SECTION FOURTEEN
EMAIL PAGE SEVEN
sm
COLUMN
EIGHTY, DECEMBER 1, 2002
(Copyright © 2002 The Blacklisted Journalist)
BY MOLLY IVANS
BUSH'S PLAN OF WORLD DOMINATION
Subject:
FW: Molly Ivins on The New 'National Security'...9-23
Date: Sat, 28 Sep 2002 01:01:27 -0700
From: "Peter Coyote" <wdprod@earthlink.net>
Organization: Wild Dog Productions
To: info@blacklistedjournalist.com
Online
special: Molly Ivins Comments on The New 'National Security
AUSTIN
-- No. This is not acceptable. This is not the country we want to be. This is
not the world we want to make.
The
United States of America is still run by its citizens. The government works for
us. Rank imperialism and warmongering are not American traditions or values. We
do not need to dominate the world. We want and need to work with other nations.
We want to find solutions other than killing people. Not in our name, not with
our money, not with our children's blood.
I
rarely use the word "we" because it's so arrogant for one citizen to
presume to speak for all of us -- and besides, Americans famously can't agree on
the time of day. But on this one, I know we want to find a way so that killing
is the last resort, not the first. We would rather put our time, energy, money
and even blood into making peace than making war.
"The
National Security Strategy of the United States -- 2002" is repellent,
unnecessary and, above all, impractical. Americans are famous for pragmatism,
and we need a good dose of common sense right now. This Will Not Work.
All
the experts tell us anti-Americanism thrives on the perception that we are
arrogant, that we care nothing for what the rest of the world thinks. Even our
innocent mistakes are often blamed on obnoxious triumphalism. The announced plan
of this administration for world domination reinforces every paranoid,
anti-American prejudice on this earth. This plan is guaranteed to produce more
terrorists. Even if this country were to become some insane, 21st century
version of Sparta -- armed to teeth, guards on every foot of our borders -- we
would still not be safe. Have the Israelis been able to stop terrorism with
their tactics?
Not
only would we not be safe, we would not have a nickel left for schools or health
care or roads or parks or zoos or gardens or universities or mass transit or
senior centers or the arts or anything resembling civilization. This is nuts.
This
creepy, un-American document has a pedigree going back to Bush I, when
--
surprise! -- Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz were at the Department of Defense
and both such geniuses that they not only didn't see the collapse of the Soviet
Union coming, they didn't believe it after they saw it.
In
those days, this plan for permanent imperial adventurism was called
"Defense Strategy for the 1990s" and was supposed to be a definitive
response to the Soviet threat. Then the Soviet threat disappeared, and the same
plan re-emerged as a response to the post-Soviet world.
It
was roundly criticized at the time, its manifest weaknesses attacked by both
right and left. Now it is back yet again as the answer to post-Sept. 11. Sort of
like the selling of the Bush tax cut -- needed in surplus, needed in deficit,
needed for rain and shine -- the plan exists apart from rationale. ` As Frances
Fitzgerald points out in the Sept. 26 New York Review of Books, its most curious
feature is the combination of triumphalism and almost unmitigated pessimism.
Until last Friday, when the thing was re-released in its new incarnation, it
contained no positive goals for American foreign policy, not one. Now the plan
is tricked out with rhetoric like earrings on a pig about extending freedom,
democracy and prosperity to the world. But as The New York Times said, "It
sounds more like a pronouncement that the Roman Empire or Napoleon might have
produced."
In
what is indeed a dangerous and uncertain world, we need the cooperation of other
nations as never before. Under this doctrine, we claim the right to first-strike
use of nuclear weapons and "unannounced pre-emptive strikes." That
means surprise attacks. Happy Pearl Harbor Day. We have just proclaimed
ourselves Bully of the World.
There
is a better way. Foreign policy experts polled at the end of the 20th century
agreed the great triumph of the past 100 years in foreign policy was the
Marshall Plan. We can use our strength to promote our interests through
diplomacy, economic diplomacy, multilateral institutions (which we dominate
anyway) and free trade conditioned to benefit all.
None
of this will make Al Qaeda love us, but will make it a lot more likely that
whoever finds them will hand them over.
This
reckless, hateful and ineffective approach to the rest of the world has glaring
weaknesses. It announces that we intend to go in and take out everybody else's
nukes (27 countries have them) whenever we feel like it. Meanwhile, we're doing
virtually nothing to stop their spread.
Last
month, Ted Turner's Nuclear Threat Initiative had to pony up $5 million to get
poorly secured, weapons-grade uranium out of Belgrade. Privatizing disarmament,
why didn't we think of that before?
The
final absurdity is that the plan is supposed to Stop Change. Does no one in the
administration read history? ##
*
* *
CLICK HERE TO GET TO INDEX OF COLUMN EIGHTY
CLICK HERE TO GET TO INDEX
OF COLUMNS
The
Blacklisted Journalist can be contacted at P.O.Box 964, Elizabeth, NJ 07208-0964
The Blacklisted Journalist's E-Mail Address:
info@blacklistedjournalist.com
THE BLACKLISTED JOURNALIST IS A SERVICE MARK OF AL ARONOWITZ