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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bilow who wrote (8787)	11/3/2001 9:45:54 PM
From: JohnM	Respond to of 281500

The left wing never did give much credence to the universality of human abilities. That's why they believe that people need their "help". They feel the same way about human nature, hence the (frequent!) argument that even though they themselves are evidently moved by force, the enemy is immune. And a hello to you, Carl. As for Chomsky, I have no need to defend his arguments. I can see that arguments about the Sudan are as complicated as those about most other places on the globe. My only point about his argument is its structure and that is if one wishes to count the costs of a bombing one need look at the consequential effects on places, peoples, whatever beyond the immediate event. As for your quote about the "left wing" I certainly don't recognize those assertions. If you wished to argue that the left is generally, but not always, about issues concerning the just distribution of resources, then I could agree. John

To: Bilow who wrote (8787)	11/3/2001 10:45:09 PM
From: arun gera	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

>You might as well argue that when the local Safeway is damaged by excessive snowfall and closes for 3 months worth of repairs it means that the people who used to shop there are going to go hungry.>> Carl: Maybe Sudan bombing is not the best example. But Chomsky's point seems valid and important. Indirect damage matters! Ask the firemen and cops who perished in the WTC. By some twisted logic it may be argued that they were not in the building when the planes struck the WTC and and their deaths could have been avoided, just like those Sudanese who might have died because of lack of affordable drugs (these things do happen in many countries where there are no safety nets such as social security and medicare.) Another example. Are you going to count the deaths of the postal workers in the anthrax cases as victims of terrorism? But theoretically they could have been saved by Cipro administered at the right time. And Cipro is pretty affordable in US. Remember again, there are few safety nets such as medicare, social security, and insurance in countries such as Afghanistan. I would have thought that after the 911 terrorist strike, we would understand the plight of the innocent victims in other countries a little better. Whether you are hit by a hijacked plane or a bomb dropped out of a B-52, the results are pretty devastating to both directly hit and those closeby. And deaths are not the only form of suffering. Being uprooted and made a refugee has its long term suffering and damage, maybe even an early death. How many of us in US have ever even worried if our house will be flattened by a bomb?. Just imagine if you lost everything that you had in your house and had no insurance and had to use all your money to drive across Canadian borders. The suffering that Afghani refugees are facing right now is obviously much worse. In some ways some of that suffering may be unavoidable after the 911 terrorist attack. But for sake of all our humanity, at least acknowledge that it is suffering. Imagine if the terrorists dropped a bomb with radioactive material on to Manhattan. Would we not be sympathetic to the resulting cancer patients in New Jersey 10 years later? Wouldn't they be counted as victims of the attack. Why are so many us in USA so eager to bomb the hell out of other countries without understanding fully the reasons? Is it because our civilian populations have never been bombed?