Via Crooks and Liars, we see that CNN’s Lou Dobbs reported on Bush family business connections with the UAE. As I wrote in the last post, this is just more of the same stuff the Bush Regime has been engaged in all these weary years since January 2001. Righties, are you finally waking up?
Um, not Charles Krauthammer, who blames the UAE mess on the fall of the British Empire:
If only Churchill were alive today … The United Arab Emirates would still be a disunited bunch of subsistence Arab tribes grateful for the protection of the British navy in the Persian Gulf. And we hapless Americans — already desperately trying to mediate, pacify and baby-sit the ruins of Churchill’s Empire: Iraq, Palestine, India/Pakistan, Yemen, even (Anglo-Egyptian) Sudan — would not be in the midst of a mini-firestorm over the sale of the venerable P&O, which manages six American ports, to the UAE.
Krauthammer’s denial of reality is so vast it’s almost majestic. I can hear the ghost of Rudyard Kipling whispering “The White Man’s Burden.” Somebody send ol’ Charles a monocle and a pith helmet, quick.
Other righties are struggling to justify the UAE deal against years of Bushie conditioning. Some columnists at FrontPage note that the UAE has close ties to Hamas. And Rich Moran of Right Wing Nut House complains,
I don’t like waking up in the morning and discovering that I’m an “Islamaphobe†or “Un-American†for calling the Administration a bunch of rabbit heads for the way they’ve managed the unveiling of this idiocy. To tell you the truth, I resent it. It bespeaks a certain kind of intellectual laziness when the best one can do to counter an argument is to indulge in an orgy of name calling and finger pointing. Better to have the facts at one’s disposal and try and counter an opponent’s argument in a logical and rational manner.
I’ll pause here so that lefties reading this can howl and roll about on the floor for a while. Come back whenever you’ve stopped laughing and/or crying. Take your time.
At Newsweek, Michael Hirsh argues that the UAE episode reveals just how out-of-control the alleged “war on terror” really is.
The way the war was supposed to have been fought—a way that would really have distressed bin Laden and Zawahiri—was that Al Qaeda was supposed to be so isolated by now that we had most of the Arab world on our side. Deals like Dubai Ports World ‘s takeover of the London company that administers some U.S. ports were supposed to be pretty much routine. After all, as one commentator said to me during an appearance on al Jazeera the other day, isn’t this the way globalization is intended to work: you co-opt everyone, even your rivals, into the international system? Instead, so mistrusted is the Bush administration—and so out of control has the war on terror become—that even leading Republican politicians this week sought to cancel the Dubai contract (Bush, to his credit, did manage a presidential response, vowing to veto).
The Hirsh article is excellent; I highly recommend that you read all of it.
If righties have been slow to catch on, so has Congresss (which, after all, is dominated by righties these days). From an editorial in today’s New York Times:
It’s easy to imagine how the Bush administration might have defused much of the uproar over a deal to allow a company owned by the Dubai royal family in the United Arab Emirates to run six American ports. Members of Congress asked for consultation and reassurance that the deal would not compromise already iffy security at one of the most vulnerable parts of the nation’s homeland defense system. What they got was a veto threat and a presidential suggestion that they were all anti-Arab.
If the administration is in trouble with Congress, it’s long overdue. For years now, the White House has stonewalled Congressional committees attempting to carry out their oversight duties. Administration officials appearing before Senate and House committees have given testimony that was, to put it generously, knowingly misleading. Requests for information have been simply waved away with an invocation of national security. Just recently, the Senate Intelligence Committee attempted to get information on the administration’s extralegal wiretapping, but was told that it would compromise national security to tell the senators how the program works, how it is reviewed, how much information is collected and how that information is used.
The chickens are coming home to roost. A White House that routinely brands anyone who disagrees with its positions as soft on terrorism is now complaining that election-bound lawmakers are callously using the ports deal to frighten voters. A White House that invaded Iraq as a substitute for defeating Al Qaeda is frustrated because Congress is using the company, Dubai Ports World, as a stand-in for all the intractable perils of the Middle East.
Today in the Washington Post, E.J. Dionne writes,
Americans owe a debt to Dubai Ports World for the storm the company has created with its pending takeover of operations at six U.S. seaports. Let us count the hypocrisies and the inconsistencies, the blind spots and the oversights that this controversy has revealed.
Until this fight broke out about a week ago, it was impossible to get anyone but the experts to pay attention to the huge holes in the security of our ports. Suddenly, everyone cares.
Dionne writes that the Bush Administration is too secretive for its own good.
Most Americans had no idea that our government’s process of approving foreign takeovers of American companies through the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States was entirely secret. When Rep. John Sweeney (R-N.Y.) asked Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff about the Dubai Ports deal at a hearing on Feb. 15, Chertoff declined to answer because the committee’s work was “classified.” Treasury Secretary John Snow told another congressional committee that he was not permitted to discuss specific transactions considered by the foreign investment panel.
Why shouldn’t the public have a right to know about the deliberations of this interagency committee? Hasn’t the secrecy surrounding this decision aggravated the uproar it has caused?
The way this administration keeps secrets strikes me as pathological. Time and time again, we’re told just to trust them. Yet they don’t seem to trust us or our elected representatives in Congress. They don’t want to have honest public discussions about policy; instead we get sales jobs. And manipulation. And fear-mongering.
After Dick’s shooting incident a New York Times editorial said “The vice president appears to have behaved like a teenager who thinks that if he keeps quiet about the wreck, no one will notice that the family car is missing its right door.” But that’s how the Bushies strike me all the time. There’s a furtive guiltiness about them, a whistling nonchalance that’s just a little too practiced.
Finally, David Ignatius, who catches a clue now and then, said something else that needs to be said.
The real absurdity here is that Congress doesn’t seem to realize that an Arab-owned company’s management of America’s ports is just a taste of what is coming. Greater foreign ownership of U.S. assets is an inevitable consequence of the reckless tax-cutting, deficit-ballooning fiscal policies that Congress and the White House have pursued. By encouraging the United States to consume more than it produces, these fiscal policies have sucked in imports so fast that the nation is nearing a trillion-dollar annual trade deficit. Those are IOUs on America’s future, issued by a spendthrift Congress.
The best quick analysis I’ve seen of the fiscal squeeze comes from New York University professor Nouriel Roubini, in his useful online survey of economic information, rgemonitor.com. He notes that with the U.S. current account deficit running at about $900 billion in 2006, “in a matter of a few years foreigners may end up owning most of the U.S. capital stocks: ports, factories, corporations, land, real estate and even our national parks.” Until recently, he writes, the United States has been financing its trade deficit through debt — namely, by selling U.S. Treasury securities to foreign central banks. That’s scary enough — as it has given big T-bill holders such as China and Saudi Arabia the ability to punish the U.S. dollar if they decide to unload their reserves.
But as Roubini says, foreigners may decide they would rather hold their dollars in equity investments than in U.S. Treasury debt. “If we continue with our current patterns of spending above our incomes, by 2013 the U.S. foreign liabilities could be as high as 75 percent of GDP and an increasing fraction of such liabilities will be in the form of equity,” he explains. “So, let us stop whining about the dangers of unfriendly foreigners owning our firms and assets and get used to it.”
Tell the righties and the Bush White House they support to get used to it. It’s their game, and they won’t let anyone else have the ball.
Even though by this point most of the performers in this piece of political theater must know that the issue is bogus, the national sentiment that they are tapping into is not trivial: it’s ethnic hatred. Serbians knew how to build national unity through hatred of Muslims, as did Germans find a sense of “togetherness” by ostracizing, vilifying, and then exterminating Jews. The port security issue is simply the latest instance of Americans nurturing a malignant bond through increasingly public displays of Arab bashing. How Americans got suckered (again!) into following a neocon rallying cry
Observations about four variables in the current equation:
1. Addiction compulsions addressed primarily by a shame based theology are likely to produce pseudo sobriety–the dry drunk syndrome. But more than that, it conviently allows the narcisscist to escape authentic examination or exploration of the blind spots of that pathological self-centeredness.
2. At every turn the Administration uses their dominant-subordinate “jungle” paradigm to grease the skids of self-gratification (btw the alternative is mutual and cooperative). Outrage driven rationalization eases the conscience about situational leadership ethics and “flexible” oversight on goverance (which is ironic b/c situational morality is one of the favorite battle cries of the fundies).
3. Bubba’s fundamentalist/evangelical world-view is driven by an unconscious fear about western society’s drift away from his/their premodern first century iron-age philosophical frame. The fear and outrage also fuels rationalizations about the decadence of modern society and the necessity of man’s subordination to the (religionist’s) god, even if the civil rights of so-called paganists and secular humanists have to be abridged; even in the good ol’ USA.
4. There must be profound intoxication related to world-stage power and the handsome profits available to the good-ol’-boy network (Arab and Western). NPR’s piece 2/23 about indoor snow sking in Dubai accomodated by $60+ oil means that there are mountains of wealth for many, many, so that if they choose, they can use U. S. Grants for TP in the john.
Maha, you above post is excellent as usual. I think I understand at least a part of what is going on, but I’ll be go to hell if I know what can be done about it if middle class America doesn’t get some shock treatments some kind of way and become first fearful and then very, very angry. Anybody else?
Maha – I am surprised you seem well disposed to D. Ignatius’s column – It seems his attitude is that it’s ok, because of what he is being told privately by Intel folks. Fair enough, but if he is being told that privately, then how are citizens and the Congress supposed to know = Just rely on winks from plugged in columnists? It’s bad enough worrying about trusting elected officals with claims of secret wisdom, but it’s ridculous to trust a reporter on that basis. Also – if it’s secret and meaningful, it is no more, because he published his findings. Not saying that this deal was done fore pure business, but it is hard to imagine the Sheiks getting the ok from Bush, if they had invested in Gore’s new start up , rather than Bush connected business.
The way this administration keeps secrets strikes me as pathological. Time and time again, we’re told just to trust them. Yet they don’t seem to trust us or our elected representatives in Congress. They don’t want to have honest public discussions about policy; instead we get sales jobs. And manipulation. And fear-mongering.
It’s obvious to me that they have something, many things to hide. It’s obvious to me that they are not running the country as our servants but as our masters, using it and us for their own gain. This is how Bush oiperated while governor of Texas, which is well documented (alas I cannot give you a link). As someone else put it, they simply moved on to a bigger game.
Somewhat OT, I agree with you maha that 9/11 was at the very least incompetence, a case of letting it happen. There is a lot of evidence to say it was more than that, that it was intentional. “The New Pearl Harbor”, no? The Dubai Ports deal is another example of the facade being pulled back to see how the world really works.
Someone remarked to me a few weeks ago, that forty years from now, we’ll be looking at 9/11 and the official explanations for it, in much the way that we look at the JFK assasination and the official explanation for that event. How many people today really believe Oswald acted alone? How many people, forty years from now, will believe that 9/11 “just happened” because of incompetence?
There is a lot of evidence to say it was more than that, that it was intentional.
I haven’t seen anything I take seriously, and remember, I’m an eyewitness to the collapse of the WTC towers. For example, all of the arguments I’ve seen that the towers were somehow pre-wired to explode exhibit astonishing ignorance about the size and structure of the towers and how it was they did fall.
Also, as someone who was there, I admit I have some buttons about the WTC collapse that can get pushed pretty easily. I try to be patient, but it’s a struggle. So if you want to theorize about the lone gunman and the grassy knoll on 9/11, please do me a kindness and do it somewhere else.
Both views are presented at Blogogram. Niranjan Ramakrishnan’s “Dubai Does Dallas” and Justin Raimondo excerpts.
maha – your comment no 5.
My niece was there also on 9/11. Oddly enough, she was there because she was a U.S. Attorney with the Justice Department. She had just left the Marriott Hotel 8 minutes before the tower collasped. The Marriott was within the structure. She was lucky that she left when she did as she left early that day. Everything that she had taken with her on the trip was gone. She was able to spend that night with a friend of a friend in town that night. She and a business associate were able to get a rental car to drive to another city for a flight back to her home state.
Maha,
Great links. Lots to mull over. That timeline of Bin Laden’s activities was fantastic. My sons, high school age at the time, both knew all about the guy before 9/11. They were flabbergasted and disgusted that the Bushies and the media acted so surprised. They kept saying, “What do you think Clinton was trying to tell you?”
Speaking of media, that Lou Dobbs is driving me crazy. The guy keeps tiptoeing up to the fence but he won’t look over the other side. I keep waiting for that, too.
Krauthammer may know Cheney, but he doesn’t know dick about Churchill.
Churchill wanted to maintain the British Empire in many parts of the world–but he definitely wanted out of Iraq. Although he helped carve the country out of the Ottoman Empire, by 1922 he was weary of trying to hold it together in the face of the same kind of factionalism we are facing today. As we wrote to Lloyd George:
“At present we are paying eight millions a year for the privilege of living on an ungrateful volcano out of which we are in no circumstances to get anything worth having.”
“Krauthammer’s denial of reality is so vast it’s almost majestic”
Nicely expressed, Maha.
Maha – I am surprised you seem well disposed to D. Ignatius’s column
Only the part that I quoted. The rest of it I am less well disposed toward, for the same reasons you express.
We forget how interconnected our world is. If people are startled a foreign country’s corporation “own†some of our ports, The Heretik hopes these same people don’t consider the implications of the Chinese owning most of our T bills.
Further to Comment #9, it’s a minor ongoing amazement to me how many of Winston Churchill’s so-called admirers, as ZakAttack puts so well, don’t know dick about Winston Churchill. Sure, he could be resolute and unbending but he also knew when to throw in a losing hand. Iraq is one example. So was India, where, despite hating having to give it up, Churchill ultimately accepted the reality that Britain could not maintain the Raj. So was the Soviet Union; despite his loathing for Communism, after Stalin’s death Churchill tried to enlist Eisenhower in a joint US-British diplomatic initiative to reduce tensions between East and West. He was also, of course, perfectly willing to ally himself with Stalin for the purpose of fighting Hitler.
There are many excellent biographies of Churchill by Martin Gilbert and Roy Jenkins. Perhaps Mr. Krauthammer should consider reading one of them before he bloviates further on this subject.
Dobbs vs Issa on CNN right now on ports
Nevermind. That was quick. Mostly time spent accusing/defending each other over the issue of racism.
Paul Begala actually sounded assertive today on this issue, though. He mentioned Churchill, too.
Mr Heritik nails it!!
The lack of reasoning on the Dubai issue is astounding.I don’t understand what threat a company owned by an Arab Nation could be simply because it is Arab owned. Using that kind of logic, one could argue that Americans are prone to mass murder because Ted Bundy, Charles Manson, and John Wayne Gacy were American.No one wants to deal with potential mass murderers!
While I don’t see the point of outsourcing Port operations, please take a moment to back up and see the big picture. If the Bush administration is so all fired up to go through with the deal, all the while crowing about 9/11 and the “Terrists” untill my ears bleed, I’m inclined to believe (as I have stated before) that this whole “war on terror” is the excuse to execute the goals of the PNAC.
As someone who has traveled a bit, I understand that Muslims, like Christians, Jews, Hindus, or any other group of people are not all the same. A Muslim from Banda Aceh might tend to be a bit more hard core than a Muslim from Lombok, and that is in just one country. If one can be frightened into believing all Muslims are evil mad bombers, think how the world must view Americans who actually carry out bombings on a grand scale. But then, for some reason it’s more civilized to use a billion dollar aircraft to drop a million dollar lazer guided bomb than to strap grenades to ones’ body and commit suicide. When innocents are killed by the former, we call it “collateral damage”, deaths by the latter are “victims of terrorism”.
I still feel there is something real funky about 9/11, but I respect your wish to keep discussion re: conspiracy theory off your blog( which I’m pleased to visit almost daily). There are plenty other forums for such chatter.
16 comment – I’m very confused about what you are saying?
maha – erinyes is starting to scare me. You know how you tell kids, “trust your feelings” “if it doesn’t feel right”.
I have to take time off and re-evaluate. The comments “don’t feel right to me”.
The Heritik hopes these same people don’t consider the implications of the Chinese owning most of our T bills.
I think it’s time we put all of this on the table. We’ve been too busy/trusting/ill-informed to pay attention to what’s been going on. The little red flags have been sprouting up all over, but we just keep weaving all around them. “Hmm. They must know what they’re doing.” Maha, you and other intelligent bloggers have been trying your darndest to educate us.
Isn’t this what econmic globalization means? We didn’t mind it when it worked in our favor, but then we always thought we’d be the big guys forever in the world economy, right?
This is from “Dennis the Peasant” today. Apparently, he’s been doing lots of research on this topic lately:
Anyway, here are a few real world facts about the relationship our nation has with this “demonstrably unreliable†nation:
• The U.A.E. has allowed the deployment of military aircraft at Al Dhafra. From there the 763rd Expeditionary Air Refueling Squadron conducts in-flight refueling operations throughout Southwest Asia in support of Operation Southern Watch.
• The U.A.E. allows U-2 and Global Hawk operations from Al Dhafra.
• The U.A.E. allowed the 10th Tactical Fighter Squadron to operate from Al Dhafra during both Desert Shield and Desert Storm.
• The U.A.E. has cooperated in the development of the Fujairah to Jebel Ali land link. This land link would serve as the U.S. Navy’s primary logistics/supply route in the case of any closure of the Straights of Hormuz. In other words, this link would allow the Navy to remain in the Arabian Gulf whether the Straits of Hormuz were remined or otherwise closed.
There’s more, but I cannot see the need to provide much else. The United States has had friendly relations with the U.A.E. since 1971. Those relations have grown closer and more interconnected over the past 35 years with the full blessings of every President – Republican or Democrat – and without any murmur of dissent from Congress.
re Comment 5 – maha, I respect your wishes, and am actually glad for your viewpoint.
[ It bespeaks a certain kind of intellectual laziness when the best one can do to counter an argument is to indulge in an orgy of name calling and finger pointing. Better to have the facts at one’s disposal and try and counter an opponent’s argument in a logical and rational manner.
I’ll pause here so that lefties reading this can howl and roll about on the floor for a while. Come back whenever you’ve stopped laughing and/or crying. Take your time.]
Thank you for that moment Maha! I needed it.
Democrats loudly denounce any thought of racial profiling. But when that same Arab, attired in business suit and MBA, and with a good record of running ports in 15 countries, buys P&O, Democrats howl at the very idea of allowing Arabs to run our ports. (Republicans are howling, too, but they don’t grandstand on the issue of racial profiling.)
On this, the Democrats are rank hypocrites. But even hypocrites can be right. There is a problem. And the problem is not just the obvious one that an Arab-run company, heavily staffed with Arab employees, is more likely to be infiltrated by terrorists who might want to smuggle an awful weapon into our ports.
Isn’t it interesting how Krauthammer manages to stereotype Arabs( muslims) as terrorists while defending the Democrat’s hypocrisy.?
#23 – That is one of the most convoluted things I’ve ever read. It would make a great exercise for English class, wouldn’t it?
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I can hardly wait to see how turdblossom is going to spin Bill Buckley’s verdict that the Iraq war has failed. He could have added that the gates of hell now have opened wide and very soon we’ll be reaping the whirlwind, but being a gentleman he wished to keep his discourse civil.
Well, I’m not a gentleman anymore and I can’t be civil. Six solid years of lies and bullshit from these fascist swine Republicans have turned me around.
I’ve finally come to believe that anyone in America who votes for a Republican this November is a god damned traitor.
And you know why. I don’t have to explain it.
And a special message to all the turd blossom trolls out there: Bend down, and kiss me royal Irish arse.
John Palcewski
http://www.palcewski.com/JP
O.K. perhaps a little clarification is needed, I wrote the post after a very long shift, & it’s a bit jumbled.
IT is difficult for me to condemn the UAE port operation deal until more facts are available.
Prohibiting the UAE from doing business because several of the 9/11 participants were from that nation makes as much sense as prohibiting American citizens from visiting Venezuela because Bush and Chavez loath each other.
While I don’t like the idea of outsourcing port operations ( or the running of my neighborhood quickie mart, for that matter), I don’t see the difference between having a company from Dubai running it as opposed to a company from London, so long as the security requirements are met, the deal is not based on cronyism, and there is no collusion involved.
All Muslims are not terrorists, nor are all Muslims potential terrorists.
The Muslim world is quite large, all of N.Africa, most of W. Africa, The former USSR central Asia Republics, The ME, Indonesia, Maylasia, portions of Thailand and PI. These people are not all hard core wahabis . America has its’ share of religious wack jobs, but not all Baptists are “rapture ready” Christian Jihadis either.
I do not trust the Bush administration, however I refuse to condemn everything they do simply to follow the pack, to do so makes me the same as imbeciles that blindly follow Bush, right or wrong.
American troops have been in Iraq for three years, and the violence is getting worse.No one can be bombed into happiness and prosperity.Many months ago, I posted on this blog that we now have our very own Palestine. We are following the same path in Iraq that the Israelis use, and it is a disaster.
From what I’ve read, America plans to occupy Iraq for years via heavily fortified air bases.This means years of airstrikes on “suspected” insurgents, and many years of “collateral” damage.
It also means many years of suicide and roadside bombs.
We will be reduced to an elephant in a tar pit, and the tar pit being about 6,000 miles from home which we keep pumping money and lives into.
And finally, the events surrounding 9/11, and the actions following 9/11 don’t add up unless the goals of the PNAC are factored in.
They got their “Pearl Harbor” and the green light to whack Iraq.The American public got a big bag of steaming poopoo and ONEHECKUVA mess to clean up.
Unless
I read the Heretiks’ post incorrectly, I believe people should be far more concerned with China than the UAE. The Chinese have the means to wreck our economy ( when and if they choose to). We depend too much on cheap Chinese goods. The Chinese have nukes and a large powerful military.The Chinese Govt is a hybrid Capitalist/Communist dictatorship.The Chinese and American economies will soon be in competition for dwindling resources.
The dragon is rising as the Eagle is in decline, and the dragon is not locked in unwinable wars thousands of miles from its’ shore.
The dragon is cultivating relationships in the Eagles’ back yard while the Eagle screams threats at her irritating neighbors.
Finally, These are my opinions based on facts.
I welcome debate, and if I’m missing some thing important, I want to know.I certainly don’t want to scare anyone.
I’ve been back and forth reading the post and comments here yesterday and again this morning.
It is wonderful to visit a dynamic site where the hostess, maha, and those commenting all offer earnest intelligent material and do so with great writing skills!
#17 * #`8: britwit……. I enjoy your many other postings, but I fail to understand what ‘is beginning to scare’ you about erinyes’ earlier postings.
My reaction to erinyes postings:….. ‘yes, yes….here are gems of deep thought coming from a very bright intellect.’
Thanks for the complement, Donna. All of what I post seem so clear to me.I look at things in total, my profession requires objective evaluations, not opinions based on preference.Buildings do not stand or fall due to divine intervention or govt. policy, they fall or stand due to mechanics and physics.
Thomas Friedman, who I don’t always agree with, has a great column today regarding the UAE port deal. Cal Thomas wrote in his column yesterday about the port deal, and it was all about terrorists.Blah, Blah….
I’m not happy The UAE port deal is bringing the far left and far right together against Bush. I would be better pleased if the union would be reality based rather than one based on idiology and hatred of Arabs.
There are some huge challenges on the horizon , both at home and across the globe, and America needs a great leader with a superior intellect, not a swaggering bully.We need to find this person quickly, Bush has lit a fire that will be difficult to quench.
William Lind has a thought provolking piece today at Lew Rockwell regarding Pakistan.
While I don’t consider myself a Libertarian, there are many great writings at his site.
i believe that bush was behind 9/11 and therefore i am usually labeled a tin-foil nut job.
but with every passing day, with more bullshit being exposed, i get closer and closer to being sane.
Here’s an interesting crony move that I hadn’t heard before…
“The same day, the White House appointed a DP World executive, David C. Sanborn, to be the administrator for the Maritime Administration of the Department of Transportation. Sanborn had been serving as director of operations for Europe and Latin America at DP.”
Worldhttp://www.upi.com/SecurityTerrorism/view.php?StoryID=20060223-051657-4981r
And so it goes with this administration
Maybe Richard Gere says it best:
“I’m asking why I said yes to this,” Gere said of the student roast. “And I realize why. `Cause we’re really all bozos on the bus. All of us, and especially in this world and in this country right now, when the biggest bozo on the bus is actually driving the bus.”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060225/ap_en_ce/people_hasty_pudding
More sobering news… (Is there a word in the English language for news that isn’t really news?)
“Iraq government warns of risk of “endless civil war”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060225/ts_nm/iraq_dc_64;_ylt=Ai6Z5CRAUtatlnVjmjjw4qFX6GMA;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl
One more interesting article this morning, from a BBC perspective, on the failure of the Democratic Party: “Democrats fail to find a message.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/4747254.stm
Poor Dr. Krauthammer; so conflicted.
William F. Buckley concedes, “It didn’t work”, re: the invasion and occupation of Iraq as promoted by the AEI and PNAC.How must it feel to promote the war without feeling the pain or getting your hands dirty(bloody)?
Great, just f’in great………..
From Post 33 above, samiam refers us to a BBC article:”Democrats fail to find a message”
Sorry, samiam…….I do not mean this personally, but I have just about had it with the drip drip drip aggravation of being offered such articles as this that really say nothing, but infer everything [negative] about Democrats.
There seems to be an intentional drip drip drip of such titles and references scattered about no matter what the topic or issue……..I really suspect the source of these drips are Rovian whispering ‘talking points’ designed by Republican operatives who intend to disempower or at least befuddle Democrats and the voting public.
The ‘no message’ theme is very much like the catch-22 of that old lawyer trick of asking, “When did you stop beating your wife?”
Unless the assumption within the question is examined [that one is in fact beating one’s wife], then what is left in one’s mind is a false idea about wife-beating forever more attached to the person being questioned.
Of course, Democrats have a message. There is not an issue of importance which Democrats fail to address! What Democrats actually say about any issue is glossed over in a continual media/politico frenzy of watching a ‘big illusion’ scoreboard.
When Republicans speak in nazi-fashion lock-step ‘talking points’, that registers as a ‘scored point’ for all who want life to be just some ‘game’ to win. When Democrats offer varied thoughtful responses, those responses will often not register as ‘lock-step’ points in a ‘game’ because they are offered as points to ponder.
The real Democratic message is “GOOD GOVERNMENT DOES NOT CUT CORNERS”
Post 36-
I took your complaint into consideration, Donna, but really I think the guy’s just British (in that he thinks we tend to be a bunch of religious rubes). Read the posts below and I think you’ll get an idea of where he’s coming from. I get the feeling that he’s truly hoping the dems will get it together. (Or that somebody over here will!)
http://thewideawakes.org/archives/2005/08/29/justin-webb-injecting-cindy-into-the-body-politic
http://www.nationalreview.com/blyth/blyth200502240747.asp
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/4400865.stm
http://www.quickrob.com/weblog/?p=229
It would be more appropriate, and a lot more fun, to send Charles a helmet full of pith (he said in a limp-wrist manner……)
Doran — good’n!
Post 37
When I spoke in post 36 of the catch-22 nature of using a phrase like ‘democrats have no message’, you then respond with a switch to yet another catch-22 phrase, “the dems will get it together’ which phrase, of course, pre-supposes that dems do not have it together……
I dutifully read the articles you made links to in #33 and #37…
samiam………er….all of these articles do the same thing…..they discuss and make judgement about image rather than deal with substance.
Samiam…..can you yourself distinguish between surface posturing and indepth grappling/balancing about national issues?
Let me make an analogy: surface posturing is what brings us the nearly manic sameness of shopping districts and chain restaurants across America, while indepth grappling/balancing looks at the same phenomena in terms of prevailing wages, food purity, local cultural continuity, education, and any other people issues having impact upon our present and our future generations.
Surface posturing is what someone might do by body-building in order to attract a date, while indepth balancing happens inside relationships.
The image-development perpetuated by body builders, rovian Bush spinners, and cloners of ‘chained-to-logo’ stores and restaurants across our beautiful country leads me to think, “Oops, nobody home inside these shells.”
And for what it’s worth, the worst sexuality in the world is that of a body-builder who has so pumped up his/her exterior shell as to negate any inner ability to move gracefully, sensitively, or fully in actual relationship with another. [This last sentence is a freebie wake-up for all the young folks who’ve grown up in a world of images and therefore have little perspective on personal inner vs outer developmental consequences]
So, ok….
Democratic message: Good Government Does Not Cut Corners.
Democrats getting it together: Democrats Are Better Lovers.
Hi Donna,
I’m a little new in this blogging world here, so sorry if I haven’t been getting my thoughts across as clearly as I’d intended. Sometimes, I’m into my own thoughts so much that I forget other people don’t know where I’ve gone! However, I feel like you’re sort of “yelling†at the choir, here.
Samian…can you yourself distinguish between surface posturing and indepth grappling/balancing about national issues?
All the points you mentioned are the very ones I’ve been “grappling†with all of my life. The issues you mention are those I find crucial to our survival and quality of life. And I too am worried sick that we’re losing it.
I’ve always felt that change will only come about through understanding human behavior and reaching consensus on important issues. And I worry about our nation’s ability to discuss these issues without blanket insults being thrown around. If you chanced on some of my earlier posts, I think you would recognize that this is the core of where I’m coming from. Perhaps this is the wrong format for me, however. Maha welcomed me to her terrific place (which I visualize as a cozy house with lots of comfy chairs, interesting people and an outstanding hostess) and said I was welcome to vent. I responded to her that I wasn’t so much a venter as a worrier.
I merely posted the BBC article because, to me, it’s interesting to see how other nations and cultures perceive us. (Sorry if I hit a sore spot with you.) And I learned something really interesting from it. (I waslooking beneath the “surface,†you see.)
Compare these two perceptions and statements, for example:
(from the BBC article) “The universities do not have the power they did, professorial authority is less respected.â€
(Now read this, from a blog I recently took part in over on the conservative side – shortened due a concern for space in Maha’s room, here. Maja warned me that they were like snarling rottweilers over there and I was glad to come back here!)
Me: (Is it safe for a liberal to visit in here?)
Chuck: Guess it might depend on who you call a liberal. Most all of the progressive sorts I met back in the 60’s were screwed up: broken families, abuse, rape, you name it. There was a reason they were radical. I don’t expect a whole lot has changed.
Me: Do you “hate” liberals?
Chuck: I *am* a liberal. I pretty much despise leftists, though. Back in the sixties I figured it was a tossup between the religious right and the wacko left as to who would become more dangerous to the Republic. The wacko left has won that race for the moment.
Me: I’m curious about your contention that the wacko left has won that race for the moment. Would you mind explaining that to me? Have they been in charge for the last five years? I’m honestly at a loss as to why you think this. I know that “flying thoughts” in this sort of format can be unclear and so I am remaining open-minded about what you might have meant. Maybe by this you meant the neocons who used to be the radical left? In that case, I’d agree with you.
Chuck: The left has been moving up the hierarchy for quite awhile, since the 60’s. I am actually more concerned with education, the media, and decent public behaviour than with politics per se. I recall having talks with some commune members at Columbia Teachers College back in 1968. I thought they were a bit nuts, all about empowerment, not about *good* education. Good education *is* empowerment IMHO. All these nuts have aged, and some have gone on to positions of influence in fundamental parts of society. It is not a good thing.
So, Donna – Now, to me, this is a striking example of differing perceptions based on different life experiences. To me, this goes past posturing and reaches into the core of what makes people tick. Life is an exploration and a mystery – human beings most of all. Most are due, at least, the respect of understanding where they are coming from, both because it’s the honorable thing to do and because we need to know what we’re up against.
Samiam……..thanks for hanging in there and offering your positioning and ‘voice to the choir.’
Do not worry about venting, and do not worry about ‘losing it’ or ‘up against whatness’! Geez, lift your arms above your head and command your own light, love and laughter to flow out and cascade back down your own form, splashing anyone in your vicinity.
Worry creates contraction……contraction shortens you, weakens the power of your voice, and entices you into a ‘duality’ dance with an ‘other’, the other being whomever you believe you must ‘convince’ about something.
I feel like I got into a bit of a dance here with you. Thanks for the swing around the floor…..but the song is over……. Cheers!
Thanks for taking time out for “our dance,” Donna!
Geez, lift your arms above your head and command your own light, love and laughter to flow to and cascade back down your own form, splashing anyone in your vicinity.
As a matter of fact, this is what I do everyday of my life. I have a reputation for being a kind, cheerful, sweet-natured peacemaker, you see. (Have been since I was a child) Yesterday, I came to the realization that I can’t be myself here in Blog-land. I can’t get into the vent, I guess. (It’s not the fault of this forum, we need forums like this!) It’s just that I have more of Alyosha’s childlike hope (and worry!) in my nature and not enough of Ivan’s stern intellect.
I’ve come to the understanding that I can accomplish more here in my world, in my own unique way. My way is not through the “power of the voice;” it is through a “duality” dance of the other. This is how I have always reached across to others – to bend like the willow, you know? And it isn’t so much a belief that I must “convince” someone about something; it’s a desire for understanding. When one understands, the convincing often becomes becomes unnessesary. And how do you find understanding? Well, that’s where listening comes in. I’m a better listener, than speaker. And I have the slower nature that comes with being a listerner. I can’t race through my thoughts. I need time to “listen” to them!
All my life I’ve suspected that truth is sometimes where you least expect it and that the heart is how you find it. There doesn’t seem to be an outlet for the heart in Blogland – for me.
This was a fascinating exercise for my limited brain, though, and I’ve gained much useful knowledge and insight. Maha is outstanding and I have so much admiration for her.
So, I’ll leave you with my best wishes and a fervent hope for a peaceful, harmonious future for us all. Don’t forget to look outside once in a while – the sun is still shining and life is still beautiful.
Honored to have met you all,
(Try them, try them? Sam I Am,)
RE: February 24, 2006 The Snapping Point II Filed under: Bush Administration, War on Terror, Middle East — maha @ 2:25 pm
CNN’s Lou Dobbs reported on Bush family business connections with the UAE.
Charles Krauthammer, who admits there’s a problem with the port deal still comes down in favor of allowing it with builtin protections. Anyone who does not categorically object to this deal allowing UAE to control our ports is a treasonous american who has lost any right whatsoever to favor of the continuing war in Iraq. Why, because the purpose of the Iraq war was to fight the war on terror on foreign soil not ours. This eal represents the wholesale give away of our national security.
The UAE does not recognize Israel’s right to exist. The UAE supported the 9/11 attack both in personnel and in finances. The UAE has close ties to Hamas.
Anti=deal progresive are not “Islamaphobes†or “Un-American†These same people tried to kill us. They must be stopped at our borders.
It bespeaks a certain kind of intellectual laziness when the best one can do to counter an argument is to indulge in an orgy of name calling and finger pointing. Better to have the facts at one’s disposal and try and counter an opponent’s argument in a logical and rational manner.
I mistrust the Bush administration for threatening its first veto of a bill blocking the deal when they knew nothing of the deal until last weekend.
The ports are the most vulnerable parts of the nation’s homeland defense system.
Secretary John Snow has some splaianin’ to do.
Greater foreign ownership of U.S. assets is an inevitable consequence of the reckless tax-cutting, deficit-ballooning fiscal policies that Congress and the White House have pursued. The righties are traitors. And they are not fiscal conservatives.
Once this deal is stoppe the Saudis will punish us by unloading their reserves. Thats why the veto threat was made.
I predict a depression in the US before this portgate is over.
Selling out our security to Bush’s Arab business cronies is reprehensible. Impeachment is a must.
When terrorists attack the United States through our ports, the Bush administration immediately will argue for a war against Iran,
looking for a way to exploit such an atrocity to pursue unrelated goals.
Bush needs to create a climate of fear. What better way than to weaken our port security?
If Bush is correct that “you’re either with us or you’re with the terrorists,†then UAE is with the terrorists.
Lets not hand over America’s security decisions to foreign leaders and international bodies that do not have America’s interests at heart.
I don’t trust the Bush administration has thoroughly vetted this deal as I don’t belive the Bush Adminsitration thoroughly reviewed the pre-war intel on alleged WMD.
Bushies are the racists. They rounded up countless Muslims, imprisoned them without due process and tortured them, who lied to the people so he could go to war and expand American empire in the Islamic Middle East, and exploited the people’s fear of “Islamo-Fascists†to ensure his re-election
Like the icebergs falling off the arctic like dominoes, we are being dismantled brick by brick and sold on the international market.
We have lost our economic independence.
Bush is selling us all out.
“Out of Iraq Now”
Frankh99 in Miami contributed to this report.
from another blog —
Let’s Outsource the Secret Service to the UAE
Posted by Trish | Feb. 25, 2006, 2:55 pm
Alert PR reader Vito D. had a really good question for the Deputy Defense Secretary. Gordon England said last week that those who question the port deal put our security at risk by giving people from Arab countries a complex. Vito asked:
Why not abolish the Secret Service and let U.A.E. guard the President? Now this would show our Arab allies that we trust them.
Sorry, outsourcing the Secret Service doesn’t put enough money into the hands of international corporate Bush buddies…..
but what a great idea!…..I dare this administration to ‘trust’ Arab allies to provide presidential protection …..
This recent comment says it all. “We’re so broke, we’re selling off all our assets.” Ports, parks, monuments, people….no matter, we’re broke.
#48………I suspect we are not so broke as we are stupid for letting the foxes [corporate puppeteers] caretake the hen house……
America and her assets.
I am particularly aghast at the idea of privatizing the caretaking of our national parks…..allowing private businesses to make profits off our parks and wilderness areas. To me, the wild places are the true cathedrals of our Creator, and offer each of us and all future generations a chance to commune directly with God amidst a magnificence of creation grandeur.
In the Bible, Jesus threw the moneychangers out of the temple,…….. now, here in America….the GOP are inviting the moneychangers to come back in and ‘caretake for profit’ the ‘temple’ spaces, our precious natural parks and wilderness areas.
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