Palin & The Bush Doctrine

A lot of people have risen in spirited defense of Gov. Sarah Palin's apparent ignorance of the meaning of the term "Bush doctrine" in the interview with Charlie Gibson yesterday. Two of this number include Michael Abramowitz and the man who coined the term, "Bush doctrine," Charles Krauthammer, both of whom point to Charlie Gibson as the one confused on this issue, in addition to being condescending and snobbish.

This from Charles Krauthammer writing in the Washington Post:

"At times visibly nervous . . . Ms. Palin most visibly stumbled when she was asked by Mr. Gibson if she agreed with the Bush doctrine. Ms. Palin did not seem to know what he was talking about. Mr. Gibson, sounding like an impatient teacher, informed her that it meant the right of 'anticipatory self-defense.' "

-- New York Times, Sept. 12

Informed her? Rubbish.

The New York Times got it wrong. And Charlie Gibson got it wrong.

There is no single meaning of the Bush doctrine. In fact, there have been four distinct meanings, each one succeeding another over the eight years of this administration -- and the one Charlie Gibson cited is not the one in common usage today. It is utterly different.

He asked Palin, "Do you agree with the Bush doctrine?"

She responded, quite sensibly to a question that is ambiguous, "In what respect, Charlie?"

Sensing his "gotcha" moment, Gibson refused to tell her. After making her fish for the answer, Gibson grudgingly explained to the moose-hunting rube that the Bush doctrine "is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense."

It's not. It's the third in a series and was superseded by the fourth and current definition of the Bush doctrine, the most sweeping formulation of the Bush approach to foreign policy and the one that most clearly and distinctively defines the Bush years: the idea that the fundamental mission of American foreign policy is to spread democracy throughout the world. It was most dramatically enunciated in Bush's second inaugural address: "The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world."

. . . Yes, Sarah Palin didn't know what it is. But neither does Charlie Gibson. And at least she didn't pretend to know -- while he looked down his nose and over his glasses with weary disdain, sighing and "sounding like an impatient teacher," as the Times noted. In doing so, he captured perfectly the establishment snobbery and intellectual condescension that has characterized the chattering classes' reaction to the mother of five who presumes to play on their stage.

Read the entire article. Michael Abramowitz has a similar defense of Gov. Palin in WaPo.

In the end, this appears to be much ado about nothing, even though the left are making it into a cause celebre. It does not matter whether Gov. Palin was completely ignorant of the term "Bush doctrine" or merely unsure of the dimensions of Charlie Gibson's question. What matters is how Gov. Palin views the distinct elements of the Bush doctrine, not whether she knows what elements are rolled up into that word. In other words, I want to know whether Gov. Palin thinks we have a right to conduct preemptive attacks - she does - and not whether she knows that is what Charles Gibson is trying to ask her when he says "Bush doctrine." Obama does not believe in preemptive strikes though he likely knows what the "Bush doctrine" is. What more could prove my point.

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Analysis Of The ABC Interview of Gov. Sarah Palin

Part I of the interview:



Comments -

Overall this was neither a great nor a bad interview. Some see it as a hostile one. It was certainly exponentially tougher than anything the press has given to Obama. That said, but for the "prayer" questions, I thought Charlie Gibson was reasonably fair.

Gov. Palin answered several of the questions very well. I especially liked her answer on Israel's right to attack Iran in its own self defense and her answer to the questions on NATO. She accurately stated the NATO central tenent - that an attack on one is an attack on all - and that we should bring the Ukraine and Georgia into the NATO fold as a way to lessen the likelihood that those nascent democracies will suffer from Russian predation.

Her answer on the prayer question, that she, like Lincoln, prayed for no more than that we are on God's side, was incredibly good. That was made all the moreso true when you consider that it was done in the face of ABC using a doctored tape that cut and spliced her words to give a different meaning. I await ABC's explanation of that one. Hot Air has that entire story.

Some of her answers to the other questions were evasive and she had the deer in the headlights look when Gibson asked her about the "Bush doctrine." That is going to make all sorts of DNC ads. Palin clearly did not know what Gibson was talking about. She would have been much better off saying immediately "I am drawing a blank, remind me of the docrine," and then launching into her answer - which would have been better if it resembeled Andy McCarthy's at NRO. Not knowing every nuance is not weakness. Being afraid to admit that she does not know every nuance is. Gibson let her hang on that one and she herself turned a small got'cha into a larger one.

Given that she didn't know the Bush doctrine - which, in reality, is fairly basic - it is clear she is not a foreign policy wonk and that she is drinking it in right now at fire hose speed. Given her other answers, she is obviously a quick study. She hurts herself by attempting paint herself on this issue as stronger than she is, and the talk about Alaska bordering Russia as somehow imbuing her with a check in the foreign policy credential box comes across as very weak indeed. Trying to make more of that then is justified is very much akin to Obama relying so heavilly on his experience as a community organizer. It rings hollow and makes her look smaller.

Gov. Palin would be better served if she followed a formulaic response whereby, in answering foreign policy and national security questions, she first would give a short statement of the general principles that would guide her judgment in regards to the matter under question and then launch into the specifics. For example, "Charlie, my rule of thumb is that we must protect existing democracies and do our best to promote democracy throughtout the world. From that standpoint, . . . . blah, blah, Russia, Georgia, Israel, etc." It would clarify some of her rambling answers and it would also highlight her judgment.

Obama has at least some record on foreign policy - his Iraq votes, his vote against declaring the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization, etc. - from which the quality - or lack thereof - of his judgment can be gleaned. Palin starts out as a true tabula rasa with no prior record. To remedy that, we need to clearly hear from Gov. Palin the principles that will guide her judgment. She will earn brownie points if she can also clearly articulate in a sound byte how her judgment on a particular issue is different from the Obama/Biden camp. Biden has been so wrong so often on so many foreign policy issues, that should be like shooting fish in a barrel.

Gov. Palin's answer to the question of Pakistan was also very weak. There is a textbook answer to Gibson's question of whether we have the right to cross the border and attack into Pakistan without the approval of the Pakistani government. The honest answer would be - "Numbnuts, I am not going to announce as policy that we are going to cross Pakistan's border and piss off a nuclear armed country and nominal ally. If our soldiers get lost and inadvertently end up on the other side dressed in Paki clothing, well, mistakes happen."

The tactful answer would be "Charlie, we are in a war and the rule of thumb is that we only go to war if we intend to win the war. We must do so at the least cost in lives of our soldiers. We cannot stand idly by while al Qaeda and the Taliban launch cross border attacks against our coalition soldiers and Afghani civilians from uncontrolled parts of Pakistan. Equally, we do not want to do anything overtly that would threaten the stability of Pakistan - a country which is at present an ally in the war on terror and which is a nuclear armed nation of over ___ million people. Launching overt, large scale attacks across the border may have that effect and leave us worse off. Thus, as things stand today, prudence demands that we should operate within those boundaries. That is the extent of my answer on this one and I will say no more." And when Gibson asks follow up, she should just have repeated "I will say no more."

I will load the second part of the interview from YouTube when its posted. She discusses "anthropogenic" global warming and drilling in ANWR. She is much more comfortable in those discussion.

My overall impression. She passed the test, she did not ace it. She is very intelligent. She is a very quick study. She will be more than ready for the debates. She will be ready for Fox in another week, the Sunday talk shows in another two weeks. She needs to be - and to appear to be - honest in her responses, even if that means displaying that she does not know the tenents of the Bush doctrine - or the name of the foreign minister of South Gotchastan. We will take our anger out on the press for gotch'as. We will take our anger out on her for trying to fool us in answer to a gotch'a.

Update: Per Bill Kristol, WaPo is "Smearing Palin On Page 1." I concur with his analysis. WaPo is claiming that Palin tied the decision to go into Iraq with the assertion that there was a tie-in prewar between al Qaeda and Iraq. She never says that, either during the interview above nor in her speech to deploying troops.

HotAir gives the interview about the same grade as I do, though they speculate on whether some of the interview where Palin appeared weakest was distorted by editing.

Over at the Politico, partisans give her . . . partisan marks.

Instapundit has an extensive roundup, including some pretty critical takes on Gibson's performance. And see Memorandum.

Amazingly, the NYT did not give Gov. Palin high marks.

At The Next Right, some on the left are hyperventilating over Palin's responses on NATO. Obviously, they do not understand the basics of the Treaty.

Patrick O'Hannigan does not trust Charlie Gibson's objectivity.

But a week ago, Charles Krauthammer wrote that Palin could only help McCain if she pulled an "Obama." My how time flys. Now, a week later, Mr. Krauthammer that she in fact is pulling an Obama.

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