ABSTRACT
Analysts like to break down the two men’s approaches to policy, and indeed to life, as liberal or conservative. That’s way too imprecise for foreign policy. There are “liberal” and “conservative” foreign policy thinkers in each party. Even as President Bill Clinton steps forward to claim successes under his belt and even as Bob Dole introduces foreign policy themes into the wind tunnel of the campaign, Americans are understandably confused as to the real foreign policy differences between the two men. United States foreign policy has been in the hands of the Clinton utopians. The anti-utopian realists believe in using force consistently, most importantly to deter aggression and to send clear signals of what they will or won’t. The problem with realists is that they can never find the words to sound as idealistic as, underneath, many of them often are.
