The Fallacies of Justin Raimondo on War and Peace
I understand that Justin Raimondo's Twitter persona is meant to be more a character than a true representation of who he is, but that doesn't excuse illogical thinking on his part or blatant hypocrisy. Raimondo was once one of Rand Paul's biggest cheerleaders and angriest defenders. Any criticism of Rand Paul was sure to be met with Raimondo shouting at you for being a sectarian demanding 100% purity. Yet after Rand has come out in opposition to the Iran deal Raimondo has switched sides and joined prominent critics of Rand Paul like Robert Wenzel and Scott Horton.
You might think this would provoke a little humility in Justin given that he now agrees with the people he once shouted at, but you'd be wrong. You see, even when Justin Raimondo changes his position to the complete opposite and agrees with people he once publicly and vociferously disagreed with he was still right at the time and they were still wrong. So calling his thinking fallacious is actually being quite generous, when in reality it's much closer to delusional.
Raimondo tries to defend his position by saying that the Iran deal is uniquely important in matters of war and peace.
Now I don't disagree that Rand's position on the Iran deal is one of his biggest transgressions against the cause of peace, but it is hilariously bad form to suggest that his previous positions weren't bad enough to turn against him or to imply that his position on the Iran deal was completely unforeseeable. Raimondo dismisses Rand's having voted in favor of sanctions against Iran and his support for keeping Guantanamo Bay Prison open as being important to matters of war and peace, but how can they not be important? Sanctions are an act of war against a civilian population and a precursor to outright military violence. Gitmo is an example of the United States invading sovereign countries, abducting their citizens, and imprisoning them indefinitely in the name of an illegal, unjustified, and ill-defined "War on Terror." Furthermore, we can also point to Rand's support of boots on the ground in a war against ISIS, which is also apparently not fundamental to questions of war and peace in Raimondo's world.
No, the only thing capable of turning Raimondo entirely against Rand was his opposition to the Iran deal, which was apparently a complete shock to Raimondo despite the fact that Rand signed on to Tom Cotton's letter to Iran. Now in Raimondo's defense, he was critical of Rand for signing onto that letter, but he still supported him. It wasn't until Rand was openly opposed to the deal that Raimondo turned against him, despite the fact that it was completely obvious that Rand would be opposed to any deal with Iran because the hawkish wing of the GOP was always going to be opposed to any Iran deal and there's no group that Rand Paul has gone further out of his way to pander to than neoconservatives.
The moral of the story here is that Justin Raimondo must always be right, even when his past and present positions are openly at odds with one another, and even if it means dismissing transgressions against peace that any other rational person would consider alarming. Justin demands only conformity with his hypocritical positions because he's much smarter than any of us simple sectarians.