EDWARDS: 5K Words Later, And We Still Don't Know Where He Stands

John Edwards 9/07 Foreign Affairs article "Reengaging With the World" drew mixed netroots reviews. The Nation's Ari Melber liked the call for "moral leadership" and a new Marshall Plan for the developing world, but: "The most significant shortcoming in Edwards' article is that he does not say precisely when he would use force as president. The emphasis on "smart power" is a welcome acknowledgment that the administration's crabbed vision of American power has made our country less safe ... But Edwards does not provide a metric, let alone a doctrine, for when to use military force."

Matthew Yglesias had a similar problem but with a different passage. From Edwards: "We must retain the capacity to swiftly defeat any conventional threat to our country and our vital interests." Yglesias responds: "Without answering it, these formulae take on a pretty tautological quality. The question isn't would you use force when you thought it was vital to do so, the question is when is it vital to use force?"