policy among those who don’t care about it

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  1. Our will to continue the engagements have flagged, I assure you the enemy has not, the Zaghul of his age, has been proscribed from running in the Egyptian election, the only decent figure worth supporting. the Mastermind of Pan Am 103, is
    quietly ensconced in Doha, ‘the long dark night of fascism’ that is always falling on America, as the late Jean Jacques Revel
    snarked, will be falling on Tripoli, show me a silver lining.

  2. I beg your pardon, but I never promised you a silver lining.

    The “engagements”?

    All I get from you is a desire to support whichever weird, cruel, massively costly and murderous “engagements” sponsored by your team, and to attack whatever the other team does. There’s no consistency, much less strategy, to it – other than the idea, perhaps, that being adequately macho in the macho world requires standing by yesterday’s bluster until even you have forgotten what it consisted of.

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