Tillerson defends outreach to foreign leaders who deviate from American 'values'
Source: Politico
By MADELINE CONWAY 05/03/17 12:35 PM EDT
Amid criticism of the White House's outreach to strongman leaders, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Wednesday defended working with foreign governments whose values deviate from those of the United States.
In some circumstances if you condition our national security efforts on someone adopting our values, we probably cant achieve our national security goals, Tillerson said in remarks to State Department employees in Washington, the second time he has addressed the full staff since taking office. Tillerson did not name any of those foreign leaders, but President Donald Trump is facing criticism for speaking warmly toward authoritarian rulers in countries including North Korea, Egypt and Turkey.
Last weekend, Trump invited Rodrigo Duterte, the president of the Philippines whose government is accused of killing thousands of people in a crackdown on illegal drugs, to visit the White House. Human rights advocates argued the invitation amounted to condoning the violence, but the White House insisted it was a strategic move necessary to establish Duterte as an ally against the regime in North Korea.
Without addressing the Duterte controversy specifically, Tillerson argued Wednesday that working with countries whose leaders are inconsistent with certain U.S. values freedom, human dignity and the treatment of people of the world doesn't mean abandoning those values.
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/03/rex-tillerson-defends-outreach-foreign-leaders-237929
tenorly
(2,037 posts)Thomas Hurt
(13,903 posts)is acting globalist with pond scum of world leaders and insulting the countries that actually make efforts to live up to those values.
Shouldn't the Secretary of Russian Oil be treating the pond scum with the same disdain...
SpankMe
(2,970 posts)We can't demand moral purity in exchange for basic dialog with other world powers. We can't lock out those who have even minor differences with us in laws and rights. The general tone of Democratic presidents and other Dems in the past - including Obama - has been generally that you can bring about change easier by engagement rather than by vilifying, blocking out and making war with.
The Dems never cozied up to real dictators, however. They still held the line on the real assholes of the world.
So, we engage China, Pakistan and Venezuela - even Cuba. But, we stay away from the North Korea's and Iran's of the world.
But, Republicans have always had a hardcore "them or us" mentality and wanted to throw out the baby with the bathwater on any country that didn't share those classic Republican values.
Remember when Obama went around the world trying to engage with everyone he could in order to bring about peace and expand human rights? Republicans universally derided him for it being an "apology tour" and for "palling around with terrorists" and for not being tough on "the enemy" whoever that was.
Now that their guy (First Asshole Trump) is in power, it's suddenly OK to engage in order to bring about "an understanding" of things.
Only, they're thinking of engaging Kim Jong Un, Duterte, Putin and the like!
Can you just imagine if Obama had ever expressed any form of admiration or make any movement toward engaging with these dictators? The Republicans would be pursuing impeachment for treason.
The hypocrisy of the right is astoundingly obvious and heavily displayed. I hate them so much I can't even breathe.