Ronald Reagan or Jimmy Carter
Mike Huckabee attempted to defend his foreign policy credentials today on the Don Imus show. The exchange went like this:
Imus: Part of the strengths of Senator John McCain, who we talked to yesterday, was his perceived, and perhaps real foreign policy experiences and so on, and you have had little or none, or perhaps you have. Is that a concern?Huckabee: First of all let me say Senator McCain is an honorable and good man and I enjoy getting to be on the trail with him. And I know we are supposed to be sort of hostile toward one another; I don’t think it has to be like that, and I have long respected him. People will say that people will say, “well, you are a governor, you don’t have much foreign policy experience.” Neither did Ronald Reagan. Ronald Reagan came as a governor, he had been an actor. But ten years after he was sworn into office, there wasn’t a cold war, the Berlin wall was down, and there wasn’t a Soviet Union. People considered that one of the most important times in American history in terms of our relationship with the world. Certainly governors have more experience than people realize because we do trade missions and we are involved in cultural exchanges, we deal with multinational corporations in bringing jobs, travel extensively. But more importantly, the role of foreign policy is one of character and understanding what your principles are and then surrounding yourself with good advice. And the ultimate thing is, I may not be the expert that some people are on foreign policy, but I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night.
It's difficult to say which part of this answer is less serious -- the reference to the Holiday Inn Express or the comparison to Reagan. The Gipper may not have conducted foreign policy prior to becoming president, but he had been thinking, speaking, and debating about vital foreign policy issues for at least a quarter of a century (roughly the period after his acting career ended and he became a political commentator). Reagan didn't bring about our victory in the Cold War because he substituted "character" for expertise, as Huckabee proposes to do. He accomplished this because he came into power having already formulated the right line on the Soviet Union and Communism generally.
When it comes to foreign policy, Huckabee more closely resembles another former governor, Jimmy Carter. It was Carter, not Reagan, who viewed foreign policy as an extension of his own character and personal principles. Carter stood for a foreign policy "as decent as the American people." Reagan stood for defeating our enemies. When Huckabee frets about how Gitmo is making us appear to foreigners, when he asserts that "we broke Iraq," and when he says he's qualified to be commander-in-chief because of his character rather than because of his understanding of our enemies, it's pretty clear that his foreign policy roots extend nowhere near the fertile soil of Reaganism.
JOHN adds: To listen to Huckabee's response to Imus, click Play. It is indeed quite lame.
Earlier today, Paul commented on the moralistic nature of Huckabee's approach to foreign policy, and how it calls into question his ability to protect us from terrorists. I would add that Huckabee's moralistic approach extends to domestic policy as well. To take just two examples, Huckabee has expressed sympathy for the idea of a national ban on smoking. From a moralistic perspective, this may make sense: smoking is bad, so let's ban it. But Huckabee shows no understanding of either the basic freedom issue involved, or the implications for federalism of adopting this kind of measure on a national basis--presumably on the theory that smoking affects interstate commerce. Similarly, Huckabee reacted emotionally and moralistically when he advocated providing scholarships to the children of illegal immigrants. Surely, Huckabee said, we shouldn't punish children for the sins of their parents. But this moralistic approach fails to even consider the consequences and public policy implications of the approach Huckabee advocates.
Generally speaking, moralism in both foreign and domestic policy is a form of intellectual laziness. Again, "moralism" does not equal "morality." We can all agree that our government should do what is morally right. But determining what is morally right requires a hard-headed attention to the consequences of any particular policy, and an assessment of those consequences in the context of a coherent philosophy. The moralist, in contrast, doesn't want to be bothered either with the facts or with philosophic coherence. Instead, he enshrines his own feelings and preferences--or, very likely, prejudices--as public policy. As in, "Smoking is really bad, so let's ban it." Mike Huckabee appears to fit squarely within this tradition.
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