Crises Help Cotton Pull Ahead

Threats Abroad Have Effects Here at Home

The rest of the world matters in a U.S. election for the first time since 2006. In Arkansas' case, that benefits U.S. Rep. Tom Cotton.

I know. There are far graver stakes to chaos in the Middle East and proxy war in Europe than their effects on a U.S. Senate election in Arkansas. Plenty of seasoned foreign affairs writers will tackle those bigger issues, though. My job is watching the ripples in our pond.

Foreign affairs loomed large when the 2008 campaigns began. Then the Panic of '08 hit. The economy and Obamacare have dominated every election since. This year, though, Russia and the ISIS asserted themselves.

U.S. Sen. Mark Pryor, a Democrat, would be cruising to re-election right now if fellow party member Barack Obama wasn't the president. Instead, the two Arkansans are tied -- and world events have driven the president's standing even lower.

"Just 38 percent now approve of Obama's handling of international affairs, down 8 percentage points since July to a career low," ABC reports from a poll. An NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found an even more dismal 32 percent.

This happened just when the pounding of Democrats from Obamacare was easing and the economy was at least better than it had been. Perhaps it's just coincidence that Cotton finally pulled ahead in recent, credible polling. I doubt that.

The president's once-famous ability to project confidence has vanished. This matters. He's not as adrift as he makes himself look. A powerful coalition that includes France and Germany is forming, however reluctantly. A coalition including Germany beats any "Coalition of the Willing" that relies on, for instance, the Fiji Islands to boost the membership count. We're even cooperating with Iran, which doesn't distress me as much as it probably should.

In the Ukraine, the president may be walking behind -- though perhaps he's pushing -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel, but at least we're in the right parade.

Obama's late-blooming strategy has substance. What it badly needs is some of George W. Bush's confidence and push. "W" was a lousy commander in chief. I've spelled his failings out in harsh detail since 2003. But on his worst day, Dub never appeared at a news conference and said, "We don't have a strategy yet." He never did that even when much of New Orleans was underwater.

Obama is making the right decisions slowly and under the force of events. Bush made the wrong decisions quickly and with vigor.

Again, appearances matter. More than 20 years ago, some Democrat remarked that President Ronald Reagan showed skill at walking away from disaster with a smile and a wave. It occurred to me then that the ability to walk away from disaster with a smile and a wave was a skill worth having for a national leader. After all, nobody walked -- well, rode -- away from disaster while smiling and waving more than Franklin D. Roosevelt did.

Democrats can certainly argue ISIS is filling the vacuum we created by invading Iraq. While true, that argument leaves them two problems. First, the mess in Iraq is what we elected Democrats to fix. It's the issue they ran on both in the 2006 congressional elections and in the campaign of 2008 until Wall Street crashed. Second, there's a big difference between Dick Cheney, for instance, and Cotton. Cotton went to war. He got shot at. He's no chickenhawk.

John Brummett wrote last week that this race boils down to whether voters will picture Cotton as Capt. Cotton or Congressman Cotton. ISIS forcefully brings Capt. Cotton to mind.

The irony is that Cotton is helped in a race for a seat that looks increasingly irrelevant. Republicans in Congress look foolish when they cry about abuse of executive power on coal regulations, for instance, then let the president take us to war without a murmur.

On a related note, we all need to ask ourselves a soul-searching question. We've assassinated thousands of people, mostly with drones. Call them "targeted killings" or whatever else you want. The whole purpose was and is to "decapitate" terrorist organizations. If this strategy works, how did ISIS grow from a militant band into a country?

Speaking of campaign strategy amid world crisis, Hillary Clinton left as secretary of state in 2013. Just in time, it appears. If she was still the country's top diplomat, her chances to be president would be ruined.

Fear not; Some Republican political junkie will "explain" how these crises are all her fault soon enough. Some ultra-liberal will rant about how this all springs from her master plan to get back at John Kerry, too. Somebody will care. The rest of us have bigger things to worry about.

DOUG THOMPSON IS A POLITICAL REPORTER AND COLUMNIST FOR NWA MEDIA.

Commentary on 09/14/2014

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