Monday’s debate on foreign policy marked the end of the presidential debate season for 2012. Much has been said about past gaffes — both in foreign policy debates and in general — but we’re going to take some time now anyway to reflect on what could have, and what did, go horribly wrong in this […]
You might think most foreign policy wonks were looking forward to last night’s presidential debate but most I know were actually dreading it. It was well known that the difficult and pressing questions on foreign policy would not be asked, and to be honest, foreign policy requires far more nuance and complexity than can fit […]
While climate change is an established reality in much of the world, the United States continues to lag behind in recognizing the truth, despite recent gains. The U.S. is the second largest emitter of greenhouse gases, behind China, but it does not have an official dedicated policy to confront that fact. One need not look […]
I’m currently in Alabama helping out my 85-years-young mom so I haven’t had time to blog, but the following paragraph in a recent New York Times article caught my eye: The United States military has secretly sent a task force of more than 150 planners and other specialists to Jordan to help the armed forces there handle […]
On the campaign trail, Mitt Romney has faced accusations of being vague about the policies he would pursue as president. Today, in his foreign policy speech at the Virginia Military Institute, he appeared to deliberately emphasize detail, particularly on defense issues, though some argue that the speech as a whole was itself vague. As he […]
Last night’s presidential debate on domestic policy offered a brief preview of the upcoming foreign policy debates. When it comes to popular perception, China arguably embodies the threat to U.S. competitiveness more than any other country. Last night, only Mr. Romney brought up China, and his remarks include the following (transcript available here): My plan […]
This week marks the official opening of the UN General Assembly in New York. As a result, several other events are taking place in New York to take advantage of the heads of state in town for the General Assembly and to focus on the many different facets of international affairs. This morning at the […]
The protest and violence associated with a film highly offensive to Islam is sure to play an outsized role in foreign policy discussions for the rest of the presidential race. Mitt Romney’s initial reaction to the Obama administration’s handling of unfolding events—and the backlash against Romney that this criticism generated—was a topic of frequent, well-covered […]
The United States has been fighting a war in Afghanistan for over ten years. Over 2,000 our bravest men and women have died there during that time period. We still have over 60,000 troops on the ground fighting in the land that hosted Al Qaeda’s leadership a decade ago. Even though, President Obama, the current […]
Like many of you, I’m eager to see how the candidates and their supporters will discuss foreign policy at the Democratic Convention (DNC) and the Republican National Convention (RNC). Over the past month, as a result of Mitt Romney’s overseas campaign trip and Paul Ryan’s entry into the race, major news outlets and the blogosphere […]
As a rite of summer in U.S. presidential campaigns, the nominee of the challenging party takes a trip out of the country to buff up his foreign policy credentials. Republican Mitt Romney is no exception, and his trip, not surprisingly, included a stop in Israel. Romney has a long friendship with Israeli Prime Minister […]
“Those guys didn’t think I would do it. I told you I was going to do it!” That’s what internet-savvy President Obama said in New York City several months ago after belting out a few lines from Al Green’s “Let’s Stay Together.” He’s sung at the Apollo and the White House, slow jammed the news, and nominated […]
“Romney is a risk when it comes to foreign policy and national security,” read bullet number three in an email titled, “Five things you should know about Mitt Romney,” sent by President Obama’s campaign manager Jim Messina to supporters Wednesday. Mitt Romney took on the role of presumed Republican nominee long before Rick Santorum left […]
When speaking about US foreign policy during the Republican Primary debates, Mitt Romney often returns to a familiar theme: his belief that troop levels in Afghanistan should be determined through close consultation with the commanding generals on the ground. It is both a criticism of President Obama’s June 2011 decision to begin drawing down troop […]
In the end, Terry, Diaz and Meyer found themselves on the sharp end of the stick for their efforts: the US Department of Justice, agencies like DHS and the Department of State, and the usual entourage of corporate and political underwriters, including the government of Mexico, all had a hand in creating scenarios designed to transform good guys into villains, narratives that ended in Terry’s death at the hands of a cartel gunman, Diaz’s imprisonment for ‘exercising excessive force’ during the arrest of a suspected drug trafficker, and in Meyer’s case, the loss of a high-paying job with a multinational defense contractor, and blowback that now has this decorated young veteran on the ropes in the court of public opinion. Let me tell you something. The only ‘mental problem’ from which Meyer suffers is a chronic case of integrity, an inability to distort the truth to accommodate political reality.
Consider–if Terry, Diaz and Meyer had ‘occupied Wall Street’ instead of the killing zones along our SW border and in Afghanistan, they might have been poster boys for the March of History, and on top of it all, alive, free, and gainfully employed.