Bob CollinsJesse Ventura is back in his favorite spot — the limelight.
The former governor is on a promotional tour for a new TV show, Conspiracy Theory with Jesse Ventura, on truTV.
Here’s a heaping helping.
On Larry King’s show on CNN, the former governor took on foreign policy:
Well, it still angers me, because it reminds me a great deal of Vietnam. The Russians couldn’t beat they will. The English couldn’t beat them over there. You are not going to get a military solution, in my opinion, in Afghanistan. It’s impossible.
Yet we’re just like Vietnam. Are we propping up a phony government like we did in Vietnam? Remember, the United States blocked free elections in Vietnam? Had there had been elections in Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh would have won in a land slide.
Well, is this the same thing going on? We’re propping up an unpopular government. We’re sending our military in.
I tell you what should happen, Larry. We need an immediate Congress to pass a war tax, because you know what? We’re involved in two wars now and this country is feeling no pain. Well, I got news for you. When you’re involved in war, everyone should feel a little bit of pain. We need to pass a war tax to pay for this war.
And I’ll tell you something else. It’s time to bring back the draft. These guys are on their fifth or sixth tours over there. I used to be advocate for a professional military. I’m not anymore. It’s too easy for these people to take our young men and women to war and not account for it.
And let’s pass one more law, Larry. The next time the government votes to go to war, I think every congressman and senator should be required to pr predesignate someone in their family begins immediate military service. I’m tired for these people voting to go to war and then they have no dog in the fight.
In a 2002 interview with MPR’s Tom Scheck, Ventura made an observation that potential viewers of his new show might consider. “I always tell everybody that I believe 50 percent of what I read or hear in the media,” Ventura said. “So let them take it with a 50 percent; half and half, because that’s how accurate the media is.”
