Some DU Googling needed - RW pols with Qadhafi

[matt819]

Got work to do, so I call on more industrious DUers to do a little Googling to find photos of Republican, tea bag, and other such pols posing proudly with the Qadhafi. It will mean nothing, of course, to the slathering sycophants, as we saw in connection with the photos of a young Rumsfeld heaping praise on Saddam Hussein (remember him?). But it might make us all feel a little better continuing to heap contempt and disdain on the hypocrites on the right. (Of course, there are likely to be photos of Dems with Qadhafi as well, so, what the hell, post them also, and we'll be equal opportunity disdainers.)

You do realize, of course, that the US government will almost certainly screw up its relations with the new Libyan government and thereby enable the Chinese to get all the oil, contracts, etc. Mark my words. We are congenitally unable to manage these transitions to our advantage.

[louis-t]

1. Why is "our advantage" the most important thing?

[matt819]

2. Because our failures in the past have had tragic consequences

First example. You may recall that in the mid-1950s the US supported/engineered the overthrow of a democratically elected leader in Iran and installed the Shah. This had pretty positive consequences for the U.S. in the relatively short term, i.e., about 25 years. When I say "pretty positive consequences," I refer to relative stability and the sale of billions in military equipment, which maintained and created jobs in the US. Yes, it was in the military industrial complex, but it was jobs, and it was at a time, just a decade after the end of WWII, when as a nation we hadn't thought through the implicates of that complex (though Eisenhower had, as it happens).

In any case, that "honeymoon" in the middle east lasted just about 20 or so years. We failed to project and respond to the rising Islamic fundamentalism represented by the Ayatollah Khomeini, a phenomenon in essence created by the US by the overthrow in the mid-50s. Then came the US Embassy takeover, Carter's failed response, and the election of Reagan in 1980. The rest, as they say, is history.

Second example. Turn now to the 1980s. The Soviet Union has installed its puppet in Kabul and sent troops to quell the natives, i.e., the Mujahideen, in Afghanistan. They failed, as we have failed, to learn from the British adventures in the Great Game that is Central Asia. In any case, here we are at the height of the Cold War, and there's no way we could allow this incursion to go unanswered. So we support the Mujahideen to the tune of a billion dollars or more, military aid, etc., to turn back the Red Tide. Fast forward ten years to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of 72 years of Soviet expansionism. It can be argued, I suppose, that the fall of the Soviet Union lead to the Soviet failure in Afghanistan, or that the Soviet failure in Afghanistan was the inevitable consequence of the fall of the Soviet Union. Either way, here we were at an interesting crossroads, in both time and place. The US was in a good position to play a role in negotiating settlements between competing Afghan factions, but we pulled away from Afghanistan as quickly as possible and terminated military aid to Pakistan at the same time. In time, this resulted in the rise of the Taliban and the availability of Afghanistan as a shelter for the rise of al Qaeda. Again, the rest - 9/11 - is history.

In short, a resolution that is to "our advantage" is not mutually exclusive to the advantage of some other party. And "our advantage" can mean contracts and jobs, it can mean the development of a democratic society (whatever that might mean in the context of Iran, Iraq, Libya, etc.), or it can mean stability and improving relationships with the US, etc. Sadly, all of those things used to mean something positive. Now, jobs means Halliburton and KBR and Dick Cheney and torture. Democratic society means nation building and money going there when it should be going here. And stability and improved relationships means access to oil. Period. But consider the alternatives, as we are seeing in Iraq and throughout Africa. We are spending the money and our "treasure," which has come to mean money and lives, and the Chinese are saying thanks and scooping up contracts for development. Talk about socializing the losses and privatizing the gains.

[louis-t]

4. "Installing democracies" is a dangerous game.

"Creating jobs" by supplying an unstable country with weapons is unwise. Supporting "the enemy of my enemy" has backfired too many times. The best we should hope for is "stability and improving relationships". Sorry, I don't buy all of the "where's our advantage" crap. Lead by example. Very simple.

[rug]

3. Thank god the tyrant is gone. How could he last for forty years?