National Review: "Why has Ron Paul joined Barney Frank...to slash defense spending?"

[RonPaulFanInGA]

h XXp://www.nationalreview.com/articles/256150/new-isolationism-alvin-s-felzenberg


The New Isolationism
The world is getting more dangerous by the day. So why has Ron Paul joined Barney Frank in an effort to slash defense spending?

Anything Reps. Ron Paul (R., Tex.) and Barney Frank (D., Mass.) both support should give the rest of us pause. Their proposal to slash defense spending by $1 trillion over a decade — only the most recent joint effort by the new isolationists on the Left and Right to curtail American military strength around the world — is as foolhardy as it is unrealistic. Were such a policy enacted, the nation and the world would be set on a path not toward peace, but toward instability, conflict, and a lessening of freedom in many corners of the world.

[Lucille]

Danger, danger! Be afraid! Be very afraid.


Isolationism

They keep on using that word...

[Matt Collins]

The propaganda machine is running at full tilt I see.

[specsaregood]

"Why has Ron Paul joined Barney Frank...to slash defense spending?"

Uhm, because our huge deficit is a matter of national defense and defending germany is not?

[Cowlesy]

OoOoOOOohhhh, daangggggerous worrrrrrld!

Go live in a padded room, Alvin, if you are worried about islamo-monsters creeping around every corner.

The rest of deal with the risk you've created by trying to turn the world into America.

Jackwagons.

[VBRonPaulFan]

Danger, danger! Be afraid! Be very afraid.



They keep on using that word...

Yup, it's funny how many people don't understand the difference between isolationalism and non-interventionism. they also can't seem to put themselves in the places of other countries we're currently occupying and imagine how they'd react if some other country was doing that shit to us.

[klamath]

Old neoconservatism.

Anything Reps. Ron Paul (R., Tex.) and Barney Frank (D., Mass.) both support should give the rest of us pause. Their proposal to slash defense spending by $1 trillion over a decade — only the most recent joint effort by the new isolationists on the Left and Right to curtail American military strength around the world — is as foolhardy as it is unrealistic. Were such a policy enacted, the nation and the world would be set on a path not toward peace, but toward instability, conflict, and a lessening of freedom in many corners of the world.

Why should we go broke fighting for freedom for other people. Freedom isn't free. Let them fight for it themselves.

[lester1/2jr]

I talk regularly with a republican guy and just liek in the cold war they go totally off the rails when discussing defense. I think they think we get PAID to fight wars.

[Southron]

These big government guys at NR don't support national defense, they support national offense.

[Fox McCloud]

ahh yes, if we cut military spending by $1 Trillion, and still have the largest military budget in the world, everything will fall apart; just look at the EU--they're not spending nearly as much as us on defense, and because of that, Europe is always at war with its neighbors.....erm....oh, wait a minute...

[Brett85]

They don't seem to realize that ending the empire has absolutely nothing to do with cutting "defense spending."

[Sola_Fide]

My personal experience with the Tea Parties here in Kentucky is that the empire mindset within the GOP is changing rapidly.

[Bruno]

Isolationists! :rolleyes: (new eye roll smiley just doesn't do it justice)

[cavalier973]

My personal experience with the Tea Parties here in Kentucky is that the empire mindset within the GOP is changing rapidly.

For better or for worse?

[Sola_Fide]

Better.

[Kregisen]

Ron's only chance to win in 2012 is if we win over the majority of republicans on the war issue. If nothing changes and we're still in both Iraq and Afghan, then I think Ron can easily go "remember 4 years ago when I said the wars never end? Wanna know how much money we've wasted on these wars? Wanna know how many of our troops have lost their lives or been injured over these wars? Wanna know how many civilians have been killed over these wars?"

I think we have a shot at disrupting the neo-con agenda in the next prez debates.

[Anti Federalist]

OoOoOOOohhhh, daangggggerous worrrrrrld!

Go live in a padded room, Alvin, if you are worried about islamo-monsters creeping around every corner.

The rest of deal with the risk you've created by trying to turn the world into America.

Jackwagons.

LoL at jackwagons.

I've really had enough of these internationalist cocksuckers.

And I consider trade suicide just another form of this sort of insanity that we see in defense.

The EU is larger in population and GDP and we spend more than twice what they do on defense.

Assuming static dollars and spending, Ron is proposing cutting a trillion over ten years, that's a 100 billion out of a 700+ billion budget.

Keep in mind, that's not including the billions of funding through "black" and "off book" sources, the money that funds the really dirty shit that government does, the extrajudicial killings, drug running, arming both sides of conflicts, among other things.

And we'd still be spending more than any other country on earth.

Enough already, bankruptcy, both personal and national, servitude and collapse is right around the corner, if we do not implement trade and defense policy that reflects the best interests of US, the American people, and our nation, and not the corporatist, elitist, one worlders and their dreams of a one world state that they rule over in perpetuity.

http://www.armscontrolcenter.org/policy/securityspending/articles/us_vs_world.gif

[JohnEngland]

These big government guys at NR don't support national defense, they support national offense.

Ron should use that line when they attack him for being "an isolationist". He should tell them, "I support sensible national defense, not debt-ridden national offense".

[kah13176]

Look at the comments. The one with a star next to it means it has been approved for publication. The other four comments that have not been approved are critical of the article.

I posted a scathing comment but I doubt it'll be approved.

[JohnEngland]

And I just want to add that this sentence really annoys me:

"America’s interests, whether economic, strategic, diplomatic, or moral, cannot be set aside when Congress tires of them."

So what exactly are "America's interests"? Manipulating Kenya's Constitution to encourage socialism? Funding the world's abortions? These people sound like "America's interests" are always the same, regardless of the administration in charge - that "national defense" should be exempt from critique and rational thought.

[Knightskye]

Do they realize that the proposal would only cut $100 billion off the defense budget? It would go from like, $820 billion down to $720 billion, and they're calling anyone who agrees with Ron Paul on foreign policy an "isolationist."

Imagine if we proposed $300 billion cuts.

[Lucille]

hxxp://hotair.com/headlines/archives/2011/01/03/ron-paul-and-the-new-isolationism/

[MaxPower]

The world is "getting more dangerous by the day," eh? I really wonder how people like this don't recognize their own paranoia. There is no military on Earth that is even close to touching that of the United States, and no country on Earth that actually has both plausible means and motivation to attack us. The best "threat" the warmonger faction in American politics can dredge up these days is Iran, which is a tiny third-world nation with a barely-existent military, and, contrary to propaganda, nothing vaguely resembling a working nuclear arsenal. Ahmadinejad may not be fond of the United States, but there is no evidence that he and his administration are profoundly stupid or suicidal, as they would have to be to actually attempt an attack on us. Short of that, we have Al-Qaeda, who do, at the least, want to attack the United States, but, as a small, poor and disjointed band of crazies, do not have the ability to inflict anything more severe than the proverbial equivalent of mosquito bites; our government's own wildly disproportionate reactions kill far more Americans and does far more damage to our economy and liberties than the terrorists themselves could ever hope to do.

[Slutter McGee]

LOL, I don't know why you guys are getting upset over this. It is the National Review. I am usually pretty reserved about using the term neo-con. I think most people support interventionism because they are deluded into thinking it is necessary for our security, not because they want to spread american exceptionalism.

So I don't use the term lightly when I say this. The National Review is neo-con central. Did ya'll expect anything else?

Sincerley,

Slutter McGee

[Brett85]

Ron should use that line when they attack him for being "an isolationist". He should tell them, "I support sensible national defense, not debt-ridden national offense".

Yes. Ron needs to change his rhetoric on this in order to actually appeal to GOP primary voters. He could get some coaching from Rand on this.

[muzzled dogg]

Ron Paul's isolationism was to blame for Hitler's rise to power

[Cowlesy]

LOL, I don't know why you guys are getting upset over this. It is the National Review. I am usually pretty reserved about using the term neo-con. I think most people support interventionism because they are deluded into thinking it is necessary for our security, not because they want to spread american exceptionalism.

So I don't use the term lightly when I say this. The National Review is neo-con central. Did ya'll expect anything else?

Sincerley,

Slutter McGee

Derbyshire is a main National Review staffer and I wouldn't call him a neoconservative by any stretch of the imagination (although he can still manage to piss off most libertarians).

[axiomata]

I talk regularly with a republican guy and just liek in the cold war they go totally off the rails when discussing defense. I think they think we get PAID to fight wars.

"If we are going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things -- praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts -- not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They might break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds." - C.S. Lewis

[Cap]

National Review=Neocon Central

Fucking neocons!

[lester1/2jr]

I don't understand the motivation of people who still think like this. When we were in the thick of the iraq war it was one thing, you don't want to be see nas abandoning the troops in the field but now? It's just weird.

[Anti Federalist]

"If we are going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb terrorists, let that bomb the terror, when it comes, find us doing sensible and human things -- praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts -- not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They might break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds." - C.S. Lewis

Updated.

[lester1/2jr]

from hot air

"While waste in the Pentagon’s budget can and should be cut, the new isolationists want to do it with a chainsaw when a scalpel is needed. "

I think that is like an exact obama quote.


"the U.S. Navy’s fleet has shrunk to its smallest size since the 19th century, just as potential rivals such as China have not only expanded theirs but have begun to target perceived American maritime vulnerabilities. The U.S. Air Force is fielding an aging and shrinking force, "

because they are pushing those guys into the marines to fight into the middle east and obviously putting their funding in those areas too.


"The U.S. Air Force is fielding an aging and shrinking force, while China is developing an advanced fighter for sale to adversaries of America, including Iran.
"


.does this guy think iran is going to fly a plane into the united states and bomb it!!!

[Matt Collins]

I don't understand the motivation of people who still think like this.It doesn't have to be rational or logical, they simply use it as a tool to gain and hold power, and to keep others from doing the same.

[axiomata]

Updated.

I left off that modification but if both you and the Humble Libertarian add it. (http://www.humblelibertarian.com/2010/12/what-cs-lewis-would-say-about-war-on.html)..

[Anti Federalist]

I left off that modification but if both you and the Humble Libertarian add it. (http://www.humblelibertarian.com/2010/12/what-cs-lewis-would-say-about-war-on.html)..

It's an awesome quote.

GMTA all the way around.