Posted on 09/09/2013 12:52:17 PM PDT by neverdem
The Force is strong with the isolationists this week.
This is not the time for armchair isolationism.
Most Republicans don’t want to become, again, the party of isolationists.
Nations such as China, Russia and Iran would see this as the triumph of a political coalition between the peace party of the left and the rising isolationists of the right.
Calling someone an isolationist isn’t a devastating quip or even an accurate descriptor. Rather it’s the answer to a question that’s been looming over the bombadiers of yesterday’s right: How do they effectively label their fellow Republicans who oppose action in Syria? The old Iraq pejoratives—”unpatriotic,” “quisling”—are no longer effective. “Realist,” “moderate,” and “skeptic” sound downright reasonable. But “isolationist”—there’s a word with a whiff of the right-wing fringe. So-called isolationists like Sen. Robert Taft wrongly opposed American involvement in World War II. (Taft also opposed the internment of Japanese Americans, but let’s not let nuance intrude here.) Thus we get writers like Stephens drawing a tortuous line between Taft and Republicans who oppose intervention in Syria today. Concerned that America is taking al Qaeda’s side in Syria? You’re in the tradition of those who turned a blind eye to Hitler. The vast majority of conservatives who question the current military action don’t want a return to Fortress America. But it’s far more convenient for writers like Stephens to hurl the I-word than to acknowledge that many on the right feel chastened by the mistakes of Iraq and are leaving the interventionist block party in droves...
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
Isolationist Libertarian Populism is rocketing down the tracks at us. Don’t be surprised when it carries the day.
Ambassador Stevens could not be reached for comment.
I like isolationists. They keep to themselves.
One man’s isolationist is another man’s rational thinker.
I call it restraint.
-- State Senator Barack Hussein Obama, Chicago antiwar rally, October 26, 2002
Glad to see this. “Isolationist’ seems to be the new perjorative for folks who think the saber-rattling is a bit too much. We’re in good company - the Pope evidently also falls into that category.
My thinking is more along the lines of, ‘The Emperor Has No Clothes’ or perhaps “The Boy Who Cried Wolf!”
I’m not an isolationist. I just don’t think we should be using our military to keep the price of natural gas low for Western Europe. They can pony-up some more money and bribe Assad to allow that pipeline through Syria. Germany voted to close down their nuclear power plants, so let them spend their Euros for heat from the Saudis.
See An American Foreign Policy.
Put another way, we were always involved with the rest of the world. The fundamental difference being that we accorded all who did not insult us with respect; but (in Jefferson's words) "punished the first insult," as for example the way the Marines, under his orders, dealt with the Barbary Pirates.
The misapplication of the term "Isolationist," has been used since the Left lost the League of Nations Debate in 1918 to 1920, by those who would like to undermine the very concept of the sovereign nation.
William Flax
Leftists don’t debate issues. They engage in pejorative name calling. Alinsky tactics. Isolate and ridicule.
One thing I learned from “Bush’s Foreign Policy” is never take a ‘Progressive’ into battle. They’re useless and they’ll only weigh you down.
To quote a post at that site:
We are not war ‘weary’. We’re ‘wary’.
Iraq was still the right thing to do, but it turned horribly wrong, thanks to the Barbarians at the Gate. (”Progressives”)
1998 Columbus Ohio CNN Town Hall Meeting.
“The United States does not challenge Iraq’s territorial integrity,
nor do we want to see the Iraqi people suffer any further,” Albright
said. “Our problem and the world’s problem is with Iraq’s leaders. And
today those leaders have a choice. They can allow U.N. inspections to
proceed on the world’s terms, or they can invite serious military
strikes on ours.”
So much for ‘Bush’s Rush to War’......
This is nothing. They’re whipping out the anti-Semite card already. Oh, and the Dems are calling us racist as usual.
What's the point?
I am tired of the US entering conflicts it has no intention of winning.
If we are going to do something in Syria, then unequivocal victory should be the goal.
If it's not, then do not do it.
Not new, Wilson used it in the debate that he lost in 1918 to 1920 to insult the defenders of an unfettered American sovereignty--those of us who understood that you can not make a habit of poking your nose into other people's domestic concerns, without inviting the internationalists in other countries--Communists, etc.--from poking their nose into yours.
Of course, nothing in the defense of our sovereignty, and the concept of the traditional nation, prevents us from responding to insult, as suggested in my post immediately above. It was not wrong for us to go after the Terrorists in 2001, for example; but we lost our way in following a flawed methodology, that ended up helping the committed enemy to recruit a huge stream of new blood. (Just look at the proliferation of fanatic enemies in the last few years, with Al Qaeda playing an open role in the Syrian civil war, as an immediate example.)
William Flax
“Isolationism” is thrown about as an epithet whenever someone wants to criticize an unwillingness to send our military into harms way to achieve some dubious objective. They can’t persuade by logic, so they resort to thinly veiled ad hominem attacks.
OK, fine. So if it makes me an “isolationist” to oppose the wasting of American lives and treasure by trying to resolve civil wars in every third world hellhole imaginable, then I guess I’m an Isolationist. And I’ll wear the label with pride.
It’s called hyperbole, very common in politics.
Gerson: “Nations such as China, Russia and Iran would see this as the triumph of a political coalition between the peace party of the left and the rising isolationists of the right.”
What else does Iran need to see after five years of unimpeded progress in its nuclear program?
What more do China, Russia, Iran and terrorist groups need to know than what is already well-known, that obama is a godsend (unilaterial nuclear disarmament, gutting the military, Benghazi, open border, etc)?!
In the current situation in Syria, I would not consider it isolationist to oppose getting involved. However, the Rand Paul segment of the GOP is too isolationist and it WILL hurt us someday should they gain real power. However, the Neocons were too interventionistic. We need something in between.
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