Long Pauses

Tag: War on Terror

  • The State of the Union

    Thoughts on the State of the Union.

    To lift the standards of our public schools, we achieved historic education reform — which must now be carried out in every school and in every classroom, so that every child in America can read and learn and succeed in life. To protect our country, we reorganized our government and created the Department of Homeland Security, which is mobilizing against the threats of a new era. To bring our economy out of recession, we delivered the largest tax relief in a generation. To insist on integrity in American business we passed tough reforms, and we are holding corporate criminals to account.

    I realize that Bush is fiercely pro-life and that he has an inspirational Christian testimony, so I understand why he has garnered blind support from certain portions of the Right. What I don’t get is his claims of conservatism. When I think conservative, I think fiscal responsibility, small government, states’ rights, and isolationism. The Bush administration is none of the above. After deriding Gore as a “nation-builder” during the 2000 debates and promising to never use our military for such purposes, Bush has ushered in a new age of American imperialism, even winning from Congress the right to launch unilateral pre-emptive strikes on sovereign nations.

    Bush’s “education reforms” have likewise helped to grow the Federal government to its largest size ever and have mandated unprecedented Federal control over local school systems. His Department of Homeland Security now exercises the authority to monitor our private lives with near complete abandon. And his mismanagement of the economy has cost us billions of dollars and thousands of jobs. (Before you claim that he inherited a bloated economy from Clinton, which is partly true, explain to me why Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill and most of Bush’s other chief economic advisors were ushered out in the closing weeks of 2002.) If we can’t count on a Republican President for fiscal conservatism, what’s the point?

    A friend and I were discussing all of this last night, trying, as objectively as possible, to understand what is so conservative about Bush’s brand of “compassionate conservatism.” (Don’t get me started on the “compassionate” part.) This morning he sent me this link, writing, “Someone’s reading your mind.”

    To boost investor confidence, and to help the nearly 10 million senior who receive dividend income, I ask you to end the unfair double taxation of dividends.

    New rule: No one is allowed to play the “senior” card unless they’re discussing, well, seniors. To spin the dividend cut as a compassionate move in the interest of seniors is just dishonest. I can only imagine what kind of lightbulbs went off when someone coined the phrase “double taxation.” Mark my words, we’ll be hearing a lot more of that one in the coming weeks.

    Join me in this important innovation to make our air significantly cleaner, and our country much less dependent on foreign sources of energy.

    Environment-friendly Bush? I wonder if you can buy that in a two-pack with the “Pro-Affirmative-Action Lott” doll?

    I urge you to pass both my faith-based initiative and the Citizen Service Act, to encourage acts of compassion that can transform America, one heart and one soul at a time.

    See, now I actually like this idea in theory, but there is no way it will have legs if it ever squeaks through Congress. The other day, I flipped on an episode of “Random People Arguing” on CNNMSNBCFOX and caught a remarkable exchange between Jerry Falwell and Strawman Liberal Methodist Minister. SLMM did his very best to pin Falwell down with the following question: “Do you support the government’s use of your tax money for the funding of Muslim charities?” Falwell absolutely refused to answer the question, doing his best to maintain that tattooed grin. But SLMM continued to press until the two men regressed to adolescence right before my eyes. Honestly, Falwell threatened him. It was surreal. Dada, even.

    And that’s exactly what we’re going to get in Congress when politicians begin trying to divvy up Federal monies for distribution to “faith-based” initiatives. Again, I can’t imagine why any conservative would support this.

    Too many Americans in search of [drug] treatment cannot get it. So tonight I propose a new $600-million program to help an additional 300,000 Americans receive treatment over the next three years.

    Can you imagine if Clinton had tried this? Lott, Robertson, and Buchanan would have called him a Socialist.

    I ask the Congress to commit $15 billion over the next five years, including nearly $10 billion in new money, to turn the tide against AIDS in the most afflicted nations of Africa and the Caribbean.

    Well I’ll be damned. You know who’s responsible for this, don’t you? Bono, and God bless him for it. If Bush gets half of that amount out of Congress, I’ll be the first person to thank him. I can only imagine what kinds of “reproduction-related” measures will be attached to this one.

    Whatever the duration of this struggle, and whatever the difficulties, we will not permit the triumph of violence in the affairs of men — free people will set the course of history.

    This one is probably too obvious to even be worth mentioning, but with “we will not permit the triumph of violence in the affairs of men,” Bush has secured his place in the Meaningless Double-Speak Hall of Fame.

    In each case, the ambitions of Hitlerism, militarism, and communism were defeated by the will of free peoples, by the strength of great alliances, and by the might of the United States of America.

    Note to self: use this line in the conclusion of your dissertation. I couldn’t possibly imagine what “militarism” means in this context, but if this isn’t proof that the Cold War is alive and well, nothing is. How much do you want to bet that an earlier draft of this speech used “fascism” instead of “Hitlerism”? I guarantee it. Probably something like this:

    Bush: “What’s fascism again?”
    Rove: “Yeah, good point. Let’s change that to, uh, How ’bout Hitlerism?”
    Speechwriter: “Hmmm, I don’t think that’s a word.”
    silent stares from Bush and Rove
    Speechwriter: “Hitlerism works for me.”

    Tonight I have a message for the men and women who will keep the peace, members of the American Armed Forces. . . .

    If war is forced upon us, we will fight in a just cause and by just means — sparing, in every way we can, the innocent. And if war is forced upon us, we will fight with the full force and might of the United States military — and we will prevail.

    Note: I’m praying that we will somehow avoid this war because I don’t feel it is theologically just (despite Bush’s deliberate efforts to work that word into his rhetoric). Because I don’t think this war is justified, I feel that any casualties, any casualties, would be tragic and senseless wastes of lives that were created by God for more meaningful purposes. So please don’t take this as knee-jerk anti-Americanism, a phrase that, in recent weeks, has been thrown around much too casually and ignorantly by Rush Limbaugh and his ilk:

    This and this is how our forces will “keep the peace.”

    Americans are a free people, who know that freedom is the right of every person and the future of every nation. The liberty we prize is not America’s gift to the world, it is God’s gift to humanity. We Americans have faith in ourselves, but not in ourselves alone. We do not know — we do not claim to know all the ways of Providence, yet we can trust in them, placing our confidence in the loving God behind all of life, and all of history. May He guide us now. And may God continue to bless the United States of America.

    This will be my most carefully measured comment. The histories of nations that have exercised imperial force under the guise of Providence should be telling to all but the most blindly ill-informed and arrogant.

  • Hauerwas, Bush, and Alexander

    After listening to me ramble incessantly, a professor recently pointed me toward Stanley Hauerwas. I now see why. Hauerwas is a professor of theological ethics at Duke Divinity School, where he has earned a reputation as an outspoken critic of the complacency that has come to characterize much of the American Christian church. I’m on my way to the library to grab a book or two, and at the top of my list is A Better Hope: Resources for a Church Confronting Capitalism, Democracy, and Postmodernity, which sounds like it may have been written explicitly for me. Should be interesting.

    Hauerwas is a ridiculously prolific writer, but here’s an interesting and timely introduction. When asked what advice he would give to President Bush, he responds:

    It’s a tricky question because, if he had asked me, he wouldn’t have been President! (Laugh) So, I’d say, “You need to tell the American people the truth.” This is still about oil. We intervened in Kuwait to protect Saudi oil. You can say, “Well, gee, don’t you think you ought to oppose a tyrant?” Look, the United States is very selective about which tyrant it’s going to pursue. When Indonesia invaded East Timor twenty-five years ago, we didn’t do anything. Why? East Timor didn’t have any strategic interest to us. Bin Laden is clearly motivated by the fact that the United States is in Saudi Arabia. We’re in Saudi Arabia to protect the oil. We need to say that the reason America has such a problem is because we’re such a rich country, and we depend on the resources of the rest of the world. Therefore, maybe the best thing we could do… I mean, rather than saying, “Well, what can you do to support a reaction against bin Laden” — rather than saying “Go out and shop” — maybe he should have said we should put a three dollar tax on gas. (Laugh) That way we won’t use so much of it. That would have been a sacrifice. Yeah, I’d say, “Tell the American people the truth about these matters.” I’m not sure that people around the Bush Administration even know the truth because they need to tell themselves lies about what they’re doing — and they believe the lies — in order to carry forward.

    And later:

    I distrust words that try to explain. I think that we’re desperate to find some explanation when there just isn’t an explanation. I mean, George Bush saying, “Why did they do this? Because they hate us because we are free.” That’s not what they’re saying. They say that they’re enacting jihad against the infidel who they think are deeply corrupt. I think even to accept that — I mean, it doesn’t explain what was there. Of course it’s helpful to get certain kinds of background to put it into perspective, but the idea that somehow or other we’re going to understand this is a little bit like people wanting to have a conspiracy theory around Kennedy’s assassination. We so hunger for some reason that this might embody and make it intelligible to us. But genuine evil is not intelligible. Bin Laden understands some of this. He wants the action to be senseless. And it is senseless because he wants it to call into question America’s sense of non-vulnerability. And he certainly did.

    And along those same lines . . . In January, Laura Bush stood with Hamid Karzai and said:

    We will not forget that 70 percent of Afghans are malnourished.

    We will not forget that one of every four children dies by the age of five because of lack of health care.

    We will not forget that women were denied access to medical care — denied the right to work, and denied the right to leave their homes alone.

    Her speech echoed the sentiments voiced by her husband repeatedly since the days immediately following the start of the U.S. bombing campaign:

    In our anger, we must never forget that we are a compassionate people. While we firmly and strongly oppose the Taleban regime, we are friends with the Afghan people.

    But, of course, the rhetoric of compassion is quite different from the practical problems of “nation building.” Like many opposed to war in Iraq, one of my main concerns has always been “the day after.” What do we do after we have destabilized a dictatorship? What do we do after, in Hauerwas’s words, “we bomb a Stone Age country back into the Stone Age”? If Afghanistan is any indication, then not much:

    “Rather than getting out there in a leadership role and saying, ‘We need a Marshall Plan,’ and fighting for it, they’ve taken a minimalist approach,” complained Joel Charny, a vice president of Refugees International.

    He’s right. The reconstruction funds the Bush White House requested for Afghanistan have been flowing slowly to the country. Moreover, several months ago the White House opposed an effort in Congress to add $200 million to the total. And the total number of US troops committed to rebuilding — after the doubling — will be 340. That’s not a lot.

    Word of the day: nomothetic adj.

    • Of or relating to lawmaking; legislative.
    • Based on a system of law.
    • Of or relating to the philosophy of law.
    • Of or relating to the study or discovery of general scientific laws.

    Maybe some context would help. From Jeffrey Alexander’s Fin de Siecle Social Theory: Relativism, Reduction, and the Problem of Reason:

    In the postwar period, general sociological theory has been associated with the search for nomothetic knowledge. It has been viewed, by its proponents and critics alike, as the crowning glory of the positive science of society. (90)

  • No Democracy for You!

    Looking for further evidence of America’s legislated xenophobia? Apparently afraid that his films might remind voters that Muslims are humans too, the State Department has denied a visa to Abbas Kiarostami, who was scheduled to present his latest film, Ten, at the New York Film Festival before delivering lectures at Harvard and Ohio University. Kiarostami’s response?

    “I certainly do not deserve an entry visa any more than the aging mother hoping to visit her children in the U.S. perhaps for the last time in her life … For my part, I feel this decision is somehow what I deserve.”

  • Calling the Bluff

    Things are getting interesting, eh? Looks like Hussein has called Bush’s bluff. This editorial is the best I’ve found. Of course, the folks in Washington and London are already voicing their doubts about Iraq’s motives, which is neither unexpected nor completely unwarranted. I realize that the Bush administration must continue to pressure both the UN and Iraq, but it sure would be nice to hear someone, anyone, in Washington voice some enthusiasm about the possibility (even this slim one) that we might avoid war after all. But then that $200 million we’ve set aside for anti-Iraq PR would go to waste.

    Check out Terry Gross’s interview with M.J. Akbar, the founder and editor-in-chief of The Asian Age, an English language newspaper published in India. Akbar is wonderfully entertaining and the most articulate spokesman I’ve yet heard for “regular” Muslims. His analysis of the Pakistan/India situation is fascinating and more than a bit frightening. He also has some interesting opinions on America’s showdown with Iraq. (I say “interesting” because he generally agrees with me.) Good stuff.

  • Wagging the Dog

    In today’s Post, Dana Milbank lets leading figures from both sides decide if the Bush administration is “Wagging the Dog” in Iraq. It’s a good, well-balanced piece, and worth a read, despite being fairly predictable. (Daschle: He’s wagging the dog. Fleischer: No he isn’t.) This is the first article I’ve read that compiles all of the relevant soundbites from the last few weeks:

    Karl Rove argued earlier this year that the war on terrorism should be part of Republicans’ campaigns this year. Last week, White House political aides encouraged GOP candidates to emphasize national security. Also, Andrew H. Card Jr., Bush’s chief of staff, said last week that the White House held back on promoting the Iraq policy in the summer because, “from a marketing point of view, you don’t introduce new products in August.” And Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (Va.), chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, made an Iraq vote explicitly political, saying, “People are going to want to know, before the elections, where their representatives stand.”

    Once again, I have to begrudgingly applaud the Republicans, who, as Milbank points out, are winning this round. A few weeks ago a Canadian friend asked me to explain why so many Americans were supporting this war. After ranting about Dubya’s supposed “moral authority,” I predicted that he would apply enough political pressure on Congress to force a vote, leaving even the most hesitant Democrats with a choice between supporting a war that they don’t want or looking “soft on terrorism.” Unfortunately, it looks like I was right. Milbank writes:

    Whatever the White House motive, the emergence of Iraq as an issue before the election has spooked Democrats, who find themselves struggling for a response. Though there is no consensus for handling the matter, party strategists said the likeliest course is for Democrats to agree to votes quickly on a resolution authorizing force against Hussein — in hopes of getting back to domestic matters.

    Of course, while the Democrats struggle to find an answer, Bush has already turned his attention to domestic matters, in a manner of speaking. While his two most eloquent spokesmen, Cheney and Powell, take turns looking Presidential on Meet the Press, Bush is back out doing what he does best: shaking hands, posing for pictures, and sitting down to $1,000 dinners. Remember the good ol’ days of bashing Clinton for his fundraising exploits? He’s got nothin’ on this guy. After visiting Iowa today, Dubya will spend part of tomorrow in my most recent home state, Tennessee, where he’ll be stomping for Lamar Alexander. Yes, that Lamar Alexander. He’s hoping to return to Washington by filling our vacant Senate seat. (Feel free to support his competition.)

    And what message will Bush be pushing on the trail? Why the need for “fiscal responsibility,” of course. It seems that we’ve suddenly run into a $157 billion deficit. A note for Karl Rove: please tell Mr. Bush that his $1.35 trillion tax cut may be partly responsible for that crunch and that the war in Iraq will also cost a penny or two. For more info, listen to Terry Gross’s interview with Steve Weisman, author of The Great Tax Wars, who puts the current situation in its proper historical perspective. He mentions, for instance, that no President has ever cut taxes during war. Interesting.

  • Dorothy Day

    Apparently this is going to be an unusually “religious” blog today. It had been several days since I last visited Sightings, so I had missed both excellent entries from last week. In “Your Two Cents,” Martin Marty gives voice to the many recent responses by Sightings readers. Then, in “A Just War?” James Evans summarizes the fundamental questions at stake, before concluding:

    No one questions the legitimacy of the American government to make the decision, it’s the other criteria that are more difficult to establish. Is our country under a direct threat, or are we dealing with a potential threat, or even a likely threat? In short, do we have a just cause for waging war? And what is our intent? The stated purpose of the war is to remove Saddam Hussein from power. Is that a legitimate cause? Is any part of our action motivated by revenge for the events of September 11?

    If we are to be faithful to the ideals of our faith, before we consent to the killing of our declared enemy, we should strive diligently to be sure our cause is just. If we determine it is not, then we should not pursue it. Even if we determine our cause is just, we may only submit to war with a somber spirit, and with repentant hearts. No cause is so just that we may kill without sorrow.

    On a related note, I’m becoming somewhat obsessed with this photo of Dorothy Day. Taken in 1924 in Staten Island, it shows her at rest on a front porch, her legs curled to one side, her hat resting against a bare foot. There’s something remarkable in that stare, the sly smile, the ease of her posture. She was younger then than I am now — already a published novelist and a once arrested suffragette; still a decade removed from the birth of The Catholic Worker and even further distanced from her later civil rights protests and week-long fasts for peace.

    I stumbled upon the photo while investigating “personalism,” the first philosophy I’ve found that builds upon the radical politics of the Gospels. That phrase will no doubt make some uncomfortable, and perhaps it should. I’ve always joked that Christ was a socialist — joking makes it easier for both my audience and myself to ignore the practical consequences of such a statement — but I’m feeling more at ease now with the thought of saying the same with a straight face.

    The examples of people like Day and Peter Maurin make it easier, for they were willing to embrace the Marxist critique of capitalism and bourgeois complacency — and at a time when doing so went completely against the American grain — while tempering their politics with a deep love of Man and the truths of Christianity. More importantly, they put that faith into practice, improving the lives of thousands by their efforts.

    Casa Juan Diego is one product of Day’s and Maurin’s work. CJD’s Website provides a host of information and insightful commentary. I’ve spent hours and hours and hours there over the last few days, marveling at the consequences of lives lived in imitation of Christ.

  • Cold War Logic

    The first editorial I read today is also the best. What I love about this piece is that it makes explicit the paradox at the root of the current administration’s appropriation of Cold War rhetoric: while they have succeeded (though not without difficulty) in reducing the situation to a gross dichotomy (good America vs. evil totalitarianism), they have suddenly abandoned our six-decade policy of deterrence and containment. Every time I hear Dubya speak, I’m reminded of those Congressmen who we point to in our recent history books and laugh at, those who called for a preemptive nuclear attack on the Soviet Union in order to “guarantee peace.” Our containment policy has, of course, been fraught with problems — ethical problems most of all — but it seems odd to me that our new Cold War logic has made a bigger threat of Iraq than the Soviet Union ever was. I wish I could take some solace from thoughts of Dubya’s inevitable place in future editions of those same history texts, but too many lives are at stake.

    A quick note: The Artists Network has built several demonstrations around the slogan, “Our Grief is Not a Cry for War.” I wish I could attend just for an opportunity to hear “REVEREND BILLY & The Stop Shopping Gospel Choir.”

  • Democracy?

    Two weeks ago I read a wonderful novella by Joan Didion called, Democracy (1984). Near the end, we learn that one of the main characters is an Ollie North-like agent, a guy who embraces the profit potential and moral ambiguity of international affairs. I love Didion’s treatment of his downfall: “What Jack Lovett did was never black or white, and in the long run may even have been . . . devoid of ethical content altogether, but since shades of gray tended not to reproduce in the newspapers the story was not looking good on a breaking basis.”

    So, in pursuit of those gray areas, be sure to read Fred Hiatt’s column. After deftly summarizing the positions of both the hawks and the doves, he turns his attention to the more complex problems associated with our involvement in the Middle East:

    After achieving a crushing military victory last fall, Americans said that they would not walk away again from Afghanistan. Bush invoked the Marshall Plan. Yet, incredibly, with not even a year gone, Washington’s attention is drifting away. Administration officials say that they would not oppose broadening the inadequate peacekeeping force. But they wait for others to do the job.

    “We have a greater objective than eliminating threats and containing resentment,” President Bush said in his State of the Union speech. “We seek a just and peaceful world beyond the war on terror.”

    That is the right aspiration. No lesser goal could provide a foundation for war. But no speeches on Iraq will carry the day, no matter how inspiring the rhetoric or solemn the promises to stay the course, if explosions in Afghanistan are the accompaniment.

    This one’s been making the rounds, but if you haven’t seen it, be sure to check out the New Hampshire Gazette’s Chickenhawk Database. Seems that the folks behind our current war-mongering found some interesting ways of avoiding combat themselves. My favorite response is from Cheney, who apparently “had other priorities” during Vietnam. Also worth reading is Marty Jeezer’s great piece on the subject.

    And have I mentioned lately that This Modern World is really funny?

     

  • A Blessing and a Symbol

    Why am I surprised? The Sunday edition of my local paper leads with two “local interest” stories: one on a couple from Chattanooga who were married hours before driving to Knoxville for UT’s opening game; the other an embarrassing interview with a couple whose first child was born on the morning of September 11. If the folks at The Onion are paying attention, I would encourage them to rerun the story without alteration. My favorite line is from the proud and deeply earnest father:

    “We just want Audrey to be an encouragement, a blessing and a symbol of hope and inspiration to the people of America. Terrorists can take life out, but they can’t bring it in,” he said.

    I can’t really blame the father, though. When I read stories like this I wonder why the “journalist” felt any need to conduct the interview at all. The story writes itself. And it’s a story that goes down much more smoothly than, say, a discussion of Colin Powell’s curious defense of America’s preemptive attack policy. Did I say “preemptive”? Sorry. I meant “preventive.”

     

  • Nine Questions

    What with Dubya and Tony Blair now promising startling revelations in the coming weeks (what exactly does a dossier look like?), I’d like to join those who are encouraging the President to answer the following questions (courtesy of the editors of The Nation):

    1. Why engage in a risky and potentially calamitous invasion of Iraq when the existing strategy of “containment”–entailing no-fly zones, sanctions, technology restraints and the deployment of US forces in surrounding areas–not only has clearly succeeded in deterring Iraqi adventurism for the past ten years but also in weakening Iraq’s military capabilities?

    2. Why has the Administration found so little international support for its proposed policy, even among our closest friends and allies (with the possible exception of Britain’s Tony Blair), and what would be the consequences if Washington tried to act without their support and without any international legal authority? Isn’t it dangerous and unwise for the United States to engage in an essentially unilateral attack on Iraq?

    3. Is the United States prepared to accept significant losses of American lives–a strong possibility in the projected intense ground fighting around Baghdad and other urban areas?

    4. Is the United States prepared to inflict heavy losses on Iraq’s civilian population if, as expected, Saddam concentrates his military assets in urban areas? Would this not make the United States a moral pariah in the eyes of much of the world?

    5. Wouldn’t an invasion of Iraq aimed at the removal of Saddam Hussein remove any inhibitions he might have regarding the use of chemical and biological (and possibly nuclear) weapons, making their use more rather than less likely?

    6. Are we prepared to cope with the outbreaks of anti-American protest and violence that, in the event of a US attack on Iraq, are sure to erupt throughout the Muslim world, jeopardizing the survival of pro-US governments in Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia and further inflaming the Israeli-Palestinian crisis?

    7. Can the fragile American economy withstand a sharp rise in oil prices, another decline in air travel, a bulging federal deficit, a drop in consumer confidence and other negative economic effects that can be expected from a major war in the Middle East? And what would an invasion mean for an even more fragile world economy and for those emerging markets that depend on selling their exports to the United States and that are vulnerable to rising oil prices?

    8. Even if we are successful in toppling Saddam, who will govern Iraq afterward? Will we leave the country in chaos (as we have done in Afghanistan)? Or will we try to impose a government in the face of the inevitable Iraqi hostility if US forces destroy what remains of Iraq’s infrastructure and kill many of its civilians?

    9. Are we willing to deploy 100,000 or more American soldiers in Iraq for ten or twenty years (at a cost of tens of billions of dollars a year) to defend a US-imposed government and prevent the breakup of the country into unstable Kurdish, Sunni and Shiite mini-states?