No, there will not be a Lincoln Chafee presidency.
The Democratic-presidential-nomination chances of Chafee, former Republican senator and independent governor of Maine, are beyond long. He’d be a formidable underdog to Martin O’Malley, Bernie Sanders and probably Lyndon LaRouche.
But here’s hoping something he is saying will still impact the all but inevitable nomination of Hillary Clinton. No, not leaving Myanmar and Liberia as the only two non-metric-system nations left in the world, but re-thinking the U.S. role in the world. He doesn’t have to go overseas for photo-ops to underscore the priority that is foreign policy and America’s inherent challenge.
Barack Obama, we’ve seen, has given it an ineffectual try.
We know how 9/11 was a game changer. We also know how 2003–and the invasion and regime-change in Iraq–made it all worse. Disingenuously, dishonestly worse. We know that Sen. Chafee voted against the Iraq war and Sen. Clinton was part of the majority who voted for it.
In his presidential-candidate announcement, Chafee recounted that he personally went to Langley, Va., to talk “weapons of mass destruction” with the CIA and asked to be “shown the evidence.” It was notably lacking. He still accuses colleagues, including Hillary Clinton, of “failing to do their homework.” A failure that still haunts this country and its foreign policy, according to Chafee–and most other non-neocons.
He made foreign policy–and the Vietnam experience that America never learned from–the lead in his announcement. He spoke of “waging peace” and talking to everybody–from Russia to Venezuela to ISIS.
His blatantly anti-war approach, coupled with a lack of name recognition, charisma and competitive campaign operation, won’t win him the nomination or a place on a Clinton ticket. But it could help the cause.
Clinton needs anti-coronation competition to properly prepare for the Republican nominee. She also seems to need a reminder of why so many voters become Democrats–and why America’s global role must be one that befits a nation that must be as geopolitically smart as it is militarily and economically strong.