A question for Obama: why Libya, why now?
It used to be fairly easy to determine why the US decided to intervene in conflicts in the third world. Whether a person agreed with such actions or supported a more isolationist policy, the answer to the question “why?” was more simple during the Cold War: much of the time, we backed the side the Soviet Union was against.
Those hot wars around the globe very often were used as proxies for the larger war known as Cold. Because it would have been way too lethal and destructive for the US and USSR to duke it out directly, and each country had allied itself with different factions around the globe, this was the way such conflicts tended to play out.
In the the case of Libya today, if one looks at Qaddafi’s history, he’s a sort of idiosyncratic socialist as well as an all-around bad guy who has offended nearly everyone with whom he’s dealt over the many decades he’s been in power. There is indeed some history of cooperation between Qaddafi and the Soviets, especially during the 1980s when there were many arms sales by Russia and a host of “advisers.”
That’s certainly not what’s in Obama’s mind these days, however. What is? Obama himself says he’s intervening in Libya because (a) the international community decided it was a good idea, and (b) it is for humanitarian reasons. I would even believe him, since these are the two traditional reasons for the left to support a military intervention, except that of course both were also highly true in Iraq (in fact, see this), and we know that not only did Obama oppose that war but he even opposed the surge after it was successful. But hey, consistency is not his bag.
John Hawkins has seven questions for liberals about Obama and Libya, but they really pretty much boil down to one: why aren’t you mounting the same criticisms against Obama that you used to hurl at Bush for Iraq?
It’s rhetorical, of course. Hawkins knows why, and is calling them to task for hypocrisy. On the other hand, I have been surprised at the fact that, although the vitriol is nothing like that generated for Bush, quite a few liberals are indeed angry at Obama for Libya and some have even called for his impeachment over this.
Another reason Obama is intervening now in Libya might be that he got tired of all the previous criticism for doing nothing in Iran as well as for his early hands-off policy in Libya. In Egypt he spoke up against Mubarak, and probably feels a bit heady at the fact that he got what he wanted, easy as pie. Qaddafi is another breed of cat entirely, one who may end up having nine lives.
David Warren on Libya: “we don’t know what we are doing”
David Warren isn’t exactly a fan of the intervention in Libya.
However, he provides an answer (but is it true?) to my oft-repeated question about who the Libyan “rebels” might be:
…[I]n point of fact, the most promising internal opponents of Gadhafi’s regime are thuggish tribal chiefs and Islamist ideologues we have no reason to prefer to the monster with whom we are overfamiliar.
Here’s more:
In a way almost touching, the Bush administration tried to meet all the criteria of a just war, when invading Afghanistan, then Iraq. They tried to meet the Powell maxims, too. They went to elaborate and exhausting lengths to leave “democratic” and constitutional regimes, in a most unfavourable region. For this, especially, they endured the contempt of the world’s most aggressively self-righteous people.
Who, in turn, seem to be rallying behind the Security Council resolution of Thursday night, which “authorizes” the enforcement not only of no-fly zones over Libya, but any other uses to which military forces may be put, short of a decisive ground invasion.
The very fact that Russia and China failed to veto this resolution, speaks against it. That it fails not on one, but on every single criterion of a just war, should be noted. That it fails the Powell test is a matter of course…
We don’t know what we are doing. We only know that we have moral support for it on paper, from an international organization that is utterly corrupt, wherein members who do not wish us well are pleased to grant us permission to blunder.
[NOTE: Michael Walzer of TNR agrees, for somewhat different reasons. Max Boot disagrees. Ross Douthat analyzes what makes this the very model of a modern liberal war, and what’s wrong with that.]
The effect of the Japan disaster
This AP article just may be the stupidest article on the Japanese earthquake and tsunami that I’ve read so far.
Anyone who never realized that industrialized, organized, complex nations are most vulnerable of all to such threats simply does not think. Every science fiction writer knows better.
Anyone who equates the nuclear part of this disaster with the other two parts simply does not think, or is pushing an anti-nuclear power agenda (sometimes it’s hard to know where the first leaves off and the second begins). But suffice to say that no disaster has happened in the nuclear sense (except an economic one), and it is highly unlikely that one will happen except in the eyes of the press and its readership.
It is especially ironic that AP author Joji Sakurai cites the Lisbon earthquake as a predecessor to the Japan earthquake in changing hearts and minds. I’ve written about the Lisbon earthquake before, here. The Lisbon earthquake of 1755 struck the city on a Sunday morning (All Saints Day) when many believers were in church at worship, and its particular horror was that a great many of the dead were among those people. The Lisbon earthquake acted as a death knell to the Age of Faith–how could a benevolent deity have allowed this to happen?–and ushered in a trend towards skepticism, science, and the Enlightenment. The irony is that, if the Japan earthquake does as Joji Sakurai suggests and ends nuclear power (“Is even minimal risk, as with nuclear power, too much risk?”), it will represent a return to an age of faith and the decline of science—in this case, not faith in organized religion, but faith in what Carl Sagan called “the demon-haunted world.”
[NOTE: If you look at the comments section at the AP article (there are over a thousand) and scan the ones that are not just expressions of support for the Japanese people, you’ll find a great deal of evidence that people haven’t a clue what’s going on and are scared out of their wits about the power plant and are demanding the closure of other nuclear power plants. The coverage has had the desired effect. (Although this Fox News poll is a bit reassuring. Older people, men, and Republicans seem to get it.)]
Lee Stranahan again: oh boy,…
…he’s getting deeper and deeper into it. Pretty soon he may realize he’s gone too far and there’s no turning back.
Please donate to neo-neocon
[I’ll bump this up just a time or two more, and then it will be retired for a while.]
It’s that time again. Don’t feel too bad if you decide not to click on that Paypal “donate” button (hint hint: it’s on the right sidebar, above the Amazon widget, which is also a handy and helpful gadget to use). But I will be deeply grateful to every single one of you who does decide to contribute. Every bit— large or small—adds up, and helps me a great deal in continuing the blog.
I thank you all in advance.
The beginnings of change: Lee Stranahan
Here’s a very interesting article from Lee Stranahan, a liberal who’s starting—just starting—to get the picture. I’m not sure how far he’ll go with his change experience, but at the moment he is surprised and perturbed that the liberal media has virtually ignored the death threats aimed at Republicans during the Wisconsin demonstrations.
This passage of his reminds me of the early stages of my own change:
My experience in the last few months tells me what I would not have believed possible; on any number of issues (including Pigford, by the way) I’ve seen liberals act much nastier and with less factual honesty than the conservatives… and this includes on issues where I disagree with conservatives.
Keep going, Mr. Stranahan, if you dare. You may be on the cusp of some more profound surprises. My change really began with the fact that, once I was exposed through the internet to conservative periodicals, I noticed they tended on the whole to be more factual and fair and be better prognosticators than the liberal press. It was a profound shock, and was followed by more shocks.
From this passage, it’s clear that this may be the first time in a long while—perhaps in his life—that Stranahan has had so much contact with conservatives [emphasis mine]:
I’m in an odd position. In the last few months, I’ve had one foot in the left wing news stream and one foot in the right. My media duality began when conservative publisher Andrew Breitbart hired me to work with him on the Pigford ”˜black farmers’ settlement story. I’m a pro-choice, pro-single payer, anti-war, pro-gay rights independent liberal with years of work in print and film backing those positions. Breitbart hired me to bring a different perspective to the non-partisan issue of corruption in Pigford.
Since then, I’ve written both here for the left-leaning Huffington Post and at Breitbart’s right leaning BigGovernment.com. I’ve ended up reading a lot more conservative sites and dealing firsthand with a lot more conservatives than any time since I attended a high school dedicated to the principles of Ayn Rand about 30 years ago.
That sounds like a rather unique high school, by the way.
Stranahan asks, “Is this really what liberalism has come to in 2011?” My answer is “yes, but it came to it quite some time ago, I’m afraid.”
Crichton: “Aliens Cause Global Warming”
Here’s another excellent Crichton speech, well worth reading.
[Hat tip: commenter “IgotBupkis.”]
Who are the Libyan rebels?
Let’s hope this isn’t the answer to the question.
[ADDENDUM: I continue to find the Libyan situation puzzling, to say the least. Not only because of the shrouded identity of the rebels, but also the fact that France is taking the lead, something I can’t recall happening in a long, long while:
The initial stage of the military operation will be run by France and Britain with significant American help, including radar planes, command and control, and precision-guided munitions, including cruise missiles and B52 bombers, NATO officials said.
But Mrs. Clinton emphasized that the United States was not leading the effort. “We did not lead this,” she said. “We did not engage in unilateral actions in any way, but we strongly support the international community taking action against governments and leaders who behave as Qaddafi is unfortunately doing so now.”
Qaddafi has been a tyrant for decades. On that level, who wouldn’t want to see him go? The justification for this intervention is supposedly that he’s killing his own people (“behaving as Qaddafi is unfortunately doing now”). But does that mean that there will be international intervention against any head of state who fights back when threatened by rebels and a civil war?
In any civil war, the government kills its own people. What’s the difference here? Is it that it’s the hated Qaddafi they are fighting against? Is is that he is indiscriminately massacring innocent citizens rather than just rebel soldiers? How does one tell the difference? How do we know the truth of what’s happening there?]
Does anyone knows what’s really going on with Libya?
Because as far as I can see, the situation is in complete confusion.
It seems that the US has finally gotten on board with action against Gaddafi. But why now? And is it a case of too little, too late?
Although we keep hearing about the Libyan rebels, I have yet to see a good description of who they are and what they are striving for, except the elimination of the current regime. I assume they’re better than Qaddafi (which would not too difficult), but such assumptions can be dangerous. I sincerely hope the State Department has more information on that than I do, but sometimes I wonder.
Here’s an article that purports to tell how the White House arrived at its new stance, and the gist of it is that it’s clear as mud. Here’s a quote:
“In the case of Libya, they just threw out their playbook,” said Steve Clemons, the foreign policy chief at the New America Foundation. “The fact that Obama pivoted on a dime shows that the White House is flying without a strategy and that we have a reactive presidency right now and not a strategic one.”
But what was Obama’s playbook in the first place? I’m not so sure this represents a change in the playbook as I’ve come to understand it, which is as follows:
(1) When in doubt (and one is always in doubt), do nothing except spout some words about what “must” happen. Otherwise, wait.
(2) Go with world opinion; do not lead.
(3) Support our enemies and pull the rug out from under our friends.
If one looks at it this way, the only part of his previous playbook that Obama is violating here is #3, and probably only because he’s following #2. World opinion appears to be against Qaddafi and for intervention on behalf of the rebels. Once the UN Security Council showed cooperation and willingness to pass a no-fly-zone resolution, that was the signal that the US could act in a more decisive manner, too.
Helen Thomas, Playmate of the Month
No, not really; she’s the interview.
And we all know everybody reads Playboy for the interviews.
In Playboy Thomas repeats and defends her historically ignorant and deeply offensive charge that the Jews of Israel should go “home” to Poland and Germany where they came from. I guess her earlier expression of “regret” about her remarks has worn off.
The only interesting thing about the interview, really, is that this woman was a highly respected member of the White House press corps for so long.
James Taranto once called Thomas “journalism’s crazy old aunt in the attic.” But here’s her resume:
She worked for the United Press International (UPI) for 57 years, first as a correspondent, and later as White House bureau chief. She was a columnist for Hearst Newspapers from 2000 to 2010, writing on national affairs and the White House. She covered every President of the United States from the last years of the Eisenhower administration until the second year of the Obama administration. She was the first female officer of the National Press Club, the first female member and president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, and the first female member of the Gridiron Club. She has written six books…
I think of a crazy aunt in the attic as harmless and isolated. Helen Thomas was neither.
The tsunami: running for your life
We already know that being in the path of the tsunami was like a nightmare—the ocean coming swiftly to swallow you up along with everything in its path, inexorable, powerful, and deadly, and your only hope of survival to outrun it. But one of the details most of us probably didn’t think of was that the people most likely to be engulfed would be the elderly, who could not run fast enough.
This turns out to have been the case. The population of Japan is quite heavily weighted towards the older, too, especially in the coastal villages affected by the tsunami, where many young people have deserted the towns for the big city. It’s a ghastly thought, and it reminds me of something I always hate to watch on nature shows, even though I know it’s the way nature works: a predator eying a herd, looking for the vulnerable laggards—the old, the weak, the young—and singling them out for the kill.