Rand Paul is a chip off the old Paleocon Block

While I wouldn't call Rand Paul's speech a particular redemption where foreign policy is concerned, he's not as far gone as his father is. At least he recognizes a long-term threat from Islam.

He has a long way to go, though, before his foreign policy isn't a weakness.

Yeah, keep fighting the 1000 year war while they sit back and wait for our economic collapse. They have to expend nothing but threats while we expend blood and treasure. F the Establishment, pull our troops out and bring them home. Keep our military and espionage strong and if they interfere with our trade, hammer them, other wise let them wallow in their ignorance but quit giving them what they want...our demise.

"What happens to the world economy when gas is $25 a gallon?"

We start developing our own petroleum resources, like we were doing when we had a real President. ;-)

From Washington Times. Rand Paul believes the illegals in our country are undocumented citizens. "I then would normalize the status of 11 million undocumented citizens"

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/feb/11/from-illegals-to-taxpayers/#.URlN6nKz8e0.twitter

I'm a bit behind, it's been called so many different things over the years :) I guess SNAP is it because they get their welfare in-a-snap!

I'm leaning towards legal immigrants (not those illegal ones) with no right to vote. Assimilate or return to home country.

Islam is not a religion, it is a cult and breeds on death and destruction.

From my cold dead hands. I shall also step aside and not allow liberals or the libertarians cover.

Yep. You hit the nail on the head.

9/11 Infidel: Well done!!!

My daughter was at the speech and pretty much came away with the same conclusions and from what I gather so did most people.

Now I have to change my mind about Rand Paul for president. What the hell is going on with these republicans? They are all becoming RINO's. God help US!

people who have actually physically served (and are paying for it for all of their lives) on those forward deployment bases may beg to differ.

we seldom had training funds as our $$ went to pay for trees destroyed (in germany you also paid for the familial loss of the tree) and stupid pc crap like that. in the end all we did was support an economy that hated us, hell we had the muslim turks trying to kill us all the time, us MP's had to watch for gangs of them.

its not cut and dried issue.

especially when our hands are always tied but the "leaders" back here.

Either do I .. many holes in Rand Paul's stance, he has some good qualities, sadly not enough of them .. He wouldn't be where he is if it wasn't for Sarah, unfortunately he became another follower of status quo. Rand Paul = not much going on ..

I don't know that I agree that Pat Buchanan is an anti-Semite. He just doesn't look at Israel the way a lot of us do. I'm a big fan of Michael Scheuer. He doesn't believe we should hang it all out for Israel either but that's just his opinion. I disagree with him on that but greatly admire the man for his other views and insights. Doesn't mean he hates the Jews. He has a unique view of things since he was head of the OBL unit.

Calling one an anti-Semite is a strong word and would save that description for real anti-Semites.

Didn't listen to the speech on FP and haven't heard him talk FP yet, so I still like RP. He seems one of few that stick up for the constitution in the Senate.

However we will never have a viable candidate that really says what Islam is and what should be done about it. It just won't happen. The MSM would come after that candidate with a vengence and all the ignorant people who believe Islam is nothing harmful will be on board. You would have people from all over the country to include his own party calling for him to get out of the race. Sad but true.

And though I do agree that we have to fight against Islam and it's influences I do know that they will not win. If you believe that they are the religion of the anti-christ then we know that the battle is already won. As Shoebat says the bible points out that the anti-christ will take up arms against the most powerful nations and God will bring those nations might against him. From that we know that the anti-christ doesn't dominate the world, although some parts of it he will. i.e. the Middle-East. But I do believe that we still need to counter Islam where we can with Christian values and supporting Christians abroad, e.g. Iranian-American pastor who has been sentenced to 8 years (i believe) in prison for missionary work in Iran.

On the FP side I do believe that there are some areas that we could cut back overseas. Am I saying all bases? No. Strategically important ones should stay open. But due to our fiscal mess can we afford to keep all of these bases operating all over the world? It's worth it to take a look. Again, I'm not advocating shutting down bases that are critical to fly into and are strategic staging and access bases. For example, we have airbases in Rota, Spain and Moron, Spain; do they both need to be open? I don't know but it may be worth looking at in terms of spending. Although spending needs to be fixed more in the domestic arena to fix our mess more so than in the military. The military is just always the easy target. I don't like cutting our budget because I see it at work and it blows. Guys who were in in the 90's talk of how their unit could afford to go to the range once a year, once. They couldn't afford the ammo. So a unit that's primary job is to engage with the enemy and kill him you allow enough money to go to the range once to shoot. Nice one bill.

Anyhow, I'm sure I went off on a little bit of a tanget but I still hold out hope for Rand. I don't want him to become like his father but we'll see.

I disagree with your use of 'neocon' scoop. (No I haven't read you entire symposium on the subject.) In common everyday usage, at least in my personal experience here in the Midwest, 'Neocon' has come to be somewhat synonymous with Compassionate Conservatism, in other words, Liberal Republicans.

I also think that it is extravagant to continue to act as the worlds police force, especially for free. This has allowed our Western allies and Japan to skip out on maintaining a decent military of their own. In this era of rapid travel do we really need to maintain hundreds of bases around the world?

Maybe we should let the Muslim countries disintegrate of their own self destructive weight. If we stopped buying their oil by DRILLING and producing the oil we have here in the US they would all be in a heap o' trouble. Now, on Iran having Nukes, and re-reading Sun Tzu I quite completely agree.

I also believe that war should be total, or not at all. This whole rebuilding the country, building Democracies, "making the world safe for Democracy" for years after 'the war' is over, is self indulgent and a reckless waste of our time, treasure and people. Basically, kick ass, pack up and go back home. Other smaller actions that are occasionally necessary... I thought that was the principle function of the Special Forces.

I dont have to hear the speech, I think that if scoop thinks that this guy is a small version of his father, that is enough for me to turn the channel away from the Rand Paul Frequency. Thank you Scoop, your insights are very welcome.

No he is not a Paleo-Conservative he is a Libertarian.

Some good points brought up in this commentary. I like Rand Paul, but I think his foreign policy speech missed the mark. No one would advocate pointless ground wars, and we could debate the whether we would fight in Iraq or Afghanistan if we had it to do all over again, and if we would we could debate how to better do it in a more efficient and cost effective manner. We live in a global market. Americans and American interests are spread all over the globe. We can't play the isolationist game anymore even if we wanted to. I'm all for closing unnecessary bases, but most of the bases we have are strategically vital. War is a costly inconvenience, most notably in lives lost, but we can't just ignore those who are actively threatening us. Putting our head in the sand won't make it go away.

By the way, folks should remember that Reagan was a fan of Ayn Rand. His first two years, there were Randians in his circle of advisors and aides. They got shoved aside by the pragmatists, though.

I hold out hope for Rand Paul, since a "Reagan + libertarian/fiscal-Con" approach can be made to work fabulously, but I'm not expecting much.

Finally, someone else that doesn't drink that dumb bastard's sugary Kool Aid. I've said this, since before he won election. The Pauls are a cursed breed, and their curse hurts this nation. They come up with a couple of good ideas, and suddenly they're the Lioniadas Family, or the reincarnations of Charles Martel and Agustas Caesar. On the military 24 hour time system, even broken clocks are right once per day. The sooner we dispense with those idiots, and their psychotic paulnuts, the better off we'll be. Their views on law and government are almost completely warped beyond recognition, and are generally not too much more American, than Obama's. They insist on portraying Conservatives as living in some sort of demented fantasy world, all the while not realizing that they are the one's looking like Kevin Spacey's character from "Seven".

Define Paleocon as anti-semitic, then brand any military cuts as Paleocon = anyone that doesn't get offended by military cuts as anti-Semites.

.....am I the only person reading it this way?

I'm glad I don't need to respond to the fake Martin Mull. Thanks for dealing with him, folks!

911Infidel, I understand your point about Rand. I've always had my reservations about him. But I'm only concerned as far as who is getting shoved down our throats for 2016.

I like having Rand in the Senate, as long as he doesn't cough up some of the nasty furballs his Dad did while in congress (and out). I also like having Rubio in the Senate. I just want them to stay there, or serve their two terms and go home.

Thank you.. I had concerns about Mr. Pauls view on containment.. I also must agree wholeheartedly with you historical assessment of the Muslim vs. all other religions.

Your article is true on every point. Its true that this war will end only with the utter defeat and destruction of all the Radical Muslims and the destruction of it's base all of it's supposed holy sites leveled and flattened or We the infidel's will all be killed or forced to submit.

Thats the way that the religion of peace has been written and practiced for hundreds of years, there is no changing the spots on that leopard.

Awesome explanation and analysis. Thank you Infidel.

XLNT POST 911 !!! THANK YOU SIR..."Beware of the camel`s nose. Why? Because once the camel gets his nose inside the tent, his body will soon follow. And once the camel gets inside the tent, the former occupants face a choice: leave the tent or lie down in the camel`s bed." Arab proverb...My concern is the degree which islam has infiltrated the highest levels of government. Thank the Good Lord we`re waking up. These next few weeks should be full of revelations. I`m pursuing Truth FULL BORE !!!!

Thank you for this excellent post. You have an incredible knowledge of the subject. I just read it for the second time. Thanks.

"And you’re wrong that our presence in Muslim lands is what motivates them to kill us. That’s just a pretext that they use."

You bet it's just a pretext. I always cringed when I heard Ron Paul excuse Muslim violence with that pretext as if it had some validity. It is no more excusable for Muslims to kill us for setting foot on Muslim lands than it would be for us to kill Muslims for setting foot on American soil. Had we never stepped foot on Muslim soil, they would still be out to kill us out of revenge for the crusades of 1000 years ago. They never forget nor forgive any perceived offenses against them. They migrate here and demand the right to build mosques on grounds we consider sacred. But do they allow us to migrate to their lands and build churches in Mecca? Not a chance! No more of this double-standard. It's time to hold them to the same standard they demand of us.

Agreed RScoop!

The only thing that militant Muslims understand is brute force. They have absolutely no compassion for people, only the TOTAL subjugation of the world. When you light them up like the sun, then they understand. When you try to negotiate, that's when they stick the knife in your back, because they are to cowardly to do it to your face.

I could read about only 2 paragraphs in to your statement and got bored. It's the same old rhetoric comments made by war mongers and statist. Always jumping to battle first. (yawn) Tired and bored of this stuff. Time to move on, you guys are old relics.