Sanders knocked off stride by foreign policy focus

[MaggieD]

Foreign policy is going to loom large in this election. He just doesn't seem up to that.

"Bernie Sanders didn’t sign up for a foreign policy election. Yet that's exactly what he's getting in the wake of the Paris attacks, a shift that's turned the primary contest — temporarily at least — into a test for commander in chief.

For the Vermont senator, it's already proving discomfiting as he faces off against an already-dominating front-runner on terrain that's familiar to her as a former secretary of state.

As Hillary Clinton works to remind Democratic voters of her experience — “I spent a lot of time in the Situation Room as secretary of state and there were many very difficult choices presented to us,” she said on the Des Moines debate stage on Saturday — Sanders suddenly finds himself forced to deviate from the stump speech he’s effectively been honing for decades.


Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/bernie-sanders-foreign-policy-paris-215937#ixzz3riaQpeC9

[Cha]

1. The Presidency is about more than bernie's stump speech... Shocker!

[MaggieD]

3. Hard to believe, huh?

Who would thunk such a thing.

[Cha]

4. Obviously not bernie and his crew.

[KittyWampus]

39. Bernie's been doing his stump speech for over 30 years. No wonder he gets lost

when having to traverse unfamiliar terrain.

[Cha]

41. That's true.. but they've got to know that running for President requires knowledge

and experience of a whole array of different issues!

[TwilightGardener]

2. Welp, she spent a "lot of time in the Situation Room" cooking up a lot of bad ideas, then.

I think Bernie's foreign policy will be rational, non-neocon, and non-regime-overthrowing. That's just fine with me.

[MaggieD]

5. He's way out of his league on FP

And it shows. Hence numerous articles like this one, and his staff member's mini meltdown when the debate shifted.

[TwilightGardener]

7. It's Politico. It counts as gossipy slanted crap, and that's about it.

And I would trust Bernie's instincts on FP far more than Clinton's--I was not impressed with her as SoS.

[leftofcool]

12. Instincts? Not without experience to back them up.

No thanks Bernie.

[TwilightGardener]

13. Colin Powell and Condi Rice are very experienced. But also fuckups.

Experience doesn't mean shit if your judgment is bad.

[Art_from_Ark]

14. George H.W.Bush also had lots of previous foreign policy experience

[Hissyspit]

28. The "meltdown" was B.S. from another candidate's staff.

[Thinkingabout]

6. It has to be more time spent more in a situation room before jumping to a financial statement.

I get it, foreign affairs experience is gathered over the years, he is vastly lacking in this area.

[TwilightGardener]

8. But what if your foreign policy is kind of...bad? Plus, Bernie's been a Senator and a Congressman,

he's hardly unacquainted with FP (that's O'Malley more than Bernie, gov's don't get FP experience). PLUS he was right on Iraq. SHE WASN'T.

[Thinkingabout]

15. He was wrong in ISIS. Just because he has been in congress for twenty five years did not give him

The necessary experience and it showed in his debate performance.

[MaggieD]

19. It was very obvious he's unprepared

.... for anything that involves FP.

[TwilightGardener]

20. How has he been wrong on ISIS?

[Thinkingabout]

21. He voted against ISIS Resolution.

[TwilightGardener]

23. Which one?

[Thinkingabout]

27. what are you talking about?

[TwilightGardener]

30. There was an initial resolution (war powers) that Pres. Obama wanted to introduce,

back in February, but there was a lot of objection to it on both sides of the aisle and it never went anywhere. Didn't get a vote that I'm aware of. I think Bernie didn't like it because he didn't want ground troops and wanted it more limited in scope. There was an earlier law that was passed that funded the rebel train-and-equip program that he didn't support or vote for. Which, considering how that turned out, showed he was wise.

[Thinkingabout]

37. Did Sanders think ISIS was just going to go away? The one you are talking about did happen, the one

I am talking about did not pass, Sanders voted no. I know Sanders was already planning to run for president and he wanted to display his dove side, in fact he is a hawk by the fact he has voted for military action many times, it appears his ISIS vote was a sad political move. The problem is still here and if elected president he would still be facing terrorist attacks and would be in a military action. It was a bad vote in which he should be confronted with today.

[KittyWampus]

40. Dear Thinkingabout, if you can find the vote you're referring to, please post it here

Edit- I did a quick google and found what I posted below, if you have time can see if it's what you are referring to?
From Bernie's own page-

Sept 18, 2014

Sen. Bernie Sanders on Thursday voted against the United States training and arming Syrian rebels. Sanders said the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

snip


The provision to fund forces battling the ISIS terrorist group was included in a stopgap spending bill to fund the government through Dec. 11. The measure, approved by the Senate, had passed the House on Wednesday.

http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/recent-business/sanders-to-vote-no-on-war-funds

[TwilightGardener]

44. Look up Bernie's position on ISIS. If you can find where he opposes airstrikes and

thinks we should just leave them alone, please post that. Because I've never read that anywhere, and I haven't seen evidence of an actual vote on a war resolution.

[KittyWampus]

45. I posted a link right above you. It's from his own web page.

Not 100% sure if that's what is being referred to.

[TwilightGardener]

46. Where in the link does he say he opposes fighting ISIS or doesn't support any action against them?

When has a vote been held on a major, finalized resolution to fight ISIS--a resolution that has been worked on and negotiated by Congress? Let's deal in fact.

[sadoldgirl]

9. Somehow I cannot trust a person

in spite of all experience in the Situation Room, who has been
such a bad judge on Iraq, Libya, and Syria.

These, after all, qualify as FP decisions, don't they?

[840high]

22. yep

[Control-Z]

33. So, with your vast experience,

what would you have done differently?

[Admiral Loinpresser]

36. No regime change for starters.

Almost always a bad idea.

[MrMickeysMom]

10. For someone spending much time -> situation Rm & w/prez, she should have a MUCH deeper understanding

The only take home message has been to sustain war

For that matter, the decision to spend as much military armament money 3 days ago after the incident in Paris shows that the situation room isn't coming out with anything more than a continuous stream of extended war.

Foreign policy a la Bush... nothing more. The American people have had enough of this short-sightedness. You mix up spending time in a room with perpetual circular logic with leadership.

[NRaleighLiberal]

11. do you come over here from your little safe haven site on schedule?

got a little assignment chart with topics and times?

[MaggieD]

16. Been a member here since 2001

Longer than you.

[frazzled]

17. He's just not that into it

His interest is pretty much confined to the top 5% of the 1% (a marvelous consistency!) and he's sticking with it. Unfortunately, the job description for president involves a range of significant subjects, foreign policy issues being a huge part of it. And I'm sorry, but you have to be able to pivot on a dime to address unexpected events in the country and the world, whether it fits your narrative or not.

[MaggieD]

18. I think so too

Which is why I don't trust him with the vast responsibilities of the presidency.

[jfern]

24. Hilary was knocked off stride by having to answer 9/11 to an unrelated question

[MaggieD]

25. I don't agree

I think she was right.

[JonLeibowitz]

26. So did she (hopefully), on the topic of Iraq. History proved that false.

[Hissyspit]

29. He's doing fine.

Jeez.

Spin, spin, spin.

[oasis]

31. Voters will choose Hillary for her solid overall knowledge of foreign policy.

There is no time to audition amateurs in the world in which we live TODAY.

[MaggieD]

32. I agree!

[SunSeeker]

34. His claim that climate change is our greatest security threat made him sound unhinged.

Climate change is not what caused ISIS.

What is sad is Bernie's statement was so out of left field that it fed into the right wing meme that liberals lie about climate change. Statements like that will make it harder for Dems to be taken seriously on climate change. Climate change is of course a horrific long term threat that we must address, but that is not the sort of immediate, acute threat that the moderator was talking about, as was obvious by the focus on the Paris attacks.

[JTShroyer]

35. Bernie frequently pivoted away from foreign affairs

Bernie frequently pivoted away from foreign affairs, deciding his time would be best spent attacking Hillary's integrity. I guess that new pollster is working out pretty well!

Bernie Sanders is allowed to flip-flop on employing the use of character assassination politics. But I guess all is fair in love and war? That's why I don't understand how Hillary is said to have made a major “gaffe” by invoking 9/11. Could those on Wall Street possibly respect Clinton's post-9/11 work on behalf of New York? The answer is: of course.

[stevenleser]

38. Sanders and Rand Paul's chances have both been hurt by the emergence of ISIS as

a serious foreign policy and national security challenge.

Their positions and philosophies don't lend themselves well to dealing with any threat and that is being made obvious at the worst possible time for both of them.

[TwilightGardener]

43. Well, considering that Clinton's big idea of arming rebels to prolong the Syrian civil war

gave ISIS plenty of chaos in which to maneuver, I think I'll trust the guy who wasn't responsible for ISIS in any way, the one who was never into regime overthrow and destabilization. She was just so fucking dead wrong on so many things. She's really incompetent in foreign policy. And a no-fly zone isn't going to affect ISIS, that's just to poke Russia in the snoot, and it's un-doable anyway. And saying Bernie's hurt by the emergence of ISIS--well, his candidacy began long after ISIS became a thing, and he doesn't oppose fighting them, so that more or less sounds like a perception some people want to push rather than reality: MORE HAWK = MORE WIN!!!!

[Todays_Illusion]

42. OP, that is not a fact it is a talking point attack, why are you spreading it around? nt