The Republican turn to isolationism

"We don't negotiate with evil; we defeat it." That was Vice President Dick Cheney's line on North Korea. It may have been a poor position, but it reflected the Republicans' moral approach to international relations. [Source]

Today, Republicans like Marjorie Taylor Greene have a different approach.

"Vladimir Putin wants access, he wants one of the ports," Greene said. "OK, we'll sit down with these two people and say a negotiation is where two parties each have to give up something to come to an agreement right?" [Source]

But there are two problems with this. First is her understanding that all Putin wants is port access, which is just plain dumb. What port does Putin want port access to? And why does he need it, when Russia already had Black Sea ports even before 2014?

Second is her thinking that negotiations will work.

"...nobody wants this war so sitting down at the negotiating table should look like 'OK Putin we'll talk about access to this port but you have to make Ukraine whole.' You've destroyed their country, you've killed all these people, make them whole." [Same source]

That's dumb, too. The #1 reason Russia and Ukraine are at war is that Putin wanted it, and he thought he could win it eaily. There's no negotiating for "making Ukraine whole" here.

Besides, as we *just* saw today, Russia violated its agreement to let Ukraine ship grain out of Odessa the day after it was signed. [Source]

There's no negotiating this issue with Putin. There's only defeating him.