Yesterday, President Bush spoke to Arab and Muslim leaders, businessmen, and others at the World Economic Forum in Egypt. President Bush's sure-to-be-ignored laundry list of reforms the Arab states should undergo missed a few really important pointers:
1) Arab states must close all legally dubious island prisons in other countries that hold individuals as "enemy combatants" or any other fictionalized classification.
2) Arab states must end all unwelcome, foreign military occupations, especially those that threaten to fragment nations and politically destabilize regions.
3) Arab states must stop incarcerating millions of people for small crimes, especially when the prisoners tend to come from impoverished, minority groups.
4) Arab armies should cease the recruitment and training of minors.
5) Arabs must stop polluting the world environment, consuming an exorbitant share of the world's resources, and end its generally gluttonous personal intake of food.
6) Arab states must close their hundreds of military bases around the world.
Perhaps these key points did not make it into his speech so he could dedicate more time to praising Israel and dishing out empty platitudes feigning support for Palestinian independence.
Monday, May 19, 2008
Pointers President Bush Missed
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8 comments:
You mean America is far from perfect? I'm shocked!
Seriously, though, let's try to avoid false equivalence. America having work to do -- every country does -- doesn't lessen the obligation to call out foreign governments on their bullshit, in some way or another.
Ah, Joe, if only "calling out" was all it was.....
Invasions, carpet-bombing, incineration, nuclear holocausts, sponsoring death squads in Latn America, dictators in South East Asia, apartheid in South Africa and Palestine, torture and illegal detention, rape as standard Marine procedure...
Is that "having a long way to go"...?
Or is it, "we've arrived, so f**k you all and your backward ass rule-of-law lib BS"....?
Has anyone seen the Dead Zone recently? Is Martin Sheen a genius foretaste of W...?
Is that "having a long way to go"...?
No, that's your usual lying.
""Invasions,""
Sometimes for good reasons, sometimes for bad reasons. Over the past two decades, our serious 'invasions' have been: the first Gulf War, Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Balkans. Three out of four were probably the right call. Room for improvement? Sure, but not abominable.
""carpet-bombing, incineration,""
Not good, we agree. But we've made major strides in smart-bombs and precision-guided munitions. Our rate of accidentally blowing up people we didn't mean to has definitely gone down.
""nuclear holocausts,""
The only times we've dropped nukes -- Hiroshima and Nagasaki -- it made sense for us to do so. Mutually Assured Destruction worked in the Cold War, and there weren't any strong alternative proposals to fall back on.
""sponsoring death squads in Latn America,""
We agree, this is not good. Though usually the people opposing the forces we sponsored had death squads of their own. Latin America has a lot of death squads.
""apartheid in South Africa and Palestine,""
Directly analogizing the two situations is sloppy logic. We moved more slowly on apartheid than we should have, true. As for Israel, our policy isn't too hugely different than what it should be; our ability to influence the changes that need to happen is limited. We tilt things a bit too hard toward the Israeli side from time to time, but the rest of the world tends to tilt it too hard toward the Palestinian side, so it balances decently.
""torture and illegal detention,""
We agree - not good.
""rape as standard Marine procedure...""
Rape happens, yes. Standard marine procedure? No. You lose credibility when you lose perspective like this.
Yes, how could anyone complain about rape and carpet bombing??? That's certainly not going to be make you look credible.
Seriously, you are more annoying than roy or pc or pat or any other retard. You try to appear magnanimous and open minded but really you just make a fool of yourself talking down to people like they need you to be their teacher. Nobody listens to you because you are stupid. K? You lose credibility when you lose perspective on this.
""Nobody listens to you because you are stupid.""
Stay classy, anonymous!
Oh, and you committed a classic logical fallacy -- the strawman.
You write, sarcastically: "Yes, how could anyone complain about rape and carpet bombing???"
And yet, if you'll actually read my writing, I *agreed* that complaints about rape and carpet-bombing are quite valid.
Where I *disagreed* was in the tendentious description of both the prevalence of rape and its supposed systematic nature contained in the phrase "standard Marine procedure". I pointed out that responsible critics of America's shortcomings would do better than to take a position that essentially crosses over into conspiracy theory.
Nothing stupid about that.
So, got any actual arguments, or just ad hominem?
Point: Joe
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