Bobby Jindal: 'Senator Paul Unsuited to Be Commander-in-Chief'

The anti-Rand bandwagon is getting crowded

American Conservative Union

Not wanting to be left out the hawks-vs.-Rand melee, not-quite-yet-declared 2016 GOP candidate Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisiana, sent out a blistering press release this morning, criticizing the junior senator from Kentucky for blaming the rise of ISIS on American hawks.

This is a perfect example of why Senator Paul is unsuited to be Commander-in-Chief. We have men and women in the military who are in the field trying to fight ISIS right now, and Senator Paul is taking the weakest, most liberal Democrat position.

It's one thing for Senator Paul to take an outlandish position as a Senator at Washington cocktail parties, but being Commander-in-Chief is an entirely different job. We should all be clear that evil and Radical Islam are at fault for the rise of ISIS, and people like President Obama and Hillary Clinton exacerbate it.

American weakness, not American strength, emboldens our enemies. Senator Paul's illogical argument clouds a situation that should provide pure moral clarity. Islam has a problem. ISIS is its current manifestation. And the next President's job is to have the discipline and strength to wipe ISIS off the face of the earth. It has become impossible to imagine a President Paul defeating radical Islam and it's time for the rest of us to say it.

Washington cocktail parties….DRINK!

As Jindal's statement exemplifies, the GOP's seemingly limitless supply of hawks have an unacknowledged problem that goes far beyond Rand Paul. Namely, they know what they're against—weakness! ISIS! Iran! Putin!—but they continue to be maddeningly vague and even silent about what, concretely, they would have the United States do in a world that stubbornly refuses to bend to the will of Washington's central planning. Absent specifics, the critique is mostly chest-puffing and name-calling circa 2003-04.

Americans have moved on from those days. When will the hawks?

Comments

[Charles Easterly]

"And the next President's job is to have the discipline and strength to wipe ISIS off the face of the earth."

Some of these hacks do not even realize who they're paraphrasing and in what context.

[briannnnn]

Can you imagine what this all sounds like in his LA accent. He always looks like he's lip syncing.

[Xeones]

Pretty sure that's racist, somehow.

[Brett L]

You're thinking of Michael Jackson.

[Suthenboy]

Well, he would know, having so much experience being unsuited to be CaC, or Governor for that matter.

Actually I think some small part of the SoCons and NeoCons know Paul is a better choice than they are. The attacks they are launching seem half-hearted, at least in comparison to what I was expecting.

[Pro Libertate]

Paul isn't his dad. He's okay with using military force, just as a last resort, not the first. I don't think these total hawks get how dumb they sound. We're not, despite some bullshit rhetoric, a military empire that has to subjugate client peoples from time to time.

[WTF]

Well, we're not supposed to be, anyway.

[Pro Libertate]

We're not. But I think we've gone from a fairly defined role as World's Goalie to, well, I don't know what our strategy is today.

I read an interesting book about what kind of empire the U.S. has had in recent years called Empires of Trust. It's an interesting read and a very different take than what you usually hear about the U.S. role in the world. And I think he's more right than wrong.

[WTF]

Looks interesting, I think I will check it out.

[Free Society]

We're not.

That's a bold claim. I hope you're not one of those types who thinks an "empire" is defined by literally having the word in it's official name.

But I think we've gone from a fairly defined role as World's Goalie

That was never "fairly defined". It was "fairly defined" that the US was the chief anti-communist state in the world, once upon a time. It's role in NATO provided some definition, for example. But there has been no theory of US foreign policy more nebulous and inconsistent than that of the US as world police.

[Pro Libertate]

It's not a bold claim. We don't permanently occupy and control nations, nor do we pillage them for our own benefit, so not a militaristic empire, and we don't really act like a traditional economic empire, either, other than the influence we wield as the big economic power in the world.

[Free Society]

We don't permanently occupy

First of all, we've spent decades in several countries. And if that's not good enough then consider that just because empires in 2015 don't have the same modus operandi as their ancient counterparts doesn't disprove anything and certainly shouldn't be a surprise. Modern states don't typically flay and dismember convicted criminals like it's ancient counterparts, that doesn't mean it's not a state administered justice system at present.

and control nations,

We absolutely do that. You don't think the US pressures and strongarms other countries into making their laws compliant with US preferences and interests?

nor do we pillage them for our own benefit, so not a militaristic empire

Not a prerequisite. And interesting coming from the country with the most powerful military the world has ever known and presently holds the distinction as the most prolific user of military power in the world.

and we don't really act like a traditional economic empire, either, other than the influence we wield as the big economic power in the world.

Commodore Perry disagrees with you.

But that is a rather rosey picture you've drawn.

[Pro Libertate]

Influence does not equal empire.

[Free Society]

Thanks for clearing that up, Senator Graham.

[ksk]

What set you off so?

[Xeones]

Shut the fuck up, Bobby, you're out of your element.

[Episiarch]

God damn you X! You fuckin' asshole! Everything's a fuckin' travesty with you, man! And what was all that shit about ISIS? What the FUCK, has anything got to do with ISIS? What the fuck are you talking about?

[Xeones]

I am the walrus.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Say what you want about the tenets of liberal democratism, at least it's an ethos.

[Bodica Slayer of Drones]

Yeah, Mike Lee, the Mormon from Utah agrees with Rand Paul too.
And Mike Lee is no fucking liberal.

So fuck you, Bobby Jindal. Fuck you and the elephant you rode in on.

[Rhywun]

Racissss--!

[perlhaqr]

No no, it's a reference to the GOP symbol. And besides, it can't be racist, because he was talking about a Republican.

[some guy]

We're talking about unchecked aggression here, Xeones.

I'm talking about drawing a line in the sand. Across this line, you DO NOT...

[Xeones]

...also, Dude, "chinaman" is NOT the preferred nomenclature. Asian-American, please.

[Inigo M.]

That rug really tied the room together.

[Citizen Nothing]

They're certainly helping Paul differentiate himself from the rest of the GOP field.This stuff has to help him in the primary, no? If only to divide up the neocon vote.

[Episiarch]

We're going to find out when the primaries get close. I don't know if this is a winning strategy but it isn't an immediately losing one; it will be interesting to see how it shakes out. I think it really depends on how much of the "base" is actually truly hawkish or not.

[Grand Moff Serious Man]

I think it's the best strategy he can run on and it might actually be highly effective in Iowa and especially New Hampshire. My feeling is that he'll do well at debates because we know how shallow and empty the warboner rhetoric is and how quickly it falls apart when challenged.

Ron Paul got boost after boost because of the pre-Iowa debates, which is where he peaked at. I expect at least the same boost for Rand, who always comes off like the most reasonable person in the room and doesn't has his dad's rambling kookiness.

[Dark Lord of the Cis]

I think one of the biggest things in Rand's favor is his ability to make his foreign policy position in a way that is much more palatable to republicans than his dad could. I also think he'll do better in the short form debates than Ron.

[Overt]

I'm pretty sure most of the base is pretty hawkish. The question is whether their foreign policy concerns are the top priority in choosing how to vote.

Primaries aren't like normal elections where vote-splitting is an advantage. As soon as one of the hawk candidates shows weakness, the hawk voters will shift to one of the alternates. The initial primaries have few real votes and their real purpose is to thin the field and consolidate the split voters.

Paul's success will not come from hawks splitting. It will come from convincing a majority of existing hawks that their priorities are wrong. I can only see that working if he effectively convinces people that the Leviathan Government is a greater threat than ISIS, and that anything short of another full scale invasion and costly, brutal 30 year occupation of the middle east will be ineffective. He needs to focus people on the problems we can solve, not the ones we cannot.

[Pro Libertate]

Here's the thing: Our military is not sustainable without a juggernaut economy supporting it. We have to get back to real economic growth, or we're fucked. The greatest strategic threat to the U.S. right now is our own government, and that's not some libertarian extremist rhetoric--nothing is hurting our economy more or likely to slow economic and technological growth.

[Overt]

Totally agree, Pro.

If Rand can articulate that, he will truly wedge the hawk vote. This requires two steps:

1) Articulate to people that fixing the middle east is impossible at any price we are willing to pay. This isn't too difficult. It took the "Surge" for us to restore normalcy to Iraq. But as soon as we left, the country fell to shit again. Unless Americans want to sign up for Surges in every failed state in the Middle East and stay there for 30 years, they are pissing in the wind. We have seen that using Special Forces, bombing from carriers, and sending advisors only serves to create instability and get Americans killed. While every armchair general has insisted that their low scale intervention will finally, totes work THIS TIME, history provides a different lesson.

2) The Leviathan Government is our real problem. Our military could be stronger if our economy was growing. Our economy will only grow if we deregulate. Let's build a stronger country that is more important as a trade ally than as an enemy. Let's stop affecting penny-ante strikes that do nothing but convince enemies that we are afraid to do anything meaningful. Let's put those resources and the political capital towards fixing our problems at home.

[Invisible Finger]

Our military is unsustainable because it's a bloated bureaucracy. It's too big to be nimble enough to adapt to changing conditions, too layered to make decisions, and too comfortable in its funding to properly assess risk. A military that is incapable of making economic decisions is an incapable military.

[mad libertarian guy]

i would think so. Only the most hawkish of conservative voters aren't yet tired of the Forever War. Pounding for yet more war when we've been at war for 14 years is a risky way to go.

That said, this strategy, in an effort to not lose the mildly war weary conservative vote, Paul will almost certainly have to espouse some fairly doctrinaire conservative politics.

[JFree]

No it isn't going to help him in the primary. The reason everyone in the GOP is lining up to attack his foreign policy is because IT WORKS. Rand Paul has zero chance of winning the GOP nomination. The longer libertarian-leaning folks delude themselves into believing he has a chance (or that 'Americans are moving away from' this - as the editorial states), the more certain it is that it will become impossible to actually offer a realistic libertarian choice in the election.

There is no such thing as working for change inside the tent in the GOP. If you are willing to compromise away all your core principles, then there is certainly a place for you to be a gofer for the GOP establishment. If you are not willing to compromise away your core principles, then you are a commie wetback-loving child-molester Democrat and should either be shot for treason or handed over to your terrorist sympathizing friends in Somalia/Kenya.

[JFree]

And by the way, there is a HUGE difference between 'neocons' and what Russell Mead called 'Jacksonians'.

Neocons don't exist outside Washington DC. They are irrelevant to elections. Yes - they are always calling for a new war and yes they never personally fight in any of them. So what. Campaigning against them is like wrestling with invisible jello.

'Jacksonians' (originating in the Scots-Irish and now basically are the majority in most red states and rural areas of blue) do serve in the military. They don't start wars - but by God once a war starts, 'we are gonna finish it and kill you - and there ain't no room for either wussies or rules or surrender monkeys'.

In theory, a Rand Paul can appeal to the latter group. But ONLY in relation to 'future' enemies. Once the enemy is identified and the fighting starts, there is only one relevant question Jacksonians want an answer to - How are we going to win. That's it.

The reality unfortunately is that those other GOP pols are appealing to that group better than Rand Paul is (or probably can).

[Joe M]

Americans have moved on from those days. When will the hawks?

Well, Americans in general have. A big chunk of GOP primary voters haven't, sadly.

[R C Dean]

Well, this is disappointing. I had some hope for Jindal. Not anymore.

The problem with all the chest-puffing blowhards is that sooner or later someone is going to call their bluff. That's what they don't get. They think as long as they sound like badasses, no one will ever test them.

But when the test comes, they will have left themselves two very bad options:

(1) Back down.

(2) Go to Total War in the Mideast. Wiping ISIS off the face of the earth will require a gargantuan slaughter spreading across multiple countries and even continents.

Nobody, it seems, including TOP MEN, can think more than one step ahead these days. Idiots, the lot of them.

[Suthenboy]

I will forgive you as you are not a resident of Louisiana. People rarely pay much attention to Governors unless they are Governors of their home state.

Bobby has been a colossal disaster. I saw it coming when he ran the first time. His speech and mannerisms were indistinguishable from those of a cheap used car salesman. I called up an old friend that I knew was well acquainted with Jindal and asked what he thought. I got a five word answer that confirmed my suspicions.

"He is a fast talker."

[MP]

Bobby has been a colossal disaster.

Apparently not according to the voters.

[Apatheist ?_??]

This logic could be applied the every elected official and we all know how universally terrible they are.

[Homple]

So what did he do that was disastrous?

[Suthenboy]

Bobby in a nutshell:

He promised to cut bloated government. He did this by firing a number of lower rung state employees and by attrition, cutting the numbers of state employees drastically. Great, right?

The trouble is that the state payroll outlays increased dramatically then played fast and loose with the books to hide it. He is basically the R version of Obama, looting the treasury on behalf of his cronies.

I know a fellow from Monroe was is connected. He got a job making around 125K/yr to be a part of a small army of 'connected' who drive around counting boll weevils. (In case you don't know, the boll weevil has been eradicated)

[Homple]

So Louisiana government in the tradition of Long, Edwards et al. continues?

[Letitride]

Your 100% right ...i live in Louisiana bobby just another big government blow hard

[kinnath]

The commander in chief needs to be a top notch poker player. I see Bobby as losing his shorts every Saturday night in the back of some hick swamp-country dive bar.

[Sam Grove]

Another endorsement for Rand Paul.

[Sudden]

It's one thing for Senator Paul to take an outlandish position as a Senator at Washington cocktail parties,

COCKTAIL PARTIES COSMOTARDIANZZ!!1!11!11!!

[DEATFBIRSECIA]

So I guess we now know what happened to Gilligan after he got off the island.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

He got a nice tan

[Paul.]

Look, the GOP has to differentiate itself from the small government types somehow. It's simple marketing!

[robc]

Why do the hawks hate Reagan so much?

Or do they not remember what he did and said after the Marine barracks attack?

[Pro Libertate]

"Fuck this shit."

[robc]

The media reported it differently, but yes, that was exactly what he said.

[Pro Libertate]

Pretty rational response, if you ask me. And he did it when "not looking tough" meant something, because of those pesky Soviet folks.

[Overt]

And of course, the Hawks all point to the abandonment of lebanon as one of the lasting foreign policy disasters of the 80s, leading to emboldened terrorists across the region. They will point out that bombing Qaddafi was ten times better in that it showed our strength and cowed a dictator.

Not that any of this is true. But the problem is in complex geo politics you can always cherry pick a little evidence to support your narrative.

[Paul.]

It was a lasting policy disaster because it accomplished nothing and got a bunch of marines killed. Pulling out was the only thing that saved the balance of our investment.

Libya on the other hand was a direct response to terror attacks directly on American interests, and after a smart bomb went through khaddafi's living room window, Libya became a quiet neighborhood on the terrorist front, and we left khaddafi in power instead of leaving an empty seat for ISIS take when the music stopped.

[Overt]

On the first, I agree. Most people do not, but again you can cherry pick evidence to the contrary.

On the second, there is ample evidence that Qaddafi amped up his terror programs after the bombing. Additionally, he initiated his own nuclear development starting after that incident. I'm sure many will say that he gave up the program after the invasion of Iraq showed what the US was willing to do to dictators pursuing WMD.

My point is not to argue how good or bad these decisions were. Like most other policies, the results were mixed. People on either side of the argument will have plenty of evidence to back their position, and people inclined to believe one or the other will do so.

[Cytotoxic]

there is ample evidence that Qaddafi amped up his terror programs after the bombing.

Cite? If so, America should have sent marines into Tripoli.

Letting Hizbollah have its way after its bombing was awful. At least America bombarded them but it should have been much harsher.

[Bee Tagger]

"It's one thing for Senator Paul to take an outlandish position as a Senator at Washington cocktail parties, but being Commander-in-Chief is an entirely different job."

He's comparing jobs, president to senator, so that doesn't address if he's able to take an outlandish position at a Washington cocktail party while president.

[Catatafish]

I'm holding out hope that Paul continues to differentiate himself from the pack and, when he gets on stage with some of these buffoons, says something to the effect of:

"My position couldn't be more clear. I consider radical Islam a threat. I also consider failed states that allow radical Islam to flourish a threat. What I am opposed to is this nation sending its men and women into harms way and constantly creating new failed states. We can be a leader in this world without having to clean up the regional messes that other nations bear a greater responsibility for and degree of self-interest in resolving. But before any of my brethren here on stage continue to dissemble and misinform on what I would or wouldn't do if I have the privilege to serve as your President, I'll say this very slowly: should any nation launch an attack on the United States or be found to have provided assistance to a group that does so, I will not hesitate to order our military to turn that country to rubble and dust...and salt their fields on our way out for good measure."

[Kaptious Kristen]

That logic is way too complex for Joe Voter.

[Catatafish]

*sheds fishy tears in recognition*

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[The Late P Brooks]

Remember when Ronald Reagan asked, "Are you better off?"

That is exactly what Rand should do.
"Are we better off? Is the world a better place? ARE WE SAFER?"
Fuck the neocon warmongers. Throw that in their faces at every opportunity.

[B.P.]

Yeah, I'd like to think that the "this shit isn't working" tactic might get some traction. Assholes like Kristol have their foreign policy wishes granted for an entire generation, resulting in failure after failure, and then have the temerity to call those seeking a different track unserious and unreasonable.

[Invisible Finger]

The TSA could ask the same question. And the majority of Americans - aka idiots - would answer "yes".

[Notorious G.K.C.]

I thought Paul criticized Obama and Hillary for *fighting ISIS's enemies,* with cheerleading from the neocons.

How dare you suggest that fighting ISIS's enemies somehow helped ISIS?

[Steve G]

Fuck off Jindal. How's about you ask a few folks in uniform who they'd rather have as CINC, the answer might just surprise you.

[Bodica Slayer of Drones]

Hey! Mike Lee is no damn liberal Democrat! Bobby, you troll!

[Letitride]

As a citizen of Louisiana I would not vote for bobby jindal. He is just another hack! he's done nothing for our state!

We need a president who will end the war on drugs/terror and reign in big government
Stand with Rand

[Pan Zagloba]

So I guess that's the Stupid Party thing, again?
Man, Republicans are weird. I can't think of any major party in a developed state that acts like this. It's seriously worse than Menshevik/Bolshevik split, as that at least had only two sides.
Maybe they are actually collapsing. This mostly reminds me of fall of Communist Parties in East Europe, in that weird period when new parties were allowed, but elections weren't held yet so the same people were still in parliaments. All of a sudden, you had a bunch party changes and people who were colleagues yesterday became fierce political opponents (at least how it was in most of Yugoslavia, not sure about Hungary and Poland).
Good thing for Paul, I think. Hopefully this gives him a boost, although I'm leaning towards "he will do more good in Senate." And Republicans need to get their shit together and start targeting Hilary with same vitriol, or she'll get in and they'll have failed again.