Amateurish Foreign Policy Has The GOP Field Failing The Commander-In-Chief Test

If you didn’t know already, Donald Trump was the Grand Marshal at the Israeli Day Parade in New York a couple years back. That’s just about as much foreign policy experience as Rubio or Cruz have, too.

Marco Rubio, the GOP field’s self-declared foreign policy expert, has skipped 60% of all his Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearings since 2011 while using those committee hearings as the basis of his experience — yet, somehow, the rest of the on-stage candidate’s foreign policy credentials are just as bad.

We learned this fall that Ben Carson was really “struggling to grasp foreign policy,” but he isn’t the only one who comes across as clueless.

Following Donald Trump’s lead, the GOP field has stooped to simplistic notions of proper foreign policy that reject diplomacy as “for the weak,” while glorifying torture and the indiscriminate carpet bombing of civilian-populated areas, a potential war crime. Donald Trump’s “plan” for fighting ISIS is to “bomb the sh*t out of them.” And Marco Rubio’s laughably stooped to partisan posturing over peaceful resolutions made possible by diplomatic negotiation. Then there’s Rubio’s tendency to prioritize fundraisers over foreign policy meetings and briefings — which does not inspire confidence in his dedication or his level of understanding.

To paraphrase the GOP field’s xenophobic frontrunner: These guys (Trump, included) just don’t have what it takes to serve as commander-in-chief.

#debates

Published: Feb 25, 2016