William McRaven wants a president who will “make America lead again.” And he tells us in a Wall Street Journal op-ed that Joe Biden will do the trick.

Why?

Because Biden will take us back to the good ol’ days of Barack Obama and George W. Bush.

You see, Trump isn’t very presidential. His speeches sound like word-salad. He tweets nasty things on Twitter. And, well, he just doesn’t look very presidential. But that’s not even Trump’s biggest failing. You see, back in the wonder-years, “[The world] believed that in spite of our political differences, our domestic turmoil, the ugliness of our democratic process and some bad decisions, America in the end would do the right thing. That we would stand up to tyranny, lift up the downtrodden, free the oppressed, and fight for the righteous.”

In other words, the world could count on the U.S. to drone-bomb kids in Pakistan and the president would look good doing it.

McRaven starts his missive quoting George W. Bush. You know, the president who lied us into a war with Iraq. But hey, at least he looked presidential doing it.

You see, that’s the crux of the matter. The retired four-star admiral is unhappy because he perceives America isn’t intervening all over the globe to the proper degree.

“Now, the world no longer looks up to America. They have been witness to our dismissiveness, our lack of respect and our transactional approach to global issues. They have seen us tear up our treaties, leave our allies on the battlefield and cozy up to despots and dictators.”

And to make matter worse, “They no longer think we can lead, because they have seen an ineptness and a disdain for civility that is beyond anything in their memory.”

McRaven prattles on about “our role in the world.” That’s a neo-conservative dog-whistle for intervening and bullying other countries across the globe.

The truth of the matter is that Trump hasn’t ratcheted back the wars nearly to the extent people like McRaven would have you believe. Even as Trump has made headlines about bringing troops home from Afghanistan, he has directed significant escalation in military intervention in Somalia. In 2017, President Trump loosened the rules of engagement for the drone war in that country, and since then the U.S. military has executed a record number of bombing missions. The bombing campaign through the first seven months of the year was a continuation of last year’s significant spike. In 2019, the U.S. military conducted 63 airstrikes in Somalia, the most in any single year.

As far as ending the war in Afghanistan, Trump oversaw a record number of bombs dropped in in that country just last year. According to U.S. Air Force Central Command data, coalition aircraft (excluding the Afghan Air Force) dropped 7,423 weapons in 2019, slightly higher than the 7,362 dropped in 2018. Keeping up the pace, U.S. warplanes dropped 415 bombs in January and 360 bombs in February, according to CENTCOM. (The last data posted.) That was just under 2019’s record pace.

On top of all that, he vetoed a congressional measure that would have ended U.S. involvement in the genocidal war in Yemen. He followed up by vetoing three measures that, as Dave DeCamp put it, “Would have prohibited arms sales to Saudi Arabia and disarmed the US-backed coalition that has been raining hell on Yemeni civilians since March 2015.”

That sounds like just the kind of “global leaders” people like McRaven salivate over.

The truth is, Trump has spilled plenty of blood. He just hasn’t sounded quite as presidential as Bush or Obama did in the process.

Biden – who already has plenty of warmongering on his resume – will undoubtedly continue the carnage. Heck, he might even ramp it up. And he will be the kind of man Americans can respect.

That truth pulls the curtain back and reveals a dirty little secret about American politics. Most people will happily pull the lever for a war-mongering sociopath as long as they look good in a suit and deliver a quality speech. And they will sanctimoniously lecture you about the moral superiority of their vote just as Admiral McRaven did.

As far as I’m concerned, their moral high-ground lies at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. I don’t think the one-armed kid in Pakistan cares very much how good the guy who authorized bombing his hut looks in a suit.

Photo by Gage Skidmore