Walker's Bush Doctrine, and the Creation of ISIS.

When I heard Scott Walker pushing the old George W. Bush preemptive war policy, known as the Bush Doctrine, I was surprised no one seemed surprised. Well, the media is catching up, but only as it relates to those odd comments made by Jeb Bush, who said he'd invade Iraq all over again. 

Scott Walker wants to dump any deal on Iran’s nuclear program the moment he takes office, making military action there far more likely. So does Marco Rubio. None of the GOP candidates will say he wants to occupy Iran. But military action against the country’s nuclear facilities ought to be, as any of them will tell you, “on the table.” 

So even after all the chest pounding that resulted in the Iraq debacle (N. Korea too), Republicans are still hoping their policy of preemptive threats will work this next time.

Here's Walker's unmistakable war mongering rant of preemption. Walker promises to "TELL" us "I'm not going to wait, I'm going to take the fight to them, before they bring the fight to us." Who needs congress, who needs a debate? This is the Bush Doctrine:

The Washington Post finally got it right:

The problem is never that some situations we confront offer no good options, or that our decisions can backfire, or that there are places where America may not be able to set things right to the benefit of all. The problem is always weakness, and strength is always the solution ... neither Walker nor his opponents seem to have learned much from the experience, whether we’re asking about concocting phony intelligence to sell a war you've already decided you want, believing that all the “bad guys” in the world must be in cahoots, seeing every foreign policy question in black and white, or putting blind faith in the idea that “strength” is all you need to succeed.

The George W. Bush years provided an emphatic refutation of the ideas underlying Republican foreign policy, but few in the party seem to have gotten the message. 

At the same time, Jeb Bush is getting heat for blaming Obama for the rise of ISIS:

Ivy Ziedrich, 19, a student at the University of Nevada, approached Jeb Bush to question him about comments he had made … argu(ing) that the Obama administration's weak foreign policy was responsible for the rise of the terrorist group, also known as ISIS, in the Middle East. Ziedrich countered that Obama wasn't to blame -- and that it was his predecessor's decision to disband the Iraqi army that made the group's formation possible. "Your brother created ISIS," she told Bush.

Specific decisions made by the Bush administration also led to the rise of ISIS. Most notably, the administration engaged in a widespread and controversial policy known as debaathification, which made most people, even low-level bureaucrats, who had been associated with the former regime, ineligible for government employment in the new era. The German magazine Der Spiegel in April published a trove of documents that once belonged to the mastermind of ISIS, Haji Bakr, who created the infrastructure of the Islamic State.

For fun, here's a short movie "preview" parody of the neocon propagandist dream:

Walker leads in Iowa, pushing "Bush Doctrine" of Preemptive Wars.

Who would have thought Scott Walker's tired old speech, with a little injected energy, could result in something like this;

ABC/This Week's Martha Raddatz stopped Scott Walker from "going back" to Obama's "red line," pressing him to "go forward" and explain what his "big bold idea" in Syria would be: 

Ironically, Walker represents more of a rerun of the Bush/Cheney years than Jeb Bush himself. Walker's calm detached demeanor is almost scary in light of taking the nation back to the Bush and preemptive wars, a failed foreign policy that ended tens of thousands of American and Iraqi lives. The cost of treating physically and mentally injured veterans will continue for 50 to 60 years, and opened the door to ISIS and other terrorist groups seeking power:

WALKER: Well, I think - I go back to the red line.

RADDATZ: Let's not go back. Let's go forward. What is your big, bold idea in Syria?

WALKER: I think aggressively, we need to take the fight to ISIS and any other radical Islamic terrorist in and around the world, because it's not a matter of when they attempt an attack on American soil, or not if I should say, it's when, and we need leadership that says clearly, not only amongst the United States but amongst our allies, that we're willing to take appropriate action. I think it should be surgical.

RADDATZ: You don't think 2,000 air strikes is taking it to ISIS in Syria and Iraq?

WALKER: I think we need to have an aggressive strategy anywhere around the world. I think it's a mistake to -

RADDATZ: But what does that mean? I don't know what aggressive strategy means. If we're bombing and we've done 2,000 air strikes, what does an aggressive strategy mean in foreign policy?

WALKER: I think anywhere and everywhere, we have to be - go beyond just aggressive air strikes. We have to look at other surgical methods. And ultimately, we have to be prepared to put boots on the ground if that's what it takes, because I think, you know--

RADDATZ: Boots on the ground in Syria? U.S. boots on the ground in Syria?

WALKER: I don't think that is an immediate plan, but I think anywhere in the world--

RADDATZ: But you would not rule that out.

WALKER: I wouldn't rule anything out. 

One more thing. Matthew Dowd said what the lazy press will be saying till the next election, and it's a major sticking point with me; what about Walker's actual record?

"He's a competent governor, so he's done that well..." 

Republican governors have failed miserably, worse than their Democratic counterparts, and yet the media doesn't seem to care.