Thursday, December 1, 2011

Foreign Policy and I


TPM2012

Newt’s Neocon Army

Newt GingrichNewt Gingrich
Benjy Sarlin & Evan McMorris-Santoro 7288 64
When it comes to foreign policy, the Republican frontrunner likes it old-school. Neo-old school.
We’ve had two foreign policy themed debates in the GOP primary now, which have provided ample opportunity to see what a Republican foreign policy would look like in 2013. And in the case of Newt Gingrich, it would probably look like a kind of neocon fantasy land.
Foreign Policy published an excellent rundown of Gingrich’s foreign policy advising team, most of whom “have known Newt for decades, and see themselves as helping a candidate who already boasts a long track record and well-formed intellectual identity when it comes to foreign policy.”
Here’s a taste of World Team Gingrich:
David Wurmser: Gingrich’s Middle East policy adviser was a notorious member of Vice President Cheney’s inner circle that pushed the U.S. into war in Iraq. Once he was questioned during an espionage probe while in the vice president’s office, and he was one of the names driving the initial support for the later disgraced Ahmed Chalabi. Asked by the Daily Telegraph in 2007 if he was a neocon, he offered this: “There’s nothing ‘neo’ about me. I’m a very medieval sort of guy.”
James Woosley: A former director of the CIA, Woolsey recently spoke at a panel hosted by the founder of Judicial Watch focused on President Obama’s “political jihad promoting Islam around the world.” Woolsey is a serious Iran hawk, warning that the way the West is dealing with the nation at the moment “rhymes with what was taking place in the 1930s [with Nazi Germany]”. Woolsey is a Democrat (of the Lieberman school) but he’s helped Republicans running for president before. In 2008, he advised John McCain.
Stephen Yates: Another ex-Cheney national security team member, Yates is known among other things for his work on China. One former U.S. ambassador to China familiar with Yates says he views “China as the solution to ‘enemy deprivation syndrome.’” As Counterpunch explained the theory, “You need some unifying enemy after the collapse of the Soviet Union.” Not exactly the most productive way to view one of America’s most important trading partner, perhaps.
It’s not just Gingrich who’s dipping in the neocon well to form a national security strategy. Rick Perry, who was once the frontrunner before descending out of view like so many before him, leaned on former Donald Rumsfeld deputy Doug Feith, best known for pushing the Al queda-Iraq connection in the run up to the Iraq War and being called by former Gen. Tommy Franks “the f***ing stupidest guy on the face of the earth.”
But no one can top Michele Bachmann when it comes to extremist foreign policy advisers. No less than Islamic fearmonger-in-chief Frank Gaffney himself has been a foreign policy adviser to her campaign.
Foreign policy is a favorite topic inside the beltway, though with the down economy (and a Democratic president in office who never met a missile-laden drone he didn’t like) it’s not clear how much of a role arguments over international affairs will have on the presidential campaign. Republicans certainly like to ding President Obama over Israel and Iran, but it’s hard to predict how important those fights will be down the line. Still, the willingness of Republicans to embrace the Bush foreign policy team — which in the end were among the least popular of his administration — is maybe telling.
2012, 2012 Presidential Primaries, Newt Gingrich

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Bob Dinitto
Gingrich is not a Trojan horse, he is the REAL horse. He is a horrible man who will lead this country to ruin. Or should I say, MORE ruin...
ReplyLike
celtibero1492
THE FUCK**NG ZIONIST JEWS THAT TOOK THE U.S. TO THE WAR AGAINST IRAQ NOW SHOWED UP AS
GINGRICH ADVISERS. IF THIS FUC**NG COUNTRY DO NOT GET LIBERATED FROM THE JEWISH MAFFIA THAT CONTROL THE WHITE HOUSE AND THE FOREIGN POLICY THE U.S. WILL COLPSE VERY SOON. DEATH TO ISRAEL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! COJONES.....
ReplyLike
Allan J Krueger
I have not been happy with Barack Obama.

HOWEVER,

The idea that ANY of the Republican candidates would be an improvement over Obama is ludicrous!
ReplyLike
Allan J Krueger
"Fool me once, shame on you... fool me again.................. just can't fool me again!"

George W Bush
ReplyLike
johnnystrike
No Newts is good Newts
ReplyLike Basil Forthrightly
carey_rowland
Maybe these guys know something about Iran that we don't know, somewhat like Churchill knew long before anybody else what the Nazis were up to.
ReplyLike
Basil Forthrightly
carey_rowland Or maybe they're all mind-slaves of reptilian space aliens. Without any evidence to support either opinion, I'd say they're equally likely.... {:>
ReplyLike
peterprinciple
Neocons = the athlete's foot of American government.

Newt = The world's biggest dirty gym sock.
ReplyLike Robman2
voreason3
The last thing we need is another war in the Middle East, but that is exactly what these people want. A war with Iran would be even more of a disaster than was the war with Iraq. Iran is a country of ~70 million people.

Absolute insanity.
ReplyLike
afblac
Newt has SO much baggage, the political ad guys must be salivating.
ReplyLike
oceras
Since WWII American foreign policy has been at least half 'find an enemy and stop it'. Importantly, this half of foreign policy has rarely had good results except in the way president Obama has conducted it with regard to support of the Arab Spring movements (but not Afghanistan, except for the killing of Osama bin Laden). Republicans have made "nation-building" a dirty term, yet it is in nation-building that the greatest strength of foreign policy lies. I use nation-building in the sense of helping other countries improve health cre and sanitation, to strengthen democracy, to strengthen education, and to conquer unemployment and poverty. Therein lies the way to truly make America secure. When everyone is your friend, when everyone sees that you have their best interests at heart, you have no enemies. Confrontation and war are the diplomatically easy way out. For these reasons we need to fear Gingrich's approach to foreign policy, at least insofar as his advisors are easy-way-out people.
ReplyLike
justanotherlamom
oceras Actually, the US financial situation is the biggest security threat to the US, primarily because of the hubris you outline in your post. Imagine the US with its declining health care, crumbling sanitation infrastructure, corrupt political system, education in a spiraling descent, increasing unemployment, poverty & inflation trying to tell others how to organize their country. What a joke!
ReplyLike
chelyabinska
Why doesn't the Democratic Party take a principled stand against Israel and call out these neocons for being beholden to it at all costs, being reason #1 for wanting a war with Iraq and now Iran?

Oh never mind because the Dems are also beholden to the same special interest group. Therefore expect more warmongering talk on Iran by both Obama and the disgusting Republicans.
ReplyLike strangerhere justanotherlamom
sabbadabbadoo32
Doesn't matter which flavor of pseudo-conservative you choose. I'll bet you 2 to 1 that if a GOP'er wins, we'll be sending troops to Iran. If Obama wins, 6 to 1. Newt's neo-cons versus Perry's anti-Islamists, no matter; it's all GOP xenophobia.
ReplyLike
Babsman
TPM alum Megan Carpentier did a good foundation on just how involved Gingrich was with the last NeoCon rein. http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/03/16/new-rumsfeld...
If memory serves me - leading up to the Iraq War 2 Gingrich's name was mentioned as the most visible of the "review team". Anonymous reports more or less describing him as bullying and barging in areas where outsiders would not normally be let.

Later documentation do not seem to highlight this - but I'd like to know how much he was paid for his historical expertise in the matter
ReplyLike justanotherlamom
delia-ruhe
It's tempting to say, "Uh-oh, they're back," but of course they've never left.
ReplyLike justanotherlamom
fargo117
We already had the neocons screw everything up almost four years ago, why do we want to give them another bite of the apple?
ReplyLike
shorebird234
Good God - Haven't we learned our lesson from the Idiot-in-Chief and his puppetmaster, Dick "I had other priorities" Cheney after their disastrous eight years, a failed fraudulent Iraq war that only made Iran stronger and failure in Afghanistan by abandoning it to run to Iraq rather than stay and have a chance at some kind of success? Gingrich and Romney have both stocked up on these absurd neocons who got it so wrong before, and want to invade Iran and create a real crisis that will make the Iraq fiasco look like peanuts.
ReplyLike
devon.noll
Foreign policy is part and parcel of our national security policy, but these ideas and these people would promote endless war, and with us as the invaders not the defenders of human rights. Our nation needs to step away from these kinds of policies, and we can do it without sacrificing our national security. We must stop assuming that every nation wants our form of government or social or economic policies shoved down their throats. We must accept that there are those out there who disagree with us philosophically and politically, and we must accept that when that is the case, we have no right to use force to change them. That is the road to endless war and destruction of our nation's heritage.

While I agree with the need to protect this nation, I believe that we stand a better chance of making this nation secure by educating its citizens, using the military in surgical, precision attacks only when absolutely necessary, not letting another nation determine our foreign policy to further their agenda, and by stopping our insane policy of being the world's police and interfering in internal matters of other nations. I learned very early in life that when you respect other people and their choices, you are less likely to find yourself in violent confrontation with them, whether at home or overseas. A foreign policy agenda that involves bringing home our troops, meeting our treaty obligations, renegotiating treaties that harm our interests, and working to establish humanitarian policies in keeping with economic, social, and cultural rights of every nation and its people is essential and will insure our safety far better than policies that have created more jihadists and terrorists than ever before.

VOTE FOR AMERICA IN 2012!

http://www.weeeevoteamerica2012.org
http://www.devonnollforpresident2012.org

Or follow my video campaign on YouTube, then go to the links for more information.
ReplyLike Packeryman
Packeryman
devon.noll The ideas are great(planks in the platform). A problem exist at this point in time if you were able to get a following. You would end up guarantying a Republican would win, the national election for presidency. Your centralist, populists ideology would appeal to some of we Independents and some Democrats but not Republicans. You would pull enough votes for the Dem's to lose.Look what happened when Gore lost. It was very close(many say he was cheated out of the race)the fact is had he had the votes from Ralph Nader and the Green party3%)and those were Dem'sand a few Independents, the number would had kept the manipulators hands off the votes.Under what new party are you registered?, how many states?there are a few states that make it nearly impossible to get on the ballot. You must be on the ballot in all 50 states before even thinking about a win(Nader did not get on all ballots an ran anyway, appears he had a hard on for the Dem's). At this time we must stay energized with one party or you will give the election to the bible thumpers and tea bagging lunatics. We did this in 2010 because Dem's and some Independents did go to the polls. We lost many governorship's and both houses in some states(look what this does to gerrymandering)and we lost the HOUSE.Look at the grief this has cased the nation. If we can stay with one party and get out all registered voters and register more new ones, create an urgency to go to the polls to throw out the flat earth folks(bible thumping religious fanatics,and tea bagging lunatics) we will not only win the presidency but take back the House and many governor's offices. We want everyone to pull the Democratic lever to rid our government of these obstructionists.
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glennbrown17
if the rethug get back in power we can kiss this country good by
ReplyLike
britbitter
Wonder if he's aware of the meaning of that gesture... I can't help but think that's directed at me personally.
ReplyLike spas485
JJRothery
Why don't they just rename the foreign policy advisors the War Criminal Club?
Y'know - none of these dopes are going to be happy until they've bombed out 3/4s of the globe, and stolen the resources from the other 1/4.
ReplyLike justanotherlamom
spas485
JJRothery "Why don't they just rename the foreign policy advisors the War Criminal Club?"

Oh, JJ, you just don't understand Republican marketing, do you? You NEVER name something to reflect its truth. You ALWAYS name it the opposite, like an anti-environmental measure called "Clear Skies", for instance.
ReplyLike JJRothery justanotherlamom
Kaneblues
According to the Washington Times, 15 of the 22 members of Romney's foreign policy brain trust are former Bushies. And yet, not even a mention of Romney and his team in the article. What's up with that?
ReplyLike justanotherlamom RealDB
JJRothery
Kaneblues Easy...Mittens isn't the latest shiny thing.
When or if he becomes said shiny thing, the magpie media will be lavishing attention his way. But alas their affection is fickle, as we've seen consistently over the past six weeks.
They've been "in lurve" with more GOP candidates than Zsa Zsa's had husbands.
ReplyLike Kaneblues spas485
Kaneblues
I get that, but it seems odd that in writing about Newt's "Neocon Army," TPM wouldn't even mention the Romney team but they would mention members of both the Perry and Bachmann campaigns. It piece reads like a Romney press release.
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JJRothery
Kaneblues 'tis true enough.
They've been acting like HuffPo Lite around here these days, so who knows where the original substance of this article came from...maybe it IS from a Romney press release.
ReplyLike
RealDB
Kaneblues Romney got the lottery picks.. staff is a who's who of the thinktank set . But I wouldn't trust Cofer Black, not at all.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mitt-romney...

For Gingrich's advisors Wurmser and Yates are neocons and a bit of a joke.. both are connected to John Bolton. However Woolsey used to be a serious player and knows where many of the bodies are because that's right where he wanted them.. is a far more complex character than the others, even Romney's staff.

Personally I have a problem with anyone who signed the PNAC document: if they were obviously so wrong about Iraq for so long, why are they worth listening to now. Oh god and we have these Bush true believers trying to stay relevant.
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peterprinciple
Candidate Gingrich shows how many new wars he and his national security advisors are currently planning.
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jpvbsmith
From reading some right wing blogs, I have found that a lot on the right are not fans of the Bush "neo-cons." But not for the reasons sane people are not fans. There are a lot on the right that are mad that the Bush neocons were not aggressive enough. They think Bush should have attacked Iran/North Korea/any Muslim country/etc. while he had the chance. They also would have turned the entire middle east, minus Israel, into glass.
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KateNH
jpvbsmith Reminds me of the history teacher I had in high school around '79 that swore about every other day when he had a chance that "we shoulda just blown the lid offa Saigon" and that letting those slanty-eyes exist one more day was a crime we'll regret forever.

So this mental disorder is nothing new.
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spas485
KateNHjpvbsmith Did that history teacher sound a lot like Sam Kinnison, by any chance?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bfgrj_62-Y
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KateNH
The political class believes strongly in recycling as its better to use dogs already trained that you know will do the whole performance without worry they might miss a step. Training new ones is an arduous process you know.

Recycled that I know of:
From the Nixon administration:
Donald Rumsfeld
Dick Cheney

From the Reagan administration:
Elliot Abrams -- criminal from Iran-Contra, criminal again under Bush's administration.

Who has Obama recycled? I'm sure others here are more informed on these names than I am. I'm just a poor worker and haven't the luxury to research this stuff like I'd like to.

Once you are in the in-crowd you never have to worry. Unfortunately, its getting more and more that once born into the in-crowd, you are pretty much guaranteed to stay there for life. The latest celebrity/political class round of hirlings to journlist posts also proves this -

- Anderson Cooper - Vanderbilt heir - journalist
- Megan McCain - politician's child - MSNBC contributor
- Chelsea Clinton - politician's child - potential network hire
- George Stepenopolos (whatever) - Clinton campaign manger - long time network "journalist"

It sometimes seems like sitting here and talking about foreign policy issues or the information we are fed and whether its correct or not, is such an exercise in futility. We are here on the ground, living tools for the political and elite classes who use us to further their empire and imperialist game playing.

I'm pretty disgusted.
ReplyLike skygazer
skygazer
KateNH Don't forget Roger Ailes was Nixon's chief media advisor and now runs Fox, which might as well be a division of the GOtP
ReplyLike
kenga333
KateNH Umm. I believe Reagan also recycled Rumsfeld and Cheney ...
ReplyLike
AdAbsurdum
Mordor is stirring.
ReplyLike David Houghton rhewitt Chava Israel 1 more
peterprinciple
AdAbsurdum A giant shadow grows in the east . . . oh wait, that's just Newt getting out bed in the morning.
ReplyLike
MarinCoUSA
Does Jesus love us enough to give Obama a chance to run against W's foreign policy?
Newt: Our National Clown Treasure.
He opens his mouth and a grateful nation laughs.
ReplyLike
skygazer
Keerist...not these neocon fools again. Didn't they do enough damage under Dubya?? How do they even exist as a viable cohort, as I would think most like Fukiyama would be doing everything they could to distance themselves from the domestic and foreign policy catastro-fuck(s) they unleashed and the country is still paying for...
ReplyLike
Rob N
It WOULD look like a neocon fantasy land?

How does it look now?
ReplyLike
glennisw250
Rick Perry being advised by "the stupidest guy on the face of the earth" - now that made me laugh.
ReplyLike Flying Squid AdAbsurdum
KateNH
glennisw250 They realized they had a lot in common and the partnership was struck!
ReplyLike
alumahead
Newt's finger on the button. How comforting...
ReplyLike
cliffhendroval
James Woolsey (which you spelled wrong the first time) was also pushing the Iraq-al Qaeda connection within a day or so of 9/11.
ReplyLike
Flying Squid
cliffhendroval Was that before or after he went through the Stargate to the Pegasus Galaxy to run Atlantis?
ReplyLike
Not2guilty
Newt, a pimple on humanity's ass who aspires to become a festering boil.
ReplyLike skygazer David Houghton
Flying Squid
"Oooh! Wurmser!" -- Professor Farnsworth
ReplyLike sullivanst
weindeb
The GOP candidates are almost to a person bloviating buffoons, as well as liars, cheats, and hypocrites, whose ideologic stands are harmful to the very being of our nation. For years the GOP has been drifting toward its strange essence of greed, selfishness, dysfunction, anti-democratic stances and strategies, and indeed the destruction of decency itself. Now that it has essentially sunk to the lower depths of the cesspool of its own creation, why should it any longer be considered an acceptable party, but rather an odorous excrescence, a cancer eating away at our body politic? This party has become so indescribably vile that it makes the Democratic Party look far more attractive than it should, for it, too, has more than its share of taint and self-aggrandizement. Seems to me that much of the OWS movement is an instinctive reaction to what we as a nation, even against our will, are becoming.
ReplyLike skygazer eab KateNH 1 more
skygazer
weindeb Mega-Like x100!
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