Before you roll your eyes, read this:
The answers, which aren’t as simple as yes or no, explain what can happen when the United States tries to use democracy as a way to reform the world. The promotion, packaging and exportation of democracy is now America’s foreign policy, more so than at any other time in U.S. history. Its most visible example is Iraq — but that’s the extreme version.
More typical of what is going on every day, in every part of the world, continuously and invisibly, can be found in the details of what happened to an unknown program in Yemen, and to a cast of characters stretching from Washington to one of the world’s most troubled and mysterious countries, all with differing definitions of what democracy means.
***Democracy as commodity: In such a calculation, Operation Iraqi Freedom is one part of Bush’s foreign policy; Yemen: Tribal Conflict Mitigation Program is another, along with hundreds of other programs funded under the Bush administration, such as Promoting Democracy Through Community Radio in Congo, $35,000; Supporting the Electoral Process in Mongolia, $109,725; and Increasing the Transparency and Accountability of Governmental Institutions in Moldova, $36,386.
In total, the United States will spend at least $1 billion this year on these programs. An exact figure is difficult to know because democracy promotion has evolved from a theory into an industry that sprawls all over Washington, encompassing the State Department, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the National Endowment for Democracy and dozens of for-profits and nonprofits around Washington that live and die on government contracts and grants. USAID, which allocates the most money for democracy promotion by far, says it will spend at least $1.2 billion, which it spent in 2004. A State Department spokesman declined to give a figure, saying, “The problem is, it falls into so many categories it’s difficult to tease out.”
The one thing that everyone agrees on is that since Sept. 11, 2001, the amount of money the Bush administration is steering to promote democracy in Islamic countries of the Middle East has increased dramatically, even at the expense of other regions of the world. To help in this, there is a new office in the State Department called the Middle East Partnership Initiative, overseen by a deputy assistant secretary of state named J. Scott Carpenter, who candidly acknowledges, “We don’t know yet how best to promote democracy in the Arab Middle East. I mean we just don’t know. It’s the early days.” But that’s no reason not to try, he says, especially in such urgent times. His approach: “I think there are times when you throw spaghetti against the wall and see if it sticks.”
Read the whole thing and tell me what your take is- I am of the belief that this is the sort of thing we should be actively supporting, and a billion dollars for seed corn, which is what this is, really, is a very wise investment.
DougJ
And who better to learn democracy from than the Bush administration?
John Cole
Thanks, Doug. Any chance of reasonable commentary is now queered, as Slide and the haters will take over the thread with yet another round of pointless Bush-bashing.
Tell me, Doug- Is it more important what you snark, or that you are the first commenter when you queer a thread?
Pb
Here’s another example for you.
John Cole, don’t be mad at DougJ for having a valid point. :(
DougJisAll
Dougj, or should I say PB, stop being your own cheerleader.
Mark
I worry that the version of democracy we export will be US-style capitalism with our usual problems (rich/poor divide, no health care for the poor, privatization of natural resources, etc).
I would prefer if the US allowed countries find their own style democracy – with our help – rather than impose our brand on everyone.
Pb
DougJisAll,
Judging from your handle, it seems to me that your comment is just further self-masturbatory tripe. Then again, you should already know that. And I should too. Right?
Oh, I’m so confused.
Pb
Mark,
We’re happy to let people impose any sort of Democracy they want… just so long as it doesn’t involve any system, group, country or corporation that we really don’t like, or exclude any group, country, or corporation that we really do like.
Steve S
Before you can have democracy, you have to have Capitalism. I think it’s nearly impossible to promote Capitalism in a country where the only economy is one derived from oil. The problem is, the govt get’s a bunch of cash because of the oil, and then they hand this cash out to the people.
What incentive is there for the people to complain to the govt and demand change? Other than demanding more money.
We have microcosms of this here in the US. Alaska for instance. This is why the only thing Alaska’s congressional delegation does is demand more money from the fed treasury. That’s what they are used to, from a state where the state govt is entirely funded by oil and receives so much money they send out checks to everybody once a year.
Compare this with China, or Russia as an example. These countries are growing capitalism… and as a result, the people are demanding more from their govt. The threat of SARS hit China, and what became their first concern? How this was going to effect foreign trade. Suddenly they take it seriously, the health ministers who incompetently handled it are fired. That would never have happend without capitlism.
ppGaz
You are wearing your tin ear today, John.
There isn’t going to be “reasonable commentary” on this subject, because it isn’t a reasonable proposition that this corrupt and arrogant bunch are going to get a pass for paying lip service to something that, on paper, looks noble.
Why not ask whether Richard Nixon should be remembered for some of the good things he did? Isn’t that reasonable? Or is it just insane revisionism?
Today, in this time, we are going to have a debate on whether freedom and democracy are on the march thanks to these disgusting potatoheads?
Thanks a lot, it’s like a fucking
ChristmasXmas present.Zifnab
Under any other administration, I’d look at this article and wonder exactly how effective each of these programs have been. Is a radio broadcast in the Congo the most efficent means of building a grassroots democracy movement? Should we be working with a top down Federalist strategy in these regions, or would a ground up Assembly based local government system better set the foundations for fledgeling third-world countries to emerge from dictatorships? Is democracy even the best choice for such countries as Jordan, where a monarchy seems to have provided a great deal of stability?
These are questions for a sane and reasonable administration. But after reading this article, the first and biggest question that appears in my mind is “Who is getting paid off now?” Is that $35,000 in the Congo some means of paying of Clearchannel or Rupert Murdock? Which oil company is profittering off of increased ‘Transparency’ in Moldova? Seriously, after five years of lies, smears, and scandals, nothing this administration touches looks clean. Not after FEMA, not after Iraq, not after the NSA tapping my phonelines without a warrant.
Everything looks dirty.
DougJ
John, I was trying to make a valid point. What’s strange is that the only times you’ve ever complained about my snark is when I was trying to make a valid point.
To be serious for a minute: don’t you see the irony in brining this up two days after we learned about the no-court order wiretap story?
DougJ
All right, I’ll leave you to have a serious discussion of whether or not freedom is on the march.
John Cole
DougJ- First, I think it is far from settled the WH did anything illegal or contra the Constitution, which is why I don’t have the vapors, yet.
Second, you de facto assume that these programs do no good, because this administration, in your view, does not like democracy.
Finally, how the hell am I supposed to take the assertion that the autocrats in the Middle East and elsewhere can’t somehow learn something from the United States and beneift from Democratic reforms, even with Bushhitler in charge, as anything other than snark.
Or do you want to go on record that we are worse than the countries these programs are targetting?
John Cole
Like I said. You were not being serious. You were threadjacking.
ppGaz
Wow, I have seen damning with faint praise before, but that takes the cake.
No offense, John, but that’s a little extreme and presumptuous, isn’t it? Unless we are now going to have “managed” threads like some blogs do?
Hey, it’s your space, do as you see fit, and we love you, man, and all that …. but this is not your best work.
Zifnab
It’s not whether this administration “likes” Democracy. The elections of ’02 and ’04 served this administration just fine, after all. But honestly, John, “illegal” might still be in the mist for the Bush wiretaps, but how about “unethical” or at least “morally questionable”? We didn’t suffer under nearly as many of these “morally questionable” actions under Bush Sr. or Clinton, and even Reagen’s worst ethical violations just don’t match up to current Bush administration policy.
It’s a legitamite concern. You didn’t buy the bullshit about the Soviets spreading peace and prosperity through Communism fifty years ago, did you? Why on earth would you believe that Bush is somehow making the world a better place through his push for Democracy abroad, when he’s got such a bad track record even at home?
ppGaz
Will we now be treated to the RightyBlog tradition of claiming that you just said Bush is Stalin?
C’mon, righties. Who wants to go first?
skip
“a billion dollars for seed corn, which is what this is, really, is a very wise investment.”
Do you really expect a billion dollars spread so thin to atone for the multiple billions we give to a regime seen oppressing the Palestinians on a daily basis? Reminder: the rest of the world sees things on TV that we do not.
searp
This PEACEFUL export of our ideas has been an ongoing bipartisan activity since the beginning of the Cold War. We have tried, in our imperfect way, to do this for my entire lifetime.
I am proud of it. I don’t see why it shouldn’t command the support of all Americans, just as it has for the last 60 years.
To inject a sour note, I don’t see why this administration seems to think that it invented the idea. It didn’t. VOA, support to labor unions, press freedoms, diplomatic efforts, etc have all contributed over the years. To the extent the current administration has re-emphasized this PEACEFUL activity, I applaud it.
KevmanOH
Well, I’ll be far kinder than fellow liberals here. The IDEA you cite is a good one, a very liberal one methinks. Whether the current bunch has an effing clue (see Karen Hughes) how to EFFECTIVELY do it is another matter altogether.
KevmanOH
^What searp said too.
DougJ
You’re better than that. That’s halfway to telling me that I shouldn’t complain about Bush because he’s better than Saddam.
John, let me put it do you this way: if you knew of a doctor who was stripped of his license by the medical board for repeated malpractice, and you learned that he was goint to Papua New Guinea to teach the people there about western medicine, would you argue that at he least he knew a lot more about medicine than the witch doctors they were using now? I don’t think you would.
DougJ
Denial isn’t just the name of Demi Moore’s new baby.
Al Maviva
At the risk of being serious and blowing a good snark attack completely into proportion, it’s often called “Track II” or “Track III” diplomacy, stuff that occurs below the radar of nation-to-nation contract, involving municipality-to-municipality or private citizen-to-private citizen contacts, often aimed specifically at a goal other than achieving peace, but aimed at strategic target of moving a peace or development process along. It is a pretty common approach for furthering particular policy ends, and has been used by the last two Administrations in a couple specific instances I’m aware of. The couple people I know who have worked in this area at the NGO level seemed to think at the time that it can achieve good results by preparing a population to accept positive change – for instance the relative peace in Kashmir has been foregrounded in part by quiet Track III diplomatic efforts ranging back to the early 90’s. Local political developments help, but if you are trying to grow and olive tree it helps to have fertile soil. It’s not clear to me whether this is a liberal idea, or a small-c conservative idea that looks at society as a fabric with a lot of little threads.
DougJ
Al, use paragraph breaks.
Cyrus
I agree with zifnab here. Don’t get me wrong, I think this story is good news and these events and programs will probably do more good than harm. Because even if BushCo does screw things up, they’re getting the ball rolling or giving a shove to something that already was rolling.
But they didn’t do anything like this in Iraq until after the insurgency was in full swing, so I can’t imagine taking this as representative of their policy or philosophy or even just their goals. Whatever good they accomplish will be entirely by accident or desperation. You don’t give someone credit for working just hard enough to not get fired, it’s the expected minimum.
DougJ
In the spirit of Chritmas, Al, I decided to read your comment. It was interesting. You’re right — it isn’t clear whether this is a “liberal” or “conservative” idea.
Emma Zahn
As other posters have commented, why is this considered a new thing? Which early 19th century poet was it that described the American Revolution as a “shot heard round the world”?
The idea of democracy doesn’t really need to be sold to most people. What those who don’t live in a democracy need is a some way to attain and then keep it. That requires empowering ordinary people through economies and education. It’s not simply a matter of being able to vote.
–Emma
my cat
I will join the chorus of people who approve of this sort of thing. It has been one thread of our foreign policy for at least fifty years.
Capitalism is not a prerequisite of democracy. That’s a myth from the the Cold War days or earlier, based on the mistaken assumption that there are only two kinds of economies, capitalism (good, Christian and us) and communism(evil, atheist and them). Most economies, including ours, are a mix and the economies of most democracies, including ours, are a mix of limited capitalism and socialism (which is not the same thing as communism). When people have the power to vote they reject pure capitalist economies and insist on socialist modifications.
I don’t know why people try to make a religion out of economic theory. I hope the democracy seed corn efforts under this administration are not linkd to the Religion of Money Worship because, if they are, they will fail.
p.lukasiak
DougJ- First, I think it is far from settled the WH did anything illegal or contra the Constitution, which is why I don’t have the vapors, yet.
let me guess… you still haven’t figured out that the “analysis” of FISA that is rapidly making the rounds of the right wing noise machine deliberately misquoted the statute…
right?
Christ, why don’t you just go all Monica over Bush, and save the blue sweatshirt he stains for you.
Perry Como
I believe making Democracy a new cottage industry is a brilliant step for the US. Since we have pretty much eliminated our manufacturing base, we can revitalize the rust belt and other industrial areas with Democracy factories. Through the judicious use of Federal grants, we can create incentives for companies to streamline the Democratizing process, and export Democracy to help balance our $700 billion trade deficit.
ppGaz
Now THAT’S comment moderation!
Jon H
Don’t forget the White House’s fundamentalist outreach policies, where it refuses to countenance any international aid program which offends the Dobsons, no matter how much good it would do.
That’s the other side of the coin, John.
Jon H
Bush teaching the world about Democracy is like China teaching the world about free markets.
srv
Sorry, but I have to assume someone like Elliot Abrams is pulling the strings behind this ‘Democracy’ project.
p.lukasiak
Sorry, but I have to assume someone like Elliot Abrams is pulling the strings behind this ‘Democracy’ project.
it depends upon which Democracy project you are referring to. The one described in the article is a genuine effort aimed at promoting Democracy. Not surprisingly, it appears that the Bush embassey attempted to undermine its effectiveness….
Krista
Honestly, I don’t think that any fledgling democracy will wind up being a carbon copy of the Bush administration. Every country has to find their own way, keeping the history and needs of their own people in mind. I mean, hell, the US isn’t even a full democracy — it’s a republic, isn’t it? Things will adapt and change over the next 20 years.
S.W. Anderson
In other times and circumstances, sure. Trouble is, the well is poisoned now and will be for some time. One lesson of history is that leading military-industrial powers that throw their weight around trigger the formation of opposing coalitions. And beyond that, a larger community of not-kindly-disposed nations forms.
Whether the Major Power’s alleged motive is lebensraum, establishing a new world order, building socialist brotherhood or spreading democracy, people in smaller, weaker, poorer countries don’t like being targeted for some outsiders’ reforms. To have a good chance at surviving and thriving, any campaign to democratize must develop first within a society, as the result of coveting what others enjoy and benefit from.
There’s plenty of reason to believe what we’re doing in Iraq and elsewhere in the Mideast is more like trying to nail jelly to a tree.
RTO Trainer
I don’t get it:
The consistent charge is that we are forcing round pegs into square holes; making nations and cultures that are dissimilar to our own into vague mirror images of our own.
Where does this come from? How does this idea persist? Has anyone here tried a side by side reading fo our Consitution and that of either Afghanistan or Iraq?
Whether you look at the formulation of the Legislative, Executive or Judicial branches, what substantial similarities exist? Has anyone here tried a campare/contrast of the individual rights enumerated in those countries with our Bill of Rights?
How about just comparing Iraq to Afghaistan? Any cursory yet honest comparison will reveal a host of differences; differences that reflect cultureal and religious differences in those nations, and so show that we aren’t simply travelling about with a pre-fab “muslim Democracy solution” as well.
Perhaps you sill disagree? Fine. I’d like to see anyone defend that proposition.
RTO Trainer
Then you should find it easy to cite a few….
srv
Well, you are right. But maybe you can tell us where the current administration has gone to great lengths to point this all out to us. You know, for example, how women in Afghanistan were going to be ‘liberated’. No chance that feminists in the west would get confused about exactly what that meant?
If there really is a program intended to use political and economic sticks to push reform, then I’d be all for it, and would not have unrealistic expectations. But try listening to GW’s 2nd SOTU speech again.
Actually, I’ve always thought the rest of the world would become more ‘democratic’ while the US would become less so. I think we have way less chance of removing our ‘democratically’ elected oligarchic powers (the two-party system) than the Iranians have removing theirs.
I promise, 30 years from now, the US will be called a democracy. And there won’t be any paper ballots.
ppGaz
And why not? Some people try to call Egypt a “democracy.”
RTO Trainer
I don’t require being spoonfed this information. Maybe it’s easier for me having been over there and seen the burgeoning, but I still had to go looking for the documents and read them for myself.
Add to this that there are those of you reading this that wouldn’t beleive the President if he told you the sky was blue….
Interesting definition of democracy that requires paper ballots.
RSA
Great article. But perhaps someone can help me with this part:
Is the “single-spaced” part pure irony? I mean, I routinely write funding proposals for that amount of money in 15 single-spaced pages (NSF page limits.) I can see Madrid saying that the program itself was too ambitious, given the resources, though.
RTO Trainer
Left out a point: The liberation of women in Afghanistan.
What do you require, and who’s trying to impose our ideas on that culture now?
Girls AND boys are educated in Afghanistan today. Women hold jobs. Women are police officers. Women are military members. Do some women still wear the burqah? Yes. That remains the choice of the male head of a household. But in downtown Kabul, you will see a womean in a burqah standing next to a woman in bluejean shorts, t-shirt and strappy sandals waiting for the light to change at the corner. No one accosts either of them. I got to see this change–when my unit arrived in Kabul in 2002, all wore burqahs and children weren’t on the streets. When we left the scene above was common and every day traffic snarls were caused by the huge crowds of children walking to school or home again.
I expect even more dramatic changes when I arrive back there next year.
srv
Well, you’re right again, but realistically, what percentage of the population do you (and I) as constitution readers represent? I have no desire to criticize other countries constitutions or voting, but the vast majority of Americans view these efforts through the administrations and MSM colorations.
And when the spin doesn’t end up matching their expectations, is it just their fault?
True enough also. My response would be that this isn’t just about winning the hearts and minds over there, it’s about winning them over here also. And we’ve been disappointed enough that many of us don’t care whether it’s because of incompetence or deliberate lies (or both).
Perhaps you missed the thread on BBV. I submit that it is a much better definition than whatever a Diebold AccuVote-TSX tells us it is.
I guess Laura Bush? She was the one running around talking about Afghan womens liberation…
If it’s what they want, and it works for them, I hope so. Do you think it will spread outside of Kabul?
Jane
Hi since you’re talking about *Yemen* I thought Id chime in here with a few stats, John: the tribal regions have little to no electricty, 85% do not have access to clean water, or health care (there’s 2 doctors for every 10,000 yemenis and inthe rural areas the infant mortality rate is 8%),and the educationsl systems are in a shambles. This article says the school is a blanket.
Meanwhile the 2006 budget cuts the electrity allocation by 60% and increases the military by 50%. Every top military and security positon is filled by a close relative of the president. The central government is over run with corruption and nepotism and is actively opposing transparency and accountability. The elites are the ones running the guns and drugs and smuggling large quanties of diesel.
The democratic reform movement, which is quite strong, is actively targeted and repressed as are Yemeni journalists which this year have faced a barrage of arrests, kidnapping, beatings, paper closures, and kidnappings.
RTO Trainer
Whose fault? THe MSM? The non-Constiotution reading public? In both cases, resoundingly, YES!
You presume facts not in evidence. You’ve been disappointed because the picture presented to you is of lies and/or incompentence and it is wrong. In many cases willfully so.
As an IT professional, I reject at least 70% of the stories about electronic voting floating about as garbage. Sure there are vulnerabilites. If you want the data to be witable aond/or readable, there simly will be. I also know alot of the safeguards in place to prevent potential exploitation.
If Laura Bush is disappointed, she hasn’t said so that I know of.
Which was my point. It will, by nature, be what they want and what works for them.
(I guess it’s my fault for mentioning where I was to see such things.) Yes, of course. It already has, long ago. The idea that Kabul is some island of security in a seething Afghanistan is another false portrayal by our fearless unbiased mainstream media.
srv
So I assume you gave prior administrations the same kind of pass on perceptions.
I guess I missed the report where they found the WMDs. Or that Atta was actually in Prague. Or mobile WMD trucks. Or the detailed plan for the occupation. Funny, the Marine Col. I met last week mentioned he didn’t get that same plan when he became defacto mayor a Karballah.
It’s just my blinders. The MSM has me in their clutches.
I’d reject more, but a handful of counties can swing a vote in todays world. Being in IT development, I just want an auditable paper trail. Alas, the last few years have made it clear that isn’t going to happen without a federal mandate. Which isn’t going to happen.
RTO Trainer
Why wouldn’t I?
Why would you get a detailed plan for occupation? I wouldn’t. I can easily imagine that a Marine COL would not either. I’m at a loss as to why any of the three of us should have expected to see it.
WMDs have not yet been found. So what? One reason of the war in a laundry list of them. Atta may have been in Prague (Been following Able Danger?), even if he was not, so what? That would provide a link between 9/11 and Iraq, which no one has claimed. I don’t know what a “moblile WMD truck” is supposed to be.
There is an auditable paper trail for the electronic machines used in Texas. If your state doesn’t, you need to get on your legislators as they are the ones who make those rules and decisions.
ppGaz
Because the war was sold on the basis of their existence and the threat they represented, you idiot.
Steve S
The only myth is people still defending the complete and utter failure of Communism as an economic system.
The Cold War may have worried about their being evil atheists, and by god the Communists certainly did their fair share of playing right into that stereotype.(Anybody who has read histories of Stalin or Mao can attest to that)
But the failing of Communism is that it does not encourage people to improve their own lots.
My girlfriend is Russian and came here in 1999. Her family was favored by the party officials for service her father rendered in the construction of an oil refinery in Egypt. What did that mean exactly? They were given a new apartment, and allowed to buy a car and home appliances. You see, such items were not available to everybody. Only if you were favored by the party were you allowed to go to the special stores to buy them.
When you speak of Capitalism, you are likely not talking about the same Capitalism I am. You are thinking instead of the Plundering form of Capitalism, which is not much different from state run Communism. I used the example of oil and there are two ways that usually plays out for a country.
The oil is either all countrolled by the State, or it is all controlled by a single Company. In either case, when the entire economy is dependent upon that substance, the people are entirely dependent upon whoever controls it.
A Capitalistic society is not one which is beholden to a single resource. It is one where the people are allowed, and in fact encouraged to be resourceful and expand into every new markets to the point where the economy is not single-sourced.
No, I’m afraid it is you who are still stuck on Cold War memes.
Steve S
So you think being an apologist for bullshit voting systems somehow makes you better than being a hack spreading hyperbolic stories?
You might want to rethink your position there, buckaroo.
srv
You don’t think we should have plans for occupations in wars of choice? After years of planning? Yes, I was total ignoramous prior 3/2003 in assuming there was such a thing. The Colonels comments was that his assignment after the invasion was a bit of a surprise to him. He was expected to just figure it out.
To his credit, he seemed up to the job. But I just have this weird expectation that somebody had a plan somewhere. You may disagree, but in all my conversations with those serving in the ME it’s clear to me that GW is damn lucky our military is so good to make up for his faith-based strategies.
Uh, well, I beg to differ. I heard/read our Vice President repeat it 5 or 6 times. Russert must have been waterboarding him…
Hmm, well I didn’t see a paper ballot when I voted there in 2004, but maybe things have improved since I’ve been gone. Good.
DougJ
RTO Trainer, I suspect that you’re a Bush-Cheney automaton but I also think you may be serving our country in Iraq and Afghanistan, so I’m not going to mock as I normally would.
Zifnab
If there was a paper trail, I never saw it. I never got a receipt for my vote or any way of knowing whether the buttons I pushed corresponded to the actual vote I cast. And from what I’ve heard on campus the lack of a paper trail has caused a number of questionable poll numbers across the state.
S.W. Anderson
Somehow, I suspect you managed to write the opposite of what you meant.
If I’m right about that, you’ve rounded out National Straw Man Day very nicely. I’m sure one or two presidential speechwriters would say you, too, are doing a heck of a job.
RTO Trainer
It was one reason in a laundry list of them.
Retief
One Beeeellion dollars? Democracy promottion is a great idea. Spreading the effort thourgh many different programs is a good way to find some that work. But does a committment of $1B really make this the top priority? I mean congress just agreed to spend $3.78 billion preparing for an Avian Flu epidemic. $1Billion is what percent of $2.338 trillion? Seed corn is great, but this is clearly a small, experimental patch not a Johnny Appleseed kind of affair.
RTO Trainer
Ever notice as the ability to respond to the original topic decreases how the subject changes more and more frequently?
But if you really want ot go down this raod, feel free to make some substantive comment on it and I’ll be happy to reply in kind. Until then I guess I “pbbbttt” back at you just as well as you can at me.
Steve S
Interesting. Someone who didn’t read what I wrote, nor responded to my points accuses me of creating a strawman.
Now we understand why you feel Communism is still a viable economic program. You probably didn’t even see it’s failures.
Steve S
You mean substantive like claiming 70% of complaints are bullshit?
You think this somehow makes you sound credible? You’re coming off like an apologist jackass, I’m sorry to say.
RTO Trainer
Occupation (and pursuitand so forth) are Phase IV operations. One cannot do credible plannig until at least the late stages of Phase III. Even if this weren’t true, by the nature of security and the issuance of mission orders, None of hte three people cited (you, and Army Sergeant, ir a Marine COL, shoud expect to have seen any planning in advance.
A COL, however, should have been well prepared to take on such a mission at littel notice, it’s part of the job description and SASO is a mission he and his Marines should have been trained for long ago.
If you are refering to what I beleive you are, you should recheck the source more closely to what was said.
I voted in 2004 and received a paper receipt for my ballot and a record that I had voted alogn with the recipt number was retained by the precinct boss.
RTO Trainer
I’m not fragile. Mock away. I’d prefer substance, but if mocking’s all you got….
Please note, however, that I am a veteran as well as a Democrat and if I understand the rules correctly that means you aren’t allowed to dispute what I say.
In my defense, I’ve never been an automaton of any sort, though I have long experience in being accused of it.
S.W. Anderson
My cat’s a loved and respected member of the family. A nice, strategically located easychair is his chair. He spends hours in it daily, especially this time of year. He loves being able to curl up in his chair.
For all of that, I can’t put him in that chair and have him stay there. Not even when I know he wants to be there. Not even at a time when he’d normally be there. If I try, he’ll look bemused or annoyed and jump down.
It’s a matter of independence, autonomy, of rights and pride. It’s important to him and to our relationship that I observe certain courtesies, including not trying to pull my greater rank or size on him for something such as where he should sit.
I think if there had been an active, ongoing native insurgency seeking to overthrow Saddam, one that had beckoned our assistance from within while doing what it could, the situation would’ve been different in 2003 and would be markedly different now. The whole dynamic would be different.
What we have now is catch-up efforts to make something arguably an improvement out of a botched job. This is the work of a cabal of crackpot crusaders who didn’t know what the hell they were doing at the outset and have proven brilliant only at resisting learning much of anything since.
It also bears mentioning that infesting Iraq with rent-a-cop interrogators and corporate brigands, and announcing plans to build the world’s largest U.S. embassy plus two to four large, permanent military bases there, goes a long way toward undermining claims that our intentions are purely altuistic.
Can we please try to keep two things straight? First, elections do not a democracy make. Second, a constitution must be accepted and used as the real law of the land, in a land where the people respect the rule of law, to be worth more than the paper it’s printed on. I once read much of the old Soviet Union’s constitution. It stood as proof of the notion there’s many a slip twixt cup and the lip.
Steve S
Phase III took three weeks.
You aren’t serious, are you? This guy certainly doesn’t agree with you:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A24891-2004Dec24.html
You haven’t really given anybody anything substantive to respond to.
S.W. Anderson
In masochistic weakness, I read what you wrote twice, trying to make sense of it. Your accusation is the thanks I get.
Trust me, if conclusion-jumping becomes an Olympic sport, you’ll be a contender.
As to your contention about not responding to your points, it would help if your points were a bit less opaque. Examples:
The Cold War was an era, an epoch, and not capable of worrying about anything. Humans worry, eras don’t. It just was what it was.
If your point is that Soviet communists promoted atheism, you’re correct. It’s notable and reassuring that after nearly eight decades of suppression, religion re-emerged and began to flourish anew in Russia.
If we’re talking about communist theory, as opposed to what was in operation on the ground for so long (or actual real estate), it really depends on how a person looks at things.
A nonmaterialistic person who enjoys dinner better if he knows no one else is going hungry, rests better at night if he’s sure no one’s left out in the cold — that kind of person might feel his lot was greatly improved in a genuine communist system. He sees life not as a series of “it’s me or you, and it’s gonna be me” competitions, but rather as a “together, we can do anything,” proposition.
Now, you can say that’s unrealistic, idealistic nonsense. But it is one way of interpreting right and wrong, and of regarding a person’s place in society with others.
And before you go off on a toot about atheism and all of that, you might consider Mother Teresa’s life and example, or for that matter, Christ’s. Neither fit with Marx at all, and yet there’s an element of seeing to the welfare and needs of all in theoretical communism that’s sort of in sync with Christian charity. Something worth a bit of thought, anyway.
srv
I’m sure that’s what the manual says, let’s think outside the box. A nation plans for years to invade a country of 25 million people. This must be how it happens:
George: “So we have a plan for the invasion”
Rummy: “We have a spectacular plan”
George: “Colin says if I break it, I own it. What happens after?”
Rummy: “That’s Phase IV. We have to wait until after Phase III”
George: “Oh. Makes sense to me”
I didn’t need to have a personal copy. I just assumed it would exist, in some form. Which it didn’t.
Ah, Richard Pryor, I miss you already. If I don’t believe my own lying eyes when I saw it:
CHENEY: Well, what we now have that’s developed since you and I last talked, Tim, of course, was that report that’s been pretty well confirmed, that he did go to Prague and he did meet with a senior official of the Iraqi intelligence service in Czechoslovakia last April, several months before the attack.
Cheney later even lies on a later Russert episode saying he didn’t say that, and Timmy gave him pass. But Cheney had already been bringing it up in other speeches, even though it had been discredited.
srv
Well,
Expect to start hearing from the admin about bad Mr. Evo, the democratically elected leader of Bolivia:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/americas/12/18/bolivia.election.ap.ap/index.html
If Elliot Abrams is working on the ME now, who’s going to work on Bolivia?
srv
Oh,
Well, I’m not sure what you do with that receipt. And I’m sure they know you voted. But how do they audit the vote count?
Perry Como
Negroponte is tied up in Iraq, so how about Casper Weinberger? I’d suggest Kissinger, but he has trouble leaving the country on occassion.
Pb
srv,
To be fair, once you understand Cheney’s definition of “pretty well confirmed”, (so utterly false that he subsequently has to lie and deny he ever said it in the first place) the rest of the “intelligence failures” in the run up to war make perfect sense.
Personally, I’d still like to know what was so darned important in those Energy Task Force meetings that Cheney had to try to intimidate the Supreme Court about it. I mean, besides the maps of oil wells in Iraq, we know about those already.
Actually, I’d just like to know why anyone ever gave Cheney a job in the first place. Ugh.
Baron Elmo
To return to the original topic, there is one angle that hasn’t received much play in this thread… the fact that nudging countries toward democracy, no matter how well-intentioned, can often have disastrous results. As fine a system as democracy is when it’s working as it ought, the fact remains that some nations simply AREN’T READY FOR IT. That’s not a slight on The Democratic Way, just an acknowledgment that the culture that birthed America is a universe away from what you’ll find in societies like Yemen, Bolivia or Kenya.
If you want an example of democratic reform run amuck in the worst of ways, cast an eye over Indonesia. After Suharto’s corrupt government was forced from power in 1989, the U.S. cheered on the idea of free elections with everything it had. Where things got sticky was that, at the time, Chinese residents were 3% of the population, yet controlled 70% of the wealth. So more than a few emerging Indonesian politicians campaigned for office on a platform that loosely translated as “let’s kill the Chinese and take their money.” The resulting wave of violence resulted in the death of 2,000 Chinese and the burning and looting of 5,000 of their shops and homes… and the remaining Chinese simply took their money and left. Over 50 billion dollars in assets vanished from Indonesia overnight — and now one of the world’s most populous nations is, to put it indelicately, fucked, with over 40 million unemployed. It it any wonder that al-Qaeda has been so successful in making new recruits in Indonesia, overrun as it is by citizens with a huge reservoir of anger and no jobs to be had?
I’d recommend reading Amy Chua’s “World on Fire,” for more on this viewpoint. Democracy and free-markets are desirable, it’s true… but too often the U.S. thinks of these things as universal cure-alls. Any good doctor will tell you that sometimes the cure can be deadlier than the disease.
Steve S
Uhh… Russia and China were genuine communist systems. That is, because communism goes against human nature, the only way to ensure it stays in place is through totalitarianism. In such a state, you are going to have believers and non-believers… Since you want to encourage more of the former, you oppress the latter by denying them food and shelter.
Which results in a state, which is nothing like your idealistic dream.
I’m honestly surprised that there is still ideological sentiment in favor of Communism given it’s history of failure.
Your perceptions are sadly distorted, considering it is in the communist and fascist countries that this situation exists, and in capitalistic nations the exact opposite.
Steve S
I’ll have to find that book. That was the broader point I was trying to make(before getting sidetracked by someone defending Communism against reality), that Democracy can only flourish with the proper economic conditions.
That’s interesting what happened in Indonesia, and I was no fully aware of that.
I worry if something similar will not happen in Bolivia now. I don’t know what this guy is up to. Apparently his first step is going to be to increase Cocain exports. In a sense, that is capitalism in action. I just wish they were doing something constructive.
S.W. Anderson
Steve S, forgive me for being direct, but you are like a lead yo-yo without a string. You must’ve worked for the Bush-Cheney campaign last year, the dead giveaway being that you don’t need facts and won’t heed what others actually say. You just twist words and make things up with wild abandon. If there’s an argument you want to make, you claim someone wrote something they didn’t write and proceed to make a sophomoric argument against what you say they said.
FYI, I’m not a communist. Never believed in it. Don’t like it or promote it. What’s more, I carefully — very specifically, for the readers in the room — drew a DISTINCTION (please see dictionary for what that means, Steve S) between theoretical communism and what was practiced in so-called communist countries.
I’d say go get some education and then come back to discuss things, but I’m not sure there’s a course in not making things up, expecting no one will notice or care that that’s what you’ve done.
S.W. Anderson
Each was a dictatorship with a socialist front office and centrally planned (misplanned, mostly) economy. China is a sort of modified socialist plutocracy these days, as best I can tell. Neither country ever achieved pure Marxian communism, or even came close. Do some homework.