Let's talk about replacing GWBush in 2004.

AU:

Ethnic Jews are born Jewish. There's no need to convert to Judaism.

(This is starting to sound like some of the threads on Abuzz on "Who is a Jew"?)

au, Who in contemporary times do not know about the "holocaust?" On the other hand, how many are aware of the Japanese American experience of WWII? Big difference.

I knew about detention of the Japanese americans for a very long time, I learnt about it while still being a Soviet citizen. Maybe, if the Japanese communities throughout the world and the Japanese government launched an explanatory campaign, more people would know about injustice that was imposed on the Japanese citizens of the USA in '40s.
The problem is, that Chinese and Koreans might have also started a campaign about genocide attempts by the Imperial Japanese Army in '20s-'40s...

steissd, You are the exception to the rule. I still find many native Americans not aware of our experience. Those same people, I'm very sure, know about the holocaust. c.i.

Native Americans? You mean, Indians and Eskimos? I am not sure that they know what are Jews, put alone Holocaust. Jews for them are one of the "pale-faced" types...

steissd, No, I did not mean Indians and Eskimos, but have it your way. No argument from me. c.i.

OK, I just misunderstood your term. The word "natives" was often used to refer to Indians and Eskimos. If you meant someone else, sorry for having misinterpreted your words.

A relevant article. c.i.


The Wimps of War
February 11, 2003
By PAUL KRUGMAN

George W. Bush's admirers often describe his stand against
Saddam Hussein as "Churchillian." Yet his speeches about
Iraq - and for that matter about everything else - have
been notably lacking in promises of blood, toil, tears and
sweat. Has there ever before been a leader who combined so
much martial rhetoric with so few calls for sacrifice?

Or to put it a bit differently: Is Mr. Bush, for all his
tough talk, unwilling to admit that going to war involves
some hard choices? Unfortunately, that would be all too
consistent with his governing style. And though you don't
hear much about it in the U.S. media, a lack of faith in
Mr. Bush's staying power - a fear that he will wimp out in
the aftermath of war, that he won't do what is needed to
rebuild Iraq - is a large factor in the growing rift
between Europe and the United States.

Why might Europeans not trust Mr. Bush to follow through
after an Iraq war? One answer is that they've been mightily
unimpressed with his follow-through in Afghanistan. Another
is that they've noticed that promises the Bush
administration makes when it needs military allies tend to
become inoperative once the shooting stops - just ask
General Musharraf about Pakistan's textile exports.

But more broadly, they may have noticed something that is
becoming apparent to more and more people here: the Bush
administration's consistent unwillingness to take
responsibility for solving difficult problems. When the
going gets tough, it seems, Mr. Bush changes the subject.

Last week's budget is a perfect example. The deterioration
in the long-run budget outlook is nothing short of
catastrophic; at this point a fiscal train wreck appears
inevitable once the baby boomers retire in large numbers.
Should we be reconsidering those tax cuts? Should Mr. Bush
tell the American people how he plans to cut Social
Security and Medicare?

The White House has an easier solution. First, it has
conveniently decided that budget deficits are not a bad
thing after all. Second, it has stopped making long-run
projections, and now looks only five years ahead. And even
those projections don't include any allowance for the cost
of an Iraq war.

Which brings us back to the war. Mr. Bush apparently
regards Saddam Hussein as a pushover; he believes advisers
who tell him that an Iraq war will be quick and easy - a
couple of days of shock and awe, followed by a victory
parade. Maybe. But even if it does turn out that way, is
this administration ready for the long, difficult, quite
possibly bloody task of rebuilding Iraq?

The Europeans don't think so. In fact, they view Mr. Bush's
obsession with invading Iraq as a demonstration of why he
can't be trusted to deal with what comes next.

In the United States it is taken as axiomatic that America
is a country that really faces up to evildoers, while those
sniveling old Europeans just don't have the nerve. And the
U.S. commentariat, with few exceptions, describes Mr. Bush
as a decisive leader who really gets to grips with
problems. Tough-guy rhetoric aside, this image seems to be
based on the following policy - as opposed to political -
achievements: (1) The overthrow of the Taliban; (2) . . .
any suggestions for 2?

Meanwhile, here's how it looks from Paris: France was
willing to put ground troops at risk - and lose a number of
soldiers - in the former Yugoslavia; we weren't. The U.S.
didn't make good on its promises to provide security and
aid to post-Taliban Afghanistan. Those Americans, they are
very brave when it comes to bombing from 10,000 meters, but
they expect other people to clean up the mess they make,
no?

And French officials have made no secret of their belief
that Mr. Bush wants to invade Iraq not because he is truly
convinced that Saddam Hussein is a menace, but because he'd
rather have an easy victory in a conventional war than
stick to the hard task of tracking down stateless
terrorists. I'm not saying they're right; I have no idea
what Mr. Bush is really thinking. But you can understand
their point of view.

In the days ahead, as the diplomatic confrontation between
the Bush administration and the Europeans escalates,
remember this: Viewed from the outside, Mr. Bush's America
does not look like a regime whose promises you can trust.


http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/11/opinion/11KRUG.html?ex=1045996406&ei=1&en=05837395f32f59d7

C.I
I think that most Americans know about the internment of Japanese Americans during WW2. Unfortunately it will be forgotten in future generations if it does not become part of the curricula in our schools. Based on the present state of education in the US is doubtful.

Good article c.i.

au, From the responses I received on both Abuzz and A2K, many Americans did not seem they had any knowledge about the incarceration of Japanese Americans during WWII. Also, from my travels, when I mention this to fellow Americans, it's the first time they have heard of it. c.i.

I am no longer the "Quiet American." c.i.

ci - Sadly, this does not surprise me.

- TW

C.I., ignorant people exist everywhere. If you make a kind of research on the level of people's awareness, you will be able to disclose people that do not know whom did the USA fight against in course the WWII, and who were her allies. You may find people unaware of existence of such Presidents as Dwight Eisenhower or Calvin Coolidge. So what? I do not think that we must be offended by the people that know nothing and are not interested to learn.
And, I am afraid, but high awareness about the Holocaust may be due to the Steven Spielberg's movie The Schindler's List.

I'm not sure the problem is just ignorant people, Steissd, but perhaps an educational system which doesn't like to teach unpleasant truths about ourselves.

Perhaps it has less to do with a lack of inquisitiveness on the part of the people or an unwillingness to teach on the part of educators than it has to do with a popular culture that values flash over substance, image over character, and almost anything over learning, considering, examining, thinking.

Tartar, That's part of it, ofcoarse. And, steissd, I'm not offended by people who are unawares of American history of the WWII period. If truth be told, it's been my observation that most Americans do not know where Cairo or Egypt is on a world map. I do get offended by bigotry and discrimination, and will challenge most things I hear or read. I'm one of those unusual Japanese Americans that speaks out when people talk in theaters while the main feature is playing. My generation of Japanese Americans are reserved and quiet. I'm not so quiet. c.i.

IMHO, that is the main reason of people being unaware of injustice caused to the Japanese Americans by the Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration. People of non-Japanese origin are not supposed to have any family memories regarding these events, and majority is not so much interested in history.

Bush's faith and swagger
raise doubts





Just before the Gulf War - the last Gulf War, that is - I was in Baghdad, staying at the Al-Rashid Hotel, when a family moved in across the hall. I remember the children, two boys who played boisterously in the hallway. I wondered what would happen to them when war came.
I suppose such thoughts would make me a bad President. I know that such thoughts were sometimes held against President Bill Clinton. He actually knew the name of a civilian killed by a wayward cruise missile in Baghdad: Layla al-Attar. She was a painter. To some, this made Clinton a softie.

This is not the case with President Bush - and that he seems so untroubled is, in itself, troubling. It's not that I don't think he is right about Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein and, if need be, the necessity to deal with him through war. It's rather that I see America going to war; he sees us embarking on a crusade.

The rest of the world, particularly Western Europe, recoils from that approach. It senses in his body language, not to mention his oft-repeated references to God, a man who is tone deaf to subtleties and nuances. In his speech, they hear a certain crudeness. Even in the high formality of the State of the Union address, he said of Al Qaeda terrorists who had been killed, "Let's put it this way, they are no longer a problem." It was a rhetorical smirk.

Recently, Bush has been telling us something with his walk. It is the parade walk of a man who has puffed himself up to show determination, leadership. It has a "no trespassing" sign all over it.

It has taken an iron sense of mission for Bush to confront the UN - not just Saddam. But this narrowness of focus is disquieting because it suggests that Bush does not see the bigger picture. Is Iraq so pressing that a North Korean bomb can be back-burnered? Is the Israeli-Arab conflict peripheral or, just maybe, central to what's happening in the Middle East?

Maybe this single-mindedness is the product of the President's deep religious belief - a conviction that he has been chosen for the task. This, too, is unsettling, especially in Europe, which is much more secular than America. Destiny and providence are a siren's call that reassures some, unnerves others. "I have been saved, destiny has chosen me, providence has preserved me," said Adolf Hitler after he survived an assassination attempt.

I am not putting Bush in the same category as Hitler. If anything, Saddam belongs there. But this reliance on providence, this tendency to see things in black and white, this contempt for the lives of the contemptible no matter what else may be at stake (capital punishment in Texas, for instance, or collateral damage in Baghdad), is hardly reassuring. Rarely does Bush explain. Usually he just declaims - quick sound bites of the game-is-over variety.

This plays badly not only abroad, but also at home, where Secretary of State Powell has become the more trusted figure. More and more, Bush is seen as inflexible - rigid on the economy, on tax policy, on getting the judges he wants.

What is increasingly missing is exactly the quality that once, especially in the days following Sept. 11, commended Bush to people like myself - a lack of rigidity, of shrillness, an open-faced easiness.

He himself called it compassion, but no matter what it is called, it is a leader's greatest virtue. Recently, though, it is nowhere to be seen.

au - No offense, but I can think of little that would be less useful than some author's opinion of what Bush thinks, feels, or does not feel. This author assumes that because Bush does not wear his heart on his sleeve, he has none.

I'm sorry, but one of the problems with those on the left is that they assume they have a monopoly on caring and conscience. The doctor that amputates your arm is not unaware of the suffering you will incur from its loss, he simply knows how to put that concern where it belongs--subordinate to the concern he has for saving your life. So too, when Clinton ordered the bombing of Belgrade, he did so with conviction, but knowing that some innocents would die. He weighed that fact and proceeded, based on his assessment of the situation, the tradeoffs involved (including civilian lives lost), and the outcome he desired.

Bush is doing no less.

I know it is convenient for you and others to demonize those on the right, but it isn't terribly useful or intelligent of you. You are not the Eloi to our Morlock; we are all human beings, trying to find the best solutions to the problems at hand. Shame on you if you can't or won't see that.