Answering hawks who call his foreign policy one of a “isolationist,” Senator Rand Paul pushed back on “Fox New Sunday,” including using a quote from the Republican standard-bearer and president wildly viewed to have been one of the strongest in the 20th century, Ronald Reagan. The libertarian-leaning Republican senator from Kentucky said he was in the mainstream of the Republican Party, not the hawks.
“There’s not one Republican who is saying we should put military troops into Crimea or into Ukraine,” Paul said. “So I think I’m right in the middle of that position, and I think those who would try to argue that somehow I’m different than the mainstream Republican opinion are people who want to take advantage for their own person political gain.”
In fact, a new CNN/Opinion Research Poll found just 1 in 10 Americans support sending U.S. ground troops to Ukraine.
“I’m a great believer in a strong national defense,” Paul added. “In fact, what Ronald Reagan said in about one sentence sums up real a lot of what I believe. He said to our potential adversary, he said, ‘Don’t mistake our reluctance for war for a lack of resolve.’ People knew that with Ronald Reagan. They still need to know that with the United States,” said Paul.
The senator articulated an analysis of the Crimea crisis that has been gaining traction, after a knee-jerk reaction made its way through the 24 — 48 hour news cycles immediately after the developments last week. It’s not a question of what the U.S. and the West can do now, but a question of what Obama should have done in the past five years with regard to Russia.
“And part of the problem is I think this president hasn’t projected enough strength and hasn’t shown a priority to the national defense,” the senator said. “That is something that were I in charge I would.”
The statement was a clear indicator of the Kentucky senator’s intentions for 2016, riding high off of his recent and dominant CPAC Straw Poll win.
Meanwhile, if you watched Washington Republicans and military experts on Sunday, you heard them ramp up criticism of Obama’s failure stop Russia’s effort to annex Ukraine’s Crimea region, even as former Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the Crimea was a lost cause.
“You think Crimea’s gone?” “Fox News Sunday” host Chris Wallace asked.
“I do,” Gates replied. “I do not believe that Crimea will slip out of Russia’s hand.”
But some Republicans are still ready to punish Putin until he withdraws Russian troops from the Crimea region, and ramped up their criticisms of President Obama, who seems empty on ideas to stop Putin’s plans to annex the region this week. Perhaps, some of the ideas may seem reasonable to the American people, as the CNN/Opinion Research Poll also found nearly 6 in 10 of those questioned say they support economic sanctions against Moscow.
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan urged the Obama administration and Congress to target Russian companies or “oligarchs” connected to Putin, seizing or freezing their offshore assets and limiting their international travel.
“We should consider targeting some of the oligarchs around him that are his enablers and he is their enablers,” the Wisconsin congressman said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
He also joined Speaker John Boehner in the Republican-led call for the administration to speed up the process for U.S. companies to export liquefied natural gas to western and central Europe, an effort to ease pressure on European allies who depend on Russia for their supply.
Former Republican Vice President Dick Cheney suggested a hawkish, yet also an arguably viable approach, including a range of military moves such as Obama reinstating the United States’ missile-defense programs in Poland and the Czech Republic. He also suggested joint training exercises in Poland and offering military assistance to the Ukraine government.
Ryan agreed that Obama should reconsider missile defense in Europe.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI), told ABC’s “This Week” that Obama should not underestimate Putin’s ego.
“He wants to be a world influence, and if he has to do it through brute force, he’s going to do it,” he said. “We shouldn’t underestimate the kinds of things that he will do that he thinks is in Russia’s best interest.”
He also said the crisis will lead to international economic instability.
“So we do need to be worried,” Rogers said.
Cary mcdonald / August 25, 2014
For the ultra-right Republicans (ie.: site sponsors here, the interests of Ruppert Murdoch and Israel), increasing U.S. spending on War is in their best interest. From a public point of view, the problems of USSR/Ukraine is a European issue. The properties that the USSR quickly pirated from the Ukraine is the SAME property a drunken Nikita Krushev casually GAVE to the Ukraine over cocktails. The fact the Russia is continuing to squash Ukraine by any devious means possible remains an issue, but not OUR issue. Shooting down a passenger plane falls on Putin. He is covertly maintaining a very small HEAVILY ARMED group of drunks. Europe already depends on Russia for it’s natural gas. Only France and the U.K. are immune to Russia’s overt strangling of their economies. It is in the interest of the private U.S. arms manufacturers to raise again the ‘fear’ from a poor, backward corrupt crap-hole such as Russia.
So this issue is a political ‘red herring’ (similar to ‘abortion’, and ‘gun’ issues) which can be used to pull attention from SERIOUS and ACTIONABLE issues that Ron Paul is also addressing:
The LOSS of privacy of americans in the internet, e-mail, and phone communications which has been SECRETLY removed from them via the Bush and Obama adminstration’s blessing. Spying ON YOU is also in the interest of Murdoch and the rich powers that be. They want to keep you ignorant, and the police state at the ready. They claim it’s for YOUR protection… but how do you know this? Don’t take my word for it:
“I can’t in good conscience allow the U.S. government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and
basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance machine they’re secretly building.”Edward Snowden
8o per cent of their stored ‘data’ is on U.S. citizens.
“The purpose of government is to protect the secrecy and the privacy of all individuals, not the secrecy of government.” Ron Paul
“In digital era, privacy must be a priority. Is it just me, or is secret blanket surveillance obscenely outrageous?” AlGore
“The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty. Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people.” John Adams ( among maxims: 1772-1775 regarding 4th amendment)
the NSA has too many missions: a military mission
dedicated to network attacks and political espionage,
a law enforcement mission focused on individual bad actors across the
globe,
and a defensive mission devoted to protecting the nation’s information infrastructure.
IF within 100 miles from any border, or 86 miles from any coastline,the NSA and U.S. border patrol can imprison ANY person without due process or formal arrest, and do as they see fit.
/