Posted on 02/16/2007 4:22:22 PM PST by Alissa
This grand debate is welcomed but it could be that this is nothing more than a distraction from the dangerous military confrontation approaching with Iran and supported by many in leadership on both sides of the aisle.
This resolution, unfortunately, does not address the disaster in Iraq. Instead, it seeks to appear opposed to the war while at the same time offering no change of the status quo in Iraq. As such, it is not actually a vote against a troop surge. A real vote against a troop surge is a vote against the coming supplemental appropriation that finances it. I hope all of my colleagues who vote against the surge today will vote against the budgetary surge when it really counts: when we vote on the supplemental.
The biggest red herring in this debate is the constant innuendo that those who don’t support expanding the war are somehow opposing the troops. It’s nothing more than a canard to claim that those of us who struggled to prevent the bloodshed and now want it stopped are somehow less patriotic and less concerned about the welfare of our military personnel.
Osama bin Laden has expressed sadistic pleasure with our invasion of Iraq and was surprised that we served his interests above and beyond his dreams on how we responded after the 9/11 attacks. His pleasure comes from our policy of folly getting ourselves bogged down in the middle of a religious civil war, 7,000 miles from home that is financially bleeding us to death. Total costs now are reasonably estimated to exceed $2 trillion. His recruitment of Islamic extremists has been greatly enhanced by our occupation of Iraq.
Unfortunately, we continue to concentrate on the obvious mismanagement of a war promoted by false information and ignore debating the real issue which is: Why are we determined to follow a foreign policy of empire building and pre-emption which is unbecoming of a constitutional republic?
Those on the right should recall that the traditional conservative position of non-intervention was their position for most of the 20th Century-and they benefited politically from the wars carelessly entered into by the political left. Seven years ago the Right benefited politically by condemning the illegal intervention in Kosovo and Somalia. At the time conservatives were outraged over the failed policy of nation building.
It’s important to recall that the left, in 2003, offered little opposition to the pre-emptive war in Iraq, and many are now not willing to stop it by de-funding it or work to prevent an attack on Iran.
The catch-all phrase, “War on Terrorism”, in all honesty, has no more meaning than if one wants to wage a war against criminal gangsterism. It’s deliberately vague and non definable to justify and permit perpetual war anywhere, and under any circumstances. Don’t forget: the Iraqis and Saddam Hussein had absolutely nothing to do with any terrorist attack against us including that on 9/11.
Special interests and the demented philosophy of conquest have driven most wars throughout history. Rarely has the cause of liberty, as it was in our own revolution, been the driving force. In recent decades our policies have been driven by neo-conservative empire radicalism, profiteering in the military industrial complex, misplaced do-good internationalism, mercantilistic notions regarding the need to control natural resources, and blind loyalty to various governments in the Middle East.
For all the misinformation given the American people to justify our invasion, such as our need for national security, enforcing UN resolutions, removing a dictator, establishing a democracy, protecting our oil, the argument has been reduced to this: If we leave now Iraq will be left in a mess-implying the implausible that if we stay it won’t be a mess.
Since it could go badly when we leave, that blame must be placed on those who took us there, not on those of us who now insist that Americans no longer need be killed or maimed and that Americans no longer need to kill any more Iraqis. We’ve had enough of both!
Resorting to a medical analogy, a wrong diagnosis was made at the beginning of the war and the wrong treatment was prescribed. Refusing to reassess our mistakes and insist on just more and more of a failed remedy is destined to kill the patient-in this case the casualties will be our liberties and prosperity here at home and peace abroad.
There’s no logical reason to reject the restraints placed in the Constitution regarding our engaging in foreign conflicts unrelated to our national security. The advice of the founders and our early presidents was sound then and it’s sound today.
We shouldn’t wait until our financial system is completely ruined and we are forced to change our ways. We should do it as quickly as possible and stop the carnage and financial bleeding that will bring us to our knees and force us to stop that which we should have never started.
We all know, in time, the war will be de-funded one way or another and the troops will come home. So why not now?
Another gutless coward - only this one is programmed and rules-based.
Wrong end of the horse.
Did he know what he was voting for when he voted for the resolution?
Ron Paul is a traitor to every man and woman who wears the uniform.
And yet, like Hillary, he wants to be CIC.
**We all know, in time, the war will be de-funded one way or another and the troops will come home. So why not now?**
Let me rephase that the way it should be.
We all know, in time, the troops will be de-funded one way or another and the war will come home. So why not now?
Agreed, Paul is the wrong end of the horse.
Go ahead, Ron. At this point, I'm just taking names for the ass-kicking list after the next attack. If you want to go on that list with the Dems, go right ahead.
Well stated.
And if he was so worried about the financial state of this country, he should perhaps contemplate on the rate of entitlement spending going on over his watch.
I also find it humerous that we're now "empire building."
Perhaps our dearest Paul would like to explain which Empire he is implying.
If we really wanted a US empire, it would be a lot easier to simply bulldoze Iraq into oblivion, take their resources, and leave their people desolate.
There would be no reconstruction. No massive effort to avoid casulaties. No constituion. No Iraqi government.
But there he is, screeching into the night...
A very conservative useful idiot.
Consider yourself marked Mr. Paul, you are not to be trusted.
Adios
I spit on it.
"If we really wanted a US empire, it would be a lot easier to simply bulldoze Iraq into oblivion, take their resources, and leave their people desolate. "
Why bulldoze when you can drop Neutron Bombs and then go in 72 hours later to get rid of the corpses? All the buildings will be perfect when you get there, and we don't lose anyone in the process of conquest.
Ron Paul has my vote.
He's a Libertarian, cloaked as GOP, in order to win reelection.
I still favor the new Iraqi capital in Babylon/massive, permanent US base in Kurdistan/let the toads fight it out in Baghdad approach. The problem with staying the course is that no US politician, GWB included, is prepared to do what really needs to be done to pacify the country.
In the short run, we'll just have to hope that the surge does some good - it looks like it's already beginning to. But if al Malaki is helping al Sadr shuttle back and forth to Iran at will, then this government is going nowhere, and like him or not, Ron Paul's assessment is correct.
Beyond disgusting. The man is a disgrace.
Fixed.
First time in years he's made a statement to anything other than an empty house chamber. He's a long standing nutcase, I hope the folks from Lake Jackson are proud of him
I can't believe Walter Williams was touting this guy as one of only three honorable congressmen today.
I know of only one. I'm sorry to hear there's more.
"Ron Paul has my vote."
Must be lonely.
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Neither is a stopped clock.
Exactly. And, remember, he voted against the war in the first place. He is, at the very least, consistent.
Ron Paul had my vote.
Yep, he stays true to HIS "principles."
Even if you disagree with Paul on foreign policy, he out-conservatives every other Republican on Capitol Hill on domestic issues. That should be worth something.
Because when our troops are defunded and brought home by these TRAITORS, You and I along with our troops will be fighting the enemy on our own streets. The Muslims want this to happen so that they will have the AREA of OPERATION to be in our country, AMERICA. Everybody needs to figure this out because America can not be an ISOLATIONIST country like we were back in WW2. Even then we weren't though some people thought we were. You can argue this if you want and I don't care. History repeats itself. Thomas Jefferson sent the United States Navy and the United States Marines to the SHORES of TRIPOLI in 1801. We are fighting the same enemy again. Argue if you want though you will be trying to keep the ENEMY out of your home not like now with the BEST of the BEST doing it for us in the enemy's AREA of OPERATION.
No it isn't....
It is not worth crap if we are attacked again by a nuke weapon. What is more important, the right to live or the right to control spending, etc? The right to live gets my vote. Ron Paul can kiss my Irish arse. I would now step over him to pick up a penny. That is what I now think of him.
Ron Paul has just dropped to the bottom of the list of the posible Republican candidates in my book.
"A nation can survive its fools and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and he carries his banners openly against the city.
But the traitor moves among those within the gates freely, his sly whispers rustling through all alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears no traitor; he speaks in the accents familiar to his victim, and he wears their face and their garments and he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men.
He rots the soul of a nation; he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of a city; he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to be feared.
The traitor is a plague."
- Marcus Tullius Cicero, Roman Orator - 106-43 B.C.
I disgree with the premise of your analogy. At the very least, he's consistent, and "right" more often than not. This is not grandstanding for him, or shifting with political winds, you are welcome to disgree with him, and I'm not saying you're wrong to, but you ought to recognize it for what it is.
True have a balanced budget after a terrorist attack doesn't mean squat...
Have been trying to tell the Ron Paul, CP, and Libertarian types exactly what he and their views stand for the past some years.
Now do you understand, Ron Paul voted with the tratiors.
He has been an anti war wingnut right along.
Ron Paul is and always has been a nut!
Well said. I second that.
I have always view Ron Paul as a nut.. In fact people like Ron Paul who runs for President on the LP ticket is the reason why I would never vote for the Libertarian Party.....
The problem is not his principles - it is his fundamental view of reality. He is trapped in a utopian world view that simply does not recognize the threats you and I perceive. In his universe, sovereign nations really can live in peace by abiding by the rules and minding their own business and not trying to impose their will on their neighbors.
He and his fellow libertarians simply cannot grasp the reality of a fascist quasi-religious ideology which rejects the very concepts of nationhood, secular government, individual rights and freedom, and which is determined to destroy all of them and establish worldwide dominance. He, and those like him, simply don't believe it, and thus keep falling back on their utopian slogans and truisms in a desperate, doomed effort to re-define reality into something they can cope with.
I, like Ron Paul and many here, would like nothing better than the restoration of that Constitutional Republic. Unfortunately, the hard reality is that, whether the Republic is restored, or more likely is deconstructed and sold off to the highest bidders by our enlightened, globalists leaders, it is IRRELEVANT to the Islamists. They are coming, regardless of what we do. And, as is emphasized and required in Paul's beloved libertarian theory, THEY are the ones who have "initiated the use of force" (long before 9/11 I might add). Our choices are to fight back and defeat them, or try to run and hide, and eventually die.
Dr. Paul is an honorable man who is simply, tragically wrong. He is not doing this for personal power, money, or to empower the socialist state, as most of the others in Congress are doing. I will not condemn him, nor curse him, nor slander him. I will simply oppose him, in the battle of ideas, and hope that I can do so as honestly and honorably as he.
You got it exactly right.
Does anyone really believe that we are going to allow US troops to remain in Iraq for 40 years until the Iraqis finally learn how to run a democracy?
Barring that we should have instituted martial law as soon as we took over. Curfews enforced at gun point. Looters shot on sight, etc.
At any point in the future we could theoretically introduce martial law and start to get a handle on this, but it has become politically impossible to do so. It would be considered going backward and claiming defeat.
Now we are going to send 20,000 more troops into Baghdad and I understand that the borders are still relatively porous.
So how do we expect to have a long term impact in Baghdad if whomever we killed is soon replaced by a new recruit that waltzes across the unchecked border?
Millions of Iraqis have left Iraq for this very reason. If they were so devoted to Jihad against America why didn't they all stay and fight?
Well said Dr. Paul.
Check Dr. Paul's record. He's not known as Representative 'No' for nothing..
On this issue to be wrong will is to be dead wrong, dead wrong for all of us and the libertarian freedom Mr. Paul Claims to support
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