Obama's Liberal Internationalists

Salon's interview with Samantha Power fleshes out a bit the perspective of the liberal internationalists who didn't support the war in Iraq and seem to have gravitated to the Obama campaign. When asked how we should get out of there, she replies:

We have to put Iraqis at the center of our planning and our thinking, which is not something we've done naturally at all -- from the '80s when we supported Saddam Hussein, when he was using chemical weapons against his own people, to the '90s, when we had sanctions against the regime and paid very little attention to the toll of those sanctions on Iraqi civilians. And then, in the decision to go to war and the way we went to war -- which was so not about Iraqis, as shown by our refusal to protect civilians and our failure to do adequate postwar planning.

We need to be incredibly sensitive as we leave Iraq to the welfare of Iraqis who are going to be left in our wake. That potentially entails the idea of sectarian or ethnic relocation if people are in a mixed neighborhood and feel that they'd be safer in a more homogenous neighborhood. Also, [it entails] massive support for neighboring countries that have taken in 2 million refugees, and some very systematic effort between now and the time we begin leaving to build funding and resource streams to internally displaced people.

We have shown again and again that we care about Iraq only insofar as it serves our interests. But I think it's time to show not only Iraqis but the rest of the world that at least as we leave, we're leaving with a very vigilant eye on how to mitigate the consequences of our actions.

It's funny how much credibility matters here. If someone who had supported this war said something like it, it'd seem like a pretext for maintaining the occupation. Or something. But coming from Powers, who's been against it, you just can't help but hope that she's serious, because it would be good if we tried to clean up this mess as much as we can. That she grants that we're leaving reflects some humility and recognition of how limited the military is in influencing events there.

Obama hopefully will think like this. It would be nice to trust that the president will do the right thing and be realistic and not reckless and arrogant and stubborn and using humanitarianism as a smokescreen for nasty ambitions. Having people like Powers around restores some credibility to the office. That's another one of the intangible assets that Clinton cannot bring to the table but is dearly needed right now.