Rudy Giuliani is a madman

The blog world is all abuzz with Giuliani's Foreign Affairs essay.

Matt Yglesias has the best take-down I've seen.

He believes Bush abandonned "a decade long -- and counterproductive -- strategy of defensive reaction in favor of a vigorous offense." Counterproductive is key here. Giuliani thinks that "we must understand that our enemies are emboldened by signs of weakness" so any expressed desire to cut deals actually undermines our safety and invites attack.

The result is a chilling vision of a world where peace can only be achieved through American military domination....

This has been the kind of thinking that's animated the Bush administration at its very worst moments. You get the immediate problem that America's military edge can be countered by nuclear weapons. So it becomes very important to prevent countries from getting nuclear weapons. This can't be done through the UN-backed process of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and international law, or even through diplomacy more generally, because that would signal weakness. The only tools available are coercion -- military and economic. Of course, signaling an American desire to invade lots of countries only makes other countries more eager to get nuclear bombs. What's needed, then, is a credible threat to fight a whole series of wars. This, in turn, becomes one of the motives for trying to do Iraq and Afghanistan with super-light forces. We want to signal that we're ready and willing to do this again and again and again until all countries submit to our will.

Needless to say, this approach has already been put to the test and failed....

Matt has much more and it's worth the read.

My constant concern is that Democrats awful message machine and a fawning, lame-ass MSM will make this kook seem legitimate.