Populist Foreign Policy Fallacy

RE: JD Vance WSJ Opinion Article Jan. 31, 2023

February 3rd, 2023

The same man who, according to many members of his own party, showed no spine and willingly took the title “a**-licker”, is continuing to discredit himself by embodying that title and writing complete nonsense when it comes to foreign policy. How can he lead and form his own unbiased opinion when all he seeks is glory for himself while shamelessly licking the boots of his idol?

For a state as easy as Ohio to win for Republicans, they won the senate by about six percentage points. The Republican governor won by over 26 points, indicating a landslide victory in a now solid Republican state. How in the world did someone almost lose with such an in-house advantage?

JD Vance, an outspoken venture capitalist, continues to demonstrate to America his backward views on foreign policy. This in of itself is odd, as he’s a veteran, having served in the Middle East for several years. In his WSJ opinion article posted on Jan 31, he contradicts himself multiple times, by highlighting and critiquing poor decisions from past presidents, while cherry picking and praising foreign policy “achievements” by the Trump administration, while omitting things that would contradict his argument. By continuing to disparage Ukraine and America’s support for the embattled country, in my opinion he directly supports the Russian regime.

Conservative support for Russian president Vladimir Putin baffles me. I’m a conservative myself, which makes it even more confusing how the narrative has changed. Is America’s right actually backing this man, a man who has ordered killings of hundreds of thousands in his lifetime (Chechen, Syrian, Ukrainian wars), crushed dissent and free speech, tightly controlled religion, expanded genocidal anti-American rhetoric, all because he’s “socially conservative”? Seriously, do my fellow conservatives hold him in such high esteem just because he is opposed to homosexuality? Vance seems to take this position when he says he doesn’t want the US “to go and fight Putin because he didn’t believe in transgender rights” (by the way, Ukraine is socially conservative themselves).

For reasons I cannot understand, populists regard supporting Ukraine and focusing on internal issues as a zero-sum game. Either the US continues to “throw away” money by supporting Ukraine, or we instead use that money to help with issues at home. This logic is absolute fallacy. Vance is absolutely correct when he says we need a stronger border and tighter security – but that objective and supporting Ukraine are not mutually exclusive. In fact, they are related. If Ukraine loses the war, many millions more will move west, including the United States, exacerbating the crisis we already have at the border. How he and his fellow populists fail to see that is beyond me.

I have touched upon the populist’s foreign policy fallacies in my previous writings, and critiqued a few of their members (Josh Hawley, I’m looking at you). I’d easily throw Sen. Vance in this camp, seeking to undermine the global standing of the United States from within. I simply cannot believe their disregard for world events and the vital role the US must play in securing not only our own interests, but continuing to be the strong leader the world needs us to be.