September 12th 2008
Which Bush Doctrine?
S
arah Palin’s stumbling response to Charles Gibson’s question, “Do you support the Bush Doctrine?” was the low point of last night’s interviews. Her posture and voice both went defensive, and she came across, as I noted here and here, as not knowing the answer.
On second thought, though, the problem may easily have been that she didn’t know which answer, not the answer. That’s because the Bush Doctrine is actually many doctrines:
- The right of the United States to treat countries that harbor terrorists as terrorists (the justification for the Afghanistan invasion)
- The policy of preventive war, or the right of the United States to depose foreign regimes that represent an immediate threat (the justification for the Iraq invasion)
- The policy of supporting democracy in the Middle East and around the world in order to squelch terrorism
- A willingness to pursue U.S. military interests unilaterally. (A hat-tip to Wikipedia, for compiling the points so succinctly.)
Let’s consider the initial substantive answer she provided:
I believe that what President Bush has attempted to do is rid this world of Islamic extremism, terrorists who are hell-bent on destroying our nation.
That is a credible endorsement of each of the four elements of the Bush Doctrine, all of which are directed at ridding the world of Islamic extremism, but because it was not presented as, “Yes, I endorse the doctrines because …” it has not been viewed as credible.
In my company’s media training programs, we teach executives and politicians that if they don’t understand the question, to ask for clarification, and we counsel not to guess at answers. Palin guessed at an answer last night and it came across – perhaps rightly, perhaps wrongly – that she didn’t know what the Bush Doctrine is. That’s hardly an endorsement of her foreign policy prowess – but why all the angst? There are only so many hours in a governor’s day, and they’re filled with local, state and federal issues, not foreign issues. It’s been the same with great foreign policy presidents (Reagan) and disastrous ones (Carter).
Her better response would have been, “Which Bush doctrine are you asking about, Charlie? I support them all generally, but I want to answer your specific question.” That would have set Gibson back in his chair and would have put a stop to all the prattle (here, here, here, etc.) this morning.
Update: Charles Krauthammer – who coined the term “Bush Doctrine” – agrees. (Thanks, Christa)
The final three questions in this series were classic dog-yapping, on our right to attack Pakistan. Her answers weren’t as strong as they should have been, so if she had cut off the repeat questions early in the interview, she would have looked stronger at this point.
