America Doesn’t Need Global Perpetual War To Prove We Love Liberty

by Joey Clark via TheAntiMedia.org,
ZeroHedge.com
May 14, 2017

I can forgive a man who loses his temper, but to lose one’s temperance lock, stock, and barrel? That is a damnable offense. Without a sense of moderation, even the most courageous and prudent man will fail in his quest for justice and may even become that which he wishes to destroy.

Yet, “moderation” has come to mean something wholly different than temperance in American politics. Rather than restraint, American moderates insist our shared classically liberal ideals call for the prodigal spending of our wealth, as well as bellicose and bloody actions abroad — not only on behalf of the American people but also on behalf of the liberty of all people on the face of the earth.

‘Don’ McCain

>“Human rights exist above the state and beyond history. They cannot be rescinded by one government any more than they can be granted by another. They inhabit the human heart, and from there, though they may be abridged, they can never be extinguished,” writes Senator John McCain in an op-ed for the New York Times, wherein he chastises Secretary of State Rex Tillerson for suggesting the United States government cannot always act simply with its ideals and values in mind.

That the U.S. must show restraint — a sort of realist, “first do no harm” foreign policy in advancing its ideals with the many diverse nations around the globe – McCain considers to be a type of retreat of American values that can only lead the oppressed peoples of the world to despair that America is no longer their champion.

“Our values are our strength and greatest treasure,” McCain writes. “We are distinguished from other countries because we are not made from a land or tribe or particular race or creed, but from an ideal that liberty is the inalienable right of mankind and in accord with nature and nature’s Creator.”

Yes, John, America purports to stand for universal human rights and the liberty of all, but does this love of liberty require us to threaten and actually wage war as long as there are monsters abroad to destroy?

Does our zeal for our libertarian ideals really behoove us to be forever tilting at windmills? Or, could this Quixotic quest actually be counterproductive to spreading the seed of liberty around the world?

Could the love of power and the constant use of fear and force to advance liberty, in fact, pervert the cause of liberty?

The Perversions of War

Aggressive wars, even wars prosecuted in the name of liberty, have a way of sowing discord and devastation, both abroad and at home. The loss of life, the wasting of wealth, the destruction of social institutions, and the corroding of the commercial, liberal, limited government spirit — these are only some of the effects of war.

War should be a last resort not only because of its costs in terms of blood and treasure but also because war always requires the sacrifice of liberty, e.g. today’s intrusive surveillance state. Furthermore, we should be wary of liberty becoming synonymous with American military intervention and global rule (even under the imprimatur of the “international liberal order.”)

Are we truly prepared to say the bloody military misadventures in Vietnam, Iraq, Libya, and beyond represent America’s best ideals? Or, were these wars for democracy and human rights really just another episode of Americans, as Aldous Huxley observed of politics long ago, exercising their will to power dressed up by political gentlemen in the noble toga of American ideals?

The Rest…HERE

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 14th, 2017 at 11:26 pm and is filed under Government Evil, New World Order, War Without End. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.