Sunday, September 21, 2008

A Consensus on Foreign Policy


I'm watching CNN's hour-long discussion of foreign policy with five former Secretaries of State: two Democrats (Madaline Albright and Christopher Warren) and three Republicans (Henry Kissinger, James Baker, and Colin Powell). This is a nearly unprecedented gathering of international experience, knowledge, and wisdom.

What's so amazing is the moderation we are hearing from them. They are all in favor of high level negotiations with Iran, in favor of working with Russia on the big issues while also supporting the right of Russia's neighbors to be independent, in favor of providing world leadership on solving the climate change issue, which they all agree is a largely man-made problem.

James Baker: "We need to beef up the elements of soft power in our relationship with Pakistan." In other words, military action cannot do it all. Christopher Warren: "We have more lawyers in the Pentagon than foreign service officers...We need more soft power." Of the five, I was most impressed by Colin Powell and James Baker, which is somewhat surprising for this Democrat, to put it mildly.

On these things, they all seem to differ from the hawkish positions of John McCain, who has argued against talks with Iran, and who has favored shutting down our relationship with Russia (by, for example, throwing them out of the WTO). Anyone who knows Obama's positions, as I do, knows that he represents this moderate, centrist, dare I say bipartisan, position.

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