McCain on foreign affairs

When Joe Biden once again earned his reputation for speaking off the cuff and not thinking how his words might be taken, he said the young Obama presidency would likely face some type of world test, manufactured or real in its first term. John McCain knew just what to do with those words-- morph them into something they were not and use them to his own advantage. Choose me. I know how to handle it all.

Due to being a POW (what does that teach you about fighting a war or tactical strategies?), having walked through a Baghdad bazaar and said how safe it was (ignoring his need to wear a bulletproof vest, ignoring gunship helicopters overhead, ignoring that those in his party bragged how they could buy a rug for $5. You think the merchants liked that price?), and because McCain was so right about Iraq and how easy that war would be, we should pick him as the next war president. Assuming we have forgotten he was actually wrong and assuming we want a next war, what about foreign affairs? You know the kind where you don't bomb bomb bomb Iran.

Foreign affairs isn't just about tactics and strategies for fighting wars (actually those are generally done by generals). It's also about getting along with our neighbors. It's about communication skills. How effective can someone be who sees even their own country as them against us? Can McCain help us deal with other world governments? He has a reputation for getting furious at anyone who doesn't agree with him. How's that going to work with diplomacy? How will other leaders see him? Will they even want to work with him?

We already know how the rest of the world sees Obama. They like the idea of the United States choosing him. Won't that make his ability to work with them easier? And I don't mean terrorists. Terrorists aren't running world governments. Ahmadinejad may sound like one, but he was voted into office and his first term as president expires in 2009 when he will have to run again. Actually the religious leaders determine most of Iran's major policies and currently that would be Khamenei.

The accusation that Obama would sit down with terrorists is more about a political gotcha at home than any possibility of it happening. What Obama said is he would engage in talks with leaders of unfriendly countries. This doesn't mean give away our country to them.

Recently, we haven't had a president capable of doing more than photo-ops after the negotiating was done. With Obama, that could be different. Isn't the ability to focus, as he has shown he can do throughout his lifetime, going to be a help in any negotiating? What about McCain's inability to focus?

Likely we could excuse his not remembering about Czechoslovakia no longer having that name or even mixing up the Sunnis and Shiites. That does tell you, however, that he, like Bush, feels no need to understand the history of any other people-- probably barely knows his own if it isn't the date of a war; but what is this all about? McCain meant his gaffe about not meeting with the Spanish leader. It's a little hard to understand why he would offend an ally of the United States, a country that has every right to expect we would treat them with respect. But McCain's staff says he meant what he said that he would not meet with Spain's leader. '

It boggles the mind. He won't meet with the Spanish leader because why again?

McCain's whole emphasis is not on his ability to work with other countries. He has trashed Europe's system of government, acted as though Arabs are inferior beings and after that, he expects to sit down and talk to any of them? No wonder he said he would not. The average age of European leaders is 55 which might also make communication more difficult for a cold war thinker (and if you don't think McCain has a Cold War mentality, you haven't been paying attention to how he operates) who is not only much older but more set in his ways-- and wants it his way or no way.

None of that matters to McCain because he wants to be a war president. He seems to see solutions in terms of wars. He might have done it with Russia too if he had been president when Georgia was attacked. We are all Georgians? What did that mean? McCain believes in wars but not in paying for them. This is where we came in, isn't it?

Some think logic is why he wouldn't authorize an attack on Iran. We are already militarily stretched too thin. We can't afford another war when we aren't paying for the ones we have. There is no proof that McCain operates from facts or logic. His slapdash way of picking Palin proves that he jumps without thinking.

Where it comes to war, for all we know, with all his talk of we must have victory, he is still fighting the Vietnam War. If the American people don't get this now, they will if he gets in a position of power. His running mate won't see a problem with it either. She operates off her concept of religious dogma.

For those who say he wouldn't start another war. All he has to do is attack and the war will be on if it's Iran. It sounds crazy. It makes no sense. Neither did what he said about Spain.

Egrets, geese and ducks in the photo all have to get along in the same pond. Our world pond is a lot smaller than it once was. McCain says he's the experienced one. What have his experiences taught him and how will they impact his choices if he gets to be president? Can we afford McCain's kind of thinking, his loose cannon temperament; or do we need what Obama offers-- even temperament, good judgment, skilled organizational abilities, respected abroad, and someone able to focus to get along both in our own pond as well as the world's?

After the divisiveness that McCain and Palin have been sowing at home, their ability to work effectively even here will be questionable-- let alone overseas.