97 replies to this topic

[Azat]

Alpha, MJ, Very nice. This is one of the reasons why after 2 years I still come to this forum everyday. Always an opportunity to learn from members like you.

MJ could I ask a personal question? Are you a Libertarian? If not, have you considered it?

[MJ]

Azat,

In some issues I am Liberal, in other issues I am Conservative. In fact, I don’t understand it when one qualifies himself/herself liberal or conservative across the board.

I do think that I am Libertarian by my essence, as a person.

However, I tend to vote Republican – the least of the two evils.

[Azat]

I vote Democratic all the time but tend to think like a Liberal when it comes to most fiscal policies and school and health funding and such. I have similar feelings as you when it comes to people who feel others owe them things.

[alpha]

The interview below has some relevance to the discussion we are having in this thread. MJ, I will try to more clearly articulate my points next time. Interesting discussion indeed. We both desire a peaceful world with no nuclear weapons, but the way to achieve that goal you see through Pax-Americana, I see through international institutions. I will get back to this subject some other time. I am really pressed on time now.

Russia, Saint-Petersburg
Date: 2003.03.24 19:41

Pax Americana - Living Reality
Alexander Rahr, a well-known German political scientist specialising in Eastern European affairs, shared his prognosis concerning the development of events in the Middle East and their effects on Europe and the rest of the world with the Rosbalt news agency.



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- On March 20, Germany witnessed a wave or demonstrations against the US invasion of Iraq. Schoolchildren went to the streets with slogans instead of going to their classrooms, workers demonstrated instead of doing their jobs. Do you think this 'spontaneous' reaction may, in fact, have been well coordinated by someone?
- In fact, for Germany, this is truly phenomenal.
This is phenomenal not just because the streets are full of so many antiwar protestors - for the first time in decades. It is also phenomenal because, for the first time since WW2, the government and people are united in their antiwar impulse. Federal ministers walk the streets of Berlin among other protestors, while the Federal Chancellor speaks the words one can hear at an antiwar meeting - from the podium in the Bundestag. An absolute majority of Germans oppose this war.

- However, there is no complete unity where attitudes toward the war in Iraq are concerned, is there? Angela Merkel, the leader of the SPD/CDU party coalition, which is among the most influential in Germany, says that Christian Democrats support the US.

- Well, here we deal with the duality of feelings that we find in any German.
On the one hand, the Germans are very much afraid that America's war against Iraq may turn into a war between the Christian West and Islam. They are afraid of bomb explosions in German streets and crazy warriors of Allah seizing aeroplanes and sending anthrax and plague germs in mail. Of course, one should keep in mind that the post-war decades shaped all Germans into total pacifists.

Pacifism was instilled in them to such a degree that many young people even became militant pacifists who are now so loud in German squares. Militant pacifism first became evident during the Kosovo war, when Germany supported NATO and even sent her troops to Yugoslavia. Yet then the pacifist movement was timid, still having to overcome much resistance, lots of it in these people's own minds.
On the other hand, the Germans, the government as much as the people, are afraid of losing the US as a friend and protector.

Immediately after WW2, the Americans began helping the Germans to restore and develop their country. Of course, many say that America was after her own ends while doing that. Yet whatever it was, America and no one else helped Germany to become 'the engine of Europe', an economically developed and politically influential country. This is why now many Germans are reluctant to quarrel with America over Saddam Hussein.

- Yet in his public address, President Johannes Rau was very seriously saying that anti-Americanism was inadmissible in Germany. Does this mean that there are certain anti-American sentiments?

- I see no anti-American tendencies in German society. The Germans are rather in shock because America, which for a long time was their role model, friend, and protector, is suddenly getting involved in such a shady enterprise.
I believe this is why so many sharp words have been lately said by the Germans about America.

- Chancellor Schroeder, who was the first among European leaders to say he could not accept American actions toward Iraq, now has been, as it were, pushed aside by the Presidents of France and Russia. French and Russian voices are now the loudest among those of other protestors.

- I must admit, I believe that Mr. Schroeder is the most honest of the three mentioned leaders. He opposes the war outside of any purposes other than trying to keep the word he gave his constituents. His pacifism is, sometimes, simply naïve. Chirac and Putin leave certain loopholes for themselves that allow them continued negotiations with the US, while Schroeder literally put himself in an isolation, even in Germany.

Joschka Fischer, for instance, when speaking about the Iraq conflict, softens his tone, gets evasive, while trying to make some space for Germany to manoeuvre. Schroeder, on the other hand, is simply appalled at what Bush is doing and is not trying to hide it. There are no geopolitics in his reaction.
France is the leader among the three European protestors. Her leaders even now are trying to grab as much political space in the post-was multipolar world as possible .

The French hope to become the new political pole opposed to Pax Americana. In the meantime, Germany does not want any multipolar world at all. As soon as this war is over, the Germans will again side with he US, you will see.

- Is this what you believe will happen? And when, do you think, this war is going to end?

- I am no military expert. However, I think this must take probably about three weeks. At least, judging by what is happening on financial markets.

- And then what?

- Everyone will calm down and get used to the new alignment of forces, while the US will get busy 'disarming' North Korea, Iran, Syria maybe, and making new mistakes.

At this time, America is the only superpower in the world, even though she has not yet reached her top power. Pax Americana is the reality of our time, and there is nothing anyone can do about it. Of course, this also will end. I think, in about ten years, the multipolarity of the world will become far more apparent. Then we will need new a United Nations, different from the organisation now.

- Do you think the role of the UN has declined because of the Iraq conflict?

- As the world government, the UN began declining even at the time of the conflict in Kosovo. This organisation has been in need of reforming for over 5 years. It was created on the basis of the post-war realities, which existed in 1945. Later, it was reshaped to fit into the cold war realities. And now, we have a total new reality.

The new 'world government' must include southern countries, such as Brazil, India, Pakistan, and Australia. They have their own vision of the world and their own problems, which today's UN knows rather little about.
Unless their interests are taken into account, a conflict between the North and the South may replace the long gone by then conflict between the West and the East. Do you think, anyone needs that?
Besides, Russia and Germany also may become very important for the new world community.

- Do you think it is possible , in the light of the above, that Germany, well, let's better say the European Union may begin closely cooperating with Russia?

- The European Union is a very viable organisation. It keeps developing and very successfully. The Europeans have already realised that as separate national states they have no chance of becoming significant figures in the multipolar structure of humanity. Only a united Europe is worth something. Also, make a note of the fact that while America is strong and the world is Pax Americana, Europe can and most likely will be also strong and economically sound.

Yet the true political significance of the European Union is still ahead. If it closely cooperates with Russia, the significance of both parties will grow. So everything is possible. However, at this time, it is not yet so. The Europeans still distrust Russia because of their memories of cold war.
As to the Russians, they are in no hurry to begin completely trusting the Germans either - for the same reason and, going even further back, remembering WW2.

An active generation must come and go for true cooperation to begin to develop. Well, we still have time.

- Let us keep hoping

The interviewer was Boris Nemirovsky, Berlin

Translated by Alex Nemtsev


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©2001-2002 Rosbalt News Agency

[Sasun]

IMO, of all versions of what is happening now, realpolitik explains the best. This is about the US ability and desire to establish a global domination in the world. Countries opposing the war are motivated by resistance to US domination, not because of humanitarian reasons, simply because it would diminish the degree they have any say in the world politics (and economics since it is now very much entangled with politics). Had France, or Germany, Russia, China had the chance of global domination, they would certainly do the same what the US is doing.
Ther rest of effects are consequences of realpolitik, although some things cannot be explained by the latter (e.g. demonstrations in the US and UK, activiteis of international humanitarian organizations). All politicians' statements that we hear, be it US or European leaders, are simply politics and a cover for their actions and agendas. Well, this is the old rule of international politics, nothing new in essence, just taking a new form ...

[Azat]

From Forbes Magazine

OutFront
Bowl-o-Drama
Daniel Lyons, 12.09.02

Michael Moore's Oscar-contender documentary, Bowling for Columbine, pokes fun at corporate creeps and hypocrites in his crusade to figure out who is to blame for the gun-related violence in America. But we've found Moore's facts a little slippery.

TITLE: Moore titled the movie Bowling for Columbine because, he suggests, the two kids who shot up Columbine High in Littleton, Colo., went to a 6 a.m. bowling class on the day of the attack.
ACTUALLY: Cool story, but police say it's not true. They say the shooters skipped their bowling class that day.

MISSILES: Moore wonders whether kids at Columbine might be driven to violence because of the "weapons of mass destruction" made in Lockheed Martin's assembly plant in Littleton. Moore shows giant rockets being assembled.
ACTUALLY: Lockheed Martin's plant in Littleton doesn't make weapons. It makes space launch vehicles for TV satellites.

WELFARE: Moore places blame for a shooting by a child in Michigan on the work-to-welfare program that prevented the boy's mother from spending time with him.
ACTUALLY: Moore doesn't mention that mom had sent the boy to live in a house where her brother and a friend kept drugs and guns.

BANK: Moore says North Country Bank & Trust in Traverse City, Mich., offered a deal where, "if you opened an account, the bank would give you a gun." He walks into a branch and walks out with a gun.
ACTUALLY: Moore didn't just walk in off the street and get a gun. The transaction was staged for cameras. You have to buy a long-term CD, then go to a gun shop to pick up the weapon after a background check.

http://www.forbes.co..._requestid=6287

[MJ]

I found another material which has some relevance to some of our previous discussions:

The Real Roots of Arab Anti-Americanism
Barry Rubin
From Foreign Affairs, November/December 2002



Summary: Despite what many argue, Arab and Muslim rage at the United States has had very little to do with actual U.S. policies--policies that have been remarkably pro-Arab over the past 50 years. Promoting anti-Americanism is simply the best way Muslim leaders have found to distract their publics from the real problem: internal mismanagement. New U.S. policies or a PR campaign will not change matters.

Barry Rubin is Director of the Global Research in International Affairs Center and Editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs. His latest books are The Tragedy of the Middle East and Anti-American Terrorism and the Middle East.

DAMN YANKEES

Since last year's attacks on New York and Washington, the conventional wisdom about the motivation behind such deadly terrorism has gelled. The violence, we are often told, was a reaction to misguided U.S. policies. For years, certain American actions -- such as the country's support for Israel and for unpopular, oppressive Arab regimes -- had supposedly produced profound grievances throughout the Middle East. Those grievances came to a boil over time, and finally spilled over on September 11. The result was more than 3,000 American deaths.

Although anti-Americanism is genuinely widespread among Arab governments and peoples, however, there is something seriously misleading in this account. Arab and Muslim hatred of the United States is not just, or even mainly, a response to actual U.S. policies -- policies that, if anything, have been remarkably pro-Arab and pro-Muslim over the years. Rather, such animus is largely the product of self-interested manipulation by various groups within Arab society, groups that use anti-Americanism as a foil to distract public attention from other, far more serious problems within those societies.

This distinction should have a profound impact on American policymakers. If Arab anti-Americanism turns out to be grounded in domestic maneuvering rather than American misdeeds, neither launching a public relations campaign nor changing Washington's policies will affect it. In fact, if the United States tries to prove to the Arab world that its intentions are nonthreatening, it could end up making matters even worse. New American attempts at appeasement would only show radicals in the Middle East that their anti-American strategy has succeeded and is the best way to win concessions from the world's sole superpower.

THE BLAME GAME

For years now, anti-Americanism has served as a means of last resort by which failed political systems and movements in the Middle East try to improve their standing. The United States is blamed for much that is bad in the Arab world, and it is used as an excuse for political and social oppression and economic stagnation. By assigning responsibility for their own shortcomings to Washington, Arab leaders distract their subjects' attention from the internal weaknesses that are their real problems. And thus rather than pushing for greater privatization, equality for women, democracy, civil society, freedom of speech, due process of law, or other similar developments sorely needed in the Arab world, the public focuses instead on hating the United States.

What makes this strategy remarkable, however, is the reality of past U.S. policy toward the region. Obviously, the United States, like all countries, has tried to pursue a foreign policy that accords with its own interests. But the fact remains that these interests have generally coincided with those of Arab leaders and peoples. For example, the United States may have had its own reasons for saving Kuwait from annexation by Iraq's secular dictatorship in 1991 -- mainly to preserve cheap oil. But U.S. policy was still, in effect, pro-Kuwaiti, pro-Muslim, and pro-Arab. After all, Washington could have used the war as a pretext to seize Kuwait's oil fields for ...

[to acquire the rest of the material requires a fee]

http://www.foreignaf...mericanism.html

[Dan]

The Columbine Coverup. What is left out of the news is the undercurrent that propelled those two young students to do what they did. Both were strugglng with homosexual feelings and had been harassed unmercifully for many years by their peers. The school adminstrators had done nothing to stop this and had even encouraged the tormentors.

Yes, and that would also explain why one of the two yelled 'who here is a Catholic?' (if I remember correctly), and when a girl jumped up and said 'I'm a Catholic!', they shot her. Perhaps that has something to do with the views of the Catholic church and community on homosexuality?

Believe it or not, I don't view those 2 kids who shot the others as criminals. I think they were all victims of the cruel system we're all living in.

We need to view the Columbine shootings in a compassionate manner, not with angry resentment. So that history wouldn't repeat itself.

Dan

[Dan]

I don't know... If gay-bashing, or even anti-gay sentiment is the reason behind the massacres, then there would be a hell of a lot more high-school murderous rampages going throughout the world. Besides, kids get harrassed all the time. Kids make fun of other kids. It's a fact of life - it builds character, it teaches valuable lessons. It certainly doesn't create murderers.

Well, each individual has a way of reacting to it. Did you know that those who have been abused react more strongly to another sexual assault or hints of contact of sexaul nature? Who knows what those kids' background and experiences were? Before going ahead and calling them racists, anti-Semites (which the Jewish community did, even though I believe there were no Jewish kids killed - or maybe one out of 12), we should first take a look at the abuse those kids took from others. Remember, if someone is raped and goes and kills the person who raped him/her, it's called the battered-person syndrome. People have been cleared of charges of murder on that basis. The mind is a weird thing - it has weird ways of functioning and reacting... Sometimes good, sometimes bad...

Person 1 might be strong and might be able to tolerate gay-bashing and bullying, Person 2 might not be able to. Remember, many people are bullied (not necessarily for their homosexuality), but not all commit suicide - only some do. For some, it builds character, for some it builds anger and resentment, and for some, it builds despair, which eventually leads to an outburst...

And no, bullying is not a fact of life. It can be stopped. If you look at the nature of bullying, you will see that all of it comes from the parents - the way the parents talk at home about homosexuals, Jews, Arabs, blacks, etc. It fills kids with anger and hatred, and because most of them don't have a good judgement at their age, it makes a huge impact on their personality. And yes, it DOES create murderers - murderers who are victims of the system.

If those 2 kids were indeed gay and if there was gay-bashing against them and the teachers/supervisors did nothing to stop it, I think those supervisors should be held responsible for it, rather than those 2 kidss.

Dan

[nairi]

One question to our resident Canadians: do YOU lock your doors?

I finally watched this movie on DVD last night and must say that there were some fair points in there, especially concerning that whole fear-culture. I notice that every time I go back to LA or have relatives come to Holland. Sadly, however, like everything else American, the fear-culture too is beginning make its way here Just ten years ago we didn't lock our doors...

[bellthecat]

I finally watched this movie on DVD last night and must say that there were some fair points in there, especially concerning that whole fear-culture.

I finally watched it on TV about a week earlier. What a BIG disapointment it was. Silly and childish. Moore comes over as a spoilt brat who makes a whole film to prove something he had decided on in advance. And ends by not proving anything!

What was the point of all his opposition to the gun culture stuff, when, as he says, there are even more guns owned by Canadians. I'd guess the point was that it was an excuse for him to use his pointless (but good publicity blurb for the film) interview with Heston, whe actually ended up appearing much more mature than Moore could ever be. Moore is someone who would exploit anything and anyone for his own ends. That bit where he places the photo of the dead girl in Heston's house was really sick. I wonder, did that girls parents know how Moore was going to abuse her image?

The "fear culture" thing was the only interesting thing the film explored - and he didn't do it in any great depth - I guess because that subject was out of his intellectual depth.

Steve

[Azat]

BRAVO Steve. Very nice review of this film and Moore

[Stormig]

Well, Bowling For Columbine was meant for the masses, not the "intellectuals"...

[Stormig]

I unfortunately got to watch only the first half of the movie - and you have to admit that what the parent said to the public about his killed son, that he wasn't killed with a Colt or something but a semi-automatic with which obviously you're not going to go deer-hunting, was right on the spot!
If you read his recent book, Dude, Where's My Country?, he goes more into the "culture of fear," and, I swear, I am about cured of being a hypochondriac.
I'm not going to go into who he is and what his purpose is, but I find myself coming up with tidbits now and then when reading him, things he doesn't say himself. I mean, just relax, kick back, and enjoy your reading, and when you're done ask yourself if some things haven't been straightened out in your head at all. NONE of the stuff about Iraq is new to any of us - I have been reading stuff from a variety of sources, ranging from the American leftists to Asia Times Online (and occasionally posting stuff here) - yet he knows how to put pieces into place. Yeah, why don't I read mainstream American? Because they are morons who swallow hook, line, and sink.
I'm not gonna review the book - those that care to know can read it themselves.
Precision operations with minimum loss of Iraqi lives, my arse... Like I said before, we heard that in Afghanistan, too, yet there was that journalist who visited that one wiped-out village where "nothing had happened" according to American mainstream...
One thing I just laughed my butt off at was the story of the husband who shoots his wife on her way to the bathroom, thinking it's a burglar instead. Talk about fear culture. Just the thing a redneck or a Turk would do. j/k

And, come on now, this was pathetic:

WELFARE: Moore places blame for a shooting by a child in Michigan on the work-to-welfare program that prevented the boy's mother from spending time with him.
ACTUALLY: Moore doesn't mention that mom had sent the boy to live in a house where her brother and a friend kept drugs and guns.

As if that mothers can't spend appropriate time to look after their children can't be true - http://armenians.com...?showtopic=7348 The shooting is only part of the problem!

[nairi]

I love your honesty, Steve

[bellthecat]

I love your honesty, Steve

Too honest for my own (or others) good sometimes.

[bellthecat]

About the "culture of fear" thing - there was a fascinating documentary series on British TV a couple of yeas ago. It was about Freud and his (and his family's)unhealth influences on western society. I think it was called "hidden hands".

Seems that |Freud had (as a result of the events of the ww1 period) developed a phobia about people in general, he believed that they were all basically irrational and dangerous, and their desires needed to be controlled by their "betters" if society was to survive. This questionable belief was the cornerstone to all his theories.

I would guess that when Freud's credo became widely accepted in America, from the 1920s onward, an inevitable side effect was that America's "culture of fear" started. By its nature it had to be an internalised fear (as opposed to the fear generated by Nazi Germany to unify the country that was directed specifically at the outsider, at "the enemy").

Steve

[Azat]

http://www.drudgereport.com/rcmm.htm

The guy is a total hypicrit...