The line between “torture” and “enhanced interrogation” was
unclear in the film although the American Ph.D. does say that now that there's been a regime change he and Maya (the woman who breaks the enemy combatants and discovers their secrets) will have have to cool it, or they will end up in the photos on the front pages, and lose their careers. The one terrorist they put through whatever it was seemed to emerge from the
sessions without being irreparably broken. He ate food and seemed to possess
his marbles at the end. Of course this was an actor. In the film itself it was said that none of these enemy combatants would ever be released. All would be slain, in other words. What really happened?
John McCain of course also went through torture and
still seems to have all his marbles. But McCain’s body was ruined. His jowls
are a mess, and he can’t lift his arms. Documenting a process that we weren’t
privy to is difficult because there’s no way to verify what happened. Taking
the CIA’s word for it that there was no torture should also be taken with a
grain of salt. It isn’t as if that outfit has never lied and always tells the
truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Staging this torture session
won’t necessarily lead to more torture but arguably to less as citizens become
familiar with what went on, and can visualize it. Some argue that this wasn’t
waterboarding the way it actually went down. My least favorite torture was
being closed up in the tiny box. That would give you cramps and claustrophobic
sensations. December 17, 2012 New Yorker Talk of the Town says, “The film
includes wrenching scenes of a terrrorist suspect being waterboarded and
subjected to other forms of torture by C.I.A. operatives; the suspect
eventually surrenders information that helps to lead to Bin Laden. Bigelow
maintains that everything in the film is based on first-hand accounts…” (27).
Should we be able to see what is on the front lines or not? Should we be
ostriches? The use of torture is arguable. On the one hand the other side are not soldiers of any country governed by or signatory to the combat conventions signed at Geneva. Does this mean anything goes? It's hard to know. In the battle of Algiers the French tortured suspects and ultimately won a military victory. However, they lost the propaganda war. And they tortured and released a few French citizens, who went on to write of their ordeals. The power of the pen ultimately freed Algeria. Could this happen with the suspects we will eventually release from Guantanamo? It was the former prisoners of the Soviet Union (Solzhenitsyn, for example) who ultimately brought down the Evil Empire. Have we also become an Evil Empire in the process of fighting the evils foisted on us by the beheaders and child-killers of Al Qaeda?
Kathryn Bigelow said that “what we were attempting is almost a journalistic
approach to film” (26).
This post is basically a response to Steven Shaviro's post. (You can find his blog through my links. The guy is a genius, but he is also a Marxist. I wanted to argue against the proceduralism viewpoint on his blog, and also to argue FOR the western way of war as NOT being merely procedural. Any form of law enforcement in the west has a great deal of individual initiative. There are procedures, but it's going outside the box that we see in series such as NUMB3RS, going back to Sherlock Holmes.) The breakthrough moment for Maya is somewhat against
procedure. She has a sudden intuition of the absence of information which
treats the negative areas as positives, which throws open the puzzle of OBL’s
courier’s whereabouts. It's the information the captives ARE NOT giving up that leads her to the conclusion that OBL's courier is alive. Maya has understood certain things: you can't run a terrorist organization from a cave. You need to be on the grid. To do this, you need a courier. Having narrowed down what it was she needed to find, she proceeded to find it.
To me the film is about the triumph of the intuition in
the analytical process, and about the freedom of individuals to pursue this
analytical process, which is why we’re going to beat Al Qaeda who blindly
follow leaders into the maelstrom. It’s the same reason the early Greeks beat
the Persians (Victor Davis Hanson posits that the individual’s freedom in the
west will always triumph over the potentate’s dictatorial proceduralism in
which the agents of the potentate unthinkingly carry out directives from which
they are unable to err). Hanson writes in Carnage and Culture (Anchor Books, 2001), "The peculiar way Greeks killed grew out of consensual government, equality among the middling classes, civilian audit of military affairs, and politics apart from religion, freedom and individualism, and rationalism" (4). Socrates, a philosopher, fought in the battles against Sparta, alongside other Greeks. Xenophon, his student, went on to write powerful testimonials of the wars that followed. What appears to be the case is how individuals, and procedures are followed, but not followed blindly. It is always innovation within a tradition that produces the edge.
Say what you will, but Maya stood up to a whole wall of bureaucrats many
times over. Hers is not merely a triumph of procedure. It's far more. Find any low-ranking personage in an Al Qaeda cell, much less a woman, who has been given the freedom to do over ten years what Maya did. OBL was a clever man. But can he stand up to an entire civilization of clever people, and live? He won the first round on the basis of a sneak attack which threw two airplanes of unarmed citizens into buildings. But a war is the equivalent of fifteen rounds. And you're not hitting children any longer in the back of the head. You're dealing with an army that is wide awake, and ready to hit you back. What’s probably scandalous to Marxists with this film is the
triumph of the individual’s ability to capitalize on the freedom of information
within her milieu to arrive at a correct perception. This is what goes wrong not only in the militias of Stalin and Ceausescu (who ultimately betray their masters in a crisis), but also in the countries of western potentates (we are beginning to see a massive exodus of Islamic women from Islamic countries -- women such as Ayaan Ali Hirsi, who constitute the beginning of this exodus, and the commencement of their Solzhenitsyns -- from absolute silence, to a condition that resembles a fledgling form of freedom. This film represents the
triumph of the bourgeoisie and individual capitalism and the freedom accorded to women represented by Bigelow,
who seized on a capital project, and completed it, and is now thriving on the
controversy it has created that endows the film with visitors. To silence it
would be tantamount to silencing the invisible hand of capitalism itself, even
as that hand may appear to slap terrorists around. (We really do have to watch that, as we need to reach into the Islamic heart and mind and offer not only the women, but the men as well, something. This something has to somehow reach back into Islamic theology and show them resources there that allow them on their own terms to escape into the multiplicity of democracy. Will this work? We've been fighting these wars a long while -- and it's not clear if they will.) This film ZERO DARK THIRTY is about the process of thought and how individuals from the west carry that
out against individuals from the east. And why we so far are winning. To win, the Islamic society will have to allow for individual creativity and the recommencement of scientific inquiry -- abandoned in the 12th century when the claims of Averroes to a kind of two-kingdoms' thought -- were censored, and he was killed: "Averroes's commentaries came into the Christian world appearing to claim that there were two kinds of opposing truths, philosophical truth (i.e. Aristotelean) and religious truth, yet also claiming that the contexts of the philosophical and theological discourse were so distinct that both truths could be accepted at the same time" (Looking at Philosophy, Palmers, Sixth Edition, p. 129). This "doctrine of double truth" might allow for a lifting of the censorship of the mullahs and allow individual thought to appear throughout the Islamic world, but on its own terms.
It appears that our edge at this point has something to do with Augustine's initial notion of "Two Kingdoms" and his ideas of "Just" "War" which were previously thought to be incompatible. St. Thomas Aquinas' acceptance of this double doctrine appears to come through Averroes, and our continuing edge has to do with Luther's further elaborations of this discrepancy, and even something to do with Jefferson's letter to the Baptists in which he announced "the separation of church and state." The capacity for independent inquiry, inquiry independent of the dicates of Islam, will make the Islamic nations that much more formidable as enemies. On the other hand, it may permit our civilizations to begin to be one civilization, or at least allow us to live together in the 21st century. While this giant metaphysical problem is working its way out, we will have to continue to take out the problematic individuals such as OBL as they attempt to shut our civilization down with terror. And we will continue to be able to do it, but it's only going to get harder, as one day soon, one of them is going to get one of our atomic weapons. We have to delay that as long as possible, while working on the other problems of East-West relations, and opening up the two-kingdom's idea within Islam (and within the remains of the Marxist one-kingdom juggernaut) so that we can get some perspective into these communities darkened by Cyclopsean monotony.
67 comments:
http://www.google.com.ph/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=bojinka%20plot&source=web&cd=8&sqi=2&ved=0CG8QFjAH&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.realclearhistory.com%2F2012%2F02%2F07%2Fthe_unraveling_of_bojinka_plot_1466.html&ei=6S0OUZfwIaSkiAfY44B4&usg=AFQjCNGPLYUvHwebEu7zG1sCmcTReY4i0g&bvm=bv.41867550,d.aGc
With an 8 iron and an astroturf doormat I could land a Pro V1 on the roof deck of the Josefa without leaving my building.
American Enterprise Institute held a seminar with CIA veterans of the OBL assassination about five days which appeared on C-Span 2 last night. There are four panelists. One is the moderator, a man named Marc Thiessen. There is also a General Hayden who worked with "enhanced interrogation" technicians from 2004-2008, and a CIA operative named Jose Rodriguez, and one other named John Rizzo, who is a former CIA chief. The allegation that NOTHING came out of these torture sessions is patently false seems to be their consensus. General Michael Hayden said the amount of information produced was equivalent to a CostCo bulging with file folders and that among other things they were able to stop bomb and abomb attacks, and also to find the identity of OBL's courier. They claim the identity of Maya is a "composite" of various CIA women analysts. While Obama's administration has claimed that "no actionable intelligence" came out of the enhanced interrogation techniques depicted in Zero Dark Thirty, thus denying both the ethical and the practical aspects of these techniques, and while Michael Moore among others has insisted in print that the hooliganism of the Bush administration is what set these techniques into play, Obama's own administration toned down some of the techniques (the box depicted, and waterboarding was outlawed, but sleep deprivation was not) they also deny the truthfulness of the portrait of the CIA woman who got herself and several others blown up -- they claim not only was she a far more beautiful woman than the actress but was also smarter and tougher than she is depicted. They claim that the interrogators found Ahmed Al-Kuwaiti partially because KSM said to his fellow detainees by secret note that under no circumstances should they mention the name of the courier, as this would surely lead to OBL's cover being blown. The role of the food in the film, as well as the expensive car given to a corrupt Kuwaiti citizen, were also discussed. It's a neat discussion, and I think provides a level of analytical and historical detail that has thus far been omitted from most discussions of the film. That "nothing came out of" these interrogations is similar to the BHO administration's lie that Benghazi was caused by an anti-Islamic film. It's a convenient cover story and since no American journalist will question anything the BHO administration lays down, it is dependent on very few other sources to dig deeper... Here is the link to this 1.5 hour discussion:
http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/310656-1
Kirby,
There is also a General Hayden who worked with "enhanced interrogation" technicians from 2004-2008
You're not usually a coward when it comes to language. Enhanced interrogation is a euphemism for torture, which is a violation of our laws, the treaties we've signed, and which we rely upon to protect our civilians and soldiers when they come under the power of the enemy. You, who are so implacably opposed to any violation of the law, seem perfectly content with this. This makes you culpable, and guilty with them. How dare you drag the good name and honor of our country through the filth, by condoning things that demean it?
The allegation that NOTHING came out of these torture sessions is patently false seems to be their consensus
What is misleading here is that the people who were tortured, the people against whom war crimes and crimes under the Geneva convention were committed, were first subject to conventional interrogation. Torture is a one-way street. Once you torture someone, you cannot un-torture them, and you cannot undo that you have become a torturer and a criminal. But neither can you learn anything. Torture is not about gaining information, it is about vengance, and about dehumanizing the victim.
The allegation that NOTHING came out of these torture sessions is patently false seems to be their consensus.
The claim is that no actionable intelligence came out of torture. No one claims that nothing came of it: our nation has been shamed, and brought down to the level of those we despise. Torture is a tactic of terror, and we have become the terrorists we claim to fight. Torture is treason.
As for the rest, people without honor tell self-serving lies. People who torture are without honor, and deserve none.
I think there may be a difference insofar as nothing irreparable has been done. The Al qaeda group is not a signatory to the Geneva Conventions or any other conventions, so presumably their own disastrous modes of pursuing warfare fall outside of the domain of just war.
I think this is a perfectly legitimate distinction. If a group is willing to slam two planes full of women and children and noncombatants into a building full of civilians, they are thus operating outside of the rules of Just War, and so I think we are permitted to respond in kind.
To do something else jeopardizes thousands of Americans. How is that conscionable?
This is a tricky and delicate issue, and one that the CIA operatives well understood.
But if another party is not signatory to the conventions, then I don't believe we have to honor them. Maybe you think we should any way. In a previous comment you argued that "no actionable intelligence" came of these interrogations and so you questioned their utility.
This turns out not to be the case.
Many many missions were foiled, not only through the death of those able to carry them out, but the arrests of many others, and the actual blocking of many terrorist attempts.
You should view the film and listen to the discussion before you judge. We must not be ostriches.
Kirby,
I think there may be a difference insofar as nothing irreparable has been done.
Torture generally creates irreparable psychological damage. The whole point to torture is its irreparability.
The Al qaeda group is not a signatory to the Geneva Conventions or any other conventions, so presumably their own disastrous modes of pursuing warfare fall outside of the domain of just war.
Al Qaeda is not a signatory to the Geneva Convention. But the people that were tortured in committing terror under the guise of the war on terror were typically Afghanis or Saudis. Those nations are signatories, and their citizens are therefore covered under the conventions. There rights are not invalidated because of al Qaeda membership, real or alleged.
think this is a perfectly legitimate distinction. If a group is willing to slam two planes full of women and children and noncombatants into a building full of civilians, they are thus operating outside of the rules of Just War, and so I think we are permitted to respond in kind.
You're wrong, both legally and pragmatically. Generally speaking, we cannot be certain that an individual handed over to torture is a member of al Qaeda, not even if they admit it. And if the standards are so low that merely alleging someone to be a member removes us of our legal obligations under our own laws and the treaties we've signed, then the laws and conventions have ceased to exist.
You should view the film and listen to the discussion before you judge.
It has been established that the film builds on a lie. That you find the lie convenient does not give it veracity.
No, the current administration is fudging when it says there was nothing actionable. It's just one long lie. Everything the current administration says about anything at all is a lie.
And when it isn't a lie it's a distraction from the essential truths of our time, such as the massive debt.
The Clinton administration also lied and fudged and focused on stupid stuff. This is how al Qaeda got going in the first place.
I think you're wrong about civilians working as a soldiers for terrorist groups. They have to be members of a given nation's army to be considered covered under the Geneva Conventions.
They can't be working with a rogue group committing actions that are not covered by the Geneva Conventions.
They also have to be in uniform.
This is why our spies can be simply killed or tortured by other nations and why they had to at least wear US army underwear.
You have to be in an army, and in their uniform, or you are not covered (in more than one sense).
This is why it's legal to do the box or other things to them.
If you want to be covered by the Geneva Conventions you have to act according to those conventions. Al qaeda does not, and is therefore opening itself to any kind of action from drone smash to assassination to enhanced interrogation.
(In terms of set theory, torture and enhanced interrogation and what they are now calling "debriefing" have some overlap, but they are also all separate, and no doubt the borders and margins are all arguable, but they are not identical.)
Except in a few instances such as sleep deprivation they do appear to be identical.
One is not a war criminal if one is defending oneself which is all we're doing against Al Qaeda.
We have to be able to use the same tactics. Yes, some errors will also be made in terms of who gets picked up. But in the fog of war these things are going to happen.
We who are in civilian centers and protected by many many layers of soldiers and police might have the comfortable position of being able to ethically criticize those on the front lines.
But since neither one of us has ever been on the front lines, I don't think we have the right to do this. James does. We don't.
Kirby,
You've reached the limiting state of paranoia w.r.t. Obama: if he says something that you believe is false, he's lying in the sense that he's not telling the truth; if he says something you believe, your assumption is that he doesn't believe it, and so he's lying in the sense that he's misrepresenting his actual beliefs/priorities. Nothing can change your mind at this point. You are brain-dead on the subject.
I think you're wrong about civilians working as a soldiers for terrorist groups. They have to be members of a given nation's army to be considered covered under the Geneva Conventions.
Five seconds will Google will show you that there are civilian protections under the the 1899 and 1907 Hague Conventions, and that while the original Geneva Conventions covered only combatants, the 1949 (Fourth) Geneva Convention also specifically covered non-combatants. So you are simply in error.
This is why our spies can be simply killed or tortured by other nations and why they had to at least wear US army underwear.
Spies are a separate case: they are neither civilians nor soldiers.
If you want to be covered by the Geneva Conventions you have to act according to those conventions.
This is not true. You need only be a citizen or the member of the armed forces of a signatory state.
(In terms of set theory, torture and enhanced interrogation and what they are now calling "debriefing" have some overlap, but they are also all separate, and no doubt the borders and margins are all arguable, but they are not identical.)
Bullshit. You have a remarkably low gullability threshold.
Ugh.
Torture.
Stupid. It's far more effective to destroy them by being friendly and lying.
Or like, you know, not getting into a war at all.
Anyway, Wikipedia doesn't have anything Ibn Rushd's getting kilt.
Stu, terrorists are not "non-combatants."
This is where you have your error.
The guys in the film were all combatants.
But they were not wearing a known country's uniform. They were rogue combatants. Therefore they fall under the category of spies.
They are fighting but not from within any recognizable army.
Of course you can't pick up non-combatants and torture or kill them. And if anyone were to knowingly do this, as Al Qaeda did to many journalists (claiming they were CIA) then this would lie outside the pale of just war.
But terrorists are fighting as more or less spies. They don't dress as soldiers, and they're sneaks. So, they're spies, or in the category of spies, and should be treated with the brutality that we traditionally accord spies.
Because they're sneaks, like spies.
Because they're spies.
GM, we didn't ask for this war. But we have it, thanks to 9/11. We could turn the other cheek.
That's what some say that Jesus would have us do.
This is debatable. I think we have to fight. Lutherans believe that war can be justified to protect the weak.
If it were left up to Al Qaeda every American man woman and child would be dead. All Jews would be dead.
Maybe you don't care.
Your tradition doesn't have a vocabulary to cover this. Mine does. We claim that to fight is not only the right thing, but that it is honorable to do it so long as it is done in the name of justice for all.
I think what W did in Afghanistan (taught 9 million women to read, and instituted democratic elections) is honorable. Most think this was bad, or a sin against "multiculturalism." I don't recognize cultures that don't have human rights for children and babies as valid cultures.
This means the right to life, and the right to read and speak.
Therefore I didn't recognize the American South under R.E. Lee, or the Afghans under the Taliban, or the Japanese under Hirohito, or Germany under Hitler. I also believe we have a duty to help the people who are laboring under such monstrous conditions.
Those who are fighting to support this kind of nonsense, especially not fighting in uniform, under the Geneva conventions, and those who are exporting terror, should be rooted out by any means necessary. I don't respect their ends, or their means.
So I think anything goes with regard to them. I am not against the drone strike against them, and am not against SEAL strike as it came down in the OBL case.
I also think enhanced interrogation is just fine. They themselves said to their CIA captors that they liked waterboarding, not because it resembled a day at the beach, but because their religious tradition forbade them to sell out their brothers until there was a serious reason to do so.
And waterboarding met the conditions of seriousness that enabled them to spill the beans.
Having enchiladas over a game of poker, which is Stu's version of debriefing (he hasn't given us what he would accept, so I am setting out a kind of parody of his position), would not have met their own criteria. Thus there would have been polite silence until we upped the ante.
War has never been any fun at all for anyone. Sherman taught us the best way to prosecute it and get it over with.
If you simply reduce the other side to rubble, it actually helps in the long run, because it keeps the affair short if not exactly sweet.
Theologians argue about just war. I think war can be a kind of charity as it was in WWII when we freed the Chinese on one side of the Atlantic, and the Jews on the other. And set up democracies. Everyone would rather live in a democracy. You can't find any majority in a democracy at least that would prefer to live under the jackboot of a pigdog like Kim Jung-Il or Hitler or that creep in Iran with all the vowels. Ahmed dinner jacket.
Kirby,
Stu, terrorists are not "non-combatants."
True, but their rights are not abridged because we allege that they're combatants. This seems to be the part you don't get -- you're assuming that if someone is accused of being an Al Qaeda member, they are, and the gloves can come off. This is lawlessness.
GM, we didn't ask for this war. But we have it, thanks to 9/11. We could turn the other cheek.
True enough, but being attacked does not justify counter-atrocity. And we tortured folks in Iraq, which screws your argument up pretty badly.
This is debatable. I think we have to fight. Lutherans believe that war can be justified to protect the weak.
I'm inclined to be a bit more on your side here. We can fight. But we have to follow the rules. We didn't, and in ignoring the rules of civilized warfare, we conceded defeat to our enemies. It was a stupid think to do, and to continue to do.
If it were left up to Al Qaeda every American man woman and child would be dead. All Jews would be dead.
Maybe so, but they lack the capability. The choice isn't between defeat and being terrorists ourselves. We had the choice to remain faithful to our principles, and pursue this as a just war. But we didn't make that choice.
I think what W did in Afghanistan (taught 9 million women to read, and instituted democratic elections) is honorable.
I think you would do better to argue that part of what W did was honorable, at least in its intention. I'm certainly willing to grant that, even though the particular pieces you refer to here may prove to be ephemeral. But the whole? No. We undercommitted to the just war in Afghanistan in order to divert resources to the unjust war in Iraq, and squandered the opportunity we had to make a real change there.
So I think anything goes with regard to them. I am not against the drone strike against them, and am not against SEAL strike as it came down in the OBL case.
I think we agree that the killing of bin Laden was justified, at least from a Niebuhrian perspective. Drones are much more problematic. There is a tendency in the US to rely on technological war, but there's a mismatch between our power to destroy and our power to sense and comprehend. There are problems in the world that can be solved by the judicious application of high explosives, but it is not so clear that our use of drones meets the "judicious" part of this formula.
I also think enhanced interrogation is just fine.
So, you're out for being pro-torture.
It was good to find some common ground... I have only the Kindle but shall spare you the torture of typos until I get on a better machine soonest.
In the film Maya wanted to drop a bomb on OBL's house. That was her initial instinct. Total war. This would have incinerated OBL, but also the twenty or thirty children in the house. One of the problems with fighting AQ is they use human shields. And they don't wear uniforms. So it's difficult because they are basically all infiltrators. They are worse than spies because they are terrorists, too.
I really feel it is hard to sort them out, because they're going to lie.
And we have to assume they're lying.
This is a very problematic war.
By contrast fighting the Nazis was Queensberry rules.
Even with the Japanese who did vivisections on American prisoners, we'd have Queensberry Rules by contrast. This bunch will chop off the head of a journalist or even a medical worker who is trying to keep THEIR population healthy. They're really out to lunch this bunch.
This is the most devilish group we've ever faced. The only real good thing is the lack of capability (thus far).
Soon however they will have an abomb and take out a major city. We have a race against time on that front. We have to kill them so rapidly that they can't achieve this end, because you know that as soon as they can they will.
They have no understanding of a limited conventional war as 9/11 makes so clear.
Dershowitz believes that therefore torture itself is justified. I'm afraid I have to agree with him. I do think torture is justified.
Because we simply cannot dialogue with this bunch. They make even feminists seem civil by comparison.
But they are quite similar. True feminists will not even speak to men. Or they will but only in order to guilt trip and berate them endlessly.
This group is like that, except they do not even believe in guilt tripping and berating. This is just all-out murder with contempt.
Getting education into their societies will make for a quantum leap. This was W.'s genius. Can they turn their societies back still to the Stone Age? Yes, but only by killing all the women.
Already there are many men even in rural areas who want their daughters to live in the 21st century. Once you give women this chance they aren't turning back.
This side of feminism is something I like. I just hope they won't turn against the men and want to silence and incinerate them in turn as so many of our women have.
Somehow whole families and whole societies have to talk with one another.
One good thing I rarely mention about BHO but which I have to openly admit. He has completely changed relationships between white and black for the better. I find that I can get along very very easily with black people now in a way I couldn't before this election.
I love that.
It has opened a whole population to releasing the last vestiges of lingering resentment. I think this is good. I can talk to blacks openly.
Was it worth 8 trillion dollars?
It's worth even more, possibly.
It's priceless. I didn't think it would ever happen. But it has happened. Hallelujah.
I just wish it was Condi instead so we could get a two-fer.
I recognize that Condi was part of the business thinking that ousted Aristide in Haiti (this was illegal and crazy but it may have been the only way to stop a Castro-sized takeover of the island).
There are often strange side-effects of things that have been done. I don't trust anything about Obama, and do think he's a liar who mercilessly uses race.
On the other hand, it really has helped us all in certain ways.
In the film Maya wanted to drop a bomb on OBL's house. That was her initial instinct. Total war. This would have incinerated OBL, but also the twenty or thirty children in the house. One of the problems with fighting AQ is they use human shields. And they don't wear uniforms. So it's difficult because they are basically all infiltrators. They are worse than spies because they are terrorists, too.
I really feel it is hard to sort them out, because they're going to lie.
And we have to assume they're lying.
This is a very problematic war.
By contrast fighting the Nazis was Queensberry rules.
Even with the Japanese who did vivisections on American prisoners, we'd have Queensberry Rules by contrast. This bunch will chop off the head of a journalist or even a medical worker who is trying to keep THEIR population healthy. They're really out to lunch this bunch.
This is the most devilish group we've ever faced. The only real good thing is the lack of capability (thus far).
Soon however they will have an abomb and take out a major city. We have a race against time on that front. We have to kill them so rapidly that they can't achieve this end, because you know that as soon as they can they will.
They have no understanding of a limited conventional war as 9/11 makes so clear.
Dershowitz believes that therefore torture itself is justified. I'm afraid I have to agree with him. I do think torture is justified.
Because we simply cannot dialogue with this bunch. They make even feminists seem civil by comparison.
But they are quite similar. True feminists will not even speak to men. Or they will but only in order to guilt trip and berate them endlessly.
This group is like that, except they do not even believe in guilt tripping and berating. This is just all-out murder with contempt.
Getting education into their societies will make for a quantum leap. This was W.'s genius. Can they turn their societies back still to the Stone Age? Yes, but only by killing all the women.
Already there are many men even in rural areas who want their daughters to live in the 21st century. Once you give women this chance they aren't turning back.
This side of feminism is something I like. I just hope they won't turn against the men and want to silence and incinerate them in turn as so many of our women have.
Somehow whole families and whole societies have to talk with one another.
One good thing I rarely mention about BHO but which I have to openly admit. He has completely changed relationships between white and black for the better. I find that I can get along very very easily with black people now in a way I couldn't before this election.
I love that.
It has opened a whole population to releasing the last vestiges of lingering resentment. I think this is good. I can talk to blacks openly.
Was it worth 8 trillion dollars?
It's worth even more, possibly.
It's priceless. I didn't think it would ever happen. But it has happened. Hallelujah.
I just wish it was Condi instead so we could get a two-fer.
I recognize that Condi was part of the business thinking that ousted Aristide in Haiti (this was illegal and crazy but it may have been the only way to stop a Castro-sized takeover of the island).
There are often strange side-effects of things that have been done. I don't trust anything about Obama, and do think he's a liar who mercilessly uses race.
On the other hand, it really has helped us all in certain ways.
Kirby,
In the film Maya wanted to drop a bomb on OBL's house. That was her initial instinct. Total war.
I've read that the intelligence estimates of the probability of OBL being in the safe house in Abbottabad were in the 50-70% range. Dropping a bomb on the house therefore had a 30-50% chance of being outright murder, and moreover would have destroyed the evidence that we'd accomplished our goal. We'd have spent the next 30 years wondering if we'd really gotten him, just as for many years there were folks who argued that bin Laden had died of kidney failure at Tora Bora. The way it was done entailed more risk, but for a far greater reward.
By contrast fighting the Nazis was Queensberry rules
I don't think the Russians would agree. Nor, for that matter, the residents of Rotterdam or Coventry. In a sense, it depended on which Germans. The regular army and navy pretty much played by the rules, the questions about submarine warfare on both sides notwithstanding. The Luftwaffe had its issues (as did British Bomber Command). The SS even more so, especially when they weren't in the line.
Soon however they will have an abomb and take out a major city.
It's an interesting question. In some sense, things have gotten better. Russia has secured it's nukes. But Pakistan's gotten worse. Iran's motives, as well as its future, remain largely opaque. North Korea is insanely lead -- although it is unlikely to transfer weapons to Islamic terrorists, it seems perfectly capable of using nukes as terror weapons by itself.
We have to kill them so rapidly that they can't achieve this end, because you know that as soon as they can they will.
Random terrorists do nothing to increase the nuclear threat. They have about as much of a chance of building/acquiring a nuke as you do. Bin Laden was problematic because he controlled so much money -- arguably enough to make it happen. There's a very good discussion of the risks/tradeoff's in Silver's recent book, which I recommend.
Getting education into their societies will make for a quantum leap. This was W.'s genius.
It's not so simple. I wish it were. Education can help a lot, but its not a panacea. Ask the Germans. Anyway, credit for the education priority rightly goes to Laura.
One good thing I rarely mention about BHO but which I have to openly admit. He has completely changed relationships between white and black for the better. I find that I can get along very very easily with black people now in a way I couldn't before this election.
I love that.
I think this is true. Obama's proof that merit can overcome the disadvantages of race, which was not the case until recently. Discrimination is sticky, and I think the right has erred in dismissing that it is still a factor. But the election of Obama is also evidence that the left was overestimating the disadvantages. This is one of those cases where the truth was in the middle.
I just wish it was Condi instead so we could get a two-fer.
Condi was ok, but I think it was unforgiveable that Chaney set up Powell to lie at the UN, essentially destroying his credibility. I think Powell would have been a credible, moderate Republican candidate for the Presidency without that. Indeed, in 2002 I'd have given him better odds than any African American then living of being the first black President.
The problem with Condi was 9/11. It was her job as National Security advisor to know the threat, and properly convey it to the President. She failed, indeed, she argued for a cold-war threat analysis a decade after the USSR ceased to exist. Bush might have been willing to give her a second chance, but she'd have been ripped apart in an electoral campaign.
I may be in a conciliatory mood here but agree with most of this. Who now controls OBL's loot? Aren't there other terrorists with deep pockets or with links to the Saudi elite that we're contracted to defend but who funnel our own money to Wahabi shock troops? Have we now managed to neutralize all OBLs assets after the hit?
donde la alhambra por la tiempo nuevo
recuerdos de la alhambra
my staff and advisors have encouraged me to point out that the film you cite here may very well be an extension of a govt plot a conspiracy the use of a ruse as a medium for distraction
propoganda and a panda
i really think osama is still alive he's reading poetry in some mountain villa in kurdistan he agreed to have no phone contact with anyone for five years in exchange for medical care i actually think his kidneys are accounted for by obama care see he needed dyalysys so they worked out a deal this whole drama of military wit is nonesense this is just another chick flick i won't go see it i can see right through it it is negligble art at best
a cartoon blown up into digital surreality
who cares i don't care all that was accomplished if it really did happen is making them hate us all the more
...if it came down to fair fighting both sides using the same weapons we wouldn't stand a chance
so they invented some weapons that sort of amazed us
...gee... how does everyone "feel" about iEdeez or human suicide diplomacy?
my intuitions tell me
you better watch hey what's that sound
everybody look what's goin' down
you'd think since the behaviourists happened we'd all be like wayay more gentle and shit but no human nature continues to be wretched the worst gives rise to something even worse and virtue is never attained
once you've explored any area of human power possibility it's pretty hard to retreat
lent is a good time to retreat
but it's mardi gras now
party like it's 2020
the mayans were right
everything changed
we just haven't noticed yet
ah well
time for a cigarette
hey barack
got a light
tomas d'aquino argued that no theology could rightly exist without the undergirdings of philosophy and you might like this he said that philosophy was not possible until one was over fifty because the passions are still a distraction until a guy is 50 i'd say he was right about that..however he died at 49
now but not yet
jh
Kirby,
Who now controls OBL's loot?
It was family money, and Islamic law is very strict on the division of assets after death. I suspect most of the money is with bin Laden's sons (he had 20 kids). As far as I can tell, at least three of bin Laden's sons were involved in al Qaeda, and all three were killed (two before Osama, and one in raid that killed his father). Osama had inherited $25M, and he had an expensive life. Odds are that none of his decendents received more than $1M, which isn't enough to cause serious trouble.
Indeed, if $25M was enough to by a nuke, Donald Trump would have one now, so I'm guessing it's not.
Aren't there other terrorists with deep pockets or with links to the Saudi elite that we're contracted to defend but who funnel our own money to Wahabi shock troops?
Good question. I don't know. It's worth understanding that what set bin Laden off against the US was (a) our basing of troops in Saudi Arabia after the 1st Gulf War, and (b) his sense that our troops would back King Fahd in the event of a coup. As regards the later, he is almost certainly correct, and his argument that the post-war basing was permitted by the Saudi monarchy as a means of defending itself makes perfect sense. In effect, we were played by both sides of a nascent Saudi civil war, not unknowingly. Stabilization of the Saudi monarchy is in the US national interest.
There is a history here of conflict between Saudi royalty and radical Islamists, and you might want to remind yourself of the seizure of the Grand Mosque at Mecca in 1979 during the Hajj. You might want to take a look at the wiki article List of militant incidents in Saudi Arabia. There's a long history. Indeed, it might be argued, although I'd do so circumspectly, that if there's a measurable sense in which we've won the war in terror, it's in a decreased tempo of terrorism with Saudi Arabia.
I'd say that this comes around to two basic causes. The first is the US became a lightning rod for Islamic terrorism, especially after GWB's ill-advised "bring it on," drawing attention away from Mecca, Riyadh, and the Saudi royalty. For whatever reason, Obama is seen as less of a Satan than Bush (which is ironic given the connections between the Bush family and Saudis -- oil, you know), which dissipated some of their energy. Obama's strategy seems to boil down to killing them without unnecessarily provoking them -- it is an art. The second is the succession of from Fahd to Abdullah as King of Saudi Arabia. From what I've recently heard, Abudllah is popular in a way that Fahd was not ("Abba Abdullah," etc.), and this has also diminished the threat to the Saudi monarchy.
Have we now managed to neutralize all OBLs assets after the hit?
Didn't need to. All we needed was strict application of Islamic law to the assets of the deceased.
Correction: ... a decreased tempo of terrorism within Saudi Arabia.
The error was bad, because it was sensical.
In French accounts of Saudi Arabia the Quincy Pact is always stressed. This was a pact signed by the CIA with the Saudi Royalty after Yalta with Roosevelt. This is always emphasized in France when they discuss OBL but I mainly find it stressed on kook sites in English. (pacte du Quincy.)
This pact was renewed in 2005 by W.
No one on Fox or any other station ever discusses it. It apparently says that we'll keep the Wahabi faction in power in exchange for their constant supply of oil. Some go very kook and claim nothing we know about the Saudis has any validity but I find this Quincy Pact business difficult to assess.
I still don't know much about factions within Islam
Power struggles within factions operate as well.
But how clear is this? In Godfather 3 there is a conspiracy between the Pope and the mafia. T or F?
Without very serious study and the ability to read Arabic no one really knows and those aren't cointries w a free press
Kirby,
I did a search for the Quincy Pact. As you said, there are French sources, but not much in English, and what there is of the latter is unpromising.
But there is some ground truth here that's worth noting. The first is that a meeting between Roosevelt and King Ibn Saud did take place on the USS Quincy (CA-71) on February 14, 1945, as Roosevelt was returning via the Mediterranian from Yalta. The topics of discussion listed were the "Palestine issue," and "a secret agreement in which the U.S. would provide Saudi Arabia military security -- military assistance, training and a military base at Dhahran in Saudi Arabia -- in exchange for secure supplies of oil." That latter claim gives a reference to a letter from Roosevelt to Ibn Saud, which touches only on the Palestine question, and promises that the US would consult with both Arabs and Jews. These issues are discussed in the "Quincy Agreement" section of the wiki article on the Quincy itself.
The letter itself seems more like a first step in the US's historic role as a Peace broker in the middle east between Israel and the Arab Nations. Oil and security considerations are not mentioned in the letter itself.
Following this a bit further, the military base at Dhahran seems to be the airfield, which you might remember was one of the bases the US operated out of during the Gulf Wars. It was operated ephemistically as an "Air Field" by the US from '45 to '62. Dhaharan, not coincidentially, is the historical home of ARAMCO (the Arabian American Oil Company).
Still, I take the notion that the "Quincy Pact" has much of an existence post '62 with a grain of salt, and especially the notion that it was renewed by W in '05. I think it's more realistic to say that the US has had a continuing relationship with the Saudis, which has been based on the strategic interests of both parties, and which has been carefully sustained by both parties despite disagreements over Israel/Palestine. Doubtless there have been many agreements, big and small, public and private, since.
Kirby,
Without very serious study and the ability to read Arabic no one really knows and those aren't cointries w a free press
Let me suggest that you add Al Jazeera to your reading list. Al Jazeera comes with a certain amount of history, some of which you might remember, and which is only alluded to in the Wiki article on it. In March 2003, Al Jazeera broadcast graphic footage of four US soldiers who had been killed by an ambush in Iraq, and interviews with five US captives taken roughly an hour after their capture. This incensed the US military and the White House, and two Al Jazeera bureaus were "accidentally" destroyed by US missles in the next month, killing at least one of Al Jazeera's reporters.
Still, I'll note that Al Jazeera quickly adjusted to US sensibilities, and the March 2003 incident has not been repeated. What seems to endure is the access that Al Jazeera has enjoyed to all parties in the various conflicts, and its ability to report in an insightful way.
I'll note that the Al Jazeera English site has articles about the US that are ideologically all over the map, but which average a bit left. Still, I think that in terms of the perspective it provides on events within the Arab world, it's consistently far better than anything else I've found.
Didn't AL GORE sell his Tv station to Al Jazeera? Glenn Beck was complaining that he was a potential buyer.
As for the French they are truthers to a big extent as in they think 9//11 was an inside job. Books like that sell millions of copies over there. I am often astonished by what I read in their press. We're worried about happy kids and safe kids. They worry their kids will get used to hamburgers and not become gourmets.
Kirby,
Didn't AL GORE sell his Tv station to Al Jazeera?
Yup. Current TV. Not that I'd every really heard of Current TV or paid any attention to it. It seems most notable for (a) having a couple of its reporters tried and convicted by the North Koreans in 2009 as spies and provacateurs (they were later released during a visit to NK by Bill Clinton), and (b) it's where Olbermann landed after he was fired by MSNBC.
Al Jazeera has basically fired the Current TV staff (including Olbermann), and purchased the channel for its physical assets and distribution agreements. It will relaunch as an English-language version of Al Jazeera News, and I suspect will find a substantially larger audience larger than Current TV ever did.
And yes, Gore and his partners rejected an offer by The Blaze (Beck's media corporation) to buy it. Evidently The Blaze's offer was rejected in the following terms: "the legacy of who the network goes to is important to us and we are sensitive to networks not aligned with our point of view." In any event, I suspect that the Qatari's brought more money to the table than Beck did. That's business, whatever people might say about it.
Kirby,
As for the French they are truthers to a big extent as in they think 9//11 was an inside job.
You'll remember that the Bushites were pissed at the French for not backing us in Gulf War II, so much so that they started a screwball campaign to rename french fries "American fries." This strikes me as simply tit-for-tat stupidity, which seems to be somewhat inate the the French character, and is perhaps the most economical hypothesis for their enduring love of Jerry Lewis.
The death of no one, the "safety" of no nation is worth this travesty.
GM,
I agree. It's one of the places where I'm very much at odds with Obama, who's embraced and extended the lawlessness of Bush's "War on Terror." This is one of the real points of contact between my philosophy and that of the libertarians with whom I so often disagree: the choice between security and liberty is no choice at all, and anyone who frames our choices in such terms is a charlatan.
This gets around to the part that Kirby consistently fails to understand. The notion of a "Just War" does not rise and fall on the notion of a "Just Cause." Co-equally inherent are the notions of "Just Means" and "Just End." Whether or not we as a nation had a just cause (and I'll likely disagree with you on that, as I think we did), when we decided to skip the "Just Means" part, we opted out of any Just War justification for our actions.
Kirby, a nice running tab on political spinning from Victor Davis Hanson ("The New Age of Falsity") here:
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/339789/new-age-falsity-victor-davis-hanson
JADL
Sir James,
You're right. That's some impressive spinning from Hanson.
Indeed, stu, impressive examples of spinning.
JADL
Stu and I disagree about the luxurious nature of American time. I don't think much of it is left. If time is money Obama has spent it all. Bush worked hard to stay ahead of the learning curve w al Qaeda. Obama's team is very lax as Benghazi proves. Hpefully we'll have Jeb in 2016 and can begin to rewind the clock of American might.
Interpolate not interpellate!
I do think the problems at Abu Ghraib were considerable but were the officers there the same folks as depicted in the film? It strikes me that they were different. The main interrogator in the film was a Ph.D. who tried hard to be fair, but was also somewhat factually brutal when push came to shove. But he wasn't psychotic. I got the sense at Abu Ghraib that some of the officers were getting sexual thrills by hurting their prisoners, that the place had become an annex for the Marquis de Sade camp who had somehow infiltrated the military. Many of the officers at Abu Ghraib were given prison time I believe after being court martialed. The original situation was that terrorist POWs were not granted Geneva Convention limitations on how they were treated. This was blowback from the ferocity of the atrocities committed on 9/11. After Abu Ghraib many detainees were turned over to Iraqi prisons and conditions got substantially worse by all accounts but the Supreme Court said that all prisoners had to be treated from within the Geneva Convention whether or not they were signatory to it. But the prison depicted in the film showed very distinct attempts to garner information as opposed to the sexual frolics and idiocy that was peculiar to Abu Ghraib at least as it was initially reported in the media. There was no gratuitous use of dogs or women's outfits or the pure sadism of Abu Ghraib. For those of us not on the front lines it's hard to know what we would have done or to know how this was spun since our media is pretty much leftist or left of center for the most part. I thank God I am not on the front lines and hope those who are will keep their sanity. Many lose it. The guy named Dykes in Alabama was apparently a Vietnam Vet. The PTSD problem is notorious for twisting minds. He does seem to have been twisted. But did he thereby deserve to be killed off like some rat? The news has been very delicate on this topic. They claim there was a bang and suddenly Dykes was among the deceased. Was a grenade tossed in there? I don't find people who hold children with autism to be moral exemplars, but we might still be dealing with the mentally ill. We send people into battle with little knowledge of how to get them back to normal should they return and too often they're going to come home perhaps with their arms and legs, but with their minds at some kind of strange angle to reality. If we're fighting for hearts and minds ours have to remain open. This is probably impossible to achieve. When war is in the offing it's panic that results. That and a kind of Aries-like trance in which blood flies and all standards generally prevailing disappear. The Rape of Nanking shows the kind of mayhem that is released. We as Americans are probably no different insofar as once a war begins we prosecute it as fiercely as the next culture. Should there continue to be a Geneva Conventions war code? I think it should exist. Having never been in a war I wouldn't presume to judge those who have been there as I think different standards apply. Can you keep your morals when all hell has broken loose? Maybe GM is right to say we just shouldn't go to war since it brings out the animal in us. But this would mean our culture's death as it has meant to Tibet. Retaining a knowledge of just war in the midst of awesome carnage is difficult just as it's difficult when arguing not to sarcastically twist another's words or interpolate one's own words into theirs. Even in posting wars I notice the tendency to interpolate and quote out of context in order to win. A true war would bring out Satan in almost everyone. God help us.
Fighting is already an attempt to bend another toward our will. Is it always already ethically unsound to do this? Probably. And yet, I do think we have the right to self-defense. I do think we had the right to take out OBL. It's the same right as any citizen would claim in terms of self-defense.
Yesterday would have been Trayvon Martin's 19th birthday.
I really enjoyed the Victor Davis Hanson essay. Just brilliant. Everything he is writing is brilliant.
In addition to discussion of the war, we have discussion of the discussion of the war. It is another kind of war altogether: psychological war. But it is still war.
I don't think even the Amish object to psychological war.
Twisting elbows, smashing egos, destroying reputations: this is just some of the carnage that is inflicted.
Those on the front lines for too long will not survive intact!
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/339789/new-age-falsity-victor-davis-hanson
Kirby,
I really enjoyed the Victor Davis Hanson essay. Just brilliant. Everything he is writing is brilliant.
Brilliantly twisted spin. If you'd like me to debunk something, let me know. I'd rather tackle this piecemeal than have to deal with the whole festering swamp at once.
Now Stu you leave this alone. But if you want to have a whack, go after the reason that Obama gets credit for golfing, while Bush was disfavored.
Kirby,
Now Stu you leave this alone.
Aw, shucks. I was just finishing up a detailed analysis of the lies in the first three sentences of the Hanson article, and had pretty well used up my 4K character allowance. But as you wish.
But if you want to have a whack, go after the reason that Obama gets credit for golfing, while Bush was disfavored.
Obama gets credit for golf? News to me. But I do get something of the sense. Obama is generally perceived as someone who is active, and therefore his occasional recreations are well deserved. Bush, on the other hand, was generally perceived as aloof and seldom present. If you're whole life is basically one big vacation, you shouldn't expect people to congratulate you for taking one.
I think we righties see the Obamas as taking a perpetual vacation on the public dime. Let's fly to Spain. Let's go to Hawaii. Let's go here, let's go there. Let's order lobster.
It sounds like both sides are thinking about the French Revolution at least in terms of resentments.
Kirby,
I think we righties see the Obamas as taking a perpetual vacation on the public dime.
Yeah, I do see a universal aspect here. Consider, e.g., ObamaCare. Getting this passed required considerable effort by the President. Yet if the result of his purposeful actions strikes you as counterproductive, you're unlikely to view it as having required work. I suppose in fairness to the Bush administration, it should be pointed out that all of those bothersome financial and ecological regulations aren't going to gut themselves.
Obama is very happy to scrape money out of the middle class and give it to his legions of voters. I see that as self-preservation, rather than any kind of principled activity. The Bush Baby on the other hand cut wood on his family's ranch. Obama would miss and chop his leg off if he did any real work. Fortunately for him he's not tempted in that direction.
Kirby,
Obama is very happy to scrape money out of the middle class and give it to his legions of voters.
Most of what Obama has been doing is trying to preserve the middle class, e.g., those people who have contributed a meaningful amount of money into Social Security in the expectation that it will form the foundation of their retirement, those who have health insurance, because they'll see their rates go down when the uninsured become insured.
The middle class has been under enormous strain during the recent recession, and he fought to extend unemployment insurance so that they wouldn't lose the assets acquired over a lifetime to meet the expenses of a crisis that they neither made nor benefited from.
I see that as self-preservation, rather than any kind of principled activity.
Appealing to a working majority is the basis for election. Obama has done this. Republican policies favor the very wealthy, who provide them with lots of money to buy votes, but fewer votes overall. Your complaint amounts to the principle that you'd rather lose that try to attract a majority. I can only agree: I'd rather that the Republican party lost than that it figured out how to create a working majority.
The Bush Baby on the other hand cut wood on his family's ranch. Obama would miss and chop his leg off if he did any real work. Fortunately for him he's not tempted in that direction.
Obama's a natural athlete. You probably saw the shot of him nailing the three pointer in Kuwait in 2008. Somehow, I think his hand-eye coordination is up to the task of chopping wood.
It was a three-point election difference. We don't have a very charismatic candidate. Bush would have beat Obama hands down. In 2016, Jeb will win it if he runs. He's more voluble than W., and even better looking.
Democrats have been hopefully predicting the demise of the Republicans since at least Goldwater. How has that been working out for you?
Almost everyone sees the middle class as shrinking under Obama, and massive unemployment has hit the lower middle strata.
Victor Davis Hanson writes in Commentary that Obama had a brilliant campaign rhetoric that united all the multiculturals against "them," and many young people fell for this since they have been indoctrinated thus (Commentary has a nice issue out with 53 conservatives looking at the recent election).
It's alphabetical should you pick it up. Some want the party to outpander the Democrats.
But the smarter strategy I think is to go back to the old JFK and talk about what you can you do for your country?
The employed middle class went largely for Romney.
The one big surprise are the Asians. They are by and large doing quite well. We need to motivate them, and then we have our three percent.
Then the country will be saved from the pandering Tammany machine.
Esp. that is if Hillary is their standard bearer. I would LOVE that. I would rather have Crabby Appleton.
Kirby,
It was a three-point election difference.
3.9%, actually. I know, math is hard for Republicans.
We don't have a very charismatic candidate.
No, but he was your best bet. None of the Republican options would have brought anything like as much money to the campaign as he did, nor appeal as effectively to the center.
Bush would have beat Obama hands down.
This is delusional. Bush exited the Presidency with approval ratings almost 30 points underwater. Since then, he's disappeared. Heck, his father has been more visible, more politically involved than he's been.
In 2016, Jeb will win it if he runs. He's more voluble than W., and even better looking.
I suspect that Jeb would be better than W was, but that's a low bar. In any event, I don't think he can overcome W's legacy. I think the D's will end up running either Hillary or Michelle, probably Hillary if she wants it. Your side will fixate on Benghazi, which will motivate a base that's too small to win elections at the national level any more, and no one else will give a damn.
As for Jeb's appearance, you're looking at old photos. Find something recent: he's gone grey and put on weight. Not that Hillary's a stunner at this point in her life either, but I think physical attractiveness is at best a draw. But if Michelle's the candidate, the last thing any Republican is going to do is to call attention to Jeb's looks. FWIW, I think Mitt's a better looking man than Jeb, and arguably competitive with BHO in looks. Not that it did him much good.
Democrats have been hopefully predicting the demise of the Republicans since at least Goldwater. How has that been working out for you?
I don't know about that. After all the Democratic and Republican parties pretty much exchanged bases in the late 60's and early 70's. Anyway, the demographics are working pretty well for us right now, and 2016 is going to continue those trends.
Almost everyone sees the middle class as shrinking under Obama, and massive unemployment has hit the lower middle strata.
Sure, the middle class has taken a hit, but what's causitive? Obama's policies, or the credit-housing collapse and the sequelae thereof? The recent election was in large part a referendum over who is to blame. You guys "won" that one. In the meantime, all of the major economic indicies (job creation, unemployment, GDP, etc.) show consistent improvement since the end of the recession. Assuming they continue to do so, the economy (and deficit) will be non-issues in 2016. What are you guys going to run on? Jeb's good looks?!
The employed middle class went largely for Romney.
This depends entirely on how you define the middle class. If you define the middle class as being the middle third of the popoulation by income, you're talking personal incomes of roughly $18K to $40K. Obama won that demographic pretty handily.
The one big surprise are the Asians. They are by and large doing quite well. We need to motivate them, and then we have our three percent.
Exit polls showed Obama beating Romney 73-26. As long as your party is explicitly xenophobic, I don't expect that to change very much. I've read lots of political commentaries that predict that Asian Americans will break to the R's sooner or later. Maybe. The argument doesn't seem to get any more sophisticated than "we're money grubbers, they're money grubbers, rah-rah-rah." The longstanding Asian sympathies for collective action seem never to enter the discussion. So I think you guys can make up some ground there, but probably less than you expect.
I don't see xenpphobia as any part of the party. I see functional versus nonfunctional. Democrats are the nonfunctional and their enablers. Republicans are the able. Asians are able to stick tpgether in families and are often Christian. They and the Hospanics who are legal should be with us as should all functional black people. The only people who should be Democrats should be those in need of handouts or can't buy foam or who want to lie around and smoke dope.
Kirby,
I don't see xenpphobia as any part of the party. I see functional versus nonfunctional. Democrats are the nonfunctional and their enablers. Republicans are the able.
We've been through this before. The states that make net contributions to the Federal government are essentially the Blue states plus Texas (which gets its money from oil). The states with the highest proportion of the population on Social Security Disability? The mid-south, plus, oddly, Maine. Unemployment insurance costs during the financial crisis: ~$60B/year. Cost to bail out bankers who make bad business decisions (TARP): $431B.
It's hard for me to see a measurable functional/nonfunctional axis that actually favors Republicans.
The only people who should be Democrats should be those in need of handouts or can't buy foam or who want to lie around and smoke dope.
Dream on, and keep losing elections.
I just think the Republicans have to call the Democrats losers and wusses to their face and call people to stand on their own two feet and stop failing the rest of us. Many cities throughout California are bankrupt as is the state itself. Illinois has real strains on its economy. There is a debt crisis throughout the country where people are fleeing California but California stillneants to fund mad dreams. Illinois keeps raising taxes too. Obama doesn't believe that S & P are telling the truth because they are in some kind of trance but the government under this guy can't face reality. Benghazi? Who cares? We don't want to face it. Dream on. That's Obama's mantra. Party on. Keep desroying the country and winning elections by giving the country pastry instead of broccoli.
Roger Kimball writes Reality is conservative - in Commentary. That's exactly right.
Kirby,
I just think the Republicans have to call the Democrats losers and wusses to their face...
That's not even functional by Kindergarten standards.
Many cities throughout California are bankrupt as is the state itself.
Actually, the budget for the state of California for 2013 is in surplus. I bet you didn't know that. As far as I can tell, there are precisely three California cities that have filed for bankruptcy since 2010: San Bernadino, Stockton, and Mammoth Lakes. Mammoth Lakes settled with its creditors, and the case was dismissed. So there are two. Two is not "many."
Illinois has real strains on its economy.
Illinois has a bipartisan tradition of political corruption, and a seriously underfunded public pension. Its current unemployment rate is 0.9% higher than the nation as a whole, but it has been falling faster than the nation's as a whole. Illinois currently ranks 18th in per capita income and is above the national average, another list that generally speaking puts the blue states on the top and the red states on the bottom.
There is a debt crisis throughout the country where people are fleeing California but California stillneants to fund mad dreams.
There is a serious effort by Texas to attract California's businesses and its millionaires. As far as I can tell, they're not having much success with businesses, although they may get some millionaires to make the move (the combined Federal/State tax rate in the upper brackets is over 50% in CA). It's too early to tell.
But fleeing? Outside of Republican wet dreams, there's no real evidence yet.
Illinois keeps raising taxes too.
Illinois recently raised its state income tax "temporarily" from 3% to 5%. That's one, "keeps" suggests a tendancy. Illinois has a flat rate. These are pretty middle-of-the-road as state income taxes go.
Obama doesn't believe that S & P are telling the truth because they are in some kind of trance but the government under this guy can't face reality.
Standard and Poors provided high ratings on mortgage backed securities that it knew were high risk. Here's an article on Bloomberg that refers to internal emails at S&P as "comically incriminating."
At some level, it's clear to me that S&P has earned Admiral Bing's role -- he was famously shot on the quarterdeck of his own ship after a strategy blunder, "to encourage the others." Bush did likewise with Lehman Brothers, albeit by a decision not to intervene in their bankruptcy. This is titrated justice: if everyone who was involved in financial malfeasance and/or bad business judgment (and there was plenty of both) in the lead up to the financial crisis was held fully accountable, we'd have no finacial system. On the other hand, holding no one accountable doesn't serve either. So there must be scapegoats, selected from among the most guilty, who are held fully accountable. You can think of this as judicial operant conditioning.
As for why Standard and Poors was the luck winner in the "which of the guilt gets to be shot" competition, there are any number of theories, ranging from those "comically incriminating emails" to S&P's downgrade of federal debt. You don't tug on Superman's cape... I tend to think there's a measure of both.
Keep desroying the country and winning elections by giving the country pastry instead of broccoli.
Romney pretty much killed his own election prospects by writing off 47% of the country. That's not enough for you, you're up to 51.1%. So hows that working for you?
there just does not seem to be anything in the whole world of meaningful rhetoric that i can add to this discussion it's one of those things that go on and on and on and on and on and on like a slow tirade or a slow burning campfire with real hard wood one that will burn easily through the night i find it refreshing that at least one republican somewhere a dark skinned guy from louisiana i think who said the republicans have to stop being the stupid party which i think was his incentive to ask the republicans to start to read books instead of listen to o'reilly maybe go a little deeper instead of getting lost in this fear mongering this big money wielding good american common financial sense foolishness all these damn business men and busniness women (who, BTW< i think should be a little closer to kitchen work and less involved in financial babble fests just put the food on the table baby leave the money to me) republicans tend to think the grid upon which all neighborhoos are based the 12 blocks to the mile the sections in the square mile all these right angle corners and it goes right into computers all the right angles on a circuit board it's all crazy it has nothing to do with nature it's imposed upon nature like some divine decree but it's madness and republicans are all right angle people square people they don't know that ellipse is the basic idea warped circles and curves republicans like to throw fast balls but i say bring back the junk ball bring back the artistry in the game what the hell bring in a spitball once in awhile if you can get away with it i mean WTF why not it's just a game
don't hear much about the green party anymore are those people turning brown or something what is going on with the greens where are all the green houses where green is seen in all its greenery
laura bush was really into reading i think she should start a bunch of reading circles in the republican party get republicans to commit to reading books again and sit in a nice circle like third graders discussing the little red hen
who will help to eat the bread
screw you selfish lazy arseholes
starve for all i care
utilitarians win every time
so go to hell
or claim bankruptcy
can't get one leg up on credit
are robots capable of being insured
i mean you want to insure the robots don't you
like i say i have nothing to add to this stellar example of modern discourse and multilogue it is simpy brilliant even the inanity is brilliant
what i worry about around here is the lack of jokes didn't there used to be a lot of jokes
how many monks does it take to change a lightbulb???
i certainly wish i had more to add but it seems you guys cover all the bases pretty damn fast what with stu becoming the master of logical rejoinder
great to read a bit from lessa n lessa
no time like the present
yo
jh
Stu--much of that federal outlay is skewed by the fact that those states have huge federal lands and employee populations (i.e. military bases, etc.).
Florida, f'rinstance, has 110,000 personnel versus New York's 75,000. Florida gets about 95 cents on the dollar and New York 79. How much of this can be accounted for my military spending?
At least a significant portion (more than 5%) I would surmise but like, you know, google and stuff.
New Mexico and Mississippi are the big bullies, taking money from everyone.
But that's like proportional, right? They've got 20k and 30k personnel.
And they give only like 5-10% of what NY and FL give in revenue.
AND their per capita taxes are 1/2 to 1/3 that of FL and NY.
So it's crazy complicated, especially when you figure that NM went blue in 2012 and most of MS was blue (especially along the river).
GM,
Stu--much of that federal outlay is skewed by the fact that those states have huge federal lands and employee populations (i.e. military bases, etc.).
Florida, f'rinstance, has 110,000 personnel versus New York's 75,000. Florida gets about 95 cents on the dollar and New York 79. How much of this can be accounted for my military spending?
A fair bit, doubtless. The claim isn't that the spending is illegitimate, only that it exists. Defense spending is 20% of the federal budget, so this is a big number, especially if you account for the spacial distribution of military assets. But I'll reiterate that this spending imbalance is a de facto drag on the donor economies, and a de facto stimulus on the recipient economies. A partial explanation for the mechanism by which blue states subsidize red states doesn't change the fact that they do.
Anyway, here's a question back at you. Why are military bases distributed as they are? They used to be spread out more evenly, but the whole base-closure phenomenon moved the center of gravity of the US military south and west. It's as if we've had a reprise of Jeff Davis's stint as Sec War under Buchannon, moving the arsenals south in anticipation of treason. I get that there's a small strategic bias towards having military assets facing Cuba, but that's not enough of a reason to explain scale of the movement.
The most benign explanation here is economic: the military had a preference for low wage states, and also for cultures that are disinclined to challenge it, or to look closely at what it was doing.
So it's crazy complicated, especially when you figure that NM went blue in 2012 and most of MS was blue (especially along the river).
The occasional blue county notwithstanding, Mississippi remains one of the reddest states in the nation.
As for NM, don't forget the national labs -- big ones -- Los Alamos, Sandia, which means huge DOE subsidies too. The recent blueness of NM is indicative of growth in the hispanic population, which is also at play in CO, FL, and will likely flip TX from red to blue in a decade or so. There's also a bit of a decline in regionalism, a consequence of population mobility, especially among the educated, so this whole red state/blue state dichotomy is dynamic, and in the main trending purple.
But I think the demographic analyses based on ethnicity miss the fundamental division along the urban/rural dimension. And the essential demographic fact here is that cities can scale in population, but rural lands can't without becoming cities themselves. There seems to be no way around the basic demographic fact that increasing the population within a fixed land area results in increased population density, and with that a political bluing.
GM,
This is by way of a brief illustration of the argument above.
Votes vs Density
This is a plot whose x-axis represents the log of the density (natural logs, per sq mile), and whose y-axis represents the log of (obama-vote/romney-vote).
The correlation between the two is striking.
JH, I laughed out loud at the Red Hen discussion series. It was so funny to think of the Republicans forcing each other to deal with that text in which we all believe and which forms the crux of our argument.
But the problem is to get it into the college curriculum.
And thus smuggle it in among the Democratic consensus.
Let's talk about work again. St. Paul said those who won't work won't eat.
Jesus sort of skirted the question with the multiplication of the loaves. With that multiplication that necessary division that was otherwise coming would not take place so Jesus could retain unity what with the surplus.
But in our country there is a massive deficit and an alarming negative trend in terms of the overall debt. I don't want to be negative, but I don't see it as a plus that the joblessness is climbing, and the public debt is climbing, and homelessness is climbing.
While Obama plays golf and shoots three-pointers, as if we care deeply. He's not good enough to win a tournament and donate the pot to the debt.
Instead he smokes pot and gets us into future debt with pork belly futures that are going on a major diet due to the all the Green Party vegetarians who refuse to eat anything and will stone you when you're trying to do your lawn.
JH, I laughed out loud at the Red Hen discussion series. It was so funny to think of the Republicans forcing each other to deal with that text in which we all believe and which forms the crux of our argument.
But the problem is to get it into the college curriculum.
And thus smuggle it in among the Democratic consensus.
Let's talk about work again. St. Paul said those who won't work won't eat.
Jesus sort of skirted the question with the multiplication of the loaves. With that multiplication that necessary division that was otherwise coming would not take place so Jesus could retain unity what with the surplus.
But in our country there is a massive deficit and an alarming negative trend in terms of the overall debt. I don't want to be negative, but I don't see it as a plus that the joblessness is climbing, and the public debt is climbing, and homelessness is climbing.
While Obama plays golf and shoots three-pointers, as if we care deeply. He's not good enough to win a tournament and donate the pot to the debt.
Instead he smokes pot and gets us into future debt with pork belly futures that are going on a major diet due to the all the Green Party vegetarians who refuse to eat anything and will stone you when you're trying to do your lawn.
Forbes says the Nordics are the new model. That might be a place of agreement?
Urbanization correlates with increased desire for state support and control.
That's been true forever.
GM,
Urbanization correlates with increased desire for state support and control.
I'm not buying it, at least not in these terms. I think urbanization correlates with increased specialization, which is a tradeoff -- deeper knowledge and skills in a few areas, vs. a more general competence. But a consequence of this is that urbanites do want a working infrastructure -- transportation, schools, food, etc. -- and they're willing to pay for it through taxes.
The imbalance here is that equivalent infrastructure investments will have less of an impact on the quality of life of rural folks, so the values are different.
The problem that I see is that no one has figured out a decent way to give both urbanites and rural folks an environment that is reasonably tuned to their needs, especially given the ever-present moral hazard that people will venue-shop, e.g., establish a residence in a low-tax locale, while benefitting from services supported by high-tax locales.
bring back the buffalo
People in rural areas are more independent probably by nature. They realize too the services aren't there which is why they need guns and to keep their tax money. On the other hand the people in cities are highly dependent on services and a natural disaster such as Katrina or Sandy can wipe them out. All over Staten Island and Long Island the services are not still back to normal. Many people died in those places during Sandy. The papers didn't cover it because they didn't want to embarrass the president or make him look like Bush especially right before the election.
I had many students who lost their homes. One kid on Staten Island was watching the Flintstones with his family when his sister looked out the window and saw a wall of water rising toward the house. They all got out except the dad who had to swim two blocks to safety.
The lady across the street tried to swim out too but was swept under and drowned.
The papers barely covered this disaster. Looting began and muggings were taking place. Police sharpshooters took positions in cranes to keep the looting down. It was like "escape from New York," and still is in many areas, but again, no one hears about this, because the response from Obama has been far more slow than Bush's response, and far less compassionate, but everyone wants to believe that Obama is gold and could not ever make any kind of mistake.
We're about to get hit with another blizzard. Some say three feet of snow. Some say one foot.
We're already quite fragile.
Obama is hoping that this will convince people to make him emperor for life, so that he can push through global warming socialism, and silence any and all critics of his mindless administration.
You can't prevent "venue shopping" and why would you try?
social organization is such a positive thing i mean why not speak in terms of progress we're doing so much better at getting millions of people to live fairly close to one another without having them kill one another in property disputes they merely have to live off the realization that property is a banking sham and then go with it live with a noose around your neck freedom's just another word for tearing up the shoes
kirby i hope you calm down at night i hope you get a back rub or something maybe a hot steaming bath
all i want is for obama to begin a retrieval of the railroads bring on a big ole national program for installing a state of the art railway system all over the land with stops at reservation casinos
we need to get rural in a whole new way
some people own way too much land
it's perverse
every 7 years there should be a payment jubillee banks say to people this is your seventh year on this mortgage (heavy on the mort- )so you pay nothing until this day next year then while your payments will be reduced for awhile they will return to normal rates until the next jubilee that way everyone gets a chance to get ahead for one year and the banks don't wear such horrific sinister happy smiles
i love living in a world where mother nature shows her vehemence
bring it on home honey
the hearth knows the peregrinations of the mind
who will help me sell the bread
don't sell to those wretched filthy ones they want day old deals and never pay what the bread is worth just sell to those glazey eyed uppermiddle class quasi nature ladies who do yoga and eat wholewheat gluten free health things all the rage you know
if there are some crumbs left over at the end of the day sell those to the beggars and layabouts but charge 'em up the ass don't give anything away free not even the crumbs sure the poor you always have with you but don't let 'em fool you they probably spend their social security check at the casino
sell the bread to wellheeled women
and let them sell the bread too that way everyone will sell the bread and we won't have to worry about the bedraggled horde who can't eat at macdonalds for fear of dysentery known as the macsplooge
sorry
did not mean for this to go to a scatological level
but it did
and the little red hen was cute and smug about her accomplishments in the freemarket
cackle cackle cakcle
cluck cluck cluck
jh
The Little Red Hen has only the Triumph of the Will going for her. She can get out of bed and get something done. Now if the pig or the dog were disabled I think she would still throw them a crust. But their willpower is bent, they are not functioning. They want to gambol life away instead of working for a living! Therefore they should starve to death, while she remains triumphant. This is the topic of a lot of folk stories. We could also talk about the grasshopper and the ant!
Obama works hard to abet the laziness of his voters, and so naturally they vote for him. Freedom from want comes with the click of a lever. What could be easier. Give me Joe the Plumber's money. I don't even have to mug him.
The government mugs him!
Long live the Little Red Hen!
Long live the smug little ant!
Long live the Protestant Work Ethic, and the freedom of the markets!
And let's hope we get to keep our guns so as to fight off Big Brother.
GM,
You can't prevent "venue shopping" and why would you try?
I'm imaging that there's a "city package" and a "rural package," and each makes sense and is sustainable on its own terms.
The "city package" is high tax, high service. There's a Starbucks on every corner. There's good public transportation: rail, bus, etc. There's work for web designers, opera singers, and personal injury lawyers.
The "rural package" is low tax, low service. Most of the dirt roads are paved by now, but not all. If you can't get milk from the barn, you need a car to get it. If you own land, or rent it, you can farm it, and sell the proceeds, or maybe land bank it if those ideologues in the house ever pass a farm bill again.
The problem isn't with the packages, or venue shopping between them. The problem comes if people are allowed an a la carte strategy, selecting low taxes from one venue, but then demanding services (hospitals, transit, etc.) in the other.
BTW, What do you call Texas after 10,000 California millionaires and the businesses they own move there?
Ans: California.
And what do you call California after all their millionaires move out?
Nuevo Tijuana.
There are 150,000 millionaires in California. If 10k leave, that still leaves 93% of them.
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