Thomas Sowell is Off HIs Meds

Shorter Thomas Sowell (http://www.gopusa.com/commentary/tsowell/2006/ts_10241.shtml):

“Yes, the GOP is incompetent and corrupt. But I urge you to vote for them anyway because I think the Democrats are soft on national security. I don’t have any basis for this, but the leaders of Iran and North Korea are just like Hitler, and we all know that only the GOP could stand up to Hitler.”

Sowell is demented or deliberately misleading the people who regularly have his columns read to them. If, like Sowell, we measure strength on national security by the degree of warmongering, interventionism, and throwing money indiscriminately at the national security apparatus, the Democrats historically beat the GOP in head to head competition hands down. I prefer to measure strength on national security by the extent to which the party supports policies and investments that actually enhance national security without undue interference with individual liberty, but I am going to use Sowell “reasoning” to debunk his proposition that the Democrats are weak on national security.

Let’s take a trip down the national memory lane.

Who dispatched the navy and marines to North Africa to raise hell with the Barbary Pirates? The Democrat Thomas Jefferson. He also acquired Louisiana and all but eliminated the French as a bordering power.

Who got the US into the War of 1812 and was C-in-C during the invasion of Canada? The Democrat James Madison.

Who established the doctrine that interference by foreign powers with the western hemisphere would be deemed interference with the US? The Democrat James Monroe. Who failed to enforce this doctrine by letting France install Maximilian in Mexico? The Republican Abraham Lincoln. Monroe was also C-in-C when General Jackson, a Democrat, put the kibosh on raids by Indians and bandits from Spanish Florida. The acquisition of Florida eliminated Spain as a power on a good stretch of border.

Who ended the menace from Indians east of the Mississippi? The Democrat Andrew Jackson.

Who oversaw the defeat of Mexico and the annexation of vast parts of that country? The Democrat James Polk. Who was a namby pamby detractor of that glorious endeavor? None other than future Republican Abe Lincoln.

Who settled the northwest border with Britain on favorable terms and pacified the Nez Perce? Democrats Tyler, Pierce and Buchanan.

The War for Southern Independence doesn’t count for either party since it had nothing to do with national security and since it was prosecuted mainly by the GOP on one side and Democrats on the other. Arguably, this internecine struggle made the country considerably weaker.

The GOP gets credit for the next couple of decades of Indian Wars, although Little Big Horn was nothing to crow about. If you don’t count the Indians, there seems to have been a national consensus on pacifying Indians, so there are no points to be had by either party as compared to the other.

The GOP can have the Spanish-American War. They can also take the blame for the far flung possessions that had to be defended with no apparent increase in national security and no apparent benefit to the American people.

Who was hell bent on getting into WWI? The Democrat Woodrow Wilson. Who obstructed him and then negated any gains in security by torpedoing the League of Nations? The GOP.

Who was determined to stand up to Hitler and Japan? The Democrat Franklin Roosevelt. Who obstructed him until Pearl Harbor? The GOP.

Who nuked two entire cities of Japanese civilians just for the sake of convenience? The Democrat Harry Truman. He started the arms race and the Cold War policy that had bipartisan support for the next half century.

Who warned about the rise of the military industrial complex? Republican Dwight Eisenhower. The Democrats embraced the national security apparatus and have supported its growth enthusiastically whether they were in or out of power. They started Korea and Vietnam. Republicans pulled out.

Both parties embraced the Cold War policy of nuclear proliferation and brinksmanship that kept the world on the edge of annihilation. It was Republican Richard Nixon that came up with détente with the Soviets and made nice with China. What a softy!

Democrats have supported a number of mindless interventions and projections of power in recent history. Examples include Grenada, Lebanon, Haiti, Colombia, Somalia, the Balkans, Afghanistan and Iraq. They are changing their mind on the interventions in the Middle East, as they did with Vietnam, because it is clear to anyone with the sense that God gave a duck that they are hurting national security, not helping it.

By Sowell “reasoning”, his claim that Democrats are soft on national security is unsupportable. If your concern is with enemies just like Hitler, let’s remember the party that actually took Hitler out, the Democrats. Democrats are as warmongering and interventionist as the GOP, and they can’t be any worse than the GOP, can they? I’m going by my default: if Sowell says vote GOP, then it’s a safe bet that voting Democrat is the way to go. The GOP cannot be allowed to go unpunished for its incompetence, corruption and overreaching.