2003-03-04|12:31 a.m.
I�ll open with a recent M joke:
My mom, who is a super right wing Christian, and I are watching some TV show and someone comes on and makes fun of Bush.
Mom: It must be hard being president. It seems like a really thankless job.
Me: Yeah, you get a BJ and lie about it and they never shut up about it.
And now for something completely mundane, my opinion of the war:
For national leaders, the definition of US policy as a fulfillment of a higher mission could assist in the mobilization of resources. Everything else being equal, citizens preferred to believe that their efforts were serving some noble purpose rather than material self-interest. Ideology could also provide leaders with weapons for weakening and silencing domestic opposition. Objections to official policy would not merely express disagreement on tactics or strategy; they would constitute disloyalty.
That excerpt was from the book Talons of the Eagle by one of my brilliant and wonderful professors, Peter Smith, from the chapter titled �Gospel of Democracy.� It startled me when I read it. I had to check the cover again. Yep, this is the book for my US and Latin America relations class, alright. So, why did it sound so familiar?
Because when I read this in Newsweek (that shitty magazine):
At Opryland in Nashville�the old �Buckle of the Bible Belt��Bush told religious broadcasters that �the terrorists hate the fact that ... we can worship Almighty God the way we see fit,� and that the United States was called to bring God�s gift of liberty to �every human being in the world.� In his view, the chances of success were better than good. (After all, at the National Prayer Breakfast a few days before, he�d declared that �behind all of life and all history there is a dedication and purpose, set by the hand of a just and faithful God.� If that�s so, America couldn�t fail.)
And this from Time (that equally shitty magazine):
Blix�one of those rumpled lawyers who always see both sides of a question�could hardly be more different from George W. Bush, a man of clenched jaw and moral clarity.
I keep getting this uneasiness. Moral? For God? Evil? Who is this man? Just last year he thought the continent of Africa was a nation and was saying things like �Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?� Now he is spreading the will of God? I am not one to pick on dumb people. But when that dumb person is deploying over 200,000 troops to kill a bunch of people over the possibility of �weapons of mass destruction� in Iraq, I get nervous especially when he's got the whole God-fearin� nation behind him. Well, at least he�s got that behind him; because just about everyone else in the world thinks we�re a bunch of assholes.
So, I was going to blab on about my opinion on the whole thing in here and then this dude from Duke University wrote this amazing piece about the war being immoral. And he makes all the points, so much more eloquently, I�ve been ranting on to my dear friends (sorry guys, love ya) with for weeks:
- This war isn�t to save the Kurds.
- Killing the people of Iraq won�t help them.
- Killing isn�t moral (see Commandment 6).
- We are not being told the facts and we need to be.
- Bush is a moron (ok, so that�s just from me, but come on, we all have to know it by now!)
And the other stuff that bothers me recently is reading crap like this from the Post:
In another question contained within the same poll, asking whether there was a relationship between al-Qaida and Iraq, 65 percent of the Americans surveyed believe that the two are closely collaborating allies. In fact, there is scant evidence to suggest a linkage in any form, despite unrelenting efforts by the Bush administration to demonstrate otherwise. Indeed, those with a scholarly knowledge of al-Qaida have consistently spoken of al-Qaida's enmity for the secular rule of Saddam Hussein. In propaganda, however, accusation confers nine-tenths of guilt.
Hell, the article goes on to to say that in a recent survey Americans were asked, �To the best of your knowledge, how many of the September 11 hijackers were Iraqi citizens?� The scary thing: only 17% knew the correct answer. None of the hijackers were Iraqi citizens. My sweet Orwell is doing flips in his grave.
So, we are terrified. And I don�t blame my fellow Americans for such (ok, I blame the weirdoes that started duct taping their windows, a little). Those clever politicians play with our emotions like crazy. Think about how stupid that level of threat scale is. What the fuck could you be looking for out there? Oh, shit, a turban wearing dark guy just bought a bag of fertilizer! TERRORIST!!! I am a little perturbed by the idea that keeping your eye open is just a recipe for hate and racism. I just found out that after 9/11 someone in San Diego shot a round into the window of a shop owned by an Arab, who luckily wasn�t there at the time. I just want to hug everyone and say �You�re going to be ok, calm down.�
And it is amazing how quickly we forgot about Afghanistan. Since about a year ago we were all screaming about how all women should have rights especially in those Muslim nations and how scary those pissed off Al Qaida members were. It was all the rage. Now we suddenly care about Kurds (but only the ones in Iraq, forgetting that a shitload of them also occupy countries like Turkey [and about four other countries], our ally, who has a long history of fucking them over. Can everyone say �death squads?�). So, where is that cute little stan country these days?
Its progress is here in an article a dear friend of mine sent me which opens:
Even as attention shifts to Iraq, America needs to be careful not to forget that its work in Afghanistan is just beginning. We have spent billions of dollars and lost precious lives to vanquish the Taliban. Yet the groundwork is being laid in Afghanistan for a regime that may be almost as repressive as the Taliban, particularly with regard to religious freedom. This is occurring with consent and, in some cases, help from the United States. When President Bush meets with Afghan President Hamid Karzai today, he should tell him that it is essential to entrench freedom, not its enemies.�
Yeah, d�j� vu wouldn�t be a pleasant thing.
But, I guess, I could be all wrong. I don�t read The Bible every morning like Bush. I just read the news.
Also, as a final question to you, reader, why the fuck am I doing algebra in political science (ok, so, this doesn�t really apply to, like, the whole world, but you too should be as upset as I am about the answers to my homework looking like this: �Since 0 is less than c is less than 3, q =(3 −c)/5 is a valid probability, so we�re fine. The mixed strategy Nash equilibrium is for the man to go to the fight with probability 3 /5,and the woman to go to the ballet with probability (3 −c)/5. The exact probability, of course, depends on the cost magnitude�)?