At the end of the day, no one cares about foreign policy.
Kerry ran on foreign policy in 2004 and still lost. Gore lost. McCain ran on the Iraq surge and lost. GHWB ran as the Iraq winner and lost. Dole ran as a ww2 veteran and lost.
1.) Economy sucked in 1992.
2.) Dole lost because the economy was booming, there were no foreign problems, and Clinton was popular.
3.) Gore lost by pushing on foreign policy? Uh...no.
4.) The war wasn't unpopular in 2004 (as in, it was still pretty divided in polls).
5.) War was very unpopular in 2008, and the economy became the main issue after Lehman.
People care most about domestic issues. Any candidate that ignores domestic issues and has foreign policy as their trump card is a loser. Foreign policy expertise is a losing card.
Gore lost to Bush because Gore seemed out of touch with main street/small town america. He was too busy learning the names of the cabinet members of India. Remember how Gore made fun of Bush for not knowing the names of foreign world leaders?
Kerry came close to winning on being a better Vietnam veteran but Bush still had more comfort with main street America.
