Irreconcilable: Conservatism and military interventionism
Conservatives hold themselves up as the defenders of the faith of our Fathers, and on most cases that is correct. Though there is an unfortunate amount of squish in Congress with respect to rolling back unconstitutional social welfare programs like Social Security and Medicare and unauthorized federal departments like Education and Energy, if you ask any conservative whether or not those programs and departments are constitutional (as opposed to something we're just stuck with), they'd almost certainly answer correctly. Ask a conservative about the Commerce or General Welfare clauses and you're more likely to get an answer in line with the intent of the Founders than if you asked a leftist, who would be inclined to argue that there is essentially no limitation to congressional authority when invoking those two clauses. On the judiciary, the conservative position is aligned with the Founders, who viewed judicial authority as very limited (neither the power of the purse nor the sword). Leftists, on the other hand, use the judiciary to implement via fiat that which they cannot accomplish via legitimate legislative action. On economics and monetary policy, here again we find conservatives more aligned with the Founders (free markets and precious metal coinage) than the left, who believe in unqualified government intervention in the private economy (as well as wealth redistribution) and support for the Federal Reserve. On balance, conservatives are in fact aligned with the tradition of Founders and the US Constitution, whereas the left believes in the living constitution and that the Founders are irrelevant because they were all white (not true) and that they were all slave owners (also not true).
We find conservatism on the ascendancy due to the TEA Party movement, which is a blend of conservatism and libertarianism and seeks a long overdue return to constitutional moorings. The American people are rejecting authoritarian leftism and embracing conservatism and libertarianism in greater numbers every day as people awaken to the dangers posed by an aggressive general government with an insatiable lust for power. But there is one glaring issue where conservatives have found themselves so far beyond the vision of the Founders it threatens our liberty in ways even more profound than the social engineering of the authoritarian left. I have grave concerns about conservatism's unending embrace of aggressive military interventionism that flies in the face of the founding of the Republic and the profound advice of our greatest Founding Fathers. There is a cancer growing in the conservative movement, and we must cut it out before the movement dies, and with it the Republic itself.
One of the most glaring weaknesses of an ideologue is the unwillingness to challenge dearly held dogma despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. This is generally the domain of the authoritarian left, not of great thinkers confident in the ability to use the gift of reason to discern great fundamental truths. Conservatives generally reason to logical conclusions, while statists invoke emotional legerdemain in order to achieve their authoritarian goals. So why is it, then, that conservatives shriek in horror whenever someone challenges conventional wisdom, especially with respect to matters concerning the military, and our involvement in the "war on terror"? Take the general reaction to Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf's contention that America's aggressive actions abroad might precipitate grave consequences at home. He said that the United States was an accessory to 9/11, and the response from the Right was to act like the Left and shout Rauf down and label him a lunatic. That may very well be as Rauf seems like a two-faced scoundrel, but intellectual honesty demands we ask ourselves the following question: is he right about our complicity in 9/11? It's a question that will almost certainly invoke pain and anger in any patriotic American. How could it not? 9/11 was, to this point, the worst tragedy most of us have ever lived through. Nevertheless, it is one that requires urgent reflection by the cheerleaders of the American empire. I am a conservative libertarian (ask any of my friends) and it is my firm belief that Rauf the scoundrel is correct, and unless conservatives grapple with the gravity of Newton's Third Law with respect to our use of military (and paramilitary) force around the world, we will sink further and further into tyranny.
Nine years after 9/11/01 it is time to review some basic history and reassess our approach to foreign policy, especially as it relates to the problem of Islamist terrorism. Islam's war against the United States dates back to the Jefferson presidency and the Tripolitan Wars, so our nation is no stranger to the tyranny of radical Islam. Islam is always on the march and we were attacked on 9/11, so obviously some sort of response was required. But our response continued the abandonment of the American tradition begun in Korea and the rice paddies of Vietnam, and morphed from legitimate response (a massive strike against Afghanistan and the Taliban) to wars of aggression (Iraq; the surge in Afghanistan; and now news comes of a major strike inside the sovereign borders of Pakistan).
Further, we ignore at our own peril how our own actions in the Middle East influence the behavior of those who resent and hate the American people and, especially, our government. Here we return to Imam Rauf's suggestion that we were an accessory to an attack on our own people. Is he right? Have we forgotten our CIA-led overthrow of Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran in 1953? Have we forgotten meddling in the Iran-Iraq War? Have we forgotten creating the mujahedeen in Afghanistan when the Soviets invaded in 1979? Should we not expect that interventionism will create resentment and hatred? What of our positioning of military bases on Muslim holy lands? Should we not expect this to incite anger and aggression? Would we take kindly to anyone putting a military base on American soil? President Kennedy risked global nuclear holocaust when the Soviet Union dared put nuclear weapons in Cuba, so I suspect I know the answer.
But to ask these questions of the conservative movement (and of the Republican establishment) is to invite not reflective consideration, but derision and ridicule. Ron Paul, a man of considerable intellectual heft, is an outcast in his own party for championing, amongst other things, the cause of a humble foreign policy. Humility in foreign policy is nothing to shun; it is the key to an effective foreign policy and global leadership. It is also something conservatives seem to have rejected out of hand in our anger and grief over the horrors of 9/11 and the complex struggle against radical Islam. Arrogance in foreign policy is not a sign of strength or one that exemplifies a "decent respect for the opinions of mankind". Quite the opposite, really. It shows an attitude of blatant disrespect for others, and suggests that our position, whatever it may be and whatever the cost in blood and treasure, is correct because it is the American position. Such arrogance and aggression position us for the kind of blowback we're experiencing all around the world. This blowback is the result of policy crafted without even a single moment of consideration as to why we were attacked in the first place and how that should influence our response. Instead of a limited but devastating counterattack designed to demonstrate American strength and resolve and mitigate the possibility of future terrorist attacks against the American people, our continuing war of aggression only begets more aggression against us and weakens us further every day.
The arrogance and interventionism that mark 21st century American foreign policy were decried by George Washington, who in his farewell address said, "The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. Europe has a set of primary interests, which to us have none, or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves, by artificial ties, in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities." Thomas Jefferson said, "[P]eace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none." John Adams avoided the possibility of war with France in the tradition of non-interventionism. Though not a Founder, President Monroe said, "In the wars of the European powers, in matters relating to themselves, we have never taken part, nor does it comport with our policy, so to do. It is only when our rights are invaded, or seriously menaced that we resent injuries, or make preparations for our defense." This tradition of non-interventionism carried from Washington all the way up to perhaps Teddy Roosevelt (who meddled in Panama), and certainly was abandoned by Woodrow Wilson and his crusade to make the world safe for democracy. But that was never the purpose of America nor the intent of our Founders.
The endless "war on terror" continues this rejection of the non-interventionist first principle of American foreign policy, and in its wake we find the eradication of our civil liberties here at home. It shouldn't be a surprise. As the architect of the Constitution said, "No nation can preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare." Madison said “no nation”, not “every nation but America.” So now due to the "war on terror" the American people have been subjected to the USA PATRIOT Act, a 180,000-person reckless and unaccountable global “national security” force, warrantless wiretapping at home, rendition and perhaps even torture abroad, virtual strip searches at airports, further abdication of the congressional responsibility to exercise its constitutional war-making powers and now, most unconscionable of all, the president of the United States claiming the authority to assassinate US citizens anywhere in the world without any congressional or judicial oversight. All of these policies are championed by conservatives as “necessities” in the “war on terror”, but none of these policies are conservative by any conceivable definition of the word. These authoritarian policies jettison anything left worth conserving of the Republic and place into the hands of the Bushian "unitary executive" all matters of life and death, of liberty and tyranny. It is, in short, a complete rejection of Americanism.
Madison continued,
These words ring ever true two centuries later, but where is the mainstream conservative movement when challenged on its support of the "war on terror" and its predictable erosion of civil liberties and unalienable rights? How can the conservative movement claim to be a champion of the Constitution and the rightful heirs of the Founding Fathers when it sits idly by while our rights are destroyed in the name of a little temporary safety? Correction. The conservative movement doesn't sit idly by. It demands yet more and more military action, which ultimately results in more death abroad and yet more destruction of our liberties here at home, never once stopping to ask if any of this has actually resulted in greater security for the American people. The chains that hang on us and our posterity as a result of endless war are as predictable as they were preventable. It's ironic at best that for all the lessons of the Founders absorbed by the conservative movement, our ability to coherently argue about commerce powers is rendered completely irrelevant in the face of a steroid-juiced, 10,000-pound gorilla of our own making staring us squarely in the face.
James Madison said, "If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy." So it has come to pass, and with great sadness and irony it has come with no small assist from the conservative movement. The contradiction between the insatiable lust for military action in the "war on terror" and the championing of constitutionalism at home is irreconcilable. After nine years of aggression it’s simply impossible to ignore this truth any longer. Conservatives must reject imperialism and embrace the American tradition of a humble and non-interventionist foreign policy before the consequences here at home are irreversible. Immediate repudiation of the neo-conservative/progressive agenda of aggressive military interventionism is the only way to begin the long, arduous task of restoring liberty in the United States of America.
END NOTE:
This piece was first published on "conservative" website RedState. The moderators at RedState decided that my opinion (which, as you'll see below, they completely distorted) was intolerable and they engaged in outright censorship. They banned me from their website. Here was the byproduct of their censorship, including the change of title and deletion and replacement of the text of this piece. RedState should be ashamed of themselves.
[I will not tolerate apologists for murderers.]
Posted by mshea_34 (Profile)
Thursday, September 30th at 12:44AM EDT
6 Comments
[Particularly those who like to babble about how the decision by vile men to pilot four airplanes into buildings is somehow our responsibility. Read Lileks's 2003 9/11 commentary, instead: it's a good deal more readable and contains pretty much no evil at all. - ML]
We find conservatism on the ascendancy due to the TEA Party movement, which is a blend of conservatism and libertarianism and seeks a long overdue return to constitutional moorings. The American people are rejecting authoritarian leftism and embracing conservatism and libertarianism in greater numbers every day as people awaken to the dangers posed by an aggressive general government with an insatiable lust for power. But there is one glaring issue where conservatives have found themselves so far beyond the vision of the Founders it threatens our liberty in ways even more profound than the social engineering of the authoritarian left. I have grave concerns about conservatism's unending embrace of aggressive military interventionism that flies in the face of the founding of the Republic and the profound advice of our greatest Founding Fathers. There is a cancer growing in the conservative movement, and we must cut it out before the movement dies, and with it the Republic itself.
One of the most glaring weaknesses of an ideologue is the unwillingness to challenge dearly held dogma despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. This is generally the domain of the authoritarian left, not of great thinkers confident in the ability to use the gift of reason to discern great fundamental truths. Conservatives generally reason to logical conclusions, while statists invoke emotional legerdemain in order to achieve their authoritarian goals. So why is it, then, that conservatives shriek in horror whenever someone challenges conventional wisdom, especially with respect to matters concerning the military, and our involvement in the "war on terror"? Take the general reaction to Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf's contention that America's aggressive actions abroad might precipitate grave consequences at home. He said that the United States was an accessory to 9/11, and the response from the Right was to act like the Left and shout Rauf down and label him a lunatic. That may very well be as Rauf seems like a two-faced scoundrel, but intellectual honesty demands we ask ourselves the following question: is he right about our complicity in 9/11? It's a question that will almost certainly invoke pain and anger in any patriotic American. How could it not? 9/11 was, to this point, the worst tragedy most of us have ever lived through. Nevertheless, it is one that requires urgent reflection by the cheerleaders of the American empire. I am a conservative libertarian (ask any of my friends) and it is my firm belief that Rauf the scoundrel is correct, and unless conservatives grapple with the gravity of Newton's Third Law with respect to our use of military (and paramilitary) force around the world, we will sink further and further into tyranny.
Nine years after 9/11/01 it is time to review some basic history and reassess our approach to foreign policy, especially as it relates to the problem of Islamist terrorism. Islam's war against the United States dates back to the Jefferson presidency and the Tripolitan Wars, so our nation is no stranger to the tyranny of radical Islam. Islam is always on the march and we were attacked on 9/11, so obviously some sort of response was required. But our response continued the abandonment of the American tradition begun in Korea and the rice paddies of Vietnam, and morphed from legitimate response (a massive strike against Afghanistan and the Taliban) to wars of aggression (Iraq; the surge in Afghanistan; and now news comes of a major strike inside the sovereign borders of Pakistan).
Further, we ignore at our own peril how our own actions in the Middle East influence the behavior of those who resent and hate the American people and, especially, our government. Here we return to Imam Rauf's suggestion that we were an accessory to an attack on our own people. Is he right? Have we forgotten our CIA-led overthrow of Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran in 1953? Have we forgotten meddling in the Iran-Iraq War? Have we forgotten creating the mujahedeen in Afghanistan when the Soviets invaded in 1979? Should we not expect that interventionism will create resentment and hatred? What of our positioning of military bases on Muslim holy lands? Should we not expect this to incite anger and aggression? Would we take kindly to anyone putting a military base on American soil? President Kennedy risked global nuclear holocaust when the Soviet Union dared put nuclear weapons in Cuba, so I suspect I know the answer.
But to ask these questions of the conservative movement (and of the Republican establishment) is to invite not reflective consideration, but derision and ridicule. Ron Paul, a man of considerable intellectual heft, is an outcast in his own party for championing, amongst other things, the cause of a humble foreign policy. Humility in foreign policy is nothing to shun; it is the key to an effective foreign policy and global leadership. It is also something conservatives seem to have rejected out of hand in our anger and grief over the horrors of 9/11 and the complex struggle against radical Islam. Arrogance in foreign policy is not a sign of strength or one that exemplifies a "decent respect for the opinions of mankind". Quite the opposite, really. It shows an attitude of blatant disrespect for others, and suggests that our position, whatever it may be and whatever the cost in blood and treasure, is correct because it is the American position. Such arrogance and aggression position us for the kind of blowback we're experiencing all around the world. This blowback is the result of policy crafted without even a single moment of consideration as to why we were attacked in the first place and how that should influence our response. Instead of a limited but devastating counterattack designed to demonstrate American strength and resolve and mitigate the possibility of future terrorist attacks against the American people, our continuing war of aggression only begets more aggression against us and weakens us further every day.
The arrogance and interventionism that mark 21st century American foreign policy were decried by George Washington, who in his farewell address said, "The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. Europe has a set of primary interests, which to us have none, or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves, by artificial ties, in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities." Thomas Jefferson said, "[P]eace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none." John Adams avoided the possibility of war with France in the tradition of non-interventionism. Though not a Founder, President Monroe said, "In the wars of the European powers, in matters relating to themselves, we have never taken part, nor does it comport with our policy, so to do. It is only when our rights are invaded, or seriously menaced that we resent injuries, or make preparations for our defense." This tradition of non-interventionism carried from Washington all the way up to perhaps Teddy Roosevelt (who meddled in Panama), and certainly was abandoned by Woodrow Wilson and his crusade to make the world safe for democracy. But that was never the purpose of America nor the intent of our Founders.
The endless "war on terror" continues this rejection of the non-interventionist first principle of American foreign policy, and in its wake we find the eradication of our civil liberties here at home. It shouldn't be a surprise. As the architect of the Constitution said, "No nation can preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare." Madison said “no nation”, not “every nation but America.” So now due to the "war on terror" the American people have been subjected to the USA PATRIOT Act, a 180,000-person reckless and unaccountable global “national security” force, warrantless wiretapping at home, rendition and perhaps even torture abroad, virtual strip searches at airports, further abdication of the congressional responsibility to exercise its constitutional war-making powers and now, most unconscionable of all, the president of the United States claiming the authority to assassinate US citizens anywhere in the world without any congressional or judicial oversight. All of these policies are championed by conservatives as “necessities” in the “war on terror”, but none of these policies are conservative by any conceivable definition of the word. These authoritarian policies jettison anything left worth conserving of the Republic and place into the hands of the Bushian "unitary executive" all matters of life and death, of liberty and tyranny. It is, in short, a complete rejection of Americanism.
Madison continued,
Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people…. [There is also an] inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and ... degeneracy of manners and of morals…. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.
A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty. The means of defence against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people.
Oppressors can tyrannize only when they achieve a standing army, an enslaved press, and a disarmed populace.
A well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained in arms, is the best most natural defense of a free country.
These words ring ever true two centuries later, but where is the mainstream conservative movement when challenged on its support of the "war on terror" and its predictable erosion of civil liberties and unalienable rights? How can the conservative movement claim to be a champion of the Constitution and the rightful heirs of the Founding Fathers when it sits idly by while our rights are destroyed in the name of a little temporary safety? Correction. The conservative movement doesn't sit idly by. It demands yet more and more military action, which ultimately results in more death abroad and yet more destruction of our liberties here at home, never once stopping to ask if any of this has actually resulted in greater security for the American people. The chains that hang on us and our posterity as a result of endless war are as predictable as they were preventable. It's ironic at best that for all the lessons of the Founders absorbed by the conservative movement, our ability to coherently argue about commerce powers is rendered completely irrelevant in the face of a steroid-juiced, 10,000-pound gorilla of our own making staring us squarely in the face.
James Madison said, "If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy." So it has come to pass, and with great sadness and irony it has come with no small assist from the conservative movement. The contradiction between the insatiable lust for military action in the "war on terror" and the championing of constitutionalism at home is irreconcilable. After nine years of aggression it’s simply impossible to ignore this truth any longer. Conservatives must reject imperialism and embrace the American tradition of a humble and non-interventionist foreign policy before the consequences here at home are irreversible. Immediate repudiation of the neo-conservative/progressive agenda of aggressive military interventionism is the only way to begin the long, arduous task of restoring liberty in the United States of America.
END NOTE:
This piece was first published on "conservative" website RedState. The moderators at RedState decided that my opinion (which, as you'll see below, they completely distorted) was intolerable and they engaged in outright censorship. They banned me from their website. Here was the byproduct of their censorship, including the change of title and deletion and replacement of the text of this piece. RedState should be ashamed of themselves.
[I will not tolerate apologists for murderers.]
Posted by mshea_34 (Profile)
Thursday, September 30th at 12:44AM EDT
6 Comments
[Particularly those who like to babble about how the decision by vile men to pilot four airplanes into buildings is somehow our responsibility. Read Lileks's 2003 9/11 commentary, instead: it's a good deal more readable and contains pretty much no evil at all. - ML]
posted by The Rock | 8:05 AM
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