The catastrophe that is Sarah Palin knows no bounds. Tomorrow night she debates Joe Biden, the absurdly more qualified Democratic vice-presidential candidate who is expected to restrain himself from criticizing Palin too heavy-handedly (lest she rally the pity vote). But Biden’s strategy may be too timid. In recent days Palin has styled herself the “Joe Six-pack” candidate, a reference as pathetically self-congratulatory as McCain’s “original maverick” intonation in the presidential debate last week. But who knows, maybe this phrase will stick and Palin will reverse the Democratic gains from the past two weeks.
Which is exactly why Biden can’t be timid in tomorrow night’s debate. If Sarah Palin wants to call herself Joe Six-pack, so be it. There’s little Biden or Obama can do to dispel the notion that our moose-hunting friend from Alaska shares more in common with the average Joe than career politician Biden or ivy leaguer Obama. But what Biden can do (and Obama should do) is suggest that while Palin may indeed be Joe Six-pack incarnate, she doesn’t have any answers to the big important questions like Iraq, the financial crisis, Russia, inequality, education, etc. In other words, don’t let her claim to be a more capable representative of the people. But this shouldn’t be so hard. As we saw in the Katie Couric interviews, Palin is more than capable of embarrassing herself without too much effort from the other party. Biden, however, would serve himself and Obama well to highlight these mistakes and explain, humbly but directly, why Sarah Palin is unfit to serve as vice president of the United States.
They talked about the financial crisis. They talked about Iraq, Venezuela, Iran, and Russia, and about restoring America’s respect in the world. So granted, McCain and Obama provided answers on several important foreign policy issues facing our country today.
But what about trade? What about development? What about democracy promotion? What about the catastrophic failure of the Doha Round at the WTO? The complete omission of these topics from the so-called “foreign policy” debate borders on negligence. Of course American voters may not be interested in such topics (do they understand the significance of Doha?), but the job of the moderator and indeed the candidates is to hold themselves to a higher standard. Besides, if we want to fight global terrorism, or prevent a global economic recession, or restore our respect in the world, we could start by rewarding our allies with trade deals, supporting third world development, ensuring that responsible democracies have the resources to survive their perilous first years, and, above all, by committing ourselves to the vitally important Doha Round of trade talks at the WTO. These issues may not have the Cold War glamor of confronting Russia, or the “I told you so” quality of the Iraq question, but they are just as, or more, important to the future safety, security, and prosperity of our country.
In early August, Russian tanks rolled into Georgia and IR students the world over started celebrating the return of their field of study to mainstream relevance. Then, I thought for about two seconds and realized that was a very twisted version of wishful thinking. First of all, none of us should wish the return of the Cold War, it would be miserable (doing missle drills during the middle of your work day would be very annoying). Second and more importantly, it just is not realistic. Reason being–and I will use a quickly tiring cliche here–is that the world is too interconnected.
I cite as my principle evidence what has happened to the Russian economy post-Georgian invasion. In this recent article, FT reporters list a number of disheartening statistics if you are a Russian investor. The main statistic is that the Russian stock market has plunged 45% since May. While this slide predates the invasion of Georgia, its hard to say that the Russian economic slide and bellicose Russian behavior are not related. It may also be true that the correlation is the reverse of what you would expect, that the economic slide precipitated the Russian invasion because politicians wanted to show national strength amidst economic weakness. I highly doubt that to be the case, but if that was their strategy, then they only accomplished further weakening their economy and putting themselves further into a corner politically. Regardless of what they may have thought, sabre-rattling is not an effective course of action anymore.
The difference between now and the pre-1989 world is economic inter-connectedness. The USSR could behave the way it did because it actually had control of a sphere of influence both politically and economically. In those days, its satellite countries traded within the Soviet bloc and their currencies were not traded on open markets. Now, even the Ruble is traded on an open market and former Soviet countries of all shapes and sizes (Russia included) are joining the free trade regime. Ukraine and Georgia may not be members of NATO but they are members of the WTO. Then there are the EU members from the former Soviet bloc like Poland. Russian wealth is also largely dependent on Europe buying Russian oil. In short, these economic ties preclude any swift turn backwards in time or allegiance to the Cold War.
What does this have to do with the impending presidential election? Well, from the Republican side we have a man with a wealth of foreign policy knowledge and experience who professes to be an economic novice. On the Democratic side we have a very intelligent yet untested man who seems to understand the way the world works. Because of his inexperience (yes, I said it but I don’t mean it like that) it is hard to say if Mr. Obama would be capable of handling foreign policy’s complexities but he has given every indication that he is intelligent enough to understand it fully. However, I view Mr. McCain’s foreign policy record as detrimental. He has foreign policy experience but his views were cemented during a truly bygone era when communists were communists and foreign policy entailed blockades and nuclear buildups. Now, the so-called “communists” are better capitalists then we are and blockading just about anyone hurts someone’s pockets that we do not want it to. The fact is that economics is foreign policy and foreign policy determines the prevailing economics. Having a rudimentary understanding of either, or even claiming that the two are separate, is simply unacceptable.
With the selection of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate there was a short-lived feeling among Democrats that Palin was vulnerable on her lack of experience. Sensing an opportunity, Obama spokesman Bill Burton quickly released a statement mocking Palin’s short resume. He noted that only two years ago, before her current tenure as Alaska’s governor, Palin’s biggest political credential was being mayor of an Alaskan town of 8,500 people called Wasilla. But the statement was soon retracted. The reason, no doubt, was fear of falling into McCain’s so-called “brilliant trap”. This trap, by inducing the Obama campaign to criticize Palin for her lack of experience, would highlight Obama’s own limited experience. It would also draw him into a shouting match with the bottom half of the Republican ticket, not the most flattering role for the Democratic standard-bearer.
At risk of falling into this trap ourselves, let’s give some thought to the experience question. How does experience qualify one for the presidency? What are the most important experiences? Does Palin have them? Does Obama have them?
To start, not all experiences are created equal. Certainly being the governor of California is a more impressive experience than being the governor of Alaska. California, after all, has more than thirty-six million citizens while Alaska has only 683,000. But let’s not stop there. Would it be reasonable to say that the mayors of Austin, TX, Columbus, OH, and Jacksonville, FL have equally impressive resumes as Sarah Palin? Probably, since Austin, Columbus, and Jacksonville each have larger populations than the entire state of Alaska. But no one’s called John Peyton, Michael Coleman, or Will Wynn to tell them they were on the short list for a VP nomination. And for good reason: they’re not particularly qualified. Of course that’s only to say that Sarah Palin’s meager resume is no qualification for the vice presidency of the United States. Although one Fox News analyst believes that Alaska’s proximity to Russia gives Palin some sort of foreign policy expertise. Huh?
But what about Barack Obama’s supposed lack of experience? Can Bill Burton still criticize Palin’s resume and avoid hypocrisy in supporting Obama?
The answer is yes, Palin can (and should) be criticized for her lack of experience, even by Obama supporters. This is because Barack Obama does have the experience to be president. Put aside, for a moment, his eight years as an Illinois Senator and four years as a US Senator. These qualifications are already impressive, but I agree with critics who worry that twelve years of legislative experience are not enough. Fortunately Obama has another qualification on his resume: Nominee of the Democratic Party for President of the United States of America. In a campaign that lasted for twenty months, spanned all fifty states, Puerto Rico, and Guam, witnessed twenty-six debates, and faced relentless 24/7 media coverage, Obama came out ahead. His personal management of the campaign is testament to his outstanding leadership ability. Even when Obama trailed both John Edwards and Hillary Clinton in the polls, and Clinton appeared to be the inevitable nominee, Obama never gave up. Instead, his record-breaking fundraising in early 2008 set the stage for his shocking upset of Clinton, concluding with his nomination at the DNC last week.
Obama’s experience running his national campaign is the right kind of experience to qualify him for the presidency. This is most true today, in a media driven age, when the presidency is more about management and judgment than it is about technical expertise. Obama has demonstrated both qualities; we know this because otherwise he wouldn’t be the nominee. Sarah Palin, however, has demonstrated neither quality. Yes, she has been successful in Alaska, but the stakes in Alaska are about as high as they are in, well, Jacksonville, FL. When it comes to the national stage she’s untested and grossly under-qualified.
Obama supporters fear not, you can criticize Palin’s inexperience and not worry about undercutting Obama. He’s plenty experienced and the voters agree.
UPDATE 8/31:
Now Cindy McCain’s claiming that Palin has “national security” experience because Alaska is close to Russia. Also check out Michael Kinsley’s analysis of Republican hypocrisy and John Podhoretz’s feeble defense of Palin’s candidacy (which proves Kinsley’s point).
In a move sure to catch the eye of Washington, Russia’s new President Dmitri Medvedev has agreed to an arms and energy deal with Venezuelan provocateur Hugo Chavez. Medvedev believes that Russian-Venezuelan cooperation is “essential for regional security” in Latin America. Chavez says he’s thrilled with this “strategic alliance” between the two countries.
Isn’t Medvedev supposed to be more liberally minded than his ex-KGB predecessor? Not in this respect, anyway. Selling arms to Chavez can’t be a very good way for Russia to improve its relations with the US, even if Bush is on his way out.
I wrote the following in relation to a New York Times article during the G8 summit, but the message is relevant for election ’08. A major difference between Obama and McCain will be how they approach the host of countries considered “developing” as they direct their foreign policy. Since climate change diplomacy was the subject of the G8 meeting, I took a quick look at what both had to say regarding how they would address the developing world. McCain’s website talks about the need to integrate “India and China” into any climate change initiative—this could be a repetition of the Bush demand that those two countries be involved in any new agreement, but it could also mean that McCain understands their importance in addressing global warming and understands that they require a different approach. Obama’s website suggests that he wants to create a “Global Energy Forum” including the G8 and the same “outreach 5” from the G8 summit, except he wouldn’t make India, China, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa sit at the kiddie table. These websites are probably not the best predictors of what policy might come out of a McCain or Obama presidency but, at least on climate change, it does show that the two candidates might be moving a little bit past the dubious distinction between “developed” and “developing”. With all that said, here was my take on the matter, as of July 9th:
The debate over climate change between developed and developing countries (or, perhaps more accurately, between George W. and China) points to the fact that the distinction between “developed” and “developing” is of decreasing utility. Most often, this distinction is made with reference to per capita GDP, which alone demonstrates the ineffectiveness of the definition. Russia (a G8 member, although on the outskirts by most people’s calculations) is ranked #54, which is a mere 4 spots ahead of Mexico. The difference between them is less than $600 per person. What makes this distinction more ironic is that Mexico is a member of the OECD (another rich country club; South Korea is another member) and Russia is left out of that one. Brazil and South Africa, two other members of the “outreach five” are within the next ten. To be fair, the difference between the two main agitators–the US and China–is nearly 100 spots on the list of 179 ranked countries and the US average per capita income is roughly 20 times that of China, but this whole line of argument presupposes that GDP per capita is a useful measurement for assigning obligations when it comes to international policymaking. Perhaps more useful measurements would look at a country’s total GDP or its share of international trade, because those would demonstrate a country’s clout when taken as a whole. Both measurements completely muddle the field. For example, the US ranks highest in total GDP and China is third highest behind Japan. On this basis, is China a developed country and the UK, France, and Italy are developing? Or, more generally, who is developed and who is developing? The point here is not to clarify or answer that last question, but to demonstrate that the segregation is utterly meaningless.
Perhaps what would be better is to think about this on a case by case basis, and in the case of international environmental regulation, this group should probably be unified. The problem is that these countries use their designations as political tools. China uses its “developing” status to argue that this problem was created by past (now developed) emitters, therefore it is their responsibility, and that it is their right as a developing country to emit freely as a part of the development process. On the other side, the US (or, again more appropriately, George W.) would like to dictate the course of action as the “developed” nation and demand that the “outreach 5″ sign on. The two countries are hiding behind a flawed economic distinction and reaping their benefits through political posturing. The reality is that in this situation, nobody is developed or developing, but everybody is screwed if we don’t do anything. Both groups of countries should probably have the same rights and responsibilities, because as far as the environment is concerned, we are all about equal. The problems with this distinction go beyond environmental regulation to a number of other issues (read: UN security council, WTO, regulation within the IFIs and pretty much anything else you can think of that would fit in here) but I won’t address them all right now. However, questioning of the developed vs. developing distinction and its normative implications needs to happen. In each of the areas I’ve mentioned, a country’s designation as developed or developing has unnecessary and often harmful implications. Any suggestions?
