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Dr X · Joined: 04 Jul 2016 Posts: 84 Location: Everywhere

Gary Johnson, the former New Mexico governor and Libertarian Party presidential nominee, revealed a surprising lack of foreign policy knowledge on Thursday that could rock his insurgent candidacy when he could not answer a basic question about the crisis in Aleppo, Syria.

“What is Aleppo?” Mr. Johnson said when asked on MSNBC how, as president, he would address the refugee crisis in the war-torn Syrian city.

When pressed as to whether he was serious, Mr. Johnson indicated that he really was not aware of the city, which has been widely covered during the years that Syria has been engulfed in civil war. After Mike Barnicle, an MSNBC commentator who is often part of the “Morning Joe” program panel, explained that Aleppo was the center of Syria’s refugee crisis, Mr. Johnson struggled to recover.

“O.K., got it,” he said, explaining that he thinks that the United States must partner with Russia to diplomatically improve the situation there. “With regard to Syria, I do think that it’s a mess.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/09/us/politics/gary-johnson-aleppo.html?_r=0

Well, Gary, you need to go back to school and learn world geography before you nominate yourself for presidential election!

plumpy nut · Joined: 12 Mar 2011 Posts: 1652

Elepo, isn't that one of the places that got gassed by Saddam, or is it the capital of ISIS? I can't quite bring my mind to remember. Maybe Wikipedia can help. A small little town that I've heard of because of all the ridiculous unwanted news coverage. I remember Biafra though, that place was in Nigeria, has anyone heard of Biafra? There was a large outcry for Biafra and quite a bit of empathy for the situation there.

adventious · Joined: 23 Nov 2015 Posts: 237 Location: In the wide

Vonnegut wrote about Biafra in one of his early non-fiction titles. Wikipedia's entries are excellent and a good starting point for both Biafra and Aleppo. The spelling is inconsequential because it's a transliteration. In other words, neither is more correct.

I worked with many Syrians between 2009-13, several of whom were from Aleppo. Casualties impacted our staff from the very beginning. A character of Syrian teachers is how regional a sense of their country is (and unsurprising as the middle east was conquered and carved up). Syrians tended to associate/affiliate by what city they were from, with prejudiced views of each other similar to any and all prejudices: E.g., So-n-so is from X; they're all cheapskates.

scot47 · Joined: 10 Jan 2003 Posts: 15343

The place name in Arabic is "HALAB". Aleppo is the Italian version which made its way into English in the Middle Ages. So the REAL name is unknown to most of us !

santi84 · Joined: 14 Mar 2008 Posts: 1317 Location: under da sea

Half my students this term are from Aleppo - doctors, accountants, and teachers.

Hod · Joined: 28 Apr 2003 Posts: 1613 Location: Home

adventious · Joined: 23 Nov 2015 Posts: 237 Location: In the wide

Dr X · Joined: 04 Jul 2016 Posts: 84 Location: Everywhere

I guess Aleppo doesn’t know who Gary Johnson is either.

https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2016/09/08/aleppo-doesnt-know-who-gary-johnson-is-either-so-were-even.html

nomad soul · Joined: 31 Jan 2010 Posts: 11454 Location: The real world

sparks · Joined: 20 Feb 2008 Posts: 632

the NYT calls it a "stumble" although "drunk guy with absolutely no body control going face-first into a street sign" might be more like it. At any rate, I find these "stumbles" interesting in that they give a little insight into how the brains of our leaders are actually working. I can't help but wonder what his view of the world is. Maybe it's like America in the center and then just a bunch of darkness. Maybe he's never really aware if he's rather in the North of the U.S. or the South. I just wonder how it all fits together up there.

wangdaning · Joined: 22 Jan 2008 Posts: 3154

He needed a teleprompter and a doctor to come tell him to keep talking. Everything would have been fine.

Q: What is Aleppo?

A: We're gonna just keep talking. Moving on...

steki47 · Joined: 20 Apr 2008 Posts: 1029 Location: BFE Inaka

adventious · Joined: 23 Nov 2015 Posts: 237 Location: In the wide

Goofed a curve ball on a topic that's been a central US foreign policy since casualties increased in 2010.
That's six years, to be clear, and deaths above a quarter and approaching HALF A MILLION human beings...
Despite any softening metaphors.
Libertarians are as splintered as any faction and it is disappointing, but excusable? Not for me.
Just sayin'

JoeKing · Joined: 30 Apr 2008 Posts: 519

cartago · Joined: 19 Oct 2005 Posts: 283 Location: Iraq

The New York Times did a worse job. Their initial article about Gary Johnson said Aleppo was ISIS' de-facto capital in Syria, which it's not, that's Raqqa. Then a subsequent edit changed this to just an ISIS stronghold, which is also not really accurate. What's worse, another correction said Aleppo was the Syrian capital, which is actually Damascus. The article had to be corrected four times.

I think what happened was the event didn't really have anything to do with something actually going on in Syria, it was about US politics, so they probably got someone who doesn't cover international news to do the article. I mean they do often have articles on Syria. It's still surprising this got past an editor and there was no fact checking or anything.