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In nearly all the republican debates this year, the candidates have followed a relatively simple formula. democrats focus on health care, education, and how much they dislike President Bush, and the republicans focus on moral issues, the war, and how weak the democrats are.
One of their best tactics has been appealing to fear. Nearly every candidate spends at least part of his speech going on about the evils of terrorists and how they're all coming to our shores to kill us.
Their dichotomy is simple. They're evil and we're good. It's a ridiculously flawed premise; yet people fall for it. It's how Bush got re-elected and it is only serving to make the so-called war on terror worse. But one candidate, Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), did question this assumption. And ironically, he's a candidate who has virtually no chance of winning.
During the June 5 debates, he made the bold statement that America's foreign policy of the past 50 years was the reason America was attacked. He proclaimed, "They don't attack us because we're rich and prosperous. They attack us because we're over there."
This, of course, enraged the other candidates. Mayor Rudy Giuliani actually called him out and asked Paul to withdraw his statement. He didn't, but his remarks were disregarded anyway. Since then he's been attacked on all sides for daring to speculate that we 'invited' the attacks on New York and Washington, D.C. None of them stop to think that there might be some truth to it.
History appears to be on Paul's side. In 1953, America helped overthrow Iran's elected Prime Minister, Mohammad Mossadegh, with the help of the CIA. Why was he overthrown? It had to do with money and politics. The prime minister nationalized Iranian oil fields, effectively kicking out British and American companies that were profiting from lucrative deals they enforced largely through military and political intimidation. It was also feared that without a regime friendly to the West, the U.S. wouldn't have an ally in the Middle East to counter the Soviet Union. So the elected prime minister had to go. And in his place came a tyrant.
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Paul does have a chance of winning. A big chance. Never say never, and it's this type of thought that has put America where it is today.
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This is an excellent opinion piece. You effectively explained your position and supported it with facts. Why don't we see writing like this in the mainstream media?
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