Archive for April, 2009

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Dingbat Republican Award

Thursday, April 30th, 2009

This installment of the Dingbat Republican Award is a tie.

First up, we have former Secretary of State and Chair of the National Security Council Condoleezza Rice.  When asked by students at Stanford University whether waterboarding was torture, Rice replied:

“The United States was told, we were told, nothing that violates our obligations under the Convention Against Torture. And so by definition, if it was authorized by the president, it did not violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture.”

“By definition”? If the President authorizes it, it is by definition legal?

I didn’t realize we had become a monarchy. This is the ideology of  authoritarianism as purely as it can be spoken.

But this week Michele Bachmann, always a candidate for the Dingbat Award, didn’t disappoint either.

On Monday night, on the floor of the House,while praising the Hoover and Coolidge administrations for their free trade policies, Bachmann said that:

“FDR applied just the opposite formula, the Hoot-Smalley Act which was a tremendous burden on tariff barriers”

And she goes on to argue that this caused the Great Depression.

First of all, it was the Smoot-Hawley tariffs—but hey, anyone can misspeak. The bigger problem was that Smoot-Halley was signed into law by Herbert Hoover in 1930, long before FDR took office.

Matt Yglesias has the metaphysical implications worked out:

It’s true that Bachmann is making an unfortunate error about the names of Messrs. Smoot and Hawley. But her contention is simply that Roosevelt, though he took office in March 1933, was actually able to cause events in the past precipitating the very years-long Depression that led to his election. It’s a bit confusing, yes. And somewhat metaphysically controversial. But not at all something she deserves to be mocked for.

Indeed. Someone needs to make sure she gets her meds.

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Posted in Politics, Watching the Conservatives | No Comments »

The Iraq War Is Over

Wednesday, April 29th, 2009

The recent violence in Iraq is not unexpected. The so-called “surge”—the increase in troop strength that was supposed to provide sufficient security to enable political reconciliation in Iraq—reduced violence but did not produce political reconciliation. Thus the violence is resuming.

But, as Nir Rosen, one of the more reliable commentators on Iraq,  writes, this violence is unlikely to result in a return to civil war:

The occasional al Qa’eda suicide attack can still kill masses of innocent civilians, but it has no strategic impact; in fact it is difficult to understand what motivates such attacks today, since their effect is almost nil. It would be naive to say that Iraq’s future is certain, or even likely, to be a peaceful one, but the war between Sunnis and Shiites is now over.

What has changed in Iraq that will enable this stable, though still violent, future?

What did work to reduce violence in Iraq was good, old-fashioned ethnic cleansing and bribery. Rosen continues:

The cleansing of Sunnis from much of Baghdad deprived Sunni insurgents of sanctuary among the population as they were losing battles with al Qa’eda, the Americans and Shiite militias. The Shiite bloc had numerical superiority, backed by the force of the Iraqi state and its security forces. And so, one by one, groups of Sunni resistance fighters struck ceasefire agreements with the Americans and joined the fight against al Qa’eda and other radical elements. The “surge” of American forces allowed Maliki to strengthen the authority of the state and its security forces, while the establishment of the Awakening groups neutralised anti-government Sunni militias (in some cases simply by paying them salaries not to fight the state). The decline in sectarian violence gave Maliki space to weaken competing Shiite militias, who had been integral to cleansing Sunnis from mixed areas and establishing Shiite dominance but whose presence prevented his fully consolidating control.

Thus, as Rosen suggests, many Sunnis have reconciled themselves to an authoritarian, Shia-led government, which they prefer to continued violence and upheaval. And the Iraqi government has been strengthened enough so that anyone who wants to actively oppose it will have few options.

There is nothing the Awakening groups can do. As guerrillas and insurgents they were only effective when they operated covertly, underground, blending in among a Sunni population that has now mostly been dispersed. Now the former resistance fighters-turned-paid guards are publicly known, and their names, addresses and biometric data are in the hands of American and Iraqi forces. They cannot return to an underground that has been cleared, and they still face the wrath of radical Sunnis who view them as traitors. They have failed to unite and as their stories demonstrate, they are on the run.

Let’s hope Rosen is right.

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Posted in Foreign Policy | No Comments »

The Weakest Link

Tuesday, April 28th, 2009

Cross-posted at Philosophy on the Mesa.

This latest outbreak of swine flu reminds us of the limits of self-reliance.

One of the main themes of Reviving the Left is that central currents in American thought encourage the idea that unbridled self-reliance is a moral virtue.

But this is a dangerous idea that continually leaves us vulnerable to potentially catastrophic events such as pandemics.

We like to think that our welfare is in our own hands—what happens to us is in the end our own responsibility. This assumption about personal responsibility is so pervasive that it seems written in the DNA of Americans. And it is encouraged by the fact that our dependence on distant others is often hidden from view. Modern marketing and technology is very good at covering up the origins of things—we are seldom forced to think about the anonymous people who grow our food or make our products.

So why should we care about inadequate public health resources in foreign countries like Mexico?

The news coming out of Mexico explains why.

Two weeks after the first known swine flu death, Mexico still hasn’t given medicine to the families of the dead. It hasn’t determined where the outbreak began or how it spread. And while the government urges anyone who feels sick to go to hospitals, feverish people complain ambulance workers are scared to pick them up.

A portrait is emerging of a slow and confused response by Mexico to the gathering swine flu epidemic. And that could mean the world is flying blind into a global health storm.

It isn’t obvious what we can do about inadequate public health in other countries. (We have our own inadequacies to worry about.) But this is another example, along with global warming, resource depletion, nuclear proliferation, etc., of a problem that requires collective solutions. And collective action requires levels of trust that only a greater willingness to be generous toward others will provide.

Whatever the particular solution to public health failures in other countries, that solution will require, from wealthy nations,  persistent, wise regard for the vulnerability of others, in part because their vulnerabilities can become ours.

This is more evidence that an ethic of care provides better moral guidance than more traditional moral theories.

h/t to Talking Points Memo

Posted in Ethics, Reviving the Left, ethics of care | 1 Comment »

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