John McCain, Schmittian Humanitarian

It’s a new category in political philosophy. His proposal for rescuing the Nigerian girls, from the Kansas City Star (with my annotations):

‘If they knew where they were, I certainly would send in U.S. troops to rescue them, in a New York minute I would, without the permission of the host country,’ McCain said Tuesday. Referring to Nigeria’s president, McCain added: ‘I wouldn’t be waiting for some kind of permission from some guy named Goodluck Jonathan.’ [!!]

… McCain, the 2008 Republican presidential nominee, said the United Nations’ charter gives the United States, the authority to mount a military rescue of the girls. [Actually, no.]

‘It’s a crime against humanity to kidnap hundreds of young girls,’ McCain said [maybe]. ‘That gives any nation, if they can, the license to stop a crime against humanity [no it doesn’t]. That’s the United Nations charter [no, it’s not], not John McCain’s policy. It’s the same reason we should have, if we could have, gone in and freed the people of Auschwitz and Dachau.’

McCain said Obama shouldn’t worry about whether the Nigerian government would approve or disapprove of a U.S. military intervention into the country’s affairs. The president didn’t seek approval from Pakistan before he sent U.S. troops into that country to get Osama bin Laden.

‘I would not be involved in the niceties of getting the Nigerian government to agree, because if we rescue these people, there would be nothing but gratitude from the Nigerian government, such as it is,’ McCain said. [Like in Iraq, or maybe Afghanistan?]

And Obama shouldn’t worry about what the Senate and the House of Representatives would say if he exercised his authority as commander-in-chief and sent American troops into Nigeria.

‘If we rescued these young girls, an appetite for that?’ McCain said ‘It’d be at the high point of the president’s popularity.’ [Carl Schmitt would be proud.]