Watch Chris Dodd respond to Bill Maher’s defense of Ron Paul. Support for this war is in the 20s. It’s now convincingly clear that it was an unmitigated failure. It’s also clear that Paul was making a legitimate, factual point that was crudely and intentionally (or if not intentionally, just ignorantly) interpreted by Rudy Giuliani to score cheap “Remember me? I’m a 9/11 hero!” points. And Dodd still can’t rise above wishy-washy in answering Maher’s question.

What will it take for Democrats to grow a goddamned backbone? You half-think George Bush could announce tomorrow that the U.S. army will begin executing every third Arab person, just for funsies, and Hillary Clinton would put out a middling press release criticizing the policy in harsh tones, but, for fear looking soft on terrorism, also suggesting a policy of executing every fifth or six Arab would probably be more appropriate. What a useless opposition party.

I know Paul isn’t the most eloquent voice of libertarianism or non-interventionism. Believe me. I’d rather Ed Crane were out on that stage. But the way Paul’s been treated for daring to suggest that we take an approach to foreign policy other than pure good versus pure evil, and that we–God forbid!–pay due deference to context, motivation, and unintended consequences just disgusts me. He shouldn’t even be allowed in the debates? What the hell is wrong with these people? I’m about as jaded and cynical about politics as one can be. I don’t disgust easily. But this childish, isolating, self-protective bubble in which the pro-war camp has encased itself, and the way it has enabled the media to shunt contrarian opinions to the fringe is appalling. Ron Paul was the only person on that stage who said anything remotely resembling the truth. And for that, they must silence him.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 20th, 2007 at 11:58 am by Radley Balko and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.