[Politics] Re: would you vote for this man?

From: Brett Paatsch (bpaatsch@bigpond.net.au)
Date: Sat Aug 30 2003 - 10:30:24 MDT

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    Robbie Lindauer <robblin@thetip.org> writes:

    > On Saturday, August 30, 2003, at 12:01 AM, Brett Paatsch wrote:
    >
    > > I do NOT see President Bush as an evil or Hitler-like character,
    > > but I DO think that the US is now riper and more receptive for
    > > the rise of a genuine Hitler-like regime than ever before.
    >
    > What do you think "Shock and Awe" means from below?

    From below? I don't know. I interpreted it from the media as
    military PR speak for "we are going to impress scare these
    folks so bad with our military display of force that they will be
    shocked and awed into submission.

    > The pretty pictures you see on TV of nice lights lighting
    > up the desert sky are really, every one of them, horrifying,
    > evil and atrocious acts of murder.
    >
    > That we are not ALL completely horrified that there were
    > two wars that didn't need to happen is a sign that in fact we
    > are already living in Die Neue Reichstadt and that a
    > Hitler-Like character has already taken over.

    Nah Robbie, if it makes sense to put horrifying on any sort of
    sliding scale I think there have been some acts in wars that
    were more completely horrifying than those of the second
    gulf war and of Afghanistan. The concentration camps in
    WWII were more horrifying, and more depraved imo. I think
    it is important to keep our sense of proportion.

    Bush does not have Hilter's political and media savvy, not by
    a long shot. I very much doubt he has Hitler's degree of single
    minded ruthlessness either. But Hitler came to power in a set
    of circumstances and using a background of propaganda and
    fear that some astute political observers of modern American
    might find provocative. Bush is a bungler, that he has done
    great harm is because he has great power and poor judgement
    not because he has great malice.

    Imo Bush intended and expected to get UN support for a
    second resolution. He expected to unearth WMD's. He did not
    have the savvy to differentiate two key issues at the diplomatic
    level and as a consequence he put many in the world offside
    that might have been onside and the UN was wrecked at a time
    when a brighter President might have re-invigorated it.

    The problem of Iraq and the UN (after resolution 1441 was
    unanimously agreed too) was two problems not one.

    The second problem was the specific problem of Iraq, the
    great mistake made was in seeing that as the first problem.

    The first was that the Security Council was the only body
    with the authority to authorise a go to war decision under
    the special circumstances that prevailed. Yet the Security
    Councils permanent members had no standard in place by
    which any criteria to go to war in the interests of international
    peace and security could be made. It still has none. Chirac
    was going about saying we will never, never go to war. Such
    a statement made in the context of being specifically asked
    as a permanent security council member for a practical
    standard would have been patently untenable in the court of
    world public opinion. And Bush would have been right to
    threaten to revoke the UN Charter on that basis and to
    actually do it if it came to that.

    A murder trial even in France must balance the risks between
    sentencing an innocent man and letting a guilty one go free.
    Jury decisions acknowledge this when they are asked to
    decide guilty or not guilty of murder against a standard, in
    this case against the standard of "beyond reasonable doubt".

    The UN Security Council including France was obliged
    under the terms of the Charter to make a judgement in the
    interests of international peace and security and yet Chirac
    of France was able to not decide because Bush did not
    challenge him to come up with a standard of proof for
    any go to war don't go to war to apply both to Iraq and
    for the UN in the future. Had Bush pushed for such a
    standard and Chirac not come up with one Bush could
    have argued legitimately that the UN could not function
    in its current configuration because one of the permanent
    security council members, France would not agree on a
    practical standard that balanced the risks in the new world
    that includes terrorist organisations and actions of the scale
    and sophistication of September 11. Bush had the move
    (if he had the sense to play it to isolate Chirac but he did
    not play it).

    Pushed to come up with a standard for UN go to war,
    no go to war decision Chirac would have had to come up
    with a standard. A practical standard for a practical
    problem. The standard could have been fair and it could
    have been rational but in its absence the security council
    cannot perform its task of maintaining international peace
    and security.

    Say the standard that Chirac had come up with was "on
    the balance of probably risk". Then the various countries
    could have applied that standard, the risk of a go to war
    against Iraq, verses the risk of not going on the basis of
    information available and factoring for urgency. Information
    which could have been provided in camera.

    Chances are, in hindsight, with such a standard, that the
    US would not have been able to make its case for a quick
    invasion as it didn't have evidence of weapons of mass
    destruction. But had there been such evidence then the case
    should have been able to be quickly. And the UN would
    have had a working standard for dealing with Iran and
    North Korea and other rogue states.

    Imo history provided a moment to a US President to put
    real teeth in international law, and to give the UN, in the
    interests of the US as well, real power. But through poor
    diplomacy Bush blue it. He missed the shot. No other
    national leader was in a position to call for a standard
    because Bush was controlling the clock, he had the military
    in place and he was setting the timetable. He got the UN
    to resolution 1441 and that is too his credit.

    Only Bush could make the UN better, or if need be break
    it in good faith in front of all the world because the French
    or some other permanent member were being hopelessly
    intractable in refusing to even come up with a standard.

    Of all the options Bush could have chosen he chose the
    absolute worst. He chose to keep the UN but breach
    the charter. And international law has been in a state of
    conspicuous farce ever since. Bush has the US in the
    situation where it appears to respect international law only
    when it suits it. And the world knows this. America
    historically has been better than that. The world looks at
    the mighty US military and thinks potential or actual
    "protection racket".

    The reason that Iraq was not worth the price was that
    the price was America's word in international law and
    the final reduction of the UN to a farce by one man.
    President G. W. Bush. America still needs the UN but it
    cannot imbue that body now with legitimacy as President
    Bush through diplomatic incompetence (not malice imo -
    he did too many other things that make malice or deep
    planning a plausible explanation) took the principle role
    in destroying it. It continues to exist now as a facade, that
    few will dare to speak of burying but the logic of its charter,
    the trust that nations especially permanent security council
    members will abide by the Charter has been rent.

    Brett Paatsch

    [NB. The views above are those of the poster only]

     
     

     

     



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