Giuliani reaching to the wrong audiences

ARTICLE: "Giuliani Visit to London Aims to Bolster Credentials," by Mary Jacoby, Wall Street Journal, 20 September 2007, p. A7.

Selling old Thatcher lines ("isn't a time to go wobbly") for pre-emptive war, resurrecting the ancient bit about Israel joining NATO ( and suggesting a bunch of Asian countries too, one supposes, to save them from Chinese domination), and tying it all off with a promise to bomb Iran if that's what it takes to stop them from getting nukes (promising only to set back their program a few years).

It just all comes off as too quaint by half.

Out macho-ing the macho promises of others isn't the way to sell his brand of foreign policy experience.

Comments

[ShrinkWrapped]

The bind with Iran is that the only way they will step back from the brink is if they are convinced we are serious about an attack (even if we have no intention of doing so.) When playing chicken, the car that wins is the one most ocmmitted to the crash; unfortunatley, that risks crashing. When both Ahmadinejad and, if you are correct, Cheney want the crash, only by convincing those who can restrain them that a crash is coming is there any chance of forestalling the crash. As Tom Friedman has said, you have to convince them you are crazier than they are.The wild card remains the Israelis who will never remain passive if Iran gets to the brink of attaining nuclear capabilities.

[Michael]

You're forgetting, Doc; another way to win a game of chicken is to spike your opponent's gas with sugar before the game:) Or, in this case, to let the radicals stupid themselves out of power before they can finish their first bomb.