The Anti-Imperialists on True Patriotism

The Anti-Imperialist League played an interesting, if somewhat overlooked, role in U.S. political history. Founded as a result of the illegal and brutal takeover of the Philippines by the U.S. government after the Spanish-American war, the group supported the idea that such military adventurism stood in conflict with the ideals of liberty and self-determination. Interestingly enough, these men who denounced big militarism were those on the political right, that is, they also favored free markets, free trade, and generally limited government. They recognized that it was intellectually dishonest to favor limited government at home and support big government abroad. Some notable members included Mark Twain, Andrew Carnegie, Grover Cleveland, John Dewey and William Lloyd Garrison.

Moorfield Storey, a member of the group, is a most fascinating historical figure. He was a lawyer and a noted civil rights leader in the late 19th Century, and the founder of the NAACP. Consider Storey's words in April 1898, on the eve of the Spanish-American War, for it was these sentiments that animated his and so many others' anti-imperialist work:
 

"This Club [the Massachusetts chapter of the league] never met under circumstances more calculated to create the gravest anxiety in every patriotic man than tonight, and by patriotic man I do not mean him who measures his country's greatness by the extent of her territory, the size of her armies, the strength of her fleets, or even by the insolence with which she tramples upon her weaker neighbors, but him who knows that the true greatness of a nation, as of a man, depends upon its character, its sense of justice, its self-restraint, its magnanimity, in a word upon its possession of those qualities which distinguish... the highest type of man from the highest type of beast."

Consider also, the words of Carl Schurz, another league member and the first German-born member of the U.S. Senate.
 

"The man who in times of popular excitement boldly and unflinchingly resists hot-tempered clamor for an unnecessary war, and thus exposes himself to the opprobrious imputation of a lack of patriotism or of courage, to the end of saving his country from a great calamity, is, as to 'loving and faithfully serving his country,' at least as good a patriot as the hero of the most daring feat of arms, and a far better one than those who, with an ostentatious pretense of superior patriotism, cry for war before it is needed, especially if then they let others do the fighting."

These men realized something profound, namely, that true patriotism does not exist where there is a clamoring for the military force of one's nation to be cast in the direction of every far corner of the world. Patriotism does not exist where childish egotists who, in their lust for blood and power and self-affirmation, insist that the nation's true strength lies in its brutality, and who conjure up an endless parade of invisible "enemies" and insist this brutality be exercised in their direction.

Patriotism exists where men with level heads resist these cries for violence, because war violates the most basic of nature's laws, and man's very humanity. Patriotism exists where a man, despite the mocking of his bellicose compatriots, says no to his state and to it's wars because wars financially and morally bankrupt nations, and are an assault on the very qualities and ideals that make humankind superior to beasts.

Iran: Paranoia and Propaganda

The latest Arab country to find itself in the crosshairs of the U.S. government is Iran. For the past several years, alarmists on both sides of the political isle have been ramping up the rhetoric about Iran and the supposed threat it poses to the free world. Unfortunately, many of the claims of these war hawks regarding the situation in Iran are simply untrue. It would seem that once again, as was the case in the months leading up to the disastrous Iraq War, many in this country are throwing about false claims in order to justify a needless war.

The most recent example of such blatant misinformation about Iran being spewed in public occurred at last Thursday’s Republican presidential debate. Michele Bachmann, who has made such outlandish statements as demanding the Iraqis pay reparations for the U.S. occupation of their country, said the following:

"We have an IAEA report that just recently came out that said, literally, Iran is within just months of being able to obtain that weapon."

This statement is false on it’s face, and only Ron Paul was willing to correct it, which he did immediately. Bachmann’s explicit misinformation was debunked by a number of objective third parties.

CNN says:

“The IAEA report does not say that Iran is within months of being able to obtain a nuclear weapon. So Bachmann is wrong.”

The New York Times says:

“[The IAEA’s] long awaited report… did not say a weapon was months away.”

Yahoo News Fact Check says:

“As Paul said, the report of the International Atomic Energy Agency does not state that Iran is within months of having nuclear arms.”

Another erroneous claim Bachmann made was to insist that Iran has stated it intends to use these hypothetical weapons to, in her words, “wipe Israel off the face of the earth.” This claim arises from an interview Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave in August. A difficulty arises in the translation of Ahmadinejad’s words from the Persian into English. The American idiom, “to wipe something off the face of the earth,” or as some have phrased it, “to wipe something off the map,” does not exist in the Persian language, and is exclusively an American idiom. The Israeli newspaper, the Haaretz Newspaper, translated Ahmadinejad’s words in the following way:

"Iran believes that whoever is for humanity should also be for eradicating the Zionist regime (Israel) as symbol of suppression and discrimination.”

This is distinctly different from saying an entire nation must be “wiped off the face of the earth.” What Ahmadinejad is saying, agree with it or disagree, is that the Israeli government has been guilty of certain human rights violations, and Iran does not want that regime to stay in power.

Many experts have testified to this effect. Juan Cole, a Middle East specialist at the University of Michigan told the New York Times,

"Ahmadinejad did not say he was going to wipe Israel off the map because no such idiom exists in Persian. He did say he hoped its regime, i.e., a Jewish-Zionist state occupying Jerusalem, would collapse."

Jonathan Steele, writing for the Guardian newspaper in London, put it this way,

"The Iranian president was quoting an ancient statement by Iran's first Islamist leader, the late Ayatollah Khomeini, that 'this regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time,' just as the Shah's regime in Iran had vanished. He was not making a military threat. He was calling for an end to the occupation of Jerusalem at some point in the future. The 'page of time' phrase suggests he did not expect it to happen soon."

The independent fact checking website PolitiFact said this,

“Where Bachmann misstepped was by accusing Ahmadinejad of saying he planned to use a nuclear weapon against Israel or the United States… Ahmadinejad has said some tough things about the United States and Israel, but we find no evidence that he has said he would use a nuclear weapon against either country.”

Despite the clear evidence that the translation between these vastly incomparable languages has led to an inflated interpretation of Ahmadinejad’s actual words, let us suppose for a moment that Iran did develop a nuclear weapon, and did attempt to attack Iran or the U.S. The consequences for Iran would be grave and immediate. Israel is armed with over 300 nuclear weapons, capable of being launched at a moment’s notice. The U.S. has over 5,100 nuclear weapons at its disposal, and an incredibly efficient means of delivering them to any corner of the globe. Iran knows that if it even hints at using any form of nuclear force against Israel that the entire nation of Iran would be obliterated without pause. The same is true vis-à-vis the United States.

This concept is known as “mutually assured destruction,” that is, any country with nuclear weapons knows that if they use their nuclear weapons, the other countries will in all likelihood retaliate. The final outcome of an understanding of mutually assured destruction is peace, as neither side is willing to risk total annihilation by firing first. This is part of the reason the Cold War remained cold.

In fact, the rhetoric being spewed about the need to destroy Iran now is similar to that which was heard during the Cold War period, except then there was concrete evidence that Krushchev indeed had nuclear weapons.

Upon the collapse of the Soviet Union, Soviet foreign spokesman Gennadi Gerasimov warned the United States, "We have done the most terrible thing to you that we could possibly have done. We have deprived you of an enemy.” That is what this current debate about Iran is all about: the government elevating the fear of the public in order to facilitate more needless violence, and therefore, the further expansion of the government.

The truth is, the government loves war. As Randolph Bourne famously remarked, “War is the health of the state.” The trenchant warrior of liberty, philosopher Murray N. Rothbard once said,

“It is in war that the State really comes into its own: swelling in power, in number, in pride, in absolute dominion over the economy and the society. Society becomes a herd, seeking to kill its alleged enemies, rooting out and suppressing all dissent from the official war effort, happily betraying truth for the supposed public interest.” 

Political historian Jonathan Finegold Catalan notes, with regard to the government’s current “War on Terror,”

“The greatest threat to American freedom proved to be, not the terrorists, but the very government that purportedly protects Americans. Indeed, in the years following the September 11 attacks, the Bush administration managed to perpetrate some of the most severe infringements on individual rights since the Roosevelt administration.”

It is high time we abandon blatant fallacies and the spreading of paranoia and propaganda in seeking new wars to instigate. As the great American statesman John Quincy Adams put it, “America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.”

On the Ownership of Person and Property

The concept of property rights arises because physical things in this world are scarce. There are, for example, only a certain and limited number of forks in the world, and therefore, we must establish a system by which we can determine who has the legally defensible right use those forks. This “right to use” is the definition of ownership.

Every physical thing on this planet is scarce, including human bodies and the space they take up. Thus, property rights must not only deal with possessions, but also with persons themselves. If person A owns person B, that means A has the right to coerce B to use his physical body in any way A sees fit. This concept will become clearer as we examine examples.

We see through logical examination that there are only five ways in which it is possible to allocate the ownership of person and property. In the first system, nobody owns, that is, has the right to use, any person or physical thing. Second, everyone owns everything, that is, he has the right to use any person or thing as he sees fit. Third, everyone owns one seven billionth (his proportion of the world population) of everything. Fourth, one person or group of persons completely owns the persons and property of another person or group of persons. Fifth, each person owns himself and his justly acquired property. There are no other conceivable ways to allocate the use of person and property. Let us examine each.

Nobody owns anything

In this system, no person has the right to use any object or person. We can see that this system of property allocation would quickly fail. Not only would a person not have the legal right to life sustaining activities like eating, he would not even have the right to exist, for the very fact that his body is taking up physical space in the world is illegal since he can have no legal claim to that space. Obviously this system is absurd.

Everyone owns everything

In this system, every person has the right to use of every physical object or person. Again, this system is doomed from the beginning. Imagine a scenario in which two persons claimed the right to use the same fork. There is no legal way to establish who has the “proper” claim to the use of the fork, because, after all, they both “own” it. This system is even more impossible when applied to persons themselves. As stated above, if one person can claim ownership of another person, then he can force that person to essentially be his slave, that is, to use his body as the owner sees fit. Thus, if we say that everyone owns everything, and this applies to persons as well, person A could legally claim ownership of person B. Meanwhile, person B could just as easily and legally reject this claim that he is owned, citing the fact that he has the same right to the use of his body as person A. Person B could even counter this claim of ownership by attempting to claim ownership of person A. Again, this entire system is bizarre and would break down immediately.

Everyone owns an equal share of everything

This means that a person has the legal right to use 1/7,000,000,000 of every object or person in existence. This system too breaks down immediately. For ownership implies the sole use of an object, unless consent is given to others to use it. I have ownership of a piano, and others can use my piano only to the extent that I consent to their use of it. Thus in our “everyone owns an equal share of everything” system, it would be impossible to use anything, for to use anything would require gaining the consent of the other 6,999,999,999 people who also claim partial ownership of that object. Philosopher Murray N. Rothbard addressed this system in his beautiful treatise The Ethics of Liberty, saying, “Can we picture a world in which no man is free to take any action whatsoever without prior approval by everyone else in society? Clearly no man would be able to do anything, and the human race would quickly perish.”

One class owns another

This is, I would argue, the system in place today. In this system, a person or group of person is entitled to own not only themselves, but the rest of the physical objects and persons in existence. The first reason that this system is disastrous is that it is not an homogeneous system, that is, it is not a universal legal ethic. For a system of law to be just, the law must apply equally to all members of society. The three systems mentioned above at least are universal in their scope, that is, no person gets special treatment, but in this system, a certain class does get special treatment under the law. Furthermore, this system violates one of the most basic and God-ordained truths of nature, namely, that all persons are created equal. For one group to deny to another group the use of their persons and properties is to say that they are, by nature, subhuman. This system is exactly what is in place today, wherein the state has the “legal right” to coerce the citizenry to use their bodies and possessions in various ways that benefit the state. This is called coercion. Common examples of this type of coercion are taxation, wherein a citizen is called upon to simply hand over his possessions upon the threat of violence, and conscription, wherein a citizen is called upon to hand over the use of his body upon the threat of violence. This system, under any definition, cannot be called just.

Everyone owns himself and his property

The only remaining conceivable system of allocating scarce resources is one such that each person has the right to use his body and his justly acquired possessions as he sees fit, provided that he does not interdict upon the ability of anyone else to do the same. This system is a universally applied legal ethic, it complies with the laws of nature, and it does not stifle the activity of society, unlike the others. Consider: only I, in the state of nature, have the ability to use my faculties (movement, vocalization, thinking, ect.), and therefore, only I can claim a right to their use. This concept is called self-ownership. When this right of self ownership is extended to other material objects, it can be said that I have the right to the use of those objects which I have either contractually exchanged with another person, or have created or gathered out of previously unowned objects (This latter concept is called homesteading, and for more on this important topic, read Locke’s Second Treatise, Section 27.)

Thus, this final system is the only way to justly, equally and plausibly allocate scarce resources. In the real world, this system would prohibit any person or group from violently confiscating the person or property of another. This means that, for example, bank robbers could not, brandishing guns, take money that from the bank that they did not earn. Also, a government could not, brandishing guns, take money from its citizens that it did not earn. It means that a kidnapper could not, under the threat of bodily harm, force a person to go anywhere or do anything against his or her will. It also means that a government could not, under the threat of bodily harm, conscript a person into its army against his or her will.

Only a system of interpersonal ethics that is universally applied, consistent with the easily apprehended laws of nature, and allowed persons freedom to act within defined spheres can ever hope to be just. Only a just system of interpersonal ethics is in line with God’s design and will for His creation.

Common Objections, Vol. 3: Non-Interventionism vs. Isolationism

Quite often, when confronted with the ideology of a principled non-interventionist, those who favor military expansionism often dismiss the non-interventionist as an isolationist. This reflects an underlying misunderstanding of both non-interventionism as an ideology and of the term isolationism.

The term isolationist was first coined as a smear tactic to apply to those opposed to America’s entry into WWII. Contained in the term were connotations of pro-Nazism. As the indomitable libertarian philosopher and historian Murray N. Rothbard pointed out, “If not actively pro-Nazi, 'isolationists' were at the very least narrow-minded ignoramuses ignorant of the world around them, in contrast to the sophisticated, worldly, caring 'internationalists' who favored American crusading around the globe.”

When defined properly, an isolationist is a person who favors a complete and total lack of interaction with other nations. Under this precise definition, there are very few who can actually call themselves isolationists, although many isolationistic policies have been enacted over the years by both Republican and Democrat-led governments.

Indeed, the real policies of isolationism are those of restricting trade, ignoring diplomacy, devaluing the currency, and meddling in the internal affairs of other nations. All these policies go far in isolating America, in destroying international relationships and trust, and in causing hatred toward America abroad. As political commentator and author Justin Raimondo writes, “The War Party [i.e. the group that favors foreign intervention, both left and right] is the one really consistent advocate of what might be called isolationism: by forcefully intervening in the internal affairs of other nations, by occupying countries and effecting ‘regime change,’ we isolate ourselves from the rest of the world and retreat into an imperialist cocoon, cutting off all normal – i.e. economic and social – relations, and laying the groundwork for the kind of ‘blowback’ that results in terrorism directed against the US and its allies.”

This tactic of calling non-interventionists isolationists is, in effect, a straw-man argument, made to make the interventionists seem like the more reasonable ones. In a June 29^th New York Times article, David Greenberg attempts to paint this picture. Noting the steadily shifting attitude of many on the right to non-interventionism, a charge no doubt led by the example and influence of ardent anti-war libertarian Ron Paul, Greenberg writes, “Suddenly, after the aggressive, militaristic foreign policy of the Bush years, isolationism — a stance that rejects America’s leadership role in the world — is on the rise among Republicans.”

So we are now supposed to believe that those who believe in the Constitution, those who are against tyrannical warmaking by the executive, and those who believe in the rule of law are now naive isolationists, thus portraying those who support a hyperactive military policy as on the side of reason. This is a grotesque and anti-intellectual distortion of reality.

To be sure, those on the side of military expansionism are indeed more irrational and dangerous than the peace-loving non-interventionists. In the post-WWI era, those who opposed the newly-labeled “isolationists” were supporters of the “League to Enforce Peace.” While often downplayed by historians, the goals of this group were incredibly frightening. Again, to quote Raimondo, “The Enforcers wanted to set up a world government, with the US and Britain at its head: anyone who looked cross-eyed at these Global Governors would be promptly invaded, subdued, and occupied. That was their idea of ‘peace.’” These goals are essentially the same as those of the interventionists of today – to "create peace" by militarily clobbering any group who the U.S., in all it’s mighty wisdom, deems disobedient.

The real internationalists, those who recognize the complex realities of geopolitics, and who do not simply see the world through red, white and blue colored glasses – the real peacemakers – are the non-interventionists. We favor globe-spanning free trade, a condition that has been incontrovertibly proven to decrease the likelihood of war. We favor truly appreciating what different races, ethnicities, cultures, values systems, and traditions have to offer, and we do not count the lives of people who are different from us as less valuable. We favor diplomatic relations that recognize other nations’ right to sovereignty, dignity and humanity. In short, we favor being active participants in the global marketplace of ideas, creativity and products, and not isolating ourselves by stirring up violence and resentment.

Objections, Vol. 2: Is Non-Interventionism Leftist?

For the majority of U.S. history, the political right was the side that favored a non-interventionist foreign policy. “The Old Right” is a term that has been used to describe the movement made up mostly of political Republicans that favored a realistic, non-aggressive policy abroad. This was a longstanding tradition.

Rightists like Rep. Alexander Stephens of Georgia opposed the Mexican War of President Polk. William Graham Sumner founded the Anti-Imperialist League, which opposed the U.S. government’s first foray into foreign empire-building, the war in the Philippines. Henry Ford was a famous critic of the government’s WWI policy. Right-wing intellectuals H.L. Mencken, Rose Wilder Lane, Garrett Garet and Albert Jay Nock were very vocal about their opposition to the U.S. government’s entry into WWII.

To question needless foreign intervention was the modus operandi of the right for a number of reasons. As I will explain below, it simply is the more ideologically consistent position. To oppose big government means to oppose it at home and abroad. Furthermore, it is more fiscally responsible to oppose expensive foreign entanglements. The old right understood this.

The Cold War changed everything. This era saw the emergence of the “new right” of Barry Goldwater, William F. Buckley and Ronald Reagan. In 1952, a young Buckley summed up what would become the new conservative credo. He said, in response to the supposed threat from the Soviet Union, “we [new conservatives] have to accept Big Government for the duration—for neither an offensive nor a defensive war can be waged . . . except through the instrument of a totalitarian bureaucracy within our shores."

Buckley continued, with startling frankness, that conservatives were duty-bound to promote "the extensive and productive tax laws that are needed to support a vigorous anti-Communist foreign policy," as well as the "large armies and air forces, atomic energy, central intelligence, war production boards and the attendant centralization of power in Washington."

And so the political right became synonymous with big militarism. This is not to say that the voices of the old right were completely silenced. One such voice was that of Herbert Hoover, who criticized President Truman for violating the Constitution by invading Korea. Other anti-war Republicans of that era included Senator Robert Taft and Congressman Howard Buffett. But slowly, these voices of reason and ideological consistency became the minority, as the country became swept up in communist alarmism.

Now there is a growing movement afoot, especially among young voters, to return the conservative movement to its anti-interventionist roots. This effort is arguably being led by Rep. Ron Paul, who is a staunch fiscal conservative, and an opponent of war. He has been criticized by establishment conservatives as advocating a “liberal” foreign policy. However, this ideology is not a left-wing ideology at all, but rather, the only consistent one. It is high time the right abandon the idea that not supporting foreign meddling is and idea of the left. This is the case for a number of reasons.

First, conservatives must realize that their foreign policy is not based on an ideology, but rather, simply upon a misguided tradition. It is not more conservative to support foreign wars. In fact, it is simply the opposite. As the ardent libertarian scholar Murray Rothbard asked, “How can the rightist trumpet his devotion to private property and free enterprise while at the same time favoring war [and] conscription?” It simply does not stand to reason that someone could oppose statism at home, in the markets and in their personal lives, and support statism abroad, with military actions and the propping up of foreign regimes. This conservative “ideology” is simply not based on reason. It is not consistent. It is based on a tradition that started with a few misguided pseudo-intellectuals in the Cold War era, and has continued to this day.

Second, the conservative, who opposes “big government” in other areas, must realize that their pet wars are the biggest contributing factor to the development of big government. As Buckley himself admitted in the quote above, an interventionist foreign policy requires totalitarian bureaucracy, extensive tax laws and the centralization of power in Washington. The problem lies in the fact that not all conservatives are willing to admit this as openly as Buckley did. As 19^th century intellectual Randolph Bourne famously said, “War is the health of the state.”

War has always been the favorite means of those in power to increase their power. The largest and most troubling expansions of government in America were mostly not the result of social programs. The Progressive Era and even the New Deal did not do as much as war to move America away from its heritage of limited, checked and balanced government, free markets and individual liberty. The Civil War brought with it censorship, a draft, inflation, the suspension of habeas corpus and a consolidated national government that signaled the end of true federalism. World War I introduced even wider censorship, conscription, deportations and spying. World War II gave us food rationing, conscription, citizen surveillance, censorship, and Japanese internment. With the "War on Terror," we have practically lost the Fourth Amendment and seen habeas corpus once again suspended.

Third, fiscal conservatives must come to grips with the fact that the majority of the U.S. government’s budget is spent on war. The government spends more than a trillion dollars a year on its empire abroad. That is more than all the other countries in the world spend combined. So-called “defense” spending, which is entirely a misnomer, has become a sacred cow of the right. While they favor cutting government spending in other areas, they will throw a fit when anyone seeks to cut their bloated “defense” budget. Again, anyone with basic reason skills should be able to see that it is not consistent to call oneself a fiscal conservative and support the enormous expenditures of the government on empire.

Being against war and foreign meddling is not an idea of the left, but rather, it should be an idea of the right. It is time the right abandons blindly clinging to a prevailing paradigm, and actually examines whether its worldview is consistent.

For more reading see the following pieces:

The Betrayal of the American Right by Murray Rothbard

America's Anti-Militarist Heritage by George C. Leef

The Real American Right by Justin Raimondo

The Intellectual Incoherence of Conservatism by Hans-Hermann Hoppe

Common Objections to Non-Interventionism, Vol. 1: Introduction

The libertarian foreign policy can be described in a single word, namely, non-interventionism. This theory states that military, economic and humanitarian intervention in the internal affairs of other nations is improper, immoral and dangerous.

It is based in the more fundamental theory of non-aggression, which, as outlined in a previous essay, is the bedrock principle of libertarianism. This is the belief that, as stated by libertarian scholar Walter Block, "It shall be legal for anyone to do anything he wants, provided only that he not initiate (or threaten) violence against the person or legitimately owned property of another."

At very few times in our nation's history have any of our leaders espoused or practiced this doctrine, especially when applied to foreign policy.  As military historian Laurence Vance put it,

 "U.S. foreign policy has resulted in the destabilization and overthrow of governments, the assassination of leaders, the destruction of industry and infrastructure, the backing of military coups, death squads, and drug traffickers, imperialism under the guise of humanitarianism, support for corrupt and tyrannical governments, interference in the elections of other countries, taking sides or intervening in civil wars, engaging in provocative naval actions under the guise of protecting freedom of navigation, thousands of dubious covert actions, the dismissal of civilian casualties as collateral damage, the United States being the arms dealer to the world, and the United States bribing and bullying itself around the world as the world’s policeman, fireman, social worker, and busybody."

History agrees with this statement. Below is a list of a small percentage of the military actions the U.S. has undertaken since the 1970s, and some examples of what we did.

·      Cuba, the U.S. has been blockading them since 1963, more than forty years.

·      Australia, in 1973, the CIA interferes to manipulate the free election process.

·      Chile, in 1973, a CIA financed coup ousts the elected President.

·      Portugal, in 1974.

·      Angola, in 1976.

·      Afghanistan, in 1979 the U.S. began to secretly finance, train and arm mujahedeen rebels including rebel leader Osama Bin Laden. These mujahedeen eventually formed what we now call Al Qaeda.

·      El Salvador, in 1980 the U.S. funded a government found to have committed gross human rights violations.

·      Nicaragua, in 1981.

·      Chad, in 1982.

·      Libya, in 1982.

·      Honduras, in 1982.

·      Lebanon, in 1982.

·      Grenada, in 1983.

·      Iraq, in 1987 the U.S. supported and armed Sadaam Hussein’s Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war.

·      Iran, in 1988, the U.S. shoots down a civilian passenger airline, almost 300 dead.

·      Libya, in 1989.

·      Philippines, in 1989.

·      Panama, in 1989, U.S. forces invade and kill the President, and an estimated 2,000 innocent civilians, including some American tourists.

·      Kuwait, in 1990.

·      Iraq, in 1990, the U.S. blockade kills 10,000 Iraqis monthly.

·      Bulgaria, in 1991.

·      Somalia, in 1992.

·      Peru, in 1992.

·      Colombia, in 1992.

·      Bosnia, in 1994.

·      Haiti, in 1994.

·      Sudan, in 1998.

·      Afghanistan, in 1998, U.S. lobs missiles into some factories.

·      Yugoslavia, in 1999.

·      Yemen, in 2000.

·      Afghanistan, in 2001.

·      Iraq, in 2003.

·      Pakistan, in 2004, U.S. begins drone attacks, continue to this day.

In addition, we currently have American troops in nearly 150  countries worldwide and we have almost 800 military bases worldwide. The U.S. has also attempted to assassinate elected presidents in Iraq, Haiti, The Congo, the Dominican Republic, Vietnam and Cuba, to name but a few.

 The facts positively mock any reasonable person who believes that the U.S. government hasn't practiced a foreign policy of expansionism and militarism. Nevertheless, the forces supporting war and interventionism have a death-grip on our policy-making, and their propaganda resonates in the uneducated ears of many in this country. As a believer in the non-interventionist norm, I've have been confronted on my beliefs by many of these ignorant naysayers, some even resorting to calling me a terrorist, or my beliefs a sin against God. The funny part about their perfunctory, half-baked critiques is that they are incredibly predictable. Those in power who support war have been feeding the American public the same lines for years, to the point where I can predict with absolute certainty which will be clumsily hurled in my direction. In the following series of essays, I will demonstrate how each of these oft-rehashed arguments fall flat on their faces when compared to reality. Stay tuned.

Lysander Spooner on the Criminality of the State

Excerpted from Lysander Spooner's No Treason:

"It is true that the theory of our Constitution is, that all taxes are paid voluntarily; that our government is a mutual insurance company, voluntarily entered into by the people with each other.

But this theory of our government is wholly different from the practical fact. The fact is that the government, like a highwayman, says to a man: “Your money, or your life.” And many, if not most, taxes are paid under the compulsion of that threat.

     

The government does not, indeed, waylay a man in a lonely place, spring upon him from the roadside, and, holding a pistol to his head, proceed to rifle his pockets. But the robbery is none the less a robbery on that account; and it is far more dastardly and shameful.

     

The highwayman takes solely upon himself the responsibility, danger, and crime of his own act. He does not pretend that he has any rightful claim to your money, or that he intends to use it for your own benefit. He does not pretend to be anything but a robber. He has not acquired impudence enough to profess to be merely a “protector,” and that he takes men’s money against their will, merely to enable him to “protect” those infatuated travellers, who feel perfectly able to protect themselves, or do not appreciate his peculiar system of protection. He is too sensible a man to make such professions as these. Furthermore, having taken your money, he leaves you, as you wish him to do. He does not persist in following you on the road, against your will; assuming to be your rightful “sovereign,” on account of the “protection” he affords you. He does not keep “protecting” you, by commanding you to bow down and serve him; by requiring you to do this, and forbidding you to do that; by robbing you of more money as often as he finds it for his interest or pleasure to do so; and by branding you as a rebel, a traitor, and an enemy to your country, and shooting you down without mercy if you dispute his authority, or resist his demands. He is too much of a gentleman to be guilty of such impostures, and insults, and villainies as these. In short, he does not, in addition to robbing you, attempt to make you either his dupe or his slave."