Another debate, another party. This one concerned foreign policy, “Which, the network exec explained, is something no one cares about — unless we declare war on Lindsay Lohan.” (Washington Post) What was missing from this debate, to my mind, was an explicit admission that American power is limited. It would have been refreshing to have one of the participants say “Fidel Castro is still in power, 50 years after we first tried to get rid of him, 90 miles off the Florida coast. So we shouldn’t be too confident of our ability to influence events on the other side of the globe.”
Both candidates ducked the hard questions, e.g., are you willing to cut and run in Afghanistan if it is obvious that the puppet government won’t last beyond 2014? Obama seemed more realistic about what we are likely to be able to accomplish. Romney did not persuade me with his “throw money at the military and hostile foreigners will be awed into submission” plan.
Phil,
I saw a talking head on FOX declare the first presidential debate to ultimately end up being the most watched and thus most important one for undecided viewers. Then I heard an MSNBC talking head say that the last presidential debate is ultimately the most important one for undecided viewers.
If I didn’t know better, I’d think there was a pattern forming. Any thoughts?
PS
I wish Obama had been more realistic four years ago.
If internet and consumer electronics companies can promise to change the world every quarter, why would we expect our presidential candidates to promise anything less than benevolent global domination for another generation? Keeping South Korea safe (albeit from communists rather than dictators and generals) or stabilizing Japan, or keeping Europe from another war, etc is much more attractive than talking about Cuba or South America. Or closer to point, I guess Americans care about awing Afghanistan into submission and failing that, bomb them into the ground, and serving up example to Pakistan… rather than build civic societies or ensuring some kind of decent life for foreign women.
And while our wisdom and abilities are certainly limited, who can doubt that our sheer military strength is boundless?
We would not feel refreshed if somebody pointed out our impotence more like rudely slapped. (Unless they promised to save us some money )
@LV
“We would not feel refreshed if somebody pointed out our impotence more like rudely slapped.”
Not sure if you’re being sarcastic or not, but I would find it immensely refreshing if a candidate stood up and said “We are utterly broke and need every cent we can find just to keep the gears turning here at home, so we are going to close our foreign bases, withdraw from the Middle East and abandon our various regime change projects over there, let Israel fend for itself (Lord knows they have enough nukes for it), withdraw from NATO, and reassign all remaining military assets to the sole objective of defending the American homeland from any and all threats”.