Telling It Like It Is

     I think very highly of Senator Rand Paul (R, KY). My admiration for him goes still higher when he expresses himself as clearly and forcefully as this:

     MARGARET BRENNAN: You've been on a tweet storm this morning saying, President's decision to pull out of Syria and cut our troop presence in Afghanistan in half, you said "the entire foreign policy establishment of Washington, DC, who two years ago were swearing Trump was going to start multiple nuclear wars. Now they're mad because he is stopping two wars. How about you just admit you hate the President, love war and have been wrong for the last twenty years on every part of foreign policy?" Who are you referring to because the defense secretary and the top diplomat handling ISIS both resigned over these decisions?

     SENATOR RAND PAUL: You know, I think that we should look at some of the statements of the people who are advocating that we stay in Afghanistan forever and that we also stay now in Syria with no sort of determined end. General Mattis, even General Mattis said that there's no military solution to Syria, and he's also said there's no military solution to Afghanistan. How do you think our young soldiers feel? I have members of my family that are going over there soon, how do you think they feel being sent to Afghanistan when your generals are saying there's no military solution? So I think the burden is really on Mattis and others who want perpetual war to explain why if there is no military solution we're sending more troops....

     We've been there seventeen years. We think now we are going to take one more village and we'll get a better negotiated deal?... That was the strategy of Vietnam for years after year after year in Vietnam was to take one more village and we'll get a better negotiated deal. No, they waited us out and the Taliban are going to wait us out. They know we will eventually leave and leave we must. I mean I don't think we have enough money to be paying to build and rebuild and build and rebuild Afghanistan. The President is right and I think the people agree with him. Let's rebuild America. Let's spend that money here at home....

     I couldn’t have said it better – and I was once in favor of the interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq. It’s time for those of us who were so inclined to admit our mistakes.