During an interview on the "Mickelson in the Morning," show on Iowa's WHO-AM Radio Thursday (watch it HERE via C-SPAN) struggling GOP candidate Michele Bachmann, when asked by a caller (at 44:50 in the video) to reconcile the United States' hypocritically different positions towards Iran and the historically more hostile North Korea, listed a number of countries in an "Axis of Evil" just as George W. Bush did years ago before invading the first country on his list -- Iraq -- and embroiling America in a long costly war that killed and maimed thousands of American soldiers, wiped out the lives of 1 million Iraqis, and eroded Americans' last bit of trust in their government.
"There is a new Axis of Evil that has emerged with North Korea, between Pakistan, between China, and between Iran...and with Russia," Bachmann said. "Russia supplied the nuclear scientists to help Iran gain that nuclear weapon."
"That was...a pretty sweeping statement you just made," said the host. "To declare all those countries as now the new Axis of Evil is...Ronald Reagan said that about the Cold War communist states. Would that be reflective of a Michele Bachmann foreign policy? The New Axis of Evil is all those countries, including Russia?"
Bachmann answered by claiming that she's not rooting for war and stating that she was against President Obama's war in Libya, but didn't retract her statement about Russia and China. Her disturbing inclusion of the two nations in her own "Axis of Evil" is a serious and dangerous escalation of rhetoric by someone running for the presidency of the United States.
The United States' continuing reach for overseas empire has now begun to stir serious tension with the two powers.
For instance, former Russian President (and current candidate for President of Russia) Vladmir Putin has accused the United States of meddling in Russia's election, the protests from which the American media attempted to portray as a Russian "Arab Spring," (like the riots that assisted the West in toppling Middle Eastern leaders in 2011). As well, Putin has accused the United States of being complicit in the execution of Muammar al-Gaddafi.
Russia has also come to Syria's aid in the face of the United States' drumbeat to overthrow its government, supplying it with cruise missiles.
The United States has come dangerously closer to conflict with China over the issue of the South China Sea, and over the United States' increased menacing of Pakistan, which prompted China to declare last May that an attack on Pakistan would be considered an attack on China itself. China has also accused the West of trying to meddle in Russia's election.
Earlier this month a military General from the Chinese National Defense University called for China to protect Iran -- the nation that Bachmann has loudly railed against during her campaign -- even if it means launching World War Three.
Bachmann seeks to continue a policy of increased aggression against Iran that started under George W. Bush and continues under Barack Obama. Those who support this policy selectively highlight Iran's reaction to years of Western hostility against it, and refuse to acknowledge that Iran's push back and potential drive for nuclear weapons is a result of the U.S. encircling it in Iraq and Afghanistan while ratcheting up the war rhetoric against it, and the fact that Israel menaces it with reportedly over a hundred of its own nuclear weapons, (though it hasn't officially declared them).
To say that a Bachmann presidency, or the presidency any of the other GOP candidates (other than Ron Paul, who stands for a strong defense but is staunchly against needlessly stirring up tensions with other countries) would be a repeat of the Bush and Obama presidencies is accurate in the sense that it would be a continuation of the same destructive foreign policy that has plagued America and the world for years, yet it would be even worse because at this stage of the neocons' game, the consequences of coming to blows with Russia and China would be larger and even more tragic than any of the wars before it.
