History And Consequence

Daniel's Reponse:


You present nothing more than finger waving and "just so" stories. You are conjuring doomsday bogeyman to justify poor policy and rationalize incompetence.

I don't know the "Islamics" of whom you speak. I know who the Kurds are, I know who the Malaysians are, I know who the Palestinians are, the Egyptians, the Pakistanis. I know Hezbollah, Al Quaedi, and Al Jazeera. All "Islamic" but hardly identical.

Maybe we would have advanced our cause in World War Two if instead of concentrating on Germany, we also declared war on the Swiss, Poles, and Czechs. I mean, they do bear a certain cultural and religious similarity to one another, they must all have been in league to plot the complete and utter annihilation of the United States, right? I don't see how attacking those countries, stationing troops, expending resources could have interfered with defeating Hitler? And if we ended up being wrong in that assessment, well at least we were trying to do the right thing?

There are no coincidences, there are only the logical consequences of policy and practice unfolding over years and decades.

It's not a coincidence that Al Quaedi seized planes with box cutters. Stone age tactics for a stone age organization. If they had the capacity to target Washington with conventional weapons, or to shoot planes from the sky, without boarding them, they would do it. The height of their technological and organization capacity amounts to promising some disaffected 18 year old 100 virgins if he blows himself up on an airplane. And half the time, the primitive bombs explode before he gets there.

The isn't a shred of evidence that this organization has the capacity to develop nuclear weapons much less ability to fling them 18,000 miles across the globe. At most it is a potential long term threat. I am not attempting to minimize the danger, I recognize the seriousness of the threat, but I see no reason to believe that if we use our technical, organizational, financial, and military superiority judiciously, competently and wisely, that we can't conquer or contain this problem long before it reaches the total destruction of the world as we know it. Yet, that is exactly what you claim.

And if Americans have grown fat and lazy, we have far more to fear from India or China than "Araby". If China and India ascend to greatness, becoming military and economic superpowers, leaving us in their wake, then they will inherit the world's problems, including the Middle East, just as we inherited them from the British and French. And they will have the opportunity to use their power and influence to make those problems better or worse, just as we have.

And while your concern for the feminists, gays, and pornographers is touching, I think you are raising another straw man. No one is arguing that the human rights conditions in Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia are acceptable, but invading Iraq in some half-baked attempt to install a "model democracy" was a bone-headed, counter productive way to improve human rights conditions in these countries.

You are very dismissive of "tactics". What you call tactics, the construction and implementation of policy, is the engine of creation behind those "historic moments" you seem to care so much about. Historic moments don't spring from the ether, they are the predictable outgrowth of tactics.

You suggest that no one else has proposed alternative strategies, but this is simply not true. It seems that way because you are so agitated by apocalyptic prophesying you are deaf to moderation and reason.

Historic Moments

Jim's Response:

Here's where I have to comment because I completely disagree on what is the big problem. I think we are at or near one of those historical moments that occurs periodically in history. The ascendancy of the Mongols. The fall of the Greeks. The fall of Rome. The rise of Fascism. The rise of Communism. Like that.

I believe that due to the West's success it is quite likely that it has become soft, fat, and lazy, and forgotten what made it strong. I think our very ascendancy is giving rise to our fall. Europe is exhausted. Demographically it, Eastern Europe, Russia, and Japan are in unprecedented decline. Meanwhile the unassimilated Islamics in their countries are prolific. This is a simple numbers game which simple math can solve.

The US is in disarray. Half of the country is fighting any attempt to right things. It's like watching a quarterback try to throw a touchdown while a couple of his lineman are falling on him. The press, the bar, the ngos are like a leach on the people who are trying to actually do anything.

As for the people who are trying to do things there is the usual mix. Some are incompetent. Some make mistakes. Some are fakes. But at least here most are trying to do the right thing, and they could use more teammates and less sports announcers. Between Mr Bush and Kerry/Gore I'd take the former any time. If a Patton or MacArthur stood up I might have a different notion.

I believe that the decline of the West is occurring at the same time that oil and powerful weapons make people who otherwise be camel jockeys into dangerous enemies. Meanwhile the Left finds them an ally of convenience in the same way as the Nazis did the Communists, likely with a similar outcome. It wouldn't take much imagination to consider what the Islamists in their ascendancy would do with feminists, gays, and pornographers since we can see how they treat them in their own countries.

Here's a scenario I could easily see. Five, ten, fifteen years from now after a tired US tries to withdraw from the Arabian scene some group of Islamists succeeds in what they attempted on 9/11 (huge hits on US political, military, and business strongholds). They level DC and parts of NYC and LA with tactical nukes. The government hierarchy is killed, the communication infrastructure is broken, and trade stops. At this point Americans are willing to sign up with the strongest conceivable military leader and our 200+ year experiment with democracy is over. In fact I could see the country breaking into parts for self-defense purposes. The South for example may lose interest in defending CA and NY, and the latter two are incapable of defending themselves. Our military of course is rather too strong to be defeated in military terms because there would always be submarines and silos untouched. Araby would be glass at that point, but too late to keep America as it was.

They don't call it "Islam's Bloody Borders" for nothing.

What you speak of below is tactics, all of which could be done better. The Left not only doesn't have better suggestions, they mean just the opposite to reach power just like their Communist and Socialist forebears. The Left has never been skittish about their enemy's blood.

Systemic Failure

The most serious problem we are facing is a colossal failure of leadership. None of our other problems are insurmountable, not Iraq, not terrorism, and not the deficit. We have a president and a congress that have chosen to increase spending while reducing government revenue. It doesn't take a budget brainiac to see that this is a formula for ballooning the deficit. Then again, low taxes and easy entitlements always play well, so rather than showing the backbone to take a hard line on taxes, spending or both, we have a president who constantly declares rhetorical victories by beating the projections he has revised ever downward, while in reality financing his irresponsible policies by selling our accumulated wealth to the Chinese, and leaving some other generation to deal with the fallout.

The administration has bungled Iraqi reconstruction, leaving the middle east more unstable than if it had done nothing, and leaving us more vulnerable to terrorist attacks. As badly as they have set back American interests worldwide through half assed, hair trigger policy decisions, it is still possible to fix their mistakes because the crux of the problem comes down to incompetence. The leadership, starting from the top, hasn't just committed to bad policy, they have made the worse mistake of compounding bad policy with incompetent implementation.

We need a Marshall plan for reconstructing Iraq and the Middle East, and instead what we have is systemic failure. We have an administration that failed to understand the cultural and political tensions and dynamics that exist on the ground, failed to provide adequate security to enact a reconstruction, failed to convince the Iraqi people to buy into the American vision for a new Iraq, failed to recruit allies, failed to engage regional governments and influence brokers, failed to stimulate the Iraqi economy, failed to provide basic services like health care, water treatment, schools and electricity, failed to finish the job they started in Afghanistan, exacerbated the Israeli/Palestinian conflict by being completely unprepared for the Hamas victories. I could go on and on.

It is completely possible to leverage our intellectual, capital and military resources to advance the cause of peace, stability and economic prosperity throughout the world, and in so doing, make ourselves safer, and spread American values. But it isn't easy, it can't be done overnight, and it requires well thought out policy implemented by competent leadership. Right now we are moving backwards, and this isn't due to circumstance, luck, unforseeable turn of events, or the failure of some poor broken populace half way around the world. We broke it, we own it, and now we need someone capable of fixing it.

Let It Go

Another Speech:

Today President Bush called for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. While the Bush administration was busy crafting this announcement a suicide bomber killed or wounded forty people in Iraq. While the Bush administration was rallying support for an amendment, Al Qaeda operative Ayman al-Zawahri released a tape promising to unleash more terrorist attacks on the United States.

Unfortunately the President chose to prioritize an issue threatening to divide Americans at a time when more pressing concerns demand that we stand united.

Should we become embroiled in a contentious constitutional debate while our enemies plan attacks? Should the president expend the time and energy necessary to alter the US constitution when so many Americans remain jobless?

I ask all Americans to do what this President cannot: put aside our differences, and stand together for the future of our nation. We may differ on the means, but we must focus upon our shared goals: defeating terrorism and restoring our economy.

This president chose to champion a policy that distracts from these goals. This president chose a path that will surely pit brother against brother.

We cannot move forward with a policy that turns American against American. It is unrealistic to believe that we can reach a consensus on same sex marriage. Some of us will go to the grave unwavering in approval, others ardently against.

But we can all agree that same sex marriage didn't topple skyscrapers. Same sex marriage didn't send thousands of jobs overseas. Same sex marriage won't bankrupt social security.

From inception, from Calvinist to Quaker, this nation succeeded by placing purpose above personal. Let us set aside differences so that we may achieve our most important goals rather than grind to a halt bickering over less substantial concerns. Let neighbor look upon neighbor and say, "Whatever our differences, whatever your race, ethnicity or sexual orientation, we have no choice but to share a future. You are welcome here."

For or against, every American must find the tolerance necessary to move forward together. If you are married, its not the place of government to judge the success of your marriage. If you are divorced it is not the place of government to judge the reasons for your divorce.

As president, I will devote my full attention to repairing social security, fighting terrorism, and creating jobs. There isn't time to manufacture divisive issues that impede progress. We are a forward looking nation and it is time to move forward. Let this issue rest.

It Is Time

A Speech For A Democratic Candidate:

I am here today with a simple message: It is time.

It is time to examine the state of our union, and reflect upon whether we are better off today then when President Bush took office. It is time to ask if this President has been a proper steward of our economy and our national security. It is time to consider the great challenges facing our nation, and elect a leader capable of making responsible decisions in difficult circumstances.

It is time to reclaim our nation from an administration intent upon mortgaging the future of our children. This administration entered the oval office with a budget surplus and a historic opportunity. For the first time in a generation there existed the possibility of eliminating this nation's National Debt. Given the chance to secure the fiscal future of our next generation by reducing a debt that rests on the backs of our children, to save social security from certain bankruptcy, this administration chose to cut taxes.

This president chose opportunism over opportunity. Presented with the opportunity to make a difficult, responsible choice, this president chose the avenue of least resistance.

I have spent my life confronting difficult choices. I fought and was wounded in Vietnam. I know what it means to risk my life for my country. I learned first hand how presidential administrations can endanger the lives of young Americans by being overly eager to believe supposedly irrefutable evidence.

In August 1964 American intelligence reported the North Vietnamese attacked American destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin. The perceived threat to our national security opened the door to the vast expansion of our military presence in Vietnam. The president was so intent on believing the North Vietnamese posed an imminent threat to American security, he chose to recognize only those facts that supported this belief. There was only one problem, there was no attack in the Gulf on Tonkin, the intelligence that reported an attack was in error. We were committed with no easy way to bring our troops home.

There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. The intelligence that reported such weapons was in error. The president was so intent on believing Saddam Hussein posed an immediate threat to American security, he chose to recognize only those facts that supported this belief. We are committed with no easy way to bring our troops home.

This administration has led us into the past.

It is time to elect a president who has the foresight and experience to correct our course before its too late. I do not deny the threat of terrorism, it is very real, and it is very serious, but we cannot allow fear to overpower reason.

It is time we had a leader who knew better than to chase the ghosts in every corner. We do not have unlimited resources. Risking American lives toppling tinhorn tyrants leaves us more vulnerable to true terrorists .

It is time to regroup and refocus.

We must reverse the mounting mountain of debt that threatens to crush our children. We must fix social security today or there will be no social security tomorrow. We must secure our nation from the threat of terrorism without lashing out at every shadow. We must repair our relationships with our allies and work together towards a safer world.

It is time that we had a leader able to avoid the mistakes of the past, rather than repeat them. America is the world's only superpower, yet there exist very real threats to our way of life.

It is our obligation and our interest to make this world safer, to encourage the growth of democracy and human rights. That will be the American legacy. But we squander that legacy when we act unilaterally, without regard for others. We belittle our great nation when we suggest every third world thug poses an imminent threat to our security.

It is time to turn our attention to securing a safe and prosperous future for all Americans, not just the privileged few. It is time to return to sound fiscal policy, we cannot continue to spend far more than we earn. We cannot pass a nation crippled by debt to our children. It is time for each American to recognize responsibility to the future of our nation. It is the responsibility of every American to pass a healthy nation to the next generation. We cannot continue to borrow against our children's future income. We cannot allow our children to inherit a nation that is hated and feared. It is time to make difficult choices, to sacrifice for our collective future.

It is time to elect a new leader. It is time. It is time. It is past time.