A while back I mentioned that, to my amazement, I had found myself in agreement with Pat Buchanan, an icon of the far right wing. Today it happened again.
While doing other things this morning, I had Meet The Press* on in the background listening to a debate between Buchanan and an author whose book W has praised as a philosophical foundation for his foreign policy.
During the discussion Buchanan make this point:
In my judgment, what happened on 9/11 was a result of interventionism. Interventionism is the cause of terror. It is not a cure for terror. The idea that the president of the United States, as he said in his inaugural, is going to help democratic institutions in every region in every nation on earth is a formula for permanent war, Tim.
And look, the president of the United States has no constitutional authority to do this. Where in the Constitution do we get the right to intervene in the internal affairs of countries that do not threaten us and do not attack us? If they don’t, their internal politics are their own business. As Quincy Adams says, "America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the champion of freedom everywhere, but the vindicator only of her own."
It made so much sense I had to look at the screen to make sure it was the same person. Buchanan made a few other statements I could argue with, but his overall assessment of how the US is conducting itself in the world since 9/11/01 was intelligent, accurate, and far too scary.
*scroll to the second half of the transcript