Critical thinking in editorial decision-making

Buchanan Op-Ed

An Analysis of Buchanan's Op-Ed

The neo-conservative agenda has never been more apparent than it is today, and Pat Buchanan's op-ed from 23 August 2011 plainly exposes it in no uncertain terms. Buchanan quotes Lindsey Graham, the Senator from South Carolina who recently likened America to a "battlefield" in his support of the National Defense Authorization Act (Anders), as saying that "Russia's invasion of Georgian land in 2008 was an act of aggression, not only to Georgia but to all new democracies" (Buchanan). Graham's statement is a blatant misrepresentation of the facts. Like Buchanan, we of the Libertarian Lobby must conclude that Graham's assessment is pure "neocon propaganda" (Buchanan). This paper will show exactly why and how the neocons are dominating our Senate and dictating our foreign policy in an aggressive, pro-war, militaristic fashion. The solution that we propose is that the Republican National Convention remember the meaning of true conservatism. As Judge Napolitano states, "Truth is identity between intellect and reality" (xiii). What I propose, as a libertarian lobbyist, is that the RNC look at the truth in Buchanan's op-ed, recall the wisdom of our forefathers, oppose all neocon Imperialism, and implement the diplomatic Instrument of National Power in order to support America's security, values, prosperity, and to maintain international order.

Buchanan's Premise

I firmly agree with Buchanan's premise, which is that interfering in the Russia-Georgia conflict will only exacerbate U.S.-Russian relations (just like they were strained almost to the point of war during the Cuban Missile Crisis). The U.S. bristled at the thought of the Soviets interfering in waters so close to home, and Russia today is right to bristle at our interference in matters so close to its home. Buchanan's point is quite clear: Russia is not the "occupier" -- on the contrary, it is the Georgians who are occupying South Ossetia: "Twice the Georgians have been expelled by force. Both times, Ossetians and Abkhazians helped throw them out. Why are we demanding that the Georgians be permitted to march back in and reimpose an alien rule that clearly is detested by these people? Is this the American spirit of '76?" (Buchanan). The answer is simple and reasonable: the answer is a resounding, "No."

The simple fact of the matter is that our country has been hijacked by a neo-conservative interest and one need only consider events since the dawn of the 21st century: an attack on 9/11, the investigation of which was completely white-washed by the same men who attempted to white-wash the Iran-Contra Affair, but which allowed the blame for the attack to be lain on a terrorist group that was only some months prior to the events of 9/11 receiving a large quantity of funds from the U.S. (Dawson); the PNAC reports and the Zionist lobby that has been pushing for American intervention in the Middle East and which will use any excuse to gain hegemony (need we recall WMDs that never existed, a terrorist leader on dialysis somehow able to elude the most "comprehensive dragnet" in the history of the world (Corbett), and now a so-called nuclear threat from Iran?); and the Patriot Act, which shows no signs of yielding to the Sunset Clause. We have become a society so easily deceived by false flag operations and psy-op warfare that to imagine that we are not in need of paternalism or that our military are not the policemen of the world are two points likely to be considered as treasonous acts.

Yet Buchanan brings us back to reality: "As a European Union investigation has confirmed, the 2008 war began with the Georgian invasion of South Ossetia" (Buchanan). Georgia is the aggressor here -- not Russia. We must not ignore the facts. We must conform our intellects to the reality. If we do not, then we will not arrive at the truth, but will be led astray by the neocon agenda, which is a militaristic, Zionistic, Imperialistic agenda. The American people need to be aware of this. The American people need to hear the voice of the only peace candidate running in the Republican primary: Ron Paul.

The Instrument of Power That Will Support U.S. National Interests

The neocons in Congress will assure us that we must resort to militaristic IOPs. But we of saner minds must ask ourselves, as Buchanan does, why? Why can we not exercise the power of diplomacy -- a power that Ron Paul advocates -- and a power that helped Kennedy avoid going to war with Khrushchev? The answer must be stated. Black ops and espionage have been viewed as far more effective in gaining for the neocons exactly what they want. Currently, Mikhail Saakashvili is the "favorite of Washington," which means that all the propaganda in the mainstream media will take the position of supporting Georgia in this conflict against the Ossetians and Abkhazians and against the Russians. Why do the neocons support Saakashvili? The answer is that Saakashvili serves the neocons' Imperialistic interests -- hegemony in the Middle East (Dawson).

Using the diplomatic Instrument of National Power would help alleviate the stress that currently permeates the Middle East, due to American occupation there. Currently, the U.S. has strong economic interests in the Middle East, interests that touch upon all countries located there including Georgia. Those interests are strongly tied to oil pipelines like the BTC line belonging to BP: "Because of politicking, logistics, and investment, pipelines can easily take a decade or more to construct, as was the case of the BTC line running from the Caspian via the capital of Azerbaijan, Baku, to the capital of Georgia, Tbilisi, on out to Ceyhan, a port in Turkey" (Dawson). As Dawson states, "the largest importers of oil from the BTC line are Italy and Israel," so it is not surprising that when the line was refitted to go through Georgia, rather than Armenia ("the more direct route"), American-Israeli interests would be compelled to support Georgia in its conflict with the Ossetians (Dawson). It should be brought to the attention of the American people that their representatives in Congress are serving an interest other than the people's: they are serving the oil men and the Israelis -- the same Israelis who have left bloody fingerprints all over 9/11.

But Ryan Dawson makes plain that "pipelines are a political weapon" and that Mikhail Saakashvili "promoted the BTC agreements and also pushed to join NATO" (Dawson). What we see in our Senators' support of Georgia and its so-called fight for "democracy" is really nothing more than a political-economic push for power. Weave into this game the ingredients of false flag operations, like the one where "Georgia president Saakashvili pulled an embarrassing stunt with Poland's Kaczynski whereby they claimed Russia shot at their car as they were driving to the South Ossetian border late at night…[before] Polish security forces [finally admitted] it was staged by Tbilisi" (Dawson), and you begin to see how all the different pieces fit together. The Taliban (America's current excuse for an enemy) was nothing more than a cell propped up by our own Central Intelligence Agents in order to subvert Middle Eastern states troublesome to certain political-economic interests. When the perpetrators behind 9/11 and the warmongers needed a fall guy, they found him in Bin Laden. He has been this century's Lee Harvey Oswald -- and the circumstances surrounding his participation in 9/11 are as dubious as Oswald's in Kennedy's assassination.

All of these elements indicate that we are lacking sorely in diplomacy. Rather than talk to nations and attempt to negotiate, we use subversion, deception, and militarism to pursue certain objectives that benefit only a select few. Yet those select few convince a great many that their objectives are equitable to our own. Supporting Georgia benefits Israel. Sending American troops to several countries in the Middle East to eradicate terrorist cells benefits…Israel. The billion dollar embassy in Baghdad is a drain on the American economy -- and men like Ron Paul know it. Ron Paul also understands the need for diplomacy and knows that diplomacy can save lives. He places a value on American life and places the lives of Americans before the objectives of a select few, namely the money men, the oil men, and the Zionists.

Security, Values, Prosperity, and International Order

Our security as a nation may well rest upon our ability to exercise diplomacy in all matters that arise with foreign nations. The militarism of the U.S. In its mission to eradicate "terrorism" has made us less secure as a people. View the TSA pat downs, the invasive reach of Big Government that puts Orwell's Big Brother to shame, the murder of American citizens by predator drones, the passing of legislation that permits the indefinite incarceration of American citizens suspected of terrorism and strips them of their Miranda rights. Our security has been destroyed by suspicion, rhetoric, and fear: diplomacy based on truth is our best option out of this mess.

Likewise, our Values are at stake. We risk becoming a country of hypocrites -- those who profess to be Christian support candidates who condemn contraception but who advocate the indiscriminate bombing of countries "suspected" of harboring terrorists -- bombing that Zionists in AIPAC whole-heartedly applaud. Zionism is even being identified with Christianity, with evangelicals uniting themselves to Israeli interests. Need we remind ourselves that Zionism is a politico-religious belief that is diametrically opposed to Christian values? The post-war propaganda that followed WWII even helped obliterate the notion of Jesus Christ as Holocaust and replace it with the Shoah, the Jewish holocaust. At the heart of Zionism is the eradication of Christian culture and the elevation of Zionist policies like the one currently being enacted on the Gaza Strip. Israel is an apartheid state and has been murdering Palestinians for years -- and now it has convinced millions of Christians and evangelicals that they must destroy the Arab before he destroys them. What kind of value is this? It is a diabolical one.

Refusing to embrace diplomacy also undermines our prosperity. Rather than attacking and occupying countries in the Middle East, we should be working with them. Rather than sanctioning Iran, and pushing the country into a corner (and making war inevitable), why can we not exercise diplomacy? Our nation's wealth is being drained by bailouts and war: we are financing a costly war in order to "protect" ourselves -- or so we are told. The reality is another story altogether.

Oil is a major commodity and many countries are affected by what happens in the Middle East -- Russia, China, and the West. But there is another commodity that is also useful -- opium. Maintaining the opium trade is a way to gain funding for Black Ops. Oil, drugs, politics, economics, and ideology all go together in the Middle East. The U.S. invasion of Afghanistan following 9/11 allowed the opium trade to flourish once more (the Taliban had shut it down previously), and it also opened the door for a new pipeline similar to the BTC: "Afghanistan is not only positioned as the final slot for the TAP pipeline, the equivalent of an Eastward BTC line to feed oil hungry Asia, it is also undoubtedly the world's capital for opium production" (Dawson). On the list of motivations for invasion and war are opium and oil -- not security, not values, not prosperity for average Americans.

And neither is international order on that list. U.S. occupation in the Middle East has rather resulted in international disorder. Daily we are being fed reports of Iranian terror plots with hints that Russia will support Iran if Israel or America strikes it. Russia sees its own interests threatened by U.S. hegemony -- and Iran knows that Israel wants to destroy it. What we need now more than ever is mutual respect for these foreign countries -- not more war rhetoric. We cannot afford more war -- our country is financially exhausted, our dollar is being devalued by the Fed, and our debts are increasing exponentially. We are so divorced from economic reality that we continue to support politicians who are indistinguishable from the very ones we presume to loathe. But why do we loathe them? Again, the mainstream media supplies us with reasons -- but none of them are good ones and all of them deter us from examining the real causes of our current predicament: Imperialism. As Buchanan states, "Medvedev believes that Saakashvili launched his 2008 attack after a visit by Condoleeza Rice, during which he may have been flashed a green light…if there is another invasion of Georgia and a new war, the U.S. Senate will not be without major moral responsibility" (Buchanan). Therefore, let us return to the Golden Rule, advocated so eloquently by Ron Paul during the Republican Primary debates -- yet booed so outrageously by the warmongers and chickenhawks unwittingly supporting a murderous apartheid state and a disastrous campaign that is bringing international disorder. To restore order in the international community, we should first get the mote out of our own eye.

How Diplomacy would affect Georgia, Russia, and Other Neighboring Countries

First off, Russia is right to be suspicious of the West. If Rice encouraged Georgia to invade Ossetia, it is not difficult to imagine that Clinton has been encouraging revolt in Russia. Putin is largely painted in Western media as a tyrant and an egomaniac (yet such labels are never applied to our own tyrants and egomaniacs). If there were more honesty in the press, we might see Putin in a different light. Certainly there is much to be gained by diplomatic efforts with Russia -- not least being some kind of understanding concerning pipelines in the Middle East. Currently, Russia has some control over the flow of oil there -- but there is no reason that we cannot come to an agreement without war and subterfuge.

With Georgia, diplomacy would certainly have an effect as well. As Buchanan observes, "the Russians are far more welcome [in Abkhazia and South Ossetia] than are the Georgians" (Buchanan). Recognizing this fact officially would not only deter the Georgians from thinking that we support them, it would also show that we truly believe in democracy -- the right of the Ossetians to govern themselves. This position might affect business, as the BTC flows through Georgia -- but, again, diplomacy is effective in business as well as in politics and it is not unreasonable to think that a solution can be found.

Ossetia and Abkazia would also be allowed to exercise their independence. This good will on our part would also go a great way in establishing international order prior to the Winter Olympics scheduled to be held in "the Russian city of Sochi on the Black Sea" in 2014 (Buchanan). Would it not be a far better climate -- one of toleration and good will -- were we to take a realistic stance rather than a politically-motivated pedagogical one?