The original Buchananist chides Bozo

Why Is Kim Jong-un Our Problem?

Pat Buchanan's apology for Kim is much of a piece with his apology for Putin, but without the white nationalist/Christianist admiration he feels for the Russian thug.

Here he scolds Trump for his apparent desertion of his campaign isolationism regarding our Pacific alliances.

And he tells us how the US can back away.

What would a true “America First” foreign policy look like?

It would restore to the United States the freedom it enjoyed for the 150 years before NATO, to decide when, where, and whether we go to war. 

U.S. allies would be put on notice that, while we are not walking away from the world, we are dissolving all treaty commitments that require us to go to war as soon as the shooting starts.

This would concentrate the minds of our allies wonderfully. 

We could cease badgering them about paying more for their defense. 

They could decide for themselves—and live with their decisions.

In the Carter era, we dissolved our defense pact with Taiwan. 

Taiwan has survived and done wonderfully well. 

If Germany, Japan, and South Korea are no longer assured we will go to war on their behalf, all three would take a long hard look at their defenses. 

The result would likely be a strengthening of those defenses.

But if we do not begin to rescind these war guarantees we have handed out since the 1940s, the odds are high that one of them will one day drag us into a great war, after which, if we survive, all these alliances will be dissolved in disillusionment.

This from a man who has never stopped insisting it was worth risking Chicago being reduced to a nuclear ashtray to keep communism out of Saigon, if not - and why not? - Phnom Penh.

Oddly, I do not recall him ever advocating, in his writings or on broadcasts, withdrawal of US forces from their overseas outposts, including perhaps especially those tens of thousands of tripwire troops in South Korea.

Meanwhile, other than to say little but "Ooooo! Isolationism bad!", no one seems to have addressed such arguments as Buchanan's, when voiced by him or by Trump.

Though, in the latter case, even peacenik Democrats reliably chorus, "Oooo! Isolationism bad!"

And of course they also chorus, "Ooooo! Putin's bumboy! Bad!"