Daniel Larison has a post about Sen. Ron Johnson’s less than brilliant demand for military action against Iran. Dan remarks that “Iran hawks such as Johnson support preventive war against Iran because they are excessively afraid that Iran will eventually acquire nuclear weapons.” Actually, that’s backwards. It should run like this: “Iran hawks such as Johnson pretend to be afraid that Iran will eventually acquire nuclear weapons because they are seeking an excuse to wage war.”
Today’s Republicans, including Benjamin Netanyahu, are much like their French forebears back in the 1790s. They want a war as an end in itself. They want, and need, a “supreme emergency”. They want to create a crisis that only they can solve. They see no role for themselves in the status quo. The country, after all, seems to be muddling its way through to “standard” U.S. prosperity. Under Obama! Yes, Obama! This is what Kenyan socialism looks like!
Several thousand years before the French Revolution, Thucydides remarked that in times of extreme crisis, caution is deemed folly, while rashness becomes wisdom. By generating a time of extreme crisis, frauds like Sen. Johnson hope to be deemed wise.
Afterwords
Is Ron Wisconsin’s worst senator since the late great Joe McCarthy? I’m afraid I haven’t been keeping track, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
