The Necessity of Building an Unreal Foreign Policy

Bryan Preston takes Ron Paul to task over Mubarak, Egypt and the general run of US foreign policy since the end of World War II:

During his speech at CPAC Friday, Rep. Ron Paul declared that the US “propped up” Egyptian president Mubarak and, essentially, blamed the United States for his dictatorship. I’d like to put the question to Dr. Paul, what should the United States have done during the Cold War? That is when our alliance with Egypt developed, and it developed largely in response to the threat posed by the USSR…

Preston then goes through the whole litany of a realistic US policy – Egypt controls one of the most strategic points on the globe (the Suez Canal) and was playing both sides of the street; we needed to get her on our side. By playing up to first Sadat and then Mubarak we kept the Soviets out and got an Egypt-Israeli peace treaty. Muabarak’s regime kept a lid on Islamism. All of this has the great benefit of being true – but does that also mean it was good US policy? In the end, after decades of doing this, is the US in a good position now and likely to retain that position for the future? I’d have to say, no.

Yes, dealing with the tyrants kept the USSR out and the Islamists down – but now that the USSR is gone, what advantage accrues to us for having kept it out? And by keeping the Islamists down all these years, what did we get other than the Islamists looking good in Egyptian public opinion simply because (a) they were martyred by the regime and (b) are not responsible either for the regime’s crimes, nor the crimes of other Islamsits around the world? The Islamists are at least unpopular in Iran by now – only ruthless repression keeps them in power there and they may fall at any time…but Egypt has no experience of them. Rather than dealing with communist apparatchiks in a Soviet-dominated Egypt during the Cold War, we might be dealing with an insane, messianic regime of Islamists during the War on Terrorism.

Furthermore, about that peace treaty – what did it really amount to? Egypt started war after unjust war against Israel and got soundly beaten each time. Even in their greatest effort – the Yom Kippur War – where they came within an ace of victory, they still ended up crushed. People who start wars and lose them are supposed to cede territory and pay an indemnity to the victors. Instead, Egypt was given back everything they lost in war and could never regain by fighting and rather than indemnify Israel for the wars, Egypt actually got us handing them about $60 billion over the years. And now if an Islamist regime comes to power in Egypt, we might find the peace treaty denounced and all that “aid” down the toilet. And, of course, the prospect of an actual shooting war with Israel at some point. The problem with peace treaty, ultimately, was that the provisions were dependent upon the regime in Egypt, not the interests of the Egyptian people. No regime, no peace treaty. Perhaps it would have been better if we had let the Israelis capture the whole Suez (they very nearly had at the end of Yom Kippur) and then annex it…without Suez, Egypt is as strategic as a cabbage, and thus of no concern to anyone except Egyptians.

And, finally, by backing Mubarak all these years we have built up a reservoir of distrust, if not hatred, on the part of the Egyptian people for the United States. While they suffered poverty and oppression, they saw American leaders in a steady stream coming to glad hand and speak highly of the man who was their bane. This doesn’t mean we can’t gain the trust of the Egyptian people, but it will be a long, hard road – and a road we would not have to travel if, over the past 30 years, all Egypt’s government got from us was demands for liberty. A realistic foreign policy (so called) has been a complete failure for the United States – what we need, instead, is an American foreign policy.

And this is where Ron Paul actually gets it wrong, as most Libertarians do. The United States cannot retreat from the world – we must be engaged on all levels and everywhere in order to ensure that at least some peace and freedom survive. There is simply no other nation on earth – or even group of nations – which can fill the gap if America withdraws. We must be there with our words and our might in order to provide a balance against those who would disturb the peace. Naturally, some things can be done to modify US policy – we don’t need troops in a lot of places we have them and we must be wary of using our power…but Paul and those like him would surrender the world to barbarism and tyranny and eventually force America, alone and at bay, to face a host of enemies gathered to kill the last bastion of civilization.

A balance must be struck – a balance between the need for engagement and the need to keep America free from entanglements with unsavory regimes. What has been termed a “real” US foreign policy has produced disaster. Time, then, to get a bit “unreal”. As long time readers know, I already have a set of policy proposals in place for this:

1. Freedom Trade – rather than freely trading with everyone, including our most deadly enemies (and thus building them to be ever larger threats), we should only engage in economic relations with other free nations around the world. If you’re living in liberty, you can freely trade with the United States…if you’re living in tyranny, you can’t so much as sell us a button. This will ensure we are never economically tied to enemy States, as well as helping other free people to grow in power and prosperity.

2. Build a Union of Democratic States – ditch the corrupt UN where tyrants are absurdly permitted to rub shoulders with free men, replace it with an organization of free nations who will be bound to come to the defense of any free State attacked by a tyrannical regime.

3. Prohibit the deployment of US ground forces outside the territory of the United States except under a declared state of war. No more setting US troops up as hostages to enemy foreign policy. By keeping our boots off the ground except after a declaration of war, we’ll retain our diplomatic and military freedom of action – only having to engage in a fight (other than smaller scale naval and aerial campaigns, at need) when we really feel it necessary.

A proper US foreign policy must be geared towards the way Americans are, and the ideals Americans hold. That is the reality – and a realistic US policy must be something Americans can understand and fully back regardless of how difficult it is. We are a good people, and deserve a foreign policy which reflects our intense hatred of tyranny and our firm desire for justice for all. Doing anything else just makes a mess – as we now see in Egypt.

Trump Says He's Pro-Life

Interesting:

…In an interview this past week with Laura Ingraham from Fox News, Trump characterized himself as “pro-life.” In his 2000 book The America We Deserve, Trump wrote, “I support a woman’s right to choose but I am uncomfortable with the procedures.” But, in an apparant reversal, he told the audience at CPAC, “I am pro-life” and pledged to fight for the reversal of Obamacare, which contains abortion funding loopholes…

Political posturing, or just following the general American trend towards the pro-life position? We’d only know for certain if he got in to office and we could see what sort of policies he advanced. But by announcing a pro-life position, Trump would remove a big roadblock to getting social conservative support. This doesn’t mean we’ll be lining up to back him, but it does get him on the playing field.

We’ll see how this plays out – but my view, for now, is that this is a giant head-fake to the GOP; that, in the end, if Trump decides to run, he’ll run as an Independent…but, meanwhile, will have built up some good feelings about his candidacy on the right.

Obama Spying on Americans!

Well, that is what you liberals called it when Bush did it – from McClatchy:

The Obama administration’s Justice Department has asserted that the FBI can obtain telephone records of international calls made from the U.S. without any formal legal process or court oversight, according to a document obtained by McClatchy.

That assertion was revealed — perhaps inadvertently — by the department in its response to a McClatchy request for a copy of a secret Justice Department memo…

You liberals will, of course, now demand that Obama be impeached and be hauled up on war crimes charges. Right?

I won’t hold my breath…

Poll: 65% Support Prayer in Public Schools

Amazing result from Rasmussen:

The debate rages as it has for decades whether there really is a constitutionally mandated separation of church and state, but most Americans don’t seem to mind mixing prayer and public education.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 65% of American Adults favor prayer in public schools. Twenty-four percent (24%) are opposed, while 11% are not sure…

How about that? After decades of relentless and lying propaganda to the effect that religion is bad and that we have separation of Church and State in America, most Americans don’t mind if the kids start the day with a prayer.

This just verifies what I already know – that the American people are morally sensible people. They’ve been beaten down by the liberal fascism which insults and slanders everyone who disagrees with liberalism, but underneath that onslaught, America’s moral center endured. And now it is rising back to the surface and starting to take back its own.

Taxation Without Representation?

From the Wall Street Journal:

Connecticut and New Jersey residents with a Hamptons summer cottage or a Manhattan pied-a-terre are about to get a nasty surprise: New York state wants more taxes from them.

A New York court ruled last month that all income earned by a New Canaan, Conn., couple is subject to New York state taxes because they own a summer home on Long Island they used only a few times a year. They have been hit with an additional tax bill of $1.06 million…

Boiled down, the tax court ruled that it doesn’t matter if the home owners live in the house – it only matter if they could live in the house. As long as the house you own in New York meets that criteria, then you are liable for the full range of New York State taxation. I really can’t imagine anything more absurd – but bankrupt, liberal States like New York will look for revenues everywhere they can find them. The question is, what do we do about it?

It would stand to reason that as this couple lives in Connecticut that they are registered to vote in that State – meaning they cannot be registered to vote in New York, and thus all taxation imposed by the State of New York is done without the representation of the Connecticut couple to be taxed on activities done outside of New York. This isn’t a matter of property taxes – you buy property, you buy the property taxes the local government has imposed upon it…but if you live elsewhere and earn your income elsewhere, whence comes this power of a government you are not part of to tax you? To me, this is taxation without representation.

Goodness knows I’m a stalwart for State’s rights, but what New York has done here is tyrannical in its entirety. If it requires federal action, then that should be done – you should only be taxed on income earned within the jurisdiction where your income-making activity is located. New York has no right to tax the income of someone who doesn’t earn New York income. Doing so is as silly as the United States taxing the income of a British firm for money they made in India because they also have an office in the United States. This ruling must not be allowed to stand.

Egyptian Army Eases Mubarak Out

Because that is what really happened – the people in the square were there yesterday, as well, when Mubarak said he’d hang tough. More than likely, the regime gave Mubarak one, last chance to try and hang in there – and when it failed, the regime said it was time to go. Now, Mubarak’s hand-picked VP and the army are in charge…hardly a regime-change as it was Mubarak and the army in charge, and Mubarak was Anwar Sadat’s hand-picked successor way back when.

This does not mean that there won’t be some major changes coming up – clearly, the Nasser/Sadat/Mubarak model no longer works. New forces are lose and bottling them up would take more oppression than anyone over there is likely willing to apply. And, so, new men will rise…but, which new men? That is the worry – and why we should still go with “no trade, no aid”. Back off from the whole mess, no more support for Egypt’s army…see how things shake out. If the regime resolves itself in to a quasi-Mubarak type regime, we want no part of it. If the regime resolves itself in to a forcing-ground for Moslem Brotherhood rule, we want no part of it. If, though, a genuine democracy is created, then we step back in with all sorts of aid.

Unfortunately, we have a government with neither the will to intervene nor the will to stay out – we’re dipping our toes in to revolution and angering both the establishment and the rebels. Could be a very long couple of years…

UPDATE: Meet the new boss, same as the old boss…

CBO: ObamaCare Will Cost 800,000 Jobs

Guess we’re really finding out what’s in it, now – from The Weekly Standard:

Testifying today before the House Budget Committee, Congressional Budget Office (CBO) Director Doug Elmendorf confirmed that Obamacare is expected to reduce the number of jobs in the labor market by an estimated 800,000…

…Rep. [John] Campbell: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, we’ll — and Dr. Elmendorf — and we’ll continue this conversation right now. First on health care, before I get to — before I get to broader issues, you just mentioned that you believe — or that in your estimate, that the health care law would reduce the labor used in the economy by about 1/2 of 1 percent, given that, I believe you say, there’s 160 million full-time people working in ’20-’21. That means that, in your estimation, the health care law would reduce employment by 800,000 in ’20-’21. Is that correct?

Director Elmendorf: Yes. The way I would put it is that we do estimate, as you said, that…employment will be about 160 million by the end of the decade. Half a percent of that is 800,000.

That is the CBO, liberals – your gold standard of what is going to happen. You’ve been telling us for the past two years that what CBO says, goes…and now the CBO is saying that 800,000 people won’t have jobs once ObamaCare is fully implemented. Have you got an answer for this? Or will you run and hide, and essentially admit that you were just cherry-picking data you liked vis a vis ObamaCare?

Can the Obama Administration Get Even Dumber?

Yes, it can – from NRO’s The Corner:

James Clapper, the head of intelligence for the United States of America, has explained to Congress that the Muslim Brotherhood is “largely secular.” It further has “eschewed violence,” decries al-Qaeda as a “perversion of Islam,” and really just wants “social ends” and “a betterment of the political order in Egypt.”

I kid you not…

This is the man in charge of ensuring the President has the best intelligence possible of what is going on in the world – whatever decisions Obama will make regarding Egypt and the larger issues will be based upon what Clapper says…and Clapper’s statements are the exact opposite of the truth about the Moslem Brotherhood.

We’re in for a very bad time, foreign policy-wise…

Is the Battle for Lower Taxes, or for Civilization?

Nick Gillespie over at Reason has an interesting article – from the distinctly Libertarian point of view – regarding all the fracas over CPAC…who is attending, who is not attending, what is conservatism, etc. It is a genuine must read. Not that I agree with Gillespie – especially this bit:

…And third, social cons have lost, period. Gays are not going back in the closet and demands for equal standing under the law are logically coherent from a conservative POV. Gays didn’t destroy marriage or the family (neither of which is in ruins, by the way, but that’s another issue). The same goes for drug legalization, which has been touted by such raging liberals as William F. Buckley. In terms of abortion, like it or not, the country has settled into a semi-easy truce that abortion earlier in a pregnancy is OK and the closer the mother comes to term, the less comfortable people feel with it. In any case, advances in contraception and reproductive technologies will almost certainly render such decisions moot as people have gain ever-vaster control of their bodies…

Oh, so that’s it, then? We’re just supposed to retreat to the sidelines, provide millions of votes and tens of millions of dollars in campaign funds and get nothing but lower taxes out of the deal? I hate to break it to the Libertarians of the world, but they can’t win election to dog catcher without us. True blue social conservatives probably outnumber true blue Libertarians by 10 to 1. We dog, you tail; you don’t get to wag us.

Marriage and the family are in ruins – and with it, our civilization. Perhaps a Libertarian doesn’t see rampant drug abuse, kids having sex, nauseating pornography throughout popular culture and the increasing recourse to extreme violence on the part of some as a death of civilization, but we do. And we’re bound and determined to stop the rot and reverse the course. Don’t try to tell us we can’t turn back the clock – we darned well can, and will. There will come a day when abortion no longer takes place, where divorce becomes the bizarre exception to the rule and people are, once again, shocked by sex and violence in public.

This is not to say it will be easily done. In fact, we may “lose” in the sense that this civilization may, indeed, die. But we social conservatives – Christians, you know? – will just rebuild from the ashes, as we have done time and time again. We’d rather not have to rebuild from scratch, but we’re not about to sell our souls and help with the destruction of our civilization. One way or the other, we will win. And if Libertarians want to come along for the ride, they’re welcome to it – because we recognize that small government is best and taxes should be lower and, in general, people should not be bothered about what they do behind closed doors…we’re certainly better for Libertarians than the Totalitarians on the left.

Now, if Libertarians decide that they don’t want to work with us because of our adherence to morality, then that is their choice. It may cause the whole conservative cause to come out loser in the contest. How that will help Libertarians is a bit of a mystery. It won’t particularly hurt us – we’ll hunker down, say our prayers and wait until in God’s good time, things come our way, again. The silliest thing a Libertarian can do is cut loose from us – but if a rigid, ideological demand that two men be allowed to “marry” is more important to Libertarians than people, on the whole, being free, that is their business.

As for me and my fellow social conservatives, we’re just fine. We’re having a good time, feel good about the way things are going and are absolutely confident that the gates of Hell will not prevail. So, make up your mind, Libertarians – join us or die.

UPDATE: Allahpundit reports a bit more on the battle over CPAC. Interesting bit – both in the gratuitous insult by a GOProud representative, and his very manly apology for getting off base. The bottom line is that we should all work together – the battle is against the left, after all. But this has all been a good lesson to all concerned that the right lives or dies with the social conservatives…we in conservative Christianity drive the movement. We’re willing to be pretty darn flexible, but we won’t roll over for anyone.

UPDATE II: And Ann Coulter weighs in:

(6) Are gay rights part and parcel with basic conservatism? If so, why are so many elected Republicans so skittish/unsupportive about the subject? If not, tell me why.

No, we don’t generally care for identity politics of any sort, much less hearing about people’s sex lives, even Nino Scalia’s. (And judging by the number of children he has, it’s pretty active.) Conservatives believe in individual rights, low tax rates, fighting terrorism and punishing criminals — so do gays! They also happen to believe Judy Garland was the most underappreciated and misunderstood person in the history of show business. I don’t think most gays care about gay marriage; they like going to the gay marriage meeting because it’s a good way to meet other gays.

Mubarak Hangs Tough, Obama Boxed In

With Mubarak deciding to stay in office what we have is a situation where we have neither kept friends with the old regime, nor made friends with the new. Both sides in Egypt – the current group of kleptocrats and the thugs/rabble/perhaps some democrats who want to replace them – have reason to dislike American policy…while the ultimate power in Egypt, the army, has not been made to understand that their support from the US is at risk. A more stupid way of going about things could not be imagined – quite simply, if we wanted to have an Egyptian policy it should have been either to back Mubarak to the hilt (something I say “no” to) or ditch him entirely and get on side with the democratic rebels (if there are any such – this is my preferred policy, with the proviso of standing off from the rebels until we get a better idea where they’re headed). We got the worst of both worlds.

With US policy in shambles and new power structures emerging – none of which will trust us as an ally nor fear us as a foe – the only thing we can hope for, now, is that nothing really bad happens until we can get Obama out of office.