The Huckster and foreign policy

A more successful U.S. foreign policy needs to better explain Islamic jihadism to the American people. Given how Americans have thrived on diversity -- religious, ethnic, racial -- it takes an enormous leap of imagination to understand what Islamic terrorists are about, that they really do want to kill every last one of us and destroy civilization as we know it. If they are willing to kill their own children by letting them detonate suicide bombs, then they will also be willing to kill our children for their misguided cause. The Bush administration has never adequately explained the theology and ideology behind Islamic terrorism or convinced us of its ruthless fanaticism. The first rule of war is "know your enemy," and most Americans do not know theirs. To grasp the magnitude of the threat, we first have to understand what makes Islamic terrorists tick. Very few Americans are familiar with the writings of Sayyid Qutb, the Egyptian radical executed in 1966, or the Muslim Brotherhood, whose call to active jihad influenced Osama bin Laden and the rise of al Qaeda. Qutb raged against the decadence and sin he saw around him and sought to restore the "pure" Islam of the seventh century through a theocratic caliphate without national borders. He saw nothing decadent or sinful in murdering in order to achieve that end. America's culture of life stands in stark contrast to the jihadists' culture of death.

But then he says this

As president, my goal in the Arab and Muslim worlds will be to calibrate a course between maintaining stability and promoting democracy. It is self-defeating to attempt too much too soon: doing so could mean holding elections that the extremists would win. But it is also self-defeating to do nothing. We must first destroy existing terrorist groups and then attack the underlying conditions that breed them: the lack of basic sanitation, health care, education, jobs, a free press, fair courts -- which all translates into a lack of opportunity and hope. The United States' strategic interests as the world's most powerful country coincide with its moral obligations as the richest. If we do not do the right thing to improve life in the Muslim world, the terrorists will step in and do the wrong thing.

Hey Huckster the underlying conditions are those put forth in your first part not the sanitation, health care, education, etc, used in your second part. No single group gets more international money then the Palestinians and yet they still live in refugee camps and all of those underlying conditions continue to exist. He felt it necessary to throw in the "moral obligation" card. Why didn't he just go ahead and use another one of the liberals favorite lines about seizing the "moral high ground".
He continues to try and be everything to everybody. He is worst then a flip flopper he is a panderer. In this foreign policy statement he says something that everybody can find to like, and as history as shown when you try to please all you wind up pleasing none.
I am sorry folks, like Ann Coulter says he is the Republican Jimmy Carter with a dash of Bill Clinton thrown in.
There is more in his position paper such as growing the military. His proposal is to do it faster. Really? How are you going to do that Huckster when it is an all volunteer force. Folks don't volunteer you can't grow the military. There is an elite group in our society I call the Warrior Culture. Less then 1% of all Americans belong to this group.
His statements on why various tribes and sections of the population are joining our side of the fight are also flawed. The one thing that trumps everything else in the Islamic world is strength. They will side with whoever they think is the big dog in the fight and they will switch sides again just as easily. It is hard wired into them, developed over centuries having to survive in their world.
Anyway I have said enough about this. Republicans, whether you call yourself evangelical or atheist, you must quit drinking the kool aid being dispensed by this huckster. If the Clinton years taught us nothing else it should be that slick words do not a man make.
His whole paper is 5 pages in length and like I said he has something for everybody in it.
"Deeds not Words"

This is also being discussed over at Little Green Footballs and Hot Air.