GOP should adopt Ron Paul's foreign policy

[William Wallace]

If our DTF overlords don't object, I going to keep posting my articles from this site.  The first one this week:

Republicans love to wax poetic about America's founding documents. Read anything by popular conservative pundits to get up to speed on how our precious Constitution has been shredded by liberals and why America desperately needs to return to the principles contained therein.

The major Republican presidential contenders all share that view as well. Newt Gingrich's website, for example, tells readers that religious liberty and life are unalienable rights “contained in the Declaration of Independence.” Mitt Romney has similarly ripped on “advocates of “secularism” for taking the idea of separation of church and state “...well beyond its original meaning.”

The problem, however, is that Republicans don't endorse their own back to basics argument when it comes to foreign policy.

[El Barto]

What about Korea and Vietnam?  It seems to me like both sides want to assume that role,  it's just a matter of how you explain it.  In any event,  the conservatives have adopted a fairly simple playbook,  and that's what we'll continue to see from them for a long while. 

[jsem]

Non-interventionism + free trade ftw.

[William Wallace]

What about Korea and Vietnam?

I don't think it was until post-Vietnam that the GOP got really war happy. Anyway, my point is that that policy belongs to the Progressive tradition, going back earlier than the 20th century.

It seems to me like both sides want to assume that role,  it's just a matter of how you explain it.  In any event,  the conservatives have adopted a fairly simple playbook,  and that's what we'll continue to see from them for a long while.

Not if Paul wins, or his ideas continue to gain ground in national politics.

[PowerSlave]

I don't think it was until post-Vietnam that the GOP got really war happy. Anyway, my point is that that policy belongs to the Progressive tradition, going back earlier than the 20th century.

Havn't each party pretty much swapped positions with one another over the last century, if not a bit longer?

[PraXis]

We cannot afford to police the world, and we do not have the authority anyway. We should live by example in being a free society in a wonderful Republic, which includes a limited federal government. Peace through trade.

[jsem]

But she[America] goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy.

[rumborak]

The overall direction of less intervention is definitely good, but as usual Paul overshoots IMHO. Trade isn't a universal pacifier. Unless you are advocating just watching Iraq invading Kuwait from the sidelines for example.

rumborak

[El Barto]

The overall direction of less intervention is definitely good, but as usual Paul overshoots IMHO. Trade isn't a universal pacifier. Unless you are advocating just watching Iraq invading Kuwait from the sidelines for example.

rumborak

Yeah,  I'm pretty sure he is advocating that.

[PraXis]

Yes, he wants us to stop meddling. If country A does something to country B, and country B is not the USA, then we stay out, period.

[rumborak]

At the cost of letting a genocide happen in front of your eyes? Is he that cold-hearted? And you too?

rumborak

[Nick]

Sovereign nations have rights, and it's past time to be thinking that the United States has to be the leader in deciding which nations deserve those rights and which don't. Yes, other people in other nations might die, perhaps more, perhaps less than if the US got involved, but in either case the point remains that we do NOT have the right to be the ones meddling in those affairs.

[MasterShakezula]

Other nations are entitled to be able to fight their own battles.

The US has no good reason to be impressing its own agendas upon other's conflicts.

Doing such can end up escalating these conflicts, resulting in greater losses for all parties involved, as well as even greater resent towards the US.

The US does not need to be gaining any more resent than it already has earned. 

Not to mention that it is becoming less and less viable for the US to be a superpower, standing above other nations.  It'd be in its best interest to accept a sort of descent down to being on a level, equal, playing field with its fellow nations. 

[Super Dude]

I don't think it was until post-Vietnam that the GOP got really war happy. Anyway, my point is that that policy belongs to the Progressive tradition, going back earlier than the 20th century.

Havn't each party pretty much swapped positions with one another over the last century, if not a bit longer?

Yes, the clearest sign of that being the Sixties, when the South Democrats became what we now call Republicans.

Sovereign nations have rights, and it's past time to be thinking that the United States has to be the leader in deciding which nations deserve those rights and which don't. Yes, other people in other nations might die, perhaps more, perhaps less than if the US got involved, but in either case the point remains that we do NOT have the right to be the ones meddling in those affairs.

Granted, but I think the Bosnians, Kosovar, and Rwandans would disagree with you.

[Perpetual Change]

They won't, because there's too much lobbying and corporate money to be lost by doing that. War is a big industry, after all.

If you guys supporting stopping that, I could agree. But as is, I don't see how you'd expect the GOP to adopt that kind of foreign policy when, as far as I know, you libertarians are all for corporate personhood and that sort of thing.

[William Wallace]

They won't, because there's too much lobbying and corporate money to be lost by doing that. War is a big industry, after all.

If you guys supporting stopping that, I could agree. But as is, I don't see how you'd expect the GOP to adopt that kind of foreign policy when, as far as I know, you libertarians are all for corporate personhood and that sort of thing.

I don't suppose the Republican party will do a 180, but the point is to get them to explain the obvious hypocrisy. And I'm not for corporate personhood.

[abrahamclark]

At the cost of letting a genocide happen in front of your eyes? Is he that cold-hearted? And you too?

rumborak

Paul doesn't make this clear very often, but in an instance of mass genocide, etc., he has suggested that he'd go to the Congress and ask for a declaration of war if public consensus strongly favored it.   Also, he wouldn't stop citizens from voluntarily picking up guns and going overseas to provide private military service.

[William Wallace]

 Also, he wouldn't stop citizens from voluntarily picking up guns and going overseas to provide private military service.

This is dangerous and irresponsible unless sanctioned by a government. Everybody knows that.

[Perpetual Change]

They won't, because there's too much lobbying and corporate money to be lost by doing that. War is a big industry, after all.

If you guys supporting stopping that, I could agree. But as is, I don't see how you'd expect the GOP to adopt that kind of foreign policy when, as far as I know, you libertarians are all for corporate personhood and that sort of thing.

I don't suppose the Republican party will do a 180, but the point is to get them to explain the obvious hypocrisy. And I'm not for corporate personhood.

Well then I stand corrected 

[rumborak]

Paul doesn't make this clear very often, but in an instance of mass genocide, etc., he has suggested that he'd go to the Congress and ask for a declaration of war if public consensus strongly favored it.

He doesn't make it clear often for good reason, because that stance is essentially the status quo. I don't see any difference to your above statement and what George Bush did with the Gulf war.

Also, he wouldn't stop citizens from voluntarily picking up guns and going overseas to provide private military service.

That's just plain ludicrous. You're still an American citizen and thus represent the country you're from.

So, in essence, RP's foreign policy is that he doesn't have any good answers.

rumborak

[abrahamclark]

Paul doesn't make this clear very often, but in an instance of mass genocide, etc., he has suggested that he'd go to the Congress and ask for a declaration of war if public consensus strongly favored it.

He doesn't make it clear often for good reason, because that stance is essentially the status quo. I don't see any difference to your above statement and what George Bush did with the Gulf war.

Also, he wouldn't stop citizens from voluntarily picking up guns and going overseas to provide private military service.

That's just plain ludicrous. You're still an American citizen and thus represent the country you're from.

So, in essence, RP's foreign policy is that he doesn't have any good answers.

rumborak

The Gulf War wasn't declared.  And there's a big difference between the state forcing the american tax payer to send their children and money to undeclared/non-consented wars, and an individual citizen voluntarily going overseas to fight alongside a foreign military. It's ludicrous for one to be incapable of recognizing this difference.

You're still an American citizen and thus represent the country you're from.
 

Judging an entire nation by the actions/words of one of it's individuals acting on their own accord, is just silly; it sounds sort of like racism.

[El Barto]

There was no formal declaration, a la The Hague Convention,  but Congress consented to military action as they always do. 

[William Wallace]

Last item of self promotion for this round. Would you all be so kind as to click the link in my OP and "mic" the article? It's the little yellow button at the end.

[El Barto]

Last item of self promotion for this round. Would you all be so kind as to click the link in my OP and "mic" the article? It's the little yellow button at the end.

What does that do, exactly?

[William Wallace]

Last item of self promotion for this round. Would you all be so kind as to click the link in my OP and "mic" the article? It's the little yellow button at the end.

What does that do, exactly?

I get a free shot of a liquor of my choosing for each one, and I'm in an internship program with that site. The more feedback I get, in the form of mics, comments, page views, the better I look to the editors.

[Scheavo]

I honestly think the generation of Republicans that support neo-con military policies are simply going to die off before anything changes on the matter.

[Super Dude]

Aren't they all old farts anyway? Condee Rice not included.

[Scheavo]

Mostly. They were around when America was great, so they still think it is.

[Cool Chris]

Yes, he wants us to stop meddling. If country A does something to country B, and country B is not the USA, then we stay out, period.

I can't hear the word 'meddling' without thinking of Fred, Velma, Daphne, Shaggy, and Scooby foiling someone's dastardly plans.

On topic (re: America's meddling in other countries' affairs...) isn't that what the UN is for?

[Super Dude]

I would argue actually that the UN was designed to obstruct action, i.e. prevention of war, whereas unilateral actions or coalition forming seems to be more a thing of deliberation, of permitting action.

[kirksnosehair]

At the cost of letting a genocide happen in front of your eyes? Is he that cold-hearted? And you too?

rumborak

Er, um, cough, cough.

We "let" genocide happen all the time.  The fact i$, unless there i$ $ome rea$on for u$ to get directly involved, we tend to $tay out of the$e conflict$ that produce genocide.  I'm trying to think of the rea$on$ why, but they $eem to be eluding me at the moment.

[jsem]

The worst thing, these conflicts are very often stirred up because of previous interventions by western nations. Like what's happening in the Congo now is a gross overreaction to try to make up for the Rwandan genocide where no one acted.