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US Presidential Foreign Policy Debate |OT| Please proceed, governor

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E

eBay Huckster

Member
The fourth and final debate for the 2012 United States presidential election is about 4 1/2 hours away.

Date: Monday, October 22nd
Time: 9:00 - 10:30 PM EDT
Place: Lynn University, Boca Raton, FL
Participants:
220px-Official_portrait_of_Barack_Obama.jpg

Barack Hussein Obama, President of the United States of America, versus...
220px-Mitt_Romney_by_Gage_Skidmore_6.jpg

Willard Mitt Romney, former governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts

Moderator
bob-schieffer-debate-moderator-cbs-072309jpg-b8280d81285a9041.jpg

Bob Schieffer, CBS News, anchor for Face the Nation

Format: Similar to the first debate, this debate will be divided into six time segments of approximately 15 minutes each. The moderator will open each segment with a question, after which each candidate will have two minutes to respond. The moderator will use the balance of the time in the segment for a discussion of the topic.
Topics:
  • America’s role in the world
  • Our longest war — Afghanistan and Pakistan
  • Red lines — Israel and Iran
  • The changing Middle East and the new face of terrorism — I
  • The changing Middle East and the new face of terrorism — II
  • The rise of China and tomorrow’s world
Where to Watch: YouTube, C-SPAN, CNN, and basically anywhere offline with "News" in the name
Streams:
YouTube Election Coverage at http://www.youtube.com/user/politics has streams from ABC News, WSJ, Al-Jazeera, NYT, BuzzFeed, and others
C-SPAN Live: http://www.c-span.org/Live-Video/C-SPAN/
"The Voice Of": http://www.youtube.com/thevoiceof http://thevoiceof.aol.com/ http://news.yahoo.com/thevoiceof/
CNN: http://live.cnn.com/
Gifwich: http://gifwich.tumblr.com/
Daily Beast: (url to be added)

This is it; after this debate, there's only two weeks of early voting left & then Election Day itself.

Who will win? Will Obama try to hammer on whose administration Romney's foreign policy team formerly belonged to? Will Romney try to keep hammering Obama on his overall response to the Libya attacks? How many times will each candidate pretend they'll "get tough" on China? And is anyone really going to get swayed by this debate? Find out this, and more, tonight at 9 PM Eastern time!

Last week's debate thread: http://neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=495656
 
H

Huw_Dawson

Member
Speaking as an International Politics graduate... super excited! This is a very interesting debate because it will highlight what the middle-ground political thinking in the US is at the moment.
 
E

eBay Huckster

Member
Side note to the OP: I can't help but feel disappointed that none of these topics seem to address arms control in spite of it being one of the signature foreign policy achievements of the 111th Congress.
 
C

ced

Member
I'm going to suffer through yet another one, the funniest thing is when it comes to foreign policy these two administrations are no different.
 
R

RDreamer

Member
This is probably a good hint at what Obama will be trying to point out tonight

As commander in chief, a president’s fundamental responsibility is to protect the American people—and that requires sound judgment and strong values. Over the last four years, President Obama has led with a steady hand—promoting our values and interests overseas while keeping our country safe. Mitt Romney, however, has left a trail of dangerous blunders and endless bluster without offering any specific policies.

In the last presidential debate, the President and Romney will illustrate which candidate is capable of passing the commander in chief test. With a series of missteps under his belt, Romney must—at minimum—answer key questions in detail to prove whether he meets the threshold necessary to be the leader of the free world.


Responsibly ending the wars
What we know: The President kept his promise to end the war in Iraq, has a plan to responsibly end the war in Afghanistan in 2014, and has refocused our efforts on the greatest threats to our security, like al-Qaeda. Romney has refused to outline a specific plan to end the war and called the President’s decision to bring all our troops home from Iraq “tragic.”

What Romney needs to answer: Will Romney commit to ending the Afghanistan war in 2014, as outlined in the plan that the President, alongside our allies and partners, has in place today? Under what circumstances would he push back our end date from 2014?


Combating al-Qaeda
What we know: Under President Obama, we have devastated al-Qaeda’s top leadership and have brought Osama bin Laden to justice. Romney said it was “not worth moving heaven and earth” to capture bin Laden and has failed to put forth any specific policy on his plans to finish the job against al-Qaeda.

What Romney needs to answer: Would Romney continue the targeted counterterrorism operations that have been so successful under the Obama administration? What would he do differently?


Iran
What we know: As he’s said before, the President will not allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon and has implemented the toughest sanctions on Iran in history to assure Tehran complies. As a result, Iran’s economy is buckling—its currency has fallen about 80% since 2011. After months of dangerous saber-rattling, Romney now says the President’s sanctions are working.

What Romney needs to answer: What exactly would he do differently on Iran if he agrees with the President’s approach? Does he think it’s time to take military action?


Alliances
What we know: Rejecting the failed go-it-alone approach of the previous administration, President Obama made it a priority to rebuild our strategic partnerships and international coalitions to confront shared challenges like the Afghanistan War, intervening to protect the Libyan people, and imposing the toughest sanctions on Iran in history. By contrast, Romney has managed to insult our closest ally, the United Kingdom, during his foreign trip and talks like he wants to return to the go-it-alone policies that came with a heavy cost.

What Romney needs to answer: How would Governor Romney work with our closest ally, the United Kingdom, if he couldn’t even get through a photo-op visit without insulting its leaders and its people? How would he work with the G-8 to continue helping the world recover from a deep global recession, when he’s talked negatively about nearly every member of the G-8 on the campaign trail? And how would Governor Romney get Russia and China on board with sanctions against Iran, when he blusters about both and claims that Russia is “our number one geopolitical foe”?


Standing up to China
What we know: President Obama has fought back against China’s unfair trade practices, bringing more trade cases against China in four years than President Bush did in eight. He also took aggressive action to protect American tire workers when China was flooding the market with Chinese tires, saving American jobs as a result. Romney called the President’s action “bad for the nation and our workers.” And now, Romney’s policies on China could cause a trade war, and have been roundly criticized by Republicans and Democrats alike.

What Romney needs to answer: Would Romney really designate China a currency manipulator on day one of his presidency, even though Republicans like Sen. Marco Rubio and Speaker John Boehner have said it’s a bad idea that risks a trade war? Why is he now taking such a hardline on China, when in his recent book he called President Obama’s actions to protect American tire workers “protectionism”?


Libya
What we know: When Muammar Qadhafi threatened to attack and kill his own people, the President led an international coalition to stop an advancing army, prevent a massacre, and support the Libyan people as they overthrew a dictator. By working with NATO and Arab partners, the President accomplished this without putting a single U.S. soldier on the ground.
Romney has been all over the map on Libya, calling for action on one hand and criticizing the President for acting on the other. Rather than clarifying his policy, he actually ran down a hallway to duck reporters’ questions. When finally pressed, he said the intervention was too aggressive and then said the world was a “better place” because the intervention succeeded.

What Romney needs to answer: After taking so many conflicting positions, what exactly would Romney have done to protect the Libyan people? How does he square his contradictory positions that American intervention in Libya was at once too slow and too aggressive, or that he alternately questioned the removal of Qadhafi and then celebrated it? And does Governor Romney agree with Rep. Darrell Issa’s decision to release State Department cables that exposed the names of Libyans working with the United States on security and to fight extremism?

Mitt Romney has traded strong convictions and sound policy for bluster and blunder on foreign policy. The President has set the threshold for what it takes to be commander in chief. Given his current record, Romney has a lot of work to do before he can pass the test to be the leader of the free world.
Click to expand...
 
F

Ferrio

Banned
This debate is going to be so damn infuriating. Nothing but "We must not look weak!" (which is such a stupid argument) from the romney camp.. and a bunch of tiptoing around the libya attack by the obama camp.
 
AgentP

AgentP

Thinks mods influence posters politics. Promoted to QAnon Editor.
American don't care about foreign policy, hell they don't know where half the places are that will come up. Mittens has zero experience with foreign policy and has quite a few gaffes when he pretends to know something. If he gets off his talking points he will be screwed.
 
D

demon

I don't mean to alarm you but you have dogs on your face
I don't know if I'm even going to watch it. I'm burned out on this fuckin rollercoaster of an election and it's depressing how the substance of the debates matters less than the narrative the media decides to spin afterwards. anyone else feel the same?
 
A

Anticitizen One

Banned
um shouldn't this be Obama's best debate? His foreign policy has been the strongest part of his presidency. From the assasination of Bin Laden to sending in forces to aid Libya's liberation to saving citizens from Somali Pirates.
 
The Lamonster

The Lamonster

Member
demon said:
I don't know if I'm even going to watch it. I'm burned out on this fuckin rollercoaster of an election and it's depressing how the substance of the debates matters less than the narrative the media decides to spin afterwards. anyone else feel the same?
Click to expand...

Yes, but I still think they're fun to watch.
 
N

NullPointer

Member
90 minutes of Romney making shit up and hoping we've all forgotten about every time Romney has traveled abroad or spoken about foreign policy.

Time for Obama to remind the voters why Romney was a horrible pick for the presidency. Time to expose Romney's advisers too, whom he would no doubt delegate his decision making to.

Time to see the 27 remaining undecided voters who were waiting for this last debate to make up their god damned minds.
 
S

SnakeswithLasers

Member
The Lamonster said:
Two major sports events tonight, the focus being foreign policy, plus this being one of the most divisive elections in modern times where most people have already made up their minds...you're probably right.
Click to expand...

Meh, it's not the debate, it's the narrative. And the FP debate will be one big reason for the news programs to start reminding people tomorrow that, "Oh yeah, Obama got Osama."
 
S

Snowden's Secret

Banned
This debate, while it should be the most important because foreign policy is one of two areas a PotUS has direct influence (appointments being the other), this debate will be awful because Romney has identical policies as Obama (when pressed, can never offer a single difference, which is a brilliant strategy b/c that makes foreign policy a non-issue).

That means these assholes are going to bring every question back to the economy, which a President has no control, and is played out. Not holding my breath.
 
R

Ravensmash

Member
As a non-US GAF, I aim to watch this one.

The first one was fairly meh to me as it was based primarily around economics, and my internet was down for the last one....but this one - internet is working, no class tomorrow, why the heck not?

I reckon it will be very interesting.
 
E

EmCeeGramr

Member
All Romney has to do is just say that "America is the greatest country ever, God bless America" and "Those other countries are either little pussies or punks we need to beat up" and then Wolf Blitzer and CNN can call it a tie.
 
P

pargonta

Member
The OP says it is similar to the first debate,

however there is a key difference.
the stage appears to be set up similarly to the VP debate,

that is,
one small table, 3 chairs, with the moderator right in there with them.

just a heads up.
 
S

SteveWinwood

Member
pargonta said:
The OP says it is similar to the first debate,

however there is a key difference.
the stage appears to be set up similarly to the VP debate,

that is,
one small table, 3 chairs, with the moderator right in there with them.

just a heads up.
Click to expand...

I want a fist fight.
 
E

ezrarh

Member
demon said:
I don't know if I'm even going to watch it. I'm burned out on this fuckin rollercoaster of an election and it's depressing how the substance of the debates matters less than the narrative the media decides to spin afterwards. anyone else feel the same?
Click to expand...

The media reaction to the debates is like going to see an orchestra and the next day, the only thing the people talk about is how well the conductor was dressed and how firm the cello player held his instrument.
 
C

Candeldandel

Member
Ugh, I hope this debate goes well; I haven't been able to catch any of them yet, and this one is no exception (work, classes, etc.) China will be an interesting topic... and I hope the moderator does a good job, too :\

Can't wait to pick through this thread afterward!
 
M

MonkeyKing

Member
Although the debate is supposed to focus on foreign policy, I expect both candidates will veer into domestic issues at every opportunity. Romney doesn't have much to say on FP aside from standard bluster. Obama as sitting president still needs to mind his words. The only way for either to score points would be to tie FP concerns directly to whatever is in their domestic platforms and talking points.
 
M

massoluk

Banned
pargonta said:
The OP says it is similar to the first debate,

however there is a key difference.
the stage appears to be set up similarly to the VP debate,

that is,
one small table, 3 chairs, with the moderator right in there with them.

just a heads up.
Click to expand...

Fuck. I pray we aren't getting Lehrer 2.0.
 
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