Tim Pawlenty winced audibly when The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg made the obvious explicit. In the race for the GOP presidential nomination, the columnist posited, “I guess you represent the John McCain-Lindsey Graham foreign-policy wing.”
The former Minnesota governor was troubled enough to go out of his way to deflect the characterization he couldn’t deny. “I prefer that it not be that,” was the initial parry. Later, he tried to lay his self-made burden on the media: “I wish you could think of another way to describe this wing of the party, other than McCain and Lindsey Graham.”
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How about the “Incoherent Wing”? At any rate, with visions of Reagan conservatives fleeing for the exits, Governor Pawlenty seemed to grasp that Republicans are not in the market for a McCain-Graham nominee. We’ve had enough of a foreign policy that has us one moment cavorting in Moammar Qaddafi’s tent with promises of aid for his armed forces, then, in the next, insisting that both the dictator and his U.S.-taxpayer-supported military be incinerated by U.S.-taxpayer-supported bombs — the better to usher in a new regime of . . . um, well, we don’t really know what.
Rival Michele Bachmann is suddenly surging in the GOP polls by marketing herself as a “constitutional conservative.” Pawlenty grasps this indicator that his campaign cannot bear the weight of Senator Graham — who, when not lecturing that “Congress should just sort of shut up” about President Obama’s unauthorized instigation of war on Libya, complains that this whole free-speech idea is something we need to rethink. And as Pawlenty himself was chagrined to admit, embracing Senator McCain is “like saying we’re embracing Nelson Rockefeller on economics.”
He is right, of course. Regrettably, though, Pawlenty’s problem is not with his embracing incoherence but with your noticing that he’s embracing incoherence. Mr. Goldberg’s question, after all, was asked only after listening to Pawlenty’s speech at the Council on Foreign Relations — a McCain redoubt where dreams of a progressive world order frequently substitute for the world that is.
Fitting then that, while explaining how we’ve purportedly got Tehran nearly “isolated,” Pawlenty pronounced that “Syria is Iran’s only Arab ally.” This was said with a straight face only two days after the president of Iraq — an Arab country that Americans have sacrificed thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars to try to turn into the Incoherent Wing’s fantasy of a pro-American Islamic democracy — proudly reaffirmed his nation’s alliance with Iran.
Iraqi president Jalal Talabani sounded his paean to the Islamic Republic during the “World Without Terrorism Conference.” His hosts were the muckety-mullah, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and Iran’s Holocaust-denying, 9/11 Truther of a president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, each of whom has made a career out of railing, “Death to America.”
Nor was Iraq the only Iranian ally on hand. Some 60 nations sent representatives. Prominent among them was Pres. Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, in whose country the United States has about 100,000 troops fighting to prop up his regime against jihadists backed by Iran. Also in attendance was Pres. Ali Zadari of Pakistan, whose country takes billions in U.S. aid while harboring anti-American terror kingpins (like Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar) and covertly aiding the Taliban (an organization Pakistan created in the 1990s).
And what antiterror confab would be complete without Pres. Omar al-Bashir of Sudan? He is under International Criminal Court indictment for genocide, though this has not dissuaded the obliging mullahs from their commitment to share with him the fruits of their ripening nuclear program. Bashir’s status as a mass-murdering fugitive certainly did not dampen the mood: United Nations general secretary Ban Ki-moon sent emissaries and issued a statement gushing with praise for Iran and its efforts in “the global fight against terrorism.”
Speaking of terrorism, the conferees ended up concluding that its real causes are — you’ll never guess! — the United States and Israel. Still, Talabani agreed with his Iranian hosts that U.S. power was thankfully in decline, boasting that Iraqis stood united in demanding that Americans get the hell out of their country. What his people really want, the Iraqi president made clear, is deeper ties with Iran, including Iranian aid.
Good article until the part about the Ron Paul wing and retreating from the world.
If Ron Paul became President(He won't) for starters the trade and travel restrictions against Cuba would be lifted. I suspect we'd start talking to Iran by perhaps playing a soccer game with them as Ron Paul suggested in the 2007-08 campaign. We might even begin on a limited basis trading with them. Agricultural products, rugs, and medicine.
The worst thing we could do is start bombing the Persians as more than a few at National Review want us to do.
You do realize Iran has been supplying I.E.D.S ,guns , military advisors, etc that have been killing and maiming our war-fighters in Iraq and Afghanistan? Those acts alone warrant numerous air strikes on Tehran. As to Paul's presidential run --let me finish my bowl of blood stained Mexican drug gang marijuana and I will get back to you.
Yes I know Iran has been supplying guns to Iraq and Afghanistan. We do have close to 200 thousand troops in the region and are always making noise about bombing them. If the shoe were on the other foot we'd be doing the same thing.
The interesting thing about this piece is that midway through, the author does exactly what he accuses Pawlenty of doing, attempt to distance himself from the all-to-public face of the far end of the ideological branch of conservatism to which he belongs. The difference being that if we actually parse the views, Pawlenty is probably more neo-con than establishment like McCain and Graham whereas McCarthy and Bachman are definitely in the liberterian wing of the movement. Honestly, I, as a lifelong conservative, am getting very tired of the liberterian wing's "holier than thou" attitude and the derision with which they treat other parts of the movement which do not line up exactly with their rather narrow view of conservatism. Frankly, they're well on the way to making sure conservatism snatches defeat from the jaws of victory.
Hallelujha! A rational foreign policy approach which recognizes the folly of protracted wars that deplete our nation's treasures, both human and fiscal,the threat of Islamo-fascism and the need to combat it when and where necessary but only with swift and overwhelming force,and only when the interests of the United States are critically threatened.This is a rational answer unlike the nation building of the McClame and Grahamnesty wing on one side and the "it's America and Israel's fault" of the lunatic wing led by Paul.
Mr. McCarthy nails another "CFR", Wilsonian Republican to the Wall! Good job holding these frauds to account! The McCain/Romney/Graham Wing need to be voted against if possible.
Boy, did Pawlenty have any strategy to winning the Republican nomination?
First he attacks Romney, then cowers in front of him at the debate. Then he joins McCain-Graham in their foreign policy only to cower when asked about it. Strength as a leader?
I can see him bending over as I write this.
Tim, like Romney , your time came & went. Only a true blue conservative will get the nomination or we won't come out to vote, preferring another disastrous 4 years with BHO than another McCain; it's really that simple. And Ron Paul? We don't do crazy.
We've already run a lot of these retread candidates for president. We did it with the first Bush, then with Dole, then with the second Bush, then with McCain. Now Pawlenty?
This time, we need someone who believes in a strong military and a very limited government.
Spot on, once again. It's time for true conservative politicians to speak with eloquence, reason and passion rather than wavering in a futile attempt to be liked by the MSM and the cultural elites. With the future of our country in serious doubt (e.g., economic and military decline), now is not the time to 'go all wobbly'!
Andrew McCarthy - Thank you for interesting information about Gov. Pawlenty. I can only say he has be quite a disappointment and your column is just one more nail in the coffin.
While you're on the subject of the foreign policies of various Republican candidates, could you please comment on Michael Rubin's column today at Commentary Contentions regarding Michele Bachmann and her support of the Mujahideen e-Khalq Organization. Thanks.
American foreign policy seems to be tainted by several faulty presumptions:
1.) That all world leaders are reasonable in comparison to conservative Americans;
2.) That the United States (and Israel) are the only countries in the world that have ambitions, or even interests that conflict with others;
3.) That the United States is the only country in the world that chooses leaders that cannot be reasoned with;
4.) That there is no downside to trusting the pronouncements of foreign governments as to their intentions;
5.) that the "intenational community" is not an artifice that serves mostly the purposes of those who are most adept at exploiting it to promote inuslar interests;
6.) That whatever else a regime does, it will certainly play fair in international relations; and worst of all
7.) That world leaders have more in common with each other than they do with their own people. Theus we can engage with Ahmadinejad because our leaders understand him in a way that the non-anointed cannot.
Devotion to these fallacies results in the recurrent noxious behaviors of North Korea and Iran, the frustration with Pakistan, and "concern" regarding China, Russia, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Iraq, Venezuela, etc. A viable conservative foreign policy will not be based on impotent happy-speak, like "human rights!" (except in Cuba, China and Saudi Arabia) and "Democracy!" except where elections will produce Islamist governments. A real foreign policy will be based on the appallingly un-PC realizations that diplomacy and multilateralism and engagement are facades, papering over the fact that international relations is a brass-knuckle, unprincipled contest where high sounding rhetoric doesn't survive the formal introductions.
I cannot in good conscience, vote for T-Paw. He's a war hawk. He believes that the United States needs to police the world, and get involved everywhere. Unfortunately, our homeland is crumbling. We can't afford to pay the bills, and continue to fund two endless wars. I am no liberal, and for the record, I am not supporting any GOP who wants to continue Wilson's "save the world" foreign policy.
Good column until you had that uncontrollable urge to use Ron Paul as a whipping boy and put strawman arguments about interventions into his mouth. Paul isn't opposed categorically to all interventions, either. Just like you, he only wants us to get involved in the worthwhile ones. He supported the original takedown of the Taliban, for instance.
I suspect the new National Review is a lot closer to Paul than it realizes or wants to admit, so there's still this reflexive need to bash Paul and try to distinguish his consistently-held views from your brand new ones, else you be forced to credit him for being right all along.
Good article. While Tim Pawlenty seems like a good guy, this is just one more reason why he isn't our strongest candidate.
I'll also note that this election isn't going to be out foreign policy, as important as it is. It's going to be about who can turn-around our economy, create jobs, and reduce the debt. These are Mitt Romney's strengths, and this is why he's our best candidate to beat Obama.
