Obama BLEW OPPORTUNITY to show grasp of key Foreign Policy issue

[Sensitivity]

The Russert question regarding the upcomming Russion election was a jump ball -- Obama allowed Clinton to grab it.

What was worse, Clinton rambled through generalities of an answer that make in clear that she was not really familiar with the name of the successor or the specifics of the constitutional crisis being debated in Russia.

Obama could have jumped in and make clear he understoon the genesis of the Dmitry Medvedev/Vladimir Putin political partnership and the implications of him beign hand-picked to succeed and his proposal to change the constitution to give new powers to the Prime Minister role to which Putin would ascend.

He failed to express himself with any more command of the facts than Clinton. A MISSED OPPORTUNITY that showed his need for a strong National Security V.P.

[Connie_Corleone]

1. I don't think either one of them could give a good answer to that question.

[subsuelo]

2. as if either of them *really* grasp foreign policy all that much

[Sensitivity]

7. This was OBAMA'S chance to differentiate himself from Clintons phony mumblings re NS issues

[ORDem]

5. I agree, both were very weak on the Russia question. It was

embarrassing. I'd give HRC +1 for doing a better job of looking like she knew what she was talking about better than Obama, but her answer was 99% fluff.

:dem:

[izzybeans]

3. I think that whole issue of being handpicked by a former president hits a little too

close to home for Hillary to really grasp. It would force her to realize the oligarchic ramifications of her run. As a member of the ruling class she really doesn't want to go too deep into this issue. If I were Obama I would have said just that. to bad he's too nice for that type of game.

[RunningFromCongress]

4. they BOTH blew it. It would have been a knockout for either, and they both let it miss

[Sensitivity]

6. With Brzezinski on his NS team, Obama should have command of U.S.- Russia issues

[RunningFromCongress]

9. They both should have a mastery of it, they're running for POTUS.

[democrattotheend]

11. Brzezinski is not on his team

He has advised him on a few occasions.

[anigbrowl]

8. Don't agree. I think both of them are similarly knowledgeable...

and it's not like it's any big secret - I could have answered that question as well. I don't think there was really anything much for Obama to say that Hillary hadn't said already: if he had gone into the detail suggested in the OP I think most of the audience would have thought he was being a showoff and/or lost interest.

I'm fairly knowledgeable on the subject (I've been to Russia and have always been interested in Russian politics) but I didn't feel Obama had anything to gain by giving a lecture on the subject. There were other times when I felt 'Yes! So glad you finally drove that point home' (eg about the question of acting against AQ in Pakistan) and some times when I felt 'Gee, why don't you just say ___', but the Russia question wasn't one of them. Frankly I thought he made his Foreign Affairs point best by taking a closer look at the Pakistan question and doing a gentle 'Told you so'.

[Tatiana]

10. I was a bit disappointed with his response. With Kerry and Brzezinski as advisors,

he should have done better.

[blm]

37. Kerry only just got back from Pakistan and Afghanistan, so I don't think they've huddled

recently. I expect Obama will be playing some serious catch up. Neither candidate sounded like they were sure of their answers.

[Tatiana]

42. Well they need to schedule some huddle time soon. Obama does have a lot of ground to cover.

However, he is a *very* quick study. Though I've always favored Kerry in the Senate, depending on what our majority is, Obama may need to consider offering Kerry a cabinet position.

[RoadRage]

12. Obama simply won the point by not misprounouncing his name...

She Blew it.. he didn't score any points, but he didn't lose any. She lost some.. her "international experience" came across as a major INEXPERIENCE by the fact that she doesn't even know how to pronounce the guys name. That's a big loss IMO...

Obama played it safe.. i'm not sure he knows much more about the guy then Hillary does - but at least he appeared to know more and kept within his range.

Not a great question for either, but he didn't fumble - she did.

[Sensitivity]

13. This was worse that Bush refering to Musharaf as "the general" because he did not know

[FlyingSquirrel]

17. I was actually expecting them to ask him if he could pronounce the name

After she mispronounced it. They let him off the hook, I'm not sure he knew the name either.

[MagsDem]

18. Yeah, like Obama knew the guys name

Pretty obvious he didn't. He let her have it for a reason. He didn't have a clue what to say. When it was his turn he simply repeated what she said. In fact he did that several times during the debate. (When he wasn't bullshitting about his health care plan).

[Labors of Hercules]

41. the finer points of debating escape someone so emotionally biased.

What's obvious is you don't like Obama so you perceive what you want to perceive. He did not in any way appear clueless, because he isn't clueless or ignorant. If you think he is, that's fine... you can think anything you want. But thinking it doesn't make it true.

[ginnyinWI]

38. as the frontrunner,

Obama is smarter to just sit back and give Hillary room to shoot herself in the foot. And tone is more important than spouting the most facts. If he had interrupted Hillary or otherwise made a spectacle out of himself, he'd have lost the point. As it was, she did.

FWIW, Susan Rice, his foreign policy advisor was on Morning Joe today and said that of course he knows the future Russian leader's name and that she thought his answers on foreign policy ran circles around Hillary's. She looked very proud of his performance.

[Political Heretic]

14. Obama didn't need to do ANYTHING except not light himself on fire

He wasn't trying to HIT OPPORTUNITIES.

He won by not losing, which was his campaigns goal going on (as well it should be).

[Sensitivity]

15. That was his chance to put her away

[Political Heretic]

16. She's already put away.

[redstate_democrat]

19. He answered well

I think he did fine with the Russia question. At least he didn't say "whatever" after mispronouncing the guy's name. In other news, he was strong on stating that he would be prepared to defend American interests if Iraq were to totally have a cataclysmic breakdown after withdrawal. Hillary didn't seem to want to answer that "hypothetical".

I also liked the fact that, and he was given this question first, the US would not maintain a presence in Iraq if we were asked to leave, pointing to the sovereignty of Iraq, which is something McInsane/Bush seem to not really give a damn about.

[ellisonz]

21. That's my new favorite political cartoon of the season.

[SKKY]

20. Obama won by letting Hilary stumble all over herself...

I thought it was a smart move. He'll have plenty of time to show was he knows. These little nuggets that present themselves are few and far between.

[Sensitivity]

24. It was his opportunity to take commamd and dismiss the mumbling pretender to Foreign Pol expertize

[SKKY]

28. He'll have plenty of time to do that when he debates McCain...

...it's a marathon, not sprint.

[Hippo_Tron]

22. Their debate prep teams both blew it

I understand that campaign scheduling is tight but for fuck's sake, make sure that your candidate can pronounce the name right.

[Sensitivity]

25. Knowing the leadership issues in the G8 is the ABC's in a pres race

[Hippo_Tron]

27. Seriously I hope someone is getting fired in both campaigns tonight

It's one thing when you're George W Bush or Mike Huckabee and someone told you the name 1000 times but you're still too fucking stupid to remember. It's another when you're an intelligent person like Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama and you have arguably the best foreign policy advisors in the country but someone forgot to make sure that you took the time to be fully briefed by them.

[blm]

32. I agree - Obama needs to huddle with someone like Kerry between campaign stops.

.

[THUNDER HANDS]

34. when was the last time they were asked about Russia?

i can't remember the last time.

[Hippo_Tron]

43. When's the last time Russia was having an election next week?

[shaniqua6392]

23. I would assume he did not know enough about it to jump in.

Otherwise he would have. He failed to express himself with more command of the facts because he did not know the facts.

[TheFarseer]

26. You're probably right

but I don't think either candidate did themselves any big favors with that question. I mean what are they supposed to say? We should invade Russia?? Impose sanctions? Instead they threw out a bunch of stuff you could read in Newsweek and bitched about Bush. I'm not sure what else there was to do with that question but I guess that's why I'm not running for president.

[Hippo_Tron]

29. We should Revoke their WTO Membership!!!

Oh wait...

[Occam Bandage]

30. Obama did the smart thing. He's ahead; his job is to avoid saying stupid shit at all costs.

If he gives a specific answer, he runs the risk of making a minor factual error, incorrectly implying a specific policy (opening himself to debate on that policy's merits), or saying something that might be construed as particularly insulting to either Medvedev or Putin. When you're as far ahead as Obama is, you have little to gain and much to lose.

[blm]

31. John Kerry or Al Gore would have knocked that one irretrievably out of the park.

.

[Sensitivity]

33. True, true. Painful to be reminded.

[karynnj]

35. Definately true - but HRC didn't do that well herself

Her answer reminded me of blue book essays in college when you know very little and need to write more than a sentence or two. She makes the same point in a least 4 different ways - that the likely successor is a hand picked Putin guy and Ptin will still be the power behind the throne.

She also took a very cheap shot in hitting Obama for not holding hearings on Afghanistan in the SFRC overseeing Europe, because it involves NATO. The fact is that hearings on this WERE held where they should have been in the Near East Asia subcommittee and the full committee, due to its importance. It is very clear that Biden and Kerry are putting enormous efforts in on this - they are the ones with a bill on how to go forward. Both have been there several times and are on the job. (http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=4795016&mesg_id=4795016 )

It would be showboating if Obama used his sub-committee to address this.

[blm]

36. Hillary sounded a bit scared in answering that question -

.

[Sensitivity]

39. She was scared. I was waiting for Obama to drop the hammer. Zbig's not doing his job

[calmblueocean]

40. Heh, true enough. I wrote a little about that last night.

After the debates, I found myself missing John Kerry just a little.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=4793213&mesg_id=4793213