12/14/07 – Anthony Gregory – The Scott Horton Show

All right, folks, welcome back to the show.
It's Chaos Radio 95.9 in Austin, Texas.
I'm Scott Horton.
Anti-war radio.
And I'll tell you, that's the first time actually that I've seen, I believe that was all of it, parts one through six of the John Stossel interview of Ron Paul, banned from the broadcast airwaves by the executives at ABC News.
And I have to tell you, I just I'm more and more impressed by Ron Paul every time I see him.
And was it almost 2008?
Now, I've been I've been following Ron Paul's career for 10 years, since he came back to Congress in 1997.
And, and I met the guy in person, you know, a couple of times.
And still, I'm more and more impressed with him every time I see him on TV.
I'm just so proud of this entire movement.
Going on.
I just think it's just absolutely incredible.
And here to celebrate with me is my good friend, Anthony Gregory.
And he works at the Independent Institute and also writes for the Future Freedom Foundation and LewRockwell.com.
Welcome back to the show.
Anti-war, Anthony.
And of course, there's big news.
The blimp is in the air.
It's on its way to South Carolina.
This Sunday is the Boston Tea Party, which is the next money bomb, where all the Ron Paul supporters save up their nickels and dimes and all give them on one big day, like happened last November 5.
And they're shooting for $10 million, Anthony.
We'll see what happens.
Yeah, you know, 10 million is quite a goal.
I'd be happy if they didn't quite make that much.
But I do, I would like to see them beat the record, which is held by, I believe by Ron Paul.
I think they'll beat their own record and that alone will generate a lot of buzz.
The most encouraging thing, of course, is you look at the donations from last time and it wasn't like a handful of people gave the maximum.
It was a huge load.
It was a huge number of people giving 50, 100, couple hundred bucks.
That's right.
I think the average donation was 114 or something like that.
Yeah.
And, you know, it's probably because he's actually the, he speaks for the, you know, the common guy who can't necessarily afford a couple grand all at once.
But, you know, it's a new month.
And though it's holiday season, I'm sure that the vast number of Ron Paulians can reach into their pockets and come up with, you know, an amount to rival or beat what was achieved on the 5th.
Yeah.
And that should be worth a lot of publicity.
And, you know, it really takes, you know, the 5th really was a leap forward in terms of media coverage and they began to take him seriously.
But then they, the coverage has really tapered off.
And the poll numbers are doing better, but it's still not generating that much coverage.
And I think that, well, the people in media, they can't really understand Dr. Paul and they can't really have a conversation on his level with him.
So they prefer to just ignore him.
And it takes this kind of thing to shock them back into paying attention to the campaign.
Well, I'll tell you, you know, I've long been a cynic as far as the media was concerned.
But even I, you know, I've even been surprised by how blatant they've been in some of this blackout.
You know, our friend Eric Garris, I believe, reported that MSNBC had a poll a week or two ago in which Paul had come in ahead of McCain.
And then they didn't even report it that way.
And, you know, on TV, they just skip over him and in the news they skip over him.
And here, you know, it looks like he might actually win Alaska, a lot of people are saying.
I don't know.
It's almost as though if he actually won, they wouldn't report it.
They just report who came in second.
I've become even more disenchanted with the mainstream media, though they're forced to at least give him a little coverage because this is so huge.
Well, you know, I hate to inject a Chris Floyd level of cynicism into this conversation so early on, but he made the point and I think it's kind of indisputable that we're talking about a three trillion dollar budget.
We're talking about the biggest honeypot in the history of the universe.
And they're not going to let this country doctor come in and take their three trillion dollars away.
We're talking about, you know, what, probably less than 10,000 or 20,000 people in this country who own the controlling shares in the biggest corporate enterprises that invariably almost every single one of which are dependent on government contracts, government subsidies, politicians going their way on tariffs and deals with the WTO and NAFTA and whatever.
And there are a lot of private interests with a lot of stake in the permanence of our three trillion dollar empire here.
And the idea that they're really just going to turn the spotlight on someone like Ron, even when he's proving that when people can get on the Internet and they get their news unfiltered, they prefer him.
When they get it from TV, they don't.
You know, they're not going to change.
And the media decides fairly early who the acceptable choices are.
You know, they're always saying, well, you know, this guy is not viable.
But the reason is because they're the ones who decide he's viable.
They start from the beginning of the campaign season.
They say, okay, these are the top tier candidates that you're supposed to pay attention to most the time.
And then here's the bottom tier.
And it's really, it's horrible.
And it's never been as clear to me as it is this election, which is saying a lot because, you know, four years, eight years ago wasn't exactly, you know, model democracy like you see in the civics textbook.
But, I mean, it's pathetic.
But you're right, there's a lot to be lost.
You know, we have our liberty to gain.
We have peace with the world to gain.
And the American people have a lot to gain.
But there are a lot of concentrated benefits that come from the biggest growth industry in America, which is the federal government.
And, you know, when you're attached to the federal government, like the media tend to be directly and indirectly, there's a lot to be lost seeing the Constitution enforced for a change.
And, you know, they, you know, people talk about, you know, some of the Democrats who want universal health care, as if this is, you know, some radical, you know, proposal and this would really stir things up.
But no, the establishment would love anything like this, anything that makes government bigger in whatever direction.
And anything that makes, you know, that doesn't change the fundamental premises upon which the current American system thrives, they don't mind.
They welcome it.
Their version of dissent is maybe we should bomb this country first rather than that country.
And, you know, so we see small changes and small proposals.
But when someone truly different, like Ron Paul comes around, which doesn't happen all that often, if ever, if someone proposes something that would truly be a revolution in America, of course they don't want to give it the attention it deserves.
And what do they do?
They say, you know, they ignore it.
They have headlines saying, you know, the Republicans agree on Iraq or something.
Yeah.
Or when you talk about him, they just like when Wolf Blitzer interviews him, all he asks him is about his plans for after he's defeated and that kind of thing.
All right.
The number here is 512-646-6446, 512-646-6446.
Whoever you are, you are on the air now with Anthony Gregory.
Hey, what's up, Scott and Anthony?
It's Matt Collin from Virginia.
Hey, good to hear from you, Matt.
How are you?
I'm great, man.
Sorry, Mr. Anniversary.
I think it was Wednesday.
I've been in Philly for about a week and a half, so good on you.
I'm glad you're around.
Hopefully, you're around for at least another 10 more.
Thanks.
The second thing is I'd like for you and Anthony to discuss and I'll listen off the air.
But what in the world, and Scott, don't go off on this, because the last time I called and brought up Mike Huckabee, you had me in tears for about 20 minutes ragging on the guy.
Yeah.
But I'm just trying to figure out what it is in the world that makes Mike Huckabee somehow skyrocket past Ron Paul and press coverage with half the staff, like an eighth of the money.
And the press kind of poo-pooed Dr. Paul, and here goes the hick reverend out into the forefront.
And if you could, maybe just toss that idea back and forth about why maybe that is.
I think he's even on the cover of Newsweek this week.
Well, my suspicion right off the bat, for my own part, is that there was a dark, smoky room full of criminals who said, okay, our new strategy is to promote this Huckabee guy who ought to cost Ron, because the kinds of people who vote for Huckabee might be the same kind of people who would be turned on by Ron Paul's dedication to the Constitution and so forth.
And so, you know, in my suspicion, in my imagination, it's a dark, evil conspiracy.
On the other hand, there are a lot of idiots in this country, and Mike Huckabee plays perfect to an idiot.
In fact, the other day, when I was watching TV, and I'm sorry, I'm already breaking my implied promise there to not go off.
When I was watching the debate the other day, you know, I'm stuck like this, guys, in case you can't tell, I'm willing to sit through an entire Republican debate just to see Ron Paul.
I can do it, you know, I'm like that.
I'm stuck this way.
But I couldn't make it through that debate.
I said, you know what, I'm just going to have to wait for the YouTube with the Ron Paul clips later, because Mike Huckabee, particularly Romney too, but particularly Mike Huckabee, so patronizing.
He talks to me like I'm a kindergartener.
And, oh, now see what we're going to have to do, because, yeah, yeah, nah, nah, nah.
Oh, it just makes me absolutely ill.
It makes me sick to my stomach.
I cannot take it.
And my gut is telling me at the same time, that's what people like.
Well, I think that's true.
I think Huckabee is both, he appeals to the religious right and, you know, the evangelicals who see in him a better ally than, say, Giuliani.
And he also appeals to kind of moderates, and that's somewhat of an irony, but it's a good coalition there, because he seems kind of more human.
I mean, I admit myself that when I first saw him talking, he didn't evoke the same sort of fear and apprehension in me, because he seemed to have some sort of human decency.
Now, I'm not saying that he's actually a better guy or would be a better president than the other, but he seems less frightening.
But at the same time, to the people who want the federal government to bring on apocalypse, he's also compatible.
And I think he shot up right after he addressed the values voter.
There was one of those debates or something where he started.
And then, of course, the media went along with it and said, oh, now Huckabee is respectable.
I've also heard that he and Giuliani have...
I don't know if this is true.
I just heard that he and Giuliani have agreed not to attack each other.
Yeah, he's running for vice president right now.
Right.
Well, and you know, look, the fact is he's doing great in Iowa.
He's in first place in Iowa.
And so thanks a lot.
Yeah, he clearly put all his marvel there.
Good thinking.
Right.
I mean, I don't know.
I think back to his argument with Ron Paul about the war, where he was trying to criticize Ron Paul's position on the war.
And all he could do...
I mean, come on, literally, we're talking about grown-ups here.
You know, all he could say was, when I was a little boy and my mommy took me to the store and I accidentally broke something or stole something, my mommy made me pay it back, whatever, whatever.
What are you talking about?
Yeah, but that's the kind of...
See, when McCain or Giuliani confront Ron Paul on the war, they're going to turn more people off.
Because Huckabee seemed to engage him.
He seemed to concede that maybe we did make a mistake, whereas Giuliani would never concede a mistake.
And McCain, you know, blamed Ron Paul for World War II.
And you know, that kind of stuff doesn't fly well, while at the same time, he gets the pro-war people saying, yeah, he's standing up for our troops and for the war.
So he's really trued at appealing to different, you know, constituencies within the Republican base.
Yeah, and it's kind of sad, too, that he's certainly appealing to the... everybody looked to the president as the father figure, you know, the Unitarian idea of the executive.
But the last thing I'll leave you guys with is that kind of thing is kind of scary, because him being a reverend and all reminds me of the great line from H.L.
Lincoln, you know, where he likened an archbishop to a Christian ecclesiastic who was superior-ranked to that ever achieved by Christ.
So, you guys have a great weekend, and don't forget to contribute on Sunday.
Yeah, thanks a lot, and thanks for mentioning that at the end.
That's right.
This Sunday is the Boston Tea Party anniversary, and it's the next big money bomb for Dr. Paul.
That's right, fellas.
Take it easy.
All right, thanks a lot for calling in, Matt.
Yeah, man.
If anybody else wants to call in, the number is 512-646-6446.
And now, let's get straight to the heart of the matter.
Here is America's relationship with the rest of the world.
That, to me, in my humble opinion, I guess for what it's worth, if it's worth anything, is the most important thing in the whole world right now to care about.
It's the only thing that matters.
It's the only thing that matters by a magnitude of a million times over everything else.
America's relationship with the world.
And that's where we get to Anthony Gregory's article today.
It's called, Mr. Speaker, Peace is Always Superior to War.
And it's Anthony's review of Dr. Paul's book, A Foreign Policy of Freedom, which is in the mail to me right now.
I don't know about UPS or FedEx, hopefully a private business is delivering it, but in any case, the book is on order to me right now.
It's my own Christmas present to myself, and I can't wait to read it, but I was really excited to cheat this morning.
I woke up and read Anthony Gregory's great review of it.
Is it basically the case, Anthony, that you're making in this article that Ron Paul has been right about foreign policy for 30 years straight?
Well, sure.
And that's the difference between him and other politicians, say in the Democratic Party, who are, for what it's worth, considerably better on war than the neocons or the Hillary.
Ron Paul is different from the mildly anti-war other figures in that he's been a very astute critic of U.S. foreign policy's details for decades.
He's been there in Congress warning about things that end up happening a year, five years down the line.
Give us some examples.
In the book, I was amazed to see just how prophetic he could be.
I mean, he'd say, you know, now we're supporting these people, but there's going to be terrorism in a few years.
Well, be specific.
Take us through.
Well, one of the most interesting parts of the book is it has to do with Lebanon, where Reagan, you know, Reagan eventually pulled the troops out of Lebanon after the Marine barracks were bombed.
But for a year or so before that, Ron Paul was saying we shouldn't pass this resolution.
Yes, it's bad that there's violence abroad, but resolutions like this end up leading to U.S. engagement overseas.
And then the U.S., you know, sends troops.
And then he says we shouldn't send troops because this will lead to resentment there and we might get attacked.
And American interests are attacked.
And he says we should get out before this becomes worse.
And then it becomes worse.
And there's that.
And there's, you know, during the Kosovo war and Clinton's interventions in the Balkans, Ron Paul was warning against, you know, some of the U.S. support, de facto support of the Muslim extremists that he said, you know, were connected to terrorists on the U.S. terrorist list.
And, you know, and he also pointed out that the U.S. wasn't helping the Kosovars earlier with an embargo, I believe.
I don't have the book in front of me, but there's just, you know, example after example, you know, the U.S. will support both sides in a conflict or one side and then switch sides.
And he owed one thing that you see earlier, which is really fascinating, during the Cold War.
He pointed out, you know, we're criticizing these communist regimes for, you know, for irritating our allies or doing whatever.
But why are we sending them foreign aid?
Why is the U.S. government subsidizing our supposed enemy?
You know, I saw a debate that Ron Paul was in.
If I remember right, it was his debate over the minority report on the Gold Commission in 1980 or something along those lines.
And he was saying, listen, the Soviet Union is doomed.
Don't you people know communism doesn't work?
All we have to do is stop subsidizing them and they'll collapse.
And yet nowadays the neocons like to take credit for this giant military buildup in the 80s is what bankrupted them.
But they were going bankrupt anyway.
And supposedly the same military buildup that hurt communist Russia isn't going to hurt America when America does it.
So the conservatives who, you know, they say communism, they supposedly understand the free market.
But then, you know, they say that if it weren't for the U.S., communism would have swept across the globe and taken over everything.
And I'm not, you know, of course, the communists and the USSR posed probably the one existential threat that the U.S. ever had.
Because the communists, they had all those nuclear weapons.
And they were brutal.
It's a brutal philosophy, especially in practice.
And it was a brutal, terrifyingly, horrifically tyrannical regime.
And the conservatives were right about that.
But it was an economic disaster.
I mean, they couldn't expand.
And, you know, as you point out once in a while, and as the former national security guru Brzezinski pointed out, the whole, what actually would lead to the defeat of the communists was expansion.
That's why the U.S. wanted to give them their own Vietnam and Afghanistan, right?
That's right, because after Vietnam, the American people, and this is covered to a great degree by John Mueller in his book Overblown, the American people after Vietnam, they just weren't up for containing communism in Africa and South America and around.
They had to resort to low level, you know, black ops type stuff at best.
And the communists were, the Soviet Union was allowed basically to pick up new satellite states around the world.
And guess what?
It was a giant pain in the ass to what?
To have a foreign empire.
It helped bankrupt them.
It was when the policy of containment was finally, you know, on the ropes is what led to their collapse.
Right.
And now the U.S. empire has been more expansive than the Soviet empire.
Since they got out of the way.
Ever since they got out of the way.
Hey, did you see this thing in the Wall Street Journal today?
I found this on the Lew Rockwell blog.
It says, Mr. Paul isn't going to be president.
He trails the national polls in no small part because his lack of a proactive foreign policy makes him an unserious candidate in today's terror world.
Oh, well, I guess what's serious is supporting a policy of near genocide in Iraq, killing hundreds of thousands of children with sanctions, depriving them of the freedom of trade, irritating the world, putting troops in Muslim holy lands.
And then when you get attacked, saying that it's because they hate our freedoms and we didn't do anything.
I guess that's what's serious.
And then I guess it's also serious to go to Iraq and try to use the military to create a Jeffersonian republic, you know, without any understanding of the culture there.
And it's also serious to every time that the violence escalates to just send more troops.
And, you know, 20,000 troops here will will will finally bring peace and freedom.
And, you know, if we impose elections and of course, with our own decision as to who can run.
Yeah, then they'll have freedom and self governance.
I mean, that's just absurd.
The fact is that if you want a pro war candidate who will basically continue the Bush, Clinton, Bush foreign policy, I know there are differences, but the basic premise of the US must control the world, especially the Middle East.
You have what, 20 people to choose from?
There are these, everyone else in the Republican Party, everyone else minus one or two in the Democrat lineup, they all want that same policy with a couple, you know, they want to tweak this or that.
But the reason that Ron Paul has so much support, you know, he has more support than the mainstream media thought he could get surely half a year, a year ago, is because he's the only one who is serious.
He's the only one who has something different, which is peace.
And, you know, the founding father's policy of non-intervention and free trade and honest diplomacy.
I mean, the idea that perpetual war, bombing civilians and saying that you're doing it to create stability, the idea that this is serious, it should be absurd on its face that more and more Americans realize it.
As Dr. Paul points out, we can't afford this.
We can't keep spending a trillion dollars on every war that we think is going to lead to Americanizing this country or that.
We can't do this.
Well, come on now, what can the Wall Street Journal be expected to understand about economics?
Now listen here, these people are so desperate.
The Wall Street Journal defended Halliburton as, you know, the model of free enterprise, saying that the liberal hate Halliburton because they hate business and capitalism in general.
And even if liberals don't understand it, conservatives who say they understand economics, they should know better.
And my guess is many of them do know better.
They do know that what they promote is in a free market.
But mercantilism and corporatism and fascism and that's how they make their money.
You know, what they do here is they say, I love this because it is, you know, the bizarre world.
Everything's inside out and it's sort of like Orwellian doublethink.
You know, what else can they do except characterize Ron Paul's anti-war talk as, quote, violent.
His violent anti-war talk.
I mean, sorry, but that's kind of, they might as well have written that in red in a different font.
His violent anti-war talk?
Yeah, yeah, when I think of bringing the troops home, ceasing the bombing, letting countries trade with each other in peace, I think that's violent, yeah.
That makes a lot of sense.
Paul's just not proactive enough.
He's not serious enough with his violent peace mongering.
Yeah.
Well, I don't know.
I guess I have to take this as another congratulations that the guys over at the Wall Street Journal are thinking, you know what?
A lot of our readers probably understand why they would prefer to have gold money than paper money.
A lot of our readers can probably pick right up on what Ron Paul is saying about the Constitution and the rule of law being superior to the will of whoever happens to be the president at any given moment and so forth.
And they might like that.
We have a president who claims the ability to take anyone on the earth and detain him forever and torture him without anyone having any say so.
This is dictatorial power that potentially exceeds, certainly exceeds in theory that was achieved by any ruler in the history of the world.
And this is supposedly constitutional republic.
And that's serious.
Giuliani's saying that he should be president because he was mayor of New York on 9-11 where the emergency response center was destroyed in the World Trade Center because he put it there despite his advisor telling him not to.
That's serious.
Some other candidates saying that Ron Paul is essentially responsible for the rise and aggression of Adolf Hitler is serious.
I mean, this can't go, Americans are waking up to this.
They're realizing that maybe if we brought the truth home, maybe Stalin and Hitler won't come back.
Maybe the world won't be conquered by, you know, a few fanatics who don't even have a state that they control, let alone a military that is one thousandth the size of, you know, the Soviet Union.
Well, and this is the important part of the book, too, I think, is the war on terrorism.
And I remember, I saw it just, well, I mean, I guess I was watching the news that day, so I was looking for it or something, but it's been a while.
But in 1998, I saw Ron Paul on the floor of the House give his 20-minute speech and then debate with, I think it was Dana Rohrabacher and a couple of others, about the Iraq Liberation Act.
And basically, it was going through a procedure in the House in 1998 that made it where there's no dissent, no dispute, and it sails right through.
And under those circumstances, under the rules of order, if you do have a dispute, blam, you can get 20 minutes.
So Ron Paul put in his file at the last minute and said, blam, I want my 20 minutes to talk about this Iraq Liberation Act.
And I remember, you know, thinking then, you know, here's a guy who absolutely has it right.
And he said then, this is a virtual declaration of war.
This is making it the official policy of the United States to have a regime change in Iraq.
That language adopted, and this is going to, you know, the Saudis are against it, and why?
What are they telling us?
They're telling us this is radicalizing their people when we keep doing this stuff.
And, you know, I don't have the book yet, but I know just from going back and doing some research on Ron Paul's congressional website and reading his speeches from back then, that he was saying then, our troops in Saudi Arabia, our bases in Saudi Arabia that are being used to bomb Iraq and to enforce blockade against Iraq, are angering the terrorists and will one day lead to massive civilian casualties on these shores if we don't wake up and quit this insane policy.
And he said that long beforehand, and that's why it was so easy for him to get it right after September 11th and before the invasion of Iraq, because he was already right years and years and years before and saw this unfolding in front of him in slow motion.
Same way I did.
And he was paying attention.
You know, remember at one of the Democratic debates, Hillary said, you know, let's get this straight, this is Bush's war.
But aside from the fact that she voted for it and continued to vote to fund it, you know, her husband was the one who signed the Iraq Liberation Act, right?
I mean, in the 90s, all the Democrats mostly went along with this because, well, we could guess why because, but one reason is because no one really pays attention to foreign affairs.
And so, except, you know, Ron Paul is very, very unusual in this regard.
And for the average legislator, all you have to say is, Saddam's evil, should the US do something about it?
And they're willing to sign on.
But, you know, it takes someone a little more serious than that to say, now, wait a second, what's this entail?
I mean, sure, we'd all like Saddam to step down, but what are we getting involved here?
This resolution is, years from now, it can lead to war.
And he warned against it, and he was proven right.
And so, you know, as he said, I'm glad that Ron has been getting more and more bold is one way I think he's improving.
He recognizes that since he knows the truth, that he's got the principles and the facts, he might as well, you know, he still has this humility, which I admire, but he knows that he can just come right out and say it in one debate.
He said, why, you know, these people who say that if we leave, it'll be total chaos, why should we listen to them?
They've been wrong about everything.
And why is it that it's supposedly serious to keep following the people who've been wrong over and over again?
They say we can't pull out because in six months, it'll be chaos and civil war, then chaos and civil war break out.
They say, you know, we can't pull out because it'll mean that Al Qaeda can take over Iraq.
But why is Al Qaeda in Iraq in the first place?
I mean, they're lunatic or they're evil and they have some long term plan that we don't even understand fully.
Well, no, I mean, the plan, look, the plan is out there.
And, you know, just a couple of months ago, Wesley Clark came out with his new book and talked about on Democracy Now and so forth and said he was briefed in 2002 that the plan is to wage war against Lebanon and Syria and Iran and Somalia and Sudan and Libya and to wage regime change and remake the Middle East and have this holy American empire, which ain't going anywhere.
But to carry out that plan quickly or as quickly as they wanted to, they would have had to succeed in Iraq.
But there would have had it been some achievement in Iraq that they didn't accomplish at all.
So either their plan, you know, Justin Raimondo, I think you know him, he talks about the esoteric and the exoteric side of these guys schemes.
I mean, who knows?
Some of them, maybe they did want short term chaos there, right?
And that, in fact, might help.
It looked for a while, at least, that that might have helped to spread the war to Iran, because now they say, you know, Iranians are meddling Iraqi affairs.
Which is, of course, hilarious because it's been the American policy to back the Shiite Arab factions that are closest to the Iranians this whole time.
And not that they really had a choice.
Once they overthrew the government and said, you know, we're going to put together a new one and hold elections and do it our way.
And Sistani said, oh, you're not going to do it your way.
You're going to hold one man, one voter.
You're going to start this war over again, pal.
They said, oh, OK, and had no choice, really.
But although they have had the choice of choosing to continue to back these guys all along when they could, you know, shift in favor of Iraqi nationalists.
And, you know, that really gets to the to the bottom line of, you know, it's really unfortunate that the debates are timed the way they're timed, that you can't really have this debate.
But I would like to see Ron Paul demand of the other candidates that they define victory in Iraq and he ought to make it multiple choice.
And and, you know, it seems to me that the most obvious definition of victory in Iraq, according to the war party, is for some sort of compliant government of one faction or another or of permanent warring factions to exist there in perpetuity and allow us to keep bases on their territory from which to wage further wars.
And if that's victory, then, you know, America should not achieve it if victory is somehow living up to any of their false promises and propaganda and lies about, you know, somehow creating a multiethnic coalition government there that will, you know, cease to have civil war and will protect their borders from, you know, keep the Iranians out, basically, and such like that.
Well, the way to do that is to leave, because those are the people who are trying to take power only are, you know, kept out of power by the U.S. Army.
And the fact is, if we if we leave, that's the most likely way.
Just from, you know, a cursory inspection of the news at the very least, that is the easiest way for the people who want to end all the inner ethnic and religious fighting and create a coalition government to be able to do it.
It's America who's backing all the secessionists.
And that's what we're calling victory is keeping this place divided and at war with itself so that we can keep our bases there forever.
What the hell is this, England?
I don't know.
It's Anti-War Radio.
Hey, we still got three minutes.
So if you've got one quick thing to add to this conversation, call in at 512-646-6446.
I'm talking with my friend Anthony Gregory from the Independent Institute, the Future Freedom Foundation and LouRockwell.com.
He's got a great review today on LouRockwell.com.
It's called Mr. Speaker, Peace is Always Superior to War.
And that was the first sentence of Ron Paul's speech in opposition to authorization for George Bush to have a war with Iraq in October of 2002.
The book is A Foreign Policy of Freedom.
It's on its way, hopefully, in the private package delivery service to me right now.
And I can't wait to read this thing.
And, you know, I wrote an article for LouRockwell.com, by the way, everybody, a couple of weeks ago with my friend David Beto from the University of Alabama.
And it's an open letter to the GOP base is what we call it.
But it's Ron Paul is right about foreign policy and particularly in regards to the Middle East.
Ron Paul is right about America's relationship with the Middle East.
He's right about Iran.
He's right about the oil.
He's right about the terrorists.
He's right about what to do about Iraq.
And it's all there.
And if anybody needs some talking points for their friends and family who just can't see it on the Middle East policy, it's there for you and hopefully will be a benefit to you.
And I think you'll learn a lot by checking out Anthony Gregory's article that's on LouRockwell.com on this subject today.
You got any closing comments here, pal?
Well, I'll say that aside from Iraq, you mentioned it, but one of the most important things that Ron Paul is right about is Iran and spreading this war.
And, you know, when he was asked at this value debate, what was the most important moral crisis facing America?
He said that it's this idea that the U.S. can just initiate war, that the U.S. can preventively and preemptively attack other countries.
This is an act of aggression.
And this is just very unique.
This alone makes him very special that he's willing to call this aggression, which it is.
A lot of Americans don't like the idea that the U.S. would ever be the bad guy.
But he knows that it's aggression, and he's unique on that.
He's unique on torture.
He knows that there's a moral issue involved, that this is bad for the Americans to the extent that we can have a national soul.
This is very corrupting, that this country has secret prisons and torture and warrantless wiretaps and indefinite detention and renditioning, where we send, you know, detainees to foreign countries that are supposedly so evil.
We don't want to have real diplomacy with them, but we'll let them, you know, do all sorts of unspeakable things to detainees who end up being innocent.
I mean, this is really, you're right.
All of this together is the biggest issue of our time.
And we have the golden opportunity being delivered to us on a silver platter right now.
That's what we have.
That's it for this week.
We've got to go.
We're up against the time wall here.
Thank you very much, Anthony Gregory from LouRockwell.com, Future Freedom Foundation and the Independent Institute at Independent.org.