A little hypocrisy in Ron Paul reporting
Despite the histrionics on display via Memeorandum, Ron Paul’s position against risking American lives to stop genocide is not outside of the mainstream. Jeffrey Scott Shapiro at Big Government describes his conversation with Paul:
And so I asked Congressman Paul: if he were President of the United States during World War II, and as president he knew what we now know about the Holocaust, but the Third Reich presented no threat to the U.S., would he have sent American troops to Nazi Germany purely as a moral imperative to save the Jews?”
And the Congressman answered:
“No, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t risk American lives to do that. If someone wants to do that on their own because they want to do that, well, that’s fine, but I wouldn’t do that.”
Shapiro claims that “when I first presented the story of Paul’s comments about the Holocaust to major news media outlets two years ago, they were so stunned they were afraid to publish my story”.
Well, that was 2009, and we were still trying to convince ourselves that we should not have tried to stop the genocidal murderer in Iraq.
The reason we know we absolutely should have, had we known, stopped the Jewish genocide in Germany is because we didn’t do it and we know how it turned out. If we had known about it in time to stop it and we had stopped it before it reached that point, the same people who claim we should never have gone into Iraq would be claiming we should never have gone into Germany.
Iraq was a cake-walk compared to Germany. We can’t claim that hypothetical non-intervention in Germany is outside the bounds of rational discourse, and at the same time claim that intervention in Iraq was obviously unreasonable. If hypothetical intervention in Germany is so obvious that disagreeing with it is “disturbing” the same should be true of actual intervention in Iraq. We know, with as much certainty as we can know, where Saddam Hussein was headed.
Ron Paul’s position, misguided as it is, is a mainstream position within today’s media, within the left, and within a significant part of the right.
In response to When is it right to stop mass murder?: The question about the war in Iraq isn’t how many people died. It’s whether or not we can ever be justified in removing another government that engages in mass murders of its own people.
- EXCLUSIVE: Ron Paul in 2009–‘I Wouldn’t Risk American Lives’ to End the Holocaust: Jeffrey Scott Shapiro at Big Government
- “Paul then looked at me, and I politely thanked him for his time. He smiled at me again and nodded his head, and many of his young followers were also smiling, and nodding their heads in agreement. Clearly, I was the only one in the room who was disturbed by his response.” (Memeorandum thread)
More genocide
- Hangover on Miracle Monday
- “There is a right and a wrong in the Universe.” So, yeah. Good morning to you, too!
- Taliban revisionism, historical amnesia
- It might not be wrong to leave oppressive murderers in power in other countries. It is wrong to pretend that that isn’t what we’re doing. It is wrong to pretend that apathy in the face of oppression is a noble effort.
- The ultimate question of Bush, Iraq, and genocide
- News sucks. Really, I just don’t understand how headlines and stories are chosen. Dog bites man can be a story, if that man is George Bush.
- When is it right to stop mass murder?
- The question about the war in Iraq isn’t how many people died. It’s whether or not we can ever be justified in removing another government that engages in mass murders of its own people.
- Hotel Rwanda
- Great movie, great story, great acting on Don Cheadle’s part. You must see this.
More Ron Paul
- Your candidate is unelectable and stupid
- Unelectable and stupid is no way to go through life, son.