I honestly don't know if you are purposefully obtuse or just blaringly ignorant of history. Consider the following foreign policy disasters (some of which I assume you've heard of):

-Saddam's invasion of Kuwait
-The Argentinian Junta's invasion of the Falklands
-The Six Day War
-The Suez Crisis' effect on US/British/French relations
-The French response to the Algerian Independance movement
-The French attempt to defeat the Viet Cong at Dien Bien Phu
-The US/British instigated coup in Iran
-The 1948 Arab attack on the nascent state of Israel
-Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor
-Hitler's campaign agaist Russia
-Mussolini allying with Nazi Germany
-The Schlieffen Plan
-Russia's campaign against Japan in 1904-1905
-Napoleon's campaign against Russia
-Ludovico Sforza's attempt to use the French to his advantage in Italy
-Roman Emperor Valens bringing the Goths across the Danube
-The Athenian Sicilian Expedition

And these are just the ones that spring quickly to my mind.

Um, no. I'm not sure how you define "mistake", but the Japanese deciding to attack the USA was their decision, not the USAs. And WRT Vietnam, I suppose on the number of Americans killed the numbers are worse for Vietnam. But then, considering that we have far better armor and consequently those who would have died are now merely sitting in a disastrous state in a hospital, perhaps this isn't the best metric. Consider also the vast number who are suffering severe psychological trauma as a result of this war. But I forgot! Y'all think people who's lives are wrecked by PTSD are bunch of pussies.

But I think the correct metric isn't just bodies, as horrific and gut wrenching as those statistics are. The correct metric for a foreign policy disaster, imho, is in terms of "unintended consequences". We attacked a country that didn't threaten us, violating international law we helped write. We made a complete disaster out of the occupation phase due to complete and utter incompetence combined with astoundingly naive ideologically driven programs coupled with ideological qualification for those in charge as the only determining factor of who was in charge of what. Finally, we're ending up strengthening our other worst enemy, Iran, far more than any of those in Iran would have hoped in their wildest wet dream. Simultaneously, we've completely dropped the ball on Afghanistan, letting our other worst enemy, Bin Laden, run around on a holiday picnic while Pakistan - a country with actual, not fantasy, nuclear capability - lies close to chaos while we coddled a military dictator. Oh, and then there's the Poppies - they have the heroin market pretty much completely sewn up thanks to our tender care.

Seriously, say what you want about Vietnam, but losing Vietnam didn't have nearly the same order of magnitude of unintended consequences, nor were any of them even in the same league of importance and criticality. As I recall, there wasn't any domino effect that swept across the world as a result of our stupidity there - as was predicted by much the same crowd that's predicting untold chaos and Al Qaeda strongholds if we left Iraq today.

Sorry, Bob, but Vietnam doesn't even seem to come close. And WWII wasn't a war of choice, so you're comparing apples and pieces of coal, as far as I'm concerned.

"At least the realists didn't produce the single most disastrous foreign policy mistake in the history of this planet."

Could not Japanese deciding to attack the US in WWII, or US involvement in Viet Nam perhaps be larger foreign policy mistakes? Our involvement in Viet Nam cost us 54,000 more KIA than has Iraq even though I am told Iraq has lasted longer. Japan's foreign policy decision resulted in millions dead and the military occupation of its homeland. Both of these are patently bigger mistakes than Iraq. But I accept that BDS does cloud one's capability for rational thought.

War looks different from the air. [Insert rant on pernicious strategic-bombing mythos of the 20th Century.]

Neocons and air power are made for each other: push some buttons, drop some bombs, and poof! regime change, democracy, liberty for everyone!

The guys whose boots are stuck on the ground are likely to have a different perspective.

I believe this is precisely the sentiment which spawned And A Pony. Sure, if it could be brought to fruition, it'd be great.

And if wishes were fishes then beggars would ride.

I'm not a realist and I have a heck of a lot of problems with the way foreign policy has been handled under democrats and republicans. But...

Worse yet, the present crop of realists are realistic enough to despise our intervention in Iraq but not realistic enough to warn against intervention in Somalia, Darfur, or Burma.

At least the realists didn't produce the single most disastrous foreign policy mistake in the history of this planet. When they had their way - literally had their way, seeing as how no one stood them down and they could do whatever they wanted - the NeoCons showed that their "grand strategy" was really nothing more than lipstick on a pig. Window dressing.

One might even call this "grand strategy" merely a mechanism to win support for otherwise unsupportable actions.

I think we need to give the devil his due and recognize that American Wilsonians have a grand strategy which, if it could be brought to fruition would be simultaneously good for the United States and good for most of the people in the world. That's more than realism has to offer.

Worse yet, the present crop of realists are realistic enough to despise our intervention in Iraq but not realistic enough to warn against intervention in Somalia, Darfur, or Burma.

Indeed.

It all strikes me as a terribly interesting way to retailor the "chickenhawk" argument for use against someone quite clearly defies such a label: "Well he was in the war, sure, but he was a POW and missed the anti-war movement, and is therefore disqualified." Odious.

It is my understanding that McCain's North Vietnamese hosts went to great lengths to ensure McCain and his fellow guests were kept fully informed of events in the anti-war movement.

As far as Kerry is concerned. Let us not forget he went and visited with the North Vietnamese in Paris, not once but twice, all the while being a member of the Navy Reserve. Oh, and when he came back, there was no neutral commentary, he parroted the North Vietnamese line.

And, as for the monumental changes occurring during the time McCain was a POW, maybe we need to look further afield than the tripe handed out at the local university, or in many contemporary texts. Ion Pacepa, in The Vietnam-era antiwar movement got its spin from the Kremlin. writes "KGB priority number one at that time was to damage American power, judgment, and credibility. One of its favorite tools was the fabrication of such evidence as photographs and "news reports" about invented American war atrocities. These tales were purveyed in KGB-operated magazines that would then flack them to reputable news organizations. Often enough, they would be picked up. News organizations are notoriously sloppy about verifying their sources. All in all, it was amazingly easy for Soviet-bloc spy organizations to fake many such reports and spread them around the free world."

Geebus. What is it with y'all that everything has to be delivered like it was the death scene from Camellia?

Dude, I've already lived through the last 8 years. I'm prepared. I also know we're going to kick McCain's 72 year old butt off the political scene.

Buck up, me boy. Courage.

That point about lobbyists strikes me a little odd; aren't Powers, McPeak, Malley, et al lobbying
effect for various Saudi and emirate interests
(Hamas, abandoning Iraq to the Sunni Wahhabi & Salafi militants, freeing jihadists from Gitmo) I know we are only supposed to be speaking of commercial interests, but aren't the former a more significant issue, in the current day.

You have made up your mind. So have I. One of us will be disappointed come November 5.

I know how it feels to be disappointed. I voted for Carter in 1980. And for GHW Bush in 1992.

I will be prepared. Will you?

Yes, he's certainly earned his maverick status on torture and excessive use of force by voting against a ban on water boarding. Quite the separation from Bush's position there. Rather, it seems much more like he's compromised on these very principles to satisfy the pro-torture base of the republican party.

Even Hal must admit that McCain has not been a Bush toady

Sure. But that isn't the same thing as being different from Bush on foreign policy in any material significance. McCain is the Neocon's Neocon and while he may have some idea that support of the American people is required to wage wars, he still wants to wage them. Lot's of them. And the rather sad (for McCain and y'alls "War all the Time" platform is that war isn't a recreational activity that has a a lot of support.

But if the Democrats continue to tack left, it probably will not damage him that much.

Yes, keep saying that. Believe it in your heart of hearts. Click your heels three times and wish, wish, wish. Meanwhile, the rest of us will be starting the long work of repairing the tremendous damage y'all did over the last 8 years.

Well, sure. He was deprived of the essential experiences that would have taught him - perhaps - other things. He was literally and figuratively isolated from these formative experiences of that generation. I'm not sure why this would be a big plus, seeing as he literally missed out on what many consider to be essential learning experiences (again, as you, bowing to those who have better insight into the psychology of a POW under conditions such as McCain). But you go into the election with the candidate you have...

But bringing this back to Drezner's thesis, his point is that McCain is more aware of the need of the support by the American people. Okay, fine. But all that seems to mean, in practice, is that he's more concerned about getting support of the American people for his mad ideas than Bush was. He still has the same mad ideas. His campaign is, after all, advised on foreign policy by "Bombing" Bill Kristol. He is, after all, pretty much the Neocon's Neocon. Drezner's "paradox" of McCain isn't a paradox at all. All it means is that he's a very, very poor candidate and won't be elected. It's only a "paradox" if you think that somehow McCain should be president but is cruelly hamstrung by American opinions which he cares deeply about. The simpler explanation is that he's simply a warmonger who is sadly handicapped by what passes for a conscience on the right - unlike the current crew who demonstrated quite clearly they have none.

And then there's the whole lobbyists for the devil thing McCain has going on. Not really choices that show the kind of thought that Drezner is trying to imply.

Kerry's four months in country do not seem objectively to equate to McCain's combination of four months combat experience and an heroic 51/2 years as a POW. The latter experience clearly informed his well-known separation from the Bush administration on the issues torture and excessive use of force in interrogation.

McCain has paid the price for these departures from what some are calling neocon orthodoxy. The cost has been lack of support from the more conservative wing of the Republican Party. Whether this will be fatal to him in the general election remains to be seen. But if the Democrats continue to tack left, it probably will not damage him that much.