I am the last person you will ever hear justifying the current state of politics, but the naivete of people who write things like this is astounding.
Sanctions, embargoes, and aid has nothing to do with principles or ethics. Principles and ethics are the excuses we give to make those actions plausible. In truth, they are all about power. . .who is allied with who and who gets to make the calls in any given region of the world. Anyone who has ever played Risk should understand why it would be foolish to give up all international footholds and financial alliances outside of the US and concentrate our resources within our borders.
Adopting an uncompromising non-interventionist foreign policy would be, long term, very good for this country. Short term, it would be economically devastating, and during that time any developed country (and a few not quite) on the planet could easily pick us off in our decade of weakness. Those that did not overtly pick us off would nevertheless be allowed to deprioritize the needs of the US in world affairs. Think of international politics like a LARP. If you attempt to bow out of LARP politics, there are serious social consequences. If you have no sway and/or do not make yourself useful to other PCs, nobody will think twice about wiping out your character.
Why can't people just accept that yes, POWER actually is important, and work from there? There are a lot of better, more ethical, and equally viable solutions to maintaining our position in the world hierarchy. This assumption that if we left the rest of the world alone the rest of the world would leave us alone makes me want to remind people there is no Santa Claus. Because, much like Santa Claus, the simplicity of this plan is a myth totally divorced from reality.
In life, and in politics, it is necessary to make friends and influence people. People will always disagree about something, and having friends and people you influence can often prevent those disagreements from erupting into actual violence. Who's going to give a guy crap with his posse at his back? America needs a posse, no matter how much we want to believe that we don't.
In the case being addressed here, ignoring the terrorist will build a bigger and more friendly posse than fighting him. We could be a sympathetic victim, but instead we're just a bully fighting another bully.
As stated in my other comment on this thread, I agree that meeting terrorist bullying with more bullying is moronoic and counterproductive. I do not think the current terrorist issues are a case study in the importance of non-interventionist foreign policy, which I generally support.
Sanctions, embargoes, and aid has nothing to do with principles or ethics. Principles and ethics are the excuses we give to make those actions plausible. In truth, they are all about power. . .who is allied with who and who gets to make the calls in any given region of the world. Anyone who has ever played Risk should understand why it would be foolish to give up all international footholds and financial alliances outside of the US and concentrate our resources within our borders.
Adopting an uncompromising non-interventionist foreign policy would be, long term, very good for this country. Short term, it would be economically devastating, and during that time any developed country (and a few not quite) on the planet could easily pick us off in our decade of weakness. Those that did not overtly pick us off would nevertheless be allowed to deprioritize the needs of the US in world affairs. Think of international politics like a LARP. If you attempt to bow out of LARP politics, there are serious social consequences. If you have no sway and/or do not make yourself useful to other PCs, nobody will think twice about wiping out your character.
Why can't people just accept that yes, POWER actually is important, and work from there? There are a lot of better, more ethical, and equally viable solutions to maintaining our position in the world hierarchy. This assumption that if we left the rest of the world alone the rest of the world would leave us alone makes me want to remind people there is no Santa Claus. Because, much like Santa Claus, the simplicity of this plan is a myth totally divorced from reality.
In life, and in politics, it is necessary to make friends and influence people. People will always disagree about something, and having friends and people you influence can often prevent those disagreements from erupting into actual violence. Who's going to give a guy crap with his posse at his back? America needs a posse, no matter how much we want to believe that we don't.
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