Is it just me or does it also appear to you that the U.S. (i.e. Obama) led invasion of Libya is strikingly similar to the U.S. (i.e. George Bush) led invasion of Iraq. Both were originally justified on grounds which were soon departed from. In Iraq, when it became clear that there were no WMD's, the rationale for the war became "regime change". In Libya, the war originally was justified on the "no fly" zone premise - i.e. make sure that the Libyan air force could not be used to attack civilians. When that was quickly accomplished, the West began blowing up Libyan tanks and armor on the ground in order to assist the opposition in their desire for "regime change". Thus in both cases the removal of brutal dictators from power became the raison d'etre for the intervention, although in neither case did it start out that way.
Another similarity is that neither country posed an immediate and direct threat to American or western interests. Yes, both dictators funded and supported terrorists, who did pose a threat. If anything, Iraq posed a greater threat to Western interests and the interests of its neighbors than did Libya. (Remember the invasion of Kuwait?) Libya, in fact, has in recent years shifted somewhat towards assisting the West in fighting Al Quaeda, much more so than one could say of Saddam. Thus, if this was the basis for either of the wars, the invasion of Iraq was more justifiable than the Libyan adventure.
Both countries had repressive and cruel dictators. Although it is difficult to place them on a cruelty scale, if one did, it seems to be that Hussein would best Gaddafi on this scale. After all, he massacred hundreds of thousands of his own people, using chemical weapons to do so. And if one were to use the removal of oppressive dictators as the justification for a foreign intervention, it would be impossible for the West to stop at either Iraq or Libya.
There is one difference. George W. actually sought and obtained Congressional approval for his war. President Obama did not. He was not even around for his war, deciding to go on his South American trade trip instead.
Now do not get me wrong. I am glad that Saddam Hussein was deposed, and I will be glad if Gaddafi is. The fact that we cannot and do not get rid of all repressive dictators is no reason not to get rid of some of them. What bothers me, as it always does, is the hypocrisy of those who were so quick to condemn George W for Iraq, but who now describe the Libyan intervention as a "just war". At least those on the far left who want Obama impeached are consistent.
George W. must be chuckling to himself right now. It will be very interesting to hear what President Obama has to say tonight and what the reaction will be.
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
The 2012 Presidential Campaign
The 2012 Presidential campaign will be very interesting to watch. It will clearly be very different from 2008 for obvious reasons.
First, President Obama will be unable to focus his campaign on being the anti-Bush. This will rob him of his major, and one might say his principal, 2008 message. President Obama will have his own record to defend. Things can no longer be blamed on George W.
Second, President Obama will be unable to campaign on a "Change You Can Believe In" theme. No-one will be buying that. The past three years have been more like "business as usual" for US politics; arguably even worse than usual.
Third, there will be a lot of 2008 campaign promises not kept which will be targets for opponents. For example, not only is Guantanamo not closed. but military trials have been supported by the Administration. Promises of transparency in legislation have not been kept. A lot of Bush era foreign policies have been followed. I am sure opponents, both on the left and the right, will be able to come up with a long list of broken promises.
Fourth, the President seems to have lost the "far" left. Calls for his impeachment by Democrats and liberal supporters regarding his Libya intervention are really quite amazing. Obama's weak defense of the treatment of Private Manning while in detention has drawn the wrath of human rights groups and liberals. The President strangely enough now seems to appeal more to soft conservatives than to liberals.
Fifth, the world has not gone well. Peace in the Middle East between the Israelis and Palestinians seems to be further away now than ever. The turmoil in the Arab world itself, involving the attempted overthrow of American friendly regimes, has caught the President off guard. Talking with one's enemies, like Iran's Ahmadenijad, has not happened and is not going to happen. The US unemployment rate is still very high, housing sales have slumped terribly, the deficit has ballooned. Through this all, President Obama has seemed strangely absent.
The one strong card the President has of course is that a Republican must emerge who can beat him. Whether this will happen remains to be seen. One thing is for sure, however. The 2012 Presidential campaign will be a lot different than the last one.
First, President Obama will be unable to focus his campaign on being the anti-Bush. This will rob him of his major, and one might say his principal, 2008 message. President Obama will have his own record to defend. Things can no longer be blamed on George W.
Second, President Obama will be unable to campaign on a "Change You Can Believe In" theme. No-one will be buying that. The past three years have been more like "business as usual" for US politics; arguably even worse than usual.
Third, there will be a lot of 2008 campaign promises not kept which will be targets for opponents. For example, not only is Guantanamo not closed. but military trials have been supported by the Administration. Promises of transparency in legislation have not been kept. A lot of Bush era foreign policies have been followed. I am sure opponents, both on the left and the right, will be able to come up with a long list of broken promises.
Fourth, the President seems to have lost the "far" left. Calls for his impeachment by Democrats and liberal supporters regarding his Libya intervention are really quite amazing. Obama's weak defense of the treatment of Private Manning while in detention has drawn the wrath of human rights groups and liberals. The President strangely enough now seems to appeal more to soft conservatives than to liberals.
Fifth, the world has not gone well. Peace in the Middle East between the Israelis and Palestinians seems to be further away now than ever. The turmoil in the Arab world itself, involving the attempted overthrow of American friendly regimes, has caught the President off guard. Talking with one's enemies, like Iran's Ahmadenijad, has not happened and is not going to happen. The US unemployment rate is still very high, housing sales have slumped terribly, the deficit has ballooned. Through this all, President Obama has seemed strangely absent.
The one strong card the President has of course is that a Republican must emerge who can beat him. Whether this will happen remains to be seen. One thing is for sure, however. The 2012 Presidential campaign will be a lot different than the last one.
Monday, March 14, 2011
President Obama and Private Manning
President Obama has been "assured" by the Pentagon that the treatment of Bradley Manning while in detention meets U.S. standards. Statement Department spokesman P.J. Crowley disagrees with that assessment and has resigned ( i.e. been fired) as a result of his public statements to that effect. The incident is disturbing. Not only does the treatment of Private Manning, the alleged Wikileaks leaker, appear to me to be inhumane and degrading, but it yet again points out the hypocrisy of those who continue to defend President Obama. If George Bush had said that he had been assured by the Pentagon that the treatment accorded to detainees met U.S. standards and was appropriate, would he have received such a free pass? No need to answer - this was a rhetorical question.
Friday, March 11, 2011
The most ridiculous comment of the week
A "coup d'etat" is a "sudden extrajudicial overthrow of a government" typically by a military; so says Wikipedia.
So when Robert Reich describes what the legitimately elected representatives did this week in Wisconsin in passing legislation taking away the collective bargaining rights of unions as a "coup d'etat", Mr Reich definitely wins the prize for the most ridiculous comment of the week. If there was any coup at all in Wisconsin ( and there was none by the way ) it was by Democratic senators who fled the state and hid from law enforcement officials so that the government could not function, or by the protesters who tried physically to block the proceedings.
Why the legislation was passed and whether it is good or bad for Wisconsin residents and workers is a legitimate question. But to describe the process as a "coup d'etat" shows the reluctance of many opponents to engage in a serious conversation about this and thereby to try to tone down what has become an angry and potentially violent situation.
So when Robert Reich describes what the legitimately elected representatives did this week in Wisconsin in passing legislation taking away the collective bargaining rights of unions as a "coup d'etat", Mr Reich definitely wins the prize for the most ridiculous comment of the week. If there was any coup at all in Wisconsin ( and there was none by the way ) it was by Democratic senators who fled the state and hid from law enforcement officials so that the government could not function, or by the protesters who tried physically to block the proceedings.
Why the legislation was passed and whether it is good or bad for Wisconsin residents and workers is a legitimate question. But to describe the process as a "coup d'etat" shows the reluctance of many opponents to engage in a serious conversation about this and thereby to try to tone down what has become an angry and potentially violent situation.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
The Defunding of National Public Radio
Excuse me if I wade into a debate which admittedly does not affect me in any way - the question of whether the American taxpayer should be required to continue its funding of NPR. It is, however, an interesting debate and I simply cannot resist.
As a frequent visitor to the States, I listen to NPR quite a lot. I have breakfast while the Dian Rehm show is on. I listen to the Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor, and I love Car Talk with brothers Click and Clack. In the evenings there is continuous Jazz on our local NPR affiliate. So I am a fan. I find the political discussions generally biased in a liberal direction. That frequently irritates me, but I have an easy solution. When I can't take it any more, I turn the station off.
If Americans needed to be reminded why NPR should stop receiving tax payer money, the Schillers did an excellent job of that. Ron Schiller was the Executive VP in charge of fund raising, who in a conservative "sting" operation made no bones of the fact that he is a committed liberal who believes that the Republican party and especially the Tea Party supporters are stupid, extremely racist, Islamophobic, and xenophobic. Democrats are much smarter according to Ron, but apparently not so smart that they know when to keep their mouths shut and to recognize when they are being set up. But no matter; Ron was fired and now joins several other high ranking NPR executives who have recently lost their jobs.
Vivian Schiller was the NPR CEO who was fired (or in the parlance of high level firings - "resigned") for a few reasons. For one thing, she hired Ron Schiller. She also badly bungled the firing of Juan Williams. In short, things have been going badly for NPR in recent days under her watch.
Now there is absolutely nothing wrong with radio and television anchors, fundraisers, or other employees to have political views and biases on important issues of the day. I would be shocked if they did not. People who work in these fields are obviously very interested in politics and current affairs, and probably very well informed. Of course they have views. And they should not be afraid to express them! BUT, when they are working for a publicly funded outfit and are counting on the tax dollars of the very people they disdain and insult, well then something is clearly wrong. It is one thing to think middle Americans who support conservative causes are stupid and racist, but quite another to have these very same people forced to support you and your organization. That is "Chutzpah".
Ron Schiller was right in one thing he said to the fake Muslim Brotherhood putative donors. NPR does not need public money and would be better off without it. It would liberate them from from the shackles of political correctness; it would allow them to openly tell the listener how they feel about things, instead of having to skulk around the water cooler, disdaining their fellow Americans in secret. Listeners who don't like what they hear can tune in to something else. People who do like it can offer their financial support in terms of donations to keep their stations alive and flourishing. We in Alberta have done just that with internationally acclaimed radio station CKUA.
Perhaps public funding made sense when radio and television stations needed the money so that people in smaller, rural communities could have access to entertainment and news, particularly when it was not commercially viable for private broadcasters to access these areas. But now with satellite, internet, and a gzillion choices, most of them free and easily accessible, is there any need to publicly fund news and entertainment outlets? And when Americans see the mountain of government debt that the US has accumulated, the escalating costs of health care, and cutbacks in all sorts of more important services, it is not surprising to see that the majority of those recently polled (see my last posting) want this public funding support of NPR to stop. Maybe thanks in part to the Schillers it now will.
FOLLOW UP:
Another suspended NPR employee for falling into yet another trap and apparently agreeing to protect an "anonymous" donor from government scrutiny. Also a letter from NPR journalists expressing outrage at Ron Schiller's comments. See here.
As a frequent visitor to the States, I listen to NPR quite a lot. I have breakfast while the Dian Rehm show is on. I listen to the Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor, and I love Car Talk with brothers Click and Clack. In the evenings there is continuous Jazz on our local NPR affiliate. So I am a fan. I find the political discussions generally biased in a liberal direction. That frequently irritates me, but I have an easy solution. When I can't take it any more, I turn the station off.
If Americans needed to be reminded why NPR should stop receiving tax payer money, the Schillers did an excellent job of that. Ron Schiller was the Executive VP in charge of fund raising, who in a conservative "sting" operation made no bones of the fact that he is a committed liberal who believes that the Republican party and especially the Tea Party supporters are stupid, extremely racist, Islamophobic, and xenophobic. Democrats are much smarter according to Ron, but apparently not so smart that they know when to keep their mouths shut and to recognize when they are being set up. But no matter; Ron was fired and now joins several other high ranking NPR executives who have recently lost their jobs.
Vivian Schiller was the NPR CEO who was fired (or in the parlance of high level firings - "resigned") for a few reasons. For one thing, she hired Ron Schiller. She also badly bungled the firing of Juan Williams. In short, things have been going badly for NPR in recent days under her watch.
Now there is absolutely nothing wrong with radio and television anchors, fundraisers, or other employees to have political views and biases on important issues of the day. I would be shocked if they did not. People who work in these fields are obviously very interested in politics and current affairs, and probably very well informed. Of course they have views. And they should not be afraid to express them! BUT, when they are working for a publicly funded outfit and are counting on the tax dollars of the very people they disdain and insult, well then something is clearly wrong. It is one thing to think middle Americans who support conservative causes are stupid and racist, but quite another to have these very same people forced to support you and your organization. That is "Chutzpah".
Ron Schiller was right in one thing he said to the fake Muslim Brotherhood putative donors. NPR does not need public money and would be better off without it. It would liberate them from from the shackles of political correctness; it would allow them to openly tell the listener how they feel about things, instead of having to skulk around the water cooler, disdaining their fellow Americans in secret. Listeners who don't like what they hear can tune in to something else. People who do like it can offer their financial support in terms of donations to keep their stations alive and flourishing. We in Alberta have done just that with internationally acclaimed radio station CKUA.
Perhaps public funding made sense when radio and television stations needed the money so that people in smaller, rural communities could have access to entertainment and news, particularly when it was not commercially viable for private broadcasters to access these areas. But now with satellite, internet, and a gzillion choices, most of them free and easily accessible, is there any need to publicly fund news and entertainment outlets? And when Americans see the mountain of government debt that the US has accumulated, the escalating costs of health care, and cutbacks in all sorts of more important services, it is not surprising to see that the majority of those recently polled (see my last posting) want this public funding support of NPR to stop. Maybe thanks in part to the Schillers it now will.
FOLLOW UP:
Another suspended NPR employee for falling into yet another trap and apparently agreeing to protect an "anonymous" donor from government scrutiny. Also a letter from NPR journalists expressing outrage at Ron Schiller's comments. See here.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
The Polarization of the Media
The firing of National Public Radio's CEO Vivian Schiller is an interesting event, about which I will have more to say in my next posting. It feeds directly into the current debate as to whether any "news" outlet should be the recipient of public moneys and, more particularly, whether NPR should be "defunded". We in Canada have had similar discussions about the funding of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, although I do not believe there is any serious move or appetite in Canada for "defunding" to happen to the CBC.
As an observer of American cable news outlets, I have frequently commented on how polarized the American media is, reflecting the deep divisions that exist in the public itself. MSNBC plays out in left field, FOX in right, and CNN floats around the center. It was therefore interesting to me to note the recent "polling" which MSNBC and FOX are conducting on their respective web sites as to whether NPR should be defunded. If you look at the MSNBC poll, you will discover that at the time of this posting, 55% feel that NPR should be defunded, as opposed to 42% who feel it should not be. The same question asked on the FOX website produces a vote of 93% who are in favour of defunding while only about 5% support continued funding. Not only does this demonstrate the vastly different audiences which support these networks, but it more importantly shows that despite NPR's pronouncements that it is an objective and professional news outlet, it does not appear that way to the public. Liberals love NPR because they obviously think that NPR promotes their political views. Conservatives hate NPR because they perceive the opposite. Thus whatever NPR thinks it is doing, i.e. representing different viewpoints and the diversity of public opinion, it certainly is not coming across that way to the American public.
As an observer of American cable news outlets, I have frequently commented on how polarized the American media is, reflecting the deep divisions that exist in the public itself. MSNBC plays out in left field, FOX in right, and CNN floats around the center. It was therefore interesting to me to note the recent "polling" which MSNBC and FOX are conducting on their respective web sites as to whether NPR should be defunded. If you look at the MSNBC poll, you will discover that at the time of this posting, 55% feel that NPR should be defunded, as opposed to 42% who feel it should not be. The same question asked on the FOX website produces a vote of 93% who are in favour of defunding while only about 5% support continued funding. Not only does this demonstrate the vastly different audiences which support these networks, but it more importantly shows that despite NPR's pronouncements that it is an objective and professional news outlet, it does not appear that way to the public. Liberals love NPR because they obviously think that NPR promotes their political views. Conservatives hate NPR because they perceive the opposite. Thus whatever NPR thinks it is doing, i.e. representing different viewpoints and the diversity of public opinion, it certainly is not coming across that way to the American public.
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