John McCain chatted with ABC’s Charlie Gibson the other day, and some of his more noteworthy comments have received surprisingly little attention.
(Update: I’m having some technical trouble with the video, but it’s online here.)
You’ll notice that, early on in the interview, he emphasized the need for “sanctions on the Iranians” because “we cannot afford to have a second Holocaust.” In the exact same interview, asked whether an Israeli strike against Iran would justified, McCain replied, “I can’t know whether a strike would be justified because I don’t know the progress or the significance or the nature of the threat.”
Um, senator? If you don’t know the progress, significance, or nature of the threat posed by Iran, why are you raising the specter of a “second Holocaust” during a nationally-televised interview? Why the constant saber-rattling about a military confrontation with Iran?
As Matt Duss noted, “This sort of vague, generalist approach to Middle East policy is typical for McCain. Whether he’s mixing up Sunni Al Qaeda and Shia Iran, or wrongly insisting that Japan, Germany, and Korea provide workable models for a U.S. presence in Iraq, or just making up stuff about the structure of the Iranian government, McCain has repeatedly demonstrated that, regardless of whatever experience or judgment he may possess, he simply hasn’t done his homework on the region of the world most likely to command the next administration’s attention. And the media have repeatedly demonstrated a disinclination toward calling him on it.”
Indeed, it appears that McCain’s confusion over foreign affairs is getting worse.
Earlier this week, McCain also sat down with staffers from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review for a rather lengthy interview, which covered a lot of foreign policy ground. There was this exchange, for example:
Trib: Some have talked also about setting up, like, coordination between Afghanistan and Pakistan, having direct links between villages, you know things like that, along the border especially between the U.S., Afghanistan and Pakistan.
McCain: I think so, since the Taliban and others do not respect borders. I think if there is some good news, I think that there is a glimmer of improving relationship between Karzai and the Pakistanis.
Patrick Barry explained that this “glimmer” seems to be a figment of McCain’s imagination.
There was also this one:
Trib: What was the purpose of your recent trip to Colombia and did you accomplish what you hoped to accomplish?
McCain: Well, I’m happy to tell you that I orchestrated the rescue of those hostages. I thought it was important, I believe they are a valuable ally. They are very important in the hard struggle against the drug issue. I think that a free trade agreement that the speaker has pulled off the table is very important to send a signal in the hemisphere. I think that we are engaged in a common struggle against the drug cartels and that’s one of the reasons why I went to Mexico as well.
Now, I have no idea if McCain was kidding about “orchestrating” the rescue of the hostages in Colombia. I hope so, but the transcript doesn’t point to any laughter. If McCain was serious, and he’s trying to connect himself to the rescue, he’s lying badly.
In either case, the number of instances in which McCain has demonstrated odd confusion about foreign policy basics keeps piling up. I’ve been kicking around the idea of doing one of my lists (like the McCain flip-flop list) detailing these examples of McCain’s confusion — but I’ve been deterred because I think the list would probably be too long to manage. Is it worth tackling anyway? Any chance we could do this one open-source style and readers would help out?