A snippet from Katie Couric’s recent interview with Sarah Palin:
Couric: You recently said three times that you would never, quote, “second guess” Israel if that country decided to attack Iran. Why not?
Palin: We shouldn’t second guess Israel’s security efforts because we cannot ever afford to send a message that we would allow a second Holocaust, for one. Israel has got to have the opportunity and the ability to protect itself. They are our closest ally in the Mideast. We need them. They need us. And we shouldn’t second guess their efforts.
Couric: You don’t think the United States is within its rights to express its position to Israel? And if that means second-guessing or discussing an option?
Palin: No, abso … we need to express our rights and our concerns and …
Couric: But you said never second guess them.
Palin: We don’t have to second-guess what their efforts would be if they believe … that it is in their country and their allies, including us, all of our best interests to fight against a regime, especially Iran, who would seek to wipe them off the face of the earth. It is obvious to me who the good guys are in this one and who the bad guys are. The bad guys are the ones who say Israel is a stinking corpse and should be wiped off the face of the earth. That’s not a good guy who is saying that. Now, one who would seek to protect the good guys in this, the leaders of Israel and her friends, her allies, including the United States, in my world, those are the good guys.
Scary. Not only does she stick to a position she clearly cannot defend, but all those years of “foreign policy experience” (thanks to Alaska’s geographic proximity to Russia) are based on who “the good guys” are in “her world”. Well, the world is bigger than Sarah Palin and her views.
One caveat before I continue: I hold no illusions that arriving at peace in the Middle East is a simple undertaking, nor do I consider myself an expert on the crisis. But is this really who the Republicans are suggesting as the second-in-command to the “leader of the free world”? Shouldn’t the role of a “superpower” be to set the example? Instead of taking sides and perpetuating the cycle of violence, peace brokering should be the top priority in the Middle East. I’d hate to think that Palin, champion of the unborn, values the life of an Israeli child over a Palestinian one. Both sides suffer in a conflict like this. Grief isn’t reserved for the “good guys”. Differences do not make people evil. At least that’s how those of us with a bigger world view operate. But there’s more…
Couric: In preparing for this conversation, a lot of our viewers … and internet users wanted to know why you did not get a passport until last year. And they wondered if that indicated a lack of interest and curiosity in the world.
Palin: I’m not one of those who maybe came from a background of, you know, kids who perhaps graduate college and their parents give them a passport and give them a backpack and say go off and travel the world. No, I’ve worked all my life. In fact, I usually had two jobs all my life until I had kids. I was not a part of, I guess, that culture.
Uh-huh. So the only “culture” Palin really knows is that of the good old U.S. of A. Makes you wonder where the rest of the world stands if the McCain/Palin ticket actually makes it to the White House.