From the 2 April Guardian: ...Today's Washington has not only broken from the different strands of wisdom which guided the US since its birth, but also from the model that shaped American foreign policy since 1945. It's easy to forget this now, as US politicians and commentators queue up to denounce international institutions as French-dominated, limp-wristed, euro-****************** bodies barely worth the candle, but those bodies were almost all American inventions. Whether it was Nato, the global financial architecture designed at Bretton Woods or the UN itself, multilateralism was, at least in part, America's gift to the world. Every president from Roosevelt to Bush Senior honored those creations. Seeking to change them in order to adapt to the 21st century is wholly legitimate; but drowning them in derision is to trash an American idea. The very notion of unprovoked, uninvited, long-term and country-wide invasion is pretty un-American, too. When it thinks of itself, the US is a firm believer in state sovereignty, refusing any innovation which might curb its jurisdiction over its own affairs. Hence its opposition to the new international criminal court or indeed any international treaties which might clip its wings. Yet the sovereignty of the state of Iraq has been cheerfully violated by the US invasion. That can be defended - the scholar and former Clinton official Philip Bobbitt says sovereignty is "forfeited" by regimes which choke their own peoples - but it is, at the very least, a contradiction. The US, which holds sovereignty sacred for itself, is engaged in a war which ignores it for others. The result is a sight which can look bizarre for those who have spent much time in the US. Americans who, back home, resent even the most trivial state meddling in their own affairs are determined to run the lives of a people on the other side of the planet. In New Hampshire car number plates bear the legend, Live Free or Die; a state motto is Don't Tread on Me. If a "government bureaucrat" comes near, even to perform what would be considered a routine task in Britain, they are liable to get an earful about the tyranny of Washington, DC. Yet Americans - whose passion for liberty is so great they talk seriously about keeping guns in case they ever need to fight their own government - assume Iraqis will welcome military rule by a foreign power. Talk like this is not that comfortable in America just now; you'd be denounced fairly swiftly as a Saddam apologist or a traitor. The limits of acceptable discussion have narrowed sharply, just as civil liberties have taken a hammering as part of the post-9/11 war on terror. You might fall foul of the Patriot Act, or be denounced for insufficient love of country. There is something McCarthyite about the atmosphere which has spawned this war, making Democrats too fearful to be an opposition worthy of the name and closing down national debate. And things don't get much more un-American than that.
We are hypocrites. Better than being consisently wrong like the French and then relying on the US to bail them out. Just kidding..... I agree that we established these "world instutions" and have pressed the issue of a world body. It is definitely true. The problem we have is that we don't want to forfeit any of our soveriegnty to these world governing bodies. The reason has nothing to do with hypocrisy in my mind. We (The US) have a a firm belief that our institutions (Capitalism, Democracy, Federalism, Bill of Rights, etc.) are the correct way to run government. The reason why is that the US is extremely strong economically, militarily, has a good record with civil liberties, etc. We don't want to give up any of our soveriegnty to others. Because we are really afraid they are going to f our stuff up. A perfect example is Kyoto. Sure, we are all in favor of multilateralism. But if most of the world agrees that we pollute too much, f them. (US way of thinking). So the solution is to spread our industrial complex out (we are) and to make changes to our way of life (we are not). That all beings said, this is only an issue when all of the world disagrees with the US. Which lately has been much more often.
Talk like this is not that comfortable in America just now; you'd be denounced fairly swiftly as a Saddam apologist or a traitor. This praticular whine is getting old....
The Guardian. Right. You people just can't get past the "war of conquest" lie, can you? OK fine, have it your way. Somebody figure out how we fit that 51st star on the flag. Why in the world would we "occupy" Iraq for the "long term"? Are you utterly mad? We want nothing better than to get the hell out of there. If it isn't obvious why, and that all this "Emperor" crap is just imbecilic nonsense, then there's not much hope for you.
Seventeen rows of three. Or fifty-one rows of one. There are lots of ways. Yeah, why would America ever do such a thing, setting up puppet regimes and exploiting the living crap out of them? What are you, a Commie? Sincerely, Latin America South America Puerto Rico The Philippines Cuba once Castro dies and we send all the kidnappers back on the reconquista No kidding. I can't think of a single natural resource that would make Halliburton - sorry, the United States - want to stay in Iraq for ONE MINUTE after all the oil's gone.
Dan, you ignorant slut; (I've been waiting SO long to say that) Lovely trip down memory lane. You forgot Iran though. Sloppy scholarship. Of course, none of them are halfway around the world, and we haven't had much influence for a couple decades, (Hell, we got the Phillipines during the McKinley administration for Christ's sake. That WAS a while ago. But I know - to a Liberal, any American misdeed is as current as today's sunrise) but hey - don't let actual facts get in the way of a good - um, whatever. And which one of those countries did the US Government go into and steal all their natural resources? As for oil: Here's a news flash: This war will supposedly cost us $170 billion. We'll have to steal SEVERAL countir's oil to get that back. Secondly, Halliburton has been eliminated from bidding on any Iraqi reconstruction. You ought to keep up. I've never understood what the deal was though. I mean, Cheney and Bush used to be in the oil biz. Clinton used to be a lawyer. Does that mean we should have expected him to lie? Anyway, Cheney had to divest his stock when he took the VP job. He didn't want to - the Dems howled until he did. Price went down afterwards, so of course the Dems then accused him of stock fraud. So what would he get out of the deal if Halliburton was handed the Presidency of Iraq and the deed to every well? I just want to hear. Third, we could have had access to Iraq's oil any time we wanted to by simply agreeing to lift the embargo. Fourth, Iraq only has about 3% of the world's reserves. We get a LOT more from Venezuela than from the Middle East. Hell, we get more from CANADA. If we were going to invade somebody, they're a LOT closer. And less Muslim. Fifth, I've always been curious how this stealing oil will work: will Bush put it all in his name, or will the money be funnelled to a Swiss account? Or will the US Army open gas stations? Exactly what are the mechanics here? This "blood for oil" nonsense is a great slogan, if you don't mind slogans that make no sense on any level whatsoever.
I agree with Bill, but... Actually, Iraq's proven reserves are about 11% and could be much higher. Only Saudi Arabia has more proven. And Venezuela's oil is heavy junk. And it's a tropical hellhole next to Columbia. And Hugo Chavez........ But Bill's right, if we just wanted their oil it would be much easier to just buy it and give Saddam carte blanche. If we make $10 per barrel we'd have to pump and sell 10 billion barrels to just break even, that's about 15 years of Iraq's peak production levels.
I wish this war were about oil. Then, it would at least be logical. And maybe then I wouldn't be paying 2.00 per gallon. Part of me actually hopes we do steal some oil so I can make sense of this war.
You mean we don't already own it all after whipping Iraq's ass back in '91? Some of the Iraqi soldiers that didn't surrender to CNN reporters must have scared us off. I was going to say that since we already owned it since '91, Bush Sr. would just sign it over upon his death to W. and Jeb. Slogans are fun. This whole lefty concept is as ridiculous as the right-wingers saying we're doing it to free Iraqi citizens from oppression.
It would take another nationwide effort on the order of the Manhattan Project to diagram those two sentences. Chile was halfway around the world, to be super-technical. And we screwed them up well within living memory. I guess with Central America, it's all right to completely fubar entire nations for untold decades as long as they're within your qualifying group. (Actually, that's a pretty good strategy. I may do a 180 and start supporting Yankee imperialism.) I imagine you've never heard the phrase "banana republic" before, since you'd question why big nations would trouble to bother little ones. But really, that's the charming thing about imperialism - you don't even need a reason! Why did the Italians want Ethiopia and Albania? Why did the Germans want Tanganyika? No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. And no. Well, yes. The war will cost US at least that much. But it's not going to cost oil companies a dime. It's not going to cost campaign contributors a dime, figuring they recoup their investment billions of times over. It's very cute that you believe oil companies are as patriotic and civic-minded as the rest of us, so it troubles me to be the one to break the bubble of your cotton candy fantasy world, but c'est la freedom fries. For now, is my response to that. Might as well have had Enron or Arbusto bid on it, it was such an obvious conflict of interest. I'm relieved and surprised they didn't get away with it, but any company who would try that will try literally anything. Or have the Cheneys resigned from the company? I just got a call from Non-Sequitur Man - he said cows have five stomachs. He's still getting paid by Halliburton, is the problem. Lynne Cheney is still on the Halliburton board, is another problem. Spejic, in some other thread, went into more detail about this, but basically, the bucks involved in controlling the oil dwarfs that you would make by simply buying it cheap. Is now a good time to point out that Cheney actually lobbied to lift the embargo during the Clinton Administration....back when Halliburton was doing business with Saddam? Of course, he wasn't in office, so he wasn't able to use the United States military to help with a hostile takeover then. Jesus, don't give the bastards any ideas. Again, I'm probably stealing from Spejic here, but all oil ain't created equal. The difficulty in refining Middle East oil compared to Venezuelan (or Alaskan) oil is negligible, I'm told. Governments foot the bill for imperialism, businesses profit. I've seen plenty of studies that said colonialism was unprofitable, because they didn't take into account the money companies were making in the colonies. I think without that factor, you get results like the British running a net loss on India and ridiculous figures like that. Joseph's probably your man here, but the lesson learned in the post-colonial era is that if you control the resources, but outsource the government bureaucracy, you make even more money. This is a big part of the reason so many "independent" former colonies are, if anything, worse off than as colonies. Picture the history of the United States, if Britain got to pick its leaders after the Revolutionary War, and had a monopoly on all trade. Since the alternative is "blood for no reason at all," I actually think that slogan is optimistic. Somehow greed is more comforting than other alternatives, such as (a) Bush wanting to distract us from the economy or (b) Bush having absolutely no clue how to fight terrorism or (c) because he tried to kill his daddy. Of course, Bush could be sincere about wanting to liberate the Iraqis from tyranny, but excuse me while the Angel of Cynicism carries me away on her scarred and broken back.
Well, freeing Iraqi citizens from oppression is a very nice by-product -- or, viewed from another perspective, an end-result that keeps the possibility of rabid nationalism at bay. The real reason for this war was: --to deal with a guy who has lied, prevaricated, deceived, and thumbed his nose at international will, and who has shown, over and over again, that he might mix up some really nasty poisons and toxins, and use them... --to prevent a plausible, but not necessarily definite, possibility that these poisons/toxins might find their way into the hands of nasty terrorists... --to show the world that the USA is not afraid to deploy its military power --to put the pressure on OTHER regimes with a desire to get WMDS...and regimes who, in the end, are VERY dangerous. That he is is a tyrannical oppressive despot just makes doing this a whole lot easier. If his people loved him, and his regime was one of largesse and generosity, and he did all those other things...well, we might still do it, but it would be that much harder.
Then try refuting it rather than mocking it. As someone who has engaged in this debate at work, school and at home, I can tell you that the "traitor" tag is thrown around quite a bit by those in support of the current administration anytime someone's opinion doesn't echo Bush II's
That's what I thought. The day I come on here and see anything of substance from the die hard right wingers is the day I die of shock.
What can I say, except that the pathetic little 'being branded a traitor' line is competley overblown and ridiculous, which is why I'm not shocked you are using it. Hence the violin graphic. 'Die hard right wingers'? Hahahahahaha Wow, I must be the first die hard right winger to vote for Clinton in 96.
You actually brought it up. I wasn't "using it" I was responding to your mention of it. I don't think it's unreasonable to be pissed off that a VERY common response to anti-war comments is to call the anti-war person a traitor (or my personal favorite: Doesn't support their country, and "If you can't support our military, maybe you shouldn't live here.") It happens. A lot. It's neither overblown nor ridiculous, which is why I'm not surprised people are upset by it. Hence my response to your violin graphic. My mistake. I saw your responses in this thread and in the other one you've been posting in on this board today and assumed. Bad habit.
Before the outset of the war, I was not convinced by the President that warfare was a good course of action. On the other hand, the protestors weren't making much sense either. Now I'm a strong supporter of the push to see this war to its successful conclusion for the three reasons you've listed above. Acquiescing to war protestors now would be a terrible decision that has very broad implications.
It's not a very common response to anti-war comments (being called a Saddam apologist and a traitor....you know, the original comments I was talking about). It's completely overblown and ridiculous, and the whining about (like you aren't able to express your thoughts) it is getting extremely lame.
On the contrary. The apologist/traitor comments seem to have become the xerox response to anti-war comments. The pro-Bush war group (or at least the very vocal among them) seems to refuse to engage in any sort of actual debate on the issues. To, that group, and those without enough common sense to form opinions of their own, if you disagree with the war, it's not because you have any possible legit reasons, it's because you hate America and want to get Hussein's rocks off. Once again using the common spin method of propogana known as oversimplification. It works on the brain dead. That leads to the complaints about those comments. When a large part of the population feels as strongly about something like the war as they do, they expect the other side to at least respond to their concerns with counter points. Instead they are met with elementary school level retorts and bully tactics. There is no discourse on the war. There is one side putting forth their views, and the other side with their fingers in their ears refusing to listen or intelligently reply.
Not really. The support our troops comments might, but the 'traitor/apologist' comments come from the fringe, and have come from them for quite a long time on a variety of issues. Yeah, I must have missed the 20,000,000 threads devoted to this issue, all who refuse to engage in actual debate.....because you say so, I guess. You could paint Michael Moore's ass with the broad brush you are painting with.... Oversimplification. Works on the brain dead. That must explain all the anti-war rallies.... Wow, 20,000,000 threads and not one counterpoint. Or just not counterpoints to your liking..... Yeah, no discourse on the war......sure, whatever you say. Now excuse me while I go to three different message boards and wade through the millions of threads which discuss Iraq, all of which is being debated by the pro side with accusations of being a traitor of a Saddam sympathizer and no real discourse. Wow, the arrogance comes thru loud and clear.
A good jape. I knew there was a much more straightforward reason why we didn't go with Kyoto. Thanks for pointing that out. Does the fact that there is two cars for every American vs. one car for every 100 non-Americans make any difference?
Except, it has had the opposite effect. This reason is like Agoos' spectacular finish in the Portugal game.
Dan got most of this, but I'll just dogpile to add that in addition to all the places Dan listed, Indonesia, South Korea, VietNam, the Philippines (you do remember Marcos, right?), Saudi Arabia, and a few other places have all been ruled by our proxy thugs into the 1990s or are still so ruled. And while Singapore and Taiwan we more independent, they were hardly bastions of democracy and freedom. Singapore still isn't a place I'd care to live unless my only other choice was, say, Indonesia or Colombia and Taiwan only recently has developed the first steps towards a democratic tradition. All this, of course, is not to mention Reagan covering himself in glory with Iran/Contra during the 1980s. Gee, illegally selling weapons to Muslim fanatics who hate us to fund a terrorist army and then lying to Congress and the American people about it. Why do conservatives think that bit of treason was just peachy while lying about getting a blow job was the crime of the century? Dan is also right that one "improvement" US leaders made on the old colonial model in the post-WW2 decades was to use local proxy thugs to do their dirty work for them. Unless things got out of hand as they did in VietNam, Panama, Kuwait. As for the US having no influence, that's just ridiculous. Granted, colonialism has been refined one step further by using secretive, unelected and unaccountable supranational quasi-governmental organizations like the WTO and IMF to enforce the will of First World leaders, saving the terrorism and violence only for strubborn cases like Chiapas, Colombia and a few other places in Latin America. And the third world is allowed to talk back at us in harmless forums like the UN if they want to waste their breath. But the First World government and business leaders, particularly the American leadership, remains in charge regarding things that really matter to them. The Asian "currency crisis" of the early 1990s was the first indication of how the First World leaders were going to use these "trade organizations", particularly the IMF, to bring uppity third world countries to heel now that the era of relying almost exclusively on overt terror regimes like Marcos's and Suharto's appears to have ended. So this is not just a matter of irrelevant "ancient history". The instruments of empire may have changed but the relationships between the rulers and the ruled haven't. Countries like Brasil are permitted to elect a Lula if they want these days because the First World interests are secure in the knowledge that they can use the WTO, World Bank or IMF to keep them in line. And if that fails, the generals and "paramilitary" groups are still waiting in the wings. If there is any fly in the ointment from the viewpoint of US business and political leaders, it is China - not because China is "communist" (ha ha) but because, as is becoming the case, a China run along the fascist lines of a Singapore would be a formidable economic power that could very well remove US dominance in Asia. Anyone who wishes to pooh-pooh this would be well-advised to read some of the reports coming out of Japanese and American think tanks regarding the situation. The Japanese are scared shitless and many US experts on Asia are also beginning to be worried.
If we are running Saudi Arabia, we sure are doing a crappy job of it. Ditto Vietnam. Marcos has been dead 20 years. We NEVER ran Singapore. What a grabbag of nonsense. Look, you want to run the history books, be my guest. I don't have the time. And why is it that YOU have so much trouble staying on topic, Joe? So far you've raised 50,000 words worth of geopolitical jibberish in an attempt to argue a point about whether the US intends to colonize Iraq. Not a bit of it is relevant. I have always thought that you seemed a bright guy, and you clearly know some stuff, but I'm trying to talk about oil and you want to talk about Iran/Contra. I'm being serious here, Joe. Here you are. So now I'm supposed to say "uh, Joe, what "local proxy thug" do we have running Kuwait"? Or point out that Panama is so far from the case in point that it might as well be Mars. We have SOME influence virtually everyhwere. Is there something inherantly WRONG with the US having some influence here and there? Except of course that you really seem to HATE the US, and think we are the biggest fountain of evil on the planet. It's all so bizarre, Joe. Do you have any idea how paranoid and extremist this sounds? Really? And can you tell me what any of this has to do with whether we intend to occupy Iraq and steal their natural resources? Please? No, not ancient. Just not remotely relevant, except that you like to pile up as much stuff as you can, conclude that it all goes to prove that the US is an evil corporate entity run by the worst pirates and barbarians on Earth, and that therefore you've proven that whatever bizarre motive you currently ascribe to them must be true. It's not debate Joe. It's guilt by association. How many new topics do you want to introduce. Brazil is so NOT SIMILAR to the case in point that it boggles the imagination. And those organizations you are convinced are tools of neo-colonial control by the vicious, bloodthirsty "First World" are hardly relevant to a country, like Uraq, that controls 11% of the world's proven oil reserves. Poor, destitute third world basket cases are not even remotely similar. the WTO and the World Bank and the IMF have nothing to do with it. China does not worry us particularly. Japan OUGHT to be scared. But how in the name of Allah, his name be praised, China emerging as a major world economic player has anything to do with Iraq wresting control over it's own oil income from a kleptocrat sadist I cannot imagine.