Palin Advocated Consumer-Driven Health Care. While running for governor, Palin attributed rising health care costs to “a lack of competition” and called for “flexibility in government regulation that allow competition in health care.” [On The Issues]
Palin Introduced Health Care Transparency Act. Palin’s Alaska Health Care Transparency Act established “an Alaska health care information office” to help consumers “make better-informed decisions about health care in the state.” The act also called for the repeal of Certificate of Need Laws, programs “aimed at restraining health care facility costs and allowing coordinated planning of new services and construction.” [Gov Tech, 1/28/2008; National Conference of State Legislatures, 8/21/2008]
Palin Did Not Take A Position On Expanding SCHIP Funding. Palin did not advocate for greater federal funding of SCHIP. [Blagojevich Press Release, 2/23/07]
Palin Signed Watered-Down SCHIP Bill. Palin signed legislation updating eligibility for Alaska’s SCHIP program, Denali KidCare, to maintain the eligibility level–which had dropped to an effective rate of almost 150 percent of the poverty line due to inflation. However, by limiting eligibility to families living below 175 percent of the poverty line, Alaska’s eligibility criteria are still among the lowest in the nation. Palin did not support legislation to expand eligibility to higher levels. [National Conference of State Legislatures, 6/2008; Kaiser Network, 5/22/2007; Anchorage Daily News, 4/15/2008]
Palin Failed To Support A Bill To Cover All Alaskans. While governor, Palin “did not get behind the most significant piece of health legislation offered — a proposal to ensure that all residents have health insurance, without disrupting the coverage that many Alaskans already have.” [Anchorage Daily News, 5/17/2008]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Palin ON THE RADICAL RIGHT
Palin Cheered On the Alaskan Independence Party. Six months ago, Palin “told members of the Alaskan Independence Party” — who advocate for a vote on secession from the union — to “keep up the good work” and “wished the party luck on what she called its ‘inspiring convention.’” Palin and her husband attended the party’s convention in 2000, and “for all but two months from 1995 to 2002, the governor’s husband was registered as an Alaskan Independence Party member.” George Clark, the vice chair of the party, claims that Palin was a member of the party “before she got the job as a mayor of a small town.” The McCain campaign denies the charge. [LA Times, 9/3/2008; ABC News, 9/1/2008]
Palin Welcomed The Hard-Right Candidacy Of Pat Buchanan. Palin reportedly supported Pat Buchanan’s 1999 presidential bid. When Buchanan visited Alaska in 1999, “[a]mong those sporting Buchanan buttons were Wasilla Mayor Sarah Palin and state Sen. Jerry Ward, R-Anchorage.” Buchanan said Palin “was a brigader in 1996 as was her husband, Chris, they were at a fundraiser for me.” The McCain campaign says Palin “never worked for any effort to elect” Buchanan. [The Nation, 8/29/08; ABC News, 8/30/08]
Palin Characterized Ron Paul As ‘Cool.’ During an interview with MTV in February, Palin called Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), who ran against McCain in the primaries, “cool.” “He’s a good guy,” she added. “He’s so independent. He’s independent of the party machine. I’m like, ‘Right on, so am I.’ ” [MTV News, 8/29/2008]
Palin Believes The Founding Fathers Wrote The Pledge Of Allegiance. In 2006, when asked by the Eagle Forum Alaska if she found the phrase “Under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance offensive, Palin replied, “Not on your life. If it was good enough for the founding fathers, its good enough for me.” But the words “Under God” didn’t appear in the Pledge until 1954. The Pledge itself wasn’t written until 1892. [Huffington Post, 9/1/08; Slate, 6/28/02]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin Welcomed The Hard-Right Candidacy Of Pat Buchanan. Palin reportedly supported Pat Buchanan’s 1999 presidential bid. When Buchanan visited Alaska in 1999, “[a]mong those sporting Buchanan buttons were Wasilla Mayor Sarah Palin and state Sen. Jerry Ward, R-Anchorage.” Buchanan said Palin “was a brigader in 1996 as was her husband, Chris, they were at a fundraiser for me.” The McCain campaign says Palin “never worked for any effort to elect” Buchanan. [The Nation, 8/29/08; ABC News, 8/30/08]
Palin Characterized Ron Paul As ‘Cool.’ During an interview with MTV in February, Palin called Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), who ran against McCain in the primaries, “cool.” “He’s a good guy,” she added. “He’s so independent. He’s independent of the party machine. I’m like, ‘Right on, so am I.’ ” [MTV News, 8/29/2008]
Palin Believes The Founding Fathers Wrote The Pledge Of Allegiance. In 2006, when asked by the Eagle Forum Alaska if she found the phrase “Under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance offensive, Palin replied, “Not on your life. If it was good enough for the founding fathers, its good enough for me.” But the words “Under God” didn’t appear in the Pledge until 1954. The Pledge itself wasn’t written until 1892. [Huffington Post, 9/1/08; Slate, 6/28/02]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin ON TROOPERGATE
Ousted Former State Official Accused Palin Of Pressuring Him To Fire Trooper. Palin allegedly “tried to get a state trooper fired and she then fired the trooper’s boss because he wouldn’t act on her request.” Palin’s sister was involved in a “bitter child custody battle” with the trooper. [Anchorage Daily News, 7/18/08]
Palin’s Intial Denials Of Interference In Firing Were Proven False. Palin “previously said her administration didn’t exert pressure to get rid of trooper Mike Wooten,” but “an audio recording that shows an aide pressuring the Public Safety Department to fire a state trooper embroiled in a custody battle with her sister.” The McCain campaign now says Palin’s husband and members of her staff had made inquiries “about the appropriate Department of Public Safety procedures for dealing with someone they considered a dangerous person and rogue trooper.” [Anchorage Daily News, 8/14/08, 9/02/08]
Palin’s Lawyer In Investigation Is Also Her Personal Attorney. Thomas V. Van Flein, the lawyer Palin hired to defend her in the trooper investigation, is “representing Palin both personally and in her official capacity as governor.” The AP noted, “Depending on where the investigation leads, that could put him in a difficult situation if Palin’s interests and the interests of the public office diverge.” [AP, 9/02/08]
Palin Has Refused To Release E-mails, Citing ‘Executive Privilege.’ Palin has refused to release e-mails requested by the state’s trooper union, citing executive privilege. Questions have been raised, however, as to whether these documents are actually related to official business, since her husband was copied on some of them. [KTUU, 8/6/08; TPMmuckraker, 9/1/08]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin’s Intial Denials Of Interference In Firing Were Proven False. Palin “previously said her administration didn’t exert pressure to get rid of trooper Mike Wooten,” but “an audio recording that shows an aide pressuring the Public Safety Department to fire a state trooper embroiled in a custody battle with her sister.” The McCain campaign now says Palin’s husband and members of her staff had made inquiries “about the appropriate Department of Public Safety procedures for dealing with someone they considered a dangerous person and rogue trooper.” [Anchorage Daily News, 8/14/08, 9/02/08]
Palin’s Lawyer In Investigation Is Also Her Personal Attorney. Thomas V. Van Flein, the lawyer Palin hired to defend her in the trooper investigation, is “representing Palin both personally and in her official capacity as governor.” The AP noted, “Depending on where the investigation leads, that could put him in a difficult situation if Palin’s interests and the interests of the public office diverge.” [AP, 9/02/08]
Palin Has Refused To Release E-mails, Citing ‘Executive Privilege.’ Palin has refused to release e-mails requested by the state’s trooper union, citing executive privilege. Questions have been raised, however, as to whether these documents are actually related to official business, since her husband was copied on some of them. [KTUU, 8/6/08; TPMmuckraker, 9/1/08]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin ON ETHICS
Palin’s Lobbyist Had ‘Close Ties’ To Don Young, Ted Stevens. “As mayor of Wasilla, however, Palin oversaw the hiring of Robertson, Monagle & Eastaugh, an Anchorage-based law firm with close ties to Alaska’s most senior Republicans: Rep. Don Young and Sen. Ted Stevens, who was indicted in July on charges of accepting illegal gifts.” [9/2/08]
Palin’s Lobbyist Was Part Of ‘Team Abramoff.’ Steven Silver, the lobbyist Palin hired as Wasilla Mayor, also listed Jack Abramoff’s lobbying firm, Greenberg Traurig, as a client. Silver lobbied on issues similar to those headed up by Abramoff, including “Indian/Native American policy” and “legislation relating to gaming issues.” [TPMmuckracker, 9/2/08; Washington Post, 9/2/08]
Palin Served As Director Of ‘Ted Stevens Excellence In Public Service’ 527. Palin’s name was listed on 2003 incorporation papers of the “Ted Stevens Excellence in Public Service, Inc.,” a 527 group that could raise unlimited funds from corporate donors. She also “served as one of three directors until June 2005, when her name was replaced on state filings.” [Washington Post, 9/1/08]
State Employee Charged Palin With Ethics Violation. A state employee filed an ethics complaint alleging Palin tried to secure a job for one of her supporters. The complaint accused Palin and her top staffers of “breaking executive ethics branch and hiring rules. It centers on the hiring of surveyor Tom Lamal, who once co-hosted a Palin fundraiser, for a state right-of-way agent job in Fairbanks.” [Anchorage Daily News, 9/7/08]
Palin Forced Top Wasilla Employees To Resign As Loyalty Test. As Mayor of Wasilla in 1998, “asked all of the city’s top managers to resign in order to test their loyalty to her administration.”[Daily Sitka Sentenial, 10/28/06]
Palin Fired Police Chief For Not Fully Supporting Her. After becoming Mayor of Wasilla, Palin fired the city’s police chief, Irl Stambaugh, writing, “I do not feel I have your full support in my efforts to govern the city of Wasilla. Therefore I intend to terminate your employment.” Stambaugh charged that Palin fired him “because he stepped on the toes of Palin’s campaign contributors, including bar owners and the National Rifle Association.” [Anchorage Daily News, 2/1/97; ABC News, 9/3/08]
Palin Used Mayoral Office Resources For Campaigning. During her 2002 campaign for lieutenant governor, Palin ordered campaign materials from City Hall, had them delivered there, and used city employees on city-aid time to arrange campaign events. According to the Anchorage Daily News, there was “no indication she repaid the city for the incidental expenses the city incurred.” [Anchorage Daily News, 7/21/06]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin’s Lobbyist Was Part Of ‘Team Abramoff.’ Steven Silver, the lobbyist Palin hired as Wasilla Mayor, also listed Jack Abramoff’s lobbying firm, Greenberg Traurig, as a client. Silver lobbied on issues similar to those headed up by Abramoff, including “Indian/Native American policy” and “legislation relating to gaming issues.” [TPMmuckracker, 9/2/08; Washington Post, 9/2/08]
Palin Served As Director Of ‘Ted Stevens Excellence In Public Service’ 527. Palin’s name was listed on 2003 incorporation papers of the “Ted Stevens Excellence in Public Service, Inc.,” a 527 group that could raise unlimited funds from corporate donors. She also “served as one of three directors until June 2005, when her name was replaced on state filings.” [Washington Post, 9/1/08]
State Employee Charged Palin With Ethics Violation. A state employee filed an ethics complaint alleging Palin tried to secure a job for one of her supporters. The complaint accused Palin and her top staffers of “breaking executive ethics branch and hiring rules. It centers on the hiring of surveyor Tom Lamal, who once co-hosted a Palin fundraiser, for a state right-of-way agent job in Fairbanks.” [Anchorage Daily News, 9/7/08]
Palin Forced Top Wasilla Employees To Resign As Loyalty Test. As Mayor of Wasilla in 1998, “asked all of the city’s top managers to resign in order to test their loyalty to her administration.”[Daily Sitka Sentenial, 10/28/06]
Palin Fired Police Chief For Not Fully Supporting Her. After becoming Mayor of Wasilla, Palin fired the city’s police chief, Irl Stambaugh, writing, “I do not feel I have your full support in my efforts to govern the city of Wasilla. Therefore I intend to terminate your employment.” Stambaugh charged that Palin fired him “because he stepped on the toes of Palin’s campaign contributors, including bar owners and the National Rifle Association.” [Anchorage Daily News, 2/1/97; ABC News, 9/3/08]
Palin Used Mayoral Office Resources For Campaigning. During her 2002 campaign for lieutenant governor, Palin ordered campaign materials from City Hall, had them delivered there, and used city employees on city-aid time to arrange campaign events. According to the Anchorage Daily News, there was “no indication she repaid the city for the incidental expenses the city incurred.” [Anchorage Daily News, 7/21/06]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin ON WOMEN’S RIGHTS
Palin Is A Member Of Anti-Abortion Group Feminists For Life. Palin is a member of an “anti-abortion group called Feminists for Life.” When running for governor in 2002, she “sent an e-mail to the anti-abortion Alaska Right to Life Board saying she was as ‘pro-life as any candidate can be’ and has ‘adamantly supported our cause since I first understood, as a child, the atrocity of abortion.’” [Anchorage Daily News, 8/6/08]
Palin Opposes Abortion Even In Cases Of Rape Or Incest. In 2006, Palin said that even if her daughter were raped, “I would choose life.” She said that she would support abortion only if the mother’s life were in danger. [Anchorage Daily News, 11/3/06]
Palin Slashed Funding To Help Teenage Mothers. Earlier this year, Palin used a line-item veto “to slash funding for a state program benefiting teen mothers in need of a place to live.” Funding for Covenant House Alaska, which provides transitional housing for teen mothers, was cut by 20 percent — from $5 million to $3.9 million. [Washington Post, 9/3/08]
Palin Supports Abstinence-Only Policies. In 2006, the Eagle Forum Alaska asked Palin whether she would “support funding for abstinence-until-marriage education.” Palin replied, “Yes, the explicit sex-ed programs will not find my support.” [Politico, 9/1/08]
Palin Supports Parental Consent Laws For Minors Seeking Abortions. According to the Anchorage Daily News, Palin was “disappointed lawmakers let a bill die requiring girls under 17 to get parental consent for an abortion. ‘My belief is parents have the right to know about the health and welfare of their children,’ she said.” [Anchorage Daily News, 8/14/08]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin Opposes Abortion Even In Cases Of Rape Or Incest. In 2006, Palin said that even if her daughter were raped, “I would choose life.” She said that she would support abortion only if the mother’s life were in danger. [Anchorage Daily News, 11/3/06]
Palin Slashed Funding To Help Teenage Mothers. Earlier this year, Palin used a line-item veto “to slash funding for a state program benefiting teen mothers in need of a place to live.” Funding for Covenant House Alaska, which provides transitional housing for teen mothers, was cut by 20 percent — from $5 million to $3.9 million. [Washington Post, 9/3/08]
Palin Supports Abstinence-Only Policies. In 2006, the Eagle Forum Alaska asked Palin whether she would “support funding for abstinence-until-marriage education.” Palin replied, “Yes, the explicit sex-ed programs will not find my support.” [Politico, 9/1/08]
Palin Supports Parental Consent Laws For Minors Seeking Abortions. According to the Anchorage Daily News, Palin was “disappointed lawmakers let a bill die requiring girls under 17 to get parental consent for an abortion. ‘My belief is parents have the right to know about the health and welfare of their children,’ she said.” [Anchorage Daily News, 8/14/08]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin ON BIG OIL
Palin’s First Statewide Campaign Was Fueled By Veco. “While mayor of Wasilla, Palin ran for lieutenant governor in 2002. She gathered $5,000 — or about 10 percent of her campaign fund — from Veco officials or their wives along the way.” [Anchorage Daily News, 9/6/06]
Palin’s Inauguration Was Sponsored By BP. Beyond Petroleum Exploration Inc. is listed by the Alaska Inaugural Committee as a sponsor of Palin’s 2007 Governor’s Balls. [Alaska Inaugural Committee]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin’s Inauguration Was Sponsored By BP. Beyond Petroleum Exploration Inc. is listed by the Alaska Inaugural Committee as a sponsor of Palin’s 2007 Governor’s Balls. [Alaska Inaugural Committee]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin ON SCIENCE
Palin Supports Teaching Creationism In Public Schools. In a 2006 gubernatorial debate, Palin “said she thinks creationism should be taught alongside evolution in the state’s public classrooms.” [Anchorage Daily News, 10/27/06]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin on ENERGY
Palin Is A Top Arctic Wildlife Refuge Drilling Advocate. Palin said she thinks McCain is “going to evolve into, eventually, supporting ANWR opening also” and “I’d like the opportunity to get to change his mind about ANWR.” [Kudlow & Co., 6/25/08]
Palin Opposes Lieberman’s Bill To Prevent Arctic Refuge Drilling. In a letter to Congress opposing the Arctic Wilderness Act (S. 2316), Palin wrote that “as a citizen of the United States” she believes “development [of the Refuge] should be authorized.” [Letter to Sen. Akaka, 11/9/07]
Palin Dismisses Alternative Energy. Palin said that “Congress needs to lift the ban on drilling” because “alternative-energy solutions are far from imminent and would require more than 10 years to develop.” [Charleston Post and Courier, 8/16/08]
Palin Believes It Is ‘God’s Will’ To Build A Natural Gas Pipeline. Speaking to the Wasilla Assembly of God church in June, Palin said, “I think God’s will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that,” referring to a $30 billion national gas pipeline project. [Huffington Post, 9/2/08]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin Opposes Lieberman’s Bill To Prevent Arctic Refuge Drilling. In a letter to Congress opposing the Arctic Wilderness Act (S. 2316), Palin wrote that “as a citizen of the United States” she believes “development [of the Refuge] should be authorized.” [Letter to Sen. Akaka, 11/9/07]
Palin Dismisses Alternative Energy. Palin said that “Congress needs to lift the ban on drilling” because “alternative-energy solutions are far from imminent and would require more than 10 years to develop.” [Charleston Post and Courier, 8/16/08]
Palin Believes It Is ‘God’s Will’ To Build A Natural Gas Pipeline. Speaking to the Wasilla Assembly of God church in June, Palin said, “I think God’s will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that,” referring to a $30 billion national gas pipeline project. [Huffington Post, 9/2/08]
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin ON THE ENVIRONMENT
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin Denies Man-Made Global Warming. When asked for her “take on global warming,” Palin replied, “A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. I’m not one though who would attribute it to being man-made.” [Newsmax, 08/29/08]
Challenging ‘Uncertain Climate Models,’ Palin Is Suing To Lift Protected Status For Polar Bears. After a multi-year court battle, the Bush administration recognized in 2008 that polar bears are threatened with extinction by global warming. Announcing Alaska’s suit to block the listing, Palin said, “We believe that the listing was unwarranted and that it’s unprecedented to list a currently healthy population based on uncertain climate models.” [Reuters, 5/22/08]
Palin Established Illegal Fly-By Wolf Hunting Bounty. In 2007, Palin illegally established “a $150 bounty to the state sanctioned airborne wolf hunters as an added incentive to increase their kills,” soon overturned by the Alaska State Court. [Alaska Wildlife Alliance; Anchorage Daily News, 3/31/07]
Palin Denies Man-Made Global Warming. When asked for her “take on global warming,” Palin replied, “A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. I’m not one though who would attribute it to being man-made.” [Newsmax, 08/29/08]
Challenging ‘Uncertain Climate Models,’ Palin Is Suing To Lift Protected Status For Polar Bears. After a multi-year court battle, the Bush administration recognized in 2008 that polar bears are threatened with extinction by global warming. Announcing Alaska’s suit to block the listing, Palin said, “We believe that the listing was unwarranted and that it’s unprecedented to list a currently healthy population based on uncertain climate models.” [Reuters, 5/22/08]
Palin Established Illegal Fly-By Wolf Hunting Bounty. In 2007, Palin illegally established “a $150 bounty to the state sanctioned airborne wolf hunters as an added incentive to increase their kills,” soon overturned by the Alaska State Court. [Alaska Wildlife Alliance; Anchorage Daily News, 3/31/07]
Palin ON EARMARKS
Palin Supported The Bridge To Nowhere. During her unveiling as McCain’s running mate, Palin claimed that she said, “Thanks, but no thanks” to federal funding for the Bridge to Nowhere. But in her 2006 campaign for governor, Palin repeatedly expressed support for the bridge project, saying Alaska should take advantage of earmarks “while our congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist.” [Anchorage Daily News, 10/22/06; Ketchikan Daily News, 8/9/06, 11/21/06]
Palin Obtained $27 Million In Earmarks As Mayor Of Wasilla. As mayor of Wasilla, AK, Palin “hired a private lobbyist to help the tiny town secure earmarks from [Sen. Ted] Stevens.” “The town obtained 14 earmarks, totaling $27 million between 2000-2003.” [Associated Press, 9/3/08]
from http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin Obtained $27 Million In Earmarks As Mayor Of Wasilla. As mayor of Wasilla, AK, Palin “hired a private lobbyist to help the tiny town secure earmarks from [Sen. Ted] Stevens.” “The town obtained 14 earmarks, totaling $27 million between 2000-2003.” [Associated Press, 9/3/08]
from http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin on FOREIGN POLICY
http://thinkprogress.org/palin-digest/
Palin Hasn’t Given The War In Iraq Much Thought. Palin told the Alaska Business Monthly, “I’ve been so focused on state government, I haven’t really focused much on the war in Iraq. I heard on the news about the new deployments, and while I support our president, Condoleezza Rice and the administration, I want to know that we have an exit plan in place.” [Alaska Business Monthly, 3/1/07]
Palin Has Never Been To Iraq. In her only trip overseas, Palin visited Alaska National Guard troops stationed in Kuwait and Germany in July 2007. [AP, 7/25/07]
Palin Believes That The Iraq War Is A Task ‘From God.’ Speaking at the Wasilla Assembly of God church in June, Palin said that “our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [U.S. soldiers] out on a task that is from God.” [Huffington Post, 9/2/08]
Palin Believes The Iraq War Was Fought Over Oil. “We are a nation at war and in many [ways] the reasons for war are fights over energy sources,” Palin told BusinessWeek in an interview. [BusinessWeek, 8/29/08]
Palin Didn’t Have A Passport Until 2007. Palin first obtained a passport in July 2007 for her trip to Kuwait and Germany to visit Alaska National Guard troops. Her only other trip outside of the United States was to Canada. A Palin spokeswoman had previously said that Palin had also been to Ireland, although it was actually just a “refueling stop” on her Germany/Kuwait trip. [New York Times, 8/29/08; Politico, 9/2/08]
Palin Hasn’t Given The War In Iraq Much Thought. Palin told the Alaska Business Monthly, “I’ve been so focused on state government, I haven’t really focused much on the war in Iraq. I heard on the news about the new deployments, and while I support our president, Condoleezza Rice and the administration, I want to know that we have an exit plan in place.” [Alaska Business Monthly, 3/1/07]
Palin Has Never Been To Iraq. In her only trip overseas, Palin visited Alaska National Guard troops stationed in Kuwait and Germany in July 2007. [AP, 7/25/07]
Palin Believes That The Iraq War Is A Task ‘From God.’ Speaking at the Wasilla Assembly of God church in June, Palin said that “our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [U.S. soldiers] out on a task that is from God.” [Huffington Post, 9/2/08]
Palin Believes The Iraq War Was Fought Over Oil. “We are a nation at war and in many [ways] the reasons for war are fights over energy sources,” Palin told BusinessWeek in an interview. [BusinessWeek, 8/29/08]
Palin Didn’t Have A Passport Until 2007. Palin first obtained a passport in July 2007 for her trip to Kuwait and Germany to visit Alaska National Guard troops. Her only other trip outside of the United States was to Canada. A Palin spokeswoman had previously said that Palin had also been to Ireland, although it was actually just a “refueling stop” on her Germany/Kuwait trip. [New York Times, 8/29/08; Politico, 9/2/08]
McCain and the war on terrorism
Is McCain the man with the experience and judgement to lead America during a war against Terror?
From:
The New Republic magazine
The Next Front
by Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon
Seven years after 9/11, John McCain still doesn't get the war on terrorism.
Post Date Thursday, September 04, 2008
At a stop on July 22 in Rochester, New Hampshire, Senator John McCain was asked a series of questions about the American troop presence in Iraq. As he has throughout his campaign, McCain insisted that U.S. forces were winning the war in Iraq and, if allowed to complete their mission, would leave behind a working democracy, check "disruptive" influences, and clear the way for a transformed Middle East. The back-and-forth culminated with the following exchange:
Questioner: Don't you believe that we are inflaming the Muslim world by our presence there?
McCain: Thank you. I do not. I believe that if we had been defeated in Iraq that the radical elements in the Muslim world would have been dramatically encouraged.
The Arizona senator's response presented in a nutshell his belief that military force is the sine qua non of a successful counterterrorism policy. McCain does not promise that victory in Iraq--which he does not define--will end Islamist terrorism in other regions or prevent attacks directed at the United States. Implicit in his view, though, is the notion that terrorists will be deterred by American military might and that their defeat in Iraq will make it more difficult for them to acquire the recruits, funding, and popular backing they need to continue their efforts.
Undoubtedly, flagrant displays of U.S. weakness could embolden America's terrorist enemies, though it seems far-fetched that a U.S. departure from Iraq in the next three years--a move endorsed by the Bush administration, the Baghdad regime, and Senator Barack Obama--would be seen as a rout. But McCain's approach fails to take into account the many other factors that affect the jihadists' ability to promote their cause and carry out attacks. Above all, it ignores the motivational power of the jihadist "story"--the contention, made by Osama bin Laden and others, that the United States is a predatory power which seeks to occupy Muslim countries, destroy Islam, and steal the Middle East's oil wealth. Undermining that narrative, most counterterrorism analysts believe, must be a central part of the strategy against radical Islamism. Yet McCain's insistence that the U.S. military stay in Iraq for the long term does just the opposite.
For a man who routinely calls the fight against terrorism "the transcendent challenge of our time," John McCain seems to understand little about it. At least twice, he has confused Sunni and Shia, the two main sects of Islam. On one famous occasion in Amman last March he suggested that Al Qaeda terrorists, who are Sunnis, were receiving training from Iran's Shia government. That notion would have surprised the late Al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Mussab al Zarqawi, who killed Shia with a demonic fury and repeatedly called them "worse" than Americans. According to the CIA, Al Qaeda personnel do operate within Iran, but the Iranian government is unaware of their presence. McCain's other fumble came just a few weeks later when he implied that Al Qaeda was "an obscure sect of the Shiites." Perhaps there should have been less surprise at McCain's mistakes, given that in a 2003 interview with Chris Matthews, he predicted that there would be comity between the sects in postwar Iraq because "there's not a history of clashes that are violent between Sunnis and Shias. So I think they can probably get along."
Like the key architects of the Iraq war, McCain appears to see all hostile Muslims as part of a monolithic enemy. This conflation of Al Qaeda with other threats underlay President Bush's belief that Iraq had something to do with the 9/11 attacks, Vice President Cheney's repeated insistence that Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein were working together years after that was proven untrue, and former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz's obsessive demands that the intelligence community demonstrate a connection between the jihadists and Saddam's Baathists. McCain has also spoken about Hamas and Hezbollah in terms that suggest that he considers these groups no different from Al Qaeda, Iraq's Baath Party, and the Iranian regime. He has speculated that if the United States were defeated in Iraq, Iran and Al Qaeda would reach a strategic understanding to divide the country between them--an inconceivable outcome, given their deep hatred for each other.
Ironically, the McCain campaign's principal critique of Barack Obama, as expressed by foreign policy aide Randy Scheunemann, is that he "does not understand the nature of the enemy as we face it." Former CIA director James Woolsey, also an adviser to McCain, said in a conference call with reporters that Obama "ignores that we are in a war against terrorism." Insofar as we are in a conflict that involves violence, we are in a war. But the flaw in McCain's worldview is his conviction that the war against terrorism is a war in the conventional sense--something of a cross between Saving Private Ryan and The Longest Day. The depth of the McCain team's embrace of the "war paradigm" has been apparent both in the candidate's near-exclusive focus on Iraq and his revival of the Bush/Cheney canard that Democrats see terrorism solely as a law enforcement challenge--that they would rather serve a terrorist a subpoena than kill him. To McCain, the central front in the war on terrorism is Iraq, and it is a war that must be fought chiefly with military power. One hundred thousand or more U.S. troops stationed in Iraq will maintain order, destroy malefactors through air strikes and ground engagements, and demonstrate that no one can outgun the American military.
But massed armies and traditional notions of total war have little to do with the current conflict with the jihadist movement. Most of the terrorists cannot be overrun with tanks. Many of them are in Pakistan--in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and, increasingly, in the broad western band of the country ranging from the Northwest Frontier Province down to Baluchistan, where Al Qaeda and its allies in the Pakistan Taliban operate in the open and increasingly destabilize our operations in Afghanistan. The United States may be able to disrupt an emerging conspiracy there with military means, such as drones, tactical air strikes, or Special Forces, but it cannot invade this nuclear armed-country, even though the terrorists who plotted 9/11 have found refuge there.
McCain has long maintained that the way to deal with this problem was to press the Pakistanis into action. "I know Musharraf. ... I know how to deal with Pakistan. I've been to Waziristan. I know these issues and I've been involved in them for the last 20 years," the Arizonan said in a Fox News roundtable during the primaries. Of course, the Bush White House emphasized working with Musharraf, too, and the failure of that approach is now clear. As The New York Times has reported, years of frustration with Pakistani military intelligence--the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate--has boiled over in the Bush administration, and a senior CIA official recently flew to Islamabad to present information showing the ISI's attempts to subvert the Afghan government and its complicity in the July bombing of the Indian embassy in Kabul. Besides which, Musharraf is now gone.
After South Asia, the other key areas of concern are in the Muslim diaspora, especially in Europe, in urban ghettoes or university cafes. These are the haunts of the plotters who planned in 2006 to rival the 9/11 attacks by blowing up six or seven airliners flying out of Heathrow. Others have burrowed into the societies of pro-Western Muslim countries, like the 700 or so Saudis arrested in the last year whose main targets were oil facilities. Military force will not be used in any of these areas, which cover most of the "theaters of jihad."
Where military force does matter--say, in Afghanistan--McCain's prescriptions have made little sense. Initially, he touted Afghanistan as a military success, but after Obama repeatedly pointed to the decay there, McCain reversed course in July and called for more troops. His pledge to deploy three more brigades, however, is hollow if he also insists on maintaining a high troop level in Iraq until 2013. As Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, pointed out on July 2, the Pentagon does not have those brigades today, and increasing the size of the army will take years.
Undoubtedly, the United States must continue working with the Iraqi army and Sunni tribes to dismantle Al Qaeda in Iraq--a parasite that came to Mesopotamia to feed off the chaos created by Bush's invasion--but doing so won't require the 15 combat brigades McCain wants to keep there or anything close to that number. Military force from some country or coalition may also be needed elsewhere in the failed and failing states that radiate violence, such as Lebanon, Somalia, and Gaza. The jihad in these areas has taken root in tribal areas, slums, and refugee camps that are effectively off-limits to police. Unlike in Europe or Saudi Arabia, these jihadists are contesting territory, not just terrorizing unlucky individuals. Ultimately, a mix of special operations forces and conventional units will be needed to chip away at these insurgencies. But they will succeed only if their efforts are carried out in the name of a government that enjoys popular support.
What McCain fails to comprehend is that his preference for firepower will give the terrorists exactly what they want. For bin Laden and his fellow jihadists, it is axiomatic that the United States must feel itself to be at war with Islam. Ramzi Yousef, the architect of the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993, explained this clearly to his American captors after he was apprehended in Pakistan in 1995 and flown back to the United States for trial. When the United States considers itself at war, the mujahedin believe, it will behave in a warlike way, and the deployment of its heavy equipment in places like Iraq will confirm to the world's Muslims that America is, as bin Laden claims, at war with Islam. This is the jihadists' strategy for winning hearts and minds, and it has worked for them. It is true that Al Qaeda hasn't mobilized the masses as it wanted, but it is nevertheless getting the funding and recruits it needs.
The key is to provoke an American overreaction. It's not just the pictures of tanks or humvees cruising through Muslim countries that horrify and motivate Al Qaeda's target audience; it is the enormous number of civilian casualties in Iraq--from a documented minimum of just below 100,000 to estimates of more than six times that--which are laid at America's doorstep. The New York Times and Fox News may not routinely show images of Iraqi civilian casualties, but media outlets overseas do. Supporters of the war have been so delighted by the decline in violence in Iraq--purchased mostly through the arming of Sunni tribesmen whose long-term reliability is dubious at best--that they fail to notice the continued erosion in America's standing in a Muslim world, where the occupation of Iraq has come to rival the plight of the Palestinians as an issue of concern.
From:
The New Republic magazine
The Next Front
by Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon
Seven years after 9/11, John McCain still doesn't get the war on terrorism.
Post Date Thursday, September 04, 2008
At a stop on July 22 in Rochester, New Hampshire, Senator John McCain was asked a series of questions about the American troop presence in Iraq. As he has throughout his campaign, McCain insisted that U.S. forces were winning the war in Iraq and, if allowed to complete their mission, would leave behind a working democracy, check "disruptive" influences, and clear the way for a transformed Middle East. The back-and-forth culminated with the following exchange:
Questioner: Don't you believe that we are inflaming the Muslim world by our presence there?
McCain: Thank you. I do not. I believe that if we had been defeated in Iraq that the radical elements in the Muslim world would have been dramatically encouraged.
The Arizona senator's response presented in a nutshell his belief that military force is the sine qua non of a successful counterterrorism policy. McCain does not promise that victory in Iraq--which he does not define--will end Islamist terrorism in other regions or prevent attacks directed at the United States. Implicit in his view, though, is the notion that terrorists will be deterred by American military might and that their defeat in Iraq will make it more difficult for them to acquire the recruits, funding, and popular backing they need to continue their efforts.
Undoubtedly, flagrant displays of U.S. weakness could embolden America's terrorist enemies, though it seems far-fetched that a U.S. departure from Iraq in the next three years--a move endorsed by the Bush administration, the Baghdad regime, and Senator Barack Obama--would be seen as a rout. But McCain's approach fails to take into account the many other factors that affect the jihadists' ability to promote their cause and carry out attacks. Above all, it ignores the motivational power of the jihadist "story"--the contention, made by Osama bin Laden and others, that the United States is a predatory power which seeks to occupy Muslim countries, destroy Islam, and steal the Middle East's oil wealth. Undermining that narrative, most counterterrorism analysts believe, must be a central part of the strategy against radical Islamism. Yet McCain's insistence that the U.S. military stay in Iraq for the long term does just the opposite.
For a man who routinely calls the fight against terrorism "the transcendent challenge of our time," John McCain seems to understand little about it. At least twice, he has confused Sunni and Shia, the two main sects of Islam. On one famous occasion in Amman last March he suggested that Al Qaeda terrorists, who are Sunnis, were receiving training from Iran's Shia government. That notion would have surprised the late Al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Mussab al Zarqawi, who killed Shia with a demonic fury and repeatedly called them "worse" than Americans. According to the CIA, Al Qaeda personnel do operate within Iran, but the Iranian government is unaware of their presence. McCain's other fumble came just a few weeks later when he implied that Al Qaeda was "an obscure sect of the Shiites." Perhaps there should have been less surprise at McCain's mistakes, given that in a 2003 interview with Chris Matthews, he predicted that there would be comity between the sects in postwar Iraq because "there's not a history of clashes that are violent between Sunnis and Shias. So I think they can probably get along."
Like the key architects of the Iraq war, McCain appears to see all hostile Muslims as part of a monolithic enemy. This conflation of Al Qaeda with other threats underlay President Bush's belief that Iraq had something to do with the 9/11 attacks, Vice President Cheney's repeated insistence that Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein were working together years after that was proven untrue, and former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz's obsessive demands that the intelligence community demonstrate a connection between the jihadists and Saddam's Baathists. McCain has also spoken about Hamas and Hezbollah in terms that suggest that he considers these groups no different from Al Qaeda, Iraq's Baath Party, and the Iranian regime. He has speculated that if the United States were defeated in Iraq, Iran and Al Qaeda would reach a strategic understanding to divide the country between them--an inconceivable outcome, given their deep hatred for each other.
Ironically, the McCain campaign's principal critique of Barack Obama, as expressed by foreign policy aide Randy Scheunemann, is that he "does not understand the nature of the enemy as we face it." Former CIA director James Woolsey, also an adviser to McCain, said in a conference call with reporters that Obama "ignores that we are in a war against terrorism." Insofar as we are in a conflict that involves violence, we are in a war. But the flaw in McCain's worldview is his conviction that the war against terrorism is a war in the conventional sense--something of a cross between Saving Private Ryan and The Longest Day. The depth of the McCain team's embrace of the "war paradigm" has been apparent both in the candidate's near-exclusive focus on Iraq and his revival of the Bush/Cheney canard that Democrats see terrorism solely as a law enforcement challenge--that they would rather serve a terrorist a subpoena than kill him. To McCain, the central front in the war on terrorism is Iraq, and it is a war that must be fought chiefly with military power. One hundred thousand or more U.S. troops stationed in Iraq will maintain order, destroy malefactors through air strikes and ground engagements, and demonstrate that no one can outgun the American military.
But massed armies and traditional notions of total war have little to do with the current conflict with the jihadist movement. Most of the terrorists cannot be overrun with tanks. Many of them are in Pakistan--in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and, increasingly, in the broad western band of the country ranging from the Northwest Frontier Province down to Baluchistan, where Al Qaeda and its allies in the Pakistan Taliban operate in the open and increasingly destabilize our operations in Afghanistan. The United States may be able to disrupt an emerging conspiracy there with military means, such as drones, tactical air strikes, or Special Forces, but it cannot invade this nuclear armed-country, even though the terrorists who plotted 9/11 have found refuge there.
McCain has long maintained that the way to deal with this problem was to press the Pakistanis into action. "I know Musharraf. ... I know how to deal with Pakistan. I've been to Waziristan. I know these issues and I've been involved in them for the last 20 years," the Arizonan said in a Fox News roundtable during the primaries. Of course, the Bush White House emphasized working with Musharraf, too, and the failure of that approach is now clear. As The New York Times has reported, years of frustration with Pakistani military intelligence--the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate--has boiled over in the Bush administration, and a senior CIA official recently flew to Islamabad to present information showing the ISI's attempts to subvert the Afghan government and its complicity in the July bombing of the Indian embassy in Kabul. Besides which, Musharraf is now gone.
After South Asia, the other key areas of concern are in the Muslim diaspora, especially in Europe, in urban ghettoes or university cafes. These are the haunts of the plotters who planned in 2006 to rival the 9/11 attacks by blowing up six or seven airliners flying out of Heathrow. Others have burrowed into the societies of pro-Western Muslim countries, like the 700 or so Saudis arrested in the last year whose main targets were oil facilities. Military force will not be used in any of these areas, which cover most of the "theaters of jihad."
Where military force does matter--say, in Afghanistan--McCain's prescriptions have made little sense. Initially, he touted Afghanistan as a military success, but after Obama repeatedly pointed to the decay there, McCain reversed course in July and called for more troops. His pledge to deploy three more brigades, however, is hollow if he also insists on maintaining a high troop level in Iraq until 2013. As Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, pointed out on July 2, the Pentagon does not have those brigades today, and increasing the size of the army will take years.
Undoubtedly, the United States must continue working with the Iraqi army and Sunni tribes to dismantle Al Qaeda in Iraq--a parasite that came to Mesopotamia to feed off the chaos created by Bush's invasion--but doing so won't require the 15 combat brigades McCain wants to keep there or anything close to that number. Military force from some country or coalition may also be needed elsewhere in the failed and failing states that radiate violence, such as Lebanon, Somalia, and Gaza. The jihad in these areas has taken root in tribal areas, slums, and refugee camps that are effectively off-limits to police. Unlike in Europe or Saudi Arabia, these jihadists are contesting territory, not just terrorizing unlucky individuals. Ultimately, a mix of special operations forces and conventional units will be needed to chip away at these insurgencies. But they will succeed only if their efforts are carried out in the name of a government that enjoys popular support.
What McCain fails to comprehend is that his preference for firepower will give the terrorists exactly what they want. For bin Laden and his fellow jihadists, it is axiomatic that the United States must feel itself to be at war with Islam. Ramzi Yousef, the architect of the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993, explained this clearly to his American captors after he was apprehended in Pakistan in 1995 and flown back to the United States for trial. When the United States considers itself at war, the mujahedin believe, it will behave in a warlike way, and the deployment of its heavy equipment in places like Iraq will confirm to the world's Muslims that America is, as bin Laden claims, at war with Islam. This is the jihadists' strategy for winning hearts and minds, and it has worked for them. It is true that Al Qaeda hasn't mobilized the masses as it wanted, but it is nevertheless getting the funding and recruits it needs.
The key is to provoke an American overreaction. It's not just the pictures of tanks or humvees cruising through Muslim countries that horrify and motivate Al Qaeda's target audience; it is the enormous number of civilian casualties in Iraq--from a documented minimum of just below 100,000 to estimates of more than six times that--which are laid at America's doorstep. The New York Times and Fox News may not routinely show images of Iraqi civilian casualties, but media outlets overseas do. Supporters of the war have been so delighted by the decline in violence in Iraq--purchased mostly through the arming of Sunni tribesmen whose long-term reliability is dubious at best--that they fail to notice the continued erosion in America's standing in a Muslim world, where the occupation of Iraq has come to rival the plight of the Palestinians as an issue of concern.
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