Former Alaska Governor has said some crazy things over the years, but perhaps none so whacko as her recent comments on Fox about war with Iran .
“Say he [Obama] decided to declare war on Iran,” she said on Fox News last week. “I think people would perhaps shift their thinking a little bit and decide, well, maybe he’s tougher than we think he is today.”
Great. All the President needs to do is launch another war — a third conflict for American military forces, and maybe his popularity goes up a few points.
Palin seems to fail to understand the lesson of George W. Bush. It took a few years, but Americans became fed up with both the Iraq War and the Bush cowboy policies.
Perhaps Palin is looking for ways to prove her manhood, err, womanhood.
This kind of talk is reckless and dangerous.
According to Fareed Zakaria writing in Newsweek, Palin apparently picked up the idea from neo-con Daniel Pipes, who suggested a military strike on Iran to reverse Obama’s political fortunes.
Palin and Pipes seem to forget that some of America’s finest would be killed and hurt in the war.
And Zakaria and others have pointed out that an American or Israeli military strike on Iran would at best delay Tehran’s nuclear weapons ambitions while alienating many around the world, causing a spike in oil prices, forcing dissident Iranians to rally around the repressive leadership and leading to Iranian retaliation in Iraq and Afghanistan.
And to repeat myself, kill and maim many Americans as well as innocent Iranians.
Dictators go to war to bolster their positions.
Democracies are supposed to behave more sensibly.
Perhaps Palin should return to Wasilla. Or at least Pipes down.
