[lit-ideas] Re: Nuclear Responsibility and Iran
- From: "Lawrence Helm"<lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 8 Mar 2007 23:29:49 +0000
Mike holds up Scandinavia as the example of a decent place to live: "And it
derailed the War on Poverty which could have made America as decent a place to
live as Scandinavia."
"To mark the Fourth of July 2006, the Los Angeles Times published an essay by
Mark Kurlansky, author of The Big Oyster: History on the Half Shell, It began
thus: 'Someone has to say it or we are never going to get out of this rut: I am
sick and tired of the founding fathers and all their intents. The real
American question of our times is how our country in a little over two-hundred
years sank from the great hope to the most backward democracy in the West. The
U.S. offers the worst health care program, one of the worst public school
systems, and the worst benefits for workers. The margin between rich and poor
has been growing precipitously while it has been decreasing in Europe. Among
the great democracies, we use military might less cautiously, show less respect
for international law, and are the stumbling block in international
environmental cooperation. Few informed people look to the United States
anymore for progressive ideas. We ought to do something. Instead, we keep
worrying about the vision of a bunch of sexist, slave-owning eighteenth-century
white men in wigs and breeches.'
"Etc. The assumption behind Kurllansky's piece are widely held, and not just
by the Left -- the assumption, for example that Scandinavia is the natural
destination of the fully evolved Western democracy and America's just taking a
little longer to get there than the Dutch and the Canadians. That's what 'the
most backward democracy' means: the least like Europe. But it ought to be
clear by now that Europe is ahead of American mainly in the sense that its
canoe is already halfway over the falls. There may be many things wrong with
the United States but only a blind fool who hasn't been paying attention for
the last twenty years would hold Europe up as the alternative. The U.S. has
the 'worst benefits for workers'? Maybe. But it also has the lowest
unemployment rate -- about half the rate in France and Germany, where it hovers
permanently at around 10 percent. As for being 'the stumbling block in
international environmental cooperation,' European countries signed Kyoto and
failed to meet its emission reduction targets, whereas the United States didn't
sign it but reduced its emissions anyway -- through that traditional American
virtue of innovation. Self-loathing Americans are in danger of sounding like
self-loathing squares if they pin their hopes on a decayed Eutopia a quarter
century past its sell-by date." [America Alone, pp 103-4]
Lawrence
> ------------Original Message------------
> From: "Mike Geary" <atlas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Date: Thu, Mar-8-2007 2:33 PM
> Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Nuclear Responsibility and Iran
>
> I'm not going down the list -- this is all so fruitless. Sometimes
> it's
> fun, but I'm all funned out. Just a couple of general points if you
> will.
> The abuses of human and civil and legal rights by this Administration
> are, I
> think, of a different order of magnitude than any previous
> Administration in
> their breadth and magnitude. This is what I think, but it's based of
> little
> more than impression I'll grant you. I'll grant you as well that
> certain of
> my "damages" are topped by some previous Administrations. Certainly
> FDR's
> imprisonment of U. S. citizens of Japanese descent was akin to Stalin's
>
> tactics except that we didn't put them to forced labor or starve them
> -- but
> we undoubtedly would have killed them had they tried to escape.
> Kennedy's
> Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba was just a much an international crime as
> Bush's invasion of Iraq. So were Reagan's proxy wars in Latin America.
>
> Johnson's throwing away hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds
> of
> billions of dollars in Vietnam is as grievous a waste of national
> treasure
> as Bush's adventure. And it derailed the War on Poverty which could
> have
> made America as decent a place to live as Scandinavia. And his
> willingness to throw away the lives of twenty-five thousand U. S.
> soldiers
> in a war that he did not even believe was winnable, and that Nixon was
> willing to throw away the lives of another twenty-five thousand
> American
> soldiers in a war that even he was desperately trying to extricate
> himself
> from and who apparently seriously considered using Nuclear weapons to
> do
> so -- these crimes are every bit as grievous as Bush's. And I
> screamed
> against them, just as I scream against Bush.
> It is people who shrug and say, oh well, that's the way it's always
> been
> that shackle humanity to barbarity. You don't have to be like them,
> Eric.
> The world doesn't have to be like them. And Nancy famously said: Just
> say
> No!
>
> Mike Geary
> Memphis
>
> PS: You keep throwing Clinton at me. I've never been an admirer of
> Clinton. I thought I'd made that clear years ago.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Eric Yost" <mr.eric.yost@xxxxxxxxx>
> To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2007 1:57 PM
> Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Nuclear Responsibility and Iran
>
>
> > Mike's list:
> >
> > >The attack on the Bill of Rights by the Patriot Act.
> >
> > **Hardly anything at all compared to the Drug War bill in the early
> '90s.
> > That damage happened on Clinton's watch when nobody was looking.
> >
> >
> > >The very notion of, not to mention the waging of, pre-emptive war.
> >
> > **Self-defense has always been a right of nations. Plus that 1
> percent
> > pre-emption policy has been abandoned. (See also below.)
> >
> >
> > >The torturing of prisoners. The kidnapping, disappearing and
> > extraordinary rendition of people around the world. The establisment
> of
> > secret CIA prisons in foreign countries. The confinement of people
> without
> > recourse to justice. The suspension of habeas corpus.
> >
> > **This happened throughout the Cold War and into the Clinton years.
> During
> > the Clinton years, the phrase "giving a trip to the pyramids" was
> coined
> > to refer to rendition to Egypt. Are you so naive as to assume that
> Bush
> > started this? Wow.
> >
> >
> > >The unprecedented, enormous waste of the national treasure.
> >
> > ** Money talk, eh? Well the waste is precedented, though I'll meet
> you
> > halfway on this one. A lot of waste and corruption that should result
> in
> > massive criminal prosecution.
> >
> >
> > >The extreme secrecy within which our own government operates. The
> > unchecked surveillance of American citizens by government officials.
> >
> > ** Again, happened throughout the Cold War. Surveillance actually
> became
> > more difficult with the switch to fiber optic cables and the
> widespread
> > use of E-mail encryption technology. Phones always were tapped. Harry
>
> > Truman authorized first tap of transatlantic phone cables.
> >
> >
> > >The destruction of the goodwill towards America throughout most of
> the
> > world caused by the foreign policy of this Administration.
> >
> > **With the USSR gone, we're the only superpower nations can feel
> > resentment toward. Part is due to Bush's strong unilateral actions,
> yes,
> > but the rest is due to the fact that we're the only remaining
> superpower.
> >
> >
> > >That's the kind of damage I'm talking about.
> >
> > **If you check what I've written, you see this is just more of the
> same,
> > only it's becoming more widely known. Engage the points above and
> I'll
> > provide you with references.
> >
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