Seemingly everyone in Washington is being characterized as an isolationist. That the word has apparently become such a slur is revealing, largely because most of those accused of "isolationism" appear to be anything but. Aside from Ron Paul, who has unashamedly called for ending America's military engagements, disbanding NATO, pulling out of the United Nations, and slashing "hundreds of billions" out of the "military-industrial complex," it's next to impossible to find a single prominent U.S. politician who is calling for the country to reduce its preeminent role on the world stage.

No major political figure and certainly no presidential aspirant is calling for the U.S. to end its membership NATO or other international institutions; none are suggesting that the U.S. bring troops home from East Asia, where more than 60,000 US troops are stationed, predominately in South Korea and Japan; and few are talking about closing down overseas U.S. military bases. Even in a time of economic uncertainty, calls for greater protectionism or an end to trade agreements are few and far between. If anything, expanding trade seems to be one area where Congressional Republicans and the White House are on the same page.

When it comes to the defense budget, few political leaders are pushing for military spending to be cut. Republicans balked at Obama's call for $400 billion in Pentagon savings over ten years, accusing him of insufficient fortitude in maintaining American defenses. Just last week, the House, with only 12 dissenting GOP voices, passed a defense spending bill that would increase the Pentagon budget by $17 billion. There seem to be more warnings today about incipient isolationism than actual examples.

What the accused "isolationists" in the GOP and the Democratic Party are really describing would be far more accurately defined as foreign policy realism. The notion that the U.S. should be more restrained in where it chooses to engage militarily, for example, is rooted in the assumption not that the United States should never intervene but that perhaps it should do so more selectively. The "isolationist" argument that vital national interests should take precedence over notions of humanitarianism or global leadership, such as those that led the United States into Libya, is really about modifying the nature of America's dominant positions in the world, not about ending it.

After ten years of foreign wars that have cost the country trillions of dollars, resulted in thousands of American deaths, and provided minimal benefit to larger U.S. security interests, it's hardly surprising that polls show a majority of Americans agree with these arguments. The Chicago Council of Foreign Relations annual survey of foreign policy attitudes suggest that most Americans would prefer the U.S. adopt a smaller overseas military footprint and share the burden of global leadership more equally with its allies. In fact, less than one in ten of those polled believe that the U.S. should "continue to be the world's preeminent world leader" and 71 percent believe it should work together with other countries to solve global problems.