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During the “America First” summit this week in D.C., Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) passionately demanded “that we absolutely annihilate the Russian forces, and we get them to crawl back into Russia so bloody and bruised that they can’t come back.”
At the same summit, Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL) said he had just returned from Ukraine and is now calling for the deployment of US military “advisors” directly into the war to operate US weapons systems alongside Ukrainian forces. “Let’s win this damn war!”
Now, there are even reports that British military “advisors” are already on the ground in Ukraine “Helping actually use the equipment” in combat.
We’ve seen these “advisors” in action before right before things get worse. Syria, Yemen, Libya, Vietnam and somehow each time they get involved the situations get more bloody and out of control.
But let’s not get too far ahead ourselves, we can get made about this pseudo-non-inolvement involvement nonsense or we can look at the Republican lawmakers who are actively enabling the worst of this behavior.
Let’s not pretend that Senate Republicans, who are largely a controlled opposition party to the Democrats, are any less bought and paid for by the war machines across the Potomac in Northern Virginia.
There’s a major problem with these types of Republicans. They’re still stuck on imperialist mantras and vicious talking points without realizing that actions have consequences (or they just don’t care).
They regularly spout rhetoric where the US must involve itself in far-flung conflicts that serve no American interests, and they do so with great enthusiasm.
One of the most insidious aspects about Republicans in the Trump era however is how they’ve been appropriating the America First message and aesthetic to justify their interventionist ambitions.
Don’t read this and think for a second that men like Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas are remotely populist conservatives. He might as well have “Raytheon” stamped across his head.
True America First advocates must be on guard here and protect the growing populist movement from being co-opted and have its energy diverted to causes that ultimately rehabilitate neoconservatism. They might look, sound, and mirror populists, but if they talk like Lindsey Graham we might have a problem.
Pushing to defeat the globalist cabal and its bedfellows on the cultural Left is the key challenge of our time. America’s existential problems are ultimately domestic in nature. Ultimately, must avoid the Siren Song of foreign entanglements.
