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Ron Paul's "noninterventionism" fraud
Bidinotto Blog & The New Individualist ^

Posted on 12/01/2007 7:52:54 AM PST by mnehring

The Muslim world is not fooled by our talk about spreading democracy and values. The evidence is too overwhelming that we do not hesitate to support dictators and install puppet governments when it serves our interests. When democratic elections result in the elevation of a leader or party not to our liking, we do not hesitate for a minute to undermine that government. This hypocrisy is rarely recognized by the American people. It’s much more comfortable to believe in slogans, to believe that we’re defending our goodness and spreading true liberty. We accept this and believe strongly in the cause, strongly enough to sacrifice many of our sons and daughters, and stupendous amounts of money, to spread our ideals through force. -- March 28, 2006

There are long-term consequences or blowback from our militant policy of intervention around the world. They are unpredictable as to time and place. 9/11 was a consequence of our military presence on Muslim holy lands; the Ayatollah Khomeini's success in taking over the Iranian government in 1979 was a consequence of our CIA overthrowing Mossadegh in 1953. These connections are rarely recognized by the American people and never acknowledged by our government. We never seem to learn how dangerous interventionism is to us and to our security. -- April 6, 2006

I believe very sincerely that the CIA is correct when they teach and talk about blowback. When we went into Iran in 1953 and installed the Shah -- yes, there was blowback. The reaction to that was the taking of our hostages. And that persists, and if we ignore that, we ignore it at our own risk. If we think we can do what we want around the world and not incite hatred, then we have a problem. They don't come here to attack us because we’re rich and we're free, they come here to attack us because we’re over there. -- May 15, 2007

Now, who is the author of these statements? Some liberal like John Kerry or Dennis Kucinich? Maybe some anti-American filmmaker like Oliver Stone or Brian de Palma? Or perhaps some militant Islamist from a group like CAIR?

No, the author is America's most prominent self-professed libertarian: GOP presidential candidate Congressman Ron Paul of Texas. And his growing public profile finally merits the small spotlight of my attention.

Dr. Paul (he's an M.D., as well as a congressman) has become the nation's foremost proponent of a foreign policy of U.S. "noninterventionism." This view holds that past American policies abroad have been immorally aggressive against other nations, provoking them to "react" against us in understandable, if not always justifiable, ways. By this interpretation of history, which parallels that of the communists and Islamists, America has been the great disturber of international peace. We are ever creating enemies where none really existed before. We did it during the Cold War; we've done it in the Middle East; we're continuing to do it today.

Dr. Paul's libertarian prescription? If only we'd stop meddling in the "internal affairs" of other nations and bring our troops home, the world would be a better, safer, healthier place. Al Qaeda and other terrorists, having no further reasons to hate us, would either become peaceful or aim their aggressions elsewhere.

Now, I'd like to point out an interesting parallel between this common libertarian view of America's foreign enemies, and the common liberal view of America's domestic criminals.

The same sort of arguments advanced by many libertarians, such as Rep. Paul, to "explain" the anti-American actions of foreign terrorists, also have been offered by liberals to "explain" the heinous acts of common criminals. Read any sociology or criminology text, and you'll find endless laundry lists of "causal explanations" for crime: poverty, neglect, poor parenting, lousy schools, poor "socialization," inadequate pre-natal care, hunger, disease, bullying, racism, police brutality, social stigmatizing, untreated psychological disorders, victimless-crime laws...you name it.

And in both cases -- foreign and domestic -- it's always American culture, society, and/or policies that are the toxic "root causes" underlying the actions of those who attack us.

Just as many libertarians like Paul treat the actions of al Qaeda and other terrorists as "blowback" for the sins of American society against them, liberal social-science professionals treat the actions of home-grown criminal thugs as "blowback" for the alleged sins of American society against them. These bloody acts are never the terrorist's or the criminal's "fault" (responsibility), you see; rather, they are all our fault, for "driving him" to do his dastardly deeds.

You may remember that during the Cold War, precisely the same sort of "explanations" were offered by liberals and, later, by left-libertarians such as Murray Rothbard to lay the blame for Communist aggression at the West's (especially America's) doorstep. It was our imperialist provocations around the world that were "driving" the Soviet bloc to "respond" by conquering and butchering millions, building weapons of mass destruction, constructing the Berlin Wall, etc. It was our economic and cultural "imperialism" that was driving indigenous peoples everywhere into the arms of the communists.

I defy anyone to draw a rational, meaningful distinction between such "explanations" for criminal or terrorist aggression, and "excuses" for it. After all, "causal explanations" for human actions aim at exonerating the actor for committing them, by treating those acts as if they were not under the actor's conscious, volitional control, but as if they were instead deterministically driven "responses" to external provocations or "causes."

Just as I reject the liberal "excuse-making industry" that denies volition and rationalizes the acts of criminals, I am totally fed up with the disgraceful foreign-policy perspectives of those libertarians who portray the United States as the causal agent of every evil on earth -- thus rationalizing the atrocities of foreign terrorists and despots.

Ron Paul has become the most visible exponent of that malignant view of America. In my mind, his "blowback" excuse for 9/11 -- and "excuse" is exactly what his "explanation" amounts to -- is sufficient to completely disqualify him for any American public office, let alone for the role of commander in chief of the U.S. military.

For example, Paul repeatedly cites as aggression U.S. government actions that helped to topple and replace the Iranian regime of Mohammed Mossadegh in 1953. However, Paul rarely mentions these days (as he did on Dec. 3, 2002) that the U.S. and Britain did so "to prevent nationalization of Iranian oil." Instead, Paul's account of the extremely complex events transpiring within Iran in those days are reduced to a simplistic fairy tale of U.S. imperialism against a "democratically elected leader," a superficial fantasy that grossly distorts the full truth.

For one thing, it was not "Iranian oil" being nationalized, but that of the British company that had drilled for it, and which had it stolen by the Mossadegh regime. Mossadegh refused all subsequent diplomatic efforts by Britain to broker a deal to peacefully regain that expropriated property; indeed, in October 1952, he declared that Britain was "an enemy." Later, this pillar of "democracy" resigned in 1952 when the Shah denied his demands for broader "emergency powers"; he was reappointed by the Shah only when street demonstrations by his supporters threatened to overthrow the government. Back in power, Mossadegh then systematically began to communize the Iranian economy.

All this took place in the context of our Cold War with the Soviet Union, which had been plotting to extend its influence in Iran, via its puppet, the Tudeh Party, in order to gain control that nationalized oil. At the same time, U.S. intelligence agencies and the Eisenhower administration worried that Mossadegh was getting dangerously close to the pro-Soviet Tudeh Party.

Was it therefore unreasonable or wrong for the U.S. and Britain to take action to topple a dictatorial, increasingly leftist regime, in order to regain that stolen property and, more importantly, to protect American national security interests? Can this 1955 action in defense of private property and against totalitarian Soviet expansionism reasonably be blamed as the "cause" of "blowback" much, much later -- such as the Iranian Revolutionary Guard takeover of the U.S. embassy in 1979, 26 years later? or the attack on the World Trade Center in 1993, 40 years later? or even the destruction of four U.S. airliners, the Twin Towers, and part of the Pentagon in 2001, 48 years later? Or is that "blowback" charge mere excuse-making for Islamist thugs and cutthroats?

The manipulative use, by Paul and too many libertarians, of vague, undefined smear terms such as "interventionist" and "neocon" permits them to blame the U.S. government for virtually anything it does in our legitimate, long-term self-defense, anywhere in the world. Actions to thwart coercive threats, such as forging defensive alliances, are "interventionism." Helping other nations counter a growing peril from a declared U.S. enemy nation (Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia, Iran, etc.) is "interventionism." Sometimes, even trading with adversaries of dictatorial regimes (e.g., trading with Taiwan, an enemy of China) is "interventionism."

The only "moral" alternative they imply, therefore, is a de facto, hunkered-down pacifism: a steady retreat by the U.S. from any interactions in the world -- lest we diss some backwater bully, cross his arbitrarily declared boundary lines, offend him for his subjective notions of religious or cultural blasphemy, or thwart his laughable claims of "national sovereignty."

Part of the sloppy thinking at the root of "noninterventionist" lunacy is the tacit equation of individual rights with "national sovereignty" -- and also the equation of "economic interventionism" (against peaceful individuals) with "political interventionism" (against despotic regimes). Philosophically, these twin equations are completely bogus.

Only individuals have rights or "sovereignty"; and only those governments that recognize the individual rights of their own people have any legitimate claims to exist. Dictatorships thus have no "rights" or "sovereignty." Likewise, the concept of economic "interventionism" -- developed by the Austrian school of economics to describe coercive governmental interference with free individuals in the marketplace -- cannot be equated with political "interventionism" against governments, especially against dictatorships.

Ron Paul (along with those libertarians who agree with him) therefore completely misunderstands the philosophical foundations of individual rights and freedom. The mere fact that he and his backers sanctimoniously claim such lofty language does not mean that they are true defenders of individual rights and liberty. That is clear from Paul's stands not just on foreign policy and national defense, but on such issues as immigration and abortion, where he ironically takes what can only be described as "government interventionist" stands.

For a detailed look at Paul's warped foreign-policy perspective, sample his commentary "The Blame Game," where he declares, "There was no downside when we left Vietnam." No downside? Here he blithely evades the wholesale butchery and the enslavement of millions that transpired after our ignominious retreat from Southeast Asia -- and the consequent, devastating loss of America's credibility, both as a military power and as a reliable ally. Add to this Paul's infuriating use, in the same commentary, of the word "empire" to describe U.S. foreign policy aims -- which claim, contrary to all historic facts, rationalizes the bogus charges raised against America by communists and Islamists, giving aid and comfort to these enemies of the U.S. Add to this also Paul's indiscriminately declared hostility to "war" as such, which (regardless of his protestations) can only translate into a de facto pacifism and isolationism.

Is this foreign-policy outlook realistic? Not since about 1789.

The relentless advance of communication, transportation, satellite, and weapons technology has simply obliterated the geographic "isolationism" that was still largely possible at the time of America's founding.

When a plot hatched in remote mountains in a backward nation like Afghanistan, with conspirators drawn from places like Saudi Arabia, can bring down iconic buildings in New York and Washington, DC --

-- when Chinese rockets can "blind" in outer space the U.S. intelligence satellites that we depend on for our nation's defense --

-- when Iranian rockets and subs can threaten to shut down international shipping lanes, thereby interfering with free trade --

-- when Islamist terrorists and despots can shut down at whim international traffic in a commodity as basic as oil, etc., etc.

-- it is no longer possible to pretend we can draw any meaningful national-defense line at the water's edge. Those days are long gone.

National defense today requires the ability and willingness to project credible power globally, in direct protection of the very trade, travel, communications, and contacts among peoples that Ron Paul and many other libertarians declare to be the pillars of international relations and peace.

Without the forward projection of U.S. military power -- through foreign bases (which implies alliances), naval-carrier battle groups, special ops forces, advanced military aircraft, and first-rate intelligence agencies (which means an effective CIA, NSA, etc.) -- the "foreign-trade-and-travel" model of foreign policy prescribed by Dr. Paul and many libertarians would be revealed for the ridiculous fantasy it is.

Well, then, is this foreign-policy outlook principled?

What "principle" does it cite? A vacuous "noninterventionism" that clashes with the proper defense of U.S. interests and the individual rights of Americans? As his coercive positions on abortion and immigration underscore, Ron Paul doesn't even grasp what the principle of individual rights is all about. His is the traditional, platonic view of "natural rights" shared by many other libertarians, which tacitly equates anti-government positions with pro-liberty positions -- as if they are the same.

They aren't.

Okay, but is Ron Paul dangerous? Not politically: He hasn't a prayer of winning the GOP nomination, let alone the White House (though he could throw the general election to the Democrats if he decides to run as a third-party candidate after the primaries).

However, Ron Paul -- or, rather, what he represents -- is dangerous philosophically.

In an essay titled "The Anatomy of Compromise," philosopher Ayn Rand wrote: "When opposite basic principles are clearly and openly defined, it works to the advantage of the rational side; when they are not clearly defined, but are hidden or evaded, it works to the advantage of the irrational side."

Ron Paul's public equation of vital and valid principles -- such as "individual rights," "liberty," and "free markets" -- with intellectual trash-talk about American imperialism, anti-immigrant border fences, the fetus's "right to life," and the de facto pacifism of "noninterventionism," only confuses and discredits those critical principles in the minds of millions. This is dangerous, because it obliterates the true meaning of the key moral principles that should undergird our politics and laws.

The resulting confusion -- if unchallenged -- will set back the cause of reason, individualism, and capitalism for decades to come. And that's not something we can afford as we confront the ongoing Islamist threat to our way of life. To win that war, we require, above all, moral and intellectual clarity. That clarity is something the candidacy of Ron Paul imperils, demonstrated by his following among self-proclaimed champions of individual liberty.

To paraphrase an old joke, then:

Ron Paul is my second choice for President.

My first choice is anybody else.

(Note: A forthcoming article in The New Individualist (January-February 2008) by Stephen Green will address Dr. Paul's problematic views on a range of other issues, as well.)


TOPICS: Editorial; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: alexjoneslovespaul; gayvoters; libertarians; paulistinians; paullovesstormfont; paulqaeda; potheadvoters; proalqaedavoters; racistronpaul; ronpaul; stormfrontcandidate
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To: MNJohnnie
Oh, but apparently he does think there is a bogeyman enemy, unfortunately he think’s its the CFR and not islamists who actually are blowing us up.
21 posted on 12/01/2007 8:12:50 AM PST by mnehring (..one candidate did not display any moderateness or liberalism...Fred Thompson - Rush Limbaugh)
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To: canuck_conservative

There are lots of excuses for Cowardice and Canada has plenty. Guess they will never have to worry about being a superpower.

Pray for W and Our Victorious Troops


22 posted on 12/01/2007 8:14:06 AM PST by bray (Let's Bring Christ Back to Christmas)
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To: canuck_conservative
Again wrong.

The problem he is too many of you wholly ignorant screaming Paulbots confuse your personal emotional based rabidly ignorant feelings for the US Constitution.

It would be nice if the screamers ONE time actually tried READING the document instead of just shouting the term “US Constitution” in every sentence.

23 posted on 12/01/2007 8:14:35 AM PST by MNJohnnie (What drug pushers do with drugs, politicians do with government subsides)
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To: MNJohnnie; canuck_conservative
It would be nice if the screamers ONE time actually tried READING the document instead of just shouting the term “US Constitution” in every sentence.

*************

Especially since it's the *US* Constitution.

24 posted on 12/01/2007 8:17:31 AM PST by trisham (Zen is not easy. It takes effort to attain nothingness. And then what do you have? Bupkis.)
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To: MNJohnnie
Because like it or not evil men exist in the world and they want to either kill you just for being of European decent or enslave you in service of their moon god death cult.

Gosh, then why are we enriching them by buying oil from them and why are we letting them buy our most valuable assets and corporations (like Citibank)?
25 posted on 12/01/2007 8:19:54 AM PST by hedgetrimmer (I'm a billionaire! Thanks WTO and the "free trade" system!--Hu Jintao top 10 worst dictators)
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To: mnehrling
The manipulative use, by Paul and too many libertarians, of vague, undefined smear terms such as "interventionist" and "neocon" permits them to blame the U.S. government for virtually anything it does in our legitimate, long-term self-defense, anywhere in the world. Actions to thwart coercive threats, such as forging defensive alliances, are "interventionism." Helping other nations counter a growing peril from a declared U.S. enemy nation (Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia, Iran, etc.) is "interventionism." Sometimes, even trading with adversaries of dictatorial regimes (e.g., trading with Taiwan, an enemy of China) is "interventionism."
If L Ron Paul had been President in 1940, the Japanese would not have been so worried about the US and would not have attacked Pearl Harbor. All those Americans who died in WWII would have been spared.

Of course, the world would have ended up being a much different place.

26 posted on 12/01/2007 8:21:56 AM PST by samtheman
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To: hedgetrimmer

Last time I checked, Osama didn’t own any oil wells and wasn’t the purchaser of Citibank.


27 posted on 12/01/2007 8:22:12 AM PST by mnehring (..one candidate did not display any moderateness or liberalism...Fred Thompson - Rush Limbaugh)
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To: samtheman

Don’t forget we captured a group Germans that came here to attack us during WW2. Hitler would have taken the fight to us even if the Japanese had not attacked us. He had to be stopped or we would be speaking German today.


28 posted on 12/01/2007 8:25:25 AM PST by jrooney (Ron Paul makes Jimmy Carter look tough and Dennis Kucinich look sane.)
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To: samtheman
If L Ron Paul had been President in 1940, the Japanese would not have been so worried about the US and would not have attacked Pearl Harbor. All those Americans who died in WWII would have been spared. Of course, the world would have ended up being a much different place.

Of course if Dr. Paul had been President in 1916 we wouldn't have interfered in WWI in a campaign to 'spread democracy' laying the seeds for WWII....oh never mind, I keep forgetting 'conservative' history stops at WWII and Hitler. It's okay to play what ifs with WWII but not with WWI. Because if we play what ifs with WWI, the 'conservative' argument for interventionism falls apart.

29 posted on 12/01/2007 8:25:49 AM PST by billbears (Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it. --Santayana)
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To: mnehrling
While I agree with the critique of Ron's foreign policy, there is much else in the article that I find to be off.


"Ron Paul (along with those libertarians who agree with him) therefore completely misunderstands the philosophical foundations of individual rights and freedom. The mere fact that he and his backers sanctimoniously claim such lofty language does not mean that they are true defenders of individual rights and liberty. That is clear from Paul's stands not just on foreign policy and national defense, but on such issues as immigration and abortion, where he ironically takes what can only be described as "government interventionist" stands."

Is it interventionist to protect human life, or to secure a country's borders? These are a few of the legitimate functions of government. On these issues, I stand with Ron Paul.



"As his coercive positions on abortion and immigration underscore, Ron Paul doesn't even grasp what the principle of individual rights is all about. His is the traditional, platonic view of "natural rights" shared by many other libertarians, which tacitly equates anti-government positions with pro-liberty positions -- as if they are the same."

While it is true that pro-liberty does not necessarily equate with anti-government, there is nothing philosophically "platonic" about such a position. It merely stems from an overreaction to the threat to liberty posed by an over reaching government. Furthermore, how can Ron's view of liberty be equated with a mere anti-government stance when he supports the use of government to defend the life of the unborn and to police the country's borders?

The author should of stopped with a critique of Ron's foreign policy positions.
30 posted on 12/01/2007 8:30:50 AM PST by rob777 (Personal Responsibility is the Price of Freedom)
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To: hedgetrimmer
Ah I see. Don't annoy the Paulbots with the facts. They have their emotion based ignorant dogmas and they are sticking to them.

Tell you want, Take some basic econ classes, then some history. Then when you have the slightest clue what you are talking about, we can have an intelligent discussion.

As long as you insist, like the rest of the Paulbots, to scream wholly ignorant, emotion based slogans that have NO base in factual reality, there is no possibility of an intelligent discussion with you.

Nice you have feelings. Too bad for you, feelings are not facts. Unfortunately for you, your feelings on both US Economic and National security issues are wholly based only your personal emotion based reality. Too bad for you that reality exists only inside your own head.

31 posted on 12/01/2007 8:32:33 AM PST by MNJohnnie (What drug pushers do with drugs, politicians do with government subsides)
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To: mnehrling

There are more truthers/racists supporting ron paul than actual libertarians.

Sad but true.


32 posted on 12/01/2007 8:37:17 AM PST by Tears of a Clown
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To: billbears

I actually think the argument can be made that it was a mistake for us to intervene in WWI, but it’s only an argument and no one knows for sure.

One thing I am quite certain about, the “seeds of WWII” were already laid by the slaughter of WWI whether or not we entered the war. Though it’s true that a stalemate (which MIGHT have occurred if the US stayed out) would have not resulted in a humiliating defeat for Germany, Hitler would not have then gone on to become a clerk in an architects office and the centuries of anti-semitism and all the other forces that were building towards fascism in Germany wouldn’t have suddenly, and magically, disappeared.

It’s impossible to predict what would have happened in Europe if the US had stayed out of WWI and to claim otherwise is just plain silly.

One thing is sure: as the power of modern weaponry increased, the US was bound to find itself on the wrong end of a world-conquering dictatorial experiment of one kind or another and the “non-interventionists” in America would have been, de-facto, on the side of that dictatorial expansion.

The bottom line is, in the 20th century the world got smaller and the weapons got larger and the modern world-conquering dictator was born and it was up to the US to deal with it, as we did in WWII and the cold war, or put our heads in the sand and end up being a vassal state, like you would have us end up doing now, in the face of the global expansion of the Jihadists.


33 posted on 12/01/2007 8:40:28 AM PST by samtheman
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To: MNJohnnie
Tell you want, Take some basic econ classes, then some history.

The factual reality is that people like YOU are selling every thing of value in this country to the Muslim world. They did it in France first, and now in your mind, it's our turn.Now here's your lesson for the day. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (the state or territory under the jurisdiction of an emir(a title of honor of the descendants of Muhammad)) now own banking (citibank), investment(carlyle group) and national security companies (haliburton). How do you claim we have a 'war' going on when the American economy is funding the enemy? You live in Alice's wonderland.
34 posted on 12/01/2007 8:42:26 AM PST by hedgetrimmer (I'm a billionaire! Thanks WTO and the "free trade" system!--Hu Jintao top 10 worst dictators)
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To: billbears
Most of those that will read this thread won't understand the difference and cheer right along with you that another liberventionist talking out of his @ss doesn't understand Dr. Paul either.

Yep, salivating right on que, just like Pavlov's dog.

35 posted on 12/01/2007 8:42:46 AM PST by Extremely Extreme Extremist
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To: jrooney
Don’t forget we captured a group Germans that came here to attack us during WW2. Hitler would have taken the fight to us even if the Japanese had not attacked us. He had to be stopped or we would be speaking German today.
I know. I purposely left that part out. What you have just done is tell "the rest of the story".
36 posted on 12/01/2007 8:42:55 AM PST by samtheman
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To: jrooney
And Hitler's U-boats reached across the Atlantic. As the song of the time went, "Did you have a friend on the good Rueben James?"
37 posted on 12/01/2007 8:44:34 AM PST by RedRover (DefendOurMarines.com)
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To: trisham
Straight from the horse's "mouth".

I don't have a problem with that quote, which has been spun to make it appear that Dr. Paul blames America.

All Paul did was look for a motive. You do know what a motive is, right?

Anywho, the quote has been confirmed by the 9/11 Commission, Wolfowitz, the CIA bin Laden Unit, and Bin Laden himself.

38 posted on 12/01/2007 8:45:08 AM PST by Extremely Extreme Extremist
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To: bray
There are lots of excuses for Cowardice and Canada has plenty.

You know that Canada has been our ally in the WOT, right?

Are you going to smear Polish & British troops for "cutting and running" from the Middle East too?

39 posted on 12/01/2007 8:46:40 AM PST by Extremely Extreme Extremist
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To: canuck_conservative; jrooney; mnehrling; bray; trisham; Extremely Extreme Extremist
Was it therefore unreasonable or wrong for the U.S. and Britain to take action to topple a dictatorial, increasingly leftist regime, in order to regain that stolen property and, more importantly, to protect American national security interests?

I wonder if the anti-Paul globalists would support the US Army going to Nigeria and recovering my investment if it goes badly.

Amazing that they try to say sending US troops to die for a British corporation is a wonderfully justifiable act that goes against Dr. Paul's point, when it makes it quite clearly.

Oh, and I'm a US citizen (one of my ancestors was a late-comer--not arriving until 1850--but I do trace back to the Mayflower, first Palatines, etc...and I hope that's good enough for everyone!) who has read the Constitution many times...and I know that declaring War is not in the Executive. And I believe that with all the persistence in stretching and twisting the words of the Constitution, it has become quite simple for the left to subvert it. How can the people rely upon the Second Amendment as written while distorting Article I, Sections 8-10 or Article II, Section 2?

And a strong Constitution is our greatest strength.

40 posted on 12/01/2007 8:48:36 AM PST by Gondring (I'll give up my right to die when hell freezes over my dead body!)
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