Today in The New York Daily News, Brian Katulis – a fellow at the Center for American Progress – has thoroughly destroyed Mitt Romney's foreign policy credentials, using some Yiddish-inspired wit for an assist.
Here is how Katulis begins (with emphasis mine):
[Romney's] bombastic rhetoric masks a thin policy agenda cooked up by a team of advisers who, when they were in power, helped undermine America’s power and credibility around the world.
Rhetorically, Romney presents himself as the reincarnation of Theodore Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan — as a strong, proud, principled leader in a turbulent world. He contrasts this with a ridiculous caricature of President Obama as a shrinking Jimmy Carter clone with muddled ideas and a shaky belief in America.
This cartoon script is little more than a ploy to divert voters’ attention from the reality that Romney's foreign policy is an empty shell lacking a solid inner core. The closer you look beneath the rhetoric, the less you see.
Katulis expands on his theme of Romeny as an empty suit when it comes to foreign policy, explaining that the GOP candidate offers nothing more than unspecific policy positions that are similar to Obama's, but that are hyped up with bombastic, Bush-eske rhetoric.
And then comes the hammer:
Though in policies and plans, Romney offers nothing to distinguish himself from the President, in tenor and tone, he carries a neoconservative shtick.
Whether he talks about Middle East security or trade with China, Romney’s instinct is to shout louder, rattle a bigger saber or hint that he would start more wars. His idea of projecting strength is to talk like a frat boy spoiling for a bar fight.
Of course, unlike Romney, Katulis backs up his Yiddish-inspired dig and frat-boy metaphor with actual specifics:
- Romney's "cringe-inducing" statement that Russia represents America's greatest threat, as though conjuring up cold-war relics represents responsible leadership.
- Romney's handling of the Libya tragedy exposed the GOP candidate's only foreign policy talent: selfishly taking advantage of difficult moments by trying to divide the nation in their wake.
- He has irresponsibly used Israel as a wedge issue with a host of fictions and falsehoods that fail to characterize the reality of U.S.-Israel relations, and denigrated the Palestinians in a way that would make a U.S.-led peace initiative virtually impossible under Romney.
- Despite hawkish rhetoric, he has offered no alternative specifics on how he's handle a host of issues, including Iran, Syria and Afghanistan.
Romney's erratic, unprincipled and sometimes dangerous approach to foreign policy may not be one of the first element which voters think of concerning Romney when they enter the voting booth.
However, Monday's debate is Obama's last chance to change that. And using Katulis for inspiration may go a long way toward that end.