There Is Always Something There To Remind Me

That they never really learn (dadun-dun duh-duh)…

Allawi’s Inside Track?

[…]

I confess that I have a much greater tolerance for these sorts of creative approaches to national sovereignty and democratic change when I have any confidence the puppeteers have a clue what they’re doing. But, that said, it would seem Mr. Allawi may be the coming man to continue Iraq’s democratic revolution.

(Via.)

Yes, yes; I know. I’m an asshole and a purist, what with my insistent refrain that ‘it’s the Imperialism, stupid.’ Yes, Marshall is an excellent reporter. Yes, he is anti-Bush. Blah-blah-blah. I’m just saying: That’s not nearly enough. Marshall confirms that while he may never be pro-war again in a time of a Republican presidency, he’s still willing to play neocongames if the puppeteers identify as Democratic (which, with foreign policy centrists like Obama and Clinton in the running, is a likely scenario). So, while it’s great that our Serious Liberal Journalists are now — after all that’s happened — suspicious of crusades that might be instigated by, say, Bill Kristol and Max Boot, they’ll still be up for those instigated by, say, Ivo Daalder and John Ikenberry. In other words, they’re against silly imperialism, but still more than open to ‘smart’ imperialism. Yeah, goody goody.

 

Comments: 37

 
 
 

“tt’s the Imperialism, stupid”

And to that I can only say, Amen!

 
 

I know that Marshall’s track record on Iraq features a very poor start out of the gate, but I think it’s clear from the context that this entire entry of his is all sarcasm.

 
 

Hmm, maybe. I smelled the sarcasm in the second quoted sentence, but thought he was playing it straight in the first one.

 
 

I’m a devoted fan of Josh and the TPM empire, but I don’t disagree with what you (and Glenn Greenwald) are saying. It would be nice if pundits and other thinkers could take away from the current mess the notion that maybe they need to rethink their attitudes about America’s role in the world.

 
 

Yes, I believe HTML’s interpretation is correct. The first sentence clearly means, without facetiousness, that this sort of thing is OK if Bill Clinton gives the order.

 
Incontinentia Buttocks
 

Obviously you love Slobodan Milosevic….or International ANSWER….or something. Remember, if it weren’t for them, sensible liberals could have opposed the impending war in 2002.

Besides, Ralph Nader is responsible for the Democrats passing the new wiretap law.

Things would be so much better if Joe Lieberman were the presumptive Democratic nominee this year….

 
Incontinentia Buttocks
 

It would be nice if pundits and other thinkers could take away from the current mess the notion that maybe they need to rethink their attitudes about America’s role in the world.

Avoiding having to rethink these attitudes is the chief function of the view that Bush’s foreign policy was a complete departure from what went before.

In fact, though the Bush administration pushed the envelope in a variety of ways, it is in many ways in keeping with American foreign policy for at least the last several decades, if not a lot longer.

Thanks, HTML, for keeping your eye on the prize. It’s so important to keep calling attention to the fact that we need a fundamental redirection in foreign policy, not just a president from the Democratic wing of the bipartisan foreign policy consensus.

 
 

Maybe I’m reading to much into his use of the word “creative” here. Anyway, I don’t want to take away from your larger point here. It IS increasingly clear that liberal thinking is going to have to get over the idea of the pax Americana, an idea that has gone from quaintly fictional to seriously past its sell-by date.

 
 

I think Josh is being a little sharky here, boys and girls. I think his lack of snark, however, lies in an argument for competence, not necessarily as a means of projecting American power, but as a means of fixing the Iraq debacle, specifically.

 
 

Huh, sort of thought the same thing about today’s altercation.
Alterman:
“Colin Powell made it difficult as hell for Clinton to commit troops to Bosnia, and we ended up with a mission that lost not a single life on the ground. (Though Republicans refused to support even that.)”

 
 

Yeah, Legalize, that was my take, too. Then the issue becomes the collective unwillingness to recognize that WE can’t fix what’s wrong in Iraq, even though–or, especially because–WE certainly did break it. The smaller, sadder point is that competence is always the preferable default setting, even in the midst of overall failure.

 
 

I agree with you, HTML, though I think it is a little unfair to translate “greater tolerance for something arguably bad if executed competently” with “its OK if Bill Clinton does it.”

Like I said, I agree that liberals/moderates should be rethinking all sorts of ideas about foreign policy, and a strong stance against this type of meddling is more appropriate. However, I think that recognizing that, if we are going to do something bad, we should at least do it competently, isn’t quite the same thing as saying it’s ok to do the bad thing.

maybe I’m wrong.

 
 

While you are absolutely right, even a slim hope that Americans will change the way they view the world and their role in it is misplaced.

The militarism and exceptionalism is way too deeply ingrained in the American psyche to ever be conscientiously rethought. I mean, think about it. The absolute counterproductivety of a massive military response to a major terrorist attack is obvious. In fact, to merely call it obvious understates the point. Of all of the continuum of possible responses, it was the one most likely to make the problem worse and least likely to bring about an end to the violence, hatred and distrust.

And yet, American, her supposedly brilliant leadership and a huge portion of the population embraced this “solution”. Why? Why, because America is the greatest country in the world, and the American military is the greatest fighting force in history.

Now a few of us might recognize that these statements, whether they are true or not, do not actually answer the question of “what actions should we take after a major terrorist attack”. But the fact that this was the course of action taken, and the fact that it has been made clear by every major American political figure that this is exactly the same response we will use when we are hit again, pretty much tells you everything you need to know about the future, and whether there is any hope for America…

mikey

 
 

mikey – that, and American’s complete amnesia regarding our foreign policy history. The worst of it is that, not only do Americans forget what happened in the world 10 years ago, we expect everybody else to have forgotten as well. We just don’t understand why anybody could be mad at us – We overthrew who? Installed who? Blowback? Huh? Man, that’s ancient history!

 
 

I agree with you, HTML, though I think it is a little unfair to translate “greater tolerance for something arguably bad if executed competently” with “its OK if Bill Clinton does it.”

Yeah, what Kathleen said.

 
 

When Mikey sez ” the fact that this was the course of action taken, and the fact that it has been made clear by every major American political figure that this is exactly the same response we will use when we are hit again, pretty much tells you everything you need to know about the future, and whether there is any hope for America…” my last shreds of hope and denial fall away, and I’m left standing naked in a small puddle.

Thanks, Mikey. Thanks a lot.

 
 

Anyone who uses the phrase “Iraq’s democratic revolution” has got to be sarcastic.

That said, maybe we could ask JMM if this was meant to be tongue-in-cheek.

Not me, of course, I gotta run to the store.

 
 

In fairness to HTML, I’m the one that dropped teh Clenis bomb on this one (his C-word–giggle–in the post referring to Hillary), and I would still maintain that it’s apt. I guarantee you that Josh was thinking about nobody but Bill when he wrote those words. It’s not like he makes a secret of the fact that he supported Clinton’s military interventions, and he would not term them to be “bad ideas well-executed”–he thought they were good ideas. I don’t mean to say he would unquestioningly support anything Bill would do were Bill in charge of the Iraq whatever-it-is, but I think it’s pretty clear he’s in favor of some, shall we say, hegemonic activities if the right guy is at the wheel.

 
 

Anyone who uses the phrase “Iraq’s democratic revolution” has got to be sarcastic.

Yeah, but that was in the sentence snarking about Allawi.

 
Garrigus Mac Ghairiog
 

The militarism and exceptionalism is way too deeply ingrained in the American psyche to ever be conscientiously rethought.

All due respect, mikey, I don’t think it’s to do with “ingrained in the … psyche”, but rather with the [sigh] military-industrial-congressional complex. It’s ingrained in the coffers. The bloated military is now akin to a drug habit in Congress, and we don’t know how to kick it.

I remember that when the Cold War ended, I (along with my brother) envisioned a world that the U.S. could mold for the future. Basically we had the opportunity to prepare all our allies to start undertaking their own defense, and bringing all the troops home. We could disband NATO. We could give Israel a time limit. Of course in fact the era started with the preposterous-if-they-weren’t-so-destructive Gulf War and Somalia, and here we are. I don’t think I was very familiar with the implications of Eisenhower’s speech at the time.

 
 

The bloated military is now akin to a drug habit in Congress, and we don’t know how to kick it.

One of the weirdest things about the mind-bogglingly huge Defense budget is that it’s apparently not enough to fight wars. As soon as we start one, it’s time to queue up the 2-a-year $50 billion supplemental bills, which don’t count against the budget (wheeeee!).

 
 

Mikey, you could very well be correct, that Millitarism and Imperialism are inseparable from our national psyche. Still, I can’t help but notice that you are against Imperialism, and so are a lot of people here. You are certainly very intelligent, but there are a fair amount of intelligent people in this nation, and some of them even give a shit about the world, too. Like Garrigus, the problem looks, to me, like as much of an economic problem as a sociological, or perceptual one. But hey, maybe I’m naïve.

 
 

The militarism and exceptionalism is way too deeply ingrained in the American psyche

Little anecdote from 1970: I was in high school in Vancouver, BC. A new kid my age moved into the neighborhood, from Oakland, Cal. The reason: his father had moved the whole family to Canada to keep his kids out of the draft and Vietnam.

Now Bob was a nice guy – totally cool, funny – but whenever talk turned to criticizing America-in-the-wider-world (which was rather a lot what with Nixon, Cambodia, Kent State, etc.) he would shout us down. The USA was not to be denigrated!

There he was in Canada telling Canadians that the country his dad had exiled him from was the greatest country in the world.

We were all pretty sure that wasn’t healthy.

 
 

What’s so interesting about a warmonger who changed his mind about this particular war? I agree with the Clinton thing. The guy’s saying “it’s okay for us to be imperialists so long as the Clenis is emperor”. He just doesn’t get that it’s the whole “we have a right to fuck up your country” thing that is wrong, not just that you fucked up Iraq *badly*.

 
LA Confidential Pantload
 

Yes, just one more coup will do it……perhaps before his next meditation on this subject, Yglesias could fuck himself with a cactus. Liberal hawks appear to be only neocons who wait for the latest crisis to blow over.

 
 

wtf? Hey! This is a humor blog. What are you guys doing having a serious een-teel-lectu-all discussion?

 
 

Sorry HTML, while I appreciate your efforts in this regard, in general, I think you read it wrong. Its pure snark, and ‘greater tolerance’, even assuming he is serious at that point does not allow the conclusion you reach.

 
Qetesh the Abyssinian
 

Garrigus and atheist: from here, the problem looks deeply ingrained in the culture. And I say that with a knowledge of the culture only from outside, not from inside, admittedly. But there are very few countries on earth whose folks have such a rosy image of their own acts.

American exceptionalism is alive and well, and quite startling when looked at in context. Some of it is justified, but a lot of it isn’t, and that’s the part that gets very worrying.

When so many Americans can say without the slightest shred of self-awareness that America single-handedly won the second world war, that America single-handedly beat back the eevuls of communism by winning a staring contest, and that America has intervened in the world only to bring freedom and right wrongs, that’s worrying.

When there’s so much cultural glorification of the military, so much worship of force and war, which isn’t usually seen except in military regimes, that’s worrying.

When everyone the US goes to war against is ipso facto evil, and when everyone the US supports is ipso facto good, that’s worrying.

The notion that force of arms should be the first resort in any contretemps between nations is very, very worrying. It smacks of schoolyard politics, as does the constant reiteration by so many in and out of the mainstream that the US can’t afford to leave Iraq because it might look bad.

I mean, honestly, how do people in the world’s most heavily-armed nation come to believe that some ramshackle guerillas will be ’emboldened’ if they get their entire fucking army out of someone else’s country? Do they really think that a bunch of guys hiding in caves and using old USSR guns will really think “Hey, they’re leaving, we must be winning: let’s attack them at home!”

It’s a psychological point that someone cleverer and more diligent than I has recorded in a book: that right-wingers hold their views because they see the world from an ‘authoritarian father’ viewpoint, in which things only happen because some authority figure makes them happen, and that authority figure is around to punish evil-doers. There’s a lot of fear in there: that without the big beard in the sky, or its deputy on earth, we’ll all go to hell in a handbasket.

Left-wingers, OTOH, tend to realise that people do things for a lot of other reasons besides coercion. One could extrapolate this dichotomy to laws, whereby righties make laws that punish people, while lefties make laws to try and make things fairer and/or take account of different situations/motivations/whatevers.

Clearly I’m less than sparklingly articulate today. Perhaps it’s a hairball. Excuse me while I hack for a moment.

 
 

So what you’re saying Qetesh is that other former wannabe empires like say.. the Germans are better now because the world rose up and smacked them down? Taught them a lesson and instilled a little collective humility?

I’m not liking that very much.

 
Qetesh the Abyssinian
 

Noen. actually that wasn’t what I was saying at all. But there is something imperial about the US culture, and imperialism is a generically bad thing, I think. I’d far rather see something like the original idea for the united nations, or better still, George Monbiot’s idea for the United Nations (or, as some wag called it, the “Untied Nations”).

 
objectively pro-
 

Like say…the British, who planted the seeds that gave the world the present situations in Palestine/Israel, Iraq, Iran and Pakistan, are better now because they went broke and learned a little common sense, if not humility? (Until TB, of course).

Would that be a better scenario?

 
 

I mean, honestly, how do people in the world’s most heavily-armed nation come to believe that some ramshackle guerillas will be ‘emboldened’ if they get their entire fucking army out of someone else’s country? Do they really think that a bunch of guys hiding in caves and using old USSR guns will really think “Hey, they’re leaving, we must be winning: let’s attack them at home!”

It’s true, Qetesh, that it makes no sense if you really consider it. I think it gets people on a sub-logical level. And, our culture over here tends not to reward logical thinking anyway. Somethin’ like that.

I dunno, I agree that Millitarism is well-embedded in our culture, I just think that to say that we in the USA are all hypnotised by Imperialism isn’t quite true. Some people are anti-Imperialism, and lots more don’t give a shit one way or another. The problem is sociological, but it’s also economic.

 
 

So what you’re saying Qetesh is that other former wannabe empires like say.. the Germans are better now because the world rose up and smacked them down? Taught them a lesson and instilled a little collective humility? I’m not liking that very much.

What’s wrong with it? A country goes powermad and starts attacking everyone, and the rest of the world smacks them down. A better scenario than if that country won.

 
 

atheist, I agree. I just don’t relish the idea or look forward to the process should say China decide we need a dope slap. I have children. I’d like them to have a future. You’ve see this haven’t you?

We have four days

The diarist is saying he thinks next week the GOP noise machine will ramp up and start drumming for war with Iran. We are so fucked if we do.

 
 

As a US citizen who spends most of my time overseas it seems apparent to me that the US media has inculcated such a high level of fear into the populace that the once positive attribute of helping the downtrodden and non democratic people of the world progress politically and economically has easily been turned to imperial ‘pre-emptive’ wars on one hand and deep seated paranoia about non Europeans on the other. I can’t watch television when I’m home without getting the willies because the drumbeat of personal physical danger is so omnipresent. Dangerous toys, terrorist plots, your spinach is killing you, BSE, internet child porn rings, sleeper cells, identity theft, school shootings, stalkers, car recalls, avian flu, car jacking gangs, rampant drug use, pollution, double murder suicide, missing kids, widespread STDs, someone is poisoning the birds in the city park… the list goes on and on every night and day in every broadcast. I’m amazed folks ever leave their homes. Even in lefty heaven San Francisco I meet people who actually think that Islamofascits are planning to come over and kill their families. I am astonished that college educated folks can be so incredibly naive and unconsciously ego centric, but when the brain has been pulverized by fear anything can happen. Union workers might start shopping at places like Wal Mart while complaining about China ‘stealing’ their jobs. The fact that this atomized, docile and paranoid citizenry believes that bombing people into democracy is a good thing, let alone possible, really doesn’t surprise me at all….. We all know when the bell rings the dog salivates whether it wants to or not.

 
 

All I can say is……and y’all wonder why I’m a socialist.

I’ve never been able to understand why outright hating on the wogs is somehow worse than this incessant desire to lift up the White Man’s burden.

And the ability to tell oneself that “the Democrats are different” is part and parcel of that total historical amnesia dAve pointed out earlier. They aren’t different. On this issue, they’re a milder version of the Republicans – which is about as comforting as a milder version of herpes.

 
 

Um, guys. The Marshall line was one hundred percent sarcasm. “To continue Iraq’s democratic revolution?”

Looks like maybe you been ironic so long it looks like sincere to you…

 
 

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