Category Archives: Foreign Policy

UPDATED (2/12): Yemen: Iraq All-Over Again, But Without The Ground Forces

Foreign Aid, Foreign Policy, Middle East, Military, Neoconservatism, Republicans, UN, War

“‘Yemeni Journalist: Saudi Arabia’s Total Blockade on Yemen is Death Sentence for All.'” But, apparently, some lowlifes on my Twitter feed are dancing with joy like the 9/11 rooftop dancers. Yes, maybe it’s Fake News. Seriously, if you wish this on Yemeni kids; I wish this on yours.

Maybe the dumb f-cks of the US government want more refugees pouring into the US, this time Yemeni ones. The Saudi’s, our bosom buddies, are barricading Yemeni ports. No aid gets through. They’re dying.

Veterans, however, seem to demand that we prop-up their warfare state:

UPDATE (2/12):

Mainstream Media Discovers Tulsi Gabbard, The Only Decent Democrat In Politics

Democrats, Donald Trump, Foreign Policy, Politics

“Tulsi Gabbard: Young, Unique, Reagan Democrat” was written as far back as December 24, 2015.

But I had first discovered this impressive Democrat on 2015/05/28. “Tulsi Gabbard Is Not A Total Ass,” I wrote soberly about an interview the Hawaiian Congresswoman gave to CNN. I was still in disbelief that a decent Democrat existed.

In the book, “The Trump Revolution: The Donald’s Creative Destruction Deconstructed,” I went on to hope that a President Donald Trump give Democrat Tulsi Gabbard an appointment in his future administration. (He did the opposite, appointing a neoconservative, that global village idiot, Nikki Haley, who hated him.)

“Luring the only decent Democrat currently in public life to a Trump administration may prove strategic, in scooping up Bernie Sanders’ voters. Being a Democrat generally comes with the presumption of asininity, which is why Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii is unusual. She’s an Iraq War veteran, who serves on the Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees. She’s poised, articulate, beautiful—and she never whinges like Michelle Fields. Tulsi stands firm against gratuitous wars, opposes the deposing of Bashar al-Assad, and despises Debbie Wasserman Schultz, despicable DNC Chair and handmaiden to Hillary.”

Finally, years on, mainstream media has caught on to Tulsi’s star power. In the November 6, 2017 Issue, The New Yorker has a profile of this “charismatic, unorthodox Democrat,” whose “opposition to U.S. intervention abroad” is quite libertarian:

…less than two weeks after the election, Gabbard agreed to meet with Trump to make her case for a noninterventionist foreign policy. A few months later, she flew to Syria and met with Bashar al-Assad, who is presiding over a brutal civil war; she and he seemed to agree that the United States should not intervene to stop it …

“What Does Tulsi Gabbard Believe?”

If Tulsi Gabbard topples the old Democrat guard, which she had fought during the 2016 election, Republicans are in trouble.

UPDATED (12/2): ‘Take ‘Em Down,’ Says Documentarian Ken Burns About The South’s Monuments

Critique, Foreign Policy, History, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Military, States' Rights, War

Let’s hear from all the sides in the Vietnam war, counsels Ken Burns, creator of the Public Broadcasting Service documentary, “Vietnam“: the North Vietnamese civilian; the Vietcong guerilla fighter, our erstwhile allies in the South. Let’s hear them all.

On the other hand, when it comes to the history of the South and the War of Northern Aggression, it’s, “Take those monuments DOWN!” More precisely, “Check the date on which the monument went up,” instructs the Burns. “If it’s the 1880s and 1890s take it down! They’re all, then, about the reimposition of white supremacy.”

This verbally incontinent filmmaker says the confederacy was traitorous. “OUR government” never recognized it. A rebellion was being suppressed by “us.”

You know what to expect from a Ken Burns “History of the Civil War.”

MUCH MORE EDIFYING:

“THE VIETNAM NIGHTMARE – AGAIN.”
“The Ghosts of Vietnam Should Haunt Us – but Don’t.”

UPDATE (12/2):

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NEW COLUMN. Niger: Finally, A War John McCain Doesn’t Love

Africa, Foreign Policy, Iran, John McCain, Middle East, War

NEW COLUMN. No war makes Johnny a sad boy. But finally, “Niger: A War John McCain Doesn’t Love.” It’s on the Mises Wire, standing for Austrian Economics, Freedom and peace. An excerpt:

News first broke about America’s Niger misadventure on October 4. “The real news here is that the US has forces in Niger, where they’re conducting covert operations,” this writer tweeted out. “Hashtag America First.”

Official media ignored the ambush of the American Special Forces, until the story gained anti-Trump traction. No word came from John McCain. Three weeks hence, the senator from Arizona is making history. McCain, who has never encountered a war he wasn’t eager to prosecute, is questioning the folly in Niger.

The senator from Arizona can run but can’t hide from the pollution he has left along his political path. Republicans wisely rejected war in Kosovo; McCain jettisoned party loyalty to call for bombs from above and “more boots on the ground.” At the prospects of war with Iran, McCain burst into song, “Bomb-bomb-bomb, bomb-bomb-Iran.” The possibility still makes this war ghoul smile. Before that, McCain promised a 100-year war in Iraq.

Senator McCain’s jingoism has encompassed Syria, Georgia, Mali, Nigeria, and China. Where the US could not effect regime change, as it did fecklessly in Afghanistan and Libya—McCain would typically call to side with an imagined local “friend of America” against an imagined “foe of America.” McCain has many imaginary friends.

Where his target country was beyond US bullying (Russia), the idea of the resumption of a cold war was an option McCain liked. He is currently fulminating over a slight delay in sanctions against Russia. When all efforts to tame the world militarily fail, McCain is partial to the idea of UN troops acting as his surrogates, say in Sudan.

No war makes Johnny a sad boy. But now he’s considering a subpoena over Niger.

GLOBAL CENTRALIZER

Playing out in Niger are the permanently entrenched, unchanging, American foreign-policy interests. Keen observers will detect a familiar pattern. Once again, the American bias everywhere is toward a powerful, overweening central state. This conceit has put our forces on a collision course with the tribal interests America toils to tame. …

… READ THE REST. The complete column is “Niger: Finally, A War John McCain Doesn’t Love.” It’s on the Mises Wire.