Foreign policy presents a conundrum for classical liberalism and libertarianism. We don\u2019t want to be involved in foreign entanglements, a generally good policy promoted by George Washington, but one nearly impossible for powerful nations. In my ideal world, the United States could ignore most conflicts. That\u2019s not the \u201creal world\u201d in which we exist.<\/p>\n
There are bad national actors and they not only will get involved, they will also stoke conflict when it suits their interests.<\/p>\n
Presidents inherit where we are, not where that particular president might want the United States\u2019 armed forces. Existing treaties and partnerships must be honored. Trade agreements are in place. Our membership in the United Nations, World Trade Organization, NATO, and other bodies cannot be waved away.<\/p>\n
I tell my students, \u201cYour honor and reputation are all you have in business.\u201d That\u2019s true in all aspects of life, of course, which is why we dislike negative rumors and misrepresentation of our words. Businesses have reputations, organizations have reputations, and nations have reputations.<\/p>\n
Donald Trump is damaging the reputation of the United States.<\/strong><\/p>\n When a nation doesn\u2019t stand with its allies, then alliances mean nothing. When a nation doesn\u2019t respect its treaties and agreements, those negotiated relationships mean nothing. Our president represents the nation, yet Trump stands for nothing except himself.<\/p>\n The ugly reality is that Russian, China, Iran, North Korea, and other nations with dangerous leaders don\u2019t follow the \u201clive and let live\u201d mantra of libertarians. They don\u2019t embrace sovereignty of the self, much less sovereignty of other nations.<\/p>\n Because there are authoritarian, statist, theocratic, oligarchic, plutocratic, states and organizations, we still need nations with borders and alliances between liberal states and those fighting (at least to some extent) self-determination.<\/p>\n We should be involved in foreign affairs to the least extent possible. Right now, I would argue it is not possible to step aside and allow other global powers the opportunity to expand their influence.<\/p>\n Yet, Trump stepped aside and handed more influence to some of the worst leaders in the world.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Photo by surrealpenguin<\/a> President Donald Trump is an isolationist. Normally, that would appeal to classical liberals and libertarians \u2014 but there\u2019s a difference between our dreams and reality.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":1533,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"iawp_total_views":5,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[36,8],"tags":[80,195,113,196,130,197,198,93],"class_list":["post-725","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history","category-politics","tag-trump","tag-foreign-policy","tag-isolationists","tag-middle-east","tag-political-parties","tag-terrorism","tag-united-nations","tag-wars","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2024\/03\/AC_Banner_Gray_1200x630.png?fit=1200%2C630&ssl=1","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pfivL7-bH","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=725"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1378,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725\/revisions\/1378"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tameri.com\/almostclassical\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.tameri.com\/wordpress\/almostclassical\/wp-content\/plugins\/wp-inject\/images\/cc.png?ssl=1\")
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