Most of those were Cold War treaties – Republicans dominated the Presidency during the height of the Cold War.
Also, New START, various free trade agreements, and most of Syria’s chemical weapons actually have been destroyed.
The Reagan ending-the-Cold-War thing is mostly a myth. Shitty systems collapse, and the Soviet Union would have collapsed with or without Reagan. He might have accelerated it by a few months or a few years, but that’s it.
And you continue to argue as if “war-mongering” is the same as “strength”. It’s not. In our recent history, it’s made us weaker. We are weaker because of Iraq. Invading Iran would make us weaker. Ground war with ISIS would make us weaker. What you advocate would weaken America.
Meaningless bullshit. Faux-punditry. We’re in a much better “position of strength” internationally now than in the mid 2000s during the Iraq debacle.
The Soviets are long gone. The Cold War is over. Shitty systems collapse. America didn’t defeat the Soviet Union – they defeated themselves.
If we compare the crap that today’s Republicans spew re: foreign policy to Bush I and Reagan, it’s pretty clear to me.
Who is advocating this? Who are you arguing with? Why pull out bullshit nonsense like this? No one advocates “negotiating from a position of weakness”.
Not even “war-mongering” - bullying. That’s what the right-wing consider strength.
When I characterized John Bolton’s approach to diplomacy as “We’re America so fuck you”, that’s the position that the current GOP mistake for strength and that the rest of the world sees as just being a bunch of overblown assholes. They still haven’t learned that Bush’s “Axis of Evil” rhetoric weakened moderates in Iran and gave Ahmedinejad and his extremist faction a huge power boost, or that Bush’s public declarations of war against Al-Qaeda gave Osama bin Laden his most effective recruiting tool. Such talk plays well to the domestic audience but weakens the country’s effectiveness as an international geopolitical force.
Conversely, Obama’s initial outreach to Muslims internationally hurt Al-Qaeda by explicitly positioning America as pro-Islam while still being anti-terror. Naturally, the Republicans have called this an “apology tour”. Because speaking softly, even while wielding a big stick, just doesn’t get the testosterone pumping.
North Korea does not yet have any nuclear weapons. They have managed to cobble together a couple of pathetic nuclear bombs, but they have no means of delivering those bombs to anyone but themselves. They are no threat to us, and the one country they are a threat to, it’s because of their conventional artillery, not because of their nukes.
Even Republicans seem to accept the George W. Bush presidency was a failure. The only mistake Jeb made was mentioning his brother by name. He could repeat all of George’s policies and speeches verbatim and get the nomination easily, just don’t mention the name!
Speaking of Lindsey Graham, it appears he will announce his candidacy for PotUS on June 1. Should make the last few months of Jon Stewart on The Daily Show enjoyable.
When you’re a moderate, things have to be perfect for you to win. Given an excuse to not back a moderate, we’ll take it. Christie’s given us too many excuses.
Lindsey Graham and John Bolton also occupy some moderate space, with Graham being a McCain conservative and John Bolton being more of a Joe Lieberman Democrat than an actual Republican. But many will like his harsh rhetoric, which causes many people to think you’re more conservative than you are.
In one paragraph, you demonstrate everything that is wrong about the modern GOP. As I’ve posted before, just because half the party wants to criminalize miscarriages doesn’t mean the ones who only want to ban abortion with no exceptions are moderates.
Fucking love for them to nominate a moderate, maybe means they’re back taking their meds. Maybe stop having those Mad Max nightmares where Ted Cruz is The Humongous.
Sort of. McCain wasn’t a moderate so much as a heterodox with a bipartisan reputation. Romney was a moderate who ran as a conservative. But it’s true that we don’t nominate hardcore conservatives, and the only time we did was Reagan and before him, Goldwater.