Ron Paul: Not Ready for Prime Time

...much less President!



Ron Paul and his followers are on the record quite strenuously that Paul is not an "isolationist", but a non-interventionist. Which makes his exchange with Bachmann that much more odd.

"If she thinks we live in a dangerous world, she ought to think back when I was drafted in 1962 with the nuclear missiles in Cuba. And Kennedy calls Khrushchev and talks to him and talks him out of this and we don't have a nuclear exchange."

First of all, thank you for your service, Dr. Paul, even though it may have been reluctantly on your part.

Second, the impression you are trying to leave, that the Cuban Missile Crisis was resolved with just a little jawboning from JFK, is more than a little misleading.

For starters, why would there have been a nuclear exchange to be talked out of? Oh, yeah. Kennedy launched a military blockade in international waters to stop Soviet shipments of arms to Cuba. But! But! Cuba and the Soviet Union were two sovereign nations! If the Soviets agreed to let Cuba "borrow" some of their missiles, isn't it their business? I mean, for JFK to put a blockade around Cuba and demand that the Soviets dismantle and remove their missiles, why that sounds an awful lot like...intervention!

And if there was a nuclear confrontation to be avoided, it was provoked by JFK's military actions. Whatever "jawboning" took place, it was only after a number of Soviet ships had been interdicted on the high seas. It was after Kennedy had intervened in the affairs of two sovereign nations, telling Cuba what it could not do within its own borders and telling the USSR what they could or could not export or transport in international waters.

So, Kennedy was an "interventionist" in Paul's terms and Paul praised him for it? Will wonders never cease? Extra points if you can guess who this statement refers to:

He calls the blockade "atrocious", "an act of war".

(Hint: It was in reference to Israel interdicting weapons such as missiles to be fired into Israel.)

JFK blockade = good. Israeli blockade = bad. Any questions?

And incidentally, Paul asked what a drone was doing overflying Iran? Well, there's a possibility that he was mistaken there. The drone may have been downed or stolen in Afghanistan and transported to Iran. But, from the tone of his question, he seems to be questioning the need for intelligence on what our enemies may be planning. But, again, to cite the example Paul himself put forth, it was U-2 overflights that revealed the presence of Soviet missiles in Cuba. Would a Paul administration shut down intelligence surveillance around the globe as "interventionist"?

Add to that his defense against an argument that no one was making, that we "declare war on 1.2 billion Muslims", and you have a muddled at best, contradictory, naive and dangerous outlook on foreign policy.

Calling Paul "not ready for prime time", is being generous.

Cross posted at LCR, Say Anything.