Neither Isolationism Nor Imperialism: The Conservative Foreign Policy Of Peace Through Strength

In peace prepare for war, in war prepare for peace. The art of war is of vital importance to the state. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence under no circumstances can it be neglected.

SUN TZU

After the Holy Bible, I consider Sun Tzu's The Art of War to be essential reading. The wisdom in that book is simple yet profound. I read from it often and have made it a basis for many of my strategies in life. This particular quotation contains the peace through strength strategy in a nutshell. Peace is not a given. You must gain peace through strength. Conversely, weakness is provocation. Recent history bears me out on this.

Isolationism is the naive belief that other countries and foreign actors will leave you alone if you leave them alone and mind your own business. This is the utopian pipe dream of those with a libertarian political bent. I wish it could be this way, but it isn't. You have to give other countries and foreign actors the incentive to leave you alone. This is why a country must maintain a robust and constant national defense.

President Thomas Jefferson learned this lesson with the Barbary Pirates. I think of Jefferson as the most libertarian of the Founding Fathers with his "entangling alliances with none" quotation. Unfortunately, reality demanded that Jefferson create the US Navy and the US Marine Corps to go kick Barbary butt. Those Barbary pirates believed they had a positive duty from the Koran to attack American ships and enslave their crews. They were never going to mind their own business.

The War of 1812 also showed that isolationism was never going to be as the Brits decided to try kicking American butt again. Weakness was provocation, and the USA had to fight once again to remain free. This has been the state of affairs ever since. By World War I, Americans were weary of fighting and dying in foreign wars. This led to a resurgence of isolationist feelings at home. Pearl Harbor would end that.

Some believe that FDR knew Pearl Harbor was coming and sat on his hands and let it happen to sway hearts and minds into battle. I think the mere planning of such an attack was enough to justify going to war with Japan and with Nazi Germany, Japan's ally. No leader should ever let such an attack happen if it can be prevented. The only prevention for such attacks is to be prepared for them.

The famous line goes that eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. It is sometimes credited to Thomas Jefferson, but it may as well have come from Sun Tzu. We are free only because of the job our men and women in uniform do for us each day.

If isolationism is the error of libertarians, imperialism is the error of those who lean left in their politics. By nature, Marxists and progressives cannot allow liberty which is why they support an ever expanding state of tyranny. This tyranny does not end at a country's borders but will spill over into other countries. This was certainly the case with the USSR and Communist China. The neoconservatives here at home were former progressives who decided that war was a good thing especially if it was an imperial war of conquest. The ultimate goal of this imperialism is the establishment of a one world global government. This is the utopian delusion of the left wing. Neoconservatives are just progressives masquerading as conservatives.

Neoconservatives proved their stupidity by invading Iraq after 9/11. That was a stupid, senseless, and unnecessary war. We can debate Vietnam and Korea because of the Soviet menace, but Iraq was war purely for the sake of war and conquest. We lost a lot of lives over there. What did we achieve?

The neocons will claim that containment doesn't work except that it does. The USA contained the USSR for the entirety of the Cold War. Peace through strength won the Cold War. This will never be enough for imperialist warmongers. They intend to rule over others no matter what. This is why someone wrote, "An evil enemy will burn his own nation to the ground to rule over the ashes." This quotation is attributed to Sun Tzu, but it doesn't appear in the Art of War. I believe Sun Tzu would agree with it.

Neoconservatives want forever war. For them, peace comes not from containment but from total subjugation of the enemy. They cannot and will not say no to war. These people are insane.

It is difficult to thread the needle between isolationism and imperialism. This is the cross of being a conservative. We do not have the luxury of arguing for a utopian position. We have to argue using facts and reality. The facts and reality show that isolationism and imperialism do not work. What does work is eternal vigilance. I hope we never forget this. History shows that we will.

The Show Horse, The Race Horse, And The Work Horse

Horse sense is the thing a horse has which keeps it from betting on people.

W.C. FIELDS

I am not an equestrian or a horse lover, but I am fond of horse and mule analogies. I'm not sure where I picked up this habit, but I did spend 7 months working for a feed merchant in a small town with a prominent horse industry. One of my best analogies is that of the stallion and the mule. You can ride a stallion to death. It will run until its heart explodes. You can't do that with a mule. The mule will do good work for you, but it will not allow itself to be worked to death or mistreated. I used that analogy many times on the job as I watched management work the stallions to death which was the stallions deciding to quit while the rest of us mules stayed and quietly labored for years. I lost count of those stallions.

Outside of work, I like to use the analogy of the show horse, the race horse, and the work horse. I see a lot of blue collar men who are confused about their identities and can't decide what they are and want to be in their lives. I know what they should be, but they don't listen to me much like the stallions didn't listen to the mules.

The show horse is the working man who decides he needs to spend money on fancy cars, boats, RV campers, motorcycles, and whatever else his credit limit will afford him. For them, the optics are what matter. It doesn't matter that most of these toys go unused. What matters is being seen in possession of working class status symbols. Naturally, this delights the bankers and finance company professionals. Later, it delights the repo man.

The race horse is the working man who sees himself as some sort of competitive athlete. These are the guys working on their golf games as the bank forecloses on their homes. These are the guys who compete in bass fishing tournaments that don't even yield enough prize money for them to justify the purchase of those expensive bass boats. At some point, the fantasy fades for them as they let the golf clubs rust and the fishing rods collect dust as they watch the real thing on ESPN.

The work horse is the working man who sees himself as a working man. Instead of buying a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, he buys a lawn mower and starts a mowing and landscaping business in the hours he has when he gets off work. Instead of buying a Jeep to flip over in the woods, he buys a boring pickup truck, so he can haul tools, supplies, and refuse.

I identify as a work horse. My brain damage has greatly killed my capacity for work, but it has not killed my love for work. I have worked with a lot of show horses and race horses in my time. But I have known some work horses who became my heroes. The irony is that the only difference between the three horses is self-delusion. The show horses and the race horses work but end up broke. The work horses are secure because they don't blow money on their fantasy selves.

Nobody wants to be what they are. This is why you have this 3 horse thing. I think being a work horse is the best thing you could ever be in life. It must be some trick of the Devil that turned working men into such self-hating individuals. They trade humility for foolishness. This message will certainly fall on deaf ears, but it is the most important lesson I have learned from all my years working. Embrace who you are. Know thyself.

You can be a show horse, a race horse, or a work horse. You can't be all three of them. Reality won't allow it. Let hard work be your sport and hobby. Be the work horse.

Sherlock Holmes Versus Columbo

You know, sir, it’s a funny thing. All my life I kept running into smart people. I don’t just mean smart like you and the people in this house. You know what I mean. In school, there were lots of smarter kids. And when I first joined the force, sir, they had some very clever people there. And I could tell right away that it wasn’t gonna be easy making detective as long as they were around. But I figured, if I worked harder than they did, put in more time, read the books, kept my eyes open, maybe I could make it happen. And I did. And I really love my work, sir.

COLUMBO

I love mysteries and detective stories. I have loved them ever since I was in elementary school reading Encyclopedia Brown books. I would graduate to the Hardy Boys and The Three Investigators. As an adult, I like Agatha Christie stories. The king of fictional detectives is Sherlock Holmes, but my favorite detective is Lt. Columbo. I have a real attachment to that character.

Before my accident that injured my brain, I was Sherlock Holmes. Problems would come up at work, and I would solve them very rapidly. The solutions were genius such that I amazed myself. My co-workers would recognize the genius but zip their lips. That was probably to the good because genius begets pride which begets stupidity.

My TBI ended my Sherlock Holmes abilities. I solve problems, but it takes much longer now. It takes me awhile to get to the conclusion, but I also don't jump to conclusions. That was a persistent flaw in the Sherlock Holmes days of my life. I didn't always get it right.

After my accident, I discovered Columbo. I think this discovery was a product of Divine Providence. God was telling me that I was dumber but also smarter as a consequence of my accident. My pride in my intelligence was gone and replaced with humility and patience. Sherlock Holmes had become Columbo.

Sherlock Holmes solves crimes through sheer intelligence. He is a genius. His conclusions come quickly and are rarely wrong. Columbo doesn't have this level of genius. He solves the crime in a similar fashion to Holmes, but he takes a longer time to do it. His virtue is not genius but persistence.

Was Columbo a genius? The best episode of the series answers this question for me. In The Bye-Bye Sky High IQ Murder Case, Columbo matches wits with a literal genius who tests him with a mental puzzle to test Columbo's IQ. Columbo does solve the puzzle but only later in the episode after thinking over it for a long time. He also solves the crime. The reality is that Columbo isn't a genius but an average guy who doesn't give up until he has the answer. Persistence trumps intellect.

Episode review: Columbo The Bye-Bye Sky High IQ Murder Case

https://columbophile.com/2019/10/27/episode-review-columbo-the-bye-bye-sky-high-iq-murder-case/

Columbo is my hero. He may be fictional, but I try to emulate his humility and his persistence. I find Sherlock Holmes to be a bit pompous and not worth emulating at all. Columbo is my detective. I will never pretend to be a genius in my life again. I will take my time and never give up. That is the way.

As a postscript, I love this line Columbo utters in my favorite episode. “Here I’ve been talking with the most intelligent people in the world and I never even noticed." That is unintimidation. It is not that Columbo thinks he is smarter than these geniuses. He knows they are not smarter than him. Don't let smart people dazzle you with their intelligence. We all have stories of geniuses who were also complete idiots. Don't fall for the hype. Be a blue collar detective and keep at it.

I'm working. In fact, I can’t remember a time I’m never working.

COLUMBO

Led Zeppelin Versus AC/DC

Most people, when they progress, they progress up their own asses.

MALCOLM YOUNG

A decade ago, I would have told you that the greatest rock band ever was Led Zeppelin. I like the Beatles, the Stones, and the Who. Those were good bands in their day. Led Zeppelin took it to the next level. Then, I read an interview with Bret Michaels from Poison who said that AC/DC was the greatest rock band ever. This answer shocked me because I expected him to say Led Zeppelin. Yet, I have given it much thought, and I agree with Bret Michaels. I have changed my mind, and I now believe that AC/DC was the greatest rock band ever.

Led Zeppelin started off as a heavy band, but they progressed in their songwriting and sound. I like those songs very much, but they don't have the same quality as an AC/DC song. Here is Malcolm Young on Zep:

Their first couple of albums, they were a good band. After that, man, phew. If you want to get laid back, put on the headphones and smoke a joint, okay. But as far as getting things happening and having a party, that's boring shit. We try to keep it exciting all the time. We've never put anything different on a record, just guitars and drums. We've never expanded. Other bands are playing disco or synthesizers, or that Bowie stuff, which is disco with a little blues. We could do that, but it's got nothing to do with rock 'n' roll.

AC/DC has a certain energy that Zeppelin lacks. If you ever need motivation to get moving, put on an AC/DC album. Here's Malcolm on Led Zeppelin live:

I’ve seen that band live. They were on for three hours. For two-and-a-half hours, they bored the audience. Then at the end, they pull out old rock’n’roll numbers to get the crowd movin’. That’s sick. They’re supposed to be the most excitin’ rock’n’roll band in the world.

What killed Led Zeppelin as a rock band? The answer is progress. They aspired to higher things but gutted what made them great. AC/DC did the opposite. They stuck to the same formula which delivered again and again long after Zeppelin hung it up.

AC/DC is a potent example of the value of keeping to the basics. I love all things basic. Anything else strays into pretentiousness. AC/DC weren't artists. They were rock and rollers.

There are two other bands that I will mention that have that same AC/DC vibe. One is Rhino Bucket. The other is Airbourne. They stick to the basics just like AC/DC.

AC/DC is the greatest rock band ever. That is just my opinion, but I don't think I am alone in that opinion. I know of no other band that consistently delivered like AC/DC.