31 August 2004
Response to McCain
It’s not enough to swat flies because that’s all we know how to do. Invading Iraq may satisfy the blood thirst of the Christian conservative bloc and the commercial interests of the military-industrial complex, but it will not stamp out the acknowledged foe – international terror. For that, we need to mobilize a true worldwide campaign to expose and eliminate forces which have targeted civilization as their enemy. Not only Al Qaeda, these forces include rightwing fringe groups like those who destroyed the federal building in Oklahoma City, drug-lord supported revolutionaries in South America, etc., etc.
Unilateral efforts of the U.S. will not succeed, as President Bush admitted to an interviewer on NBC’s Today Show. Only if a broad coalition of civilized nations uses its technology and human dedication to combat this nihilist threat will it be defeated. Our limited resources, in human life, financial means, and public attention, should not be wasted and diverted on military adventures like regime change in Iraq.
War is a convenient way to strengthen the Administration’s bid for reelection. But it is costly and only temporary. The long battle in which we were engaged on 9/11/2001 must be fought through public diplomacy as well as military force when necessary. This will only be achieved through the marshalling of alliances with leading civilized nations around the world, instead of the cosmetic assembly of client states who support Gulf War II.
It’s not enough to swat flies because that’s all we know how to do. Invading Iraq may satisfy the blood thirst of the Christian conservative bloc and the commercial interests of the military-industrial complex, but it will not stamp out the acknowledged foe – international terror. For that, we need to mobilize a true worldwide campaign to expose and eliminate forces which have targeted civilization as their enemy. Not only Al Qaeda, these forces include rightwing fringe groups like those who destroyed the federal building in Oklahoma City, drug-lord supported revolutionaries in South America, etc., etc.
Unilateral efforts of the U.S. will not succeed, as President Bush admitted to an interviewer on NBC’s Today Show. Only if a broad coalition of civilized nations uses its technology and human dedication to combat this nihilist threat will it be defeated. Our limited resources, in human life, financial means, and public attention, should not be wasted and diverted on military adventures like regime change in Iraq.
War is a convenient way to strengthen the Administration’s bid for reelection. But it is costly and only temporary. The long battle in which we were engaged on 9/11/2001 must be fought through public diplomacy as well as military force when necessary. This will only be achieved through the marshalling of alliances with leading civilized nations around the world, instead of the cosmetic assembly of client states who support Gulf War II.
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