Tag Archives: Afghanistan

Where was this foreign-policy Romney in the GOP primaries?

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Etch-a-Sketching Middle East policy

In pre-debate discussion on CurrentTV last night, former Vice President Al Gore speculated that Mitt Romney would need to avoid the pitfall of “too much endless war.” I wrote in my notes that “R will prob know how to avoid that one.”

Did he ever.

Whether Romney knew how best to avoid the pitfall of recommending endless war might be questioned.  But he knew enough to sidestep it over and over. I lost count of the number of times Romney endorsed President Obama’s actions and policies, particularly in regard to the Middle East.

 

Romney, President Obama on split screen

A plug:

Once again, C-Span came through for the public. Watching the debate on C-Span gave viewers something no other channel offered–a split-screen view of both candidates while each was speaking. Thus one could see, for example, Romney looking sick when moderator Bob Schieffer asked the president about Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak. The question was whether the president had any regrets about calling for Mubarak to step down. The answer was a firm no. Apparently Romney thought the answer was a good one; he responded to the Mubarak question by quickly saying that he had supported the president on Egypt.

 

Former dictator Gaddafi

Romney didn’t look a whole lot more robust when Obama discussed American policy in regard to previous conflict in Libya–including the fact that Libya was previously governed by long-time dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Does any GOP candidate even remember Gaddafi? Do any of the chicken-hawks eager to inflame tensions around the world–particularly in dangerous situations–even recall that Gaddafi was removed on the president’s watch, to U.S. advantage as well as to the advantage of his own people, without American boots on the ground?

For that matter, do any of the Republicans running for national office remember that a series of dictators has fallen in the last four years? Where was the mention of a string of collapsed dictators, when Romney attempted to rattle off a stump-speech litany of administration failures?

To his credit, Romney began on a conciliatory note by saying, “I congratulate him” [Obama] on getting Osama bin Laden.

Romney, Schieffer, Obama

Romney also did not mistakenly mix up Osama bin Laden’s name with President Obama’s. Every little bit helps. Romney even went on to say, “but we can’t kill our way out of this mess”–making two people on his ticket (as of this writing) going for non-military-intervention in hot spots, for a total of four on the two national tickets. No saying how the rabid right wing of his party will receive the message, but at least he stuck with it through the course of the debate.

As mentioned, Romney’s statements often paralleled the president’s or paralleled administration policy. Romney voluntarily brought up the U.N. (Those words should probably be highlighted and bold-faced in red.) He expressed a desire to “help the Muslim world.” He spoke favorably of policy recommendations from a group of scholars. He referred to “economic development.” He voluntarily brought up “foreign aid.”

Where was this Romney during the Republican debates of the campaign season?

When the president said firmly, in response to Schieffer’s question about Syria, that Syrians have to determine their own future but that the administration is organizing the international community, working to isolate the dictator and to support the opposition–without military intervention and without providing arms that might later be turned against the U.S.–Romney had no rebuttal. No counter-offer. No specifics. But he, too, to do him justice, said clearly that “we don’t want to get drawn into a military conflict” in Syria.

Romney, in short, agreed with Obama on Egypt, on Syria, on the Muslim world and its youth, on engaging in commerce, on supporting education around the world, on supporting women’s rights around the world–and on Pakistan and Afghanistan.

That last might be the big item. After repeatedly criticizing the White House for even wishing to get out of Afghanistan, the Republican presidential nominee came through with a key policy endorsement in the clutch: “we’re gonna be finished [in Afghanistan] by 2014,” Romney said. He said it more than once, too: the troops will be “out by 2014.”

More bold red highlighting needed. In response to questions from Schieffer about Pakistan, Romney even went so far as to say, “I don’t blame the administration” for going into Pakistan (without permission). “We had to go in there,” Romney said, if we were going to get bin Laden.

Even in regard to China, Romney’s policy suggestions parallel those of the administration. With a lot of tough talk about Chinese piracy, hacking, and currency manipulation, Romney still had this to offer: “China can be our partner.” Since no Republican candidate wants a ‘trade war’, he pretty much had to say it. It still left him in a vulnerable position, politically; as Obama mentioned–speaking of trade–“You ship jobs overseas.”

More on some of the domestic-policy talk that derailed the foreign policy debate, later. For now a slight plug for Current TV. Current TV made the mistake of the decade firing Keith Olbermann. It made itself look petty and feeble. It lost ratings. It may tank financially. But it did offer an entertaining gimmick with the candidate debates: Viewers can read tweets on the debate scrolling below the screen while watching the debate. This has its downside, of course. One gets a microscopic up-close-and-personal look at some right-wing ignorance.

Furthermore, the tweets are selected by someone behind the scenes at CurrentTV. When I helpfully tweeted Current, during the second presidential debate, that sound problems were distorting the president’s voice, the tweet did not appear. The sound problems seem to have been corrected, though by that time I had switched to C-Span.

Back to the tweets last night–they were helpful on Romney’s oral mistakes; for example, Romney mixed up ‘Iraq’ and ‘Iran’ more than once, etc. Although I don’t recall anyone picking up on Romney’s remarkable claim that “The economy is not stronger” (than four years ago), tweets were alive with Romney misstatements. Even with GOP spinsters horning in, Obama won the tweets column.

Farther down and later on, one could sense big guns getting alarmed at President Obama’s strong performance in contrast to Romney’s feeble one. Karl Rove and Ann Coulter took a valuable minute out of their busy schedules to tweet a diss of the president. The cavalry appears over the top of the hill.

They got some help from an odd source: For some reason the otherwise astute Eliot Spitzer, Olbermann’s replacement, keeps preaching from the text that ‘the economy’ is ‘Romney’s issue’. ‘The economy’? Romney’s issue? After the mortgage-derivatives crisis? With Romney’s background? This from a man who as New York’s Attorney General went after the bad guys on Wall Street?

Politics makes strange bedfellows, as they say. It also makes strange theory-weddings.

Weird.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The 2012 southern strategy and a GOP pincer movement on Afghanistan

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2012 southern strategy and the giant pincer movement on Afghanistan

 

In Afghanistan

 

The political equation of winning-and-losing is far from the most important point about Afghanistan. The shooting spree by a U.S. soldier who apparently had a nervous breakdown and shot Afghan civilians, including women and children, is only the most recent dreadful event.

Not one Afghani was on those planes on September 11, 2001. Not one. The only connection between Afghanistan and the paired, parallel attacks of 9/11 was Osama bin Laden, encamped with his wealth in the ruling regime over the hapless Afghanis.

There was also not one political reporter in the national political press in Washington, D.C., who pointed out this fact in the heyday of George W. Bush’s popularity after 9/11.

The Afghan people—much as they undoubtedly hated foreigners on Islamic territory—had about as much say in regard to bin Laden’s presence as television viewers in the U.S. today have in regard to the number of commercials on cable television. Or less, since theoretically our elected officials could brace up the FCC and control paid commercials on air time that subscribers have already paid for.

 

Ron Paul

On the campaign trail, the only Republican candidate who comes close to persuasive sanity on the Middle East is still Ron Paul, whose views have been consistent throughout his years in Congress.

 

Gingrich

A new development looms, however, politically speaking. On yesterday morning’s talk shows, Newt Gingrich began making little noises about pulling out of Afghanistan. Not a clarion call, still a deviation from the usual bellicosity. Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum, as always, continue to call for more bloodshed, and even the concept of an end in sight—some day—continues to be disparaged or ridiculed. So on one side of the argument, as the GOP presidential campaign swings through the South, you have Paul and to some extent Gingrich; on the other you have Romney and Santorum.

 

Santorum

In narrowly political terms, it’s a lose-lose for the president, as always with these guys, in a situation not of Obama’s making. If Obama succeeds in getting us out of Afghanistan—as most decent people hope—it will be too soon for Romney, Santorum and the professional saber rattlers, no matter when it is. If we remain mired in Afghanistan, there will be hints from the Gingrich types that more could be done to get out.

There is always an underlying tension between GOP voters who are primarily evangelicals, on one hand, and GOPers who are primarily fans of militarism. There is also a tension between extreme militarists and genuine fiscal conservatives. Wars cost treasure as well as blood. The uneasy overlap among the three big ‘wings’ of the party—rightwing Christians, rightwing monetarists, and rightwing militarists—also goes largely unreported in a press contingent eager to play up divisions among Latinos or other Democratic voters.

It will be interesting to see whether Gingrich’s most recent comments on Afghanistan affect his results in tomorrow’s southern primaries in Alabama and Mississippi, for better or worse. He has sagged somewhat in polls over the past couple of days.

 

The word was

Meanwhile, in the South, the campaigns are working hard. Voters (including Democratic voters) across the Mississippi Delta are being inundated with robo-calls from the Romney campaign. One asks the householder to stay on the line for a telephone ‘town meeting’ with Rick Santorum, who is heard saying (2008) that Romney is the only choice. Another offers a recorded conversation between Newt Gingrich and Nancy Pelosi, agreeing on something. Another brings the recorded voice of former NBC news anchor Tom Brokaw, announcing that Gingrich has been censured by Congress on ethics charges.

Speaking of the FCC.

Notwithstanding the foregoing, Romney is being castigated for the wrong things. Far too many commentators are harpooning his harmless “grits” comments–about liking grits, about eating the local food while in the South. Far too few are taking him to task for being in favor of apparently every war, everywhere, regardless of the cost to other Americans and to other human beings.

 

But the establishment GOP has been given a free pass on that for years.

What is the ‘centrist’ number of Americans and Iraqis killed in Iraq?

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In 1971, decorated Vietnam War veteran turned antiwar activist John Kerry asked a Senate committee, “How do you ask a man to be the last man killed in Vietnam?”

Today we need to ask an updated question: what is the centrist number of people killed in Iraq?

[Example headline: “Democrats Push Toward Middle On Iraq Policy,” WashPost Sept. 13, 2007]

Twentieth-century physics upended previous ideas about time,
space and mass. Mass converts into energy; energy changes rather than being
gained or lost; time and space are relative to each other. Albert Einstein, he
of the adorable face, space-physics hair, and loving eyes, combined some
premier principles into one simple formula.

Einstein

Heading into the 21stcentury–and stuck in Iraq, unless we the people do something about it–we need to apply some equally lucid conversion principles to the Iraq war.

Here is the simple formulation: the more time we spend in Iraq, the more lives lost.

Time translates to death. More time translates to more death and injury. Less time translates to less death and injury.

This is the formulation that the White House, the GOP in Congress, and most Republican candidates for the White House, with the honorable exception of Ron Paul, do not want mentioned. They keep trying to change the real formulation – more time means more fatalities – into the bogus alchemy of self-serving rhetoric – less time means ‘failure,’ while for unspecific reasons more time in Iraq means ‘success.’ Pulling out – that is, reducing our losses of life, limb and treasure suffered–means ‘losing,’ and staying means–again, for unspecified reasons– ‘victory.’

The real loss was going in. The real failure was the immoral, illegal and unconstitutional invasion of another country.

 

Meanwhile, top-crust administration figures and their allies in the large media outlets keep using a similar head-banging Orwellian lexicon to characterize the big argument about the war. People who want us out of Iraq, in this War-Is-Peace twist, are “left”–never mind public survey polls showing that a solid majority of Americans want us out of there. People who insist on our staying in Iraq, on whatever omigod pretext, are characterized as “conservative”–never mind that Congressman Paul (R-Texas) and many of his supporters are conservative, as are publications such as Chronicles Magazine that have consistently opposed the war.

Most grating of all, officeholders and candidates for office who keep us stuck in Iraq by waffling publicly, temporizing instead of taking a stand, are characterized as “centrists,” or “moderates” as in a series of Washington Post items about Maine Senator Olympia Snowe, designated “the anguished moderate.”

Virtually all the big media outlets have adopted this terminology, even though this kind of language desecrates the very notion of language– English–as communication.

More time in Iraq means more casualties. Less time in Iraq means fewer casualties. It’s that simple. So what is the ‘moderate’ number of young American servicemen and servicewomen to be injured or worse? Even aside from the fact that we are currently nearing the 4,000 mark, what was the ‘moderate’ position on the acceptable amount of death, injury, psychological trauma, sexual assaults and domestic violence, and all the other ills connected with war, going into Iraq? Now that we are nearing the 4,000 mark for deaths, what is the ‘moderate’ quota for American death in Iraq and Afghanistan? What, for that matter, is the moderate quota for killed and wounded Iraqis?

What is the ‘centrist’ number of deaths in Iraq?

So They ‘Surveilled’ Financial Institutions? – You Don’t Say

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So they ‘surveilled’ financial institutions? – You don’t say

On July 29, the Democrats wound up their national convention and awaited the anticipated ‘bounce’ in the week’s opinion polls.  On August 2, the administration announced, with maximum fanfare, that U.S. financial institutions and locales in New York and Washington were under surveillance by terrorists.

 

Bush, Porter Goss

Some thoughts here:

(1) My own call on this one is that it demonstrates beyond a reasonable doubt that the Bush White House uses terror alerts as bludgeons in domestic politics, especially since–as it turns out–some of the purported information on terrorism was three years old.  It seems to have worked, too, at least for the capital’s pundits:  the following Sunday, Chris Matthews’ weekly opinion-experts’ panel voted that Bush had ‘won’ the week, and administration media shills including Charles Krauthammer gleefully proclaimed that Kerry had gotten no bounce.

(2) Unfortunately, along with the older information, the flamboyant items also involved some sensitive information.  The news released by the administration compromised a (rare) actual investigation by disclosing the name of an undercover intelligence asset, and was followed by an equally abrupt round-up of several suspects, with more risk and less stealth than law enforcement personnel would have preferred.  To call the media release cavalier would be charitable.

(3) The release was also timed fortuitously in another way:  old though some of the information was, it came just that little bit too late for the suspects and other witnesses to be interviewed by the 9/11 Commission or by congressional investigators.  Two of the suspects were relatives of alleged 9/11 planner Khalid Sheikh Mohamed.  Why weren’t they pulled in shortly after KSM’s capture, if not before?

(4) Anyone privileged to read about the CIA’s role in supporting the Taliban, through Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), has to be aware of Pakistan’s support for terrorism.  Much terrorist funding came (and still comes) from Saudi Arabia, more than ever now after the invasion of Iraq.  But mujahideen training, schooling, transportation and logistics have come extensively from Pakistan, as the administration knows:  the Osama bin Laden-ISI-Taliban triangle is an old story.  Presumably, the CIA and ISI could have pulled in the usual suspects earlier than summer 2003.

(5) One last, sad story.  Among the genuine 9/11 investigations short-changed and/or outright impeded by the administration are scientific investigations of the sites.  The National Science Foundation gave several special awards immediately after September 11, 2001, for expert investigation including a study of the World Trade Center debris by a much-credentialed engineering professor at Berkeley.  The result? –Mayor Giuliani and Governor Pataki had the debris hauled away immediately and destroyed; the authorities involved never gave the engineering researchers the videos, blueprints and other primary material requested; and wild conspiracy theories of ‘controlled demolition’ are floating around three years later, even though hundreds of people saw the planes hitting the towers.

Professor Astaneh’s own suggestion about the skyjackers is that they did not know the buildings would implode but intended the towers to topple onto the Stock Exchange, causing thousands more deaths and crippling the much-hated US financial sector.  It’s only a guess–as he points out, “there are not enough data for a hypothesis”–but it sounds like a good guess.

The item that purported assailants had financial institutions under surveillance sounds valid.  Three years ago, however, we were all barraged through corporate media outlets about an “attack on America.”  An attack on Wall Street and the Pentagon is still an attack on America, but it’s too bad the networks’ thrust had to be so aggressive on this point; I think the American people could have been trusted to draw the right conclusions on their own.  Surely, given all the deaths and injuries, the grief and heroism, we could safely have been allowed to hear that the hijackers thought they were dealing a crippling blow to US military and financial centers.  Couldn’t we?

 

Iraq WMD

But only now, safely after wars have been launched against pitiful Afghanistan and starved-and-strangled Iraq, are we allowed to hear widely that the assailants had financial institutions in their sights.

Afghanistan