Did Rand Paul Convince Trump to Withdraw from Syria?
If Paul did, in fact, persuade the president to withdraw U.S. troops from one of the seven military conflicts we’re currently engaged in, bravo.
Wednesday, January 02, 2019
Well, presidents are allowed to choose their own advisers. But how is it “troubling” that Trump might take advice from Senator Paul, but it’s fine to take advice from Senators Cotton and Graham? And by the way, check the quote above: how is a president’s conversation with a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee “wholly outside the policy process”?
Of course, Paul isn’t responsible for the fact that Trump is unable or unwilling to set a clear policy, implement it in an orderly manner, articulate a defense of it without using “alternative facts” and words like “suckers,” and make an inspirational, presidential speech to troops in a combat zone.
It’s better to withdraw from unnecessary wars inarticulately than to stay in them with a 500-page report.
Rogin concludes by bemoaning “dangerous … isolationism [and] retreat.” “Isolationism” is a term that the foreign policy establishment
throws around any time anyone questions whether all seven wars are actually wise.
The New York Times also uses the term, reporting that the Syrian withdrawal “has been
condemned across the ideological spectrum,” “with the exception of a few vocal isolationists like Senator Rand Paul.” And a few realists and noninterventionists like my colleagues
John Glaser and
Christopher Preble. And
about half the American people.
https://fee.org/articles/did-rand-p...rss_pushcrew¬ification_source=pushcrew_rss