fbpx
Politics Foreign Affairs Culture Fellows Program

Pawlenty Was Currying Favor Instead of Telling Hard Truths

Actually, Pawlenty is continuing his “speaking truths in unfriendly venues” tour, which took him to Iowa to denounce ethanol subsidies, Florida to call for Medicare reform, Washington to blast current entitlement policy, and Wall Street to call for financial reform. His speech to CFR was not intended to cater to the elite, but to achieve […]

Actually, Pawlenty is continuing his “speaking truths in unfriendly venues” tour, which took him to Iowa to denounce ethanol subsidies, Florida to call for Medicare reform, Washington to blast current entitlement policy, and Wall Street to call for financial reform. His speech to CFR was not intended to cater to the elite, but to achieve note from the Republican base by disagreeing with the establishments’ views [sic] in its own house. But of course, Traub cannot be expected to pay attention to this. ~Ben Domenech

Domenech’s faith in Pawlenty’s bold truth-telling is touching. It would be more persuasive if Domenech could cite a single thing Pawlenty said that represented a meaningful disagreement with establishment views on foreign policy. He doesn’t do this. Perhaps this is because there isn’t very much in Pawlenty’s speech that qualifies. Instead, Domenech huffs and puffs about the evil elitists who are not showing the ignorant Tim Pawlenty the proper respect. It is hardly a daring move to go to a CFR event to denounce so-called “isolationism,” to express enthusiasm for American hegemony, and to declare hostility towards Iran. Pawlenty hardly encountered criticism or serious resistance from his audience, and he delivered this speech where he did to claim that he is the “serious” foreign policy candidate that his admirers pretend him to be.

When Traub says that Romney, Pawlenty, and Huntsman “all offer some variant of conservative internationalism,” he is basically correct. That doesn’t mean that their positions are identical. That is why he uses the word variant. Their internationalist positions vary, but they are all broadly similar. Domenech is apparently too busy berating Traub to notice the obvious.

Advertisement

Comments

The American Conservative Memberships
Become a Member today for a growing stake in the conservative movement.
Join here!
Join here