Tag Archives: Saudi Arabia

Political Rants

Bipartisanshit.

Lopsided bipartisan majorities in both houses of Congress have approved the President’s crackpot plan to arm the non-existent “moderate” opposition in Syria; in the Senate the tally of 78 to 22 was identical to the one that body delivered in support if Bush’s Iraq invasion. So much for the value of bipartisanship, as Chris Hayes has pointed out many times. By virtue of this blinkered legislation, we will be providing military training and equipment to many of the same people we profess to despise. (The simple fact that McCain and Graham are in favor of such funding should be enough for any sentient creature to surmise that it’s a bad call. McCain wouldn’t know a member of ISIS if he were inches away.)

McCain and his "moderates". The response to ISIS is another instance of decision-making driven by decades of bad policy. We are, in essence, seeking to deal with a mess of our own making, to put it charitably, and in so doing making an investment in future crises while bankrupting ourselves in the present.  The money and arms flowing to ISIS emanate from Saudi Arabia, other gulf states, and abandoned resources in Iraq, not to mention oil payments from third countries, like Turkey (our NATO ally). Many if not most of the weapons are stamped “Property of the U.S. Military”. Working with the Saudis to arm and train “moderate” opponents of the Assad regime is akin to working with the Pakistanis to arm and train “moderate” opponents of the Soviets in Afghanistan during the 1980s. How did that turn out again?

Once again, we are pushing towards war and there are few dissenting voices in the conversation. NPR’s Cokie Roberts had spoken of a major “educational” initiative by the Administration on fighting ISIS that would be rolled out after summer, just as the Bush charge to invade Iraq was stoked prior to the 2002 election. No real alternatives are presented; only deviations in degree from what we are doing now. Trial balloons are being floated by General Dempsey and others on the deployment of U.S. ground troops. We have seen with Libya how what started as a “humanitarian” effort morphed into a more determined campaign towards regime change. The current Iraq drive began with a mostly bogus story about impending genocide; next comes increased air strikes, then arming and training rebels. What’s next?

Obama fans: Think twice about supporting this. It is a really, really dumb idea.

luv u,

jp

Political Rants

Persistent truths.

As I write this post, the parliament in Crimea has just voted to secede from Ukraine and rejoin Russia, to which it belonged until the mid 1950s. The Russian parliament, in turn, is considering legislation to enable it to accept new provinces, an ominous turn to Where's America in this picture?be sure. There is a referendum on Crimean secession scheduled for later this month, and the new Ukrainian government is crying foul. So … are we on the brink of a new Crimean War? Charge of the Light Brigade, anyone?

The “Putin is Crazy” narrative is dominating the news cycle here in the United States. I can hear it right now, on the evening news. Even supposed activist liberal shows like Rachel Maddow are playing this as a crisis for which Russia is solely responsible, and strong evidence of Putin’s departure from reality. He’s living in another world, the German premier suggests, and that claim is being hammered home, day after day, on every network, every news channel, every media outlet. One would think no one had ever occupied a square mile of foreign territory before. (Ummm …. Afghanistan? Guam?)

I hate to be the lone dissenting voice on anything, but this thing is obviously spinning out of control, and the potential consequences are enormous. Despite his autocratic tendencies, Putin is not hard to figure out, friends. He doesn’t want another Syria as his next door neighbor. With the ouster of Yanukovych, he sees the potential for civil conflict, possible failure of the central government, etc. Putin sees the United States and Europe as having stoked the opposition, and in all frankness, it’s probably true that we did. We regularly support political movements in other countries to an extent that we would consider unacceptable should another country attempt the same on us. Now we openly support the revolution in Ukraine.

Is is about supporting democracy? Well, that’s certainly not a prerequisite for U.S. support. See Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, etc., etc. In all honesty, I think it would be a really good idea to work towards a diplomatic solution with greater energy. There is a tendency to fall into old cold war habits – a fact that reveals the bankruptcy of our obsession with communism back in the day. It’s really just about great power competition, and that should be considered illegitimate, particularly when so many lives are at stake.

Between us, we still have thousands of nuclear weapons. This is not something to fool around with.

luv u,

jp

Political Rants

New year, old news.

This year is starting out very much like the last one ended. Here are a few of the ways I’m thinking of.

Conflict in Syria. Juan Cole reports that 2013 may have been the bloodiest year thus far in Syria, with an estimated 73,000 killed in the ongoing civil war, and more than 130,000 since the conflict started. This ongoing disaster is, in many ways, a regional conflict with a Syrian focus, as one representative of the International Crisis Committee put it recently. The only solution, it seems, is for the warring parties to say “enough”, to agree to some means of saving what’s left of their country, even if it means Assad remains in power. That would be a hard pill for many to swallow, but what is the alternative? As Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United States put their ample resources into fighting a proxy war with Iran, the Syrian people are caught in the middle. Six million refugees and no end in sight. Time to push the extremists aside and sue for peace.

Oil BoomEnergy refugees. While talking heads praise the fracking-fueled resurgence of America’s energy sector, people in places like Casselton ND are paying the price, driven from their homes in the middle of winter by the dramatic derailment and explosion of a sludge-oil train laden with fracking chemicals. This is the latest in a series of toxic spills as the country hurriedly ramps up production of the last-century fuels that are destroying our atmosphere in pursuit of short-sighted economic growth. Once again, it’s all about jobs, jobs, jobs … if by that we mean, profits, profits, profits for the oil and gas industries and the corporations that support them.

Unemployment. The long-term unemployed are playing without a net this new year, thanks to a useless Congress intent on blaming the victims in a financial crisis they helped create and have bent over backwards working to prolong. I’d say the chances are close to nil that the House will pass an extension when they return to what’s euphemistically referred to as “work” in their little world, but miracles happen … particularly if you call to complain.

I’ll continue this noxious list next week. Stay tuned.

luv u,

jp