Posted on 11/06/2011 11:33:55 AM PST by smoothsailing
November 3, 2011
Alan Caruba
It can be argued that domestic affairs are a president's top priority, but the Constitution expressly puts the chief executive in charge of setting and conducting foreign affairs. It is therefore essential to know if the candidate who wants to be president has a reasonable knowledge of events around the world.
On Tuesday evening I watched an edition of Fox News Bret Beir's Special Report where Herman Cain was "center chair" as the usual members of the panel got a chance to quiz him and, after he attempted to dispose of the charges of sexual harassment unleashed against him, syndicated columnist, Charles Krauthammer asked a question that dealt with foreign policy.
What would Cain do if Iran was going to unleash an attack on the U.S.? Cain gave a rambling, unspecific answer except to say he'd order an Aegis destroyer into the Persian Gulf to let Iran know he was serious, mentioning something about the use by Iran of missiles. It was distressingly clear that Cain had no more idea what he would do than he had regarding other potential foreign policy questions.
Foreign affairs are Herman Cain's Achilles' heel and it has not gone unnoticed by the political press and others. In the October 17 Washington Post, Chris Cillizza took note of Cain's appearance on "Meet the Press" where he was asked "whether Iran's involvement in an alleged plot to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador to the U.S. amounted to an act of war."
Cain replied, "After I looked at all of the information provided by the intelligence community, the military, than I could make that decision." That is what is known as a lawyerly response. "If, if it's an act of war, and the evidence suggests that, than I am going to consult with my advisors and say, 'What are our options"'"
If Barack Obama's extremely muted response is any indication, there aren't that many overt options, though one might hope that there are a host of covert ones in the works.
During a PBS interview with Judy Woodruff, Cain was asked about China as a potential military threat to the U.S. At one point Cain said, "They've indicated that they're trying they're trying to develop nuclear capability..." China conducted its first text of a nuclear device on October 16, 1964. It is estimated to have some 400 nuclear weapons. They are not "developing" a nuclear threat. They are a nuclear threat in the same way as other nations with nuclear weapons. This is why Iran is hell-bent on acquiring its own nuclear weapons.
A man no one could accuse of being anything but conservative, Bill O'Reilly of Fox News, had Cain on his program and, in a segment with Dennis Miller, the show's comic relief, O'Reilly said, "Look, I like Herman Cain. I like his spirit. I think he presents himself very well. But when he came on The Factor a few weeks ago, he had no clue about foreign affairs."
Cain lacks a good poker face. When asked questions for which he is unprepared, his eyes begin to blink like a deranged traffic light. He responds with some programmed answer that is often unrelated to the question. He is the proverbial deer in the headlights.
During a recent speech to a Republican audience, he said that so far as he's concerned, America is Israel's ally and vice versa. That got the predictable applause. Cain visited Israel in August on a fact-finding tour. He met with a deputy prime minister and the Mayor of Jerusalem.
However, when he was interviewed by Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday, he was asked about the Palestinian demand of "right of return," a major divide between Israelis and Palestinians, and Cain had no idea what it was. "That's something that should be negotiated," said Cain, grasping for an answer that sounded sensible, but the issue is not negotiable so far as the Israelis are concerned and with good reason. Someone even casually aware of the issues affecting Israel would know that.
Stephen Yates, president of the DC Advisory and former national security advisor to Vice President Dick Cheney, might not be expected to criticize a GOP candidate, but when asked he said of Cain, "These are the kind of questions a leading candidate cannot simply pass to advisors. To date, Cain has not projected command of these presidential imperatives."
A pizza company executive or one leading a restaurant trade association probably doesn't need to know much about foreign affairs, but a candidate for President of the United States needs to know more than some hasty daily briefings by his campaign staffers.
Cain dismissed the fact he had no idea where Uzbekistan is or its strategic importance to U.S. foreign affairs. "When they ask me who is the president of Ubeki-beki-beki-stan-stan, I'm going to say, you know, I don't know. Do you know?" Even Obama knows that a stable relationship with Uzbekistan is regarded as of vital importance to the war in Afghanistan for its airport and as a transit corridor to reduce dependence on Pakistan.
Cain thinks foreign affairs questions are "gotcha" questions, but they may well be the most critical questions a potential president has to understand and answer. It is testimony to the difficulty of these issues that Barack Obama has essentially carried out most of the policies put in place by George W. Bush when it comes to foreign affairs.
Right now Herman Cain is the candidate-de-jour in the polls, but so was Michelle Bachmann and Rick Perry when he got into the race. I like the fact that Cain is a bona fide conservative. I don't like the obvious fact that he couldn't find Uzbekistan on the map and probably doesn't know much else about the world.
On that count alone, I would not vote for him. Republicans have to get over their current love affair with Herman Cain and select a candidate more qualified to lead the nation.
© Alan Caruba
Bill O’Reilly is no conservative.
Now we’re hearing conservatives being told Cain is deficient in foreign policy.
The Left failed to derail him with a phony scandal so now its trying another line of attack.
They and the GOP establishment are getting desperate.
It is not mastery of facts that make a leader, it’s mastery of principle.
Many an idiot-savant has mastered “facts” as such. They don’t do much more than show off.
Someone grounded in principles can get any number of experts to lay out facts. The set of principles put them together in a meaningful way.
"Dr.Kissinger have you ever heard of Alan Caruba?"
"Yes, he's a moron."
What is the capital of Assyria?
I am beginning to think that Perrywinkes define “religious like fervor” - as anyone who isn’t particularly enthused by being called “heartless” by a RINO.
Just saying.
Perrywinkes, used to regularly say the exact same think about Palin supporters. That we “went on Perry threads to disrupt”. Etc.
Word for word. The talking points remain on the same fax, only the candidate name is changed.
So did all the Palin supporters change religions?
Or are they simply realizing there is someone else on the scene, who believes as they do?
Now. Here we are on a Cain thread. A Cain thread.
Just saying.
Who is disrupting?
No one seems to recall the famous commercial Hillary ran about Obama being unprepared for that 3:00 AM crisis phone call.
The voters discounted it and thought Obama’s lack of foreign policy experience wasn’t relevant to his being President.
Now a different, higher standard is applied to Cain. How convenient.
Exactly. Pinheads can go read a book. You want a man of action that supports the value of hard work. The Constitution supports this and the right to pray and worship about it. It also supports your right to defend it. The over-educated numbnuts we have in charge now just expects it.
I tend to agree with you.
I think a candidate for President should have a well-articulated set of priniciples for dealing with foreign policy and concrete proposals for advancing them re the major challenges on the world scene. When the USSR was the foremost of those challenges in the 1980’s, Ronald Reagan had a well-thought out philosophy regarding how to deal with the communists: “We win, they lose.” And he had a program, both overt and covert, for making that happen.
We should now have the same attitude regarding radical jihadism, led by Iran openly and by the likes of Saudi Arabia covertly. A new President, explicitly unlike Obama, should have a program ready to go to frustrate and defeat this enemy. They don’t have to reveal every detail of it - they shouldn’t, in fact - but they should let us know they have one ready. or so it seems to me.
It’s not like this is the first time someone has questioned his prowess on foreign policy.
I had the same concern about candidate Reagan....
What do you want him to say?
How are all the foreign policy “experts” currently destroying America’s future, working out for you?...
Mr. Reagan was in a much different position. He put a big scare into the 1976 convention.
Concern trolls like you love to paint the motivation of the other side as something cultish. Trust me, I've seen plenty of that on the Perry side as well, running around foolishly claiming that Perry is the only one who can beat Romney. Well, guess what? Cain has doubled Romney in the most recent Iowa poll and has FIVE TIMES the support of Perry.
No criticism of him can be accepted or even discussed.
And another thing the concern trolls like to do is to pretend that they can't criticize a candidate. And that is pure horsecrap and you know it. You just don't like the retorts that get properly thrown right back in your face when you try to push liberal hatchet jobs against Cain.
Try this - working on your candidate to undo some of the positions that sunk him into single digits, instead of bashing the guy who is actually putting a hurt on Romney.
I never did. Reagan had been making his position clear for years.
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