The US, UN & Iraq III

Excellent comment, Tartarin. I, too, drive behind flag-bedecked cars and wonder what the Power of Pride means. The phrase is alliterative and uses emotion-laden key words. But what does it mean? Just that we were on the winning side, as was pointed out above? We are Proud of our Power.

Tartarin

Your road sign joke is really very good.

I bumped into this 'competition is bad' thing when I did my ed degree. It had become a given with some of the folks I studied under and the notion wasn't available for discussion or reflection with them. That was true with a number of notions, actually. The faculty was divided roughly into two schools, one taking an analytical or philosophical approach, and the other hunkering down into the comfort of some happy answer or an 'authority'.

The self-esteem issue came up quite a lot and got me in a fair bit of trouble when I suggested, for example, that assembly-line "That's a wonderful point, Bill...that's a wonderful drawing, Susan...that's a wonderful idea, Jim" ended up actually validating nobody. A grievous error, not even noticed by the folks forwarding such strategies, was that kids very often quite clearly realize they are being manipulated.

I admit to no small consternation that so many adults are not congnizant of the manipulation they are undergoing.

Blatham,

May I please state how very much I relate to your posts. I have often wanted to join a political forum. Yet, I could never say what I wish to convey, in the manner that you do.
Thank you for saying it...
I concur with ALL you write, heartily- and admire your style.


(not meaning to diminish the other great posts here- enjoy all your links and expressions.)

Well, I've just lately arrived at the Chelsea Clinton - Bush twins scene. The Bush twins (called "children" by their mother at the age of 21) are supposed to be afforded the privacy due them to live a normal life. They've always been shielded by privacy. However, the things they've done since we've known about them have been offenses against the law, and certainly haven't reflected well upon the office of the presidency, which their father occupies. And there has been the public view of news about them being deliberately witheld (such as the Hollywood partying). Chelsea Clinton, on the other hand, had it harder as an only child, and it was accepted that as the child of a sitting president she would come in for a fair share of attention. And she was obviously sharing in family experiences. The opinion of the press was that she was an honor to the family.

But this raises a larger question - that of parents. Chelsea Clinton strongly appears to be a devoted member of a strong family unit, admiring and respectful of her mother and father, and quite obviously enjoying a close relationship with them. And throughout Clinton's travails, the famiy stuck together as a cohesive whole.

The Bush family, on the other hand, never seems to show up as a family. It's like the Bush twins are kept hidden, rather than shielded. And Bush always seems to be acting in a solo role, never as a husband or father, despite the hype put out on rare occasions. So much talk about the mother's role, the father's role. His daughter's weren't even at the WH for his birthday, although the Bush's might not celebrate birthdays and all.

They say the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. Or Bush.

No, I think one thing was always clear. The Dems have had nicer families. Amy Carter and her parents were mutually respectful and close and she went on to be an interesting,educated person. The Reagan kids were a disaster. The Bush 1 family -- siblings and children -- were disasters, also with police records and histories of malfeasance. In spite of Clinton's unzipped pants, his family was also close and Chelsea worked hard and made it to really good schools, did volunteer work, etc. etc. And now Bush 2 and the Texas-wide reputation of those kids (ick!) and the parents (nasty people).... double ick.

Steve I must respectfully disagree.
Of course we had a choice.

This is the starkest and most distasteful example of Realpolitik involving this country that I can think of.
Has it really come to this, that we would expect a British prime minister to do anything, anything at all, rather than resign? Especially on a morality issue or point of principle?

I must say it surprised me. Perhaps I am too naive and unwordly.

Yes, you had a choice, McTag, and showed it in the tremendous demonstrations. But did you have an inkling, back during the last election, that Blair would do this? I don't remember, but I don't think so. We KNEW what Bush was like before we elected him, and those of us who didn't vote for him probably should have made an even greater effort to keep him out of office. Probably that wouldn't have made a big difference,given the corruption endemic in the election system, but...

I had no inkling. This came as a great surprise to me. And when Blair indicated that he would commit our forces to support an invasion, I was convinced it would bring him down, by a no-confidence vote in Parliament.
Yes, more than two million marched, including me, and the strength of the opposition among all classes and types of people surprised some. The British are not given much to political demonstration, and in my case it was my first, and that in my sixth decade too. But the strength of feeling and conviction on the street was not enough to sway the vote in the House.

So I was doubly shocked, when a nominally socialist government here fell into step with a fascist act, an unprovoked and virtually unopposed military foray into a foreign land. Opposition enough however, to ensure the violent deaths of thousands of innocent civilians.

(I use the word "unprovoked" here in the limited sense that the grounds for war did not exist. I am not in any way an apologist for Saddam or any of his works)

One predictable outcome we are seeing now, increased terrorist violence in other places, in East Africa and Morocco in the last few days.. Which will further threaten Britain, and exacerbate the refugees problem.

Heres an interesting article I found on the National Review's website:

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-lacey051503.asp

This is authored by Jim Lacey and the first paragraph ponders the question of whether Syria's President Assad was Saddam's WMD bagman. But once past that he examines whether Saddam was duped into thinking he actually had WMD by his henchmen!

If you get the time check it out.


JM

My Lord! If this is true, then long live the unscrupulous officials in the Third World...

JamesMorrison
The article sounds like a fairy tale. But than again anything is possible. Even that the moon is made of green cheese.

McTag -- Did you catch the David Runciman article in the 5/8 LRB about Blair? Quite fascinating.

jackie

That is very kind, thank you. But I would point out that you expressed yourself very clearly and succinctly just now. Please toss in your voice whenever you feel engaged. You can always address a thought or question to an individual here (others may comment, of course) and that individual will in most cases get back to you.

Mama and Tartarin

I suspect I grind my teeth as I sleep, pondering the incongruities of the 'family values' crowd.

james

Seems impossible to make a judgement on Lacey's piece without considerably more data. But the link is appreciated - surprises do happen.

What makes Lacy's article more interesting is the failure of our intelligence services to determine the non-existence of WMD's. If they were so well hidden, the 12,000 page proclamation that Iraq had no WMD's could prove embarrassing for both sides of this crisis. Their failure to come clean either way resulted in in lose-lose outcome; Saddam's regime is gone, and the US and UK spent billions to get rid of WMD's that never existed. c.i.

ci

It was a mere pretence.

blatham, A pretence for which they justified this war. c.i.

ci

I'm afraid so. One of several they pulled out of their hats when the previous one started to look a bit thin. "Nexus of fibs" is the proper description, I think.

Thank you, no, London Review of Books is not on my regular list- I have my time cut out with The Independent, sometimes The Guardian, and dipping into A2K.

However I'll look this one up on the website, see if it's still there.

Thanks again, and to all contributors; and is it my imagination that the Reps have gone a bit quieter lately? It must indeed be getting harder and harder to defend the indefensible.

McT