Wallowing In My Own Obscenity

That’s great that Paul is opposed to preemptive war – so is Obama. What the fuck does that have to do with the actual war that is actually happening that neither one of them created but they have to deal with head-on? One of my biggest gripes with Greenwald is that he doesn’t recognize the disparity of choices that we are granted. We all get choices in life that are free, and are reversible…

But other choices aren’t like that – particularly Presidential choices. You’re told that there is actionable intelligence that [Osama Bin Laden] is in a house in Pakistan and may be protected by the Pakistanis. Do you tell them that you’re going in? Do you go in without telling them? Do you do nothing? Do you call in a drone strike instead? They all carry negative consequences. None have 100% positive outcomes. They all have the potential to backfire on you, and every single one of them is irreversible in the consequences they create. If you do nothing and OBL was there, and organizes another attack, you fucked up. If you tell Pakistan and they slip him out before you get there, or worse, they tip off that you’ve helicopters coming in, you have another Operation Eagle Claw. Presidents face countless decisions where the best outcome they can expect really is to do less damage than the other outcomes. Shit, no other US presidents killed more innocent civilians than FDR and Truman. Were they wrong? Yeah, probably with some of those decisions, but not collectively. There simply wasn’t any clear way to get it more right than they did. That’s life as President…

Paul doesn’t have those liberties, nor did candidate Obama, and comparing the positions of someone like Paul who is free of the burden of these decisions to someone who has the full burden placed upon them is bullshit without noting that distinction – or at least noting the relative position that candidate Obama took when he too was unburdened with that responsibility. And anyone who thinks that the Paul positions are in any way credible or realistic of what will actually happen in office are fucking delusional.