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Respect should never be confused with immunity.
We should respect U.S. soldiers, but we should never be afraid to criticize the ones who commit war crimes.
We should respect the president, but never be afraid to protest when he does something we deem immoral.
We should respect America, but we should never let a misconceived notion of patriotism keep us from practicing non-violent resistance when we feel like our country is on the wrong side of history.
It's so easy and comforting to blindly adhere to dogma or to practice some form of idolatry: nationalism, military worship, cult of personality worship or a blind worship of one of the isms. But to do so is a shameless act of selfishness or blissful ignorance. A healthy society cannot survive if people quit thinking for themselves. Individual thought and principled dissent will always be two of the strongest defenses against tyranny and injustice.
Over the years, I have come to respect -- although not always agree with -- the so-called neoconservatives and their unacknowledged, yet important liberal interventionist allies.
It seems clear, despite the skepticism of anti-war groups,the advocates of the United Nations Responsibility to Protect doctrine, seem genuinely passionate about preventing mass attrocities carried out by war criminals in foreign lands. I remain convinced that the aims of these groups go beyond cynical economic opportunism.
Too often malicious dictators have shielded themselves from accountability by invoking their country's "right" to sovereignty. And history provides us with many examples when country's have turned a blind eye to genocide occurring in foreign lands.
Mere common sense should tells us that it's absurd to let a vicious dictator systematically kill his own people because it's allegedly "wrong" for one country to insert itself into another country's internal affairs. Such absolutist, utopian fantasies have no place in our complex world.
Yet, the pro-interventionist groups like the Weekly Standard and their liberal allies at the New Republic sometimes seem too willing to call for a U.S. intervention before a clear plan has been developed to assure at least a reasonable chance of success. After all, the reporters for these news magazines will not be the ones implementing the inveitably complex strategies that underly efforts to facillitate regime change in said country.
Recently, both news magazines have featured articles urging the Obama administration to do more to stop the malicious repression the Syrian regime is inflicting upon its own people.
In its editorial, the New Republic correctly pointed out the success limited U.S. interventions achieved in Bosnia, Kosovo and East Timor -- although it conveniently failed to mention our countries shameful policy toward East Timor up until 1999.
It also cited the United States role in helping the Libyan resistance overthrow tyrannical dictator Muammar Gaddafi as another example of the effectiveness of limited U.S. intervention, even though the end results of that act have yet to be determined. After Gaddafi's death, groups of miliitias, some of them featuring people who actively fought the now defunct Gaddafi government, have been involved in lawless acts. While I still think Gaddafi's ouster was a good thing, it also has shown how people in the news media can be too quick to declare success after a dictator has been overthrown. As Iraq and Afghanistan, and now Libya have proven, the aftermath of the overthrow can be just as messy as the acts that facilliated the overthrow itself.
On the other side, anti-war groups and commentators are right to highlight reasons a U.S. intervention could prove too costly and, therefore, not worthwhile. In addition, anti-war critics like Stephen Zunes, Glenn Greenwald and Noam Chomsky -- although I think Chomsky's stance on the U.S. role in the Bosnian conflict is wrong -- do the country a service when they shed light on the times when U.S. was guilty of double standards. Yet, this group also has it's faults; paramount among them being the unwillingness to ever believe in the neccessity of U.S. intervention. While the group's skepticism about U.S. aims is often it's greatest strength, it also can be a weaknesses when it blinds them to instances where U.S. has been a key factor in preventing the ongoing of atrocities on foreign lands. Anti-imperialists have a tendency to become just as orthodox in their foreign policy views in as the American nationalists they assail for their unconditional belief in American altruism.
It would refreshing and productive for the people from interventionist and anti-imperialist camps to put their preconcieved ideas aside and come together from some honest, cordial debate about the pros and cons of U.S. intervention. It would be wonderful to have magazines featuring the views of both sides -- with open-minded arguments that didn't tip-toe around the truth for partisan advantage or ideological self-assurance. Such genuine discourse would be a breath of fresh air in our increasingly polarized country.
It's every American citizen's responsibility to stay informed about the major issues of the day.
It's one of the sacrifices we should be willing to make to continue living as free citizens. And staying up to snuff on broad-reaching American policies is a small sacrifice when compared to the U.S. soldiers who battled the Nazis in World War II or the Continental Army soldiers who suffered through the brutal winter in Valley Forge in 1777-78.
Still, the angry world of politics can be exasperating at times and sometimes I find myself confining my political intake to small doses for mental health reasons. I'm not offering that up as an excuse for my lack of willpower. The fact that I haven't rigorously studied the underlying factors and nuances that underlie some of the nation's most pressing issues -- terrorism, health care reform, illegal immigration, the economy -- is my fault and I take full responsibility for my lack of knowledge.
All I'm saying is that more people would be willing to follow politics if the culture wasn't so toxic. The most frustrating thing about American politics is how it tends to bring out the worst in people. There is something about the atmosphere that plays on people's primitive tribalistic instincts. The whole process often seems like an incessant maelstrom brimming with anger, cynicism, hypocrisy, arrogance and chauvinism.
While characterizing someone who disagrees with you as evil isn't a strategy solely confined to politics, it does seem especially pervasive in this environment. Outwardly at least, there seems to be a refusal among certain politicians and media pundits to reconcile with the fact that just because somebody differs with you in opinion on some issue doesn't automatically mean they are an evil person. This knee-jerk willingness to depict a political foe as a arrogant, perfidious or worse is a dangerous form of zealotry that, with the right spark can set off a political prairie fire that cannot be controlled. And some folks seem all too willing to be the ones to light the match.
Now it could be that much of the heated rhetoric we see on television is merely for show; a clever way to court voters back home. But even is this is the case in some instances, it still promotes the illusion of an ugly, combative culture that has people grabbing their remote controls to see what else is on the tube.
Politics doesn't have to be this way. People can disagree on a number of issues and still remain cordial to each other if they remain vigilant of their own emotional tendencies. Constant anger and cynicism isn't healthy for anybody. Polticians need to make a bipartisan committment to tone down the anger and macho posturing and start acting like the adults that they are.
From my parents backyard, I could sometimes see an old couple walking their dog in the park that lay behind our house.
The dog was a mangy, raggedy looking thing -- not the kind of dog that is oohed and aahed over by teenage girls and young children. Yet, I had no doubt that the dog was loved. Just knowing that an ugly, bedraggled dog like that had found owners who cared for it enriched my soul in a way no fancy car or flashy shirt could ever do.
Rarely have I witnessed something so innocent and good. To be able to watch that couple slowly and deliberately take that scruffy, ugly-looking animal around the park brought tears to my eyes. If only the rest of the world could be so beautiful, I thought to myself
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John Raese is the latest person to use the Nazi card to denigrate government policies he's opposed to.
Raese, a West Virginia businessman running for U.S. Senate, equated having to put a huge sticker on his buildings declaring them smoke-free environments to Jews being forced to wear the Star of David in Nazi Germany.
"Remember, Hitler used to put the Star of David on everybody's lapel, remember that? Same thing," he said
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While we may never know exactly what happened that day, one this is clear: The death of Trayvon Martin is a tragedy.
The death of the African American teenager at the hands of George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old Hispanic, has not only cast the spotlight on the state of racial relations in his country, it has also put "Stand Your Ground" Laws under the microscope.
Zimmerman, who was a member of the neighborhood watch in his Florida community, claimed he shot and killed Martin in self-defense. Since there were no bystanders around when the confrontation between the two took place, disproving Zimmerman's story may pose a challenge. After all, the one person who could offer an alternative to his account is dead
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Democratic operative Hilary Rosen has taken a lot of heat lately for comments she made about Ann Romney.
Rosen commented that Ann Romney, the wife of presumed Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, "has actually never worked a day in her life."
Rosen's remarks were in response to Mitt Romney saying that his wife was helping him understand the challenges women face in today's economy
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The U.S. battle against terrorists should be renamed the War on some Terrorism.
While it is true that U.S. forces are bravely combating vile terrorist forces, they have also worked with a group that is listed as a terrorist organization by the State Department.
According to Seymour Hersh, members of the Mujahideen-e-Khalq, a dissident group in Iran, were trained by the Joint Special Operations Command, the Pentagon's covert intelligence operation, at a site in the Nevada desert sixty-five miles northwest of Las Vegas with the approval of the Bush administration. The MEK was one of many dissident groups receiving U.S. intelligence in Iran with the goal of creating internal chaos in the country. The Bush adminstration used these groups to collect intelligence -- presumably about whether the Iranian regime was trying to develop a nuclear weapons -- and engage in anti-regime terrorist activities within the country. Hersh reports that the training appears to have been stopped by the Obama administration
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Conservatives love to assail liberals for allegedly promoting moral relativism. The criticism implies that liberal encouragement of "subversive" ideas has done great harm to American culture.
Rick Santorum is the latest right winger to indulge in this conservative shibboleth. According to Salon magazine, Santorum blamed our liberal-tainted culture for the Catholic priest child abuse scandal. Yes, you heard me right.
While most reasonable people placed the blame on the priests who abused innocent children and the enablers who covered up their crimes, Santorum identified liberalism as a guilty party in this shameful scandal
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Our system of government is broken. And it will remain broken until the Tea-Party wing of the Republican Party learns to compromise.
Too many Republicans view any sort of negotiation or accomodation with the Democrats as an act of betrayal. Compromise is not traitorous, it's an essential part of the governing process. Without compromise, nothing would ever get done.
While Democrats should be willing to consider making cuts in Medicare and Social Security, they have no incentive to do this until Republicans agree to raise taxes on the rich. Liberals know how wimpy they would look if they caved in to conservative demands for budget cuts without getting anything in return. Their base supporters would accuse them of being no better than Republicans when it comes to favoring the privileges of the few over the needs of the many
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