Impeccable Reaganite

In The American Conservative, but with my emphasis added, Daniel Larison writes:

Five months ago I wrote a column for The Week in which I argued that the GOP needed to stop reflexively rejecting every foreign policy decision Obama made. As I said at the time:

"In the short term, the Republican credibility gap means that Obama will have little effective domestic opposition to his foreign policy. The GOP’s recent hysteria over Obama’s decision to cancel the Central European missile defense system confirms this. Unfortunately, an administration that lacks credible critics is far less likely to be held accountable for its misjudgments. By failing to make credible, accurate arguments against Obama’s decisions, Republicans will make it far more difficult to resist the administration when it does err—as it inevitably will."

Occasionally, when the administration has genuinely been doing the wrong things, his Republican critics have landed some solid blows, but this has been entirely by accident. Mishandling the deposition of Zelaya was one time when Obama’s habitual attackers stumbled upon the right critique, because they are always aiming to find fault with every move and to misrepresent his foreign policy at pretty much every turn. The botched handling of a Falklands issue that shouldn’t even be on Washington’s agenda is another.

Despite its impeccable Reaganite pedigree, neutrality over the Falklands already seemed like a betrayal of a Britain his permanent critics were convinced Obama disliked. After all, they would say in all seriousness, he sent back the bust of Churchill! This was insipid criticism that could be easily overcome. Now Clinton’s ill-considered remarks provide them with some real ammunition. For the last year the GOP has been muttering darkly about Obama’s desire to undermine U.S. allies. On the whole, this has been utter nonsense, much like the “apology tour” lie that accompanied it, but every once in a while the administration blunders and provides some small confirmation of this otherwise fantastical claim. As bad as it is to harm relations with Britain over something that is none of our business, it might be even worse if it helps to revive an unrepentant, unreformed, incompetent nationalist opposition.