Ron Paul's "noninterventionism" fraud

Bidinotto Blog & The New Individualist ^

[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.)

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Oh sure, the constitution is full of passages about the virtues of surrendering to terrorists and other purveyors of atrocities.

If you want to see the effects of noninterventionism, look no farther than WORLD WAR II. 40 million people died because everybody not directly involved looked the other way until the scum came looking for them!

[traviskicks]

There is an over riding reason why I can’t vote for RP... I’m a Christian and I believe that America has an obligation to support Israel. RP would end that.

FYI:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/block/block88.html

[Halgr]

Yeah I think Lew Posts here....LOL

I don’t see the world the way Lew does....sorry

[traviskicks]

It’s not written by Lew, it’s written by some guy I’d never heard of that happened to be on that website, but it is a good analysis of our foreign aid problems and the way we hold back Israel, by preventing her from dealing with the terrorist problem and funding ME dictators etc..

[Halgr]

We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion.

Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people.

It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

— President John Adams, 1798

---

Can Ron Paul reverse the direction that America and Israel are heading....

No.

[Dr. Frank fan]

In other words, even though the US isn’t located anywhere near the Middle East, American boys must continue to die in some Middle-Eastern hellhole because .... what was the reason again? Oh yeah, so the CFR globalists can continue their worldwide agenda. Of course.

The US isn't located anywhere near Germany or Japan either. Your argument-from-location is equally valid against U.S. involvement in World War 2.

Nor is the US located anywhere near the parts of Afghanistan where Al Qaeda trained the 9/11 hijackers. I guess that means we were safe from them and would have had no business intervening there either had the opportunity arose.

The ramifications of this logic are fascinating to think through.

[Dr. Frank fan]

Did Dr. Paul, per the quote in the May 15th debate, imply that U.S. is to blame for 9/11?

I don't know about that, but in my view he did something worse in the Youtube debate: he implicitly declared that Saudi Arabia somehow belonged to Al Qaeda.

"(Al-Qaeda) want to come here ... because of our military base in Saudi Arabia," Paul retorted. "They come here because we're occupying their country just as we would object if they occupied our country," he added.

(emph. mine)

Let's review: Al Qaeda, an international, terrorist organization, which enjoys nothing approximating any sort of democratic legitimacy whatsoever - and which contains people from Egypt, Yemen, Afghanistan, and presumably many other countries - commits a terror act. Paul's summary of their motive: "because we're occupying their country". By which he means....Saudi Arabia.

In short, Ron Paul has rhetorically awarded Saudi Arabia to Al Qaeda. He considers it "their" country now.

I have no problem with examination of cause and effect, accounting of motive. But this is crazy talk. Saudi Arabia is not "their country" anymore than America is "Timothy McVeigh's country", and someone who seems to instinctively concede the claims of mass murderers as if their mass murdering alone gives their crazy claims greater weight really has no business being the chief executive.

There is no dispute that one of the reasons that motivated young hotheads to join Al Qaeda and blow things up is "because the United States has troops in the holy land". Yes, indeed, that was the motive for some of them - just as David Berkowitz's motive for murdering young couples was that a talking dog said "Son of Sam" (or something).

But simply identifying the motive is not an argument for anything. The United States contracted with the government of Saudi Arabia for the latter's defense. Within Ron Paul's own philosophy - of national sovereignty and freedom of contract - this should be perfectly acceptable. Al Qaeda's "grievance" against the U.S. for doing this was therefore completely unjustified and not worth the spittle it cost them to spew it. It is bad enough for Ron Paul, a supposed libertarian, not to recognize the violation of his own supposed principles he commits when he essentially encourages backing down to the demands of crazy, unjustified people. But to come out and concede the point of these crazy morons, and blithely refer to Saudi Arabia as "their country", is reprehensible.

Another interpretation of this statement, I suppose, is that by "their country" Ron Paul merely meant "the Arabs", or "the Muslims", or whatever - because, perhaps, he can't tell them apart. But this would not exactly reflect any better on the man.

Why does Ron Paul believe that Al Qaeda speaks for Saudi Arabia? for Arabs in general? for Muslims in general? (Which is it?)

Is it because they kill people? Is that it?

I'd really like to understand what he meant.

[Dr. Frank fan]

When FReepers came out against Clinton's war in Kosovo, and his other military actions, were we "blaming America" or were we disagreeing with Mr. Slick's foreign policy?

What Paul is doing is not merely "opposing military action", he is justifying the attacks of our enemies as having, in some cases, rational explanations that put us in the wrong. Not the same thing. Anyway, the "military action" already took place and is a historical event now, so there'd be nothing to "oppose" per se, so what would the controversy even be about if that's all Paul were doing?

That said, there were people against the Kosovo campaign who did so in a pretty blame-America way, too. Many of them on FR. I seem to recall charges bandied about that Clinton/the UN/someone wanted to snatch a silver mine in Kosovo (or something).

I myself may have even made such posts at the time, I don't remember :) Everyone's capable of letting politics cloud their judgment.

One thing I'll say in Paul's is that I don't think that's what he's been doing (playing politics, or just saying things to win an election, etc). Not at all. He strikes me as remarkably consistent and sincere. It's just that the thinking about which he's consistent, is seriously misguided in this case. (On many/most issues, I think he's great)

[Dr. Frank fan]

Wars are DECLared against nations.

Where is it written that wars can only be declared against nation-states?

[DugwayDuke]

“Dr. Paul doesn’t share the views of Alex Jones or Stormfront.”

The point is that Stormfront shares the views of Ron Paul. (I assume Stormfront still has the Ron Paul for President Banner up.)

[DugwayDuke]

“Alex Jones’ views are irrelevant. Paul doesn’t agree with him. He is a nationally-syndicated radio host which means that he’s media just like Savage & Rush are. He’s not some bug-eyed guy transmitting over a ham radio in his basement.”

If you think Alex Jones is not a ‘bug eyed guy’, then you should visit his website. He’s got an ‘archive’ for every ‘bug eyed’ conspiracist theory there is from the Bohemian grove, the illuminati, free masonry, to the coming gulag in America.

[Turret Gunner A20]

Where is it written that wars can only be declared against nation-states?

That is a good question, so let me answer it with one. In view of the fact tht we are not waging this war against a specific named nation; and. in view of the fact that we are fighting against several bands of butchers from several different nations in several different locations around the world, tell us specifically against whom Congress would declare said war?

Or are you for our troops tucking their tails between their legs letting those butchers run wild all over the world, in cluning in the United States, because we don't have a special rogue nation to declare war on?

[Turret Gunner A20]

... including in the United States ....

[Dr. Frank fan]

In view of the fact tht we are not waging this war against a specific named nation; and. in view of the fact that we are fighting against several bands of butchers from several different nations in several different locations around the world, tell us specifically against whom Congress would declare said war?

To my knowledge there are effectively 2 war powers resolutions currently in force.

The first one names "those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons".

The second one names "Iraq".

So that is, literally, the answer to your question. My earlier point stands, nowhere is it written that war can only be declared against nation-states. Indeed, we are living through a counterexample.

Or are you for our troops tucking their tails between their legs letting those butchers run wild all over the world, in cluning in the United States, because we don't have a special rogue nation to declare war on?

Wait, what?

No, I am not for that thing you said.

[lormand]

"I'm sorry you feel slighted...will it make you feel better if I call you a real idiot?"

I actually feed off of name calling from Al Qaeda dupes.

It makes me feel important, so flame away Mohammed.

Besides, my tagline hints at another Freeper who harbors the same feelings I have about Ron Paul.

I suppose you want associate him with "idiots" as well?

[lormand]

"So someone who’s been here longer that you is now an interloper? You’re way too full of yourself."

Interloping is not time sensitive.

[Allegra]

And how about what was said to Allegra by one certain paulbot?

You mean the one who told me to f*** off? Or the ones who call me a war profiteer?

I get all kinds of classless freaks....and they're all paultards. LOL

[MEGoody]

There are long-term consequences or blowback from our militant policy of intervention around the world.

Sure, just as there would be long-term consequences or blowback from a policy of non-intervention. The key is, make you best guess as to which is the least dangerous and go that route.

[Darksheare]

That’d be the one.

[Tolik]

Please forgive me for a long excerpt from even longer article. I find the argument against non-interventionism here very compelling. My other favorite point is also spelled out perfectly: "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." 

---

Robert James Bidinotto:

 

... Dr. Paul ... 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.

... 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.

... 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.

... 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.

... 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.

... 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.

---

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