In the US, domestic issues dwarf foreign policy concerns
The centre of gravity in America’s political debates remains at home, with heavy doses of cultural warfare and identity politics from the right and left dominating the airwaves
AFP
Student loan borrowers demand President Biden use "Plan B" to cancel student debt Immediately at a rally outside of the Supreme Court of the United States on June 30, 2023 in Washington, DC.
In the US, domestic issues dwarf foreign policy concerns
Less than a year and a half before America’s 2024 presidential elections, the mood of the country remains oddly pessimistic, despite the country’s strong economic rebound from the forced shutdown during the pandemic and low unemployment.
President Joe Biden and his team are steadily unfolding his re-election campaign with a great deal of uncertainty about who will emerge as the leading candidate for the Republicans and big questions about what kind of party they are becoming.
Former President Donald Trump maintains a strong advantage over a wide field of opponents within the GOP, and big questions loom large about multiple legal cases against Trump and how that might impact how voters view him as a candidate.
The centre of gravity in America's political debates remains at home, with heavy doses of cultural warfare and identity politics from the right and left dominating the airwaves. The rest of the world doesn't feature all of that much in today's American political debates.
Domestic politics take centre stage
The centre of gravity in America's political debates remains at home, with heavy doses of cultural warfare and identity politics from the right and left dominating the airwaves.
The rest of the world doesn't feature all of that much in today's American political debates, even as the Biden administration continues to lead in global efforts to counter Russia's aggression against Ukraine and take steps to engage and cooperate with China in certain spheres while it simultaneously invests to help America compete with China in the long-term.
The Middle East today barely registers as a minor blip on the political radar screen of America, even though big things are happening in the region every week.
America's zeitgeist about most things Middle East is a mixture of apathy and ignorance – the vast majority of Americans aren't paying attention and don't know or care about what's going on in the broader Middle East.
America's zeitgeist about most things Middle East is a mixture of apathy and ignorance – the vast majority of Americans aren't paying attention and don't know or care about what's going on in the broader Middle East.
Growing apathy among the electorate
More than a year is a lifetime in US politics and a lot can happen in the span of a few weeks before an election to tip the balance in presidential campaigns.
Most public opinion polls of US voter attitudes find that America's electorate remains bitterly divided along partisan lines with growing ranks of people who are dismayed about the positions adopted by both parties.
A recent poll conducted by The Liberal Patriot and YouGov found that President Biden held a slight lead over two potential Republican rivals Donald Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
Republican presidential candidate and Governor of Florida Ron DeSantis delivers remarks at the Faith and Freedom Road to Majority conference at the Washington Hilton on June 23, 2023, in Washington, DC.
A recent Yahoo News/YouGov poll showed Americans aren't enthusiastic about a potential 2024 matchup between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump. https://t.co/ToXQjQuSmDpic.twitter.com/k2kQdCxMFi
Republicans hold an edge over Democrats on which party is most trusted to handle some key issues like building up America's manufacturing capacity, fighting crime, and maintaining strong security and defence. But Biden is seen by more voters as being more moderate and less extreme than Trump.
In addition, Democrats have some potential vulnerabilities on some key policy issues such as immigration, climate and energy policy, and transgender rights, but how this all plays out depends on who takes the GOP presidential nomination and the party sets on key issues in the coming year.
On foreign policy, Republicans have an edge with voters on other key national security questions like taking on China in a smarter manner, and more voters see the party as "being patriotic," a general sense of pride about America as a country.
Biden is viewed by voters as stronger on foreign policy issues than the rest of his party among voters, which is a possible silver lining and strength he can accentuate in the coming months.
But it's important to remember that foreign policy doesn't dominate the news cycle in America today the way it once did in the years after the 9/11 attacks and the Iraq war.
Even with dramatic events in Russia's invasion of Ukraine and high-stakes engagements between the United States and China, American voters are just not as tuned into the rest of the world as they once were, but that could change at a moment's notice.
Foreign policy doesn't dominate the news cycle in America today the way it once did in the years after the 9/11 attacks and the Iraq war. Even with dramatic events such as Russia's invasion of Ukraine, American voters are just not as tuned into the rest of the world as they once were.
In addition, this doesn't mean that voters are isolationists or want America to pull out of key parts of the world, including the Middle East. It just means that relative to other priorities shaping their political preferences, Americans aren't looking as closely at foreign policy issues as they once were.
A vendor sells former US President Donald Trump items at the North Carolina Republican Party Convention in Greensboro, North Carolina, on June 9, 2023.
The Middle East: Mostly out of sight, out of mind
What does this public opinion and political landscape mean for US policy in the Middle East? Not much at all, because the simple fact of the matter is that US presidents have generally had broad leeway to set their own agendas for their approaches in the Middle East for decades.
Even at the height of attention to the Middle East in US politics in the early part of the 2000s, the George W. Bush administration continued to undertake measures in places like Iraq that lacked broad support.
Some have argued that US public opinion is shifting on particular issues like the Israeli-Palestinian question, especially with younger generations, but what these arguments typically ignore is the fact that these issues don't matter as much politically outside of narrow elite circles.
Furthermore, the tenor and nature of the debate among many elite voices in the increasingly caustic and divisive debates about America's role in the region have often lacked a close connection to the actual reality on the ground for most people living in the region.
It is a form of neo-Orientalism that both the left and the right join in advocacy-driven debates that rarely capture the attention of ordinary American voters.
Most of the disagreements over Israel and Palestine or Iran and Saudi Arabia one reads about these days from think tanks and media outlets in America are little more than reflections of the broader social and political divisions within the United States.
Most of the disagreements one reads about these days from think tanks and media outlets in America over the Middle East are little more than reflections of the broader social and political divisions within the United States.
The general trajectory in the past decade and a half of US foreign policy in the Middle East has been to pull back from the big open-ended military commitments to the region that were ramped up after 9/11.
Presidents Obama, Trump, and Biden had a lot more in common in their approaches to the Middle East than the political and media debates typically recognise.
A common thread in all three has been a rather unsteady and inconsistent approach to the region in terms of diplomacy and overall strategic approach, something that leaves increasingly assertive countries and people in the region to have big questions about America's overall strategic intent and reliability.
The Middle East will remain a strategically important region of the world, and the United States will continue to stay engaged in one way or another.
The best way for the people and leaders of the Middle East to attract the attention of Americans is to clearly articulate the value proposition for why the United States should stay involved and how it directly benefits their security.
This means outlining a "silver linings playbook" of sorts that explains to others how the US stands to benefit from the economic and political changes in the region and how the burden of providing security won't just rest on the shoulders of Washington.
Americans are just not that into the Middle East as they used to be, and that may be a good thing – it may provide an opportunity to reset the nature of relations between the peoples of the region and the US in new and exciting ways.
