Re: The result of central purchasing of vaccine by the Government.
I know that you just made that up.
On another topic, I notice that you don't post much from Thomas P.M. Barnett. Is it because of articles like this:
thomaspmbarnett.com
The doctrine of preemption is in doubt, we are now told. What does that mean? It means that we need to call it something other than preemption. We need to call it something far more descriptive, like rule enforcement, as in, if you do a lot of bad things to your own people and threaten your neighbors and the UN sanctions your ass for years on end, the Core powers should be able to come together and agree in advance, under an explicit shared rule set, to take down your regime at a time and method of their choosing. Why? Because your crappy regime doesn't deserve any "sovereignty."
If the Core comes up with the A-to-Z rule set on how to process politically bankrupt states, then we don't have to resort to things like screaming, "He's got a gun!" as we rush into his criminal lair to handcuff him and haul his ass off to the International Criminal Court.
This article is a fairly stupid one, arguing that the Bush Admin is dissembling now (yet again) regarding its reasons for going to war in Iraq (which, of course, it is doing with even greater fervor). But, you know what? That's not what the article should be about. David Sanger (usually a very good writer) is pretending to do real "news analysis" here, but he isn't. He's just poking holes in the latest flaccid story coming out of the White House, and frankly, hard-hitting journalism should do better.
It's not "thought crime" to display intent to obtain WMD inside the Gap; it's more like a young child reaching for matches. If that sounds paternalistic, then sue me, but I'd rather be a condescending jerk than the guy who sweeps up the body bits after some despot or terrorist lights one up.
Sanger's piece gets better when he brings up the Kerry point on "global test." That was an unfortunate term, but it's basically the right idea. In fact, both Bush and Kerry are right: intent is enough when you have a long track record like Saddam is, but a "test" is equally valid, meaning we need to establish a rule on when consensus is reached among the Core's big powers about it being time to take somebody bad down. So not so much a "global test" as a super-majority of, say, the G-20 deciding that, say, Robert Mugabe sucks big time and the Zimbabean people deserve a better chance than having one-third of their population face malnutrition through the winter.
People write me and ask, "You talk about the G-20 a lot, why not the UN?" I'll tell you why. The UN Security Council just now passed a resolution condemning terrorism against innocent civilians. Just now! As described in the NYT article, the resolution broadly calls upon all 191 member states to "begin a global campaign against terror by prosecuting or extraditing people supporting, facilitating, financing, participating in or attempting to participate in terrorist acts."
As always, the UN is right on top of things, coming up with this killer "resolution" three years after 9/11. Of course, the resolution has no power. None of them really ever do. It's more like a polite request. But it reflects basically what the UN has become: a place where consensus gets codified well after the fact. The U.S., in this administration, has pushed for a far more aggressive global rule set on terrorism, and three years later, that effort is bearing fruit. But that tells you what the UN serves as within the global community: not a leader, but a follower, not an executive, but more a secretary.
The Bush Administration comes off a lot like I do in my briefs: a bit too cocky and arrogant. For me, it's an occupation hazard that often leads the audience to confuse the actor with the act. But frankly, nobody likes the humble visionary, because visions need to be bold and confident to capture people's attention. The same is true for forging new rules. If the Bush Administration had come out with: "Well, we might do this or we might do that? What do you think Europe?" We never would have done anything of note in the past three years.
Have we gone too far? We've certainly set something dramatic in motion in the Middle East, something we can start but can't really finish by ourselves. I don't think that's bad. I think it was needed. But I also think that understanding that we need help to finish what we started is the compelling strategic self-realization we need to make right now. Does that make me wishy-washy? A flip-flopper? Hardly. It means I believe in adaptive planning, or adjusting according to feedback from the environment. We see plenty of signs that the Core is coming along with us in our desire to wage a global war on terrorism. Now that we have that momentum, it's time to synchronize rule sets among the great powers in such a way as to get far deeper buy-in—not to mention internationalizing the Iraq occupation.
What I worry about with a second Bush administration is that the conservatives in general do not follow Bush's lead in his desire to wage a systematic global war on terror. Many are already falling by the wayside, and the "America first" sentiment is rising on the right. That sentiment, coupled with the similar sentiment of the antiwar far left, gets to be a fairly potent package regarding America's tendency—historically speaking—to lapse into isolation when things look tough.
That's why I essentially like Kerry's arguments for a more effective and nuanced approach to waging this conflict, one that admits it will be largely a police action across the Core, which—quite frankly—is what the rest of the Core really wants to hear. Why? Being in the Core should mean defeating terrorism isn't a military matter but more a police one, otherwise, what's the point of achieving membership in this shared community of security interests?
But Bush is right to cast the effort as "war" within the Gap, even though the real goal should be described less as "hunting them down and killing them" and more as the extension of rule sets and strong governments inside the Gap that ultimately take what is today a military situation and turn it into a policing environment down the road.
To me, the real question of this election is: Who is likely to learn the dual nature of that reality first? Is Kerry more likely to come around on the "war" definition inside the Gap or is Bush more likely to come around on the "police" definition inside the Core? And which is more likely to be able to convince fellow Core powers that they see this conflict in that complete, nuanced way?
Given Bush's tendency to define himself as a "war president," and given the state of U.S. relations with the rest of the Core after four years of pedal-to-the-metal, and given the tendency of the far right to pull out as soon as the going gets tough, and given the coterie of neocons inside this administration still gunning for China . . . I have grave doubts about Bush pulling this off in a second go-around.
Meanwhile, I see Kerry being able to rally other Core powers toward greater cooperation, while still being willing to wage the "war" effort across the Gap. The man is both a former prosecutor and a war hero, and that's a nice combination for this point in our history.
When I come down for Kerry, it's not a condemnation of all-that-is-Bush, because—frankly—I like much of what he did over the past four years in response to 9/11. It's more a question of where I think America and this effort need to go over the next four years. When the NYT Magazine profile of Kerry asks—in effect—"Is this guy's vision for defeating terrorism too complex for the American public to understand?" I know I've found my man, because we need complex answers to complex problems in this global struggle against terrorism. Yes, I do worry plenty about Richard Holbrooke as Secretary of State, especially given his tendency to focus on the UN as the answer for everything, but I worry even more about another four years of Colin Powell, whom I consider to be one of the worst SECSTATEs we've ever had.
And so that's how I call it—just like I see it. |
