Mitt Romney's latest jabs at the Obama administration's foreign policy reiterate the GOP platform's aggressive notion of American exceptionalism, including an exaggerated notion of US innocence in world affairs--excluding, of course, certain US Embassy officials in Cairo.
Some cranks in Hollywood produced a movie, or at least a 14 minute trailer for a supposed movie, that depicted the prophet Muhammed in vile ways. Other cranks, the Quran-burning Pastor Terry Jones, had the video translated into Arabic, and delivered to Egyptian audiences a few days prior to 9/11 (New York Times, NPR). This occasioned a protest at the US Embassy in Cairo, where demonstrators managed to storm the walls and take down the US flag. Later that day, a protest at the US Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, apparently became an opportunity for armed militants to attack. The US Ambassador and three other foreign service officers died in a fire that erupted during the melee (Washington Post). Fierce protests continue in Cairo, and have broken out in Yemen, and unrest has been reported in Morocco, Sudan, and Tunisia (BBC).
Before the initial protest in Cairo began, US Embassy officials tweeted the following:
The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims — as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions. Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy. Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others [these tweets have since been deleted].
According to the Washington Post's The Fact Checker, this kind of message has been a standard since the George W. Bush years. When Embassy officials anticipate a volatile situation in the Muslim world, they typically:
1. Condemn the potential offending action.
2. Emphasize that the United States believes in religious freedom and religious tolerance--as well as freedom of speech.
3. Make a reference to American democracy, or at least the U.S. Constitution.
Evidently ill-informed, Mitt Romney acted as if the tweets had appeared after Egyptians had forced their way into the US Embassy. In a late evening press release on September 11, he claimed "that the Obama administration's first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks." He stayed with argument the following day, insisting the Embassy statement was "an apology for our values" (transcript of his full remarks here).
Romney received a great deal of criticism for his comments, even from Republicans, not only due to the inaccurate basis of his accusation, but because of the timing given the four deaths (NY Times). I think, though, that it is understandable and acceptable for a presidential candidate to put in his two cents on what clearly was a significant series of events. Romney has to demonstrate his foreign policy chops. So how are those chops looking in this instance?
Reckless: Not just Romney, but his staff, are to blame for leaping to a conclusion without all information. They are just too anxious to knock any sheen off of the President's foreign policy record, hence the recklessness. The question for voters is whether or not this trait would continue should he manage to win the election.
Parochial: At one point in his Wednesday press conference, Romney said:
We have confidence in our cause in America. We respect our Constitution. We stand for the principles our Constitution protects. We encourage other nations to understand and respect the principles of our Constitution, because we recognize that these principles are the ultimate source of freedom for individuals around the world.
How is pontificating about our rightness, and how we are the fount of freedom for the world, going to contribute to resolving this crisis? At this point, Romney should have actually talked about foreign policy. For example, how do we beef up security for our foreign service staffs in countries where many are already unhappy with the presence of US troops? What might be some effective ways to address the grievances that fomented the protests? What do we do about deliberately provocative material, produced by Americans, that might be considered the equivalent of shouting "fire" in a crowded theater in places like Egypt? What about the challenge of strengthening relations with countries under economic strain and undergoing rocky political transitions?
Arrogant: This "Obama-is-apologizing" rap depends on an absolutist position that anything short of total condemnation of actions against the US is a symptom of weakness. Any talk of trying to understand those hostile to the US is a sign of appeasement. This position requires a willful myopic vision of US actions abroad, and of consequences of those actions. It's linked to the Romney campaign's commitment to American exceptionalism, the belief that US is uniquely great in human history, and therefore duty-bound to lead the world. A version of this came out in a Romney campaign spokesman's assertion that "President Obama's failure to assert leadership throughout the Arab Spring set the stage for Tuesday's assault." Note how the statement elides any connection between the violent protests and the American-produced film, or the broader context of US actions in the region (apart from Obama's supposed inaction). The statement also assumes that the US government could have managed disparate anti-regime movements, all unfolding at different rates and under different circumstances. It requires a powerful sense of self-importance to think the US capable of such management (while I am criticizing the ideological basis for Romney's "apology" argument, The Fact Checker piece dismisses it based on evidence that the Embassy tweets were SOP, and Politifact does so it based on an rhetorical analysis of the tweets).
Because it occurred during a campaign, this political dust-up over the attacks on US embassies can't accurately predict a Romney foreign policy. Given the polarized electorate, Romney is going to lurch to extreme positions in his foreign policy pronouncements, ones he might not really take were he President. And if he gets into the White House, just as happened with President Obama, he will find out hard it is to realize platform goals, even if really believes in them. Still, this exceptionalism in Romney's foreign policy is, at best for me, disheartening. We're still recovering from eight years of that vision under George W. Bush.
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