Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
On Thursday evening at the St. Regis Hotel three blocks from the White House. Paul Ryan was the featured speaker at a meeting of the Alexander Hamilton Society. I think it telling that his subject was not the fiscal crisis besetting our country. It was, as Michael Warren makes clear in a detailed report on the website of The Weekly Standard, the conduct of American foreign policy. If you have even a passing interest in the current Presidential race, you should read Warren’s report in its entirety. In it, he reprints Ryan’s every word. Here is how the Congressman began:
Some of you might be wondering why the House Budget Committee chairman is standing here addressing a room full of national security experts about American foreign policy. What can I tell you that you don’t already know?
The short answer is, not much. But if there’s one thing I could say with complete confidence about American foreign policy, it is this: Our fiscal policy and our foreign policy are on a collision course; and if we fail to put our budget on a sustainable path, then we are choosing decline as a world power.
Ryan’s main point was that decline is not inevitable. It is a choice – a choice that we can make, a choice that we can resolutely refuse.
If we continue on our current path, the rapid rise of health care costs will crowd out all areas of the budget, including defense.
This course is simply unsustainable. If we continue down our current path, then a debt-fueled economic crisis is not a probability. It is a mathematical certainty.
Some hear these facts and conclude that the sun is setting on America… that our problems are bigger than we are… that our competitors will soon outrun us… and that the choice we face is over how, not whether, to manage our nation’s decline.
It’s inevitable, they seem to say, so let’s just get on with it. I’m reminded of that Woody Allen line: “More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly.”
In his speech, Ryan considered the consequences of making the wrong choice in this regard. It is, he insisted, a matter of paramount importance.
In The Weary Titan, Aaron Friedberg − one of the founders of the Hamilton Society − has shown us what happened when Britain made the wrong choice at the turn of the 20th century.
At that time, Britain’s governing class took the view that it would be better to cede leadership of the Western world to the United States. Unfortunately, the United States was not yet ready to assume the burden of leadership. The result was 40 years of Great Power rivalry and two World Wars.
The stakes are even higher today. Unlike Britain, which handed leadership to a power that shared its fundamental values, today’s most dynamic and growing powers do not embrace the basic principles that should be at the core of the international system.
A world without U.S. leadership will be a more chaotic place, a place where we have less influence, and a place where our citizens face more dangers and fewer opportunities. Take a moment and imagine a world led by China or by Russia.
Choosing decline would have consequences that I doubt many Americans would be comfortable with.
Ryan is persuaded that “we must lead,” and he is also convinced that “a central element of maintaining American leadership is the promotion of our moral principles – consistently and energetically.” We must, however, he continues, not be “unrealistic about what is possible for us to achieve.”
America is an idea. And it was the first nation founded as such. The idea is rather simple. Our rights come to us from God and nature. They occur naturally, before government. The Declaration of Independence says it best: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
There are very good people who are uncomfortable with the idea that America is an “exceptional” nation. But it happens that America was the first in the world to make the universal principle of human freedom into a “credo,” a commitment to all mankind, and it has been our honor to be freedom’s beacon for millions around the world.
America’s “exceptionalism” is just this – while most nations at most times have claimed their own history or culture to be exclusive, America’s foundations are not our own – they belong equally to every person everywhere. The truth that all human beings are created equal in their natural rights is the most “inclusive” social truth ever discovered as a foundation for a free society. “All” means “all”! You can’t get more “inclusive” than that!
Now, if you believe these rights are universal human rights, then that clearly forms the basis of your views on foreign policy. It leads you to reject moral relativism. It causes you to recoil at the idea of persistent moral indifference toward any nation that stifles and denies liberty, no matter how friendly and accommodating its rulers are to American interests.
The real question, of course, is the practical one: “What do we do when our principles are in conflict with our interests? How do we resolve the tension between morality and reality?” And here is Ryan’s answer:
According to some, we will never be able to resolve this tension, and we must occasionally suspend our principles in pursuit of our interests. I don’t see it that way. We have to be consistent and clear in the promotion of our principles, while recognizing that different situations will require different tools for achieving that end.
An expanding community of nations that shares our economic values as well as our political values would ensure a more prosperous world … a world with more opportunity for mutually beneficial trade … and a world with fewer economic disruptions caused by violent conflict.
Here, too, Ryan urges prudence and caution. “In promoting our principles,” he argues, “American policy should be tempered by a healthy humility about the extent of our power to control events in other regions.” Then, he turns to Saudi Arabia, Syria and Iran, Afghanistan, and China – where you can see a bit more clearly what he has in mind when he speaks of limits and where you can also see just how much care he has given to considering our strategic situation.
Read Warren’s report. Run it off, and read it again. I think that, if you do, you will see why I think it right that this country do something almost unthinkable that it has not done in more than a century: elevate a mere Congressman to the Presidency.
There are many reasons why we need to get our fiscal house in order. Perhaps in the long run the most important is that, if we do not, we as a people will lose the hard-won capacity to shape the strategic environment within which we, as individuals, live our daily lives. The political liberty we treasure depends upon our independence -- and ultimately that cannot be sustained if ours is an entitlements state.
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Comments:
Nov '10
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
A presidential debate between Paul Ryan and Barack Obama, should it occur, will be watched around the world. Obama will need to do more than run his middle finger up his face while Ryan speaks. But Obama doesn’t have anything more.
The debate, if it happens, will be a bloodletting, and Paul Ryan will be sworn in as President in January, 2013. If anyone in the Obama camp reads the Warren report this morning they will lose their breakfast.
Can’t come soon enough.
Jun '11
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
After electing and elevating a "community organizer" to the Presidency, I would submit that electing a thoughtful Congressman would be stepping up.
Sep '10
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
I think Paul Ryan is a sincere Republican insider. His vision of where we are and what must be done is shaped by 20+ years of beltway brainwashing. Ron Paul proposes dong something about the countries debt problem, Ryan proposes to continue to grow the debt. He repeatedly says he is addressing the deficit, not the debt, but his proposal calls for continued deficit spending for two decades and yet he, you and others claim he is a deficit hawk. He deserves credit for at least beginning to address the Medicare, but he does little else. His charts are little more than fantasies and his calculations are based on not only on the unknown, but the unknowable. Any person presenting a business proposal of this sort would be laughed at. Why are you cheering?
Nov '10
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
Give up some of that liberalism, Jim. It’s distorting your vision. Paul Ryan is pretty much the direct opposite of how you describe him. He’s not one of the establishment Republicans who, fools they be, are trying to distance themselves from him. He’s popular with conservatives precisely because he is not brainwashed by the the Washington beltway.
Edited on June 4, 2011 at 8:53pmNov '10
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
I agree, Ducatista. If I wake up tomorrow and find I've got $50,000 in credit card debt, and the reason I have it is because of my extravagant spending, I have to deal with the spending. I have to bring the spending down in order to have the disposable income to pay down the debt. And if there are commitments in spending that I've made, so an annual lease on a storage unit, or something that I can't simply say "I'll just stop spending that money" (like Medicare and Social Security). I have to consider how, in the next year, I can make that commitment, knowing I'll end it in a year. I have to be realistic about my needs and wants, and the fact is, I may continue to have deficit spending and increase debt in the short term. But in the long term, if I'm disciplined, I'll get out of debt if I make a plan and stick to it. I think that is what Ryan is suggesting, simple as that.
Aug '10
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
I like him more and more every day. Could vote for him, definitely.
Dec '10
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
Wow! I read the Warren piece (snicker, sorry) and I'm impressed by the speech's breadth, coherence, it's unabashed exceptionalism, and the fact it was idealistic yet realistic. His math is, frankly terrifying! My greatest concern for a Ryan v Obama throw down is that there are so many unspeakably stupid voters who will see the fiscal train heading straight for us all yet argue about who it should hit first. Ryan would tell America the truth. I fear the body politic is not grown up enough to hear it.
Sep '10
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
Ducatista
Give up some of that liberalism, Jim. It’s distorting your vision. Paul Ryan is pretty much the direct opposite of how you describe him. He’s not one of the establishment Republicans who, fools they be, are trying to distance themselves from him. He’s popular with conservatives precisely because he is not brainwashed by the the Washington beltway. · Jun 4 at 11:50am
Edited on Jun 04 at 11:53 am
Only an establishment Repub.. would be named chairman of the Budget Com. How long has he been swimming in the cesspool of DC? He seems to me to be enjoying it. If he wasn't he would not keep running. Your right my belief in liberty does distort my vision.
Sep '10
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
Using Ryan's approach you in 20 years you would owe over $500,000. Does not seem like much of a solution to me. This assumes your creditors would continue to extend you credit. Exactly what do you not understand about compound interest? Ryan's plan does not begin to address the fiscal mess. My guess is he proposed what thought he could sell. Much more needs to be done.
Feb '11
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
Jim- if Ryan "proposed what thought he could sell", what else is he supposed to do? Get elected to 200+ more house seats, 60 senate seats and win the White House? If he sees the problems and proposes the best solution that actually has a chance of being implemented, why are we faulting him? Shouldn't we fault the rest of congress? Should he propose the hopeless, but perfect plan in order to remain pure? If we are going to wish for a perfect world, why don't we just wish that Medicare and SS never even existed in the first place?
Give the man credit, he has grabbed the third rail and is forcing people to deal with it.
Aug '10
Re: Paul Ryan’s Strategic Vision
Well, he's been running in it less than Ron Paul has and Ron Paul keeps running for re-election. What does that say about your (I assume) preferred candidate? Be careful trying to put your own guy on a pedestal above everyone else.