by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
U.S. rulers have designated Hillary Clinton as the Democrats’ next front person, while Sen. Bernie Sanders has volunteered to be the loyal “lefty” opposition – who will step aside and endorse Clinton at the proper time. Sanders will refuse to indict Obama or Hillary for embarking “on a war against world order and civilization, itself, in which Salafist death cults are its frontline storm troopers.” But Rand Paul, the right-winger, will.
Rand Paul Makes More Sense than the Democrats’ “Left” Champion
by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
“Having pledged in advance to support Hillary, de facto Democrat Sanders cannot risk running a campaign that might reveal the sheer awesomeness of her evil.”
The whole world knows that the United States and its closest allies created the ISIS-al Qaida juggernaut in Syria, Iraq, Libya and proliferating points elsewhere in the Muslim world. Russian President Vladimir Putin knows it, and has now begun to denounce the crime against civilization on the world stage. Rand Paul knows it, and has made the fact central to his campaign for the U.S. presidency. Every world leader, whether a vassal of the Washington or part of the resistance to U.S. imperialism, is fully aware that the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Pakistan gave birth to the international jihadist network in the mountains of Afghanistan, and have nurtured, financed, trained and armed the monster ever since.
The trajectory of the Wahhabist horror show was both planned and predictable. Back in 2012, the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency said bluntly that “Western countries, the Gulf States and Turkey” wanted an “Islamic state” to arise in eastern Syria, and foresaw that al Qaida would soon “return to its old pockets in Mosul and Ramadi” in Iraq – all of which, and much more, has come to pass.
Muammar Gaddafi prophesized correctly that NATO’s transformation into a jihadist air force would turn Libya into “another Somalia” – a vortex of Salafist chaos that would destabilize the entire region. “We came, we saw, he died,” cackled Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who yearns to bring the same ghoulish statecraft to the Oval Office in 2017. Does any decent person actually consider this banshee a “lesser evil”?
Bernie Sanders does. The Vermont senator promises to endorse Clinton as soon as he drops out of the presidential race – thus nullifying whatever “message” he plans to deliver during the Democratic primary process. But of course, having pledged in advance to support Hillary, de facto Democrat Sanders cannot risk running a campaign that might reveal the sheer awesomeness of her evil. Therefore, there will be no Democratic Party discussion of U.S. and allied sponsorship of the Islamic State and al Qaida, in the same way that serious criticism of Israel is off-limits for Sanders and all national Democrats.
“Sanders will not acknowledge that U.S. governments of both parties deploy jihadists as foot soldiers for U.S. imperialism.”
The Party is a trap. Not that its strictures, alone, force Sanders to bite his tongue. He actually has nothing much to say about U.S. and allied sponsorship of jihadists. Instead, he buys into the lie that the Obama administration is eager to fight the Islamists – at least the Islamic State component – and puts his foot down at giving the president sweeping powers to do so. But, he will not acknowledge that U.S. governments of both parties deploy jihadists as foot soldiers for U.S. imperialism.
Rand Paul does. Just last week, the Tennessee Republican senator told MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”:
“ISIS exists and grew stronger because of the hawks in our party who gave arms indiscriminately. And most of those arms were snatched up by ISIS. These hawks also wanted to bomb [Syrian President Bashar al-Assad], which would have made ISIS's job even easier.
“They created these people. ISIS is all over Libya because these same hawks in my party loved -- they loved [former Secretary of State] Hillary Clinton’s war in Libya. They just wanted more of it."
Democrats will not get the equivalent analysis from Sanders, or even from Dennis Kucinich, should he decide to re-enter the fray as a Democrat.
Paul speaks from a political space in the Republican Party that is deeply opposed to “internationalism,” which it equates with foreigners, people of color, socialists, and other folks that are anathema to “good white Americans.” Paul’s anti-interventionism strikes a chord with rightwing whites that oppose entanglements with people who don’t share their “values.” Their revulsion to the U.S. becoming polluted by foreign entanglements – a race-based reaction – moves them to oppose foreign wars.
“Paul’s anti-interventionism strikes a chord with right-wing whites that oppose entanglements with people who don’t share their ‘values.’”
Sen. Paul has been consistent in indicting the United States for the scourge of the Islamic State. Last June he told CNN:
"We have been fighting alongside al Qaeda, fighting alongside ISIS. ISIS is now emboldened and in two countries. But here's the anomaly. We're with ISIS in Syria. We're on the same side of the war. So, those who want to get involved to stop ISIS in Iraq are allied with ISIS in Syria. That is real contradiction to this whole policy."
Bernie Sanders, representing largely rural, whiter-than-white Vermont, also makes a kind of “American values” appeal. In an appearance on CNN, in September of last year, he said:
"I'm sitting here wondering where Saudi Arabia is, where Kuwait is, where Qatar is. I'll be damned if kids in the state of Vermont – or taxpayers in the state of Vermont – have to defend the royal Saudi family, which is worth hundreds of billions of dollars."
Sanders frames the conflict as Saudi Arabia’s war, absolving the United States, the Saudi’s senior partner in promoting jihadist war for generations. Besides, says Sanders, the war costs Americans too much money, which could be better spent on creating jobs at home. "While we focus all of our attention on ISIS, the middle class in this country continues to collapse," Sanders said.
Rand Paul’s position is far closer to Russian President Putin’s. Speaking to a meeting of the BRICS nations, Putin declared:
”We know what is going on in the Middle East and North Africa now. We see problems caused by a terrorist organization, which calls itself ‘The Islamic State.’ However, there was no terrorism in those states before the unacceptable interference from the outside took place without an approval of the UN Security Council. It is obvious that the consequences are tough. Everything that has happened in the international arena over the last couple of years needs to be re-adjusted.”
In the language of diplomacy – in which Putin is well versed, unlike the crude, cackling Hillary – these are very harsh words, reserved for times of crisis. Putin urged fellow BRICS leaders to take collective steps for their own security against the lawlessness that the U.S. and its allies have created.
The United States is embarked on a war against world order and civilization, itself, in which Salafist death cults are its frontline storm troopers. The fact that U.S. imperialism is now dependent on jihadists who must inevitably turn on their royal and western backers, is among the best evidence that the empire has arrived at a fatal stage.
The Democratic Party is no place or vehicle to engage such issues of planetary life and death. When a libertarian Republican is saner on international affairs than the Democratic Party’s “left” champion, it’s time to lower the curtain on that show.
P.S. Anyone that thinks this piece was an endorsement of Rand Paul or the Republicans – should not be reading BAR.
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at [email protected].
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