In describing the demands on the presidency, Franklin Roosevelt once
said: "It is preeminently a place of moral leadership." If
we accept this proposition, we would expect the president to respect
the lives, liberties, and the property of all of the world's people.
A president committed to a realistic and unbiased foreign policy would
send Americans into harms way only when there is no other option in
defense of American life and property. In the past, presidents have
usually rejected unilateral aggression for domination over other people
and their land.
A president who believes that all nations are equally entitled to life
and liberty can hardly justify invading and occupying their territories
for the purpose of imposing upon them political and economic controls
they reject. Our Founding Fathers rightly rose up against British rule
when it failed to respond to the will of the people. For the same reason,
occupied peoples in the Middle East have long been rejecting foreign
invaders: Turks, Britons, Frenchmen, and others. Now they are in despair
about the threat of an American variation of colonialism. That is why,
regrettably, radical Muslims are going to extremes in terrorizing the
foreign invaders.
To deal effectively with the terrorism provoked by some of our policies,
we need a president who understands that it is wrong to finance and
defend oppressive regimes, such as the Likud government in Israel. We
need a president and a Congress that recognizes the Arab-Israeli conflict
as one of the root causes of the terrorism directed against us.
We cannot expect to end this scourge unless we show the Muslim world
that we are not out to conquer and oppress the Mideast but want to be
evenhanded mediators between Israelis and Arabs. It would be disastrous
for all concerned if our next president did not take all action necessary
to establish Palestine as a sovereign state, next to a State of Israel
guaranteed against any aggressor.
Since the violent Palestinian resistance is not likely to cease until
Israel ends its occupation, the next president needs to preside over
a peace settlement very soon, not some time in the indefinite future--for
the sake of Israelis, Palestinians, and Americans alike. The U. S.,
more than any other outside power, suffers the consequences of Sharon's
and Arafat's intransigence, financially and militarily. The next president
therefore has an urgent obligation to negotiate--or impose, if necessary--an
end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
By vetoing or ignoring virtually every United Nations resolution condemning
Israeli violations of international law, the incumbent president has
increasingly harmed our moral reputation around the world. Every time
our Israeli friends or our soldiers mistreat, maim, or kill Muslims,
relatives and friends of the victims are prone to avenge them by joining
terrorist cells. While we do have to fight back, we are unlikely to
end this war with the superior force of our arms. The sooner we can
give up our bases in the Middle East and wherever else we are not wanted,
the better it will be for all involved, particularly for the many Americans
who pay the price of our counterproductive policies with their blood
and their money.
If the next president believes in effectively stopping the proliferation
of nuclear weapons, he has to insist on a nuclear-free Mideast, including
Iran and Israel. As long as the U.S. allows Israel to violate arms control
agreements and attack neighboring countries with impunity, the Mideast
is bound to remain a war-torn region.
As America's fighting men and women struggle in Afghanistan and Iraq,
we expect our president to tell us the full truth not only about their
triumphs but also about their troubles and their losses. Rational people
know that leaders make mistakes, but a president lying about them can
no longer be trusted.
Wisely, the U.S. Constitution requires of the people to evaluate their
president every four years. That is a blessing because his moral convictions
and his knowledge of the world have a tremendous effect on the quality
of life in America and around the globe.