The Gibson / Palin Interview: Foreign Policy

Just for the record, Sarah Palin knows nothing about current events.

• She didn’t know Georgia invaded South Ossetia. She thinks Russia’s response was completely unprovoked and she seems to border on a Cold War approach.(It is, of course, more complicated that this, but she doesn’t even know the basics.)
• She didn’t know that the US just told Israel that we wouldn’t help them bomb Iran.

The US government, under Bush 43, has refused to give Israel the go-ahead to fly over Iraq and has refused to allow Israel to buy refueling tanker planes from Boeing. The US told the Israelis that they can have some fancy radar we’ve developed and we’ve even bought it for them already.

• Palin didn’t know what the Bush doctrine is. It took her something like three questions from Gibson to figure it out.

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MORE…

• Palin believes the US energy situation is the cornerstone of foreign policy / national security, the Alaska pipeline being her version of energy independence that will somehow protect the US from Russia and other not-so-friendly countries.

That’s her sole credential.

GIBSON: What insight into Russian actions, particularly in the last couple of weeks, does the proximity of the state give you?

PALIN: They’re our next door neighbors and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska.

Oh, brilliant.

• Palin believes Iran’s development of a nuclear reactor is a direct nuclear threat to Israel.

Sarah seems unaware that Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has talked about religious reasons for not having nuclear weapons: “Our religion prohibits us from having nuclear arms and our religious leader has prohibited it from the point of view of religious law. It’s a closed road.”

If Ahmadinejad really plans on wiping Israel from the map militarily he’s going to need cooperation from other countries in terms of safe conduct, fly zones, etc. It is not clear as yet that he could obtain everything he needs. And, in any case, he’s not really the one in charge. The supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is. Khamenei issued a fatwa against the production and stockpiling of nuclear weapons that was cited by the International Atomic Energy Agency in 2005. I have seen no evidence that this is a false fatwa, such as the one in France in 2005.

Also, from Global research:

The Iranians are at an elementary stage in the processing of uranium, not even reaching the point of uranium enrichment, which in turn will take still a number of years, and overcoming many complex technical problems before it can build a bomb. There is no factual basis for arguing that Iran represents a nuclear threat to Israel or to the US forces in the Middle East.

Israel has been threatening to bomb Iran because of this perceived nuclear threat since at least 2006, but hasn’t done so. What’s up with that?

The only country to benefit from Israel’s bombing of Iran would be Israel, and even that wouldn’t work because it would provoke all-out war against Israel by other countries in the Middle East.

• Palin doesn’t know what the Cold War was.

Definition of Cold War: A state of political tension and military rivalry between nations that stops short of full-scale war

PALIN: … We are thankful that, under Reagan, we won the Cold War, without a shot fired, also.

Without a shot fired? Oh, boy. Thanks.

• Palin still mentions that her son’s brigade is going to Iraq.

I wish she’d shut up about that. If she knows for sure where he’s going, she shouldn’t say anything. But, in general, you don’t know where they’re going. And you keep your mouth shut until you’re told it’s OK to open it.

• Palin also thinks “God’s plan” for the world has something to do with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I wonder if this means she would intend to spread that around, like Bush 43 did. OMG.