Going Nuclear
I’m in Asia right now. On the way in, I was reminded of the increasingly visible effects of climate change–a tropical depression had closed the airport in Tokyo, so I was diverted to Nagoya, where I and 12 plane-loads of people slept on the airport floor, hoping to reach our destinations in time for our business meetings. It took me 2 days to reach my destination, and I had to spend $300 on clothes to make do until my bag reached me. That’s going to be an increasingly common occurrence so long as our leaders (read, Bush) ignore the real effects of climate change.
And now I have to contemplate flying home just east of a newly nuclear North Korea. It worries me a bit, sure (though I’m in SE Asia, far from any fall out, real or political). But mostly it makes me weary and sad that our failed leader continues to have such a tangibly negative effect on the world.
I’ve been harping for a long time, after all, about Bush’s propensity to choose the wrong targets. He has been chasing WMD ghosts in Iraq for 3 years now, and is contemplating chasing WMD ghosts in Iran, without making effective strides to roll back Pakistan’s proliferation network. You know, Pakistan? The country that assisted North Korea to get nukes? And for that matter, perhaps if we hadn’t sown so much chaos in the Middle East, we’d have had the focus to find a real solution in North Korea.
What Tipped the Balance?
John Amato provides some perspective on the most ominous development of the week, when Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani announced that he can no longer restrain his followers. Sistani announced this in the last few days. But, as one of Amato’s readers pointed out, David Ignatius reported that Sistani was worried about this back in July.
David:.. the most important and powerful personality in Iraq issignaling the Bush administration this week that he is worried that thesituation in Iraq is spinning out of control. He is the crucial person.If he gives up on this effort-this effort is over…
So what happened in the interim? What tipped the balance?
Republican Foreign Policy: Make a Profit on Destruction, Make a Profit on Reconstruction
I can’t remember where I asked it, but several weeks ago I asked who was going to pay for Lebanon’s reconstruction. Some in the thread mused that we, the American taxpayers, would pay for it. Well, wouldn’t you know:
The Bush administration is scrambling to assemble a plan to helprebuild Lebanon, hoping that by competing with Hezbollah for thepublic’s favor it can undo the damage the war has inflicted on itsimage and goals for the Middle East.
Administration officials fear that unless they move quickly todemonstrate U.S. commitment, the Lebanese will turn more fully to themilitant group, which has begun rolling out an ambitious reconstructionprogram that Washington believes is bankrolled by Iran.
"Scrambling to assemble a plan to helprebuild." Those Lebanese who watched Katrina on the TV or who have heard from cousins in Iraq are no doubt reading those words with dread. And any number of campaign donors probably just heard the lovely ring of "Ka ching!"
Judy and Johnny
It seems Arianna hasn’t disbanded her impressive network of Judy Miller sources. She reports:
At 7:30 this morning, John Bolton was having breakfast at Oscar’s at the Waldorf with Judy Miller.
Arianna wonders whether Bolton’s nomination battle to be reappointed came up. But I’m not convinced. After all, we have good reason to believe that John Bolton is the only Neocon who has availed himself of Judy’s particular talent for WMD porn since she was ousted form the NYT. And while Judy has been instrumental in the past in helping Bolton get someone fired, drumming up political support in Congress to get someone hired isn’t really her forte. That would take rational argument, after all.
Perhaps this news from Steve Clemons offers some clues as to what Judy and Johnny were doing this morning at 7:30 am.
How Many Terrorists Does One F-16 Get You?
Fred Kaplan tries to teach BushCo a lesson about cooperating with unsavory regimes by pointing out the central role Pakistan played in yesterday’s big terrorist bust.
There’s a broader lesson here, and it speaks to the Bushadministration’s present jam throughout the Middle East and in otherdanger zones. If the British had adopted the same policy toward dealingwith Pakistan that Bush has adopted toward dealing with, say, Syria orIran (namely, it’s an evil regime, and we don’t speak with evilregimes), then a lot of passenger planes would have shattered andspilled into the ocean, hundreds or thousands of people would havedied, and the world would have suddenly been plunged into very scaryterritory.
This is not one of Kaplan’s strongest articles. He makes an important point about our relationship with Syria and Iran, sure. But to play up BushCo’s short-sightedness on Syria and Iran, Kaplan pretends that only Britain cooperated with Pakistan’s ISI on this terrorist bust. Kaplan thereby ignores that the US–in both this bust and the war on terror more generally–has precisely the kind of relationship he would advocate, one cognizant of the fact that, "the concept of morality in international relations is more complex than President Bush sometimes seems to recognize." Indeed, I have a suspicion that Pakistan’s involvement here may raise some very challenging questions about our cooperation with them on the war on terror.
Consider how Pakistan itself describes its involvement in this terrorist bust.
Pat Lang's Four Questions and Hezbollah
What a dirty trick Pat Lang played, sending his friends a list of four issues with the US-French peace plan, but not addressing those four issues himself.
- France and the United States are not at war with each other. They cannot agree to end the fighting.
- Hizbullah thinks it is winning both tactically and strategically.Why will it agree to anything other than a cease-fire in place?
- Such a cease-fire will be a victory for Hizbullah.
- Who will disarm Hizbullah if it accepts such a cease-fire?
I’m with Pat in doubting the feasability of the peace plan, as far as I understand it, and for some of the same reasons. I mean, Condi can’t even get Olmert (much less Peretz) to keep a straight face when she makes requests of them. Presumably Bolton was closely involved in this, and presumably he has more sway with Israel. But thus far the US has seemed unwilling and possibly unable to pressure Israel to play nice.
And France, as a stand-in for Hezbollah? I could see Chirac speaking with and for Rafiq Hariri’s Lebanon before his death. But Lebanon’s government has been all but castrated by the Israeli assault. So unless you’ve got a surrogate for Hezbollah, or preferably Hezbollah itself, you’ll be left with the problem of getting Hezbollah to agree to a plan it had no part in. Until Hezbollah is brought into the process, I assume they will answer, as they seem to be already, "Yeah, who’s going to disarm us? You and whose army?"
Lamont's "Single Issue" Voters
The Q-Poll shows that 44% of Lamont’s supporters support him mainly because of Lieberman’s stance on the Iraq war. And Markos anticipates a bunch of pundits frowning on the large number of "Single Issue" voters.
For a pundit to suggest the Iraq war is a "Single Issue" simply betrays their ignorance of the impact that war has and will continue to have on this country and the rest of the world.
Some are opposed to the war because they’re opposed to 2,500 Americans dead, 18,000 Americans wounded, perhaps 100,000 Iraqis dead, untold wounded. Some oppose the war simply because it uses violence to solve problems that should be solved using other means.
Some are opposed to the war because it has ruined our military. Two-thirds of our active army and three-quarters of our National Guard face readiness problems because it needs to replace equipment used in Iraq. Extended deployments and lowered recruiting standards are having bad effects on the military, their families, and our mission. The Iraq war–sold as a way to make our country safer–has only exposed it defensively.
Some are opposed to the war because it has thoroughly destabilized Iraq, and threatens to destabilize the entire region. By almost every standard, Iraqi quality of life is worse today than it was under Saddam.
Some are opposed to the war because it has created precisely the problem that it was cynically sold as a way to prevent. Iraq is creating terrorists, at a time when the threat of terrorism remains very real.
Some are opposed to the war because it has turned us into an international pariah. Some countries no longer trust us. Others want nothing to do with our aggressive ways.
