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Quote by: maximdewinter I don't know about Palin but Couric is out of her depth here. She seems to be making the same mistake that Obama made last night in the debates about whether Kissinger thought the US president should enter into direct negotiations with Ahmadinejad. Kissinger came out today and said that he never said that the president should talk directly to A-jad.

Except that's not what Couric said, Maxim.

Couric: "You met yesterday with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who is for direct diplomacy with both Iran and Syria. Do you believe the U.S. should negotiate with leaders like President Assad and Ahmadinejad?"

Nothing about the President talking directly to anyone. Get your facts straight, okay?

Palin: "I've never heard Henry Kissinger say, "Yeah, I'll meet with these leaders without preconditions being met."

Excluding himself or the President, that's pretty much exactly what Kissinger said, "without preconditions".

Besides, it's unclear that Obama specifically meant that HE HIMSELF would be speaking directly to those leaders - despite the wording of the question in the debate - since in the same response he referred to Reagan and other Presidents who "constantly spoke" to the Soviet Union without talking directly to them. Even in his response, Obama states that he would "send a signal that we need to talk to Iran and Syria".

Clearly he's suggesting that, unlike the failed Bush doctrine, we would benefit from diplomatic discussions, notwithstanding the carefully nuanced wording of Ed Bradley's question.

Who's playing "gotcha" here?

Quote by: maximdewinter A perfect case in point would be the Charlie Gibson question to Palin about the "Bush Doctrine." Would it not be of interest to voters to know that the question was invalid and stupid to ask because there really never has been a stated policy called the Bush Doctrine by the Bush Administration?

A red herring. Because it was never written or stated directly as 'The Bush Doctrine' doesn't mean it doesn't exist, or that it isn't commonly understood.

The Bush Doctrine is a phrase used to describe various related foreign policy principles of United States president George W. Bush, created in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks. The phrase initially described the policy that the United States had the right to treat countries that harbor or give aid to terrorist groups as terrorists themselves, which was used to justify the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan.[1] Later it came to include additional elements, including the controversial policy of preventive war, which held that the United States should depose foreign regimes that represented a potential or perceived threat to the security of the United States, even if that threat was not immediate (used to justify the 2003 invasion of Iraq); a policy of supporting democracy around the world, especially in the Middle East, as a strategy for combating the spread of terrorism; and a willingness to pursue U.S. military interests in a unilateral way.[2][3][4] Some of these policies were codified in a National Security Council text entitled the National Security Strategy of the United States published on September 20, 2002.[5]

If you prefer it in writing, there's always the NeoCon manifesto, Project for a New American Century.

Simply because the Bush Doctrine has been completely discredited, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Quote by: maximdewinter It seems to me that for reasons unknown the press is very anxious to have a "gotcha moment" with Palin and it is working against them in public opinion.

Oh waaaaah. The press lives for gotcha moments with ALL politicians, or have you forgotten Gibson's interview with Bill Clinton a while back.

Welcome to the major leagues, Sarah.

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