Slate's Kaplan Fails to Prove US Should Spend Big To Promote Mideast Stability and Peace
MSN Slate's Kaplan ( http://www.slate.com/id/2148742/ ) is saying that the US of A, should keep troops in Iraq so as to prevent civil war which could widen into a big mideast war pitting various Muslim mideast nations against each other.
Comical to think that the US of A, controlling little except the "Green Zone" in Baghdad and a few such outpost of the like, where the American troops hunker down in their outposts under mortor barrages, this US of A which has been unable to suppress Sunni guerillas, would be able to suppress Sunni guerrillas and also their civil war opponents the Shi-ites, which is what would have to be done if the US of A were to suppress civil war in Iraq.
Kaplan sez Bush sez terrorism takes place in hotbeds of despair but Bush hasn't poured hundreds of billions into making the poor mideasterners happy. Kaplan's logic is off. The fact someone cites foreign poverty as leading to terrorism, does not mean he at the same time has to be in favor of hundreds of billions of foreign aid for the foreign poor.
Kaplan sez we should keep troops in iraq because of the Iraqi civil war danger, the danger that the Iraqi civil war will expand into a civil war pitting mideast Muslim nations against other mideast Muslim nations. Funny idea this, that a nation facing gigantic problems threatening the very existence, material prosperity, psychological health, and liberty of people in its own nation and in its own world, should get involved in refereeing foreign civil wars, and wars between foreign nations.
In order to force peace on two fighting parties, the USA needs to be able to defeat both parties. How can a USA which is unable to defeat one of two such fighting parties, be expected to defeat both of them?
Kaplan does not show how it would be a superior choice to put resources into suppressing foreign civil wars, compared to other activities such resources could be used for. He simply declares, that we should suppress foreign civil wars and wars between foreign nations, so there.
Kaplan champions the US of A promoting "stability" in the mideast. Sounds like he is merely parroting George Bush Sr. Dubya's dad. The fact Bush Sr. was enthusiastic about promoting stability in the mideast, does not indicate that the USA getting involved putting significant amounts of money into (counterproductive?) attempts to promote stability in the mideast is a good idea, a good expenditure of resources vis a vis other resources.
Bush Sr's attempts to promote stability led to the Bush Jr attempts to promote freedom. Sounds nutty to me, a US of A which has better things to do than dabble in promoting stability or freedom in the mideast, getting involved in a debate as to whether stability or freedom should be promoted in the mideast.
Kaplan says Bush's failure to promote stability will leave us with neither stability nor freedom. This mere assertion does not explain why the USA expending resources attempting to promote stability in the mideast is a wise allocation of limited resources, compared to alternative possibilities for the expenditure of the limited resources.
Bush was promoting the crusade for freedom in the mideast in his recent press conference, he got caught failing to prove that expending resources crusading for freedom in the mideast is the best way to spend those resources, then he shifted into declarations that freedom in the mideast is essential and indispensable to national security, and now Kaplan thinks Kaplan is having the epiphany that Bush is inconsistent because he talks about how important the problem is but does not devote resources commensurate with importance of said problem to said problem.
Then Kaplan by turning around and saying Bush does not devote the resources to the problems because the resources to devote to the problems do not exist, invalidates this epiphany about Bush allegedly weirdly not devoting resources to problems he thinks are big. Fact is there are important problems and the fact we do not have the resources to deal with them does not mean they are not important.
Seems to me that Kaplan picked up a few of the points he made in his essay from blog posts I put up days before he put up his Slate Opinion Piece.
@2006 David Virgil Hobbs
Comical to think that the US of A, controlling little except the "Green Zone" in Baghdad and a few such outpost of the like, where the American troops hunker down in their outposts under mortor barrages, this US of A which has been unable to suppress Sunni guerillas, would be able to suppress Sunni guerrillas and also their civil war opponents the Shi-ites, which is what would have to be done if the US of A were to suppress civil war in Iraq.
Kaplan sez Bush sez terrorism takes place in hotbeds of despair but Bush hasn't poured hundreds of billions into making the poor mideasterners happy. Kaplan's logic is off. The fact someone cites foreign poverty as leading to terrorism, does not mean he at the same time has to be in favor of hundreds of billions of foreign aid for the foreign poor.
Kaplan sez we should keep troops in iraq because of the Iraqi civil war danger, the danger that the Iraqi civil war will expand into a civil war pitting mideast Muslim nations against other mideast Muslim nations. Funny idea this, that a nation facing gigantic problems threatening the very existence, material prosperity, psychological health, and liberty of people in its own nation and in its own world, should get involved in refereeing foreign civil wars, and wars between foreign nations.
In order to force peace on two fighting parties, the USA needs to be able to defeat both parties. How can a USA which is unable to defeat one of two such fighting parties, be expected to defeat both of them?
Kaplan does not show how it would be a superior choice to put resources into suppressing foreign civil wars, compared to other activities such resources could be used for. He simply declares, that we should suppress foreign civil wars and wars between foreign nations, so there.
Kaplan champions the US of A promoting "stability" in the mideast. Sounds like he is merely parroting George Bush Sr. Dubya's dad. The fact Bush Sr. was enthusiastic about promoting stability in the mideast, does not indicate that the USA getting involved putting significant amounts of money into (counterproductive?) attempts to promote stability in the mideast is a good idea, a good expenditure of resources vis a vis other resources.
Bush Sr's attempts to promote stability led to the Bush Jr attempts to promote freedom. Sounds nutty to me, a US of A which has better things to do than dabble in promoting stability or freedom in the mideast, getting involved in a debate as to whether stability or freedom should be promoted in the mideast.
Kaplan says Bush's failure to promote stability will leave us with neither stability nor freedom. This mere assertion does not explain why the USA expending resources attempting to promote stability in the mideast is a wise allocation of limited resources, compared to alternative possibilities for the expenditure of the limited resources.
Bush was promoting the crusade for freedom in the mideast in his recent press conference, he got caught failing to prove that expending resources crusading for freedom in the mideast is the best way to spend those resources, then he shifted into declarations that freedom in the mideast is essential and indispensable to national security, and now Kaplan thinks Kaplan is having the epiphany that Bush is inconsistent because he talks about how important the problem is but does not devote resources commensurate with importance of said problem to said problem.
Then Kaplan by turning around and saying Bush does not devote the resources to the problems because the resources to devote to the problems do not exist, invalidates this epiphany about Bush allegedly weirdly not devoting resources to problems he thinks are big. Fact is there are important problems and the fact we do not have the resources to deal with them does not mean they are not important.
Seems to me that Kaplan picked up a few of the points he made in his essay from blog posts I put up days before he put up his Slate Opinion Piece.
@2006 David Virgil Hobbs
posted by David Virgil at 12:32 AM
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