Back in the day, back in 1987, when the facts of what became known as the Iran-Contra scandal first hit the fan, wide-eyed Reaganite Andy Sullivan was appalled. Ronald Reagan’s White House secretly sold weapons to Iranian terrorists and used the money to finance Nicaraguan “freedom fighters” (aka “terrorists”), an activity specifically banned by the…
Tag: Donald Trump
Iraq now must be seen as the Republicans’ Vietnam
Well, it was a long time coming, but now it’s here. Heresy-speakers Donald Trump and Ted Cruz walked away with the most recent Republican debate. Both Trump and Cruz have repeatedly and explicitly rejected the regime change meme that has been the foundation stone of Republican foreign policy since 9/11. And will no one notice…
Hey, Alan Vanneman! The U.S. had TWO debates on foreign policy, while you weren’t listening!
Well, indeed we did. I recently complained, rather at length, at the failure of the U.S. political system to generate a meaningful discussion of U.S. foreign policy, noting that, for the past several decades, we’ve been allowed to choose between “idealistic” hawks like Hillary Clinton and, well, shotgun-wielding freaks. But just before the holidays, both…
Cognitive Dissonance at the Washington Post
Last week, the Washington Post bitterly, and correctly, chastised the entire flock of Republican presidential candidates for their conduct at their most recent debate for remaining very largely mute while Donald Trump went on his now-standard war dance against folks who ain’t like us, and the Constitution, not to mention simple common human decency, be…
Tashfeen Malik linked to ISIS; you can kiss your civil liberties goodbye
The wife of the couple identified as responsible for the murders in San Bernardino has been linked to ISIS, the New York Times reports. Donald Trump won’t exploit this one, will he?
The Republican Civil Wars
Over at Reason, Matt Welch is keeping watch over the continuing Republican kerfuffle/steel cage death match being waged by the Trumpians and the Republican Establishment. Matt found a particularly piquant angle, noting the rage with which the National Review has been treating Trump in recent days, after, well, after saying what great ideas he has…
The Republican Party earned Donald Trump
Starting with the election of Bill Clinton in 1992, the Republican Party became the Irresponsible Party. Republicans in and out of government laid siege to the Clinton presidency, pursuing him with an endless series of shamelessly partisan investigations, law suits, and court decisions, finally impeaching him for lying about cheating on his wife, after having…
Da Angst a’ da Elites
America’s elites are suffering. You hear it in the frenzied efforts of “responsible” conservatives like Charles “Donald Trump’s Fantasy of Mass Deportation Is Political Poison for the GOP” Krauthammer, Fred “Donald Trump’s Nativist Bandwagon” Hiatt, and George “Trump’s immigration plan could spell doom for the GOP” Will to convince their fellow conservatives to listen to…
Donald Trump or Donald Paul?
Lately, a few percipient observers, including myself have remarked that Bernie Sanders has been sounding just a bit Trumpy on the subjects of immigration and international competitiveness. Now, it seems, Donald Trump has been sounding a bit Rand Pauly on the Middle East. Bloomberg Politic’s Melinda Henneberger reports on the scene with the Donald at…