An empire or a beacon?

The Russia/Georgia situation is looking grim. It begs the question, how much can saber-rattling ensure democracy across the world? The message our country has projected the last several years has been “be democratic or we’ll whoop you.” Now, that might work if we could actually whoop every nation on earth, including Russia and China. But we have already tapped our strength in our invasions and occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq, respectively. Oh, we’re strong, still the strongest military on earth, in fact. But earthly power has its limits.

America won the cold war by projecting strength and serving as an ideal for the citizens of foreign powers to aspire to. Georgia has engaged Russia, perhaps naively, because they believed America to be literal when President Bush recently said we would “protect” democratic nations across the world with our brute military strength. I mean, look at how we took out the Taliban and Saddam! That was awesome! (Never mind the lingering, never ending occupations that have followed). This is the Bush doctrine, not the far more successful Truman doctrine, executed by many of Truman’s successors from both parties. In the Truman doctrine we use a combination of strength, diplomacy and outreach to the people of oppressed nations. All nations must eventually reconcile with the will of its people. America is in the unique position to influence people everywhere for the cause of democracy and equal rights. And we have the military resources to serve as a deterrent for the oppression of free peoples. But it doesn’t seem like we’re deterring Russia right now, does it? Our occupation in Iraq has everything to do with that.

As we watch the cavalcade of negative ads and talking heads over the next couple months, here’s all you really need to know about the foreign policies of our presidential candidates. McCain embraces the Bush doctrine. Obama lives by the Truman doctrine.

This one really, really matters.

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