Libertarian Populism - a sellable repackage?

[Frediano]

Bush 41 to Saddam, after Saddam takes Kuwait: "This aggression will not stand."

Bush 41, wih a coalition of international forces, boots Saddam out of Kuwait. The Road to Basra fleeing North is a turkey shoot-- a brutal boot on the throats of the perps.

Credibility.

Look how long that credibility lasted; it was immediately squandered in Somalia. We go in all 'Project Restore Hope', get bloodied, then flee, apologizing, "We don't really mean it; Africa, you are on your own." Every two bit thug in the world-- including Saddam, who was just kicked out of Kuwait, is reassured. The West is the West after all; Gulf War I was an abberration. The West really doesn't mean it.

This is the Western disease, since Vietnam. Reagan in Beirut. We're here only for a show of force...not actual force. Bloody us, and these colors not only run, but in style-- in massive C5 Galaxys. When we enforce 'No Fly Zones' in Iraq in our 30 million dollar fighter planes, it is mainly to take pictures of Saddam's forces rolling up on those who we promised we'd have their back when they revolt against a tyrant. This is not a defect of our military, but of the clueless civilian command who abuses it from afar.

For another brief moment -- 2003, credibility was restored. But the hand wringing, nervous propitiation and apologies and self internal flaggellation soon reassured the thugs "The West we know is back; they really don't mean it. The West is ... emminently doable."

And, here we are today, throwing our crabspreadfests at Renaiissance Weekend events, tsk-tsk-tsking about the M.E., and pretending that we'll be able to face down in Baltimore what we were unwilling to face down in Baghdad.

The Western Disease is, a unilateral desire to get on with modernity unmolested and unchallenged, as if freedom was free. We are content to yield 99% of the world to thugs, as long as the thin, resort crust that surrounds those interntional airports -- what AMericans call 'overseas' -- remain open and in business.

As if.

[Frediano]

Well written.

I have some small differences with some of your statements in # 22.

However, these sad, stumbling efforts to effectively subdue certain African populations have eventually failed purely due a lack of will.

The Dutch, and for a time, the French, had the will. No longer.

The Mahdi story/theme works quie well in the Dark Continent.

A...

The problem isn't limited to just the failures in Africa....the problem is, the message those failures send to every two bit thug in the entire world. Lessons not only not learned, but ... catastrophic for the West lessons learned by the thugs.

The West can (and must) act selectively, not broadly-- making it all the more important that when it does act, it does so effectively-- with overwhelming force, with absolute certainty in the outcome. Else, by acting inneffectively in front of the whole world , the West aggravates the need in the future to act. Better to do less-- and do it effectively -- then to attempt more and do it poorly.

The West -was already deployed- into Somalia.

The West -was already deployed- into Rwanda.

Then what? We thought we could finesse the show of force into an exercise only?

Our nervous deployment of force-- our unilateral wish to make these things only a -show- of force-- 'limited' strikes, and so on, is entirely counterproductive and themselves accelerants of geopolitical chaos.

What the West needs to do -- if it is not already way too late to dig out of its credibility hole -- is to have a very high hurdle for action, but when that hurdle is reached, to act decisively, with overwhelming force. Not to fight 'limited' conflicts, but to enter them with overwhelming force as an 800 lb gorilla-- to not even pause to pick up the pieces in its wake, to humanely end them at the earliest possible opportuity because of that overwhelming force.

To act credibly...and so, minimize the need for future deployments of force, because of that credibility. A lack of credible use of force is precisely the invitation for ever more need to deploy force.

We are too quick to act...and too unwilling to act decisively when we do act. We want it both ways. Example: Jimmy Carter sending F15s to Saudi Arabia during Gulf crisis, then announcing to world "Don't worry---they aren't armed." (!?!?!?!?!?!!?)

Sending armored APCs to Rwanda ... months late, because we needed to paint them all white. Why? To show how benign a vehicle with a mounted M2/.50 cal can be? Who are these people who think like this?

[Selene]

Sending armored APCs to Rwanda ... months late, because we needed to paint them all white. Why? To show how benign a vehicle with a mounted M2/.50 cal can be? Who are these people who think like this?

Agreed.

I focused on Africa because it is topical.

The Ugly American was a serious exposure of the incompetent global policy of foreign aide, corrupt ambassadorships and fundamental criminality by the US foreign corps.

The novel takes place in a fictional nation called Sarkhan (an imaginary country in Southeast Asia that somewhat resembles Burma or Thailand, but which is meant to allude to Vietnam) and includes several real people, most of whose names have been changed. The book describes the United States's losing struggle against Communism—what was later to be called the battle for hearts and minds in Southeast Asia—because of innate arrogance and the failure to understand the local culture. The title is actually a double entendre, referring both to the physically unattractive hero, Homer Atkins, and to the ugly behavior of the American government employees.

In the novel, a Burmese journalist says "For some reason, the [American] people I meet in my country are not the same as the ones I knew in the United States. A mysterious change seems to come over Americans when they go to a foreign land. They isolate themselves socially. They live pretentiously. They're loud and ostentatious."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ugly_American

Now, half a century later, this mutt is the ugliest American of all...no one, except his inner guards, his adoring fan base and certain "racially and 'progressive' Congressional constituencies" have basic loyalty to 'the one."

I have always been a proponent of the basic theory, that, if, you, as the Executive, limited by the Constitutional's powers, has time to act, it is your Constitutionally directed responsibility to get a declaration of war from the Article I branch, or, shut up.

shall have a declaration of war, or, you need to mind your own business.

[Frediano]

I agree; should be a high hurdle to act, and then when that hurdle is reached, the perps and their hovels need to be bouncing in the air as hard and as fast as can possibly be made to happen. It should be an awful, terrible thing when that hurdle is reached. As terrible as we can make it and then some, so that it is effective in achieving the high hurdle goal, and so for as brief a time as is humanly possible-- not drawn out. I think an unintended consequence of embracing the flawed concepts of 'limited war' and 'limited strikes' etc is, not only are they inneffective and counter productive, but they increase the liklihood of our national acceptance of 'limited war' and 'limited strikes.' They are what I call 'gesture megapolitics.' NO FLY ZONES. Missions to Africa where our only mission is to protect ourselves in uniform in front of folks desperate for protection. If we're not going to put boots onto the throats of perps, then don't go; we can throw more effective parades safely at home, and instead of actually demonstrating our unwillingness to act effectively, we would at least keep that fact well hidden and he question, if any, unanswered. Our inneffective actions overseas are -reassuring- the enemies of freedom, not discouraging them from future aggression.

After decades -- long since Vietnam, when we -should- have learned the lesson-- perhaps it is finally starting to sink in. This nation has finally grown tired of ill defined inneffectual limited actions that produce no positive outcomes.

If we're going to do it, then do it. If not, then don't. This unilateral Third Way/half assed declaration of 'limited' engagement nonsense is somebody smoking dope. It is naive, not nuanced.

[Selene]

If we're going to do it, then do it. If not, then don't.

Completely agree.

According to the one (1) [Ellen ] book that I have read about Patton's troops that were supposedly "wasted" by his "blood and guts" tactics, alledged that he apparently had the lowest per capita casualties of any comperable unit sized unit in WWII.

A...

[Frediano]

If we're going to do it, then do it. If not, then don't.

Completely agree.

According to the one (1) [Ellen ] book that I have read about Patton's troops that were supposedly "wasted" by his "blood and guts" tactics, alledged that he apparently had the lowest per capita casualties of any comperable unit sized unit in WWII.

A...

My father(deceased in 2009 in his 90s) was initially in 5th armored, which was all but destroyed in Holland, and finished the war in Patton's 2nd Armored, so I benefitted from Patton's tactics. My father returned from the war, and a result was me.

[caroljane]

My father was also in Holland, with the 8th New Brunswick Hussars, after Italy and North Africa. I don't think "protect your troops" was much of an option for the Canadian commanders,I can't respect Patton because of his pro-Nazi policies during the Occupation, but I acknowledge his military genius and am also here because together we won the war.

Dad died aged 60 in 1984. My mother always blamed it on the tank fumes he inhaled as a turret gunner from 1940-45.

He disliked guns and never went hunting, even with his brothers and Legion buddies, in civilian life.

[Frediano]

Drones fall under the classification of 'limited strikes.' They are too easily accepted by the population. We think of them as effective, because all we are risking is hardware. SOmebody packs their lunch, sits at a console and plays video games, conducts war over the horizon, drives home at 5:00 to play with the kids. But it allows our nation, on our behalf, to be wreckless with force, in undeclared constant war, with little drag on the process.

Right now, this very moment, do Americans realize how many drones are deployed worldwide in our name?

10s? 100s? 1000s? 10000s?

The answer is no doubt 'classified' but is also no doubt neither 10's nor 100's...

And coming to a neigborhood near you. Look up the unclassified Lockheed Martin "Audacity" program, and check out the second page of the brochure. The image is of a town in the UK near Farnborough, UK airbase... Indeed; who put the 'city' in Audacity?

Speaking of drag on the process, don't be fooled by the giant Global Hawk in the background; more like http://www.draganfly.com/

Unintended consequences of letting our government wage undeclared war in our name.

[syrakusos]

Blah, blah, blah...

All I have read in this topic thread is an over-intellectualizing about other people that ignores each and every one of your own individual experiences. (Well. except for Daunce, of course...)

"Oh, yes, indeed! I am Howard Roark (or Dagny Taggart), but what do I have to say to convince Hopton Stoddard or Kip Chalmers or Betty Pope -- or the lesser Hillary Clinton or the nascent John McCain next door..."? Hillary Clinton started in Youth for Goldwater. Do you imagine that she made a single tragic error in judgment and would really be an Objectivist (or at least a Libertarian Party candidate) if only someone could pronounce the magic words? Youth for Goldwater was her introduction to power politics.

Billions of people believe something, anything, or nothing, for reasons that are intractable to you. You cannot get inside their heads and remake them. Even to want to do so is the very same motive of the Grand Inquisitor to prevent people from straying from your version of the Ultimate Truth.

I am fully and completely an Objectivist. I also understand that I live on a planet of people who are not. I join with my Left comrades Alan Sokal and Christopher Hitchens in wanting to open everyone else's eyes to the marvels and splendors of the rational universe. But I appreciate the fact that until and unless that happens, I am going to buy gasoline from a Muslim,and pay a Christian to repair my plumbing.

[Selene]

Wow...you are such a touchy feely Objectivist that I got shivers up my spine.

And you are so open and diverse that you would actually buy gasoline from a Muslim!!!!!

Wow, I am humbled by your magnanimity.

Next you are going to embrace an anthropomophic basis for any change in weather.