Trump Was Never a Viable Path to End the Forever Wars
The current moment simply vindicates what many of us were saying.
This is a brief post, but I feel I need to make this point, if only for the record.
During 2024, many commentators on the anti-war or 'libertarian' wing of MAGA justified their support for Trump on the belief that his election would end the forever wars, or at least put America on the path to do so, given his supposed anti-establishment and isolationist tendencies, and his outspoken opposition to Bush-Cheney style regime change wars. They used the unfortunate fact that two new wars happened to start during the Biden era (notwithstanding that neither were initiated by the Biden administration), and the fact that Dick and Liz Cheney supported Kamala Harris, to justify their view that the regime change warmongers had migrated to the Democratic Party, and it was now the Democrats who represented the Bush-Cheney forever wars ideology.
Fast forward to, well, less than one year later, and we have many loyal Trump supporters openly calling for America to enter into yet another Middle Eastern war, with the stated goal of regime change. It is now abundantly clear that the forever wars ideology remains very much a core part of the Republican Party, ready to assert its influence whenever the opportunity comes. Even more concerningly, it appears that the warmongers actually have the upper hand now, with reports that anti-war administration officials are being sidelined. Other MAGA figures opposed to the war also appear to be striking an increasingly desperate posture, as Trump himself keeps refusing to take entering a new regime change war off the table.
These events, among others, just shows that MAGA simply isn't that different from the Bush-Cheney Republicans who upheld the forever war, pre-emptive strike ideology. It's simply different packaging. The fact is, MAGA exists on top of a Republican establishment who still believes in all those things. That many libertarians became very frustrated with the woke left during the 2010s blinded them to the fact that the neoconservatives still run the show on the 'right', and unless this changes dramatically, the artificial coalition of the 'right' will never be a viable home for libertarians and other peaceful people. New right, old right, MAGA, neocons, NatCons, they are all the same. I hope that everyone can finally wake up from the 'MAGA is good for libertarians' fever dream now.
TaraElla is a singer-songwriter and author, who is the author of the Progressive Conservative Manifesto, the Moral Libertarian Manifesto and the Moral Libertarian book series. She is also the author of her autobiography The TaraElla Story.