Two economists, Milton Friedman and Murray Rothbard, agreed that many of the steps Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt took to end the Great Depression only made it worse. Also, that their expanded Presidential powers, new bureaucracies, and curbs on economic freedom had long-term disastrous consequences both morally and economically. Both Friedman and Rothbard promoted the downsize DC message for several decades, and remain admired by many for their work.
But the funny thing is, they disagreed about what actually caused the Great Depression in the first place. Friedman thought the Federal Reserve was too deflationary; Rothbard thought it was too inflationary and that the Fed itself should be abolished.
They disagreed about the causes, but agreed that FDR's
"cure" was worse than the disease.
Likewise, we don't have to agree on everything in order to agree that DC must be downsized. We often get mail from supporters of the 9/11 Truth Movement disputing some of our assumptions, such as that we were attacked by Islamic terrorists on 9/11.
We do believe a new investigation of 9/11 should take place, because the federal government already had the tools it needed to prevent the attacks and that those who failed should be held accountable. And if an investigation reveals criminal conduct rather than mere incompetence, the guilty persons should be prosecuted.
But here's a question for 9/11 Truthers: what if there was nothing fishy about the attacks? What if it was indeed true that Islamic terrorists planned and executed the whole thing?
Would the War on Terror then be justified? Would it be justified if we had a smarter, more trustworthy President?
We at DownsizeDC.org say no, and that is the basis of our "I am not afraid" campaign. Regardless of the causes behind 9/11, the government's cure - destroying a thousand-year Western tradition of individual liberty - is worse than the terror threat itself.
We saw something similar with the War on Iraq: after-the-fact finger-pointing. The Administration claimed that Saddam was developing weapons of mass destruction and had links to Al Qaeda. When both claims were demonstrated to be false, the question turned to who in the Administration lied about what. But the following points were missed:
- The Administration did make "claims" before the war, but never did provide much in the way of evidence;
- Congress had an obligation to insist upon evidence;
- Congress and the President had an obligation to explain why such evidence provided a justification for war;
- Congress and the President had an obligation to explain why an invasion, and not less extreme measures or diplomacy, was necessary;
- Congress had a Constitutional responsibility to declare war, and violated the Constitution by "delegating" that power to the President to start a war when and if he deemed it necessary.
What if U.S. troops invaded, discovered nuclear warheads, and found Saddam playing tennis with Osama bin Laden? Unfortunately, many war critics would have been silenced, and the war would have been seen as a "triumph" for Bush.
But this would have been a "post-hoc" justification for the war, where the end result excuses an illegal act. And it would have been unnecessary to invade illegally, had Bush actually provided evidence and Congress actually declared war.
We may disagree on what the "real motives" of the Administration were in invading Iraq. But whether or not their intentions were good, good intentions do not justify by-passing the Constitution.
Likewise, even if the "official account of 9/11 is true and there was no government conspiracy, and even if the Administration has only "good intentions" in keeping Americans safe, these do not justify shredding the Bill of Rights.
Regardless of what you believe about conspiracies and criminality within the government, we hope that you will join us in refusing to be afraid. Regardless of how it started, the War on Terror as it is presently waged must come to an end. We may disagree about causes, but we can agree to oppose government "cures."
Labels: conspiracy, Downsize DC, Iraq, War on Terror
8:58 AM permanent link 0 comments
But why should I, as an American, give a damn one way or another? Yes, there is that $3 billion in foreign aid given to Israel every year, which allows Israel's enemies to blame America for Israel's actions. This in turn creates diplomatic headaches and the threat of terrorist attacks that probably cost Americans closer to $300 billion/year in Defense, Homeland Security, and opportunity costs. And this leaves out the possibility that America made war on Iraq and is threatening war with Iran in large part because those countries don't acknowledge Israel's right to exist. But all of this only goes to show that foreign aid to Israel is bad policy. To cut it off does not mean we are taking the side of Arabs. There is such a thing as neutrality.
If a similar dispute existed in Africa involving the same size of territory and number of people, we would probably ignore it entirely and call it "tribal" warfare - perhaps blaming it on the artificial boundaries created by European imperialists. A similar dispute in Southern or East Asia also would only barely get our attention. To the extent we are interested in the Balkans or meddle in the affairs of ex-Soviet Republics, we do so only to humiliate Russia. The U.S. may be more interested if something like it existed in the Americas - only because of our historically paternalistic attitude toward our neighbors - but even then it wouldn't consume nearly as much of our time and attention as does Israel, which is the size of Massachusetts.
Of course, every conflict is unfortunate. Human suffering, particularly war-related suffering is tragic anywhere. But human suffering outside of the U.S., and not caused by the U.S., is not the U.S.'s problem.
Some would try to persuade me that it's "obvious" that Israel is in the right, or that it's "obvious" that the Palestinians are victims of Israeli aggression, and that it's my "duty" to "see this clearly." But why should I even bother to study this, or form an opinion at all, when I don't bother to do so with most other national and ethnic strife in the world? This conflict is several hundred miles away from oil fields. The region may be of interest to some religious people, but they can donate money to the Israeli government on their own if they so choose. There is simply no vital U.S. interest on the east coast of the Mediterranean.
Why should I mourn the death of an Israeli more than anybody else? Because of his religion? Because he lives in a democracy? Because of his skin color? These are all very bad reasons. The Israeli is no more entitled to American protection, aid, or sympathy than any other person on the planet. No more than a Somalian or Albanian. Or Palestinian.
Labels: foreign aid, Iran, Iraq, Israel, war
6:12 AM permanent link 0 comments
Let's say a dictator is threatening an ethnic minority group in his country. The international community fears a coming genocide, with up to 500,000 lives lost. The U.S. "comes to the rescue," overthrows the dictator, and "saves" this group. If this mission costs $50 billion, that means it costs $1 million to save each potential genocide victim. . . . World Vision believes that spending as little as a dollar a day per child will greatly improve their health, nutrition, and education. So, if 500,000 of these children were sponsored for a dollar a day, the cost for a whole year would be about $183 million. A dollar-a-day support for 100 million of these children would cost $36.5 billion, less than what our hypothetical "humanitarian war" would cost to save 500,000 lives.
Labels: Iraq, Partial Observer, war
8:12 AM permanent link
Labels: Iraq, Partial Observer
6:46 AM permanent link
This would a) establish the Iraqi government's independence of the U.S., which is important from an internal political perspective; b) tell the American people that the Iraqi government is ready to provide for its own security, making the war that much more pointless.
At least negotiations for a withdrawal could start, including discussions on the safety and status of Iraqi collaborators. Unless we ditch all our equipment, a withdrawal is going to take several months anyway.
I don't think an exit will be so bloody in any case. Perhaps a million Iraqis have already been killed in the war, and as Lew Rockwell says, "It is also striking how the further geographically you move from US troop activity, the more peaceful the area is."
U.S. politicians are stuck; they claim Iraq will get even worse if U.S. troops leave, so they keep the troops there because they don't want to be proved wrong. But pulling out gives them the opportunity to get the credit either way:
- If the U.S. leaves over a nine months' time and relative peace follows, they can say that they created the conditions for peace and Iraq becomes a "victory." Mostly b.s., but everyone would be better off.
- If full-fledged civil war ensues,that would only underscore that the U.S. wouldn't have been able to keep a lid on the violence forever. To truly support the troops, then, would be to pull them out. But our politicians could still point out that Saddam was removed and democratic elections were held, and that our intentions were noble. Complete B.S., but if such face-saving rhetoric is necessary to get the troops out, so be it.
Labels: Iraq
6:08 PM permanent link 0 comments
If the goals were met:
- that proves the American military strategy is working and therefore we must stay and maintain the new stability, or
- we've won and it's time to go home.
If the goals were not met:
- that proves all the more that we need to stay and finish the job, or
- it just goes to show that the Iraqis are pathetic and no longer deserve our help; we must pull out.
Somehow or other, I think President Bush will manage to find a reason to stay. If the next President pulls the troops out, Bush and his die-hard supporters can blame him or her for the "defeat."
Labels: Iraq
12:40 PM permanent link 0 comments
Comments welcome at the Partial Observer.
The now-repentant Sullivan and Dreher helped give Bush the "political capital" to invade Iraq. But at the end of the day, all they were guilty of was exercising their First Amendment rights of freedom of speech and freedom of the press. As are the unrepentant war supporters; Bill Kristol and Sean Hannity never killed anybody, whereas George Bush is responsible for starting a war that has killed hundreds of thousands.
The people with the power are the ones responsible. That they get support from others for even their most foolish schemes only goes to show that the social system raises impressionable children to trust the State, and that habit of belief is hard to break. Faith in the State is strong even though the State commits every wrong we are taught not to do. We are taught to respect individuals and their property, and to treat others with courtesy. The State, however, views individuals as members of a collective, as figures in statistical studies, as collateral damage. Does the fact that one person is able to figure the State out as a teenager while it takes another 40 years to see the light make the former more virtuous than the latter? Can we condemn one for not having the education, experience, and perspective of another?
Labels: Andrew Sullivan, Iraq, Partial Observer, Rod Dreher
7:09 AM permanent link
[N]early five years later, the Antiwar Right was proven correct on all counts about the war. Many former war supporters have now changed their minds, but that doesn't explain why so many on the Right supported the war to begin with, a war so clearly against the national interest.There were a variety of reasons, I'm sure. But one rule of thumb is that if the "Left" opposes something, the Right vehemently supports it, and if the Left supports something, the Right condemns it vociferously.
Labels: Iraq, Partial Observer, Rush Limbaugh
10:08 AM permanent link 0 comments
- comes to terms with Iran, as Nixon did with China in the Vietnam War.
- "allowing [with Iran's probable assistance] any elements that may hold the potential of restoring an Iraqi state to rise within Iraq." This will probably be a Shiite leader, probably Muqtada al-Sadr, who can also unite at least some Sunni insurgents as well. The "objective is solely the restoration of a real state, and that al-Sadr may be able to accomplish. If he can, we will have little to complain about in terms of his toleration of al-Qaeda or other Fourth Generation [non-state, terrorist] elements."
- withdraw American troops.
Lind implicitly suggests that if we repair relations with Iran and then leave, any ensuing civil war will be shorter and less bloody before a leader restores a functioning Iraqi state. Withdrawing won't be as bad as some predict, and I tend to agree with Lind. And in any case, if the killing does continue, at least Americans won't be involved anymore.
Labels: Iran, Iraq, War on Terror, William S. Lind
9:58 AM permanent link 0 comments
Six years after 9-11, America is on the verge of bankruptcy, has lost her freedom, and has become the most hated country in the world. Meanwhile, bin Laden's Al Qaeda movement, once the extremist fringe of the extremist fringe of radical Sunni Islam, has exploded in numbers.If we saw a fictional account of a Presidential Administration this incompetent, we would dismiss it as too unbelievable. Ever since we invaded Afghanistan as a response to 9/11, the American government has done exactly the wrong thing every step of the way, but one blunder sticks out. Only an idiot would have invaded Iraq, but an even bigger idiot would have neglected post-war occupation planning, and an even bigger idiot than that would have dismissed all the experienced Iraqi officials who would have had the knowledge and experience to rebuild the country. If we are living in a movie, it is suffering from Idiot Plot Syndrome.
Labels: bin Laden, Bush, Dick Cheney, Iraq, Partial Observer, War on Terror
4:30 AM permanent link 0 comments
"The fact is, we were harassing them in Afghanistan, we're harassing them in Iraq, we're harassing them in other ways, non-militarily, around the world. And the answer is, every time you poke the hornet's nest, they are bound to come back and push back on you. That doesn't suggest to me that we shouldn't be doing it." [emphasis mine]Well, it definitely suggests to me that we shouldn't be doing it.
Terror networks such as Al Qaeda are depicted as wanting to take over the world and impose Shari'a law. But that goal is obviously impossible through terrorism. It is far more likely that Al Qaeda gets recruits not because they are Islamic fundamentalists, but because they are motivated by solidarity with fellow Arabs and/or Muslims, and desire to expel Western troops from their lands.
If their tactics are unjust, their cause is not.
What have we ever gained by taking sides and sending aid and troops to Middle Eastern countries? If we wanted cheap oil, all we had to do is maintain neutrality in their squabbles and engage in peaceful commerce. There was no point in poking the hornet's nest. And there is no point now.
Labels: Iraq, War on Terror
8:59 AM permanent link 0 comments
- neocons/Wolfowitz: build Iraq into a democracy with a market economy, with an overwhelming American troop presence to provide security, a la post-WWII Germany and Japan.
- Donald Rumsfeld: test his lean, mean New Model Army. Go in, install pro-American dictator, get out. Obviously, not enough troops to advance the neocon plan.
- Dick Cheney: Award Haliburton with contracts. Crony capitalism standing in the way of the neocon dream of free market capitalism.
- Karl Rove: expand Republican power. Staff the Coalition Provisional Authority based on GOP loyalty, not experience or competence. Exploit the war for political purposes back home.
- George W. Bush: prove that he is more of a man than his Daddy. Hence, backing out and admitting defeat is not an option.
Result: Iraq is a mess.
There were a couple of responses in agreement, but we also heard from the "blame media, kill Muslims" crowd accusing Spindizzy of Monday Morning quarterbacking and defeatism. That's the way it goes on the Right. A few of them are very reasonable: far more sensible than the whining mainstream Left and more perhaps more realistic than hard-line non-interventionists (although the latter are more consistent). Yet so many others on the Right are among the most unreasonable and hateful human beings on the planet.
Perhaps we'll see a partisan realignment in which war will be the defining issue, not culture or economic redistribution, where realists and non-interventionists take one side of the aisle and the War Party the other. Perhaps this is developing already.
Labels: Conservatism, Iraq, politics, war
8:52 AM permanent link 1 comments
(Blaming the Iraqis for anything is ridiculous. Lots of Iraqis resist the illegal U.S. occupation of their country. Whose fault is that? The Iraqi puppet government resents the Americans telling them what to do, and don't always play along. Whose fault is that?)
Schieffer may be wrong in blaming the Iraqis, and he is wrong about not exiting Iraq, but he is right about one thing. There are no good options, there is no way the U.S. can fix what it broke in Iraq, and current policy from now on should shift from the humanitarian or ideological and back to America's own security concerns. I understand the position that we are responsible for creating the mess, and therefore we are responsible for fixing it. I understand it, but I don't agree with it. The President has a duty to protect American lives first. Not because they are more valuable than Iraqi life in a moral or cosmic sense, but because protecting American lives is the President's job, just as protecting Iraqi lives is the Iraqi government's job. The policy that America should take is that which will most likely prevent future wars, future attacks on American troops, and future attacks on American soil.
The only purpose staying in Iraq serves is to invite more attacks on U.S. troops and increase the terror threat on American soil. It is far better for the U.S. to exit Iraq - even in a dishonorable, humiliating way - than to continue tossing thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars in a futile effort to bring stability to Iraq. Particularly as we are the primary cause of that instability.
A nation can recover from a military humiliation. How can it recover from bankruptcy? 8:58 AM permanent link 0 comments
If U.S. troops believe everyone is their enemy, they feel justified in randomly beating and killing them. But that raises the question of what are we doing in Iraq in the first place. Why "rebuild" their country if they all want to kill our troops? How can we bring "stability" to Iraq through occupation, if the people of Iraq view the U.S. as their enemy? And if they're not our enemy, why are our troops being told that they are?
If the troops are going to beat and kill Iraqis indiscriminately, there is no way they can bring order and democracy to Iraq. 12:33 PM permanent link 0 comments
There will come a day when this kind of interventionism and Global Policing will be generally accepted for what it is: a moral outrage. Like former segregationists, interventionists will either repent for their absurd and contradictory stances, or remain silent. 11:51 AM permanent link 0 comments
Labels: Iraq, War on Terror
5:39 PM permanent link 0 comments
In a sense, though, he is a war criminal one can respect, much as one may respect a movie villain who at least shows personal courage. Harry won't just order people to their deaths, and he won't sit comfortably somewhere and insist on his laptop that other people fight the war. Instead, he himself is willing to die "for his country." Stupid, but courageous.
In America, something around 30% of the people still support this war. Let's say 90 million - and they think the rest of us are anti-American and treasonous. 90 million is more than Germany had went it almost won two world wars. From this population alone, one could raise an army in the millions, more than enough to overwhelm the Iraqi insurgency, and at ever-decreasing risk for each soldier.
So why aren't they overwhelming the recruiting offices? Why are there Young Republican clubs on college campuses - why aren't all the young Republicans in uniform?
The fact is, it wouldn't matter what the majority of Americans think - things are accomplished, for good and bad, by determined minorities. If 80 million Germans were so close to going 2-0 against the entire world, surely 90 million pro-war Americans can subdue one nation of 27 million people, no matter what the other 210 million of us think.
Instead of blaming antiwar folks for the war's failure, the pro-war crowd should look in the mirror. It isn't our nation's "lack of will," but the cowardice of pro-war Americans to fight themselves, that is the reason we have insufficient numbers in Iraq and the military is stretched to the breaking point.
Prince Harry they're not. 2:50 PM permanent link 0 comments
1. Even if Colin Powell's performance at the United Nations was believable (and I believed it at the time), all it did was present a convincing case that Saddam was a bad person; it did not present a convincing case for war.
2. Iraq was never an imminent threat, and did nothing to provoke a Congressional Declaration of War, without which military action would be illegitimate.
3. The reasons outlined by the Bush I Administration for not invading Iraq were never refuted.
It is for these reasons that invading Iraq was clearly wrong and clearly nuts - no matter what the mainstream media reported. Given the fact that we had a nutjob in the White House, it was primarily the responsibility of Congress to stop him, not the mainstream media. 3:54 PM permanent link 0 comments
NO, THE TERRORISTS WON'T "FOLLOW US OVER HERE"
April 12, 2007
One of the justifications I keep hearing for continuing the war in Iraq is: “If we don’t fight them over there, we will have to fight them over here.” However, there is no historical basis for this. Consider the following examples:
- In 1983, after 240 Marines were killed in Lebanon, Ronald Reagan pulled the Marines out of Lebanon. Lebanese terrorists did not “follow them here.”
- In 1962, France granted independence to Algeria. FLN insurgents did not follow the French back to France.
- In 1960, Britain granted independence to Kenya. Mau Mau insurgents did not follow the Brits back to Britain.
- In 1946, the Irgun, a Zionist terror organization, dynamited the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. In 1948, the Brits went home. The Irgun did not follow them.
There is simply no basis for all of this incessant neocon sound and fury about the terrorists “following us over here.”
America has, far and away, the world’s mightiest military. Indeed, the US is responsible for about half of the world’s military spending. If we simply minded our own business and guarded our borders and shores we would be pleasantly surprised. Nobody would dare mess with us.
Militarily, we outspend Iran 20:1; we outspend Iraq 100:1. In fact, if you add together all the military budgets of the Arab World, they equal barely one-quarter of ours. Any attempt to invade us would constitute national suicide for the perpetrator. Cyberpundit extraordinaire Fred Reed recently pointed out that it has been centuries since a Muslim country invaded and conquered a non-Muslim country.
If Muslim countries are impotent relative to the United States, terrorists are even weaker. They control no countries and have no armies. Terrorism is not an ideology of government, but rather a means of venting political grievances.
In Pat Buchanan’s words, “terror (is) a weapon of the weak and stateless against Western powers they (can) not defeat with arms.” Although they are horrible people who hate us, they have neither the means nor the desire to invade or conquer us. They just want us to leave their countries. While terrorists cannot defeat you with arms, they can sure make your life miserable.
9/11 was an attack, not an invasion. (1) The differences here are not just semantic. There was no follow-up. There was no invading army. There were no terrorist carrier groups headed into New York Harbor and Chesapeake Bay. After the attacks there were no aerial bombing raids from the terrorist Luftwaffe.
And there have been no terrorist attacks on American soil since. This is not because of the surveillance state that the Bush Administration has imposed and which millions of Americans have all too gladly accepted. There are thousands of things terrorists could do that they could plan without catching the attention of the authorities. They could carry out their diabolical plans at airports, on highways, at power plants, at stadiums, at schools, on subways and in numerous other settings. And they haven’t done it!
But the possibility of an attack exists! Those three words -- the possibility exists -- are an age-old excuse for massive intrusions on your liberty. If you will give up your liberty in the name of there never being a terrorist attack, consider this: Cuba has no terrorism problem. Would you want to live there? (Cuba also has no immigration problem.)
Speaking of immigration problems, why are we being forced to surrender our liberty and fight all these wars in the name of fighting terrorism, while all the while the border with Mexico is well-nigh non-existent?
If all these Holy Joes who glorify this war on terror would just open their Bibles, they would learn some amazing things. Specifically, you reap what you sow and if you live by the sword you die by the sword. Translated: If you insist on throwing your weight around militarily to the extent that America does, do not at all be surprised if you have a lot of people hating on you. If you hit a hornet's nest with a baseball bat, do not be surprised if you get stung. If you hit it repeatedly, do not be surprised if you get stung repeatedly.
Again, there is no historical basis for thinking terrorists will “follow us here” if we pull out of the Middle East. Rather, they just want our military gone. Let us oblige them. Whatever problems persist over there are not ours to solve anyway.
The Left wants us to surrender our freedom in the name of the junk science of global warming. The Right -- the flip side of the same coin -- wants us to surrender our freedom lest people who do not even control Afghanistan come here, take over, force us all to speak Arabic, force all our women to wear burqas and force us all to pray to Mecca five times a day. These two doomsday scenarios are equally ludicrous.
If a totalitarian state comes to America, it will not be the doing of some Islamopsychopath in a cave in Afghanistan or some band or bands of Islamogangsters. Rather, it will be because the American people give away their freedom based on unfounded fear. Let us not walk in fear, especially such baseless fear.
(1) For the record, I believe that the official story on 9/11 is a lie. This is not the result of some “brain snap.” It was the result of somewhat extensive research over a few years' time. While I do not know exactly what happened on that horrible day, I do know what didn’t happen. The best source for 9/11 truth is the documentary “Loose Change”, which is 90 minutes long and can be found here on Google Video. While its approach might appear somewhat leftist, it is extremely thorough and impeccably well-documented.
Freely Speaking: Essays by Doug Newman
Labels: Iran, Iraq, War on Terror
5:50 AM permanent link 0 comments
And this is perhaps the most important point of the cross: the religious authorities and the political authorities agreed that it was "prudent" to put Jesus to death in order to preserve their instititutions. So even when those institutions function "efficiently," the message of the crucifixion seems to be that institutions and authorities are the enemies of justice. It can't really be another way; as hierarchies evolve, ambition, or even just careerism, and its resulting network of internal loyalties, will undermine an organization's original mission.
Now if we dump on Pilate for killing one innocent guy (no doubt he was responsible for others, but he isn't remembered for them) to keep his job and preserve order, what does that say for politicians - Christian politicians like Bush and Blair - who start wars against impoverished, weak nations? How could they willfully sacrifice what they knew would be at least a few thousand, and has now become hundreds of thousands, of lives - for a dubious "cause" that had nothing to do with self-defense? War is bad enough even when it is defensive. It is incomprehensible to start - or get involved in - a non-defensive war.
We must resist the assumption that "good intentions" that involve hurting innocent people are actually good intentions. We must insist once and for all that going to war to "liberate" Iraqis is at least as bad as invading their country to steal their oil, and probably worse. After all, it is better to be governed by a cynic than an ideological fanatic; a cynic isn't stubborn, whereas a fanatic would rather destroy the entire world than be proven wrong. The U.S. is governed by the latter.
The Bush's of the world have so much faith in their own good intentions that they are convinced that whatever they do is just, and that the human cost is "worth it." Whereas, the Pilates of the world value self-interest over justice - but at least they recognize what justice is. 1:23 PM permanent link 0 comments
