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February 13, 2004
Long road back on foreign relations
I wonder how long it will take a new President and friendly Congress to reverse all of the damage done by the Bush administration. I’ll bet it will take a lot longer than the three years it took Dubya and his buddies to destroy the foreign policy credibility we built up under Clinton. -- Katie SteinFebruary 13, 2004 in Foreign Relations | Permalink
Comments
All the damage the Bush Administration has caused?
Like eliminating one of the worst dictator's in history? Saving the lives of millions of Iraqi's and Afghans? Like getting Libya to give up their weapons program and putting North Korea in check?
Like actually taking seriously the fact that an entire religion would like to blow Israel and the US into the ocean?
Who will be left to care about foreign policy if they blow us up?
All you dems need some lessons in Islam.
We only achieve peace by eradicating evil. Peace is the goal isn't it?
Bravo George Dubya! Keep givin 'em hell!
What dreamland do you come from that you think there will ever be friendly Congress?
Posted by: tallglassofmilk at Feb 13, 2004 9:37:35 PM
All of those would be valid points if they were in any way related to how this war was sold to us.
But let's face the facts. The war was spun as a hunt for WMD's. Where are they? If we can find one pathetic little dictator huddled in a spider hole, we should be able to find the arsenal of WMD's that Dubya led us to believe that Saddam was sitting on. Unless they weren't there to begin with.
On to other points. "An entire religion" does NOT want to "blow the US and Israel into the ocean." That's rhetoric and we know it. In fact, to insinuate that every Muslim wakes up every morning with the sworn intent to destroy the US and Israel is pretty much the same as saying that every Christian wants to bomb abortion clinics. Simply not true.
Concerning North Korea, last time I checked, they still had nukes and the systems to deliver them. Also, they weren't really that willing to talk about non-proliferation. Actually, Clinton had made some progress with North Korea, which has been pretty much undone at this point.
Most conservatives need lessons in not drawing sweeping generalizations about other cultures and religions.
Peace is the goal, but please understand, its not a zero-sum game. There can be other countries left standing at the end too. I promise.
Peace (for real).
TallGlassOfReality
Posted by: tallglassofreality at Feb 14, 2004 11:55:59 AM
All the damage the Bush administration has caused:
Like destroying our credibility the next time we ask the world to help us take on someone who actually has WMD (assuming that we would ask at all);
Like funneling massive amounts of resources into an unnecessary war while ignoring the real war on terrorism(except for the part of it where Americans of Middle Eastern descent or anyone who looks like them no longer have constitutional rights);
Like CREATING a terror threat in Iraq where one did not exist by not having a post-war security plan;
Like leaving Afghanistan in a state where only Kabul is controlled by the central government, the tribal fighting has started anew, and oh, by the way, our soldiers are still dying regularly, while Bin Laden is still uncaptured and Taliban fighters are still a major problem.
Meanwhile I don't necessarily feel that much safer at home, when ABC can smuggle uranium into the country and we have airliners being escorted into the country by F-16's. You don't make the country safer just because you fight a war every couple of years. I don't know about you, but I expect a little more nuance than that out of my president's foreign policy. The damage that has been done to our credibility and our international relationships will indeed take a good deal of time and diplomatic skill to repair, and getting rid of Bush is the first step.
Posted by: Billy Merck at Feb 15, 2004 10:03:09 PM
The United States is the most powerful nation in the world .... culturally, politically, economically, and militarily. The U.S. is the proverbial 800 pound gorilla. You may not like that ... and many people in other countries certainly don't like it ... but it is reality.
Question: You do understand, don't you, that some nation is going to dominate the world. Some way, some how, through force, sheer size, happenstance or the mere operation of the laws of nature, some nation is going to dominate. It cannot be any other way. As long as there are nations it will be completely impossible for this world to exist without the dominating influence of one of those nations or one culture. If you aren't happy that the United States just happens to be that nation right now, tell me -- which nation would you chose?
So ... the United States dominates, and much of the rest of the world, especially the Euro-weenies, don't like it one little bit. These people think that the United States simply should not have the right to exercise its power, to use its military superiority, without their permission! How dare George Bush not seek the express approval of the United Nations before he takes actions which he believes necessary to protect his people and his nation? How dare George Bush not seek European approval of every element of his plan to attack and destroy international Islamic terrorism?
Why would John Kerry win a world-wide election for president of the United States? The rest of the world would like to see a weaker America. The weaker we are, the stronger they can become. The less our influence, the greater is theirs. The rest of the world would like to see America grovel at their feet for permission to use our military in our own self defense, to protect Americans and American interests across the globe. The rest of the world wants to see America engage in a glorified international game of "Mommy May I?", with the useless United Nations as the mommy. And --- you know what? John Kerry is ready to give the rest of the world exactly what it wants. Kerry has been hammering Bush for what Kerry believes to be his foreign policy failures. What failures? The failure to get the permission of the rest of the world for every action he takes in the international theatre. John Kerry wants to subordinate the sovereignty of the United States to the authority of the United Nations and the international community, and the international community loves him for it.
Posted by: Willy G. at Mar 4, 2004 2:06:47 PM
I'm perfectly fine with the United States "dominating" the world. In fact, I think it's vital for ours and the world's security that we maintain our position as the sole superpower. My discomfort is not with the U.S. having the power, but with the person currently wielding that power. He's exercising it in a way that puts us in danger of losing it. It's all well and good to say we've got the guns, so let's kill all the bad guys (in the meantime defining the bad guys any way that's convenient), but there's a limit to even our resources, and this policy is a sure way to find out what it is. I just happen to think that it makes more sense to concentrate on the really bad guys, and to have as many people in your posse as you can even if you could probably do it yourself, because you never know when you might need them.
No one is suggesting that we need to ask "for permission to use our military in our own self defense". Iraq was not that. Iraq was an offensive invasion premised on an imminent, oh wait, we never said imminent, threat. Either the threat truly was imminent, in which case the U.N. Charter specifically allows us to defend ourselves and nobody has any reason to complain, or it wasn't and we needed Security Council authorization. That's the deal. If we don't like it, we can withdraw from the UN, which we created, but until then that's the way it works.
Ok, I know that's not really the way it works, and ultimately he who has the guns wins, but is that the way we really want it? What if one day we don't have the guns anymore? Why are we so in love with the "rule of law" at home (especially if renegade mayors are allowing gay marriage) but perfectly comfortable with might makes right with foreign policy? International law remains an ineffective abstraction exactly because of this attitude.
Posted by: G. Willikers at Mar 6, 2004 2:19:06 AM
I have some business acquaintances in Spain, and I asked them about the election. It was not about the bombing, it was about Aznar's lies. They all said the same thing - Aznar ignored the majority of the country on the war, and Spain's involvement had nothing to do with Terrorism, and had everything to do with Aznar's bad relationship with Chirac and Schroeder. The Spanish simply got tired of the lies and the spin on the lies. Republicans right now, in the week of Richard Clarke and the withheld information on Medicare, should be pondering that message. Continue to identify with Bush, and you will go down with him.
Posted by: JM at Mar 26, 2004 11:13:25 AM
Am I the only one who noticed that the original poster said that "an entire religion wanted to take out the U.S. and Israel?" I'm suprised that no one else noticed this, and appaled that the poster would even say it. Its this kind of attitude that is prevalent in American society that is so damaging to our worldview. Islam is not about destroying America or Israel, and if you think so, you need to re-evaluate your knowledge of the religion.
Posted by: Marcus Owens at Mar 31, 2004 2:31:44 PM
If weak-kneed, Doug Haines-style Democrats take control of America, you had better brush up on your Arabic, because al-Qaeda will be taking over. God bless President Bush!!
Posted by: Willie Harris at May 9, 2005 2:03:54 PM