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McCain versus Paul: The New Red Scare Masks US Foreign Policy Insanity

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English: Map to show current affiliations of E...
Map showing current affiliations of European Countries with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

On March 15, US Senator John McCain (R-AZ) revealed just how ridiculous the American political establishment’s reliance on Vladimir Putin as boogeyman has become.

McCain, seeking the Senate’s unanimous consent to advance a bill supporting admission of the small country of Montenegro to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, warned that anyone who dissented would be “carrying out the desires and ambitions of [Russian president Vladimir] Putin.” True to form, when Kentucky Republican Rand Paul objected (meaning only that the matter will actually be debated instead of rubber-stamped), McCain asserted that “the senator from Kentucky is now working for Vladimir Putin.”

Paul’s having some fun with McCain’s over-the-top theatrics, describing McCain as “past his prime” and “unhinged” on MSNBC’s Morning Joe. But let’s set aside the rivalry aspect and look at what McCain’s hysterical performance says about US foreign policy.

Montenegro is a small country (about 600,000 people) with a small military (less than 2,000 active duty soldiers, sailors and airmen) which is nowhere near the north Atlantic (its only coastline is on the Adriatic Sea).

Lest we forget, the Balkans are known for producing wars both small and large. Montenegro borders Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo and Serbia. Is there any particular reason the US should commit itself by treaty to intervene in the military spats that break out in that region at the drop of a hat (or the assassination of an Archduke)?

The only word I can come up with on short notice to describe the idea of bringing Montenegro into NATO is “nonsensical.”

But even assuming the idea made sense at all, it hardly seems urgent.  The matter has been pending for more than a year now (Montenegro received its initial NATO invitation in December of 2015). Is the world going to end if the US Senate takes time to talk it over instead of just stampeding on John McCain’s command?

McCain seems to think so. He considers any Senate action other than unthinking, reflexive approval of anything he might happen to propose vis a vis US foreign policy to be evidence of a Russian plot to destroy America, and anyone who doesn’t give him exactly what he wants on demand a Russian agent.

The American foreign policy establishment’s use of Vladimir Putin as an all-purpose hobgoblin isn’t just ridiculous, it’s dangerous and insane. Left unchecked it will, sooner or later, drag America into unnecessary wars costing us untold blood and treasure.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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Stranger Fruit Meets Rotten Fruit: Robert McCulloch and the Michael Brown Shooting

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A makeshift memorial placed during protests -- photo by Jamelle Bouie via Wikipedia
A makeshift memorial placed during protests — photo by Jamelle Bouie via Wikipedia

As the 2014 shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson was litigated in the court of public opinion, Ferguson’s police department released video which appeared to show Brown robbing a local store a few minutes before his fatal encounter with Wilson.

A new documentary, Stranger Fruit, includes additional, mostly previously unnoticed, footage which seems to call that interpretation (and the attendant perception of Brown’s character) into question. Filmmaker Jason Pollock believes it shows that what happened was not a robbery, but an exchange of marijuana for cigarillos.

I’m no more sure what to believe about the footage and its import than I am of precisely what happened that day between Brown and Wilson. But I am sure that the last person entitled to have his opinion on the matter taken seriously is St. Louis County, Missouri prosecutor Robert McCulloch.

McCulloch calls Pollock’s theory “just stupid” and “just nonsense.” But it was McCulloch whose epic, and apparently intentional, mishandling of the formal investigation made speculative inquiries like Pollock’s inevitable. Stranger Fruit exists because Robert McCulloch wanted neither to do his job nor to be seen as not doing it.

As a prosecutor, McCulloch had discretion to do one of three things.

He could charge Wilson with a crime, presenting evidence to sustain the charge in a public preliminary hearing.

Or he could take the case to a grand jury where the evidence would be considered in secret.

Finally, he could decide not to pursue the matter further if he didn’t believe the evidence was there to convict Wilson.

At all times when taking any of these three courses, McCulloch’s job remained the same: To pursue charges if he believed he could prove the case, to not pursue charges if he didn’t.

Instead, McCulloch set up shop as Wilson’s defense attorney behind the closed doors of the grand jury proceedings. For all intents and purposes he quit his job as prosecutor and concentrated solely on NOT doing what he was supposedly there to do, which was to get an indictment.

McCulloch’s machinations created the impression that “the fix was in” — because it was. His priority wasn’t to do his job, or to reach the truth, or to serve justice. It was to exonerate Darren Wilson because, and only because, Wilson was a police officer.

McCulloch has a long and legendary record of bending over backward to ensure that no police officer is ever held responsible for his or her actions, even when those actions are clearly criminal.

Granted, his personal history plays a role. When he was 12, his father, a police officer, was killed in the line of duty. But that’s no excuse. He’s supposedly a prosecutor, but instead works tirelessly to exonerate accused cops, including the killers of two unarmed men at a Berkeley, Missouri restaurant in 2000.

Wilson may or may not be one of those rare bad apples we always hear about from defenders of police as such. McCulloch undoubtedly is. Stranger Fruit, meet rotten fruit.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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Sorry, Non-Interventionists: Donald Trump is a War President

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Rescue and clean-up crews search for casualtie...
Rescue and clean-up crews search for casualties following the barracks bombing in Beirut on October 23, 1983. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

During the 2016 presidential campaign, Donald Trump claimed to have opposed the Iraq war, wanted better relations with Russia, and even briefly put his hand on the hot stove of the Arab-Israeli conflict, calling himself “neutral” on Palestine.

On the other hand, he called for “rebuilding” the US armed forces, which hardly need it (they’re already the most expensive and bloated war machine on the planet). And he yanked his hand off the stove when he got his fingers burnt, turning 180 degrees to announce that he’d be “the most pro-Israel president ever,” when he decided that’s what it took to win the election.

Clearly candidate Trump was a mixed bag on foreign policy, but he was marginally better than most of his opponents. Some antiwar activists took heart at the possibility that he might, as president, cut back on US military adventurism.

No such luck.

The first major post-inauguration evidence that Trump is just a typical political con man came in February with a raid in Yemen resulting in the murder of an 8-year-old American girl and dozens of other civilians by US Navy Seals (one of whom also died). The raid was planned under and approved by then-president Barack Obama prior to Trump’s inauguration, but instead of condemning the action he defended it. He invited the widow of the fallen SEAL, but not the surviving members of young Nawar Anwar al-Awlaki’s family, to attend his speech before Congress.

Now he’s  deployed 400 artillery and infantry troops from the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit and 100 US Army Rangers to Syria, effectively doubling the number of US military boots on the ground there.

Mainstream American media outlets seem to consider it novel, perhaps even controversial, that Syrian president Bashar al-Assad refers to the US troops as “invaders.” I’m not sure why. Sending troops into a country against the will of its government is, by definition, an invasion.

Apart from a few bitter-enders still trying and failing to get the words “I was wrong” out of their mouths like Fonzie in Happy Days,  antiwar Trump supporters seem to understand that they got played.

Perhaps Trump will change course yet again and start pulling American troops out of the Middle East when (not if) things blow up in his face, as Ronald Reagan did after the 1983 Beirut Marine barracks bombing. But I wouldn’t bet on it. His temperament and, so far, his actions scream “war president.”

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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