Author: Daniel McAdams

No matter who occupies the US presidency, it seems the neoconservatives always occupy positions of foreign policy power. A neocon like Robert Kagan, for example, is perfectly comfortable going from a senior position in the GW Bush administration to another senior post in Barack Obama’s State Department. When their failed policies wear out the name of one of their institutes, like Project for a New American Century, they simply change the name without losing a beat, in this case turning into the “Foreign Policy Initiative.” Filmmaker Robbie Martin has done a terrific job looking into the neocon domination of Washington in his three-part documentary film, A Very Heavy Agenda. Martin joins today’s Liberty Report to talk about his films and to talk about the neocons who star in them:

Reprinted from The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) is being advertised in some circles as the heir to the Ron Paul libertarian movement, yet one look at his foreign policy and it is immediately evident that he is anything but. His advisors are Bill Kristol, John Bolton, James Woolsey, Elliot Abrams and other washed-up neocon has-beens. No wonder he screams about “carpet bombing” the Middle East and making the sand glow in the dark. The libertarian movement is essentially built around rejection of wars of aggression and against interventionism. Ted Cruz, neocon, in today’s Liberty Report:

Reprinted from The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity.

The US Senate under Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is poised to rush to the floor a bill that would give the president total war authority anywhere on the globe, perhaps even including on US soil. All in the name of fighting ISIS, Congress is about to crown the president with unlimited war powers. In today’s Liberty Report we discuss the dangers of the incredible shrinking Legislative branch of government:

Reprinted from The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity.

Most normal people look at the smoldering cemetery that is post-“liberation” Libya, the gruesome graveyard of an almost-“liberated” Syria, the 14 year slow-motion failed regime change in Afghanistan, blood-drenched Iraq, and they are horrified. Washington Post’s neocon nag Jennifer Rubin looks across that bloody landscape and sees a beautiful work in progress.

She writes today in the online edition of the Post that despite what we might be hearing from some “libertarian/populist pols masquerading as conservatives,” the interventionist enterprise is chugging alone just fine. Democracy promotion at the barrel of a gun is every American’s “white man’s burden” whether he likes it or not.

Never mind that Syria has been nearly leveled by almost five years of an Islamist insurgency that was but a few weeks from success when Russia stopped it in its tracks. The real villain is the secular Bashar al-Assad, writes Rubin. After all, he “is partnered with Iran and spurs support for Islamist rebels…”

Assad “spur[s] support for Islamist rebels” by waging war on them for six years? Or does she somehow deny that Assad is fighting the insurgents who seek to drive him from power? Both cannot be true.

Continue reading “WaPo’s Jennifer Rubin: More Regime Change, Please!”

A Saudi-backed opposition committee representing the rebels fighting to overthrow the Assad government in Syria have agreed on a chief negotiator for peace talks scheduled to begin in Geneva next week. The rebels will be represented by Mohammed Alloush, political leader of Jaysh al-Islam.

Mohammed Alloush’s brother, Zahran, led Jaysh al-Islam until he was killed in an airstrike at the end of December. Under Zahran’s rule, Jaysh al-Islam was a fiercely Islamist group that insisted strict Sharia law must govern Syria. He maintained close ties with the al-Nusra Front, otherwise known as al-Qaeda in Syria.

John Landis, Director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, put together a detailed profile of the then-leader of Jaysh al-Islam. Should this group fulfill the US/Saudi/Turk/Israeli/Qatari wish of overthrowing Assad in Syria, there is little reason to believe the bloodshed would stop. In fact it may only really begin in earnest if they succeed in gaining power. Here is Landis on Zahran:

Zahran calls for cleansing Damascus of all Shiites and Nusayris. (“Nusayris” is the old term that referred to the Alawites prior to the adoption of “Alawite.” It is considered a term of abuse by Alawites).

Continue reading “Al-Qaeda Allies to Represent Opposition in Upcoming Syria Peace Talks”

Free trade — not corporatist, managed trade — is the best guarantor of peace and prosperity. Protectionism leads to trade wars which very often lead to hot wars. In the US presidential race the issue of tariffs and other taxes on trade have begun to enter the conversation. We should remember how dangerous this kind of isolationism is, especially to working and middle class Americans. In today’s Liberty Report, Ron Paul explains the importance of real free trade:

Reprinted from The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity.