Libertarian Conservatism

Thanks for the blog so far. Its definitely interesting.

So in my ongoing reluctance to convert to a Paul supporter, I want to ask you something. It seems that Paul is not against military strength, simply having a constitutional mandate to engage in war and then conducting it well. It never ceases to amaze me that we defeat both Japan and Germany in WWII in less time than we have currently been fighting the war on terror. We have bombers that could carpet bomb entire cities with no loss of life (and no collateral damage, either, if we pursue the leaflet warning route...) Yet we engage in this war as if to avoid offending the enemy.

I get the part about winning hearts and minds, and that it will eventually be our ideas that win out rather than our military might, but I don't get why we have such dangerous (for us) rules of engagement.

It seems Paul is someone who is much more hesitant about using military force, much more hesitant about keeping alliances, but much more willing to use force required IF a war was declared constitutionally. Is that accurate?

I think what you say is fairly accurate. However, Ron Paul DID vote in support of the Afghan War even though it wasn't a formal declaration. Of course,in that case, there was no recognized government to declare war against.

But I think it's also important to recognize that many of the so-called conflicts that we have with other countries are actually manufactured here at home by people with an interest in promoting that conflict.

Our present conflict with Iran is a perfect example.

We have no strong evidence that they are developing any kind of nuclear weapon.

They are permitted to develop nuclear power peacefully under the NPT.

The Ayatollah has issued a fatwa against the possession of nuclear weapons.

Iran has offered to permit all kinds of intrusive inspections of their nuclear program, 24 hours a day. They've offered to sign the Additional Protocol which would allow their imports to be inspected to assure that they weren't importing weapons-making materials. They've offered to limit the number of centrifuges that they will use.

These amount to virtually iron-clad guarantees that their peaceful program will not be diverted into a weapons program. Yet the Bush Administration has turned all of these down and threatens to bomb Iran even though our own gov't and the CIA says they have no WMD.

Surely, from all of these proposals we should be able to construct a compromise that would allow Iran to enrich uranium to commercial grade at the same time that we could assure that they did not acquire a nuclear weapon.

We don't do this because there are many elements in this country who want to keep this conflict alive, and they have a great deal of influence in the Bush Administration. Worse yet, I fear, is that they have influence in any likely successor administration regardless of the political party.

So how does this policy pertain to the dictatorships in our hemisphere?

Would Paul start trade with Cuba? Would Venezuela's Castro Jr. be allowed to do whatever he wants?

The logic of Ron Paul's position would presumably support trade with Cuba although I suppose it would depend to some extent on the origin of the trade embargo which I believe began under the Eisenhower Administration when Castro seized American-owned property without paying for it. But I think that policy has since morphed into something about bringing democracy to Cuba and that sort of thing.

What threat does either Cuba or Venezuela pose to the U.S.? Why do need to concern ourselves with what their leaders say about world affairs? Why do we need to concern ourselves with their domestic form of government? It would be nice if they had democratic rule, but that is something the Cubans have to achieve for themselves and the Venezuelans have to preserve.

That is my view. I'm not sure what Ron Paul's position is, but I assume that it would be something similar to that.

Here is the URL for a link to a Ron Paul essay on Cuba. He favors an end to the embargo:

http://www.ronpaullibrary.org/document.php?id=968

Here is the URL for the Ron Paul library where this came from and where Ron Paul's position on many other issues is presented:

http://www.ronpaullibrary.org/index.php

I liked it. He's right, years of embargo: Cuba still communist. Free trade hits Russia: USSR falls and becomes a free society. Want to change cuba? Change the embargo.

I like that Paul is on the same page as me. As for Venezuela, it isn't a threat, but Chavez is not doing any favors for American interests over there. He refuses to let his currency be traded with the dollar, he nationalized multiple US businesses there, and he has the proverbial oil noose ready to be cinched tight if need be.

I'm not in favor of imposing embargoes, but I think the best foreign policy is that proposed by Natan Sharansky in the "Case for Democracy."

In case you haven't read it, he proposes linking our involvement with other nations, (including in terms of foreign aid ) to the extent that they grant freedom to their citizens. That may seem to contradict what I just said I believe about trade liberating countries such as Cuba. I am still looking for the middle ground, or where I am mistaken about some idea.