05-22-2016, 05:45 PM
(05-15-2016, 04:23 PM)Mikebert Wrote: I am also an isolationist, started to become one around 2004, although not absolute until a bit later.
The Syrian thing shows that the idea that one can avoid stupid interventions by electing the right leader is pure wishful thinking. Obama did not want to get involved in Syria. Even when Syria stepped over his red line he managed to find a way to avoid attacking Syria by getting the Republican congress to act to stop him. And when ISIS showed up he dismissed them. But when they cut off the heads of Americans the political cost for not intervening became too great.
And so it will always be. We intervene because we can. As long as we can we will. If Donald Trump is elected we will be at war on half a dozen fronts. It does not matter a whit what Trump wants to do. He will be goaded into inteventions by challenges to his masculinity, his image of toughness, or by insulting him, whatever works. Everything I have seen about Trump suggests he is easily goaded into over-the-top responses.
If Clinton is elected she will engage in war far less often than Trump. She cannot be goaded in war by being seen as effeminate. Americans do not want a President who comes across as a Lesbian. After 25 years of shit being thrown at her, she as developed the thick skin that Trump lacks. She is the epitome of calculating and cannot be goaded by insults that would work on Trump. She will be goaded into war by political concerns, as Obama was with ISIS and Libya, and since she tends to listen to more hawkish counsel than Obama she is more prone to intervention than Obama was.
The only way for interventions to decline is for a true non-interventionist to be nominated by the Republican party. Republicans had the chance to do this with Ron Paul and again with Rand Paul. They did not. And until they do it will be permanent war.
Your analysis about Trump and Hillary C is spot on. But I think a non-interventionist is more likely to be nominated by a Democrat. They have already nominated McGovern, and since then Democrats have been less interventionist. Sanders is basically a non-interventionist. So are the Pauls. But the right and left share that element in the Libertarian platform, and it's also in the Green platform.