<$BlogRSDUrl$>

28 June 2008

War of Ideas

Western civilization has long diverted the elites of Iran from the rigors of Islamic dogma. They admire and emulate American and European culture. The expatriate Persian communities of the U.S. and Western Europe are strong. Nevertheless, most of those who are not tormented for religious reasons maintain personal and commercial ties to Iran because of the private and monetary rewards those ties bring. And even in Iran, surreptitious adoption of modern secular mores is widespread.

Why the dichotomy between the behavioral preferences of its wealthy and educated upper class and the doctrinally conservative, polemically radical, intolerant political leadership? As Marjane Satrapi has noted in her book, “Persepolis,” that’s the Persian way. Over a millennium of authoritarian rule has calcified the people’s mental barrier between enjoying, on one side, the pleasures of life and withstanding, on the other side, the indignities imposed by power-hungry dynastic, military, or religious oppressors.

Therefore, I disagree with the assertion by James K. Glassman in his OpEd article in the June 24, 2008, Wall Street Journal, “How to Win the War of Ideas,” that ideological confrontation should appeal to the Iranian population--neither its elite nor its common segments. However, the lack of effective domestic opposition to the human rights violations of the Iranian regime and to its aggressive international politics does not make U.S. or collective military intervention justifiable or reasonable without direct threats to our security. It does strengthen the argument for energetic support of an indigenous resistance movement; but that will take time and will require a Persian degree of patience in the secular West.

19 June 2008

Windfall

I agree with Craig Pizonka, whose letter to the editor appeared in the June 19, 2008, Wall Street Journal, that a windfall profits tax on large oil companies is ludicrous. The recent high price of crude is not a windfall for enterprises that have invested their capital for many decades in finding and developing deposits of a critical natural resource. Nor is the income earned by Senator Obama and other writers a windfall for the work they have devoted to producing their essays and literature.

The high value of oil is, more accurately, a windfall for the nations whose property covers those hydrocarbon resources. Alas, we cannot tax them; we are limited to charging consumers, for example at the gasoline pump.

Major oil companies as well as successful authors intend to be compensated for their investments of capital and effort. If Mr. Pizonka and I were to earn a return on our letters to the editor, that would be a true windfall.

17 June 2008

McCain as Sacrificial Lamb

When the Republicans have conceded in the past that the presidential election was a lost cause--1964, 1976, 1996--they've used the convention to shore up their ideological levees. Usually this has succeeded in assuring a Republican victory for the next election cycle. Unfortunately, when the Democrats have tried to regroup in the face of a seemingly indomitable foe--Nixon, Reagan, Bush 41, Bush 43--they have commonly doomed their own fate for a long time to come.

If the Republican party makes the blunder of stepping away from McCain this summer, they will have taken a page from the Democratic party book. Instead, they will probably stick with the winner of their primaries and use the opportunity to devise a strategy that recaptures a majority of the U.S. electorate. The nomination of McCain in 2008 will probably mean stronger party support for the Democrats' opponent four years later. Obama should win this year, but he will have to prepare for a tough reelection fight.

12 June 2008

Rationalizing Hellmouth

The God described in Bart D. Ehrman’s book, “God’s Problem,” reviewed in the June 9 & 16, 2008, New Yorker by James Wood, is the one in whom faith is nothing more than a show of humility. We display shame before those of us who cannot imagine other answers to the mystery of “theodicy”—God’s allowing evil to exist. It is expected of us to suspend our confidence in the refutability of human logic. So what if the idea of God makes no sense? Order in a world dependent on the cooperation of philosophically unquestioning masses is threatened by insisting on thinking through the problem of God.

The Hellmouth referred to by Mr. Wood reminds me of the “Deus Ex Machina” I modeled as a schoolboy to capture the drama of medieval pageantry. What is the point of abject submission before this specter of arbitrary horror? It colludes in domination by power-hungry sages. It may be explained as rationalization by most of us of our subjugation by those sages, or as elevation of their power-hunger to be a divine attribute.

06 June 2008

Urgency of the Day’s Issues

Should we feel guilty about not being as urgently concerned with the issues of the early 21st Century as we were with those of the 1960s? It was more the temper of those times to react impetuously to unwanted events. This was partly the result of baby boomers’ coming of age ahead of the IT revolution. The interconnectedness that technological advance made possible served to modulate feelings of alienation and helplessness that broke out in violence and antiestablishment behavior.

It’s not the urgency of our political sentiments that gauges the depth of our convictions. We now have the luxury of wide and near instantaneous interchange of information and views that allows the most thoughtful and passionate of our incipient opinion leaders to “vent their spleens” and create a consensus without engaging in disruptive conduct. Rather than regretting an era of rebellious action, we should be rejoicing that technology has enabled political change with civil order.

04 June 2008

Military Solution to Terror

In his Global View column in the June 3, 2008, Wall Street Journal, Bret Stephens makes a false analogy of Iraq with Colombia and Sri Lanka. Whereas the sword may be an effective prelude to political reconciliation in countries that are united in opposition to terrorists, as long as it is taking in Colombia and Sri Lanka those nations have a settled identity and a generally recognized government to suppress their insurgencies. Iraqis, on the other hand, still do not agree on their own nationhood. They have always depended on a foreign power or a minority dictator to hold their country together.

That is not a role the U.S. is comfortable playing; nor is it consistent with our political principles. Terror is the tool chosen by certain Iraqi factions to resolve their prisoners’ dilemma; others have effectively chosen secession. The military solution that Mr. Stephens and, for example, John McCain say has been successful in reducing terror in Iraq only works because Americans have been willing to acquiesce in invading another country to establish order there. When its chaos and genocide directly threaten our own security, military intervention may be justified and consistent with our principles. Otherwise, except in the case of reaction to an attack by an organized and clearly identifiable foreign power, military tactics only succeed if we are willing to occupy or annex the territory we seek to pacify.

I thought we learned that lesson in Vietnam, Lebanon, and Somalia. Apparently, we’ll have to add Iraq to the list.

03 June 2008

Subsuming Decisions

I agree with William McGurn’s Main Street column in the June 3, 2008, Wall Street Journal, that President Bush is unwilling to subsume all his decisions to the “permanent campaign.” It is precisely this blindness to public opinion that has led to his low popularity and has aggravated fellow Republican politicians.

What Mr. Bush can be accused of is evangelism—subsuming pursuit of the interests of the country to achievement of an overarching mystical or theological goal. He was elected to serve the country’s interests and not those of a “higher authority.” Confusion over whose ox to gore is also what characterizes the next Republican candidate for the White House.

Scott McClellan didn’t miss the surge. He missed the terrible cost to the country of indulging our President’s stubbornness.

01 June 2008

The Lawyers’ Crusade

Despite what Aitzaz Ahsan has sought to achieve in Pakistan, according to James Traub’s article in the June 1, 2008, New York Times Magazine, the imperative of protecting the security of America must always trump Democracy promotion as the goal for our government’s policy. Keeping us safe cannot justify sacrificing our own civil liberties; however, supporting the civil liberties of the people in a strategically important foreign country must take second place to the priority of maintaining our own ability to live our lives with the material and political values we cherish.

I am eager to see Mr. Traub’s upcoming book, “The Freedom Agenda: Why America Must Spread Democracy.” Perhaps I am missing something in that title, but I believe that it is precisely the kind of evangelism signified in its message that put America into the misbegotten invasion of Iraq by the George W. Bush Administration.

Of course, American influence may never be used to suppress the growth of individual liberty in other countries. Nevertheless, expanding freedom in other societies is primarily the responsibility of their members. In certain cases, U.S. policy is well served by promoting democracy in other countries; however, our interests and the spread of democracy in every foreign culture are not identical.

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?