Asymmetrical Information

Great list, but you left a couple off:

option 8) CIA black bag op

option 9) Get all righteous and moralizing

option 10) fall on own sword

option 11) pray for them to repent their evil ways

option 12) attack another unrelated repressive regime

option 13) 3 monkeys (see no evil, hear no evil, ...)

damned if you do, damned if you don't (sounds like another normal day at work)

You must have some kind of hidden Republican tendencies to have missed the two obvious, and obviously correct answers!
1. Elect Progressive Democrats to all offices and enact a national, single payer, pay as you go, no co-payment helath care program.
2. Award all of the oil contracts to French companies to promote better international relationships.

Regards.

Seems like a straw man argument constructed by aggregating arguments by different liberals and pretending they're all by the same person.

Still funny as heck, though!

Well, interesting, looking at those choices and reading the supposed negatives reinforces why I am not a Lefty--I happen to think that some of the supposed negatives are positives, but I wouldn't phrase them in the same negative way! Trade with China, for instance, has done a lot to improve the standard of living in China. If the only way that can be done is to permit corporations to make a profit, then what's wrong with that?

I'm still upset that the Democrats in Congress specifically disapproved the idea of financial guarantees to companies who entered the former Soviet Union after the breakup because they might make a profit! If we had been able to get corporations into Russia back then (late 80's, early 90's), the Russian Mafia wouldn't have been able to move into the economic vacuum the way they did. And all because the Democrats think that "profit" is a dirty word.

OF course they're constructed from different opinions. The point is - no matter what decision one makes (including making no decision), some group of people can say it is the wrong decision, and claim moral superiority to whatever government is in power.

Having said that, option 8 seems like it would be:

Work through the UN to build a broad international consensus on how to deal with the problem, and allow a third-party country to take control of US troops as well as troops from a variety of other countries in order to fix the problem without the taint of the US imperialist agenda, US corporate exploitation, etc.

This is, of course, wrong because it requires us to allow our troops to be under another country's control. The only positive to this particular approach is that it hasn't been tried yet.

"The ONLY positive to this particular approach is that it hasn't been tried yet."(emphasis mine)

alone in last place.

jb: The point is - no matter what decision one makes (including making no decision), some group of people can say it is the wrong decision

I don't think that was the intended point, or else it would have included objections from the Right. Plus it's not as funny that way.

Who's been on the human rights council lately?

Actually, economic sanctions usually work and are usually supported by the Left, because it is not at all usual economics sanctions to be anything like as draconian as those imposed on Iraq.

If generalizations based on the words liberal and conservative were accurate we wouldnt have the largest year of debt in US history right now.

"I'm still upset that the Democrats in Congress specifically disapproved the idea of financial guarantees to companies who entered the former Soviet Union after the breakup because they might make a profit! If we had been able to get corporations into Russia back then (late 80's, early 90's), the Russian Mafia wouldn't have been able to move into the economic vacuum the way they did. And all because the Democrats think that "profit" is a dirty word."

That's one theory. The one of nobel prize winner stiglitz - namely, that "economic shock therapy" in Russia was a totally stupid idea - seems a bit strong grounded in evidence and theory.

...economic sanctions usually work...

"Economic sanctions usually work"???!!!

Example please. I can think of none. I remember as a kid in England in 1958 being told that we weren't going to buy a certain can of peaches because they were from South Africa. Those sanctions certainly worked well, didn't they?? How many years later was apartheid abolished? And let's not even mention the Oil for Palaces program.

Do we have any evidence that the sanctions (as opposed to the regime) caused deaths in Iraq? UN Reports were based on official Iraqi numbers, since Iraq didn't allow independent verification. After Saddam was gone, Iraqi doctors told reporters that they were required to refrigerate the bodies of all dead babies (not just those, if any, that starved) to save them up for the montly parade in which reporters were told that this was just one day's worth of babies that had died because of sanctions. Parents were forced to wait, sometimes for weeks, to bury their dead children, but they were rewarded for weeping and telling the cameras that their children had been killed by sanctions. At least this is what a Newsday reporter claimed.

There was also at least one case, several years ago, where it was discovered that the Iraqis had smuggled a boat-load of infant formula out of Iraq, presumably to sell it (they said that they were returning defective formula, but why smuggle it out to return it to a third party that hadn't sold it?).

Has there been an objective look at this, now that we have access to more evidence? After all, one of the goals of the Oil for Food Program was to try to force Iraq to spend more on food and medicine. Were any Iraqis killed by sanctions, rather than by their own government's actions?

This letter was genius, by which I mean (as I usually do when I say something is "genius") I had already worked this out for myself.

I was living in Sydney, Australia on 9/11/01. In the following weeks, I read opinion pieces and letters to the editor in the Sydney Morning Herald concerning what exactly had brought about 9/11, and what the US should do about it. Timothy Roscoe Carter's letter might as well have been a summary of those thoughts.

I wrote about it here, on one of my first blog posts.

I meant to go on...If you ask a lot of well-meaning people what we should do about the world's trouble spots, they'll use words like support, foster, encourage, develop -- words that sound great in abstract, but become problematic when it comes down to actually making them into reality. For example, Qaddaffi was "encouraged" to end his nuke programs by the instructive example of Saddam.

Generally, though, I have come to believe that these words actually mean something like:

1) We send Joe Wilson (or equivalent) to drink mint tea and gab endlessly with various Third World thugs, and

2) Then he pulls out a briefcase filled with large gobs of cash.

In other words, all this "fostering" and "encouragement" basically means copious amounts of jawing, followed by bribing. Bribe everybody in the world into better behavior, courtesy of the US taxpayer. This, of course, would be corrupt if it weren't for the talking (that's "diplomacy").

In the unlikely event that cash didn't make everything all better, we can always...send more cash.

Noting that the post is tongue in cheek, it can be said that all of them work but none, by themselves, are the silver bullet that will solve the "problem" (whatever that may be).

But the thing left out about these "tools of foreign policy" is that it has to be the right one, executed at the right time and the right place. In other words, competently.

But we won't go there, just stirs up all kinds excuses, denial, cognitive dissonance and intellectual masturbation. Messy.

"Seems like a straw man argument constructed by aggregating arguments by different liberals"

Or by Kerry's different personalities...

Cheap shots aside, I just don't see any liberals praising a Republican president for following ANY one of these actions. (Or any of PatriotBoy's #8-13, either.)

I cant believe the reps still bring up Qaddaffi. There is great doubt that Qaddaffi abolished any active wmd program, and since our misadventure into Iraq, Qaddaffi has revisited his terrorist roots for the first time in 10 years by plotting to assassinate the Saudi Crown Prince.

All this liberals oppose every war a rep starts is nonsense. Consider Afganistan. Because the administration was able to show clear linkage of Afganistan to Al Qaeda most liberals supported that war, only the few fanatics that oppose every war were heard from. I supported the war in Afganistan, and I would support a war on Saudi Arabia and now even Iran. But your not going to lie in my face about Iraqs wmd, links to terrorism, Saddams capacity to threaten anyone, and have me support that war. Its not so much Im concerned for Iraqis, or even offended by the hi-mach manipulation of the global oil markets, for me its that we are using Iraq to let Saudi Arabia off the hook for 911, and noone is speaking for the 3000 that died by holding those most responsible accountable. I suppose words like justice and honor mean nothing these days.

What crap. Of course it's a strawman. Dems have supported all of the above, and in recent years, particularly economic sanctions, economic aid, trade, and military action.

But the list makes sense if you understand it as directed specifically to the Bush Administration. If you've ever been in a lab, you've probably heard the same thing at some point. A parent comes in with their kid to grab something, but doesn't want to drag him around with her, so she dumps him in the lab, leaving him with the stern admonition to "not touch ANYTHING." And right she is - the equipment is shiny but delicate, and probably best left to grownups who know what they're doing.

That's all Dems are saying - you selected a moron, so it would probably be best if he didn't touch anything. We'll deal with problems when the grownups get back, which, we hope, happens on Jan. 20.

See, a little thunkin' and it's all cleared up.

"That's all Dems are saying - you selected a moron, so it would probably be best if he didn't touch anything. We'll deal with problems when the grownups get back, which, we hope, happens on Jan. 20."

That is convenient argument. If a donkey tries it, it is well intentioned, but elephants are incompetent by virtue of being stupid. They don't support nationalized healthcare, for chrissakes. What more evidence of stupidity do you need?

8) Gain international (French) consensus/support to provide fig leaf of approval to cover the fact that we are providing all of the resources and funding. Right! The tranzis feel good: their organizations get more money to talk about the next crisis; they get to downplay US leadership; and they get to spend the money of those neanderthals in fly-over land.

That's all Dems are saying - you selected a moron, so it would probably be best if he didn't touch anything. We'll deal with problems when the grownups get back, which, we hope, happens on Jan. 20.

So basically, the dems would maintain the status quo, but the would do it with nuance.

There's a confidence-inspring thought for the day. Time to go stockpile weapons and ammunition again, I suppose.

"it would probably be best if he didn't touch anything"

Nice summation of what passes for Democratic strategy in the face of terrorism.

Lets take a look at the idea that attacking a nation state is good strategy in fighting multinational terrorist groups. Since attacking Iraq, incidents of global terrorism have gone up, remember Powells embrassing retraction of comments that stated otherwise a few months ago? Consider Chechnya or Israel where direct confrontation of extremely overmatched terrorist organizations over a number of years has only made the matter worst. But at least Russia and Israel have proximity problems that leave little choice in their policy on terrorism.

There are many reasons invading Iraq was stupid, but none more so than not having a plan to secure the wmd. Why is it that the intelligence on Iraq was good enough to launch a preemptive war, but then when we dont find the wmd, we immediately assume they didnt exist at all? Since the Iraqi intelligence was good enough to start this war, we should now assume those wmd are in the hands of terrorists or another Islamic country. And that makes the world a much more dangerous place.

"Since attacking Iraq, incidents of global terrorism have gone up...."

Incidents of global terrorism are up over the last 30 years, so what? Got any solutions besides hoping the problem goes away? By the way, it ain't going away.

"....we should now assume those wmd are in the hands of terrorists or another Islamic country. And that makes the world a much more dangerous place."

I think you're absolutely right about the wmds being elsewhere. But the world would would still be a very dangerous place even if we hadn't invaded Iraq. Any solutions besides appeasement? Will you have any new solutions after a city is taken out with wmd's?

...the list makes sense if you understand it as directed specifically to the Bush Administration.

Nice summation of what passes for Democratic strategy in the face of terrorism.

Mindles, are we talking about terrorism, or repressive regimes? There is a big difference in the response one might want, and the failure to make the distinction is kind of a key plank of a lot of critiques of current policy.

After the US declared war on Japan in the wake of Pearl Harbor incidents of Japanese attacks on US interests increased dramatically, too. Remember, the Japanese were willing to back off, if we agreed to give them a free hand in Asia. Violence always increases after the party who was attacked first decides to fight back. That doesn't mean that it's always wrong to fight back - quite the contrary, in fact.

Ben you make a convincing argument to attack Saudi Arabia. Since you bring up Pearl Harbor, its kind of funny that Rice stated "Who could imagine using planes as weapons?" I guess she missed the Kamikaze stuff in her WW2 history class.

"Since attacking Iraq, incidents of global terrorism have gone up"

And their relative effectiveness (number of casualties and amount of damage) have gone WAY DOWN.

Oh no! They keep trying to hurt uS! Well, duh. This is called "forcing their hand". The other alternative is to let them peacefully plan how to kill as many of us as possible as easily as possible (9-11). Gee, that worked so well...

These groups have ben trying to kill us for 30 years. We ignored them for over 25 (across multiple administrations in both parties), and what did it get us? We've TRIED your way; and it got us 9-11. Thanks, but we'll try something different now.

Just remember, Bush is stupid and not nuanced. All he wants to do is start wars with people. That's why he invaded Iraq, talks with North Korea, ignores Iran, and puts pressure on Saudi Arabia. That's right, Bush the moron, with only one un-nuanced response to every situation...

Yeah, let's invade Saudi Arabia, home of Mecca and Medina. Just having our soldiers there (at Saudi request) was one of Osama bin Laden's top reasons to hate us, so let's give them some more! Let's recruit the WHOLE MUSLIM WORLD to fight against us! Wee!

[/sarcasm]
Seriously, Saudi Arabia's time will come, but not with American troops - not unless something much worse than 9/11 happens. (And then it will probably be just 1 or 2 planes flying very high to drop a very few big nasty bombs in select places, not troops on the ground. That or ICBMs.)

"There are many reasons invading Iraq was stupid, but none more so than not having a plan to secure the wmd."

That second part I actually agree with! Of course, that and this:

"Since the Iraqi intelligence was good enough to start this war, we should now assume those wmd are in the hands of terrorists or another Islamic country. And that makes the world a much more dangerous place."

just SLIGHTLY contradicts:

"But your not going to lie in my face about Iraqs wmd, links to terrorism, Saddams capacity to threaten anyone, and have me support that war."

So, which is it? Did they have WMDs or not?

"I supported the war in Afganistan, and I would support a war on Saudi Arabia and now even Iran."

I'll hold you to that.

"I cant believe the reps still bring up Qaddaffi. There is great doubt that Qaddaffi abolished any active wmd program, and since our misadventure into Iraq, Qaddaffi has revisited his terrorist roots for the first time in 10 years by plotting to assassinate the Saudi Crown Prince."

Again, evidence? "There is great doubt" - among whom? "Qaddaffi has revisited his terrorist roots for the first time in 10 years" - evidence that it's been 10 years, evidence that he actually has now.

But hey, just write off the stuff that gets in the way of your happy little world, OK? I hope it makes you feel better (honestly, I do - that's all it's good for). Just don't try to get elected to any major office.

Since you bring up Pearl Harbor, its kind of funny that Rice stated "Who could imagine using planes as weapons?" I guess she missed the Kamikaze stuff in her WW2 history class.

For someone who previously tried to blow off criticisms against Kerry's Senate voting record as being made 'out of context,' this really is too rich.

John Adams said something about America being a well wisher to seekers of freedom, but a supporter of none. The Cold War is over, countries and peoples need to choose their own way. A democracy set up with bribes, over military aid, trade, etc. will not last.

Deoxy the level of the effectiveness of an act of terrorism is measured by more than the bodycount. The single most successful act of terror was the train bombings in Spain, they flipped an election. I also have seen nothing that indicates the bodycount on recent terrorism has decreased.

Im would be willing to share in the risk an attack on Saudi Arabia might bring us. Thats what a sense of honor is. I find the whole wrong idea that its better to have terrorists attacking those serving in Iraq so we remain safe disgusting, and Im glad theres not a shred of truth to it. We are a country of porous borders and soft targets, the only reason we havent been hit again is they havent tried. But thats to be expected, it took 9 years between the two WTC strikes.

I never said I believed there was WMD in Iraq. I said since we had enough intelligence to justify a preemptive war, its mind boggling to do a 180 on there existance when you dont find them. I think its proof the administration knowingly lied about the existance of Iraqi wmd, but I await an alternitive explanation.

I have seen several mid east experts state that Qaddaffi was motivated entirely by the removal of sanctions, and there is no evidence he stopped any wmd programs. We do know for certain he was plotting the assassination of the SA Crown Prince after the start of the misadventure in Iraq.

Anonymouse how did I take Rice out of context?

Anonymouse how did I take Rice out of context?

You didn't take Rice out of context, you took the kamikazes out of context. Here, I'll spell it out for you:

Kamikazes: Warriors in marked war planes ramming other warriors on marked war ships, in a war. (Even so, Americans considered this sort of thing rather beyond the pale.)

9/11: Men disguised as civilians hijacking civilian airliners to ram into office buildings filled with civilians, not in a war.

Although this argumentum ad Clancium brings up an interesting question: is there any contingency the Bush administration needn't have considered? For example, are they expected to give serious study to the Independence Day scenario? The Day the Earth Stood Still? The Deadly Mantis?

Anonymouse how did I take Rice out of context?

Don't be dense, please.

If what you meant to say is that officials of state should have at least considered the possibility, especially given that even popular entertainment had vaguely floated the idea more than once in the preceding years, then yes, there is an argument to be made there. Of course, said argument must also take into account that dozens of commerical airline incidents had taken place in the preceding decades, and all generally ended either with an unscheduled detour and demands by the hijackers, or an unmanned bombing of the aircraft. This in spite of the fact that hijackers during the 1970s sometimes managed to smuggle submachine guns on board, let alone sharp objects.

If you were trying to argue that kamikaze pilots steeped in the culture of imperial Japan flying military aircraft into military targets, fifty years ago, was some how an analogue that Rice should have contemplated when she spoke of the use of civilian aircraft against civilian targets by multiple suicide squads, then either you are at best inconsistent and/or ignorant in your understanding of what 'context' is, and at worst, maliciously dishonest in your portrayal thereof.

Im glad you all know what Rice "meant" by her comment. Just like you know what Bush "meant" when he called the war on terror unwinnable.

It wasn't only the Kamikazes Rice should have known about. She should have also known of the Islamic terrorists that hijacked a commercial jet in France and ordered the pilots to ram it into the Eiffel Tower in 94. She should have also been aware of the security plans for the Atlanta Olympics that cautioned of an attack of using planes as weapons. Then theres the PDB entitled "Bin Laden plans to strike in the US" and mentions hijacking. Why did Tenant immediately think of the Al Qaeda flight school report from the CIA when the first plane struck the WTC? Seems he could imagine it. How could Bush be so stupid as to think "what a bad pilot" in light of the month old PDB?

Hey, WOW! *I* wrote that! Interesting it's still floating around.

For the record, I was satirizing leftists, NOT liberals. Note that the criticisms of economic sanctions against Iraq and the attack on Kosovo are critiques against the CLINTON administration. My own politics veer wildly from liberal to leftist depending on the issue. My favorite comment from above was:

Noting that the post is tongue in cheek, it can be said that all of them work but none, by themselves, are the silver bullet that will solve the "problem" (whatever that may be).

But the thing left out about these "tools of foreign policy" is that it has to be the right one, executed at the right time and the right place. In other words, competently.

I was in head-shaking, slack-jawed disbelief at the stupidity of the folks just slightly to my left in the aftermath of 9-11, but the deceptions, stubornness, and incompentency of the Bush administration and its supporters with regard to Iraq has left me looking the same way at people not far to my right. I am STONGLY supporting Kerry. At least the idiots on my side only control humanities departments at universities, not the White House.

Oh, yeah, patriotBoy's #12 is precisely the problem.

Im glad you all know what Rice "meant" by her comment.

It was reasonably obvious on account of (drumroll please)...the context in which it was made. So for example, when you claimed on other ocassions that Kerry's voting record was being mischaracterized because it was being taken out of context -- to wit, that some of the things he voted against were riding on other bills -- you were effectively arguing that his vote cannot be directly construed as being against said weapon system. (Presumably, you would have no objection to a delimiter such as "...barring the introduction of additional context showing that he did, at least in part, vote against said bill because it contained that weapon system.")

It was you who inserted a bunch of patronizing nonsense about WWII kamikazes into Rice's statement, with similar disservice to context. That is, unless you can show that she WAS talking about planes as weapons in a highly general sense; but if you have that capacity, you strangely ommitted it in favor of something like a sneer.

Just like you know what Bush "meant" when he called the war on terror unwinnable.

Red herring. I never made any such argument. Neither I, nor very many others here I have gathered, are specially impressed by your ability to fire a gross of talking points from a blunderbuss, just to see which ones stick. In fact, I don't even really care what Bush "meant" in the incident to which you refer, first because it appears irrelevant to the discussion at hand, and second because I haven't yet had a reason to sit down and analyze it in its context.

It wasn't only the Kamikazes Rice should have known about. She should have also known of the Islamic terrorists that hijacked a commercial jet in France and ordered the pilots to ram it into the Eiffel Tower in 94. She should have also been aware of the security plans for the Atlanta Olympics that cautioned of an attack of using planes as weapons. Then theres the PDB entitled "Bin Laden plans to strike in the US" and mentions hijacking. Why did Tenant immediately think of the Al Qaeda flight school report from the CIA when the first plane struck the WTC? Seems he could imagine it. How could Bush be so stupid as to think "what a bad pilot" in light of the month old PDB?

Beats me. If I made such a comment in those circumstances, I would be speaking to a sincere hope that what took place was nothing but a most horrific accident. Now maybe if I WAS him, and had to deal with the same information flow he does, I could answer that question for him, rather than just for myself. However I'm not, and thus I can't, and I strongly suspect that neither can you, for whatever that's worth. Do note that if you had simply limited your argument to points like those (not that they were at all releavant in the context of the thread, since it was you who jumped on Pearl Harbor to make an out-of-context comparison), I would have no special grievance with them.

Can't wait for November, whichever way the election goes, if only because I hope that discussion forums like these will once again be dominated by reasonable people for another three-ish years, rather than political cheerleaders with an axe collection to grind.

Anonymouse I didnt take Rice out of context, she plainly stated 'Nobody could imagine using planes as weapons.' Its not a question of context with Rices comments, its a matter of precision. I pointed out the Kamikazes because its the most widely known example. In any case this was rendered an irrelevant point after I provided examples of other plots and attempts to use commercial aircraft as a weapon.

My comments about Bushs statement about the war on terror being unwinable are relevant because the reps try to change what was said, by claiming to know what was 'meant'. Just as they did with Rice.

Anonymous we are talking about two planes hitting the same buildings. Bush stated he thought 'what a bad pilot' immediately after Card whispered to him in the goat video. The big problem Bush has here is he first made statements that Card told him about the first plane to strike the WTC, when it was whispered to him after the second plane struck the WTC.

Clearly we are not going to make any strides toward mutual understanding so long as the debate continues on these lines, so I respectfully take my leave.

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