BATR 2020 Election News
Showing posts with label America First. Show all posts
Showing posts with label America First. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 25, 2019
Monday, September 16, 2019
After Bolton, Trump’s Second Term Depends on America First
By sacking former national security adviser John Bolton, President Donald Trump has put himself in a better position to keep the campaign promises that distinguished him from the other Republicans who ran against him in 2016 and perhaps pull off another come-from-behind win next year.
Finally, an example of regime change that could actually make our country safer. But while firing Bolton is prerequisite for pursuing a true “America First” foreign policy, it is not sufficient by itself. Trump needs reinforcements if he is to fulfill his pledges to end the wars in Syria and, especially, Afghanistan. The next national security adviser cannot be a Bolton bureaucratic rival who largely holds the same view as the mustachioed militarist or even a Bolton mini-me.
Trump cannot govern the way he wants to by recruiting from the George W. Bush and John McCain B Teams. While his options are limited—realism and restraint has considerable academic support, but less Beltway experience and fewer credentialed Republicans—the alternative is to surrender the advantages that put him in the Oval Office in the first place over the objections of the mainstream media, outraged Democrats, and even some of his own party’s establishment.
So far there has been a disconnect between Trump’s rhetoric and the Trump record. He has allowed underlings to essentially override him on Afghanistan and Syria. He scrapped the Iran nuclear deal without a viable alternative and vetoed a bipartisan resolution rebuking U.S. participation in the unconscionable Saudi war on Yemen. He has escalated many of the ongoing presidential wars that lack constitutionally required congressional authorization.
Read the entire article
Finally, an example of regime change that could actually make our country safer. But while firing Bolton is prerequisite for pursuing a true “America First” foreign policy, it is not sufficient by itself. Trump needs reinforcements if he is to fulfill his pledges to end the wars in Syria and, especially, Afghanistan. The next national security adviser cannot be a Bolton bureaucratic rival who largely holds the same view as the mustachioed militarist or even a Bolton mini-me.
Trump cannot govern the way he wants to by recruiting from the George W. Bush and John McCain B Teams. While his options are limited—realism and restraint has considerable academic support, but less Beltway experience and fewer credentialed Republicans—the alternative is to surrender the advantages that put him in the Oval Office in the first place over the objections of the mainstream media, outraged Democrats, and even some of his own party’s establishment.
So far there has been a disconnect between Trump’s rhetoric and the Trump record. He has allowed underlings to essentially override him on Afghanistan and Syria. He scrapped the Iran nuclear deal without a viable alternative and vetoed a bipartisan resolution rebuking U.S. participation in the unconscionable Saudi war on Yemen. He has escalated many of the ongoing presidential wars that lack constitutionally required congressional authorization.
Read the entire article
Wednesday, August 28, 2019
Friday, July 05, 2019
5 reasons Independence Day is for the anti-government rebels
No matter how many things are wrong with this nation, Independence Day is not a time for cynicism and pessimism.
Celebrate America, and celebrate it hard.
Because the 4th of July is NOT about supporting this government or blind patriotism.
Independence Day is about the rebel American spirit that gave a big middle finger to the government oppressors.
1. It is your right, and DUTY to ABOLISH a government that no longer represents you.
2. Governments are authorized ONLY by the “consent of the governed.”
3. Rights come from the “Laws of Nature and Nature’s God.”
4. “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness” are “unalienable Rights.”
5. We tried to do this the easy way…
Read the entire article
Celebrate America, and celebrate it hard.
Because the 4th of July is NOT about supporting this government or blind patriotism.
Independence Day is about the rebel American spirit that gave a big middle finger to the government oppressors.
1. It is your right, and DUTY to ABOLISH a government that no longer represents you.
2. Governments are authorized ONLY by the “consent of the governed.”
3. Rights come from the “Laws of Nature and Nature’s God.”
4. “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness” are “unalienable Rights.”
5. We tried to do this the easy way…
Read the entire article
Friday, June 28, 2019
Justin Raimondo, RIP (1951-2019)
Justin Raimondo, former editorial director and co-founder of Antiwar.com, is dead at 67.
Justin CO-founded the Libertarian Party Radical Caucus (LPRC) in late 1978. Economist Murray Rothbard joined a few months later. Around the same time, Justin became one of the first employees of the newly formed Students for a Libertarian Society. Shortly after Democratic US Senator Sam Nunn and other members of Congress moved to reinstate the military draft and draft registration, Justin helped organize a number of anti-draft rallies that were held around the country on May 1, 1979. The LPRC disbanded in 1983.
He found more intellectual inspiration in the Old Right, people like John T. Flynn, Albert J. Nock, Frank Chodorov, Isabel Paterson, and other mid-20th century figures who defended the vision of a constitutional republic and protested the progressive leviathan’s despotic powers at home and abroad. Justin was especially influenced by novelist Garet Garrett, who saw Franklin Roosevelt’s presidency as a revolutionary development that gutted American freedom while leaving the superficial form of the Constitution intact, and who was perhaps "even harsher" in opposing Truman’s Cold War imperialism. Justin regarded the irreconcilable conflict between interventionists and traditionalists as the defining struggle over the heart and soul of American conservatism.
Because of his strong antiwar views, Justin also supported Pat Buchanan three times in his run for President of the United States: 1992, 1996, and 2000. In 2000, Justin gave the nominating speech for Pat Buchanan at the Reform Party convention in Long Beach. It can be seen here from 1:19:00 to 1:32:02.
Read the entire account
Justin CO-founded the Libertarian Party Radical Caucus (LPRC) in late 1978. Economist Murray Rothbard joined a few months later. Around the same time, Justin became one of the first employees of the newly formed Students for a Libertarian Society. Shortly after Democratic US Senator Sam Nunn and other members of Congress moved to reinstate the military draft and draft registration, Justin helped organize a number of anti-draft rallies that were held around the country on May 1, 1979. The LPRC disbanded in 1983.
He found more intellectual inspiration in the Old Right, people like John T. Flynn, Albert J. Nock, Frank Chodorov, Isabel Paterson, and other mid-20th century figures who defended the vision of a constitutional republic and protested the progressive leviathan’s despotic powers at home and abroad. Justin was especially influenced by novelist Garet Garrett, who saw Franklin Roosevelt’s presidency as a revolutionary development that gutted American freedom while leaving the superficial form of the Constitution intact, and who was perhaps "even harsher" in opposing Truman’s Cold War imperialism. Justin regarded the irreconcilable conflict between interventionists and traditionalists as the defining struggle over the heart and soul of American conservatism.
Because of his strong antiwar views, Justin also supported Pat Buchanan three times in his run for President of the United States: 1992, 1996, and 2000. In 2000, Justin gave the nominating speech for Pat Buchanan at the Reform Party convention in Long Beach. It can be seen here from 1:19:00 to 1:32:02.
Read the entire account
Monday, June 24, 2019
White House Pushes 'Trump Pulled Back' Story - He Likely Never Approved To Strike Iran
Trump wages an economic war on Iran through sanctions on everything Iran exports or imports. Iran is doing its best to to push back against this by creating incidents that are plausibly deniable but put Trump under maximum pressure. But there are now signs that Trump is finally getting that.
Yesterday evening Tucker Carlson, a FOX News host with a direct line to the White House, had two strong anti-war segments on his show (vid). In the second segment Carlson talks with retired army Colonel Douglas McGregor. Both argue for pulling back on sanctions. This was likely a preplanned exchange (at 9:56 min) designed to give Trump cover for his decision:
Carlson: Is there some good reason to maintain this level of sanctions against Iran? Are we getting something out of that?
McGregor: Well, I think the idea was to destroy the Iranian economy to bring the nation to its knees. That is really not what we should be trying to do at this point. I think the president senses that there is now an opportunity for diplomacy, for a new approach to Iran that could deescalate this set of conditions and produce a positive outcome.
Look, this will ruin our economy if we engage Iran in a war. Iran will have instantly have support from around the world. They will be the victim of this "limited strike" that is being discussed. The limited strike idea is sheer insanity. It will provoke a war. Everyone, China, Russia, India, many European states will come to the aid of Iran. We will end up with a larger coalition of the willing against us, than we have seen in decades.
I think the president has figured this out. He's got good instincts. But he needs to get rid of the warmongers. He needs to throw these geniuses and their limited strikes out of the Oval Office. The last thing the America First agenda needs is a stupid pointless unnecessary war with Iran and he knows that and he needs to act.
Read the entire article
Yesterday evening Tucker Carlson, a FOX News host with a direct line to the White House, had two strong anti-war segments on his show (vid). In the second segment Carlson talks with retired army Colonel Douglas McGregor. Both argue for pulling back on sanctions. This was likely a preplanned exchange (at 9:56 min) designed to give Trump cover for his decision:
Carlson: Is there some good reason to maintain this level of sanctions against Iran? Are we getting something out of that?
McGregor: Well, I think the idea was to destroy the Iranian economy to bring the nation to its knees. That is really not what we should be trying to do at this point. I think the president senses that there is now an opportunity for diplomacy, for a new approach to Iran that could deescalate this set of conditions and produce a positive outcome.
Look, this will ruin our economy if we engage Iran in a war. Iran will have instantly have support from around the world. They will be the victim of this "limited strike" that is being discussed. The limited strike idea is sheer insanity. It will provoke a war. Everyone, China, Russia, India, many European states will come to the aid of Iran. We will end up with a larger coalition of the willing against us, than we have seen in decades.
I think the president has figured this out. He's got good instincts. But he needs to get rid of the warmongers. He needs to throw these geniuses and their limited strikes out of the Oval Office. The last thing the America First agenda needs is a stupid pointless unnecessary war with Iran and he knows that and he needs to act.
Read the entire article
Wednesday, August 08, 2018
The Censorship Is Real – EndOfTheAmericanDream.com Is Being Completely Blocked By Library Internet Filters
Somebody out there definitely does not want you to see what I have to say. On Sunday I received an email that upset me greatly, and I am about to share it with you. One of my readers recently went to his local library to print off a couple of copies of one of my articles, and it turns out that EndOfTheAmericanDream.com was completely blocked by the Internet filter that the library was using. I have been writing a lot about how conservative voices are being systematically censored on the Internet, but it becomes more real when it happens to you. The following is the message that my reader sent me via email…
Michael I just had a terrifying, alarming experience at my local library in Pleasant Hill MO. I went in to get the Librarian to run off two copies of your article about the gap between the rich and poor being so great now and the Librarian couldn’t get on endoftheamericandream because your website is considered a “radical opinion” website by Homeland Security Administration and the Library!!!!!!!!!!!! She said that is according to the “filter” the Library uses. TALK ABOUT CENSORSHIP AND BOOK BURNING!!! So I couldn’t get the copies made. I have been hearing about how the internet is censoring, shadowbanning, and unsubscribing people from Conservative websites and NOW I BELIEVE IT!!!! I experienced it first hand. WOW! I thought I should let you know. Truly, we are living in Orwellian times!
Why in the world would they want to censor me?
The only “radical opinions” that I have are the exact same ones that conservatives, Christians and patriots have had ever since this country began. Unfortunately, those opinions are now considered “radical” because of how far this nation has shifted in recent years.
Read the entire article
Michael I just had a terrifying, alarming experience at my local library in Pleasant Hill MO. I went in to get the Librarian to run off two copies of your article about the gap between the rich and poor being so great now and the Librarian couldn’t get on endoftheamericandream because your website is considered a “radical opinion” website by Homeland Security Administration and the Library!!!!!!!!!!!! She said that is according to the “filter” the Library uses. TALK ABOUT CENSORSHIP AND BOOK BURNING!!! So I couldn’t get the copies made. I have been hearing about how the internet is censoring, shadowbanning, and unsubscribing people from Conservative websites and NOW I BELIEVE IT!!!! I experienced it first hand. WOW! I thought I should let you know. Truly, we are living in Orwellian times!
Why in the world would they want to censor me?
The only “radical opinions” that I have are the exact same ones that conservatives, Christians and patriots have had ever since this country began. Unfortunately, those opinions are now considered “radical” because of how far this nation has shifted in recent years.
Read the entire article
Wednesday, November 23, 2016
What Would an ‘America First’ Foreign Policy Look Like?
As Donald Trump takes the reins and we all prepare for the next four years, the need to translate rhetoric into reality comes to the fore. Trump spent the campaign repeating a phrase that horrified the elites – especially the foreign policy Establishment – even adopting it as his official campaign theme: “America first.”
The elites were aghast because the phrase evokes the legacy of the biggest anti-interventionist movement in American history: the America First Committee, a coalition of conservative businessmen and progressive activists (including the socialist Norman Thomas) who not only opposed US entry into World War II, but also pointed to the authoritarian tendencies of the Franklin Roosevelt administration, which they feared would be exacerbated in wartime – as indeed they were.
Smeared by pro-war liberals and their Communist party allies as “Nazi sympathizers” — in the same way antiwar activists were later accused of being pro-Communist, pro-Saddam Hussein, pro-terroriost, etc. – the AFC has not fared well with historians, who, for the most part, are Roosevelt partisans, and globalists in any case. The America Firsters are the original “isolationists” the War Party warns us about, “dangerous” subversives who saw that in the quest for a “world order,” Americans would lose their old republic.
Which is precisely what happened.
Whether consciously or not, Trump has revived this long-disdained trend in American politics, and, what’s more, he has won. So how does –or should – he translate this kind of rhetoric into reality?
Read the entire article
The elites were aghast because the phrase evokes the legacy of the biggest anti-interventionist movement in American history: the America First Committee, a coalition of conservative businessmen and progressive activists (including the socialist Norman Thomas) who not only opposed US entry into World War II, but also pointed to the authoritarian tendencies of the Franklin Roosevelt administration, which they feared would be exacerbated in wartime – as indeed they were.
Smeared by pro-war liberals and their Communist party allies as “Nazi sympathizers” — in the same way antiwar activists were later accused of being pro-Communist, pro-Saddam Hussein, pro-terroriost, etc. – the AFC has not fared well with historians, who, for the most part, are Roosevelt partisans, and globalists in any case. The America Firsters are the original “isolationists” the War Party warns us about, “dangerous” subversives who saw that in the quest for a “world order,” Americans would lose their old republic.
Which is precisely what happened.
Whether consciously or not, Trump has revived this long-disdained trend in American politics, and, what’s more, he has won. So how does –or should – he translate this kind of rhetoric into reality?
Read the entire article
Thursday, April 14, 2016
‘America First’ – The Trump Slogan the Establishment Hates
Why has the Establishment pulled out all the stops in an effort to smear him, stop him, and crush him underfoot? Every single day the “mainstream” media unleashes a foam-flecked fusillade of fury at the GOP front-runner: he’s a “racist,” he’s “corrupt,” his campaign manager is a “bully,” he “incites violence,” etc. etc. ad nauseam.
Of course, the media is going to attack any Republican candidate. However, this time, the GOP elite is joining in, and the level of ferocity is something we haven’t seen since 1964. That was the year Barry Goldwater’s trip to Germany provoked a report by Daniel Schorr on the CBS Evening News that falsely linked the GOP candidate to German neo-Nazis – while Nelson Rockefeller denounced Goldwater’s delegates as “extremists” who “feed on fear, hate, and terror.”
Yes, “terror”!
The same violence-baiting hysteria is being deployed against Trump, but one has to wonder what’s behind it. I was watching Bill O’Reilly the other day, and he was saying that it has to do with the elite’s visceral dislike of Trump as a personality. They think he’s a “vulgarian” who appeals to the rubes in flyover country. Well, there’s something to that: these consumers of arugula and “artisan” cheese no doubt disdain the hamburgers-and-beer crowd embodied by Trump’s persona, but there’s more to it than that. And I can sum it up in two words: foreign policy.
Yes, yes, I know: foreign policy isn’t supposed to figure in presidential elections. Dan Drezner keeps telling us that. And yet I couldn’t help but notice that the anti-Trump hysteria hit a high note (or is that a new low?) when he came out with a series of foreign policy pronouncements and started attacking NATO. The hairs on the back of the necks of the foreign policy wonks must’ve stood at attention when he adopted “America first” as his campaign slogan.
Read the entire article
Of course, the media is going to attack any Republican candidate. However, this time, the GOP elite is joining in, and the level of ferocity is something we haven’t seen since 1964. That was the year Barry Goldwater’s trip to Germany provoked a report by Daniel Schorr on the CBS Evening News that falsely linked the GOP candidate to German neo-Nazis – while Nelson Rockefeller denounced Goldwater’s delegates as “extremists” who “feed on fear, hate, and terror.”
Yes, “terror”!
The same violence-baiting hysteria is being deployed against Trump, but one has to wonder what’s behind it. I was watching Bill O’Reilly the other day, and he was saying that it has to do with the elite’s visceral dislike of Trump as a personality. They think he’s a “vulgarian” who appeals to the rubes in flyover country. Well, there’s something to that: these consumers of arugula and “artisan” cheese no doubt disdain the hamburgers-and-beer crowd embodied by Trump’s persona, but there’s more to it than that. And I can sum it up in two words: foreign policy.
Yes, yes, I know: foreign policy isn’t supposed to figure in presidential elections. Dan Drezner keeps telling us that. And yet I couldn’t help but notice that the anti-Trump hysteria hit a high note (or is that a new low?) when he came out with a series of foreign policy pronouncements and started attacking NATO. The hairs on the back of the necks of the foreign policy wonks must’ve stood at attention when he adopted “America first” as his campaign slogan.
Read the entire article
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