Republican presidential candidate Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., didn’t have the easiest go of it with media Wednesday as he was pressed to answer difficult questions involving the National Security Agency and the current turmoil in the Middle East.
The Kentucky senator’s day started off rocky as he drew ire from certain conservative circles for saying in an interview on MSNBC that GOP hawks helped create the Islamic State.
Paul’s hawk remarks were made in response to a hypothetical question posed by “Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough.
“[South Carolina Sen.] Lindsey Graham would say, ISIS exists because of people like Rand Paul who said let’s not go into Syria,” Scarborough said.
Paul replied, saying, “I would say it’s exactly the opposite. ISIS exists and grew stronger because of the hawks in our party who gave arms indiscriminately, and most of those arms were snatched up by ISIS. These hawks also wanted to bomb [Syrian President Bashar] Assad, which would have made ISIS’ job even easier. They created these people.”
The Kentucky senator didn’t leave it at that and continued, saying, “ISIS is all over Libya, because these same hawks in my party, they loved Hillary Clinton’s war in Libya, they just wanted more of it. So everything they’ve talked about in foreign policy they’ve been wrong about for 20 years, yet they somehow have the gall to point the finger otherwise.”
His remarks did not exactly find a warm reception with certain conservative authors.
Commentary’s Noah Rothman, for example, was quick to push back on Paul, writing Wednesday that the senator’s answer to Scarborough was a “juvenile and unconvincing effort to square a predetermined conclusion with contradictory evidence.”
PJ Media’s Roger Simon, meanwhile, was far more critical of the senator, writing Wednesday that Paul had revealed “his true colors.”
“Alas Rand (I had higher hopes for him), like father Ron, has a mega-chauvanistic view of the world. The USA is so big and strong it causes everything, including, at one point, 9-11, and now ISIS, if you can believe that,” he wrote.
Paul was not without his defenders, but there was some particularly sharp criticism Wednesday morning for his suggestion that GOP hawks created the marauding horde known as “ISIS.”
Later, on Fox News, Paul was pressed to answer for his longstanding opposition to the NSA’s data collecting methods.
“What happens if there’s a lapse in this program and a terrorist attack happens? Will you feel guilty?” Fox News’ Gretchen Carlson asked the senator in a question that most would find extremely difficult to answer.
Paul explained that his position is that intelligence gathering can be smarter and more effective and that he merely opposes the broad strokes used by the NSA.
Carlson kept at it, however, declaring that the senator would “take a hit” should the United States ever come under an attack because it lacked the proper intelligence.
Paul eventually pushed back on the Fox host’s line of questioning, referring to her inquiries as “improperly worded,” and saying that questions about who would be to blame for an attack on United States soil are not quite fair.
The senator’s tough day with the press came not too long after he sat down for a hardball interview Tuesday evening with Fox News’ Megyn Kelly.
