Some people think that being a libertarian means that you should have opposed the war in Iraq. Such was the official position of the Libertarian Party.
I believe that national defense is one of the key functions of government. I get mad when I think about things like the No Child Left Behind Act or authoritarian "just say no to drugs" laws. But hearing that we have a military, and our military attacked another country, doesn't by itself make me mad about anything.
Most of the opposition to the war in Iraq came from liberals who hate the United States and think our country is so bad and evil that we have no moral authority to take any military action. Liberals think we're really not much better than Iraq.
I disagree strongly with the liberal "hate the United States" viewpoint. Although I am extremely disappointed with our nation's increasingly authoritarian and socialist agenda, we are still a nation of freedom, and our nation was founded on freedom. Through freedom and free market capitalism, not by conquest or evil, we became a great superpower.
With the philosophical stuff out of the way, analysis of whether we were justified in invading Iraq rests on a practical analysis of Saddam Hussein's behavior and the threat he might have posed to us. This is too huge a topic to blog about completely in one post, so I will leave further discussion of Iraq to future posts.
4 comments:
If more Libertarians shared your views on national defense and security, more people would become Libertarians. As it is, far too many Americans just don't believe libertarianism can keep us safe, which is unfortunate, because libertarian philosophy is the most liberty oriented philosophy in the world.
It's kind of ridiculous to say liberals hate the United States. I mean, come on!
Is it that they hate what the United States stands for? Would that be things like free speech? and freedom of religion? and a democratic society where people can criticise their country?
So does that make any sense at all?
I believe that national defense is one of the key functions of government. I get mad when I think about things like the No Child Left Behind Act or authoritarian "just say no to drugs" laws. But hearing that we have a military, and our military attacked another country, doesn't by itself make me mad about anything..
You're trying to equivocate national defense with a pre-emptive strike on a sovereign nation and it won't wash. Iraq took no belligerent action towards the United States, making the war a war of aggression, not a war of defense.
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Most of the opposition to the war in Iraq came from liberals who hate the United States and think our country is so bad and evil that we have no moral authority to take any military action. Liberals think we're really not much better than Iraq.Here you attempt to avoid the criticism by claiming that all of the critics are "evil America haters". Aside from the fact that it's not true, it makes no difference; the criticism is either valid or invalid based on the facts, not the identity of the critic. I'd expect better logic from a purported Objectivist.
The question is not whether America pre-emptively attacked another sovereign nation. The bigger question is whether those of us who love America believe that this what we want America to be. Aggressing against smaller nations who have done nothing to attack you is the act of a bully. If you want America to be a bully, that's your choice.
Yours truly,
Mr. X
...liberty lover...
Oh my God! We agree again! What is this? Let's do something together on this topic. You're right. One blog won't do it justice. I too am not thrilled with the official Libertarian position on the War on Terrorism and Iraq. I feel that we need to be a bit more pragmatic and realistic when the Libertarian idealism doen't fit the necessity or properly address the problem. I argued with ol' Harry on this point to ad nauseam and all he could come up with is the idealistic litany of why we shouldn't be there. But in fact we ARE there. So now we need to support our troops and insure we win. Our freedom, whole way of life and the lives of our children are at stake. Let's be real on this topic.
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