The Daily Background
| Ron Paul’s dangerous advocation of a non-interventionist foreign policy
by Arlen Parsa
Texas Republican Congressman and 2008 presidential hopeful Ron Paul was on Bill Maher’s program last night (video of his appearance above). I should probably preface this by saying that I really, really, don’t like Bill Maher despite the fact that a lot of liberals think he’s a good guy.
Frankly, Maher is just a racist who doesn’t deserve to have a show (he was a strong advocate of racial profiling and segregationist treatment of Arabs and Muslims after 9/11… read his book “When You Ride Alone You Ride with Bin Laden” if you can stomach it). On top of that, the man is just grossly ill-informed and although his audience loves him, he just isn’t particularly smart and doesn’t ask particularly smart questions. So naturally he loves Ron Paul.
Paul, or “Dr Ron Paul” as his legions of non-voting internet supporters would have you call him (he was a gynecologist before he ran for Congress), is a former Libertarian candidate for president, who is now running as a Republican. Paul, like Maher is a Republican. He opposes Bush’s foreign policy, but he’s in favor of irresponsible tax cuts and smaller, weaker government, no universal health care etc and much of the rest of the Republican agenda.
What’s disturbing about his foreign policy proposals is that he advocates “non-interventionist” policies (you can see an example in the above video). While he’s certainly right that the US never should have gone into Iraq, it’s obvious that a non-interventionist policy can be just as catastrophic as the type of interventionist one that Bush has instated (despite originally campaigning against in 2000). Neither extreme is healthy.
If Paul were president in 1994, would he have pursued Clinton’s disastrous non-interventionist policy of ignoring what everyone could plainly see was happening in Rwanda? Hundreds of thousands of Hutus killed Tutsi and Tutsis killed Hutus while Clinton’s Administration ignored the situation because he was in the middle of his first term and he didn’t want another situation like that which happened in Somalia in 1993 (which the movie and book “Black Hawk Down” is based on).
The same disastrous non-interventionist path is even now being followed in Darfur, where a void of US troops (they’re all in Iraq) has crippled the UN’s capability to intervene in what almost everyone agrees has been yet another terrible genocide. Did Paul applaud Clinton’s non-interventionist stance with regard to Rwanda? Does Paul applaud Bush’s non-interventionist stance in with regard to Darfur? These are questions that he needs to be asked over and over again.
Update: Brad responds over at his blog–
Concurred, Arlen. And such a debate would be extremely healthy for our democracy. Ironically enough, however, as discussed in the video clip, various folks in the Republican party have actually made efforts to keep Paul out of further Republican debates!
While you may find points you agree or disagree about in Paul’s position — or wish to learn more about — I’m sure you join me in my astonishment that some feel he should not even be allowed to discuss such issues as part of a Presidential nomination campaign.
To which I agree of course. If Giuliani and his cohorts continue to try and bar Paul from future GOP debates, it will do nothing but prove how close-minded he and his pals are to considering a foreign policy approach that is in some ways more reasoned.
Those are some very good questions. He’s against undeclared wars. I’m not sure if congress can declare a peace keeping mission the way they can declare war. Overall, however, his non-interventionist policy will make America safer and would have saved the 600,000+ iraqis and 3000+ servicemen and women who have lost their lives due to this neo-con agenda to use force to promote American ideas.
I don’t disagree with you that the US should have stayed out of Iraq– you me, Ron Paul, and most of the rest of America agree on that point. My overall thesis is that foreign policy either way (both hyper-interventionism and non-interventionism) are dangerous.
Paul’s follow up to the GOP Debate clash with Giuliani is pretty hilarious…you can watch this clip of him suggesting some “reading” for Mayor Giuliani: http://thenewsroom.com/details/338681/Campaign+2008?c_id=tvo
US intervention in Africa for the 50 years prior to 1994 probably aggravated the situation and with a world-wide poor track record for intervention, it is likely to have been botched.
In discussing foreign policy issues Ron Paul has encouraged giving, communication, and trade. There are many ways folks could have joined hands around the world to help in Rwanda.
I wonder how much you really differ with Paul. Though you might judge that there should be more intervention than Paul, you might still be much closer to Paul than, say, to most Democrats or the Neocons.
Dar said it perfectly. I can only add a question … did Rwanda, Somalia, or Sudan attack the United States? I don’t remember any attack and therefore don’t see any rational way for the U.S. Congress to approve sending U.S. troops over there.
Congressman Paul’s “non-interventionism” is not “isolationism.” He advocates trade and communication. He wouldn’t use military force in those listed situations, however. Nor should he.