The Water's Edge and the High Road

There's an idea about foreign policy regarding presenting a unified face. What President Joe Biden did today was give full support to Israel, denounced the actions of Hamas as evil, and pledged support to our regional friend. His statements were a profound statement on the ties of the US and our ally, Israel, against terror and a straightforward denouncement of terrorism. It was well-received by our allies. It was a clear message about our support of our ally and as with his great support of Ukraine in their resistance against Russia, he has made clear: we will support the ability of democratic nations to endure. 

I know we don't talk about that water's edge so much. Vietnam. Iraq. Afghanistan. There is a time to stay silent, and also a time when one must speak. 

But when human lives are at stake, the idea of being the guy who lays culpability for others' actions at one's opponents' doorstep just because is profoundly shitty, because it means you want something solved not today, but when it benefits you best.  And here's Tim Scott:

  

“While Hamas carried out these attacks, Joe Biden has blood on his hands.”

– Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) blames Biden for Hamas’ terrorist attacks on Israel, again parroting an unsubstantiated GOP claim that Iran used the money from the $6B prisoner exchange to help fund the attacks pic.twitter.com/J0EEfbOttW

— The Recount (@therecount) October 10, 2023

Joe Biden is responsible for Hamas which existed long before he was president and has been supported by Iran and Russia, never by us?  He wants to investigate the money that Iran can use for a very specific purpose and hasn't even used yet in a deal that saved American lives, because maybe it might've, could've been used by Hamas, even if it can't be verified that Iran actually backed this particular op? (and it obviously preceded the hostage deal?)

Terrorist attacks aren't prevented by steely glares and play-pretend games of "Who is more macho?"  They are prevented by good intelligence and being willing to not assume you have every entry covered and every fact established. You admit some failure points will persist in the best of situations, and you learn from them. 

I know, and Tim Scott doesn't seem to, that he's never going to be president. He's signifying this specific anti-Biden bullshit, instead of being in any way useful in his actual job as Senator, because his party can't have or accept a Democrat as doing anything positive, and he would rather US foreign policy fail--no matter how many allies in Ukraine or Israel die. He isn't on the low road but the gutter. He's making pronouncements that are about people who aren't him, for himself,  

Nikki Haley and DeSantis aren't better. They just failed to be opportunistic enough to express that much foreign policy failure out loud. Obviously, Trump is siding with the Putin/whoever Putin says side, if no one ever knew by now. 

Biden represents the high road, and the actually functional foreign policy the moment needs. It seems like Republicans are not just disastrous for this moment, but even purposefully so.