Candidate Review - Foreign Policy - Mike Huckabee

Were I not stuck with this post titling system, I would change the title of this post to "Set Yourself on Fire," the stars song. In a moment you will see why.

Huckabee has three seperate foreign policy pages, all dealing with issues - he has Foreign Policy Iraq (which, as previously noted, is a subject for another week), he has Foreign Policy Israel, and Foreign Policy War on Terror. Foreign Policy War on Terror has most of the relevant bits, talking about the balance between war and Diplomacy, and an interesting mythological reference.

I believe that we are currently engaged in a world war. Radical Islamic fascists have declared war on our country and our way of life. They have sworn to annihilate each of us who believe in a free society, all in the name of a perversion of religion and an impersonal god. We go to great extremes to save lives, they go to great extremes to take them. This war is not a conventional war, and these terrorists are not a conventional enemy. I will fight the war on terror with the intensity and single-mindedness that it deserves.

. . . While I prefer America to be safe and secure within her own borders rather than loved and appreciated abroad, I believe we can accomplish both goals. We can resurrect relationships with our allies and neighbors. With a focus on renewed diplomacy and inclusion, we can accomplish the goals of our nation without having to go it alone.

When the sun rose on September 11, we were the only superpower in the world; when the sun set that day, we were still the only superpower, but how different the world looked. During the Cold War, you were a hawk or a dove, but this new world requires us to be a phoenix, to rise from the ashes of the twin towers with a whole new game plan for this very different enemy. Being a phoenix means constantly reinventing ourselves, dying to mistakes and miscalculations, changing tactics and strategies, rising reborn to meet each new challenge and seize each new opportunity.

So you see President Bush's self-immolation foreign policy strategy makes sense after all. He wants us to rise from the ashes.

At any rate, while Huckabee wants you to know about the other tools in his foreign policy toolbox, War still seems to be the big one.

I'm going to forgo on Israel for now; that might well make a subject for another week as well.