Posted on 09/12/2008 1:11:06 AM PDT by jeltz25
What Exactly Is the 'Bush Doctrine'? It's being taken in some quarters as revelatory of inexperience that Sarah Palin sought clarification when ABC's Charlie Gibson asked her about the Bush Doctrine. To review, here is the passage from the transcript.
GIBSON: Do you agree with the Bush doctrine? PALIN: In what respect, Charlie? GIBSON: The Bush -- well, what do you -- what do you interpret it to be? PALIN: His world view. GIBSON: No, the Bush doctrine, enunciated September 2002, before the Iraq war. PALIN: I believe that what President Bush has attempted to do is rid this world of Islamic extremism, terrorists who are hell bent on destroying our nation. There have been blunders along the way, though. There have been mistakes made. And with new leadership, and that's the beauty of American elections, of course, and democracy, is with new leadership comes opportunity to do things better. GIBSON: The Bush doctrine, as I understand it, is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense, that we have the right to a preemptive strike against any other country that we think is going to attack us. Do you agree with that?
Gibson should of course have said in the first place what he understood the Bush Doctrine to be--and specified that he was asking a question about preemption. Palin was well within bounds to have asked him to be more specific. Because, as it happens, the doctrine has no universally acknowledged single meaning. Gibson himself in the past has defined the Bush Doctrine to mean "a promise that all terrorist organizations with global reach will be found, stopped and defeated"--which is remarkably close to Palin's own answer.
Consider what a diversity of views on the meaning of the Bush Doctrine can be found simply within the archives of ABC News itself:
September 20, 2001 PETER JENNINGS: . . . Claire, the president said at one point, 'From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.' Should we be taking that as the Bush doctrine? CLAIRE SHIPMAN reporting: I think so, Peter,
September 21, 2001 CHARLIE GIBSON: The president in his speech last night, very forceful. Four out of five Americans watched it. Everybody gathered around the television set last night. The president issued a series of demands to the Taliban, already rejected. We'll get to that in a moment. He also outlined what is being called the Bush Doctrine, a promise that all terrorists organizations with global reach will be found, stopped and defeated.
September 21, 2001 CHARLIE GIBSON: Senator Daschle, let me start with you. People were looking for a Bush Doctrine. They may have found it when he said the war on terror will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped or defeated. That's pretty broad. Broader than you expected?
December 9, 2001 GEORGE WILL: The Bush doctrine holds that anyone who governs a territory is complicit in any terrorism that issues from that territory. That covers the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Second, the war on terrorism is indivisible, it's part of the Bush doctrine.
December 11, 2001 GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: Two years ago, September 1999, Bush gave his first speech when he was running about terrorism. And his first--had the first explanation of the Bush doctrine, that if you harbor a terrorist, you're going to be attacked. The Bush White House is putting this out, saying it shows that Bush was very prescient, but that was only one speech given in the campaign.
January 28, 2002 BOB WOODWARD: This is now the Bush Doctrine . . . , namely that if we're attacked by terrorists, we will not just go after those terrorists but the countries or the people who harbor them.
January 29, 2002 GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: It was striking and significant that the president really expanded the Bush doctrine. If a nation builds a weapon of mass destruction--Iraq, Iran or North Korea--we will reserve the right to take out those weapons even if we're not attacked or even if there's not a threat.
March 19, 2004 TERRY MORAN: That was the Bush doctrine we just heard. On this one-year anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, President Bush offered a very broad justification of American leadership in the world under him since 9/11. Not just since one year in Iraq. For American voters as an argument that the country is safer, but more as you point out, for the world, which has been divided by his leadership, that Iraq is knit, in his mind, very firmly into that war on terrorism. One omission which I believe will be noted around the world, he made no mention of the role of multilateral institutions, the UN and others, in this fight against terrorism. In his mind, it's clear it's American leadership with others following along.
May 7, 2006 GEORGE WILL: Now the argument from the right is the CIA is a rogue agent because it has not subscribed to the Bush doctrine. The Bush doctrine being that American security depends on the spread of democracy and we know how to do that. The trouble is, Negroponte, who is considered by some of these conservatives the villain here and an enemy of the Bush doctrine is the choice of Bush, which makes Bush an insufficient subscriber to the Bush doctrine.
I'll stop there, although anyone with a Nexis account can find far more where that came from. Preemptive war; American unilateralism; the overthrow of regimes that harbor and abet terrorists--all of these things and more have been described as the "Bush Doctrine." It was a bit of a sham on Gibson's part to have pretended that there's such a thing as 'the' Bush Doctrine, much less that it was enunciated in September 2002
You’ll notice Hillary’s transcript includes “uhs” and Obama’s doesn’t. IIRC
Yep, I did Hillary was a test case for the media if they could decide the election.
Agreed. It is a made up media term. She had every right to ask for a clarification of which part of the media term Gibson was referring too. Second, she should have known it was a media catch phrase. Perhaps that was the reason in her asking for a clarification, but it got lost on the public. Even I would have asked for a clarification as the media catch phrase the "Bush Doctrine" is thrown about to mean just about anything to the public.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAEnu89dxCY
Barack Obama on ABC World News With Charlie Gibson (7/23/08)
And the fact that Bush was more loyal to his staffers than they were to him. I'll always be disappointed that Dubya didn't use the bully pulpit of the Presidency.
I knew Sarah would hold her own with Gibson. Whatever mistakes she may have made, she'll learn from them and move forward. She does fine without a teleprompter in front of her.
She's no Dan Quayle, thankfully. OTOH, Biden is making Jack Kemp's performance in '96 look positively spectacular.
Biden hasn't had to run an extended campaign for decades, and it's showing. If he's still on the ticket 10/1, he'll be a dead man walking.
They want to be in the middle of politics, rather than doing their damn job, throw it right back in their face.
Mediots would rather key off the New York Times and the Washington Post than to think for themselves.
Facts will easily beat them. They are completely curious about Palin's past, as they are completely un-curious about Obama's past, for just one easy example; they are easy to beat. And they deserve nothing but open contempt.
And they can't figure out why their readership is plummeting. They're stupid.
WOW- great find- thank you again :) Interesting- the tone is SO different. He asks the experience and age question- in a friendly and non-hostile OR condescending manner- and did NOT press him on the non-substantive answers given.
He DID press him on his flip-flop on Jerusalem.
Luk 12:8 Also I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess me before men, him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels of God:
Luk 12:11 And when they bring you unto the synagogues, and unto magistrates, and powers, take ye no thought how or what thing ye shall answer, or what ye shall say:
Luk 12:12 For the Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye ought to say.
when he asked about it I was wondering whatonearth he was on about.
he should have been more specific and now I hear liberals saying she blew it
do liberals actually hear and see what the rest of the country see.
last night on hannity the guy they had on said Palin will go to war Russia, she never said that and had to be corrected
now this morning this henican guy saying about the speech and how she isn;t experienced
er she’s more experienced than obama
Palin could raise the dead and cure the sick and liberals would say that is proof we need health care reform.
>>Bottom line, the “Bush Doctrine” as a term is a made up media phrase.<<
I thought so!!!!
I thought so when I heard it!!!
Thanks, I thought I was crazy.
Great column, great analysis. Bookmarked.
Absolutely, nobody from the Administration ever came out and delineated a “Bush Doctrine”. It was a term applied secondarily by journalists. Can someone here do a Lexis/Nexis search on this? The article itself mentions Gibson’s own words, there are definitely more examples. I’d like to know who coined it.
I was driving my kids to school this morning, and was listening to the local radio that the kids listen to, and they were aghast that Palin didn’t know what the Bush Doctrine was. Paraphrasing, they said that everyone knows that it means attack first and ask questions later.
Ridiculous.
I think history is the one to decide what the Bush Doctrine is or isn’t. Pre-emption is certainly not a new foreign policy concept.
If you had asked me yesterday morning, what is the Bush Doctrine? My answer would be— if you harbor terrorists, you will be held accountable as though you were a terrorist nation.
The Bush Doctrine is a response to the non-governmental (but in some cases state-sponsored) organizations that have become prevalent in our World. It is an attempt to craft a foreign and defense policy in an era when our greatest enemies are not foreign nations with standing uniformed armies...
Thanks for posting.
Look and listen to her for 4 years or Biden, take your pick.
Is that really her couch?
It’s so cool!
Wow, there is an exceedingly stark contrast between the questioning of Obama and the interrogation of Palin.
If Gibson had a conscience, he would be ashamed of himself.
I’m happy because every single question posed to Sarah Palin is fair game for someone to ask Barry. When the country sees her decisive America-first stances side-by-side with his ahh, uhmmm, er, ‘nuances’, the choice of who is ready to lead will be crystal clear.
I thought "Charlie's" voice was weak and condescending. And I could see Sarah's wheels turning as she listened to his questions, especially on the Bush Doctrine. She didn't have to utter an uhhhh, and an uhhhhhh to answer...she looked him in the eyes and made her comments.
This was her first so-called big interview, and her eloquence and her clear diction and her forthrightness came across like gangbusters. She was very impressive.
I think we have a winner on our hands, GO, SARAH, GO.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.