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RON PAUL: BRING BACK JEAN LAFITE & FRANCIS DRAKE
The Prince of Paultardia is not advocating digging up the old boys BUT he's urging the US guvmint to make like it's 1812 and issue letters of marque and reprisal. LINK. These letters would allow private citizens to shiver their timbers and hit the sultry waters of the Horn of Africa to fight pirates. In short, Paul wants to bring back Privateers and I'm not talking about the UNO hoops squad either, y'all.
Mr. Paul has long been an advocate of privatizing everything that doesn't move but the timing seems as off to me as your basic Paultard. The late and unlamented Bush administration privatized many military functions during their imperial wars and it didn't work all that well. Repeat after me: Halliburton; Blackwater. The latter were land based privateers, after all. Is that what we want? I would hope not. I wish that the Paultards and all the other Randian knuckleheads would go Galt and STFU. Of course, they'll never close their mouths, it would interfere with the teabagging. (Note to readers: That will be my last teabagging joke for the foreseeable future now that everyone's jumped on the bandwagon.)
The distinction between a pirate and a privateer is a subtle one at best. The latter, gents like Lafite and Drake, were given official sanction to "fight" piracy but got to keep the swag for themselves. Hmm, I wonder if modern day privateers would be satisfied with some of the perks Francis and John enjoyed. Drake has a San Francisco hotel named for him and Lafite has several bars bearing his brand, which is a good word to apply to him since he was a slave trader. Ah, the glamor of piracy. Nah, privateers, even modern ones, would rather have booze, booty (of both kinds) and bounty. Of course, Mr. Paul hasn't contemplated the practical aspects of his notion: he's an idea man and details are for bureaucrats. Now that I think of it, Paul is more like a mutineer than a privateer, which fits the going Galt thing as well as giving me an excuse to post a Warren Zevon song:
Adrastos, I am not advocating for RPaul here but if the US government did
this, what would be the results? What are the dangers? Blackwater and
Halliburton performed much larger functions and I can recall one major
incident with Blackwater that went awry and there are complaints about how
Halliburton got their contracts (sound familiar Orleanians?) but has anyone
ever argued they never did their job well or that many others could do it?
That's really not the point of the post though. The point is that we are
talking about a few dingies and speedboats, at worst. One American ship (am
I wrong?) the whole time of these pirate attacks off the Horn of Africa
over the last 5-6 years or so has been boarded, and then last week another
was unsuccessfully fired upon. Today there are *no* American hostages (now
we know why) and it looks like the US Navy has this thing under control.
However, there are 250 or so hostages from other countries. I don't think
the US needs privateers, but Italy and others might want to consider it.