Monday, March 31, 2003

Simple Minds. Complex War. Dangerous Combination.

We seem to have divided up the country into the “support our troops” pro-war camp and the so-called “no war for oil” anti-war camp. This separation is ultimately divisive. You’re either for the troops or against them. You’re either for war or against it. You’re either with us or against us. And now it appears that you’re either one of us, an American of good, non-Arabic ancestry, or you’re one of them, an Iraqi or al-Qaeda sympathizer and likely terrorist.

The Bush administration has been speaking in terms of black and white. Good vs. evil. Conservative vs. liberal. Christian vs. heathen. And, if the polls showing massive support for the war are to be believed (and I don’t believe them for a moment), we’ve taken the easy way out. We’ve surrendered our right to think to the exigencies of war. We must come together to support the President because if we don’t, not only are we being unpatriotic, we’re being treasonous.

It’s far too easy to view the world in terms of us vs. them, good vs. evil. People think like this because it’s easier to allow someone else to think for you than it is to deal with the real world and think for yourself. But simple thinking is what perpetuates Catholic vs. Protestant terrorism in Northern Ireland. Taking the easy way out is responsible for the Serbian, Croatian, and Muslim massacres of Yugoslavia. It’s responsible for the Sunni vs. Shi’a wars of the last thousand years. Simple us vs. them is responsible for the crusades, jihads, black slavery, and even the Holocaust.

But modern life is complex, and complex times requires complex thinking, not the simple minded prattle of a fundamentalist President who won’t even listen to the head of his own faith. Simple minded thinking is what has driven Donald Rumsfeld to ignore the advice of generals who have actually experienced combat and won battles when their own lives were on the line. We need people who are don’t believe that they are personally the Swords of God and thus imbued with God’s authority.

But we don’t have them in the Presidency right now. Most of the complex people in the policy arms of the government are hunkered down, trying to avoid being labeled a heretic and being burned at the stake by the self-righteous administration. They see the beginnings of a multi-national Arab uprising against the United States and pray that, somehow, the Swords of God will fall upon their own blades before they have sparked a civilizational war.

Unfortunately, there seems to be precious little debate between complex thinkers in these “simple” times. Complex thinkers are notably absent from both the “support the troops” and the “no war for oil” camps. If you’re not for the soldiers, you might as well join the Iraqi army, climb into an explosives-laden Nissan pickup truck, and blow yourself up along with 4 or 5 Marines. And if you’re not against the war, you might as well sign up for the Marines, and if we’re lucky, you’ll be the bastard who gets blown up by the pickup truck.

This war is not that simple.

Unfortunately, the President and his apostles have done a frighteningly good job at making it seem simple to his followers and his detractors alike. There are valid reasons to go to war. There are even good reasons to go to war against Iraq. Bush did not use any of them to justify the current war. There are also valid concerns about what signals this war is sending to the rest of the world. Bush did not address a single one of them before ordering missile strikes on Baghdad. So we’re left with a complex war that is already seen as an imperialistic crusade by a fundamentalist Christian against a Muslim and Arabic nation.

To be fair, the President is not alone in his thinking. Simple minded imams with their fatwas against the United States are partially to blame. Arab governments who oppress their people and think of nothing but their own personal wealth and power must also shoulder their own burden of guilt. And as I said before, simple minded opposition to the war is no better than simple minded support of it.

If we must label people, we cannot allow ourselves or any one else to resort to such simple labels as “troop supporter” or “anti-war protester.” There are any number of complex combinations possible. There are people who hate soldiers but love war itself in an abstract sense. Others hate war but love the soldiers for the security they offer. Still others believe peace is the ultimate way to support the troops, since the soldiers would no longer be facing injury or death in combat. And there are even people who believe that this war could have been justified had the President been rational about it, but oppose this war because of the hell it’s making of our economy and international relationships. Complex possibilities for a complex world.

The President has turned out to be just too simple minded for these complex times. He has divided the world into good and evil, and in the process has remade the United States from a shiny beacon of hope, freedom, and wealth into a dingy gray tower of fear, insecurity, and economic malaise. And now his simple minded approach is threatening to turn the nation against itself in a way not seen since the Vietnam War. With a little luck, our nation and the world will survive until November 2004, when we can replace a simple minded and divisive man with one who understands the complexity of the real world.

Friday, March 21, 2003

A neo-Pagan Prayer for the World

Earth, element of the North and of the cold winter, grant us strength and good health in this time of war. Bless the world with economic strength so that those who lack food and medicines may receive them, and heal the hearts of the wounded so that the world may know peace again.

Air, element of the East and of the warming spring, grant us creativity and insight in this time of conflict. Bless the world with the creativity needed to solve the intractable problems we face, and give us insight so that we may all understand those who would be our enemies.

Fire, element of the South and of the hot summer, grant us passion and energy in these times of trial. Bless the world with passion so that love may replace the hatred of war and misunderstanding, and energize us enough to rebuild the institutions that have recently been damaged or destroyed.

Water, element of the West and of the cooling autumn, grant us empathy and magic in this time of anger. Bless the world with empathy so that we may improve the plight of those living in fear, and mystify us all with the magic of our oneness with the natural world and each other.

Spirit, element of the Center and of the gods themselves, grant us the faith to make a beginning, a beginning to heal, to understand, to rebuild, and to be mystified. Grant us the faith to face the truth, the truth that the world and the people are ill and need our strength, our creativity, our passion, our empathy. And grant us the faith to stand before the future with open eyes, and arms, and hearts, and minds.

Gods of my ancestors, grant us all that we ask of Earth, Air, Fire, Water, and Spirit. Ogma, loan us your inspiration. Lugh, loan us your skill. Badb, loan us your wisdom. Dana, loan us your prosperity. For with you, through you, and through the hope and faith you grant us, we shall heal the world again.

Tuesday, March 18, 2003

Another Battle in the War on Terror, or the First Shots of World War III?

War is coming. The President has given Saddam Hussein and his family 48 hours to leave Iraq, and Hussein’s representatives have already refused on the Iraqi leader’s behalf. Based on this, no one can reasonably doubt that war is coming. The question on my mind is whether this war will turn out to be, as Bush has claimed, the second major battle in the war on terror, or whether it will become known as the opening salvo of World War III.

Bush has failed to make a convincing argument tying Saddam Hussein to the war on terror. While no one can deny that Hussein is a tyrant worthy of deposing, the so-called logic of the Bush administration is faulty at best. Certainly, Iraq has supported the enemies of Israel in the past. Certainly, Iraq has gassed its own civilians in a continuation of tribal and religious conflicts that have existed for hundreds of years. But there has been no evidence presented that ties the secular Iraqi regime to fundamentalist Islamic al-Qaeda.

This isn’t to say there aren’t valid reasons to depose Saddam Hussein. Indeed, using Iraq as an object lesson for the rest of the world, especially those states who do support terrorists, is a valid if somewhat questionable use of military might. Freeing the people of Iraq from a dictator responsible for decades of oppression is also a valid use of our military. If the President had used either of these reasons as a justification for the coming war, more United States citizens might be able to support his position. But neither would have had any more luck in garnering international support than the tired “war on terror” argument.

The problem is that the President has never been able to convince the world of the immediate threat Saddam Hussein poses. If we’d been able to provide incontrovertible proof of activity in Iraqi chemical weapons factories, we’d have some allies now. If we’d been able to provide incontrovertible proof of mobile biological weapons trucks, some of our critics would instead be supporters. If we’d been able to provide incontrovertible proof of the refinement of nuclear materials, the United Nations would have supported our contention that Iraq is a threat.

But the Administration hasn’t been able to do this. Sure, there is a mass of circumstantial evidence. Shells capable of deploying chemical weapons were discovered. Missiles capable of exceeding the maximum U.N.-allowed range were destroyed. Surveillance photographs showing images of supposed chemical weapons factories have been shown. Yet not once were traces of chemical weapons found. Not once have traces of biological weapons been discovered. And the only damning technology used for nuclear weapon production, namely several dozen aluminum tubes sometimes used for uranium enrichment, has enough alternate uses that it cannot possibly be damning in this circumstance.

Yet here we are, with our President marching us into war ostensibly to save us from future terrorist attacks. I can’t help but ask how the President feels that angering nearly every ally and the vast majority of the Muslim world could possibly save us from future terrorist attacks. Some of the least stable nations in the world already have weapons of mass destruction and have a great deal more capacity to be dangerous. The government of Iran hates the western world with a passion, has been suspected of having nuclear weapons for quite some time, and has a history of supporting Islamic terrorist groups. Pakistan has tested nuclear weapons, and while the current military junta is somewhat secular, the nation as a whole is radicalized. It is likely that al-Qaeda is hiding in the lawless tribal regions along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. If we’re truly afraid of nuclear weapons falling into the hands of terrorists, we should be far more concerned about radicals in the Pakistani military selling nukes to the al-Qaeda members in their own nation than we should be about Saddam Hussein selling weapons to Islamic terrorists.

Attacking Iraq cannot and will not prevent further terrorist attacks. Instead, the anger directed at the United States by Muslims is already enlarging the pool of men and women willing to be used as suicide bombers and airplane hijackers. I can’t imagine how attacking Iraq will dissuade other nations from providing terrorists with chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons. I can, however, easily imagine that attacking Iraq will make the nations who already support terrorists more likely to provide them with even more devastating and powerful weapons.

What I’m most concerned about is what happens if Iraq actually does use chemical or biological weapons to defend itself? Will Bush follow through on his threat to use nuclear weapons in retaliation? Will Iraq gas Haifa in a desperate bid to drag Israel into the conflict, and thus the rest of the Muslim world in a response to Israel’s inevitable military response? I don’t know, but these are questions that I sincerely hope the United States military and State Department have the answers to.

If we can complete the war on Iraq quickly, with few civilian casualties and no popular uprising against our invasion, we have a chance. A fast war will limit the damage that Iraq might be able to do to Israel. Keeping Israel out of any war will keep Syria, Jordan, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and others from coming to the defense of their fellow Muslims in a religiously motivated conflict. Only by keeping Israel out of the war, and by not resorting to the nuclear option ourselves, can I see this war being only the second battle in what will be a multi-generational war on terror. Otherwise, the war could far too easily spiral out of control into World War III.

Imagine for a moment the following chain of events. We attack Iraq with what amounts to a blitzkrieg assault, hitting everything we can find immediately. Iraq, expecting this to happen, launches a dozen or so chemical or biological munitions-equipped ballistic missiles at Israel. Enough civilians are killed in Haifa, Jerusalem, and Tel Aviv that the quintessential Israeli hawk, Prime Minister Arial Sharon, orders the Israeli air force to retaliate with nuclear weapons. A one hundred kiloton bomb explodes over Baghdad, killing Saddam Hussein but also killing and irradiating several hundred thousand innocent Iraqi Muslims. Syria, Iran, and Egypt, supported by the rest of the Muslim nations, rally around their dead and dying fellow Muslims and attack Israel. Israel, in a desperate bid to survive, responds with further nuclear attacks on national capitals and columns of attacking military forces. Then the United States responds to the Israeli conflict by entering the war on the side of the Israelis, finally tying the entire region into one big war, Muslim vs. Christian and Jew.

There would be no winners in this kind of a war. It would claim millions, maybe billions of lives, and it would continue until one civilization or the other had totally, utterly annihilated the other. There would be no quarter asked, no quarter given. Crusade and jihad on a truly global scale. The first world war didn’t deserve the title, the second did. The third absolutely would.

In this event, I expect that Osama bin Laden would be sitting in his cave, laughing his ass off.

I don’t expect World War III to happen. I expect that the United States military, backed by what few allies we still have, will hit the Iraqis so hard and fast that they don’t have the opportunity to turn this into a Muslim vs. Christian and Jew conflict. But I don’t like to depend on the rationality of a desperate dictator, a hawkish Israeli Prime Minster, or on our less-than-brilliant President and his uber-hawk advisors. I like knowing that World War III isn’t right around the corner, and until several months ago, it seemed a remote possibility. The fact that I, an electrical engineer with no military training, can even conceive of the chain of events needed to produce such a war means that the possibility is no longer remote.

May the President and his advisors be right about how decisive the war will be. For war is coming, and the world desperately needs the President to be right this time.

Friday, March 07, 2003

Mr. President, meet The Prince

The best book that I have ever read about how politics really works is Machiavelli’s The Prince.  Not everything is applicable today, of course.  Considering that we live in a country ruled by laws, killing your predecessor and all his family is rightly not allowed.  But much of what Machiavelli said is applicable, either directly or with a few minor adjustments.  Just as an example, Machiavelli says that a prince should reside in the lands he just conquered, but if that’s not possible, he should plant colonies in order to control the lands and suppress dissent.  Moving a newly elected President to D.C. and having him spend the bulk of his time there handles the first suggestion.  The closest thing to planting colonies would be the President ensuring that his political party controls the Congress as well as the state legislatures and Govenorships.

I like to think that having read repeatedly and understood The Prince has provided me with a decent understanding of the realities of politics.  And my understanding of politics has led me to the following conclusion:  George W. Bush is highly unlikely to be given a second term in office.

Below is some of the key advice that Machiavelli provided in The Prince as well as a brief discussion of how well Bush is following, or not, that advice.

The Prince on Ability and Reputation

“A prince is further esteemed when he is a true friend or a true enemy, when, that is, he declares himself without reserve in favor of some one or against another.”

Bush has done a great job of this, I must admit.  He is, without reserve, against al-Qaeda, North Korea, and Iraq, as well as against many international treaties.  He is also, without reserve, in support of Israel, the National Missile Defense, restricting abortion rights, and ensuring that faith-based organizations receive federal support for their work on helping the poor and disadvantaged.  This solid support has made the President at least as many friends as it has enemies.

“…princes should let the carrying out of unpopular duties devolve on others, and bestow favors themselves.”

The point of this advice is that while you can always remove someone else in order to placate the displeased masses, you cannot remove yourself.  Depending on the situation, Bush has done an ok job on this front.  Most of the time, he sends Ari Fleischer, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice, or John Ashcroft out to do his dirty and unpleasant work.  But recently, for whatever reason, he’s been doing it himself, and in so doing has allowed himself to get beat up pretty badly in the process.

“One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps, and a lion to frighten wolves.  Those who wish to be only lions do not understand this.”

This advice basically requires that the prince be strong enough to keep the wolves at bay, but cunning enough to recognize when something is a trap.  I’m afraid that Bush is simply a lion, a President exercising the tremendous military might of his nation.  He’s failed to see that we’re playing right into the hand of Osama bin Laden with his quest for civilizational war.  Bush has allowed himself to be manipulated by those who would see us isolated from our European allies and the target of the hate of a billion Muslims, and so has shown he lacks the necessary fox-like traits.

“…all wise princes… consider not only present but also future discords and diligently guard against them.”

This applies equally to internal squabbles as to international problems.  Beyond the trap that the lion Bush is failing to avoid, there are discords cropping up within the United States that he is not guarding against.  Polls show support for Bush falling as he gets closer and closer to war with Iraq.  His treatment of Medicare, specifically drug benefits for the elderly, is rapidly turning an entire segment of the population against him.  And he’s turning moderates against him by his treatment of education nationwide.

The Prince on Policy

“…one ought never to allow a disorder to take place in order to avoid war, for war is not thereby avoided, but only deferred to your disadvantage.”

This is absolutely true, and Bush’s rush to war in the face of international and domestic turmoil ensures that the war will not be deferred to the disadvantage of the United States.  Similarly, our assault on Afghanistan was so total that the Taliban and their al-Qaeda allies had no time to prepare to our disadvantage.

“A prudent ruler ought not to keep faith when by doing so it would be against his interest, and when the reasons which made him bind himself no longer exist.”

It’s remarkable how often politicians break their word.  The President’s No Child Left Behind initiative, while an excellent idea, isn’t funded.  It will be difficult at best for public schools to even maintain their quality of instruction with the coming cuts in state and federal education funding.  I also seem to recall that his prior commitment to Medicare and affordable drugs has fallen off a cliff of late.  Of course, Bush has changed his priorities, so his changing level of commitment to education and affordable health care is hardly a surprise.  On the other hand, we can and should ask ourselves whether his priorities have actually changed, or has our President never been truly committed to these stated goals?

“In course of time [a miserly prince] will be thought more liberal, when it is seen that by his parsimony his revenue is sufficient, that he can defend himself against those who make war on him, and undertake enterprises without burdening his people….”

The budget for last year (which still hasn’t been passed) and the next budget are excellent examples of Bush’s liberal fiscal policies.  Bush has increased fiscal spending on pet projects across the board while at the same time cutting taxes in a time of war.  This will most likely lead to budget deficits for the foreseeable future and thus to slower long-term economic growth, poor job prospects, etc.  Ultimately, this will require even further budget cuts in order to afford to keep the government running, punishing our children for the economic crimes of our President.

The Prince on Nobility and Mercenaries (aka fellow politicians and political donors)

“Thus it is well to appear merciful, faithful, humane, sincere, religious, and also to be so; but you must have the mind so disposed that when it is needful to be otherwise you may be able to change to the opposite qualities.”

Bush is an expert at appearing sincere, even as his actions are contrary to his words.  He is certainly religious, but in the same sense as a crusader who has the moral certainty of blind faith without the ambiguity of moral reality.  He is a master of creating appearances while retaining the freedom necessary to perform actions that are cruel and inhumane (detentions at Guantanamo that are of questionable legality), insincere (hypocrisy on any number of policy fronts), and irreligious (bending Christian dogma to suit his political and military goals).

“[the forces of a powerful neighbor] may be good in themselves, but they are always dangerous for those who borrow them, for if they lose you are defeated, and if they conquer you remain their prisoner.”

While officially applying to military forces borrowed from another prince, this statement applies just as well to borrowing political strength, especially in the Congress.  Working across the aisle with Democrats absolutely applies.  Essentially, every time Bush needs Democratic help to pass his agendas, he is borrowing forces from another and makes himself more and more the Democrats’ prisoner.  In addition, every time the President needs Karl Rove’s help bringing the Republican Party into step with Bush’s agenda, the President makes himself more and more Rove’s prisoner.

“…it is impossible to satisfy the nobility by fair dealing and without inflicting injury on others, whereas it is very easy to satisfy the mass of the people in this way.”

In essence, Machiavelli is saying that the nobility, in this case fellow politicians and especially Congressmen and Congresswomen, are powerful enough that they always have their own agendas and therefore cannot be relied upon as a true basis of support.  Only through dealing fairly with the people can a prince guarantee his position.  The President doing a horrible job at following this particular piece of advice.  Bush is making the people nervous with the erosion of civil liberties, the threat of war and it’s effects on the economy, and the rapid destruction of the nation’s educational priorities.

“Mercenary captains are either very capable men or not; if they are, you cannot rely upon them, for they will always aspire to their own greatness, either by oppressing you, their master, or by oppressing others against your intention; but if the captain is not an able man, he will generally ruin you.”

The trading of personal and political favors for support is inherently a mercenary pursuit even if it is a common practice between the Executive and Legislative branches of the federal government.  Bush cannot rely on people like Bill Frist, Dennis Hastert, or Tom DeLay lest they begin to vie for the Presidency themselves.  Trent Lott was found to not be an able mercenary captain and in the process gave the entire Republican Party a thin sheen of slime.  And Bush can’t rely on any campaign supporters whom he paid off with political pork, either.  After all, pork has a tendency to go rancid over time, and political pork is no exception.

The Prince on the People

“…a prince should make himself feared in such a way that if he does not gain love, he at any rate avoids hatred.”

Bush is a radically polarizing influence on this country.  You either love him and what he’s doing or you hate him.  I can recall meeting no-one who falls anywhere in the middle.  Bush’s problem is that he has been unable to reduce the number of detractors to the point that they’re insignificant and could be ignored.  Instead, he’s bringing the country close to a social civil war between his supporters and his detractors.  He has not avoided being hated, and he’s so goofy that the populace doesn’t fear him.  Not a good combination for a person who intends to have a second Presidential term.

“…the conqueror must arrange to commit all his cruelties at once…. For injuries should be done all together, so that being less tasted, they will give less offence.”

Bush appears to find this concept totally alien, as he keeps dishing out small injuries here, there, and everywhere.  Education reform is hurting schools nationwide, tax cuts are expected to hurt the economy rather than help it, the terrorism alert system is giving millions sleepless nights, the coming war in Iraq is weighing down the economy and has put a hold on nearly all new hiring, and Medicare still doesn’t and likely won’t have a prescription drug benefit before the next election.  Not a good combination.

The Prince and Bush

In essence, Bush is following only some of the advice given by Machiavelli.  He’s staying the course on war with Iraq, putting up a good front on his “good” traits while hiding his “evil” traits successfully, and he’s not waffling on who his friends and enemies are.  The problem is that some of Machiavelli’s greatest advice is being ignored.  Bush is widely despised by a large enough portion of the country to be a threat.  He’s regularly angering even his supporters with many small injuries and no end to them in sight.  He lacks enough personal charisma and power to push his agenda through without the Democrats and without buying off powerful and possibly threatening members of his own party.  His economic decisions are proving to be far too monetarily liberal even for his own party and will lead to terrible economic results.  And he’s unable or unwilling to see the traps laid for him or the discord his decisions are causing both domestically and internationally.

Because of his failure to apply good political advice to his actions, the President is extremely unlikely to be given a second term in office.

As a final note, Machiavelli’s The Prince succeeded in getting Niccolo Machiavelli labeled an extremist, immoral, unethical, and he was exiled specifically because of what he wrote within it.  Many people find its advice morally and ethically repugnant, as do I.  But that doesn’t change the fact that, should a politician follow the advice within The Prince, he or she would likely perform well, effectively, and long.  There may be other treatises on politics that gloss over the negative aspects better, but I doubt that any can so prove so effective a tool as The Prince.  It is for this reason that I recommend that anyone who desires to understand the inner workings of the political mind read The Prince.  You may find yourself appalled, it may make you as cynical about politics as I am myself, but within its pages you just might come to understand the realities of politics.

(Machiavelli, Niccolo.  The Prince. Translated Luigi Ricci. Revised E.R.P Vincent. New York, NY, Mentor, 1980.)

Wednesday, March 05, 2003

Protest and Patriotism

When did protesters become traitors? Was it when Rush Limbaugh labeled them such? Was it when a man, draped in a flag, rushed the floor at a basketball game to confront an athlete who, in protest, turned away from the flag during the Pledge of Allegiance? Was it when Clear Channel Communications, one of the largest radio conglomerates in the country, sponsored their first pro-war rally? Was it when the President implicitly questioned the patriotism of all who opposed him and his intentions to make war on Iraq?

I don’t know, and frankly, I don’t care. It just needs to stop. Now. Yesterday would be preferable, three months ago would be great, before it ever started would be perfect. Unfortunately, that would require breaking the laws of physics as we understand them, so I guess that’s out.

But as I said, it needs to stop now.

I remember what it was like in ’91 when I was the only high school student in my class wearing a peace pin. I remember the glares, the half-hushed abrasive comments made so I could hear them as I walked by. I remember what it was like to walk through the mall or the grocery store and see faces harden into an angry mask when the realized what the shiny emblem on my shirt was. I’m sure that many of my fellow students felt I was a traitor, and maybe by their warped definition I was. But I refused then, and I refuse now, to allow my silence to support a policy that I disagree with.

The thing that scares the hell out of me now is the frenzy the nation has built up. Maybe I was just too young to notice in ’91, but I don’t remember Bush the First consciously whipping the nation up into a war frenzy using the language of war, hate, and faith. I don’t recall his advisors telling the entire planet to go Hell, go directly to Hell, do not pass Go, do not collect $200. Rumsfeld has. Rice has. Cheney has. Ashcroft has. And the President himself certainly has. Not in so many words, of course, but the actions of this administration speak far louder than their words.

I can hear some of you now saying “But wait! There’s been 9/11 since ’91. That changed everything.” Bullshit. 9/11 is an excuse for all the President’s men to go shove Humpty Saddam off the wall, and to hell with trying to put him back together again. 9/11 is an excuse for Ashcroft to strip away the civil liberties that we value so dear, like the implied right to privacy in our own homes. 9/11 is the excuse that fanatical ultra-patriots are using to label everyone who disagrees with them a traitor in hopes of destroying their opponent’s credibility.

And the protestors have credibility. There are a great many people who oppose the coming war, not just me. Celebrities, politicians, radio DJs, and millions of people world wide who marched in protests several weeks ago, just to name a few. The sheer number of protestors alone give them credibility, if only the President would admit it. Oh, but wait, Rumsfeld can blow off Europeans who don’t want us to go to war by labeling them “Old Europe,” implying that they are stuck in the past. Bush can blow off the U.N. by saying it’s credibility has been destroyed (as we all know he will) when the Security Council doesn’t vote the way the President wants it to, even though the U.S. put a bullet through the heart of the U.N.’s credibility by refusing to enforce U.N. mandates on Israel.

I know I’ll sleep better knowing that the man who is ostensibly the leader of the free world is so confident he’s right that he’ll go to war with a small Arab nation against global public opinion and the rule of international law. What happened to government by the people, for the people? I realize that Bush is beholden only to the citizens of the United States, but no nation with our ideals should ever, under any circumstances, just think about ourselves. This may be really arrogant, but we’re bigger than that. We’re ostensibly the beacon of the democratic world, the nation that everyone aspires to. How can we be a beacon when our congressional leaders fail to debate the coming war in any meaningful way? How can we be a guiding light when our own government is already fingerprinting and tracking every Arabic male who comes into the country? When did “guilty until proven innocent” become the mantra of the INS?

It’s not too late to stop the Stalinization of the United States, but we’re most definitely headed down that path. Stalin named political enemies traitors and had them shipped off to work camps in Siberia or had them killed outright. How long will it be before Bush’s political enemies are named traitors and beaten up by the ultrapatriots? How long before the fanatical nationalists, dressed in combat boots and camo instead of brown shirts and jackboots, beat the first protestor to death for political reasons?

I know enough about how the Nazis came to power in the 1930s to see some parallels to recent events. Economic depression led the German people to support whoever they thought would improve the economy. Fear of Communism in the Weimar Republic united the right and center against the far left, much as fear of terrorism is uniting the country against outsiders now. The Nazi party claimed “proper” German patriotism and nationalism as their own, just as many of the ultrapatriots and nationalists supporting the President are today. The Department of Justice under Ashcroft has all but called for citizens to spy on each other in a manner frighteningly similar to the exhortations of the Gestapo. And one of the most effective tools of power that the Nazis used was their ability to convince people that anyone who disagreed with them was a traitor.

Unlike some politicians and pundits, I’m not one to use “Nazi” rhetorical weapon lightly. Ever since I studied the history of Nazism and fascism in college, I have refused to label someone a Nazi of any kind unless they truly deserved the label (as true neo-Nazis do). So I refuse to label the current administration “Nazi-esque,” even though the parallels exist. There are enough differences between Germany in the 1930s and the United States now that I’m not as worried as you might think. The very technology that allows people to organize global protests against the coming Iraq war makes the adoption of a neo-fascist ideal by the United States government dramatically more difficult, even as technology provides the tools to make the horror of Orwell’s “1984” possible. Luckily, there actually are people who have learned from history and who will fight to prevent it from repeating here.

But I won’t stand by and allow someone to call me a traitor just because I don’t support the President. Treason is betrayal of the United States, not disagreement with the present administration. Treason is stomping on the rights guaranteed in our Constitution because an external threat makes it expedient to do so. Protesting and exercising our rights as citizens of the United States, whether people agree with us or not, could never be treason, regardless of what right-wing ultra-patriots like Rush Limbaugh say.

I dug out my peace pin today, the same pin I wore in ‘91. It’s sitting here next to me as I write this, as I contemplate what I might have to face when I wear it after the second U.S.-Iraq war begins. It won’t be any easier to wear it now than it was in high school, but I refuse to give permission to the President with my silence. I can easier deal with people who would label me a traitor than I could sleep at night knowing I was a traitor to myself.

Tuesday, March 04, 2003

Playing a Global Game of Chicken

Bush is playing a game of chicken with Iraq and North Korea. But like everything else, there’s a different name for it when talking about foreign policy – brinkmanship. Unfortunately, changing the name doesn’t make it any less stupid or immature, it just changes the name. And in the case of international relations, ups the ante by an immeasurable amount.

Brinkmanship is a dangerous game. Kennedy and Khrushchev played. We call that unfortunate game of chicken the Cuban Missile Crisis, and we very nearly bombed ourselves into oblivion in the process of playing. India and Pakistan have fought enough wars that when they start playing chicken, the entire world lands on their shoulders and attempts to smack some sense into the leaders responsible. Now the President of the United States is playing the same stupid game with both Iraq and North Korea.

Saddam Hussein is a bully, and everyone knows it. And many people, especially in the current administration, feel that the only way to stop this particular bully is to stand up to him and force him to back down. I’ll admit that they might be right. But there has to be a better way to do it than what Bush and is doing now.

Think about it. George Bush the First very clearly told Hussein before the Gulf War that the use of chemical and/or biological weapons would not be tolerated, and that the United States would respond in a way that would be devastating. But Bush the First didn’t come right out and say “Hey, we’ll nuke you back into the Stone Age if you use chemical or biological weapons.” Instead, he allowed the threat be implicit, suggesting that he might use nukes, but still allowing the threat to be interpreted some alternate way. Bush the First didn’t paint himself into that particular corner, and so avoided the necessity of having to follow through on the threat in order to maintain credibility.

Our current President, unfortunately, doesn’t seem to get it. Bush the Second has already said that he’d nuke Iraq if Hussein used biological or chemical weapons. That’s right, let’s inflame an already smoldering Middle East by telling them that we’ll vaporize or irradiate millions of innocent Muslims just to get one bully. And by outright saying that we’d nuke Iraq, and doing so publicly where the world could hear, if Hussein uses chemical or biological weapons, we HAVE to use nukes to maintain our credibility. Of course, we could accept the losses and save face by restraining ourselves in the face of a madman’s horrific assault, but that gives Bush and his team hawks way too much credit.

Kim Jong Il of North Korea is also a bully. Not only is North Korea a threat, they’re very much a clearer threat than Iraq is at this particular moment. North Korea has nukes, has one of the world’s largest armies, chemical weapons, and a siege mentality. And North Korea just recently threatened to use nukes if the US attacked them. Sounds a lot like Bush’s comments on Hussein using chemical or biological weapons. It’s nice to know the President of the United States is in such rarified company as Kim Jong Il.

So, in response to the implied threat of Bush leaving “all military options” open to dealing with North Korea, Kim Jong Il threatens nuclear war on the Korean peninsula. And in response to the interception of a US military spy plane by North Korean MIGs, Bush has ordered fighter escorts for the spy planes in an attempt to show how serious the US is about maintaining our right to spy on North Korea. I sincerely hope this won’t end where some games of chicken end – with one or both participants dead on the side of the road after the high-speed, head-on collision.

When I grew up, the law of the playground required that you face down a bully, because doing anything else was an invitation to further bullying. Ignoring the bully because you were mature enough to realize that assholes weren’t worthy of your disdain wasn’t an option. Kim Jong Il and Saddam Hussein are both bullies, but Bush is allowing himself, and the United States along with him, to be bullied when we should instead be playing the parent figure in this playground drama. And by allowing himself to be bullied, he’s responding the only way some kids seem to be able to these days – by going home, grabbing Daddy’s pistol, and threatening the bullies with worse than they can give. Just because it might work doesn’t mean it won’t get Bush, and the entire country, expelled from the international community we rely on.

How nice it is to see we’ve matured so much since grade school.