This is why I predicted that Palin's appearances before the national press would be disastrous. ABCNews is teasing this exchange from today's sit down with Charlie Gibson:
We cannot repeat the Cold War. We are thankful that, under Reagan, we won the Cold War, without a shot fired, also. We've learned lessons from that in our relationship with Russia, previously the Soviet Union.
We will not repeat a Cold War. We must have good relationship with our allies, pressuring, also, helping us to remind Russia that it's in their benefit, also, a mutually beneficial relationship for us all to be getting along.
GIBSON: Would you favor putting Georgia and Ukraine in NATO?
PALIN: Ukraine, definitely, yes. Yes, and Georgia.
GIBSON: Because Putin has said he would not tolerate NATO incursion into the Caucasus.
PALIN: Well, you know, the Rose Revolution, the Orange Revolution, those actions have showed us that those democratic nations, I believe, deserve to be in NATO.
Putin thinks otherwise. Obviously, he thinks otherwise, but...
GIBSON: And under the NATO treaty, wouldn't we then have to go to war if Russia went into Georgia?
PALIN: Perhaps so. I mean, that is the agreement when you are a NATO ally, is if another country is attacked, you're going to be expected to be called upon and help.
But NATO, I think, should include Ukraine, definitely, at this point and I think that we need to -- especially with new leadership coming in on January 20, being sworn on, on either ticket, we have got to make sure that we strengthen our allies, our ties with each one of those NATO members.
We have got to make sure that that is the group that can be counted upon to defend one another in a very dangerous world today.
GIBSON: And you think it would be worth it to the United States, Georgia is worth it to the United States to go to war if Russia were to invade.
PALIN: What I think is that smaller democratic countries that are invaded by a larger power is something for us to be vigilant against. We have got to be cognizant of what the consequences are if a larger power is able to take over smaller democratic countries.
And we have got to be vigilant. We have got to show the support, in this case, for Georgia. The support that we can show is economic sanctions perhaps against Russia, if this is what it leads to.
It doesn't have to lead to war and it doesn't have to lead, as I said, to a Cold War, but economic sanctions, diplomatic pressure, again, counting on our allies to help us do that in this mission of keeping our eye on Russia and Putin and some of his desire to control and to control much more than smaller democratic countries.
His mission, if it is to control energy supplies, also, coming from and through Russia, that's a dangerous position for our world to be in, if we were to allow that to happen.
I'm going to say this slowly, and as I do I'm going to try and contain my anger.
I'm sure the people of Georgia are wonderful people, and yes we should do everything within reason to make sure that they are not oppressed by foreign powers. Human rights matter, and they should be defended whenever possible. But go to war with Russia? Over Georgia and the Ukraine? Are you fucking insane?
If this doesn't clarify how far off the rails conservatism has gone in the 21st century, nothing will. Once upon a time not that long ago, the dominant strain of thought in conservatism was realism. Be cold, calculating, and ruthlessly pragmatic in foreign affairs, putting your own national interest above the interest of others. If old school conservative thought had a flaw, in fact, it was that it often took realism too far, ignoring the long term consequences of policies (for example, how our support of dictators often radicalized local populations, producing movements like al Qaeda and the Taliban) in favor of perceived short-term gains.
Talk about the pendulum swinging. We're supposed to start a war with Russia over Georgia? Russia, in case you somehow don't know this already, is a nuclear power. The Cold War might have ended, but they still have thousands of thermonuclear warheads pointed in our direction that could, even if only partially deployed, end civilization as we know it. And she wants to threaten open military conflict? With them? Over Georgia?
Maybe Russia really is expansionist. Maybe their goal is to take control of pipelines and oil fields and thereby somehow control the worlds energy supply. Hell, maybe their goal really is to recreate the old Iron Curtain and Soviet sphere. (I don't see any evidence on that last point, but I'll put that aside for the moment.) Even if all of that is true, the appropriate way to handle the situation is not to go on national TV in your first prime time interview and suggest that war might be necessary. This is not how statesmen act. This is not how diplomacy works. This is not how rational leaders lead.
And most fundamentally: This is not putting your country first. This is putting some hypothetical "world community of democratic nations" first, making their citizens co-equal to ours. And I'm sorry, but I want a president who puts Americans first, not Georgians. If that makes me a foreign policy realist, so be it. If that makes me an Americanist, so be it. If that makes me a nationalist, so be it. And If that makes me an old school conservative, so be it.
As I often tell my students, I wasn't the one who left conservatism in the 1990s, conservatism left me. In just a few short decades, conservatism morphed from a movement that wanted less government and more liberty to a movement that wanted more government and less liberty.
It was conservatives who created warrantless wiretapping programs.
It was conservatives who created Offices of Faith-based Initiatives.
It was conservatives who created state-sanctioned torture regimes, using the secret prisons of our former communist adversaries as their new centers of operation.
It was conservatives who tried to impeached a president because he lied about a blow job.
It was conservatives who tried to interfere in a family's end-of life decision in the Schiavo case.
It was conservatives who let business take over the oversight agencies that are supposed to represent the people, replicating the kids of cronyism we saw in both communist and third-world countries.
It was conservatives who systematized the revolving door between Constitution Ave and K Street, further replicating the functioning of a third world state.
It was conservatives who drove the exponential increase in earmarking, yet another behavior common to corrupt third world systems.
It was conservatives who created a $9 trillion dollar national debt.
It was conservatives who in a moment of national disaster sat by and watched as a city drowned.
So if that's what you get when you elect the party of "small government and big liberty," I want none of it. If the government is going to get big, let's let the people who believe in government run it for awhile.
And now apparently it is conservatives who want to threaten war with our former Cold War adversary over a tiny little country that most Americans couldn't even find on a map.
And this comes, it must be noted, after conservatives asserted to both the nation and the world that big countries could, should, and must invade small countries whenever they determined that they posed a threat to their own national interest.
Haven't we had enough of this already? More pointedly: Do you want to elect someone who thinks it makes sense to send your children, or perhaps your children's children, off to die in a war to defend the people of Georgia?
There are a million and one different ways to respond to Russian aggression, but threatening war in some future hypothetical circumstance is not among them. Pundits and think tank professionals can do this if they like, but the Vice President of the United States most certainly cannot. Not unless we are moments away from the deployment orders, that is.
If this doesn't help clarify the stakes in this election, nothing will. One of two potential Vice President's has just explicitly signaled her willingness to go to war with a nuclear power to defend the democratic systems of government in Georgia and/or the Ukraine.
These are the stakes. If you vote for her and her running mate, you are now explicitly supporting the principle that the Ukraine is worth defending by force of arms. To vote for McCain-Palin is to say to your fellow citizens and to the world that you are willing to risk open war with a nuclear power to defend the Ukraine.
UPDATE: And what of Obama's supposed support for Georgian inclusion in NATO? First, let me make clear that this is a point on which he and I disagree. Beyond that, however, it is important to understand the differences in the world views that nevertheless drove Obama and McCain/Palin to similar conclusions.
Obama has said repeatedly that H.W. Bush is one of his role model's in foreign policy. H.W. was a realist's realist, a near textbook definition of its application in the late 20th century. McCain and Palin, by contrast, have surrounded themselves with neo-conservatives. Neo-conservatives in their 21st century incarnation really should have been called neo-Wilsonians. Unlike realists, who believe that national interest is the only interest worth defending, Wilsonians believe that democratic ideals and the universal rights upon which they are based demand and require defense whenever and wherever they might be threatened. So in this circumstance, whereas a realist might support adding two new nations to a treaty organization because they have weighed the evidence and concluded that on balance it is in our own national interest, Wilsonians believe that we have no choice but to include them in a "league of democracies" because they share our ideals and beliefs. One makes a decision based on pragmatism, the other on idealism. Call me cold, but I'll take the realist position every time.
For realists, changing circumstances call for reevaluation and reconsideration. For Wilsonians, by contrast, there is nothing to reconsider. Universal rights are universal rights, done and dusted.
But even if you don't buy all of that.. even if you only look at their choice of words... at least Obama has the good sense and good judgement to not go on national TV threatening that war might be necessary to defend Georgia. Take, for example, this statement from Obama last spring:
"Ukraine and Georgia have also been developing their ties with NATO. Their leaders have declared their readiness to advance a NATO Membership Action Plan, MAP, to prepare for the rights and obligations of membership. They are working to consolidate democratic reforms and to undertake new responsibilities in their relationship with the Alliance. I welcome the desire and actions of these countries to seek closer ties with NATO and hope that NATO responds favorably to their request, consistent with its criteria for membership. Whether Ukraine and Georgia ultimately join NATO will be a decision for the members of the alliance and the citizens of those countries, after a period of open and democratic debate. But they should receive our help and encouragement as they continue to develop ties to Atlantic and European institutions.
"NATO enlargement is not directed against Russia. Russia has an important role to play in European and global affairs and should see NATO as a partner, not as a threat. But we should oppose any efforts by the Russian government to intimidate its neighbors or control their foreign policies. Russia cannot have a veto over which countries join the alliance. Since the end of the Cold War, Republican and Democratic administrations have supported the independence and sovereignty of all the states of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, and we must continue to do so. President Putin recent threat to point missiles at Ukraine is simply not the way to promote the peaceful 21st century Europe we seek.
UPDATE II: I'll post the video when I have it, but.... Palin just went all deer-in-the-headlights when asked about the Bush Doctrine. And as Yglesias points out, when she did somewhat recover, she did so by describing H.W.'s approach to the world.
So maybe she isn't a neo-con so much as she is clueless. Wonderful.
UPDATE III: Also worth noting... McCain says Palin's foreign policy expertise comes mostly in the area of energy. Exact quote:
She knows more about energy than probably anyone else in the United States of America..
She did try to bring this question around to energy, but in so doing used energy as an excuse to threaten war with a nuclear power. If that's the direction her expertise leads her, well...
UPDATE IV: Put more simply in an attempt to head off more criticism: If given a choice on this issue between between a realist with whom I disagree and an idealist with whom I disagree, I'll take the realist every time. At least I and others have a chance to change the realist's mind.
