Forget foreign policy: Ben Carson doesn't seem to know what a map of the US looks like

Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson has been under fire for recent television appearances that suggest his foreign policy knowledge could use a little brushing up.

The retired neurosurgeon, who has no professional political or security experience, said during the most recent Republican debate that China is militarily involved in the Syrian conflict, and was unable to name allies the US could rely on to fight against Isis in an interview with Fox News on Sunday.

Carson's international affairs advisor also chimed in, telling the New York Times:

Nobody has been able to sit down with him and have him get one iota of intelligent information about the Middle East.

In a bid to prove his credentials, Carson wrote an an op-ed in Tuesday's Washington Post outlining a strategy for defeating Isis. But on the same day, his campaign published a map of the US which fundamentally gets the geography of his own country wrong:

The map is supposed to highlight all the states in which governors want to (misguidedly) stop taking in Syrian refugees in the wake of the Paris attacks.

However, probably due to an illustrator software error, the northeastern tip of the country has been elongated and the states located there have shifted about 150 miles away from where they actually are.

Here's what a map of the US should actually look like:

Carson himself admitted in an interview with PBS NewsHour on Tuesday night that he still had a lot to learn when it comes to foreign policy, saying in his defence:

We have something called continuing medical education. I think that applies to everything in our lives.

Well first up, Dr Carson, someone went and fixed that domestic map for you. There will be a pop quiz.

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