Asked by CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Tuesday why each is best placed to serve as the next commander in chief, the 2020 Democratic presidential candidates flailed.
Bernie Sanders said he’s ready to lead because he voted against the 2003 war in Iraq (we’re in 2020, folks) and because he wants to spend more money on infrastructure (because another bridge in New Jersey will defeat new hypersonic weapons). On Iran, Sanders offered the platitude of seeking an international “coalition.” He would stop spending “trillions” of dollars on military spending. This new fiscal rectitude is notable from Sanders, seeing as he wants to spend tens of trillions of dollars transferring control over the U.S. economy and consumer choices from the private sector to the government?
Joe Biden asserted that he has got everything right on foreign policy apart from his 2002 vote to authorize the Iraq War. The former vice president argued that the Iran deal was working. This is an assertion proved laughable by the European Union’s rejection of that deal on Tuesday and by Iran’s relentless development of ballistic missile technology outside that deal. Oh, and by Iran’s covert research of nuclear weapons technology.
Amy Klobuchar argued that she’s ready to lead because she doesn’t like President Trump’s policy on Iran. She pledged to remove more troops from Iraq than Trump would, but not all of them. How many? No clarification. How will Klobuchar address Iranian nuclear proliferation? By “bringing people together.”
Elizabeth Warren says she’s ready to lead America’s military because she’ll take on the banks and cut defense spending. Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin would have smiled. Warren also said that she’ll pull U.S. combat forces from the Middle East. The platitude-centric candidate then said she’ll use diplomacy to provide an alternative to the use of force. This will be welcome news to enemies who have little interest in diplomatic discourse and much interest in killing American diplomats.
Pete Buttigieg, the only veteran on the stage, spoke about cybersecurity and climate change security, but he didn’t offer any specifics on deterrence or how he would manage the intelligence community or the military. He then offered a story on the sacrifice of service members wounded in combat.
Tom Steyer said he’s an outsider who won’t meet with Kim Jong Un. That’s about it. Steyer doesn’t care much for foreign policy. Except that Trump is bad.
Give me a break. These responses were pathetic.
Here’s the problem. President Barack Obama fundamentally failed to constrain Russian aggression, to deter Chinese efforts to seize the South China Sea and international trade, and to counter Iranian and North Korean nuclear weapons proliferation.
Is Trump perfect? Not by a long shot. But whatever you think about Qassem Soleimani, China, or Russia, you better want a president willing to equip the military with lethal primacy and a president willing to use that primacy to defeat our enemies when and where diplomacy fails.
None of the 2020 Democrats on the stage Tuesday night showed they are ready to lead.
