Posted on 11/26/2007 1:54:54 PM PST by rob777
He won’t win the nomination. He won’t win any primaries. But for Ron Paul’s quixotic bid for the White House, it’s “Mission Accomplished.”
In the past few months, Ron Paul has dramatically raised the profile of libertarianism inside the Republican Party. My small-l libertarian friends seem more comfortable describing themselves as such, even though they’ll go out of their way to disassociate themselves from Ron Paul and the big-L kind.
Libertarianism in the GOP took a big hit on 9/11, and it’s slowly coming back, with Ron Paul as the catalyst. Its underlying ideals still have appeal well beyond the cramped confines of the LP. If it’s possible to be known as a pro-life, pro-war, pro-wiretapping libertarian, then sign me up. Markos too brands himself a “libertarian Democrat,” though he’s never read Hayek and supports big government social programs.
Some campaigns can win big without ever coming close to winning an actual contest. Pat Robertson’s 1988 campaign signaled that Christian Conservatives had arrived in the GOP. Ron Paul is doing the same for libertarians. This is not a counterweight to the religious right per se, since Paul is identified as pro-life, but it does potentially open up a new army of activists on the right not primarily motivated by social/moral issues.
Not every losing single-issue candidate succeeds like this. Immigration-restrictionists still lack an outlet in the GOP, thanks to Tom Tancredo’s embarrassing tone-deafness as a candidate. Sam Brownback’s campaign had hoped to galvanize single-issue pro-lifers, but was hobbled by his dry persona. Duncan Hunter looks mostly like a campaign for Secretary of Defense.
Assuming Paul loses, where does small-l libertarianism go from here? His movement already did the smart thing by making peace with social conservatism. Libertarianism is no longer aligned with libertine stances on abortion and gay rights.
To become the ascendant ideology within the GOP, I suspect they’ll have to find a way to do the same thing on national security. The war on terror writ large is the one big thing social and economic conservatives agree on, and Ron Paul is vocally aligned against both.
Mainstream Republican libertarians might be gung-ho for Paul’s small-government idealism, they might adopt Glenn Reynoldsish skepticism of the homeland security bureaucracy, and even John McCain has lately made a thing of ripping the military-industrial complex, but there is no way — I repeat NO WAY — they will embrace Ron Paul if he continues to blame America for 9/11 and imply that America is acting illegally in defending itself around the globe. Even if they aren’t the biggest fans of the war, most people that are available for Ron Paul on the right are by temperament patriotic and will never vote for someone who sounds like Noam Chomsky.
As someone who routinely called myself a libertarian prior to 9/11, here’s how I would square the circle: Absolute freedom within our borders, for our own citizens; eternal vigilance and (when necessary) ruthlessness abroad. For libertarian ideals to survive, they must be relentlessly defended against the likes of Islamic extremists. Take a look at Andrew Sullivan’s writing right after 9/11 to see this ideal in its purest form; far from a religious crusade, ours was a war for secularism, tolerance, and free societies where gays don’t get stoned to death.
The key principle is one of reciprocity. If you behave peacefully and embrace the norms of a libertarian society, we leave you alone. If you seek to destroy a free society, we will destroy you.
If they’re serious about defending their ideals and seeing to it that libertarianism survives more than a generation in actual practice, I don’t see any reason why libertarians couldn’t embrace a more conservative positioning on national security.
That assumes Romney or Giuliani is the Republican nominee. I don't think they will be. Right now, name recognition, personal appearances and saturation TV ads in Iowa and New Hampshire are keeping Romney and especially Rudy, at or near the top of most polls. I believe that will come to a quick end once actual Republicans start casting their votes in the primary contests. Most GOP primary voters will be hard-core FR-style conservatives, not the apathetic, "I guess I gotta pick someone" citizen that votes in the general election. They are not likely to be voting for 'liberal' candidates like Romney or Rudy. I know I won't. Still, on balance and if it ever comes to that, Rudy Giuliani or even Mitt Romney is far superior to a Hillary Clinton or Barack Hussein Obama.
I could be wrong but I see Fred Thompson, perhaps Mike Huckabee, winning the early primary contests, completely contrary to what the 'pundits' predict.
It's politics. Realistically, we cannot get the 100% pure, flawless conservative candidate we want. I'm sure libertarians would have been against Ronald Reagan in 1980 and been promoting some hopeless candidate as 'more conservative'. Well, the Reagan days - great as they were - are now almost 20 years past. This is 2007. We're in a social, political and cultural war. I believe a moderately conservative candidate can beat some warmed over socialist like the vastly inferior Hillary or Obama, but the Ron Paul candidacy is simply a distraction, at best.
“I find it kind of bizarre that you consider eagerly squandering our military might in 130 nations around the world at the behest of a corrupt United Nations is somehow “pro-America” or “pro-military.””
What 130 nations?
Name them. Oh wait you can’t because you’ll probably cite that bullsh*t posted by that flaming retard lew rockwell as “proof”.
“I was asking about a few of the other 127 countries around the world where the overextended, stop-lossed US troops are stationed.”
OMG stoplossed troops.
How about reading an enlistment contract before whining about something you havn’t got a damn clue about.
“The GOP wasn’t going to invite Paul to the convention or reach out to him anyway,”
That’s because he isn’t a Republican.
Never has been, never will be.
He’s a political opportunist who went district shopping just to be in congress again.
He resigned from his seat in the 22nd district as well as the party to run as a libertarian, and as I’ve read he didn’t have any kind words for Republicans at the time either.
He got his ass handed to him in ‘88, and had to come back groveling on his knees for the Republicans to allow him back to run in the 14th district.
Now he’s kissing up to cindy sheehan, code pink, and the rest of the terrorist supporting traitors.
Based on last night's debate, I like Huckabee a lot. But I can't see anyone on that stage except for Rudy, Mitt, or Fred drawing non-GOP votes, and that's going to be crucial come November 2008.
Honestly, I wouldn't sweat the Ron Paul candidacy so much, and I don't know why it's drawing such hostile fire here. As one of FR's long-time loserdopians, and as someone who thinks Paul's ideology is spot-on, even I realize his foreign policy is not ready for prime time.
But I wholeheartedly agree with you that just about anyone on that stage last night is better than Hitlery or Obama.
Page DoD-32 of this report shows a total of 766 bases overseas, with 16 of them "large."
Page DoD-71 starts the inventory of overseas bases, as follows:
Antigua, Aruba, Australia, Bahamas, Bahrain, Belgium, British Indian Ocean Territories, Canada, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Egypt, France, Germany, Greece, Greenland, Hong Kong, Iceland, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Kuwait, Kwajalein Atoll, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Netherlands Antilles, Norway, Oman, Peru, Portugal, Qatar, Saint Helena, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Trucial Oman Coast, Turkey, and the UK.
The report omits installations in Afghanistan, Kosovo, Iraq, Kyrgyzstan, Qatar, and Uzbekistan, among dozens and dozens of others, such as Camp Comanche in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Maybe since it's a "camp" instead of a "base," it's not included in the report.
This link is a front-end to a database of US installations worldwide. A simple keyword search sorted by country is a good way to get a list.
Afghanistan, Australia, Bahamas, Belgium, British Indian Ocean Territories, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cuba, Cyprus, Greenland, Ecuador, France, Germany, Greece, Guam, Honduras, Hungary, Iceland, Iraq, Italy, Japan, Korea, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Kosovo, Marshall Islands, Netherlands, Norway, Panama, Philippines, Portugal, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Spain, Taiwan, Turkey, UK, Uzbekistan.
Both of these sources omit mention of Camp Simba in Kenya, for example.
“Page DoD-32 of this report shows a total of 766 bases overseas, with 16 of them “large.””
Let’s see, some of those are redundant since they count Army Airfields (AAF’s) as independant bases.
Then they list supply and fuel depots which are mostly operated by contractors.
I find it funny that they list the naval station at Key West Florida as an “overseas” station in the Bahamas thus making it one of the 766.
Some of the other “bases” such as the one listed in Australia for example is a communications relay station.
Others are early warning radar sites.
And as far as the Kwajalein Atoll....
“Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site (RTS), formerly known as Kwajalein Missile Range. RTS includes radar installations, optics, telemetry, and communications equipment which are used for ballistic missile and missile interceptor testing and space operations support. Kwajalein hosts one of three ground antennas (others are on Diego Garcia and Ascension Island) that assist in the operation of the Global Positioning System (GPS) navigational system.”
So I guess that we should pack up and leave and say f*ck missile testing, and space operations support, and f*ck GPS too?
Camp Comanche was not included in the report because it was turned over to the Bosnians back in 2002.
http://www.nato.int/sfor/indexinf/148/p02a/t02p02a.htm
So with that being the case, how many of those 766 bases have been closed since the report came out?
Funny how we’ve had a lot of these “bases” for the past 40 or so years and it’s only now that the military hating anti-war left started populating the paul campaign that he and his supporters now whine about the military being overstretched.
The military may or may not be "overstretched," but that's beside the point of how much tax money we're spending on a military empire stretching across the globe.
For example, to what purpose in pursuit of our national security do we maintain nearly 170 million square feet of building space (about 46 Pentagons worth) and 165,005 acres (257.8 square miles) in Germany? World War II ended there 62 years ago, and the Cold War ended 16 years ago.
By the way, do you support the “Clinton Doctrine” of “humanitarian warfare?”
Do you think our sons and daughters in America’s military forces should be sent overseas to build sewers and electrical lines for Iraq?
Oh it’s a military “empire” now? I was wondering how long it would take for you to start using liberal “code words”.
“For example, to what purpose in pursuit of our national security do we maintain nearly 170 million square feet of building space (about 46 Pentagons worth) and 165,005 acres (257.8 square miles) in Germany? World War II ended there 62 years ago, and the Cold War ended 16 years ago.”
Most of those assets have either been closed or will be closed.
We maintain bases in Germany because strategically they’re close to trouble spots.
And most of that area consists of training areas such as Baumholder, Graf and CMTC that we share with the German military as well as our other NATO allies in the name of joint training.
“By the way, do you support the “Clinton Doctrine” of “humanitarian warfare?””
By humanitarian warfare I guess you mean peacekeeping?
Nope
“Do you think our sons and daughters in America’s military forces should be sent overseas to build sewers and electrical lines for Iraq?”
Contractors are building them for the most part.
But there are some deployments of engineer units to places such as South America where they get to use their training and equipment in a real world mission.
Now deployments like I just mentioned I do not see a problem with for the following reasons:
1.) It’s training and it’s not just for the engineer unit either, because you’ll have sea and airlift specialists, personnel specialists, medics, etc all doing their part too.
2.) It gives our troops exposure to other cultures that they may never see otherwise.
3.) It improves our image
But the biggest thing is training because these engineer units will be able to go out and use their skills and equipment to the fullest extent which is something that doesn’t always happen back stateside.
Half my town is still on septic tanks. Now admittedly, there's not sewage running in the streets like there has been in Fallujah for the last five thousand years, but I wouldn't mind a $200 million project by the Army Corps of Engineers to pay for sewer line extensions and hookups here in town if they need training and experience.
Exposure to other cultures? They could get that in the Peace Corps, or on vacations that are paid for out of their own pockets, instead of mine. The extent of our military forces' understanding of other cultures should be how most efficiently to bomb them into surrendering. That's what the military is supposed to be for, after all, not "improving our image."
But I find it interesting that you mention that our image might need improving. Listening to everyone around here you'd think that they just "hate our freedom" or something like that.
ACoE would have nothing to do with it. The funding comes from the EPA through the state’s own environmental department which is then granted to the individual system operators.
The only way that you’d be placed on a sewer system is if you live close enough to a city or town that has such a system and you can get them to annex where you live.
Another thing, if you’re on a sewer system you’ll have to pay additional service fees.
“Exposure to other cultures? They could get that in the Peace Corps, or on vacations that are paid for out of their own pockets, instead of mine.”
Ok, so let’s have all that equipment and training go to waste because YOU don’t want them to gain real world experience.
“The extent of our military forces’ understanding of other cultures should be how most efficiently to bomb them into surrendering.”
Uh huh.
“That’s what the military is supposed to be for, after all, not “improving our image.” “
Ok, so by using your rule of thumb, let’s not have any airshows, or use the military for natural disasters either since that’s not what they’re supposed to be used for.
“But I find it interesting that you mention that our image might need improving. Listening to everyone around here you’d think that they just “hate our freedom” or something like that.”
Yeah let’s not do any sort of “goodwill” missions so people only hear the propaganda by the mymood imonajihad’s and hugo chavez’s of the world about how terrible we are.
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