← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Sertorius
Thread ID: 11306 | Posts: 10 | Started: 2003-11-30
2003-11-30 14:57 | User Profile
The Chant Not Heard By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
November 30, 2003
I stood on the sidewalk in London the other day and watched thousands of antiwar, anti-George Bush, anti-Tony Blair protesters pass by. They chanted every antiwar slogan you could imagine and many you couldn't print. It was entertaining ââ¬â but also depressing, because it was so disconnected from the day's other news.
Just a few hours earlier, terrorists in Istanbul had blown up a British-owned bank and the British consulate, killing or wounding scores of British and Turkish civilians. Yet nowhere could I find a single sign in London reading, "Osama, How Many Innocents Did You Kill Today?" or "Baathists ââ¬â Hands Off the U.N. and the Red Cross in Iraq." Hey, I would have settled for "Bush and Blair Equal Bin Laden and Saddam" ââ¬â something, anything, that acknowledged that the threats to global peace today weren't just coming from the White House and Downing Street.
Sorry, but there is something morally obtuse about holding an antiwar rally on a day when your own people have been murdered ââ¬â and not even mentioning it or those who perpetrated it. Watching this scene, I couldn't help but wonder whether George Bush had made the liberal left crazy. It can't see anything else in the world today, other than the Bush-Blair original sin of launching the Iraq war, without U.N. approval or proof of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.
Believe me, being a liberal on every issue other than this war, I have great sympathy for where the left is coming from. And if I didn't, my wife would remind me. It would be a lot easier for the left to engage in a little postwar reconsideration if it saw even an ounce of reflection, contrition or self-criticism coming from the conservatives, such as Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld, who drove this war, yet so bungled its aftermath and so misjudged the complexity of postwar Iraq. Moreover, the Bush team is such a partisan, ideological, nonhealing administration that many liberals just want to punch its lights out ââ¬â which is what the Howard Dean phenomenon is all about.
But here's why the left needs to get beyond its opposition to the war and start pitching in with its own ideas and moral support to try to make lemons into lemonade in Baghdad:
First, even though the Bush team came to this theme late in the day, this war is the most important liberal, revolutionary U.S. democracy-building project since the Marshall Plan. The primary focus of U.S. forces in Iraq today is erecting a decent, legitimate, tolerant, pluralistic representative government from the ground up. I don't know if we can pull this off. We got off to an unnecessarily bad start. [u]But it is one of the noblest things this country has ever attempted abroad and it is a moral and strategic imperative that we give it our best shot.[/u]
Unless we begin the long process of partnering with the Arab world to dig it out of the developmental hole it's in, this angry, frustrated region is going to spew out threats to world peace forever. The next six months in Iraq ââ¬â which will determine the prospects for democracy-building there ââ¬â are the most important six months in U.S. foreign policy in a long, long time. And it is way too important to leave it to the Bush team alone.
On Iraq, there has to be more to the left than anti-Bushism. The senior Democrat who understands that best is the one not running for president ââ¬â Senator Joe Biden. He understands that the liberal opposition to the Bush team should be from the right ââ¬â to demand that we send more troops to Iraq, and more committed democracy builders, to do the job better and smarter than the Bush team has.
Second, we are seeing ââ¬â from Bali to Istanbul ââ¬â the birth of a virulent, nihilistic form of terrorism that seeks to kill any advocates of modernism and pluralism, be they Muslims, Christians or Jews. This terrorism started even before 9/11, and is growing in the darkest corners of the Muslim world. It is the most serious threat to open societies, because one more 9/11 and we'll really see an erosion of our civil liberties. Ultimately, only Arabs and Muslims can root out this threat, but they will do that only when they have ownership over their own lives and societies. Nurturing that is our real goal in Iraq.
"In general," says Robert Wright, author of "Nonzero," "too few who opposed the war understand the gravity of the terrorism problem, and too few who favored it understand the subtlety of the problem."
For my money, the right liberal approach to Iraq is to say: We can do it better. Which is why the sign I most hungered to see in London was, "Thanks, Mr. Bush. We'll take it from here."
Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company
This immediately came to mind:
...try to make lemons into lemonade in Baghdad:
We have another way of putting it down here. Trying to turn chickensh*t into chicken salad!
First, even though the Bush team came to this theme late in the day, this war is the most important liberal, revolutionary U.S. democracy-building project since the Marshall Plan. The primary focus of U.S. forces in Iraq today is erecting a decent, legitimate, tolerant, pluralistic representative government from the ground up. I don't know if we can pull this off. We got off to an unnecessarily bad start. [u]But it is one of the noblest things this country has ever attempted abroad and it is a moral and strategic imperative that we give it our best shot.[/u]
He may not know, but if we let history be our guide here, then the answer is no. Nonetheless, Friedman and his band of neo-liberals are ready to try as long as its's someone else doing the trying. As for this being "noble," yes, in the same way the lunacy known as WW I to "save the world for democracy" was.
On Iraq, there has to be more to the left than anti-Bushism. The senior Democrat who understands that best is the one not running for president ââ¬â Senator Joe Biden. He understands that the liberal opposition to the Bush team should be from the right ââ¬â to demand that we send more troops to Iraq, and more committed democracy builders, to do the job better and smarter than the Bush team has.
People like Friedman never learn. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. I believe that if we waste all this blood and treasure that at the end as soon as we leave (we won't) the country will wind up with another dictator running it. Friedman is living in cloud coo-coo land with this column and manifests the position of a fanatic, unlike the more cynical neo-cons who know that this is about Israel and oil.
2003-11-30 17:16 | User Profile
Did someone point out to these squealin' sheeny that the reason no one is protesting Osama and Saddam killing the occupying army is just that - the army "in their bests interests" that occupies them is an oppressor in their view, and the British who protest want out. O-U-T. That's the fair, balanced and reasonable way to change public policy. Invading other people because some squealin' sheenies think it's a "moral imperative" is a horrible idea.
2003-12-01 04:17 | User Profile
Craig,
This column is simply Friedman show the legendary Jewish (self serving) concern for "social justice!"
2003-12-01 05:12 | User Profile
Duhhh, can't we all just say that this Iraq War is a Jewish-led war and be done with it??? Hmmmmm?
2003-12-01 13:32 | User Profile
Pay very close attention to this, the ecumenical bullshit intended to appeal to the whole Judeo-bourgeois world:
"Unless we begin the long process of partnering with the Arab world to dig it out of the developmental hole it's in, this angry, frustrated region is going to spew out threats to world peace forever. The next six months in Iraq ââ¬â which will determine the prospects for democracy-building there ââ¬â are the most important six months in U.S. foreign policy in a long, long time. And it is way too important to leave it to the Bush team alone."
The "undemocratic" (i.e., non-Judeo-plutocratic) Arabs are perpetually frustrated and angry, thus threatening world peace, merely because they cannot be us! If only they could live in Beaver Cleaver's neighborhood, they would be pacified. Who among us can argue with that? Certainly not those who fail to see the blatant contradiction in Friedman's profile of his malefactors.
Accordingly, there is no end to the Zionist imperialist enterprise in sight - until every Moslem is exterminated by the Friedmanites.
2003-12-01 14:06 | User Profile
"The primary focus of U.S. forces in Iraq today is erecting a decent, legitimate, tolerant, pluralistic representative government from the ground up."
Something we ought first to create for Whites here at home, don't you think?
2003-12-01 14:13 | User Profile
"Second, we are seeing ââ¬â from Bali to Istanbul ââ¬â the birth of a virulent, nihilistic form of terrorism that *seeks to kill any advocates of modernism and pluralism***, be they Muslims, Christians or Jews. This terrorism started even before 9/11, and is growing in the darkest corners of the Muslim world. It is the most serious threat to open societies, because one more 9/11 and we'll really see an erosion of our civil liberties. Ultimately, only Arabs and Muslims can root out this threat, but they will do that only when they have ownership over their own lives and societies."
"Unless we begin the long process of partnering with the Arab world to dig it out of *the developmental hole it's in, this angry, frustrated region*** is going to spew out threats to world peace forever."
Only in Greater Judea can this sort of *blatant contradiction*** slide by - where the insane manipulate the thoughts of the stupid.
The Jews and their Goyim. Enjoy it while it lasts.
2003-12-01 17:42 | User Profile
N.N.,
I think that Friedman actually believes the nonsense that he writes, based on years of reading his columns. It is for that reason I call him a fanatic. Of course, Friedman also believes that to create this world of kumbya that it is necessary for his tribe to rule over everyone else.
2003-12-02 17:22 | User Profile
[QUOTE=NeoNietzsche]"The primary focus of U.S. forces in Iraq today is erecting a decent, legitimate, tolerant, pluralistic representative government from the ground up."
Something we ought first to create for Whites here at home, don't you think?[/QUOTE]
This bears repeating.
Great post, NN, and here I thought you'd retired.
2003-12-03 05:47 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Sertorius]Craig,
This column is simply Friedman show the legendary Jewish (self serving) concern for "social justice!"[/QUOTE]
True. "Tikkun Olam" means trashing the world so that Jewish values have a home!