Welcome to Cheney World!

 Posted by Mike  Bush Administration, Foreign Policy, Middle East, Terrorism, U.S. Politics, War in Iraq  No Responses »
May 312005
 

Dick Cheney gave a very interesting interview to Larry King yesterday. First, he expressed shock and dismay that Amnesty International would criticize the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay. “For Amnesty International to suggest that somehow the United States is a violator of human rights, I frankly just don’t take them seriously.” He went on to say that Occasionally there are allegations of mistreatment. But if you trace those back, in nearly every case, it turns out to come from somebody who has been inside and been released … To their home country and now are peddling lies about how they were treated.”

Well, Cheney never did have a real firm grasp of the importance of truth-telling. Still, I guess that means he doesn’t believe it to be a violation of human rights to hold and interrogate prisoners for several years without treating them as POWs (which would entitle them to Geneva convention status) or charging them as criminals (which would give them the right to a trial). And, I suppose that widespread reports of prisoner beatings, Koran desecration (while the US News story was retracted, there have been any number of other, similar reports), sleep deprivation, and even murder by news sources as varied as the BBC, the New York Times, and the Washington Post (among many others) are all simply fabrications and lies. After all, Cheney has never investigated these claims, and since he believes in the goodness of our cause and our military, then the claims must be false! Besides, any attempt to hold the United States to a higher standard or to expose the flaws in American policies is unpatriotic, evil, and probably even treasonous, right? In fact, since we all know that God is, after all, on our side, these reports are also the work of the Devil, and anyone who spreads them must be demon-possessed Satanists.

Cheney also says that he believes the insurgency will be over by the time that Bush leaves office. I suppose that it is good that he has faith that this will be over shortly. After all, six years of civil war is not really all that bad, is it? Of course, he offers no evidence that the insurgency will be over then. If Dick Cheney’s predictions of the future were always correct, Iraq would be a thriving, stable, oil-producing, Commie-hating (oh, wait, sorry, Islamist-hating), secular American ally, and would currently be spreading the peace and good-will of Democracy across the Middle East. Well, I will say that his predictions are getting slightly more realistic.

Still, I wonder if the Untied States can afford to maintain over 100,000 troops in Iraq for another four years. Or is that a question that only the liberal, America-hating, unpatriotic heathens are supposed to ask?

Memorial Day

 Posted by Mike  Bush Administration, Foreign Policy, U.S. Politics  No Responses »
May 302005
 

I have no idea what President Bush will say today, but I imagine that he will use the commemoration of Memorial Day to remind people of the great American soldiers of the past who fought to spread freedom and democracy around the world. That’s not the message that needs to be given. If I were writing a Memorial Day speech, I think it would go something like this:

“I take very seriously the idea that our government is “of the people, by the people, and for the people”. All government representatives are our employees, they are our responsibility, and they do their jobs for us. So, this is a great day to remember what all of our employees have done, and continue to do, for us.

- Remember the warriors. The soldiers, sailors, pilots, and support personnel that fight our wars, protect our borders, go where we want and do what we ask. We send them into harms way in exchange for room, board, and a pretty pathetic pay-check, and that merits our respect. I respect our soldiers in spite of the fact that they are too often sent to fight the wrong wars for the wrong reasons. It is because I respect our soldiers and the principals for which they stand that I think we ought to be extremely cautious before sending them into battle. On the other hand, this respect does not give them carte-blanch. They are our representatives, and we hire them to represent the United States well; which means that we ought to hold them to a higher standard of conduct than our enemies. We should not, in fact we cannot, use violence to teach peace, torture to teach liberty, or imprisonment to teach freedom.

- Remember the civil servants. It is all too acceptable to let our politicians bash the “bureaucrats in Washington” or the “inefficiencies of the government bureaucracy”. But these bureaucrats are intelligent people usually working at significantly less than a market wage in order to serve us, to do the jobs that we ask them to do. They work long and hard, and they deserve our respect; their jobs deserve our respect. Of course, we should be good stewards of our money, and that means hiring civil servants only when it is the most efficient way to accomplish the task. But let us uplift the ones that we hire, not denigrate them.

- Remember the leaders. Agree with them or not, they are our representatives, our employees, the stewards that we chose to protect our way of life and our well-being. They ought to be held to an extremely high standard, especially come election day. We should cajole them into doing the right thing and encourage them to do their jobs well, to represent us well. We need to force them to lead, and to set a good example for the soldiers and civil servants under them. But we should also be respectful and gracious for the terribly difficult tasks and impossible choices that we daily give them.”

Sorry to be preachy, but that’s what we should use Memorial Day for. Instead, we will once again paper over the sins of the past with the mythology of the World War II veteran and wonder why the wars and soldiers of today can’t seem to measure up to that great war when Men were Men, the enemy was Evil, and our cause was Nobel.

National Debts

 Posted by Mike  Europe, Foreign Policy  No Responses »
May 272005
 

I miss the Freedom Fries. And the Freedom Toast. In fact, I wish we could have taken it further. Imagine the high-school kid who gets caught making out with his girlfriend, turns to his mother and says “Don’t worry mom, it was only patriotic; we were Freedom Kissing!” We could have had Freedom Bread, Freedom Twists, and Freedom Braids. It might have put a dent in the California wine industry (who wouldn’t prefer a Freedom vintage over a Californian one?), but I’m sure the Golden State would have gotten over that. Heck, we could have just taken it all the way and renamed the maps and history books. We could have had the Freedom Revolution, the Freedom Empire, the Freedom Monarchy, even Vichy Freedom. Imagine the travel books: “take a tour of the wine country of Freedom!”; “sit in a small Parisian cafe and absorb the culture of Freedom”. The absurdity of our distaste for the French was never so obvious as when we renamed our fried potatoes.

Sadly, however, it seems that we have returned to our old fashioned, subtle Fracophobia. Our mistrust and distaste of the French still exist, of course. Only yesterday, I heard a Fox News commentator telling us how the French and German economies were suffering because they refused to join the Iraq coalition. And of course, he brought up everyone’s favorite historical fact: they owe us. After all, we saved the French in both World Wars; finished their war for them the first time, and liberated them the second time. And now they don’t even have the courtesy to join us in a Middle Eastern war that they didn’t want. The FOX commentator claimed that it was because they were “bowing” to pressure from their growing Muslim constituencies, and therefore it showed a lack of political courage. (Keep this in mind when critiquing democratic leaders: if they do something you like they are uplifting the will of the people whereas if they do something you dislike then they are bowing to electoral pressure.)

Essentially, this commentator (and many others that I have heard) are referring to the logic of indebtedness. Because of what we have done for France in the past, they should follow us now, because they are indebted to us. This logic is stupid for any number of reasons, despite the fact that it is often recited. First of all, it is un-Christian. Christianity tells us to do good towards others, to treat them with respect, no matter what they owe you or you owe them. Second, it is bad publicity; it makes the United States look like a giant loan-shark, which is not quite the image that we ought to be projecting in the world right now. Third, who is to say that the French owe us more than we owe them? Think about all that the French have done for the United States:

- It was the French who won us the Revolutionary War. We were able to maintain pressure on the British and keep the fight going, but Washington was only able to shift into the offensive and attack the British because French forces had cornered the British in a poor strategic position and the French fleet had cut off the British army from their supply lines.

- In fact, it was only because of French loans that we had the money to field an army in the first place. American finances and credit were extremely poor during the war, and only by getting exceedingly generous loans from the French were we able to maintain the war with the British at all.

- The French sold us the Louisiana purchase for extremely little. Yes, Napoleon needed the cash badly. But there were other potential buyers and other possibilities for raising money. We came to posses our “heartland” because of French benevolence.

- They gave us the gift of the Statue of Liberty. That great symbol of America exists to commemorate our close historical ties with the French.

These are just a few, although perhaps the most important, of the things that we owe to the French. So, if you really do believe in the logic of indebtedness, you still have to ask the question of who owes who more? Besides, I wonder what the APR on national independence would translate into…

Senate Compromise Analysis

 Posted by Mike  Judicial System, Nomination and Confirmation, U.S. Politics  1 Response »
May 262005
 

Sorry for the lack of posts lately; I’ve been in NYC visiting family the last few days. Since I left, however, it seems that a group of moderate Senators has joined together across party lines to avert a Senate shutdown. Take note, people, this is possibly a once in a lifetime event, and I’m not just being cynical about the supposed increase in partisanship and party polarization.

First, remember that this deal was compromised without the party leadership from either side; the party leadership that controls the movement of soft-money and the endorsements of the most senior and well-known party members. The party whips are most likely up in arms over this deal; a deal that was brokered without them. Furthermore, this is exactly the kind of deal that Sen. Frist did not want; he repeatedly turned down efforts to trade some candidates for others, which is implicitly what this deal does.

Keep that in mind when you consider the involved Senators. The Senators we would most expect to be involved in this kind of deal are red-state Democrats, and blue-state Republicans. These are people whose largest electoral challenge is going to be in the general election from the opposing party who will claim that the incumbent is too extreme; a notion belied by participation in this deal. That would describe Sens. Snowe (R-ME), Collins (R-ME), Chafee (R-RI), Nelson (D-NE), Landrieu (D-LA), Salazar (D-CO), and Pryor (D-AK). A few Senators involved were so senior or well-known as mavericks that they will face no serious challenge regardless of this issue: that describes McCain (R-AZ), Byrd (D-WV), and probably Lieberman (D-CT). That leaves Warner (R-VA), Graham (R-SC), DeWine (R-OH), and Inouye (D-HI) as the more unexpected members of this coalition. All four of these Senators could face a strong challenge in their next primary as a result of their participation in this deal. Remember, this is a compromise that the moderates love and the extremists (those who are most likely to show up in the primaries) hate.

Warner is well-known and senior enough that he might be in the “untouchable” category, although it is equally likely that this deal is a subtle way of announcing his retirement. Graham is a bit of a maverick, but he is also extremely conservative; look for him to spend the next few years trying to win back any good-will among the Religious Right that this deal may have cost him. DeWine is a young Senator from a battleground state; this deal will play very well in the general election for him, if he can ever get past the primaries. Still, I think it was probably a mistake for him, especially if the Senate leadership takes this slight as an excuse to withhold support from him. The last thing that DeWine needs in the next election is for Frist and Bush to refuse to be seen with him, although he may be hoping that Graham, who apparently lead him into the deal, will come to his aid. And I really don’t know enough about Hawaiian politics to know if Inouye is likely to face a stiff primary challenge as a result of this deal. Still, look for him to try to reestablish his credentials among feminist and civil rights organizations over the next few months.

In the end, of course, this deal could be all-for-naught. Ultimately, President Bush can scuttle this agreement by continuing to nominate controversial candidates; especially if/when a Supreme Court seat opens up. The language in the deal was incredibly vague when it came down to which candidates the Democrats could or could not filibuster. If Bush nominates judges who fail to get even nominal support from across the aisle, this could force another show-down sooner rather than later.

To that end, keep an eye on Kavanaugh. He currently works in the White House council’s office, and is therefore close to the President. He also was a protege of Ken Starr, and is by far the youngest of the nominees to the appellate court, and his mere nomination offended many Democrats. The President and the Majority Leader are likely to push hard for a vote on Kavanaugh, and the Democrats are likely to resist it. Therefore, it will be up to either the senior Republicans in the compromise to stand firm against a rule change (keep your eyes on DeWine and Graham, especially), or to the senior Democrats (i.e. Byrd and Lieberman) to convince their own party leadership to let him through.

Tale of Two Papers

 Posted by Mike  Foreign Policy, Middle East, Terrorism, The Media, War in Iraq  No Responses »
May 202005
 

That bastion of the “liberal elite media”, the New York Times, published this article today detailing the on-going investigation of atrocities committed at a holding cell and interrogation center in Afghanistan. Two men died as a result of poor treatment, while the armed initial response was basically to do nothing. In fact, the unit stationed there was later transferred to Abu Graib. One of the men was killed by interrogators after they already suspected his innocence. In this supposed war for freedom and democracy against terrorism and tyranny, our interrogators apparently took the Bush Administration’s laissez fair attitude and the constant reminder that “these people attacked us” to heart, and responded just the way you would expect poorly-trained, stressed out kids with more weapons and power than they know what to do with to act: like bullies. And in this case, it resulted in the deaths of two men and the torture of many more.

Also, today, two Rupert Murdoch newspapers (Murdoch is the owner of FOX, among other media outlets, and is a very vocal conservative), published photos of Saddam Hussein in his underwear and sleeping. The photos were supposedly obtained from a GI who wanted to “deal a body blow” to the Iraqi insurgence. The New York Post article spends most of its time describing the treatment of Saddam and mocking him, saying that “when he does get some shut-eye, he bundles up against the cold like a street bum” and that “closed-circuit cameras monitor Saddam’s every movement – even his bowel movements”. Of course, the article also takes time to criticize the Red Cross: “Every two months or so, he’s visited by a team from the International Committee of the Red Cross, which checks on his medical condition – and then refuses to comment about him.” The message, apparently, is that anyone who wears poorly fitting underwear can obviously no longer be a threat. Or something like that.

To the Pentagon’s credit, they did express displeasure that the photos of Saddam were released, although President Bush expressed doubt that they would further inflame anti-American sentiment. Perhaps only liberal newspapers and magazines are capable of inflaming anti-American sentiment. What really disturbs me about both episodes is that the Bush Administration still doesn’t seem to get it. Fighting the war on terrorism is completely about public relations. The rest of the globe, especially the Muslim and Arab worlds, are going to hold the United States to a higher standard. That’s what happens when you claim to be the champion of Freedom and Democracy; you get held to a higher standard. And so every time our soldiers beat or humiliate a prisoner, every time the Administration fights dismisses the applicability of the Geneva Convention, every time one of our bombs misses its intended target and hits a child, we are going to lose credibility. And with each attack on our credibility, our goal of reducing or eliminating terrorism and making the American people safer slips further away.

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