Accidental Blogger

George Bush’s grades in Yale were a "Gentleman’s C", we have been told. His presidential grade however is an unqualified "F". A while ago, Lawrence Wilkerson, the chief of staff to Colin Powell had this to say:

"If something comes along that is truly serious, something like a nuclear weapon going off in an American city, or something like a major pandemic, you are going to see the ineptitude of this government in a way that will take you back to the Declaration of Independence."

Incompetence in Iraq and after Katrina, unfolded before our eyes. Now the report card is out on what this administration, has or rather, has not done to make the the homefront safe against domestic terrorist attacks.

"The five Republicans and five Democrats on the commission, whose recommendations are now promoted through a privately funded group known as the 9/11 Public Discourse Project, conclude that the government deserves "more Fs than As" in responding to their 41 suggested changes.

The U.S. is at great risk for more terrorist attacks because Congress and the White House have failed to enact several strong security measures, members of the former Sept. 11 commission said Sunday."

Much of the blame for the unconscionable unpreparedness is due to homeland security funds being spent on pork barrel projects and not for sensible implementation of security measures, the commission reported.  Politicians’ penchant for making money for themselves and for their friends is well known. As we have learnt in recent days, several GOP members of Congress are mired in financial scandals . My own Congressman Tom DeLay is a ring leader among them.  So it’s no surprise that we have been let down again by our elected leaders. George Bush, who got elected by exploiting 9/11 and global terrorism to the hilt, has not uttered a word about breaking faith with those who elected him. And we are exhausted by the greed, lack of accountability and utter shamelessness of this administration. Amidst these chaos, Rumsfeld admonished the media for not reporting enough uplifting and optimistic news about Iraq!  Are there any job openings with Ring Ling Brothers for these jokers?

Right now President Bush is delivering his speech on "Plan for Victory" in Iraq. What victory? Shouldn’t it be "Plan for Peace" now? I don’t have time to listen – will catch up with it later on the news.  Members of this failed administration are stuck on semantics over substance. They believe that a bad situation will magically become better by introducing new phrases and expressions. They ought to pay heed to what Gary Hart (who understands global terrorism far better than the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld trio) had to say about Iraq: "The public trust must be earned, and speaking clearly, candidly and forcefully now about the mess in Iraq is the place to begin."

Here is an example of Rummy Speak (or Turkey Talk) over the weekend:

He (Rumsfeld) declared that the insurgents would, henceforth, no longer be called insurgents.

"Over the weekend, I thought to myself, ‘You know, that gives them a greater legitimacy than they seem to merit,’ " Rumsfeld, at a Pentagon briefing Tuesday, said. "It was an epiphany," he added, throwing his hand in the air.

Encouraging reporters to consult their dictionaries, Rumsfeld said: "These people aren’t trying to promote something other than disorder, and to take over that country and turn it into a caliphate and then spread it around the world. This is a group of people who don’t merit the word ‘insurgency,’ I think."

Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Peter Pace, standing at Rumsfeld’s side, evidently didn’t get the memo about the wording change. Describing combat in Iraq, he paused and said, "I have to use the word ‘insurgent’ because I can’t think of a better word right now."……. "Sorry, sir," Pace said. "I’m not trainable today."

And now find out what another turkey, "Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job,"  – is doing for his own rehabilitation:

The former bureaucrat, nicknamed by President George Bush in a memorable but misplaced compliment, "Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job," has picked up the pieces and launched a new career as a disaster preparedness consultant, with offices in Colorado and Washington. In an interview with the Rocky Mountain News, the unchastened Brown explained why clients should hire a failed disaster manager to provide advice on handling future emergencies.

"Hurricane Katrina showed how bad disasters can be, and there’s an incredible need for individuals and businesses to understand how important preparedness is," Brown said, apparently with a straight face. Without mentioning names, Brown claimed he’s doing good work with a number of clients. "If people want to take shots at me, fine, but let’s figure out a way to make this thing work better next time." …..

Supporters of the Iraq war continue to impute to those of us (the liberal left or just the plain old left)  opposed to this appalling misadventure, several unsavory qualities and motives. They imply that we are not sufficiently disturbed by tyranny and oppression. That we find fault with the US government (especially a Republican one) engaged in a noble endeavor to punish fascist regimes. The right has even asserted that opponents of the Iraq war wouldn’t mind if the terrorists defeat George Bush (cut off one’s nose to spite one’s face). Also, we cannot bring ourselves to celebrate the liberation of Iraqi and Afghan citizens. In other words, we are not patriotic Americans and we are crestfallen that democracy might be breaking out all over the mideast !  All straw man arguments of course – a mindset spawned by the one dimensional thinking of the right’s current champion who famously said, "You are either with us or you are with the terrorists."

What the right willfully ignores is that the opponents of the Iraq war may have paid heed to history and learnt that a reckless, unilateral aggression exacts a high price in human lives and national morale. We find the notion of pre-emptive invasion of a country (however detestable its leadership) which did not attack us and was unlikely to do so, a morally reprehensible and unacceptable political precedent. We vehemently disagreed with the suggestion that the death and mutilation of US soldiers, wanton killing of Iraqis and the destruction of Iraq’s historic and modern infrastructures was only a necessary "collateral damage". We nervously predicted the futility and danger of abandoning the pursuit of the Taliban and Al Qaida to focus on an aging and attenuated despot (whose follies we had ignored for years because of his oil wealth) with whom, it appeared that Bush-Cheney had a personal score to settle. Why is it so difficult for the right to appreciate that to be alarmed and repulsed by terrorism and to disapprove of a cynically wrong headed war are not mutually exclusive moral choices ?

What really bothers the pro-war crowd is that the opponents of Bush’s war have been proven mostly accurate and prescient in their prediction of what could and would go wrong in Iraq. The alarm bells that went off in our heads when the Bush-Cheney brigade tried to scare the hell out of us by the deliberate and dishonest juxtaposition 9/11 with Iraq and Saddam with Osama, were sounding the right warning. All reasons and justification presented for the flawed war have turned out to be morally and factually hollow.  Almost everything they told us has fallen apart systematically for the whole world to see, without any participation by the left. That is why the right is angry – they are blaming us for being correct.

President Bush has been asked by some US senators (a couple of GOP senators among them) to give an accurate status report of the war in Iraq to the American people.  If and when George Bush undertakes the task, I hope we will hear the unvarnished truth. We are no longer interested in the tired old litany of "let freedom reign", democratic Iraqi elections and constitution and "the world is better off without Saddam". I hope he will have the courage to acknowledge the following and admit that we are not just breaking some eggs to make the omelette, we are also killing a whole lot of chickens: 

Human rights abuses in Iraq are as bad as they were under Saddam Hussein if not worse, former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi has said.

"People are doing the same as (in) Saddam’s time and worse," Allawi said in an interview published in Britain on Sunday.

"It is an appropriate comparison," Allawi told The Observer newspaper. "People are remembering the days of Saddam. These were the precise reasons that we fought Saddam and now we are seeing the same things."…….

This report is more than a year old but was grossly ignored by the US media perhaps because of the impending 2004 presidential election.

When more than 200,000 people died in a tsunami caused by an Asian earthquake in December, the immediate reaction in the United States was an outpouring of grief and philanthropy, prompted by extensive coverage in the news media.

Two months earlier, the reaction in the United States to news of another large-scale human tragedy was much quieter. In late October, a study was published in The Lancet, a prestigious British medical journal, concluding that about 100,000 civilians had been killed in Iraq since it was invaded by a United States-led coalition in March 2003. On the eve of a contentious presidential election — fought in part over U.S. policy on Iraq — many American newspapers and television news programs ignored the study or buried reports about it far from the top headlines……

Security Contractors in Iraq Under Scrutiny After Shootings

Recent shootings of Iraqi civilians, allegedly involving the legion of U.S., British and other foreign security contractors operating in the country, are drawing increasing concern from Iraqi officials and U.S. commanders who say they undermine relations between foreign military forces and Iraqi civilians.

(Their) activities have drawn scrutiny both here and in Washington after allegations of indiscriminate shootings and other recklessness have given rise to charges of inadequate oversight.

"These guys run loose in this country and do stupid stuff. There’s no authority over them, so you can’t come down on them hard when they escalate force," said Brig. Gen. Karl R. Horst, deputy commander of the 3rd Infantry Division, which is responsible for security in and around Baghdad. "They shoot people, and someone else has to deal with the aftermath. It happens all over the place."

And in another part of the mideast : In Egypt, election tests U.S. push for democracy Analysis

For months, the Bush administration has said that it is serious about pushing for democracy in the Middle East. It’s about to get a serious test of that resolve.

Egypt, the world’s most populous Arab country, is suddenly roiling with a wide-open, combative election that seems certain to end with the country’s main Islamic group, the banned Muslim Brotherhood, as a big winner….

And here is an apt cartoon by Mike Luckovich . Please click on image to see.

India, Pakistan, Israel, England, New Zealand, Indonesia, Latvia and Finland have all done it once. The Phillippines, Sri Lanka, Ireland and Bangladesh have each done it twice.  Germany and Liberia just did it.  Chile is poised to become the first to do it in the Americas.  Will the US elect the first woman national leader in 2008?

Hillary Clinton and Condoleeza Rice have each been touted by their respective parties as the next president of the United States. There is speculation that after Bush – Cheney – Rumsfeld, the country will be so tired of war and an over-abundance of testosterone in its politics, that we will be ready for the gentler regime of a woman leader. I would like to see a woman president – but not for those flawed reasons and unrealistic expectations. We should judge a woman by the same criteria we apply to male candidates and elect her for the same reasons – whether her policies are likely to be good of the country and the world. All other Mars – Venus hypotheses are wrong and bound to disappoint, unless the assessment of potential leaders is firmly grounded on Earth. It is naive to think that a female politician brings the mythical "woman’s touch" to leadership, something that is inherently different from what a man brings to the table. Successful women in business and in public life, as of now, compete on the same playing field as men and operate by the same rules, although they do help in revising gender based preconceptions of competence and capability – mostly in the minds of men.  The women leaders named above gained their political power because of hard work, shrewdness, personal ambition and even ruthlessness (in the case of some of the Asian women leaders, their family backgrounds helped). Many fought their share of bloody wars.

An intelligent, honest and competent leader – man or woman, brings those qualities to his/her policies and vision, irrespective of gender. A corrupt and stupid woman leader is capable of wreaking the same havoc as a similarly unqualified or unsuitable male. It is not realistic therefore to expect women to change politics and governance for the better just by virtue of their womanhood – an astute mind, the right moral philosophy and courage of conviction will accomplish that. The election of a woman to the highest office has one unique beneficial fallout. It frees up a nation’s mindset from the historical inaccuracy of equating maleness with competent leadership and femaleness with a lack of bold and innovative ideas. For this reason alone, it will be refreshing to have the 2008 roster of US presidential candidates populated with feminine names.

It is a bit unnerving that we are even having this debate in the 21st century. In the last one hundred years or so, women have burst through several previously closed doors with impressive aplomb. They have emphatically proven wrong thousands of years of inequitable, discriminatory practices and prejudicial notions. That we would need a TV show (Madam President), or a disastrous male president to prep us for a female presidency in 2008 is silly and condescending – and if true, disappointing.

Even Japan’s traditional imperial household has seen the light.                                               

A panel on Japan’s imperial succession formally recommended Thursday that women be allowed to ascend the ancient Chrysanthemum Throne, a change that could spare the royal family a looming succession crisis.

Japan’s imperial family hasn’t produced a male heir for 40 years and Crown Prince Naruhito and Crown Princess Masako’s only child is a girl, 3-year-old Aiko.

If approved by parliament, the revision is expected to make Aiko second in line to the throne, behind her father.

"This would be a new experience for the Japanese," said Hiroyuki Yoshikawa, the head of the 10-member panel.

He said that the proposal was intended to allow Aiko to ascend the throne even if Naruhito and Masako had a boy.

Strict male succession has been possible only through the use of concubines, a practice that ended during the reign of Emperor Hirohito, who died in 1989 and is father of the current emperor, Akihito.

Opinion polls have indicated wide support for a ruling empress, but some conservative academics and lawmakers have voiced opposition.

But elevating a few women to positions of power would not amount to much of anything if the following report by the WHO about violence against women is accurate and if the plight of women and girls in poorer societies does not improve dramatically.

Last year, we watched with fascination and a sense of solidarity, a tide of orange take to the streets of Kiev,  in support of the popular but battered, Viktor Yushchenko, the eventual winner of the presidential election in Ukraine. The process was widely viewed by the world as a triumph of ordinary citizens’ voice and democratic will. Nearly a year later, the Ukrainian Orange Revolution has lost some of its glow. The new administration is beleaguered by corruption and chaos. Ukrainians are crestfallen. But on the one year anniversary of the revolution, Ukrainians will don orange, celebrate and hope that the promise of democracy will bear fruit in the near future.

It is difficult to predict whether a country breaking out from under the oppressive yoke of totalitarianism, colonialism or plain corruption, will succeed as a democracy. What are the parameters that determine the trajectory a newly formed sovereign nation will launch itself into? No economic, political or military model has accurately foreseen the outcome of a peoples’ revolt – peaceful or violent. In 1947, Britain packed up and left India after two hundred years of the Raj, leaving in its wake a divided subcontinent. The two new independent nations of India and Pakistan were products of almost identical history, culture and ethnicity.  India went the way of a secular democracy and Pakistan became an Islamic military dictatorship. Corruption, nepotism, social and economic inequities are commonplace in the region. But India manages to muddle through it all with a free press, regular multi-party elections and an expanding educated middle class. Pakistan, which is the godfather of the Taliban and Al Qaida, on the other hand, has slipped further and further into the chasm of religious fundamentalism, terrorism and narrowing of modern educational opportunities for its citizens. Yet, the USA until recently, allied with Pakistan, not India – even when the Pakistani government unleashed a genocidal mayhem on its own people in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) in 1971.

Is easing into democracy, rather than the overnight liberalization of the political process, a better option for societies unaccustomed to self determination? Does the euphoria of sudden freedom foster the re-emergence of dormant, ancient hostilities and factionalism kept in check by oppressive regimes? Are newly acquired democratic rights often interpreted as opportunities for corruption, nepotism and lawlessness by both the citizenry and the leadership? Most of Africa and the new "democracies" which sprouted after the fragmentation of the erstwhile Soviet empire, indicate that this may indeed be the case. Are China and Vietnam, with their totalitarian governments imposing discipline and political order, along with a single minded focus on the education and economic betterment of their citizens, likely to emerge as more stable grounds for democracy in the long run than Russia, Ukraine, Nigeria or Kenya? Case in point, South Korea today and a decade or two ago. Or is democracy hastened by a society’s  collective catharsis which unites the leadership and the populace in their determination to go in a new direction and never again revert to the old ways of a disastrous past?  Examples, the shame and humiliation of post WWII Germany and Japan or the tragic trauma of European Jews and the formation of Israel. Or, perhaps the process just takes time – like the two hundred plus years of American democracy.

We are currently engaged in the business of imposing democracy in two faraway lands whose history and culture we do not understand very well or don’t care to. The ancient society of Iraq, consisting of Shias, Sunnis, Kurds, Jews and Christians, was transformed into its modern incarnation by Britain during World War I (when Britain was butting heads with the Ottoman empire for the control of middle east). The British plan was almost identical to our own government’s in 2003 – regime change and territorial reorganization of the middle east. What began in 1914 as a strategic and political calculation, became the petro-politics of later years.  The west’s need and greed for cheap oil has necessitated a succession of "friendly", corrupt and oppressive rulers to govern the middle east. That in turn, has made the region hostile to democratic changes and created a breeding ground of Islamic fundamentalism. In fact, until the Iranian Ayatollas and Arab Islamic terrorists reared their ugly heads, it was not in the "interest" of the west to have a democratic middle east! The US is in Iraq now for the same reason as Britain was – hoping to control the region by installing a supplicant (??) government and ensuring the free flow of oil. The establishment of a free and fair democratic system, if it happens in the foreseeable future, will be a very fortunate accident. If only an exuberant show of purple fingers and a hastily cobbled constitution were guarantees of an easy and peaceful transition to democracy in an area that has for years been manipulated and exploited by its own leaders as well as foreigners. 

Afghanistan, which through the centuries, has been a poor, battle hardy land of proud people, is our other experiment in democracy. In the best of times, Afghanistan has been a loose confederation of tribal strongholds, run by fiercely independent warlords who paid taxes but not homage to the ruling powers. During the British colonial rule in India, Afghanistan was coveted by both Russia and Britain.  Neither succeeded in colonizing or conquering it. (See my book review The Man Who Would Be King ) In 1979 the USSR invaded Afghanistan and managed for the first time, to install its puppet government there. We armed the "democratic" anti-communist insurgents to their teeth, fanned their religious and nationalistic fervor, only to see them later transmogrify into the dreaded Taliban and Al Qaida after the Soviets were forced out. We are there now to try and "civilize" the country, run free and fair elections and put another "friendly" regime in place. But we did not do a thorough and serious job of ridding Afghanistan (and Pakistan) of  Islamic fundamentalists  – the perpetrators of 9/11 and the real obstacles to democracy. Now the Talibs are training in Iraq and streaming back into Afghanistan, Osama is hiding in a nearby city or cave and the warlords with their American armed militia, are doing a booming business of growing poppy in the countryside.

If the US does indeed successfully unload the modern day "white man’s burden" in the middle and near east and democratizes the region, it will be a miracle.  We can then boast of a new and successful formula for creating democracies in the world – by foreign fiat and military force. But I am not so optimistic. After all, one definition of insanity is "repeatedly performing the same action and expecting a different outcome."

Speaking of democracy, last Sunday I saw George Clooney’s excellent movie "Good Night and Good Luck", about the efforts by  Edward R. Murrow and a handful of courageous CBS newsmen in exposing the dangerous tactics of Senator Joe McCarthy. I was not around in the McCarthy era but I watched Indira Gandhi in 1975, when in a naked grab for power, she suspended the freedom of the Indian press, curtailed civil liberties of citizens, threw dissenting intellectuals in jail and held nearly a billion cowering people in a state of utter nervousness. (India later extracted its revenge in the voting booth). I have no doubt in my mind that the greatest danger to the democratic character of a nation is not a hostile foreign power or terrorism abroad or any other external real or imagined threat. Democracy is in danger when we become fearful of our own government. A government which is secretive, stifles debate, uses national security as an excuse to trample on domestic rights and liberties, demands that science play a secondary role to corporate interests and theology in national policy debates and is antagonistic to its intellectuals, runs counter to democratic principles. Such a government can hold on to power only by creating a continuous state of unease in the public mind. In Clooney’s film the newsmen at CBS are played by actors. Joe McCarthy’s words are his own – from the archival footage of his speeches on the senate floor and on TV. Substitute the word "communism" in them with "terrorism" and you have fast forwarded fifty years to the Bush – Cheney era.

Whether or not one agrees with Rep John Murtha (D -PA) about immediate withdrawal of US troops in Iraq, it is indisputable that his proposal to do so has ignited a firestorm.  The Republicans who are used to lobbing their pseudo patriotic grenades at liberal and dovish soft targets, are finding it a bit more difficult to paint the hawkish, decorated (a Bronze Star and two Purple Hearts) veteran of the US Marines Corps, with the same "yellow belly" brush. But it has not stopped them from trying .

All hell broke loose on the US House floor when Rep Jean Schmidt, R – Ohio, the most junior member of the House, who narrowly defeated anti-war Iraq vet Paul Hackett, told of a phone call she received from a Marine colonel. "He asked me to send Congress a message — stay the course. He also asked me to send Congressman Murtha a message — that cowards cut and run, Marines never do," Schmidt said.  Democrats booed and shouted, causing an uproar.  "I won’t stand for the swift-boating of Jack Murtha," said Sen. John Kerry later of Schmidt’s comments.

I doubt that Rep Murtha will need anyone’s help in defending himself. Here is an example of his response to Dick Cheney, who likes to fight his wars by remote control, tele-kinetics and other peoples’ sacrifices.

On Wednesday, Vice President Cheney said that the suggestion by some senators that the administration purposely misled the public about the reasons for invading Iraq "is one of the most dishonest and reprehensible charges ever aired in this city."

"What we’re hearing now is some politicians contradicting their own statements and making a play for political advantage in the middle of a war," Cheney said. "The president and I cannot prevent certain politicians from losing their memory, or their backbone — but we’re not going to sit by and let them rewrite history."

Murtha sarcastically dismissed such attacks by alluding to the fact that Cheney never served in the military because he received deferments from the draft during the Vietnam War era.

This is what Rep Murtha had to say about Cheney’s remarks:

"I like guys who’ve never been there that criticize us who’ve been there. I like that," said Murtha. "I like guys who got five deferments and never been there and send people to war, and then don’t like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done."