I’d like to echo the comments of my fellow contributors here at United Liberty in a call for a non-interventionist foreign policy on the part of the United States when it comes to the situation in Gaza. This conflict is complicated and poses no real threat to our national security. The U.S. should discontinue its foreign aid to Israel as well as Egypt, Jordan and all other countries receiving the largesse of the American taxpayer.
Independent of any opinion regarding who is “right” and who is “wrong” in this conflict (I think there is plenty of blame to go around on both sides), I do have to stand up and give Israel a small moment of applause for standing up to the United Nations. Israel is a sovereign nation and has the right to make its own military decisions. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert recently reacted to the UN Security Council’s recent resolution on the situation in Gaza:
As Obama continues his negotiations on nuclear weapons with the Russian government, he would do well to remember the mistakes made by American policy-makers who wished to drastically reduce the threat of nuclear weapons in the past. After World War II and the Truman administration’s use of atomic bombs in Japan, many Americans, awed by the power of the bomb to change the nature of war, pressed for policies that would reduce the risk of nuclear war.
I have searched for a term to describe my political ideology and have come to use the term “minarchist” as the best descriptor. According to Wikipedia, minarchism is the belief that the only proper role of government is to protect individuals from aggression. I would classify my beliefs to be generally consistent with this view; however, like some minarchists, I do believe that there is a proper role for government to deliver some additional services and infrastructure beyond merely a system of laws and defense. For more on this, please read my previous article on government spending - “To Spend or Not To Spend”.
It’s my belief that continued agression is in the future of the Obama administration and I’m writting this article to help define and document the similarities between the reasons for invading Iraq (Bush’s War) and which ever country Obama will invade or war he may escalate. Here are/will be the similarities, all bad reasons for war.
I sincerly hope I’m proven wrong.
Americans may be growing tired of biannual belligerent escalations in the Middle East, or more Generation X and younger commentators are getting jobs in media and thus publishing views more complex and nuanced than the blind support of Israel that characterized the Baby Boomers. Whatever the case, we now live in a political climate where Wall Street Journal’s op-ed page, a friendly place for neoconservatism, includes articles such as this one by the Palestinian American professor George Bisharat:
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