Obama Maintains Bush Middle East Policy

In so many ways, the current president is an extension of the previous one

Until the last few weeks, foreign policy remained in the background as President Obama and Mitt Romney duked it out over the economy. Then came the storming of U.S. embassies in Egypt, Sudan, and Yemen, and the deaths of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other diplomatic staffers in Benghazi, Libya. Suddenly foreign policy became a flash point, with Romney accusing Obama of sympathizing with the rioters and failing to protect American interests, and the president countering that Romney has "a tendency to shoot first and aim later."

Despite the rhetoric, when it comes to the question of how the U.S. should handle the ongoing transformation of the Arab world, the differences between the candidates have more to do with style than substance.