War

Nuclear powers Pakistan and India are fighting along the Kashmir border. You might think combat between nuclear powers would be big news, but all the US media wants to talk about is gun control. Frankly, that's a good thing for us. I'd hate for the press to distract Americans from foreign policy while Washington quietly passed gun control.

Pat Buchanan on Obama's nominee for Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel.

"But the amigos and neocons deceive themselves if they think that in their hostility to Hagel's views they occupy the mainstream.
Set aside the nonsense about homophobia and anti-Semitism. What, at bottom, are Hagel's views? Where does he part company with much of the Senate GOP? What are the substantive disagreements?
First, Hagel believes in direct communication with our enemies, be it Hezbollah, Hamas, Iran or Cuba. Second, he believes war is a last resort to be undertaken only after all diplomacy has failed, and war should not be undertaken unless vital interests are imperiled.
Third, he believes a Pentagon budget as large as all the defense budgets of the other 190 nations combined is bloated and too big to carry when, as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Adm. Mike Mullen said, the deficit and debt are the greatest strategic threats to the United States."

No reasonable person would disagree with any of those things. I also agree Obama's using a Republican as cover to cut the military.