Clark: McCain's Threats of Force Disrespect Presidency
Gen. Wesley Clark on John McCain's lack of policy-making and foreign policy leadership experience.
Clark says McCain has always been for the use of force, and more force, when a president should view force as a last resort. He complains that when McCain talks about throwing Russia out of the G8 or makes up ditties about bombing Iran, he "betrays a disrespect for the office of the presidency."
Hat tip: J. Miller Rampanti.
posted by Juan Cole @ 6/23/2008 01:00:00 AM
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9 Comments:
"...or makes up ditties about bombing Iran..."
For the record, McCain didn't make up that ditty; it's been out there since '06. Here it is (but you have to wait through the Hogan's Heroes march to get to it):
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/video/40956/
McCain is an insane person. My mother has been a Republican for 60 years, says McCain frightens her and she will probably vote for Obama.
One wonders if Juan Cole thinks that Obama's recent promises at AIPAC similarly "disrespect the presidency"? I don't think I've seen one piece here raising an objection to Obama's calculated and irresponsible promises respecting Iran. Is it that Juan regards McCain as the only loose cannon in the race? Believe me, he isn't.
John Lowell
The astonishing thing about this interview it the degree to which the TV commentators interviewing Clark are blatant John McCain advocates.
It's always bothered me to see the phrase "force is a last resort." Field Marshal Erwin Rommel tried to begin battles by asking his opponents to surrender. It didn't always work, of course, but it worked enough times that it was a reliably good first resort.
Back when I was in the Navy, we had some people try to storm aboard our ship. We utilized our weapon of first resort, a fire hose. We smacked 'em with a hard spray of water, they ran off, problem solved! Our people had guns of course, but this way there was no blood to clean up and no explanations had to be rendered.
I guess I just like the language of first resort as opposed to that of last resort.
wow
conventional wisdom is questioned and tv "news" media ask critical questions!
too bad that the questions have the form of "but this goes against conventional wisdom - surely you cannot be serious"
the "but obama isn't any better" line also was quite telling of the mindset of the journalists
needless to say, the one who questioned mccain's lack of leadership once attempted to start world war 3 over an airport in Kosovo
see BBC
the more interesting question would be: why is someone who is shot down while bombing civilian targets from the sky (war crime), and is then being detained and tortured (cruel treatment in newspeak) widely considered to be a war hero?
instead we are discussing whether such experience constitutes expertise in military or foreign affairs.
see note by Rahul Mahajan
regards
andreas
Dems could do a lot worse than a centrist southern 4-star general for SecArmy, SecDef, or even VP. NATO-EURCOM commander cum politician Wes Clark would not be bamboozled into rash troop commitments, the way that inexperienced Pres. Kennedy was, in Cuba and Viet Nam. The US/NATO Balkan bombing campaigns were not pretty, but they did get the Al Qaeda brigade out of Bosnia, and lead to peacekeeping ops, Clark should have credibility with Euro oriented moslems.
Candidate Obama's statements on use of force against Iran, promise to conduct increased operations into Pakistan certainly give me pause to conside unintended consequences.
It seems clear to me that someone in Pakistan is using missiles, trying to pull us into the sort of attacks that will mobilize a far greater mass of trans-border tribesmen to arms against the Kabul and Karachi gov'ts.
These are dangerous times, with a serious squeeze on the US working class, and some politicians willing to promise anything to maintain their own rice-bowl.
As Andreas points out, Clark is hardly the soberest thinker on the use of force or the role of the Presidency.
But Sen. McCain, as Sen. Webb archly noted during his 06 campaign, has never seen a war he didn't support. As President he'll be the one to start them. Considering he's never found reason to disagree with other Presidents (excepting his initial opposition to the Lebanon deployment in '83), what does that bode when he's the one making the decision?
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