John a few points.
1. But there are arguments about many of these countries as to whether the term "fascist" is appropriate. It's a combative term; not particularly helpful as an analytical tool.
Fascism. Is there another word? Fascism is not an attractive thing, anymore than is pederasty. We know what it is. We've discussed it here on the board. This guy was an expert on fascism and I don't think the Salafists, Hindu extremists, Baathists would disagree one wit with the sentiments:
" Fascism, ? believes neither in the possibility nor the utility of perpetual peace. It thus repudiates the doctrine of Pacifism -- born of a renunciation of the struggle and an act of cowardice in the face of sacrifice. War alone brings up to its highest tension all human energy and puts the stamp of nobility upon the peoples who have courage to meet it.
"Fascism, now and always, believes in holiness and in heroism?.
" ?Fascism combats the whole complex system of democratic ideology, and repudiates it, whether in its theoretical premises or in its practical application. Fascism denies that the majority, by the simple fact that it is a majority, can direct human society; it denies that numbers alone can govern by means of a periodical consultation, and it affirms the immutable, beneficial, and fruitful inequality of mankind, which can never be permanently leveled through the mere operation of a mechanical process such as universal suffrage....
...Fascism denies, in democracy, the absur[d] conventional untruth of political equality dressed out in the garb of collective irresponsibility, and the myth of "happiness" and indefinite progress....
"The foundation of Fascism is the conception of the State, its character, its duty, and its aim. Fascism conceives of the State as an absolute, in comparison with which all individuals or groups are relative,
?the Fascist State is itself conscious and has itself a will and a personality -- thus it may be called the "ethic" State....
...The Fascist State organizes the nation, but leaves a sufficient margin of liberty to the individual; the latter is deprived of all useless and possibly harmful freedom, but retains what is essential; the deciding power in this question cannot be the individual, but the State alone...."
B. Mussolini
fordham.edu
Islamists and Hindutva types would replace 'state' wiith 'umma' or such like term, is all.
I will not allow you to deprive me of useful vocabulary for reasons of gentility. What the hell am I supposed to call it?
We discussed fascism and its charateristics in these movements here on this thread about a year ago and fleshed out its overarching themes.
2. More democracy would certainly help but I don't think it works well to impose it by military force.
What was done 9/11 has to lead to some re-thinking about that. The 9/11 attack is seen in the areas it came from, as a challenge to modernity both by pro-modernist and anti-modernist folk. It has broken things open. No sensible person in ME or South Asia thinks Afghanistan operation is the beginning and end of the miltary response, (although the anti-moderns and status quo ante folk wish for that). Most operations agains al Qaeda won't be miltary in nature. Modernists in the Gulf area have made facilities available to the US for the very reason they want a military response and some imposition of democracy (and of course because they need protection for their own democratizing project).
The longer such a project is delayed, the bolder and more organized the islamofascists become and the more likely Hussein's fascism gets a nuclear life extension. The longer the delay, the greater the chance of these fragments coalescing.
If you are proposing a long term project to encourage democracy, fine.
I don't see a US invasion of Iraq going to be particularly useful long term unless it does lead to such a thing.
The US record on that score is a far from stellar one so one place to start would be to go back and rethink our own support for anti-democratic forces.
It was pretty good in Europe apart from Spain and Portugal. Managed OK in Peurto Rico. Things turned out not badly in Asia apart from Indochina and N Korea. The rest was badly coloured by the Cold War. The US would not have touched these regimes had it not been for the Soviet communists (and, I suspect, would have been fairly energetic at some point in actually pushing them to be democratic but that's speculation and it's water under the bridge). Since the end of the Cold War, when the West (especially the US) periodically wakened from its somnolence it encouraged regimes to be democratic and did provide some help in that direction. Personally, given the difficulties, I don't think the US did badly.
3. I remain convinced that the one clear use of US military force right now, in so far as it works, is to counter the Al Qaeda and affiliates threat. I also think a case can be made for its use in Iraq. I finally come out on the other side when all is said and done on it but I don't find such arguments unreasonable.
Actual military action against al Qaeda itself will be a very small thing.
4. Finally, the large amount of US resources your program requires would be better put to use helping renew the US safety net, taking care of the medically uninsured, paying down the deficit that the Bush folk are now creating.
The US safety net, by which I assume you mean making sure the very young and old, and disabled are looked after, can best be helped with economic policies leading to great prosperity. The biggest bang for the buck in this area would be low taxes, no tariffs, no subsidies to ag or industry, because lots of money would then be available to pay for these things. I don't understand this obsession folk have with government deficits because they're just not a big deal. What is a big deal is having conservative fiscal policy and not very activist monetary policy. Deficits can look after themselves. Oh, yes! Lots of immigrants from Iraq would be helpful, also.
How the US would sort out its priorites with respect to social programs gets tricky and wildly OT on this thread.
5 I'm definitely in favor of helping development in other countries, both economic and political along, but the terms under which the US can be of help are, my favorite saying, complicated.
We've been here before. I think we agree on at least this much: eliminating tariffs and subsidies would help underdeveloped countries enormously because then a lot of their industry and agriculture would then be viable. State department actually has some programs through affilited orgs which useful in terms of helping develop democratic institutions. Where it operates outside the ME, the UN has some pretty good experience now in helping countries recover from civil wars these might be supported unilaterally; Actually, I seem to have come across at some point or another where it was doing that -my memory may yet come alive. |
