Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Libertarian Party Open Letter to Rand Paul

Dear Sen. Paul,
Sen. Rand Paul
Sen. Rand Paul
We agree with you that Congress should obey the Constitution. We should never engage in foreign wars without a congressional declaration of war, a restraint on military action put in place by our Founding Fathers to ensure lawmakers never send our troops to war without deliberation.
But a constitutional war in the Middle East is just as bloody, destructive, and likely to incite terrorism as an unconstitutional war.
Our half-century of interventions in the Middle East have been a colossal failure. We have provided arms, military training, and subsidies to virtually every country in the region, inciting continual war and unrest. This has created a breeding ground for international terrorists that pose a real danger to our country and the world — one that would not have existed had we kept our noses out of the affairs of other countries.
U.S. military interventions have put our troops in harm's way, separated them needlessly from their families, and led to tens of thousands of American deaths and casualties — plus many more losses for innocent citizens of foreign countries.
We agree with your father, Ron Paul, who for decades was a lonely yet brave voice in Congress for peace. He was right when he called for getting the U.S. military out of the Middle East.
Everyone knows that you're posturing to get the Republican nomination for president in 2016. But for this long-shot hope of winning the nomination, you have endorsed a roster of hawkish Big Government Republicans — from Mitt Romney to Mitch McConnell. And now you're calling for sending our troops back to Iraq, which will be a death sentence for many of them.
Just how much can your long-shot presidential bid be worth? Is it worth the lives of these young men and women? The Libertarian Party says, "Absolutely not!"
While we agree with your view that no funds should be allocated to an illegal war, a policy of non-intervention remains the only just and reasonable approach to dealing with the Middle East — a land halfway around the world where the United States does not belong.
Your bid for a declaration of war against ISIS is unjustifiable and dangerous. Please withdraw it immediately.
Respectfully yours,
Nicholas Sarwark
Nicholas J. Sarwark
Chair, Libertarian National Committee

(ht Michael Edelstein)

3 comments:

  1. It's fascinating to see this letter.

    In the quest for the LP to have some sort of political relevance they chastise Rand, for being a statist, yet we all know they themselves would accept him with open arms if he decided to run as a Libertarian.

    I always love the LP's occasional reference to the Fondling Fathers as well. Hypocrisy truly knows no bounds.

    "The State is sort of bad, until we say it's not." -Libertarian party credo

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  2. This is why the Libertarian or libertarians in general will not succeed. You guys have no guts; no knowledge of what risks need to be taken in order to accomplish beating the state at its own game. Every time somebody takes a risk it's like "oh no! he should not have done that." No wonder the most famous of current libertarians are either pundits or pseudo-libertarians that are only declared to be libertarians by libertarians because they made movie or song. Even with Ron Paul, when he endorsed Cuccinelli, some where critical; turned out it was a good decision by Paul. Cuccinelli lost funding from the GOP establishment for a reason. Often I criticize Rand Paul, but on this he has cajones.

    This bill will bring the debate between libertarians and conservatives about war (because let's face it, progressives aren't relevant anymore when it comes to war). Instead of having the offensive actions against ISIS fester for years with it being on the back burner for the American public, the American public will have to face the question and information. I do believe libertarians will have this moment. The Republican war hawks want to send in troops, but as usual they'll send them in without an official declaration. What I think - and it's only a theory - Rand is calling their bluff. They won't vote for a declaration, especially, if it means to remove troops from Iraq. They will either be forced to say no to war or have actual guidelines to this war instead of doing on the whim decisions. It forces everybody to do think before they act.

    What Rand is doing is what it takes. It's dangerous; this could backfire. Yet, so has been what we've been doing for years - war without declaration.

    Personally, however, I would be surprised if this thing meets the floor. For real, stop acting like girls.

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