I AM SHOCKED -- SHOCKED! ISOLATIONISM IS GOING ON HERE!

This is peculiar:

A prominent conservative activist group has given Ron Paul the boot.

The Young Americans for Freedom has voted the Texas congressman off its national advisory board in the aftermath of his straw poll win at CPAC over his positions on national security issues.

"It's a sad day in American history when a one-time conservative/libertarian stalwart has fallen more out of touch with America's needs for national security then our current socialist presidential regime," said the group's national director Jordan Marks....

Wait -- you guys just now noticed that Ron Paul is anti-interventionist? Paul's unpleasant exchanges on foreign policy in the last presidential primary season with gung ho war hawks somehow escaped your attention?

I've got to believe that this isn't a matter of the scales suddenly falling from the YAF's eyes so much as a concern that the tea party tail may be wagging the GOP dog.

Really, though, there's not much likelihood of that, at least not in this way. Oh, sure, Paul won the CPAC straw presidential poll, blowing away everyone other than veteran straw-poll vote-buyer Mitt Romney. But so what? While that was going on, we had Haley Barbour and Peter King following in the footsteps of Sarah Palin and Tim Pawlenty by responding to recent events in Egypt by shouting MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD; King did so, unsurprisingly, on the TV show of Sean Hannity -- who is, even more than Glenn Beck, Fox's great Muslim Brotherhood obsessive. (Yet again we see signs that Fox News and talk radio drive Republican opinion these days, rather than merely reflecting and publicizing it. King would probably be saying this no matter what, but I don't think Barbour would if Fox and Limbaugh weren't fixated on the Brotherhood.)

I'd also point out that CPAC's closing speaker was Allen West, who sounded like a reincarnated Cold Warrior as he called for "peace through vigilance, resolve, and strength" and added more jingoistic red meat:

... on foreign affairs and the resolve for peace, West issued a challenge. "Peace begins with courageous leaders who are willing to identify and defy our enemies and their objectives," he said, "Because political correctness has no place in our national security agenda."

Touching on the developments in Egypt he cautioned, "Yesterday we witnessed a historic moment. However, let us be reminded of the lessons of revolution in Iran. History has a way of teaching you a very bad lesson if you don't pay attention."

But the most important pillar for West, who shared stories from his childhood and a family history in the military, was the commitment to values.

"We do not separate faith from the individual. We must never forget that the American motto is in God we trust. We welcome the beliefs of others in America, but when tolerance becomes a one-way street it leads to cultural suicide," he said....

"Cultural suicide"? That's a dog whistle meaning America is a Christian nation! Give them Moo-slimes an inch and they'll impose sharia law in the U.S. overnight!

I don't know if the YAF is worrying needlessly or is just getting with the program of aiding and abetting a pivot to foreign policy (i.e., arguing that Obama is a friend to America's enemies) as we approach the 2012 election. But that's where we're headed -- jingoism is making a comeback as surely as is anti-abortion, anti-gay God-bothering, regardless of what you thought you heard during the 2010 campaign about domestic issues being the right's top priority. Can't wait to see how often right-wing propagandists in the next year or two attack Ron and Rand Paul as "liberals."