12-01-2006, 07:10 PM | #51 | |
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That naive approach is simply cart before apple, which is my objection to Bush's approach. You don't give democracy to people wanting stability, economic success and who are not educated. You must also engage in a costs benefit approach in light of very limited dollars. An approach of curing the world's ills does not create stability as there is not enough money anywhere to solve ills. For a society to become stable, it needs these things created internally, not externally. First, economic viability, economic freedom and resources or skills which one can market. Without that, that society can never succeed. Second, it needs to have a reason to exist. Many of the world's nations have been forced together unnaturally by colonial powers. Artificial nations are less likely to last. Third, the internal structure of governance must mature as the people become more educated. Fourth, the society must protect itself from outside predators. It is naive, costly and will not ever succeed to think we can solve any or most of Africa's problems. It is a collection of feudal nations, a greatly illiterate populace, with badly allocated resources, and horrible governments. The naive police advocated since Carter will simply send our nation reeling sooner than natural causes will incur it. We cannot impose civility in the Sudan, Somalia or any where else for that matter. Until the internal population consent to be governed, no amount of police force can succeed. Until the people consent to governing themselves intelligently, no amount of AIDS expenditures will succeed. I doubt many of those cultures will survive, as they lack the internal characteristics for them to survive.
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12-01-2006, 07:30 PM | #52 | |||||
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( NOTE: I had to delete your first quote and part of others, apparently there is a limit to how many characters there can be in one post, lets call it an "anti-blow hard" device)
I know you keep wanting to bring the conversation back to AIDS only, but as I said before I am now talking about a larger point nad have been for several posts now. What I then tried to explain, and maybe not succinctly, is that the larger point still may tell us somethign about your point. Let me see if I can be more clear and anwer your questions. 1. The larger point is that many who believe that it is not for us to solve Iraq's problems believe that we should try to solve Africas problems. 2. A narrower point is that putting troops in the Sudan would present many of the same challenges that being in Iraq has, that is, there is an ongoing civil war involving muslim arabs and it is certain that at least one side of that fight would not welcome us. 3. Moving back to the big picture, we went to Iraq for selfish reasons and, finding no WMD, have stayed for what I believe are a mix of noble and selfish purposes. What we are learning is that our good intentions in trying to give democracy to Iraq have not been well recieved, that the gift is not particularly wanted, that our idea of what is rational is different from theirs and that it is very difficult to bring about the desired outcome. Speaking broadly, we are learning that not only can we not solve the problem, we cannot even really identify a problem that Iraqis think needs addressing. What does this teach us about trying to "fix" Africa in any sense? That we cannot expect help, that our efforts will at best not be appreciated and at worst we will be blamed for any problems that result, that our help may not be wanted and that we may not be able to affect the desired outcome anyway. You aren't going to hear me say that these are reasons not to attempt these things in either case and I have said over and again that I think we should help with AIDS because of the innocent victims. My bottom line point is that many who seem to believe that we shouldn't attempt to fix Iraq want us to fix Africa, what I am insinuating I suppose is that one they find politically objectionable and the other not but there is no consistency as to where we ought to intervene as a general principle. As I say, that is a point which is a step removed from talking about AIDS, except to the extent I have already said. Quote:
If what you are talking about is putting troops on the ground (which is where I have been trying in vain to move the conversation) to save lives in Darfur, then we are back to my point that this is apples to apples to Iraq in many ways. Quote:
At last, I've gotten through! My point is EXACTLY that it is ironic that so many are fatalistic about Iraq but optimistic about Darfur. I don't think I have advanced a plan or said we should NEVER put troops there, I have just been pointing out that it is not remarkably different in terms of the challenges we will face to those we now face in Iraq. The position you have adopted is consistent and I'm certain I have said on this board in the past that I think it is the correct one. Quote:
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The second part does not have a single answer, but they are all easy answers. We don't invade North Korea because they already have nukes and are a client state of nuclear China. Saudi Arabia we don't invade because, at least nominally, they are our partner and whereas we seem have had some success in modifying their behavior (though of course not always and of course we have failed in important areas) we never modified Saddam's behavior. Last, invading Iran is impossible for two reasons: (a) we don't have the military capability to do it and (b) we have learned in Iraq that in the short term you lose more lives in an invasion than you do to a WMD. This is a lesson we will unlearn instantaneously if one ever goes off in a US city. The reality is that if the political will existed, we could also invade Iran. Let us hope that the events necessary to create that will never come to pass. Don't we also have the same interest in ending poverty in Mexico? Don't we have that same interest in a hundred different things around the globe? As you assert these interests, aren't you guilty of the same selectivity of application you accuse me of above? Isn't it true that our politics inform how and where we apply our principles, or worse.......maybe they are post-hoc rationalizations. :-) Hmmmm. Perhaps we aren't as different as it would seem.
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The Bible tells us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go. -Galileo Last edited by UtahDan; 12-01-2006 at 07:39 PM. |
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12-01-2006, 07:33 PM | #53 | |
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12-01-2006, 07:38 PM | #54 |
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