Note: This “Moore to the Point” commentary aired on NewsTalkSTL on Wednesday, August 3rd. Audio included below.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is currently* in Taiwan, which pretty well pokes a stick in the eye of the CCP.

I’m okay with that, but it got me to thinking about Teddy Roosevelt. Our 26th President was many things – politician, conservationist, historian, writer. One of the more salient takeaways from his presidency was the “Big Stick Diplomacy” that he employed, which he reportedly described as “the exercise of intelligent forethought and of decisive action sufficiently far in advance of any likely crisis.” More commonly, we hear this distilled as “Walk (or speak) softly and carry a big stick.”

A critical component of this approach is to have the might (i.e., the military strength) to back up your positions. If potential foes know that you will walk the walk and not just talk the talk, they’re far more likely to respect you and not test you.
The other key components are acting justly, never bluffing, striking only when prepared to strike hard, and being willing to allow the adversary to save face in defeat. It all makes perfect sense, right?

Well, to me, it does anyway. Unfortunately, for the Biden Administration, “Walk softly and carry a big stick” has been pretzel-twisted into “Shuffle aimlessly, and toss the stick in the sociological woodchipper, lest it offend or frighten someone.”

*This episode was recorded on Tuesday, August 2nd. The Speaker has since departed Taiwan.