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Posted Oct 24, 2002 by djemaelfna
of all aphorisms in life the one that states:'we must learn from history so that we do not repeat history's mistakes' seems the most overlooked and the most appropriate in regard to the middle east.
does the west have any say whatsoever in a middle east peace process.
of course! in a global economy individual countries should lose a measure of their autonomy for the good of a continent/area/region. lose a measure of their autonomy in that no single country should act unilaterally when its decision may affect countries neigbouring and far. generally speaking, through the instruments of the U.N. and U.N. related councils unilateral decision-making rarely happens.
so where does this leave england and the u.s.a and their resolution regarding iraq?
nobody likes saddam hussein. not even the iraqis. outside we can say so. inside iraq you say so at the risk of your own life and that of your family. saddam hussein is a bully but he is the iraqis bully. whether they chose to keep him or get rid of him is their business. if we choose for them, we become the bully.
the parallel learned historically seems to be the rise of hitler and his subsequent invasion of the sudetenland. a good deal of the rhetoric concerning saddam right now centres aound the idea of 'a change of regime'; in retrospect one would have liked to have done the same with hitler. but the real lesson learned from hitler is the one of appeasement. of letting him continue to bully outside the confines of german borders uninhibited. whilst it may have been preferable to rid the world of hitler before sudetenland, to have done so would have been as reprehensible as the reich's act of annexation. i realise that stated in this way a so-called good and just people are constantly exposed to the vagaries of dictators, to the threats and consequences of said threats of bullies; that ultimately in order to remain good and just we must leave ourselves exposed to threats and actions. what appeasement should have taught us is to respond quickly and decisively to aggresive actions. appeasement should have taught us to be on a constant ready-for-war footing with unequivocable rhetoric regarding our strength and resolve in retaliation.
no first strikes.
no pre-emptive regime changes.
when saddam invaded kuwait, the west responded quickly and appropriately. he has been contained ever since. he can rattle his sabres all he wants; sabre-rattling is no reason to shed blood.
how should we regard muslims in the light of recent terrorist actions?
let's not resort to platitudes about the many not being responsible for the few, about the actions of extremists tainting an otherwise decent group of people. whether you are christian, jew, muslim or atheist your actions take on the 'taint' of your belief only as a result of perceived responsibilty from outside your peer group. what this means is that only non-muslims will be the judge of whether or not muslims are perceived as good or bad, and non-muslims will be looking primarily at how the muslim community deals with terrorists within its own ranks. if the general perception is that apathy or a 'laissez-faire' attitude prevails then it will be construed that all muslims are guilty of terrorism by default and there will be (indeed there is currently) the feeling that we must step in.
personally i find it interesting that nearly 1400 years since the birth of islam, certain militant members have decided to wage holy war. this is wholly reminiscent of the knights hospitallers - in their own right terrorists of the 14 th century.
the specific problems of the palestinians and israelis are truly biblical in their complex simplicity. palestinians and israelis share a common ancestor.brother killing brother; how sad and how clearly unavoidable. the mid-twentieth century saw one of the worst periods of prejudice and genocide meted out against the jew. will they have to do the same to the palestinians before they understand the lessons of the holocaust? how much longer will the palestinians have to endure the israelis own policy of lebensraum?
for a meaningful peace to endure, firstly, islam must come fully into the twentieth century. make the separation between mosque and state, liberate women, promote democracy. the israelis have endured much over the centuries and have a right to sovreignty but not at the palestinian's expense. they must relinquish recent homesteads, give the palestinians some real estate, integrate its people into the israeli workforce and promote trade and education.
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Posted Oct 26, 2002 by Rita
This is a very interesting recapitulation of Globalist theory, which in turn is a retreaded version of 16th century Colonialism/Merchantilism theory. This is the root of the problem.
The West needs to come out of the 16th century if they expect Islam to come into the 20th or 21st century since the conflict arises in the West's greed for middle eastern oil and Biblically-based hatred of the Jews. Islamic people haven't threatened the West directly since the time of Suleiman the Magnificent, yet the Europeans have repeatedly threatened Islamic people in conquests of North Africa, Palestine and Mesopotamia among other regions.
This aggressiveness has caused the current problems, this colonialism, now called Globalism continues to threaten the region, and regions all over the world.
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Posted Oct 28, 2002 by tacsatduck- beware the <sheep> lie
Rita can you give me your definition of Globalism (well mabye give me is the wrong way to say it how about could you tell me hmmm  )
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Posted Oct 28, 2002 by Rita
As a practical matter, Globalism means the West or Euroamericans control world trade and the financing or credit that supports it including resource extraction concessions in Third World countries. Some other so-called developed countries share in this system to some extent, but it is primarily controlled by the United States or certain European nations, or at least multinational corporations that originated in the United States or certain European nations.
Did you have another definition?
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Posted Oct 28, 2002 by tacsatduck- beware the <sheep> lie
nicely put...no, not a word I would use myself...I've heard a couple of definitions but it seems to boil down to the same thing...now you say this is the root of the problem
how would you change it (saying you had the power to change it) or would you leave it exactly the same and hope it worked out on it's own
the way it stands now is the reason the west and/or Euroamericans control world trade are they are the ones who are the largest consumers so they naturally supply the direction of demand plus the are the largest producers so they control the direction of supply and as far as credit and financing you have to have money to be able to give credit or finance something so it would be impractical for a developing country to finance things on there own (which is why grants and loans tend to be given out by the UN and Countries around the world) and that one of the first steps on the road for a developing country to kind of get there legs under them is to use resources to sell or develop the country's own infrastructure.
I am just not sure how people want to change it to run
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Posted Oct 28, 2002 by Rita
How would I change it?
First by correcting your misconception about production. Most production, in fact, is not being done in the First World but in the Third because the labor is cheap, comparable to slavery. The same thing applies to resources so the factors of production are all relatively inexpensive.
That means you can import products from these areas at substantial profit, even factoring in costs of distribution. The only drawback is that a lot of the areas are "unstable" meaning you have to maintain a military presence of some sort to insure no interruptions in production. Exploited people tend to get desperate after all. This is fine, from the multinationals' point of view, because they contribute very little to the military services utilized for intervention.
Second, consumption should be reduced, not increased. Most the things First World people "consume" are luxuries, yet that consumption keeps people at work in the developed countries primarily in the fields of marketing, accounting and project management. They have to have these highend occupations to support their credit burdens, among other things.
Speaking of credit, without the 40 billion dollar consumer credit line in the United States, markets would shrink overnight. That's an awful burden to be putting on future generations. Rest assured the debt won't be forgiven if things turn sour. There has been and continues to be a concerted effort at foreclosure that effectively transfers real property to the control of bankers or government.
That is the fundamental problem in most developed nations. The people no longer control the land upon which they live nor can they feed themselves. Therefore, they must rely on the exploitation of Third World labor and industrialized agricultural conglomerates to provide their sustenance. This is one of the reasons modern urban life is so stressful.
If the military superiority could be maintained indefinitely, you might think the system would be sustained as well, but there's a more serious problem related to resource depletion. For that the only military solution is the forcible seizure of known reserves. We're seeing that being acted out right now. After that is accomplished, there's still the matter of finding more reserves, which is getting more and more problematic.
Even if that problem were solved indefinitely, there would still remain the matter of pollution or increased entropy in the earth system. This can't be addressed by locating new resource reserves. It can only be reduced by reducing the throughput of the system. That ultimately would mean less consumption.
Obviously, the global system isn't working for the benefit of the majority of the earth's inhabitants and it will likely adversely effect the minority that benefits now in the future. It's just a question of how long the majority can endure the exploitation and how long the minority can endure their own garbage.
If humans ever get back in balance with their resource range and reestablish local control of resources, these problems may be mitigated. Actually the localized system worked for hundreds of generations and thousands of years. It's only in the last few centuries that the alternative resource intensive system supported by a technologically advanced, highly organized and brutal military presence gained any credence, and I suspect that won't last much longer no matter what people in the developed countries want or demand.
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