Posted on 09/13/2013 9:51:54 AM PDT by chessplayer
WASHINGTON — Sen. Rand Paul was in the middle of one of his trademark takedowns of the “right-wing hawks” in his party who “have never met a war they didn’t want to get involved in,” when he suddenly paused and began grinning.
“There was a funny article the other day in Mother Jones — did you see it? About one of my colleagues?” he asked.
He was trying to do the polite, senatorial thing by not mentioning his “colleague” by name. But when his vague prompt was met with a blank look during an interview with BuzzFeed, he scrapped the pretense of diplomacy and charged forward.
“It ranked the different countries on how eager Sen. [John] McCain wanted to be involved [militarily],” he explained, not even attempting to contain his amusement. “So, like, for getting involved in Syria, there’s five Angry McCains. For getting involved in the Sudan, there’s two Angry McCains. And there’s a little picture of him. You know, he was for getting involved to support [former Libyan president Muammar] Gaddafi before he was for overthrowing Gaddafi. He was for supporting [former Egyptian president Hosni] Mubarak before he was for supporting the Muslim Brotherhood before he was for supporting the generals.”
One of his favorite targets — and the one that most delights the political press — is the Bush-era army of neoconservative Republicans who championed the Patriot Act and led the U.S. into war with Iraq. (Paul believes the U.S. should only use military force when the country’s national security is directly at risk.)
“So many of the neocons in our party, they think they’re the great defenders of the military. They think, Oh, the soldiers must love me because I want to be involved in war,” Paul said, before criticizing the assumption that members of the military are eager to fight. “They will, they volunteered, and they’re the most patriotic of our young people. But they’re not excited about war. They want to go to war if it’s the thing they have to do to defend our country.”
Paul also finds plenty to dislike in his own party’s approach to beating the war drum — particularly the theological overtones of the Bush years. In a strikingly candid speech last year at the Value Voters Summit, Paul, a Presbyterian, cited his religious beliefs while declaring, “I’m not a pacifist. But I do think it unacceptable not to hate war.”
He elaborated to BuzzFeed: “I think some within the Christian community are such great defenders of the promised land and the chosen people that they think war is always the answer, maybe even preemptive war. And I think it’s hard to square the idea of a preemptive war and, to me, that overeagerness [to go to] war, with Christianity.”
Common sense in a world devoid of such. I don’t think this man would have been remarkable 30 years ago. What is remarkable is there are so few guys like him in congress today.
This is a disturbing attitude. I'm sure there are some who fit this description, but it can't be enough to warrant Paul's stereotype.
That Mother Jones piece was perfect.
Ten years ago, if you’d told me that the day would come when I would laugh at and cheer on a piece in Mother Jones mocking McCain ...
Yeah but but back then you probably wouldn’t have believed that Putin would be the world leader in the fight to save western culture.
Many disgusted delegates left the convention and went to the bridge tournament in the same hotel in Boston. I was one of them.
What's my point? At its beginning, the youth conservative movement was anti war and mostly isolationist. Rand Paul could bring us back.
“He elaborated to BuzzFeed: “I think some within the Christian community are such great defenders of the promised land and the chosen people that they think war is always the answer, maybe even preemptive war. And I think it’s hard to square the idea of a preemptive war and, to me, that overeagerness [to go to] war, with Christianity.”
Manifest destiny Rand. While that was a notion related to this “hemisphere” it was expanded post WWII. The notion in its earlier stages was really a Democrat notion rejected by the Whigs. But here we are, with a notion largely stripped of its so-called Christian pretensions and is largely a secular and globalist notion now.So I think Rand puts the fault again falsely at the feet of christianity.
Go Rand. People are catching on that the Security State and the Welfare State are the one and the same. A country that will attack another without being threatened “for the good of mankind” will do the same to an individual.
Rand Paul strikes me as a decent man which is a rare breed in Washington, D.C.
I think isolationists have been given a bad rap. They were right to protest FDR before WW2 as he was actively doing all he could to get us in the war against Germany. Had Hitler not been reckless, he would not have declared war on us after Pearl Harbor. But since he did, history seems to have been written as if being against war was somehow foolish. It would be nice to view foreign events as “foreign.” Why should America be using her blood and treasure to stop one group of people killing another group of people when our security is not at risk? In the end the answers to that questions are weak....and if you cite morality as a reason that is lol sick and twisted. Morality from a country that aborts babies and has policies that foster the destruction of the traditional family needs to tend to problems at home. Let God (or Allah) sort out the rest of the world’s problems.
Keep in mind that the NeoCons and the cultural populists left the democrat party to join(or begin joining) the GOP at about the same time.
Irving Kristol, who at that time was the top NeoCon, made a concerted effort to court cultural conservatives and that coalition has existed since.
Some, of all Christians, is a small number or small percentage.
The percentage would probably be higher among fundamentalists, evangelicals, end timers, or Christian Zionists.
There are definitely some Christians who support a militant policy in the Mideast on the premise that, that will lead to a conflageration, the second coming, and end times. So, don't be left behind!
Why, that's BARBARIC!
Ive been told..a couple of times...I wouldnt make a good Christian or Jew because of my views of blowing the shi’ite of the mussies! After working/living in the ME N.&W. Afirca for many yrs I aint gonna change my mind!
I stand with Rand!
I'm sure there are some who fit this description
...any different than Dr. Paul's descsription of .....
I think some within the Christian community
??????
The fact he singled them out for mention implies their significance. They are not (a significant group), IMO.
Here's the passage at issue:In the 1980s, the war caucus in Congress armed bin Laden and the mujaheddin in their fight with the Soviet Union. In fact, it was the official position of the State Department to support radical jihad against the Soviets. We all know how well that worked out.Let's leave aside for now the insulting, utterly asinine, sickening, inexcusable use of the phrase "war caucus" to describe those (including Reagan!) who supported the mujaheddin against the Soviets. That word choice alone is almost entirely disqualifying for its purveyor to ever be president.
Instead, let's just look at a little history here -- because the ignorance evident in this paragraph is truly astonishing. One would be hard pressed to find even a single historian, whether right, left, or center, who would argue anything other than that the Soviet failure in Afghanistan was not just a huge factor, but probably an essential one, in the Soviets' ultimate loss of the Cold War. [Rand Paul’s Really Ignorant Paragraph | 7 Feb 2013]
Rand Slams Congress for Funding Egypt’s Generals:
‘How Does Your Conscience Feel Now?’
Foreign Policy | 15 Aug 2013 | John Hudson
Posted on 08/15/2013 5:44:10 PM PDT by Hoodat
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3055253/posts
Sen. Rand Paul is hammering his fellow senators for keeping billions in financial aid flowing to Egypt’s military — even as Cairo’s security forces massacre anti-government activists.
[by “anti-government activists” is meant church-burning jihadists]
Rand is a decent man. He is coming to speak for a luncheon later next week in Hudsonville MI for our County fundraiser. Should be a good time. Then, he is off to Traverse City for the convention on Mackinac Island. Ill try to post some picture of him from the lunch and convention.
Wow. They couldn’t have been more obvious sellouts if they’d tried. What a discouraging thing to have happen, especially if you’re young and patriotic.
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