The Debate Should Be a Wake-Up Call For Americans
Ron Paul, MD

There were plenty of surprises in last week’s presidential debate. For one, Americans who rely on the mainstream media for their news learned that they had been lied to for the past three years about President Biden’s capability to do the job he was elected to do.

The realization that the media has been lying for years about Biden is a positive development, as, hopefully, thoughtful Americans might begin wondering what else the media has been lying about. For example, they will find out that the media has been lying to them for years about Russia and Ukraine and about the Middle East and elsewhere. They will find out that our hyper-interventionist foreign policy does not make us safer and more free, but the opposite.

Unfortunately for most Americans, foreign policy is something that happens “over there,” with few direct effects back home. Dumping nearly $200 billion into the lost cause called “Ukraine” may at most seem like an annoyance to many Americans, but it’s not like they are being snatched up by gangs of military recruiters and sent to the front line as is happening to Ukrainian men.

However, $200 billion is real money and the effect on our economy is also real. The bill will be paid by each American family indirectly through the inflation “tax.” Each dollar created out of thin air and spent on the Ukraine debacle devalues the rest of the dollars in circulation.

The danger posed by our foreign policy seemed to escape both candidates, who each tried to convince us they were “tougher” than the other. Despite Donald Trump’s sober and accurate warning that Joe Biden has taken us to the brink of World War III, his solution to the problem is doing more of the same. His stated foreign policy seems to be that were he in office the rest of the world would not dare do anything against his will.

He would have been so tough that Russian president Vladimir Putin would never have dared to invade Ukraine, he claimed. He would have been so tough that Hamas would never have dared attack Israel on October 7th. It’s only Joe Biden’s “weakness” that leads to these disastrous foreign policy outcomes.

But the world does not work that way. Decades of US sanctions placed on any country that fails to do what Washington demands have backfired and led to the emergence of a block of countries united in their resistance to American dictates. Being “tough” on less-powerful countries may work…until it doesn’t. That’s where we are today.

Neither candidate seems to realize that the world has changed.

I have always said that real strength in foreign policy comes from restraint. To prevent these bad outcomes everywhere, stop intervening everywhere. It is not “toughness” that would have prevented Russia from taking action against Ukraine. It is restraint. Not launching a coup in Ukraine in 2014 would have prevented the disastrous war in Ukraine. Just like not stirring up trouble in the South China Sea would prevent a war with China. Not continuing to occupy and intervene in the Middle East would prevent a major regional war which might include Iran and other big players in the region.

Restraint is the real toughness. Non-intervention is the only foreign policy that will keep us safe and free. We’ve tried it the other way and it does not work. Let’s try something different.

 

The Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity is a project of Dr. Paul’s Foundation for Rational Economics and Education (F.R.E.E.), founded in the 1970s as an educational organization. The Institute continues and expands Dr. Paul’s lifetime of public advocacy for a peaceful foreign policy and the protection of civil liberties at home.

The Institute mobilizes colleagues and collaborators of Dr. Paul’s to participate in a broad coalition to educate and advocate for fundamental changes in our foreign and domestic policy.

A prosperous America is profoundly linked to a foreign policy rooted in peaceful relations and trade with all. With peace, comes real prosperity.

Ron Paul’s real legacy in his writing, teaching, and in politics is his success bringing people of very different backgrounds and perspectives together under the common cause of peace, individual liberties, and prosperity. His institute energetically continues this kind of “coalition-building” in all aspects of its work. The Institute board is itself one of the best examples of how broad a coalition can come together and work for the same shared goals and values.

First and foremost a resource for supporters, the Institute provides timely news and provocative analysis through its engaging website. Features such as “Congress Alert” and “Neo-Con Watch” bring to life the latest threats to our liberties at home and abroad in a capsule format. Longer features and press analysis, as well as blog posts, regularly appear, giving the Institute the character of an online magazine.

The Institute places special emphasis on education and on the next generations, with a foreign policy summer school for university students studying international affairs and journalism.

It will aggressively promote student writing on foreign affairs on its website and will launch a student writing award program to recognize the best of college journalism.

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