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10-31-2014, 10:26 AM
Rand Paul: ‘Huge Percentage’ Of Washington Elites Are Neoconservatives, Hardly Any Are Realists
OCTOBER 23, 2014 By Ben Domenech
In an interview with The Federalist, Rand Paul previewed his foreign policy address tonight, in which he plans to make the case for “conservative realism” as a consistent and wise policy approach.
Rand Paul: We’ll be talking about basically the theme of conservative realism. The concept is that there is a position of foreign policy that I think is very much attractive to Conservatives. There hasn’t been a leader filling that spot as well because there are two views, basically, espoused in foreign policy.
One is that we’re nowhere any time. That would be isolationism, but there’s another extreme that we’re everywhere all the time. That would be interventionism. I think conservative realism is the more moderate position which says that: you follow the Constitution. If we have to become involved in war, enmeshed in conflict, you have to involve the Congress to accomplish what the Constitution has intended.
Then there’s also there’s the second part of the debate. The debate is over whether or not there’s a national security interest, whether it’s a vital American interest, which is needed before we go to war. I think often, too often, that those debates really never occur. We just have a conclusion – we’ll stand up, say it’s in our national security interest. In theory, that needs to be a debate. Like last year, there was a big debate over Syria and I was one of the loudest voices saying that it’s a mistake to give weapons to the Syrian rebels, because one day we’ll have to fight those weapons. A year later it turns out that I was accurate.
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read more:
http://thefederalist.com/2014/10/23/rand-paul-huge-percentage-of-washington-elites-are-neoconservatives-hardly-any-are-realists/
OCTOBER 23, 2014 By Ben Domenech
In an interview with The Federalist, Rand Paul previewed his foreign policy address tonight, in which he plans to make the case for “conservative realism” as a consistent and wise policy approach.
Rand Paul: We’ll be talking about basically the theme of conservative realism. The concept is that there is a position of foreign policy that I think is very much attractive to Conservatives. There hasn’t been a leader filling that spot as well because there are two views, basically, espoused in foreign policy.
One is that we’re nowhere any time. That would be isolationism, but there’s another extreme that we’re everywhere all the time. That would be interventionism. I think conservative realism is the more moderate position which says that: you follow the Constitution. If we have to become involved in war, enmeshed in conflict, you have to involve the Congress to accomplish what the Constitution has intended.
Then there’s also there’s the second part of the debate. The debate is over whether or not there’s a national security interest, whether it’s a vital American interest, which is needed before we go to war. I think often, too often, that those debates really never occur. We just have a conclusion – we’ll stand up, say it’s in our national security interest. In theory, that needs to be a debate. Like last year, there was a big debate over Syria and I was one of the loudest voices saying that it’s a mistake to give weapons to the Syrian rebels, because one day we’ll have to fight those weapons. A year later it turns out that I was accurate.
...
read more:
http://thefederalist.com/2014/10/23/rand-paul-huge-percentage-of-washington-elites-are-neoconservatives-hardly-any-are-realists/