You won't find me talking much about 'The Bush Doctrine' around here at Cobb. In fact, the most clear and positive thing I've ever said about Bush, which I think should be his proper legacy has everything to do with his use of the Army and nothing to do with pre-emption.
What I have been saying consistently is that GWBush uses the US Armed Forces in a public, overt, coordinated way with full authorization of the US Congress, along with a compliant United Nations in coalition with multiple nations around the world. He is, in the best possible way, just like Dirty Harry. He is pointing the gun, there is no question he is pointing the gun. There is no question that he is the man behind the gun and there is no question about whether or not he is willing to use it. The only question is whether or not you want to defy him.
He is, also in the best possible way unlike Ronald Reagan who used subterfuge and deception and covert operations by the CIA against the specific laws enacted by Congress, sneaky, underhanded, half-assed and plausibly deniable. Against two bit ankle-biting countries. By GWBush standards, Ronald Reagan was a coward and a bully. That's the Bush Doctrine to me. Go in fighting in front of everybody. Call out your enemy, the Axis of Evil, and tell them to git on or get spit on.
Now. I want you to follow this link. It's going to give you names from Google about those people who advised and generated Bush's foreign policy thinking. Some if not most of them are PNACians. I've been a PNACian from the moment I heard about and understood their charter. What makes me ill is that those people who charge McCain of being a clone of GWBush in foreign policy neither recognize the role of the PNAC nor how it influenced Bush, much less how it compares with McCain's own worldview. They pretend that Sarah Palin should riff off exactly what the Bush critics' view of a Bush Doctrine without even being able to name the PNAC names themselves.
Even with the PNAC's existence as an influential moment in history, I find the Palin Dogpile unwilling and likely unable to articulate the evolution in the thinking of the parties involved. I recognized the limits. Which reminds me, I've got to go get Feith's book.
BTW, I think rational people shouldn't be surprised at the depth at which these operatives ply their trade. They've sunk their fangs into Wolfowitz and Bolton.
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