Good lord above, it's Tom Hayden. Next time please tell us in advance. I was wondering who wrote this nonsense and I actually had to go to Huffpo [shudder] to find out. Hayden. Criminy. He's still around?
Robert McNamara died the other day as seven American soldiers were killed in Afghanistan.
It wasn't the deaths on the same day that made me remember McNamara's folly.
It was the sense that McNamara's ghost is hovering over the new graveyard of America's future.
Continued on Page 49
#2
The Vietnam War was won at the time of the Paris Peace Accords. All it would have taken to hold the line was to continue sending supplies to South Vietnam, even as the Soviets were shipping billions in Migs, tanks and artillery to North Vietnam. Instead, Democrats in Congress chose to cut South Vietnam off, making the sacrifice of 58,000 American lives essentially meaningless. This is a lot like what happened with the Chinese Civil War in the late 40's - the Communists won because Uncle Sam stopped supplying the Nationalists even as the Soviets sent the huge amounts of American equipment we had shipped to them (during WWII) over to Mao Zedong's army.
During that interval, apologists for the Communists said that they were living off the land, when in fact they couldn't have survived without Soviet aid. The Chinese spent the next three decades repaying the Soviets for all the equipment they had bought on credit. And we lost 100,000 GI's because the Chinese Communists proceeded to stick it to us during the Korean and Vietnam Wars.
Suppose, from a purely hypothetical standpoint, the crisis in Honduras was mimicked in the United States? A fictional American president, lacking the votes in Congress and the judicial nod from the Supreme Court, circumvents the constitutional process and holds an illegal national referendum to repeal the 22nd Amendment -- thus infinitely extending his potential for reelection. Someone should rewrite this as Bush in summer 2007 so liberals would get it. They were saying he was going to do this, declare martial law, etc.
The obvious legislative differences between the United States and Honduras aside, reactions would be nearly identical. Members of the Armed Forces take a solemn oath to "support and defend the Constitution," not to a specific individual. The oath further specifies an obligation to defend the Constitution and the Republic against "all enemies, foreign and domestic." This was a revolutionary concept back in the 18th century, when most of the dominant European armies mandated an oath of loyalty to their respective monarch, though it's wholly in line with the clear Platonist distinction between an organized, functional republic and the chaos of pure democracy. An American military coup in a similar Honduran scenario, against the tyranny of the majority, wouldn't just be likely -- it would be the obligation of every serviceman who swore to uphold the rule of law.
The Honduran military coup -- if it even fits that definition -- has separated itself from its South and Central American cousins in that its one of those rare occasions when the military stands to deny, not support, the aspirations of a dictator-in-waiting. No junta has or will be formed, and a new election is forthcoming. Not only was Honduras' action legal, it stands as a model for how a republic steels itself against internal subjugation. When you theoretically transplant that very same scenario to the United States, its nothing less than shameful that the Obama administration has failed to recognize the very same standards to which its own troops are bound. Obama's just supporting his lefty allies, constitutions be damned.
#1
hell, potus and congress do constitutionally questionable things on a monthly basis. I'm still waiting for someone to tell me what the "shot heard around the world a second time" will be started from. His hypothesis is a good benchmark but I don't think any slick potus would be that brazen - it would be very incremental & low key methinx.
#4
The wrong question is being asked. The real question is "What if Venezuela happened in America?"
I was writing on this very subject on the 4th: missed the local tea party because I felt I had to work through the intellectual ins-and-outs, but got bogged down when I got to the Civil War.
My thesis is that there is America and there is the United States. The Declaration of Independence was an expression of Americans, while the United States is a creation of Americans to implement a specific Constitution. In a sense, the Declaration is similar to a software requirements document, and the Constitution is similar to the design document implementing the requirements. Individual laws are similar to source code. Is the programmer loyal to the source code, the design document, or the requirements document? Should a Legislator be loyal to the Declaration, the Constitution, or the laws they make?
Up until now, the "game plan" under which everyone operated was that the laws are supposed to adhere to the constitution, which specified parameters for establishing and changing them and the Constitution itself. This is similar to revising and/or abolishing laws that contradict the requirements of the Declaration as hard-wired into the constitution (The Bill of Rights, whose restrictions are calculated to keep the government from committing the same offenses the King of England committed that are given in the Declaration).
However, what if one changes the constitution so that the laws violate the requirements specifications of the Declaration are now legal? After all, a change to the Constitution is a change to the design to implement the requirements, and it should be changed if the altered design generates code whose effects violate the requirements.
Let's take a look at some the offenses of the king of England that may seem familiar today:
He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.
He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation,
A prince (or president), whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Thus, does no good to swear loyalty to a Constitution if the Constitution is amended to violate and destroy the values whose protection motivated the person to swear loyalty in the first place.
Two illustrations: a dog is renowned for the Loyalty it shows to its master, but that loyalty was created initially by the good deeds and good behavior of the master. What happens when the master goes bad and starts mistreating the dog? We continue to admire the loyalty of the dog, but the reason, cause, and point of that loyalty have disappeared.
The intent of marriage is to forge deeper and more permanent bonds between two people who love each other. We admire the faithfulness of the wife if the husband starts abusing her, but we call that relationship co-dependent when loyalty continues when the behavior starts becoming destructive. At what point in time should the wife realize that the reason, cause, and point of the marriage has disappeared?
At what point in time should the citizens of a constitutional republic realize that the reason, cause and point of their loyalty has disappeared when they are victims of laws that are now "definitionally legal" from the point of view of a constitution that was revised into something they would not have agreed with in the beginning?
#5
PTAH - awesome. When your finished w/your work could I get a copy somehow? I've been having similar discussions (in a round about way) on what is the line in the sand that gov't crosses in our country that gives the people the go ahead to remove elected officials forcefully. I'd hate to see it happen but I enjoy pontificating about it.
#6
I recall hearing a phrase: The constitution is not a suicide pact. Is that the argument now?
I liken this to a ship (we here do know a bit about them).
This ship of the Laws of the USA has been in the water for too long, with only coats of paint merely hide flaws. It needs to be pulled up and have the riggings re-roped, sails replaced, and the hull cleaned of barnacles.
Modern ships have devices that limit growth of things on the hull. Perhaps that should be the first thing to attend.
This would call for term limits, certainly many of the barnacles are in your legislature for far too long.
#7
My favorite barnacle would be the one ensuring any member of the House or Senate , for however long, gets a lifetime hall pass and is exempt from the laws they passed regarding their benefits.
A favorite of mine has been the concept of the Declaration as a blueprint, the Constitution as a foundation & framework and federal laws, rules & regulations along with lower levels of government as the materials that give substance and form to the structure erected upon the Constitution's base. The consequences of nailing multiple layers of shingles over each other or hanging multiple layers of wallboard but never removing the old stuff are illustrative of what happens when a regulatory regime simply piles on new requirements haphazardly.
I quite like the software requirements document / design document / code in that context as well. Though my knowledge in that arena is a bit dated I recall that there's a good bit of scholarship showing the rapid rise in the probability of failure to even complete a software project as the required number of lines of source code grows (probably true of most disciplines but the scholarship on software development is pretty black-and-white). We might look at a piece of legislation or the overall amount of laws, rules & regulations implemented by a government and conclude that at some point the entity itself becomes so large as to foreclose any possibility of success beyond what is experienced via mere chance.
#10
This whole discussion is frightening, necessary but still. Like many of the RB crowd I have spent a large portion of my life in shithole countries. The ONE lesson I have learned with all of them is how very fragile democracy is. What triggers failure in my feeble experiences, I'm being humble here but screaming, is two fold. First is the senario talked about with a leader that was elected wanting to retain power. The analogies below are great examples. Power grabs like that are just that, but.
The second and more sinister is the "We need to redo our Constitution because it is old and not relevent" crap. The Philippines is going through this right now, GMA is trying to create a constitutional crisis to stay in power. We all have issue with the constitution, it does need some work, and thats the trap. Who will do it? I tell you history is the teacher here and it is done by who ever is currently in power. We open the door on an overhaul and Pelosi, Reed, and Zero WILL rewrite it. Those that say anything against it will be outcast as part of the problem. It is then only a few steps to a kinetic environment. Zero is slick, he has a playbook, if anyone here thinks they will get a say in the overhaul of our political or constitutional life under Obama they are kidding themselves.
I don't care how screwed up our constitution is, right now, right here in time, in this nation we need to hold it with our lives, leave it alone with no change, defend every word in it, good or bad, it at all costs. Our very existance depends on it. Otherwise we will live Obama's vision of the constitution, brownshirts and all.
That document has lasted longer than any other in the course of history if anyone here thinks they can rewrite it better is a self induldging fool. A bit emotional, I know, but from the heart.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
07/08/2009 15:09 Comments ||
Top||
#11
in order to legally change the constitution congress would need to go through the constitutional process of amending it - not an easy thing to do, even w/the donk majority.
I love our constitution, I'm proud to take the oath periodically to defend it. It's just too bad that it's not always interpreted w/original intent nor does anyone hold congress and potus really accountable when they circumvent it. Other then term limits and a few loop holes (like the improper interpretation of anchor babys as American citizens) I'd leave it as is. It's not the constitution that's the problem, it's the people that don't honor their constitutional oaths and the ignorate electorate that keeps sending these hacks back to DC.
#13
PTAH - awesome. When your finished w/your work could I get a copy somehow?
Thanks, but It was merely an exercise to help me solidify my thinking.
I've been having similar discussions (in a round about way) on what is the line in the sand that gov't crosses in our country that gives the people the go ahead to remove elected officials forcefully. I'd hate to see it happen but I enjoy pontificating about it.
Ah, now that's precisely where Pan's comment (#10) fits in: BY DEFINITION, things done according to the constitution ARE LEGAL, while things done contrary to the Constitution ARE ILLEGAL. The situation in Honduras and what the Military did WERE LEGAL because they were done to Protect their constitution which was being violated. My concern would be the amendation of the Constitution a-la Venezuela's that turned it into something else that we would NOT support originally.
I should point out that the doctrine of Judicial Review essentially makes the Constitution THAT WHICH THE SUPREMES SAY IT IS. In a way, the Judges have effectively taken over how the Consitution is interpreted, and declared private interpretations as "illegal". Remember, "LEGAL" IS A RELATIVE TERM, and is based
Pan's concern is that disaster is sure to follow if we do not embrace the Constitution. The signers of the Declaration were very much aware of, and very much respected, such sentiments, but again I point out that the issue is not choosing between mob rule and a democratic constitutional republic, but a different question of "Which version and whose vision of the Constitution are we being told to embrace and obey without question?"
Pan's comments and that of the first two paragraphs of the Declaration contain part of the answer: the current trouble-cost [TC(now)]created by the current interpretation of the Constitution is compared against the trouble-cost created by changing it [TC(ch)]. As long as perceived TC(ch) is higher than perceived TC(now) (based on raising the value of TC(ch) (as pan is doing), or lowering TC(now) (as the MSM is doing now)) nobody in their right mind would change the present situation.
Broadhead6's concern is very much immediate: he wants to defend the Constitution, but I think his oath requires he defend the most recent version of it as amended and interpreted by the Supremes, not some private interpretation of an earlier version. Thus, the threat of Venezuelan-izing the Constitution so the honorable army is either rendered immobile, or legally used against true reformers.
#14
Remember, "LEGAL" IS A RELATIVE TERM, and is based
Urk, let me inish that sentence:Remember, "LEGAL" IS A RELATIVE TERM, and is based on what the Constitution says is permissible, while "ILLEGAL" is based on what the Constitution says is forbidden.
#16
If any of you bright and incredibly patriotic and cynically far-seeing people want something to go on, there is the "Contract with the Constitution" and the accompanying "instructions, citizens for the use of" that the SA Tea Party Committee developed over the last month or so. Think of it as the next step after a couple of really inspiring and fantastically morale-raising parties. This kind of effort will take it to another level.
It's not just enough to swap sarcastic comments on a blog - we have to focus on those we elect - either those in office already, or those who we will elect in the near future. (Feel free to download, and use - please, that's what we intended it for!) Gov. Perry of Texas, no matter what else you might think of him, came to our event and publicly signed off on it, so did Jeff Wentworth, and we will - have no doubt about that part - be using this on other elected officials, at every level. Sign, or face the wrath of engaged and furious citizens. The ambition of our chairman (a retired AF Captain named Robin Juhl) is to have politicians, or aspiring politicians, about wet their pants when they hear that someone from the Tea Party is waiting in the outer office to have a quiet word with them.
#17
Broadhead6, you can always find Ptah's thoughts, whether finished or inprocess at his blog. I go there irregularly, then gorge on everything he's done since my last visit... which always takes some time to digest. :-) Ptah is that very dangerous thing, an engineer-philosopher with strong writing skills.
#18
*blush* Thank you TW. I have not written at my Blog very little since march of last year because my writing has been almost exclusively devoted to writing essays at another website under my own name that explore the implications of a radically different way of looking at and living the Christian life using a form of analysis I've come to call theo-engineering. The results, though preliminary, have revolutionized my spiritual life and walk, and that of a co-researcher.
Much of what is objectionable in Political Islam and especially Talibanism is Sharia laws that attempt to enforce moral behavior from the outside because the religion supplies little to no hope of defeating lusts and temptations from within. I believe many Muslims support such a regime in the belief that some external control on personal behavior are better than none. My experiences indicates that there is a far superior way of suppressing the passions and lusts within that would strongly resonate with such people, and not just in that culture, to the point of wholesale abandonment of Islam in favor of a version of Christianity whose power would be daily demonstrated in the ease with which such passions are suppressed. We won't get the ones motivated by lust for power, but that is mostly in a leadership whose main lever of power within their subjects is the use of a religion that demands a righteousness that only obedience to the point of Jihad can attain.
Granted, such a massive exodus of people out of Islam and into Christianity would cause great heartburn among the MSM and liberal intelligensia, but you can't make omlettes unless you break the eggs.
The Golden State's political class comes unglued in the face of a citizens' revolt.
On May 19, California voters went to the polls to decide whether to pass a package of six tax-and-gimmick ballot propositions. Its supportersRepublican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Democratic legislative leaders, the California Teachers Association, and the overwhelming majority of the states major newspapersbilled it as the last best hope to plug Sacramentos $24 billion budget deficit. Either pass it, warned the Los Angeles Times editorial board, or risk fiscal disaster.
Those who believe that either money or the media determine political outcomes should pay close heed to what happened next: Although opponents were outspent by more than 7 to 1, they trounced the states political class, rejecting five of the six measures by an average of 30 percentage points. The only proposition to pass was an anger-driven new law that limits elected officials salaries.
Faced with such thorough repudiation, Californias best and brightest then did a telling thing. They lashed right back.
The Los Angeles Times headlined its morning-after news analysis, California Voters Exercise Their Powerand Thats the Problem. Sacramento columnist George Skelton argued that voters helped get themselves into this fix by passing feel-good ballot box budgeting initiatives and sanctioning heavy borrowing for infrastructure projects. Business columnist Michael Hiltzik averred that far more blame for the deficit belongs to California voters because year in, year out, they enact spending mandates at the polls, often without endowing a revenue source. Missing from any of these critiques was the fact that the Times own editorial board endorsed more than 90 percent of the very same ballot-box bond measures during the last decade. No matter: A perpetrator had been located.
Good morning, California voters, The Sacramento Bees post-election editorial began. Do you feel better, now that youve gotten that out of your system? The Bee, which (like the Times) had endorsed four of the five losing measures, came under immediate attack for its heavy-handed, citizen-blaming sarcasm. (A sample: So, now that youve put those irksome politicians in their place, maybe its time to think about this: Since youre in charge, exactly what do you intend to do about that pesky $25 billion hole in the budget?) Rush Limbaugh gleefully read passages on his show, San Diego Union-Tribune editorial writer Chris Reed called it staggeringly juvenile, arrogant and revealing, and commenters on the Bees website were full of reactions like, What an obnoxious editorial. Nevertheless, it illustrates that the Bee is completely in favor of bigger government and higher taxes.
Then another funny thing happened: The Bee scrubbed the editorial off its website, replacing it with a much more conciliatory piece, addressed this time to legislators. The original editorial had been posted in error, the paper explained, and the new piece was the one that appeared in the print edition. That [first] article was a draft prepared for internal discussion among members of The Bees editorial board, a brief note said. Such discussions are a routine part of our work, and frequently lead to editorials that are considerably different from writers first drafts.
This instant airbrushing, normally fodder for such journalism-tracking websites as Jim Romeneskos Media News, went virtually ignored by all but a few mostly right-leaning websites. So did another colossal gaffe, by the aforementioned Los Angeles Times columnist Michael Hiltzik, who thundered that the very notion California had a spending problem was an infectious myth.
Hiltzik claimed that the state governments budget growth had kept pace almost to the penny with growth in population and inflation during the last decade. There were three problems with this analysis: Hiltzik miscalculated population growth (claiming 30 percent instead of 14 percent), he chose a federal inflation rate of 50 percent during that period instead of the California Consumer Price Index figure of 35 percent, and, most important, he excluded from state spending more than $100 billion in bond measures. This whopper was roasted and dissected on local talk radio, but it was unmentioned by more august repositories of public policy and journalism debate, such as the Times-tracking LA Observed.
Rarely has the chasm between elite political discourse and grubby popular opinion been displayed in such sharp relief. The implications of this citizen revoltand the hostile reactions to itstretch far beyond Nevadas western border. California is the Ghost of Federal Government Future.
During the last two decades, the Golden State has been transformed from what was once known as the nations most anti-labor outpost to a state essentially run by public-sector unions. Nearly three in five publicsector workers are unionized, compared to less than two in five public employees in other states. The Democratic Party, which is fully in hock to unions, has controlled the legislature and most statewide posts, with the notable exception of the governors mansion, for more than a decade. That means more government workers, higher salaries, and drastically higher pension costs.
According to Adam Summersa policy analyst at the Reason Foundation, the nonprofit that publishes this magazinethe states annual pension fund contribution vaulted from $321 million in 200001 to $7.3 billion last year. According to public databases, more than 5,000 people are drawing pensions in excess of $100,000 from the state of California each year.
So pervasive is the union influence that big labor doesnt even try to defend its deleterious effects on Californias finances. Just before the special election, a member of the Los Angeles Times editorial board asked Service Employees International Union chief Andy Stern to respond to charges that unions are the 21st-century equivalent of the railroads that were once all-powerful in California. Stern verbally shrugged: I think democracy is an ugly thing at times.
That ugliness has made the California budget, like those in most of the other 49 states, less efficient and more bloated. Government spending, unlike spending in the private economy, is a zero-sum gameespecially on the state level, since governors cant print money. Every dollar spent gilding a pension is a dollar not spent funding an orphanage. Naturally, the same elite outlets that were busy blaming voters after the election spent even more time detailing the horrors of the annihilating cuts, as the Los Angeles Times called them in a news article, that were coming down the pike. (In early June, the paper invited readers to be shocked that a high school with 3,200 students would have to make do with just three guidance counselors.) Bloated pension costs and the increasingly inefficient provision of state services received a fraction of the coverage.
The federal government is now run by a president and Congress more responsive to union concerns than any in at least two decades. The same bloat currently bogging down statehouses and city halls is being duplicated in boomtown Washington, D.C. President Barack Obama even brought Andy Stern in to help warn Schwarzenegger that federal stimulus money would not be disbursed to California unless the governor rescinded some proposed state job cuts. Though that threat was later withdrawn, Schwarzenegger at press time was pushing for a measly work force reduction of 2 percent.
But theres another interpretation of Californias rebellion, one with far sunnier implications for those of us who prefer our governments constrained. Faced with a political class that ignored bureaucratic inefficiency, that demanded higher taxes, that filled the newspapers with scare stories about people who will literally die as a result of budget cuts, the citizens of one of the bluest states in the nation collectively said we just dont believe you anymore. If even Californias famous fruits and nuts can call the statists bluff, there may be hope for the rest of the country.
Diplomatic hot spots are popping up everywhere, in spite of President Obama's "adopt an evil-doer" doctrine. We have real-live crises in Honduras, North Korea and Iran; things are dicey in Afghanistan, China is ever problematic and Mexico is a mess. Not to worry: the administration is on top of things. Joe Biden is trying to make Iraq's leaders play nice in their sandbox, President Obama is becoming the Russians' new BFF, Richard Holbrooke has been meeting with G8 foreign ministers in Trieste, and George Mitchell convened recently with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's last gig was...installing Jose Villarreal as the Commissioner for the 2010 Shanghai World Expo? Boy, has she been had.
Is a fractured elbow keeping Hillary out of the limelight, or are there more sinister forces at work? Could her virtual disappearance have anything to do with sky-high approval ratings -- ratings suggesting that Americans might favor Clinton over Obama in future scuffles?
Barack Obama, who campaigned as new to the whole partisan, "inside the Beltway" world of politics, is a fast learner. His cunning elimination of Hillary Clinton as a political threat will be a case study someday in the Handbook of Power Politics. Tapping her to be part of his administration was of course brilliant; she can't snipe from the sidelines, and she, moreover, will carry the president's baggage, at least in the realm of foreign policy. Placing in front of her several showy envoys to cover the big tasks was clever too. But recently, Obama has dug the hole even deeper.
Not only has Clinton been off center stage, some of her most visible moments of late have spotlighted her carrying out the world's most thankless assignment -- criticizing Israel. First she lectured our allies about treating Palestinians poorly and then she ramped up the pressure about its disputed settlements. Not one to mince words, she translated President Obama's gentle reproof into a harsh ultimatum, insisting he meant "not some settlements, not outposts, not 'natural growth' exceptions" -- in short NO settlements.
Think about delegating a New York State politician to chastise Israel and its leaders. Short of sending toddlers to undermine the siege of Moscow, it's hard to come up with a more daunting mission. If she continues as the heavy in this new relationship with Israel, Hillary Clinton can kiss goodbye to any future ambitions that rely on her raising money in the Jewish community -- or that is, almost any ambitions at all. Overcoming initial hostility due to her memorable smooching with the wife of Yassir Arafat, Clinton worked hard to woo the well-heeled Jewish vote. She succeeded. In the primaries, according to CBS News, she garnered 54% of the Jewish vote, compared to only 43% for Barack Obama. (Of course, it may have been the "Hussein" that threw Jewish voters off.) For President Obama, separating Hillary Clinton from the nipple of Jewish generosity is an insurance policy.
Why would Obama need to undermine Hillary Clinton? For starters, the public is beginning to warm to our Secretary of State as never before. In May, her polling topped Obama's. Clinton had a 71% approval rating, compared to 65% for the president. That's the kind of comparison that could furrow a brow or two.
Moreover, it is entirely conceivable that our ambitious young president could run into trouble. He has undertaken one gigantic initiative after another, potentially undermining the economic recovery. As investors have assessed soaring budget deficits, they have demanded higher returns on Treasuries. Rising interest rates have eliminated one powerful balm for consumers -- mortgage refinancing. Higher taxes are inevitable, and will further pressure any rebound in spending. Unemployment numbers are dreadful, businesses are apprehensive, unions are demanding payback for their support and our trading partners are grumpy about rising protectionism. It's not a pretty picture.
Though Obama has tried to make Congress the fallguy should healthcare prove disastrous or cap-and-trade disruptive, Americans are not so dumb. They know where this whirlwind of change is coming from, and they are increasingly uneasy. Should our Afghanistan adventures prove as punishing for our GIs as they have for every other power enticed into that miserable landscape, should GM come back to the people's feeding trough, should Chavez et al continue to make the president look foolish, Americans may seek relief -- and they may spell it HILLARY.
The Middle East is a hard place for idealists, especially for the Western liberal variety. My feelings of optimism for the region have been ground down over time like rocks under slow-moving glacial ice.
Last time I visited Israel, at the end of the Gaza war this past January, I met Palestinian journalist Khaled Abu Toameh. He sounded no less despondent than the Israelis I spoke to. "Listen," he said. "We must stop dreaming about the New Middle East and coexistence and harmony and turning this area into Hong Kong and Singapore...I don't see a real peace emerging over here. We should stop talking about it."
That's what I hear from almost everyone I speak to over there now, whether they're Muslims, Christians, Jews, or whatever. Arabs, Israelis, Kurds -- most seem to have a dim view of the future. Optimists, for the most part, parachute in for a brief time and leave. I hate it. It depresses me. But that's how it is.
Some writers and analysts are slightly less gloomy, and I frequently ask them to cheer me up and hope their relative optimism isn't fantasy. Jeffrey Goldberg's work at The Atlantic occasionally qualifies as less pessimistic than mine. His outstanding book Prisoners strikes just the right balance between world-weary pessimism and hope. He's an American Jew weaned on Socialist Zionism who became an idealistic Israeli as a young adult. He sought out friendships with individual Palestinians with whom he could forge his own separate peace, if for no other reason than to prove to himself that peace was possible. It was much harder than he expected. But he managed, with some difficultly, when he worked as an IDF prison guard at Ketziot during the first intifada to kindle a rocky but enduring friendship with his prisoner Rafiq Hijazi.
I spoke with him a few weeks ago in Washington D.C.
Go to the link to read the interview. Interesting stuff, although much is the same as its been since Zionism began. Little details pop out though, like Mr. Goldberg's comment, "Jews are floating around in the Persian Gulf with nuclear weapons in German subs that are aimed at the new Hitler. If you step away from your personal feelings about it, it's just fascinating." They also mention Israeli nuke-armed subs in the Mediterranean, which is interesting to know... and should give pause to any anti-Zionists who happened to poke their heads into Rantburg today.
#1
I read this yesterday. Great interview. He makes the point that the Paleos take a very long view ("sacrificing generations"). Peace isn't something that can be imposed; both parties have to want it. And that isn't the case now and likely won't be for a long time. Irresistible force, meet immovable object.
The U.S. invasion and liberation of Iraq from the regime of Saddam Hussein may have been one of the important forces behind the uprising of Iranian citizens after their failed elections, according to British pundit Christopher Hitchens.
Hitchens, a liberal who nonetheless was one of the strongest supporters of the war in Iraq, wrote in the online magazine Slate that reformist forces in Iran have been studying the rebirth of Iraq since the invasion. They even refer to it as a liberation, a term not commonly used among political forces in the Arab world.
But Persian Shiite clerics have been vocal in their denunciations of the regime headed by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei for years a fact not often discussed in the mainstream media. One of the leaders of this group, though a junior cleric, is Sayeed Khomeini, the grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini, the radical founder of the Islamic Republic. Khomeini, as well as former Iranian President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, have developed an important relationship with Iraqi religious leader Ayatollah Ali Husaini Sistani, a long-standing opponent of the Khamenei regime.
Certainly when I interviewed Sayeed Khomeini in Qum some years ago, where he spoke openly about "the liberation of Iraq," he seemed to hope and believe that the example would spread, Hitchens writes. One swallow does not make a summer. But consider this: Many Iranians go as religious pilgrims to the holy sites of Najaf and Kerbala in southern Iraq. They have seen the way in which national and local elections have been held, more or less fairly and openly, with different Iraqi Shiite parties having to bid for votes (and with those parties aligned with Iran's regime doing less and less well). They have seen an often turbulent Iraqi Parliament holding genuine debates that are reported with reasonable fairness in the Iraqi media.
Meanwhile, Hitchens adds, Iranians have seen their own leaders treat citizens as children and put on a let's pretend election.
Iranians by no means likely to take their tune from Arabsperhaps least of all from Iraqisbut watching something like the real thing next door may well have increased the appetite for the genuine article in Iran itself.
#1
If the official narrative was correct, Obama would have emulated George Herbert Walker Bush, by encouraging a revolt and then not supporting it; neither militarily or even only rhetorically.
[Jerusalem Post Middle East] Monday's news that Saudi Arabia will appoint an ambassador to Syria signifies a gradual effort by the western world and moderate Arab nations to extract Syria away from the "Shi'ite Axis of Evil" and to strengthen relations with the West under the aegis of the American administration.
Reports of the appointment come amidst the backdrop of the Syrian-Saudi-Lebanese summit, set to convene in Damascus next week, and US President Barack Obama's announcement that the US will also appoint an ambassador to Syria.
The Saudi ambassador appointment and the combined effort of the United States and other western nations to foster better relations with Syria stem from a legitimate Iranian threat to the region's interests and oil resources. A nuclear Iran has the capability not only to threaten Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern nations with war, but also to demand oil concessions in the hope of dominating the Middle Eastern market.
The Americans hope that their push for better relations with Syria will force the Syrian government to better patrol the Iraqi border and stop the infiltration of foreign fighters into Iraq. In addition, the Americans are likely to demand that Syria reject North Korean military aid. In exchange, it is possible that the United States will replace North Korea as the major arms provider to Syria, similar to the Americans' replacement of Soviet aid in Egypt.
Iran's inexorable isolation from the world and its disputed nuclear program threaten to isolate the much more moderate Syrian regime. If Syria chooses to sever its relations with Iran and Hizbullah, new doors may open up for a possible détente with the West and Israel, including the return of the Golan Heights. In the event of a Syrian-Western alliance, Syria could receive economic-military aid from the Arab Gulf States and the United States.
Despite the opposition of the Israeli public to returning the Golan, the political establishment is willing to do such in an agreement that would pass muster with the Israeli public. This would include a major change in Syria's relationship with Iran, and a cessation of Syrian support to Hizbullah.
In fact, most Israeli prime ministers, with the exception of Ariel Sharon, have had no major objections to relinquishing the Golan Heights, captured from Syria in the 1967 Six Day War, which was never part of the "Greater Israel" vision. Moreover, Israel would find it much easier to have a satisfied Syria manage a Palestinian peace agreement, rather than deal directly with Hamas or Fatah.
Syria's relationship with Iran is becoming increasingly onerous and while Syrian President Bashar Assad wants to maintain his Iranian ties, he cannot afford to play both cards. In the event that Israel attacks Iran or vice versa, Syria would be drawn into a regional war, from which it would have nothing to gain. A conventional army like Syria's, unlike the forces of Hamas or the insurgency in Iraq, would lose in a military conflict with Israel or the West.
In the case of a future Syrian-Western alliance, Iran and Hizbullah will be more isolated than they currently find themselves. Hizbullah would lose a major economic and military supporter, and Iran would lose more ground to the Sunni Arab alliance. While this may push Hizbullah further into the Lebanese political arena, the group may also turn to terrorist action against their former sponsors.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/08/2009 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[14 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
#1
Left With Iran Pakistan and North Korea then!
Still dont trust any Arab nation as they are taught to hate the West by their religious guys!
#2
Sounds like the Axis of Evil may be morphing from a tricycle into a Segway.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
07/08/2009 11:47 Comments ||
Top||
#3
I've been working wwith computers too long, the script above assad's hed looks to me as if it reads Illegal DLL
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
07/08/2009 16:52 Comments ||
Top||
#4
OMG Redneck Jim, you're right! I'm not sure what that means, exactly, except that someone's computer is about to crash. (Please don't explain further -- computer stuff gives me headaches.)
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
On May 19, California voters went to the polls to decide whether to pass a package of six tax-and-gimmick ballot propositions. Its supportersRepublican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Democratic legislative leaders, the California Teachers Association, and the overwhelming majority of the states major newspapersbilled it as the last best hope to plug Sacramentos $24 billion budget deficit. Either pass it, warned the Los Angeles Times editorial board, or risk fiscal disaster.
Diplomatic hot spots are popping up everywhere, in spite of President Obama's "adopt an evil-doer" doctrine. We have real-live crises in Honduras, North Korea and Iran; things are dicey in Afghanistan, China is ever problematic and Mexico is a mess. Not to worry: the administration is on top of things. Joe Biden is trying to make Iraq's leaders play nice in their sandbox, President Obama is becoming the Russians' new BFF, Richard Holbrooke has been meeting with G8 foreign ministers in Trieste, and George Mitchell convened recently with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's last gig was...installing Jose Villarreal as the Commissioner for the 2010 Shanghai World Expo? Boy, has she been had.
[Jerusalem Post Middle East] Monday's news that Saudi Arabia will appoint an ambassador to Syria signifies a gradual effort by the western world and moderate Arab nations to extract Syria away from the "Shi'ite Axis of Evil" and to strengthen relations with the West under the aegis of the American administration.
