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My first cousin's husband and family have prepared a book on the family tree on my father's side: basically on the descendants of my paternal (Robertson) grandparents.
This was a lot of work, they've done a great job, and I'm really pleased to have a copy. I hope nothing I say is taken as a mark of ingratitude.
I'm just amused by the attempt to connect us to some aristocratic, land-owning Highlands Scots. Hmmm...if this was us, how did we end up living in southern Alberta during the Depression?
The original male Robertson in our line in Canada was David Robertson, who was born and raised in Scotland and then served in the British army. He was posted in the American colonies, fought on the losing side in the Revolutionary War, and then received land in what is now Ontario. (I can hear some readers of this blog saying "Ah hah!")
The land-owning Robertsons in Scotland are also known by th Gaelic name Clan Donnachaidh, or "children of Duncan." One particular Robert in this clan was given lands by the King of Scotland in 1452. From then on the official clan was known as the Robertsons of Struan. There are also two offshoots, with land, who can trace their descent to the main group.
Ah, but read on. The official story "does not entirely explain the very large number of Robertsons in the Dundee and Peth areas. Probably, apart from the well connected, there were dozens of persons in the area who adopted the name because it was their father's given name, a common practice of the times." And of course, some families were hoping to benefit from some confusion as to whether they were among the "real" Robertsons.
The real kicker: "What connection the family of John Glasgow Robertson and Bessie Chalmers [my grandparents]have to Robertson of Struan is not known at this time. All that is known is that David Robertson, from whom John G. descends, was probably born in Scotland around 1746."
Why does this make me think we are probably descended from the nameless tenant farmers/itinerant labourers/cattle thieves, rather than from the landed barons?
My son saw the map of Scotland, with the Robertson lands well marked, and found this extremely cool.
Great article in the Dec. 15 New Yorker: "Back Roads: How serious is the Bush Administration about creating a Palestinian state?" by Connie Bruck.
This is a serious article both about the specific issues between Israel and the Palestinians, and what the Bush Administration is likely to do about them.
As for the ongoing conflict itself: on the whole Bruck strives to be even-handed as to which side is most at fault in the continuing violence. Arafat's actions at Camp David in July 2000 certainly haunt the narrative of events since then: "Arafat had rejected what was on the table...and, even more inexplicably, had made no counter-proposal." Sharon visited the Temple Mount; and violence escalated.
Thus there is genuine sympathy for the Israeli view that it is the people behind the intafada, with Arafat somehow still at their centre, who are refusing to negotiate. When Israel expands the settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, and builds the new wall along a new frontier, it does so out of self-defence.
On the other hand, several people are quoted to the effect that sooner or later, both kinds of aggression will have to cease. A man named Avi Gil says Bush's "road map" is basically the old Oslo agreement, which admittedly did not work, with specific performance targets. There will have to be a two-state solution, acceptable to both sides, and presumably Israel cannot decide unilaterally that the border between them is going to be much less advantageous to the Palestinians than any that has been discussed previously. "We all know what will be the endgame. But we are getting there with the maximum pain, the maximum blood possible."
The road map involves three phases, and Phase III includes the thorniest issues: Palestinian refugees from what is now Israel, the fate of existing Israeli settlements, and the status of Jerusalem. Phase II includes the provisional borders of a Palestinian state. This new state was tentatively to be established by sometime in 2006.
In other words, there are some pieces in here that the Palestinians want, and Sharon does not. Hence the question in the title: is Bush serious about negotiating hard to achieve some goals that are resisted by Israel's leadership?
The answer seems to be "yes." The article focusses on Elliott Abrams, who was the ultimate Cold Warrior in the Reagan years and is now the ultimate exporter of democracy and, generally, friend of Israel. He has been a leader on the "road map" file, and one question is whether he is prepared to ask Israel to trust the Palestinian leadership, rather than do wha they think maximizes their short-term security. One suggestion is that Abrams agreed with Bush that the Palestinians should be given one more real chance to show their good faith. Phase I of the road map includes a freeze on Israeli settlements in the occupied territories, and the dismantling of outposts built after March 2001. But on the other side, the Palestinians have to undertake comprehensive political reform, draft a constitution, and hold elections. Above all, there must be a group or individual who can both speak for the Palestinians and control the terrorists who have been attacking Israel. This came to be treated as the first condition to be met. In other words, the Palestinians must make the first move. In effect, just as the Israelis have said, Arafat is treated as someone who can never be negotiated with, and the intifada must stop before Israel is asked to sacrifice anything.
So far this could be read as a kind of cynical trick by people who are pro-Israel, who support Bush, and who want to give the impression that a real effort has been made to achieve peace.
Somewhat surprisingly, however, the article emphasizes that Bush himself has been completely in charge of this file for a long time. He postponed releasing the road map, and many Israelis began to think he was truly on their side, he would do nothing urgently to achieve a Palestinian state. Then he released the road map sooner than they expected, and made it clear that if there is a Palestinian leadership he can negotiate with, he will indeed negotiate with them.
Unfortunately, Mahmoud Abbas/Abu Mazzen did not work out as Prime Minister. (He endeed up being bitter that the Bush Administration did not help him more). In late November 2003, a new Palestinian government was formed under Prime Minister ahmed Qurei/Abu Ala. Bruck says he is "a more accomplished politician than Abu Mazen". A Bush administration official is quoted to the effect that this is what Bush has always wanted--a credible Palestinian leader across the table. The problem with the recent "Geneva" accord, supported by prominent people from both the Israeli and the Palestinian side, is that it tries to get to the "end game" too quickly. Serious people have to negotiate for the two sides, and build confidence in each other. Thus the Bush view has always been consistent; it is the Palestinians who have failed to send effective negotiators to the table.
The same official says there is an important difference between Oslo and the road map: the road map requires that the new Palestinian state be a democracy.
[Update Dec. 20: See also the Washington Post's remarkable criticism of Howard Dean's foreign policy stance, with the explicit and implied praise of Bush along the way. In particular, the Post says "Only [Dean, among the leading Democrats] omitted democracy from his goals for Iraq and the Middle East. And only Mr. Dean made the extraordinary argument that the capture of Saddam Hussein 'has not made Americans safer.'
"Mr. Dean's carefully prepared speech was described as a move toward the center, but in key ways it shifted him farther from the mainstream.... Mr. Dean has at times argued that the United States must remain engaged to bring democracy to Iraq, yet the word is conspicuously omitted from the formula of 'stable self-government' he now proposes."]
There are several passages iin the New Yorker piece stressing that Bush has paid great attention to the details of proposals and counter-proposals. He has made sure that his major statements have all been consistent. The idea of talking about a "Palestinian state," going beyond both Oslo and Clinton, was apparently his alone. He is not asking the Israelis to abandon their security, but he will ask them to negotiate when there is a real opportunity to do so.
I still don't understand what happened when there was a cease-fire, including an apparent agreement that the Palestinians would track down terrorists, with help from Israel on finding hide-outs. Suddenly, it seemed, Israel started taking out terrorists on its own, and the cease-fire was over.
As Mark Steyn points out in the Spectator, "there has been a noticeable decline in the number of suicide bombings against Israel, suggesting the intifada is having some problems without its sugar daddy."
More surprisingly, Christopher Hitchens says in a recent interview, in which he blames all the monotheistic religions for spreading hate, that Bush is the best hope for peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians.
"Mr Bush, to his credit, has become the first President to use the term 'Palestinian state'. And he has criticized the building of the wall that both locks in and extends the occupation. Every one of the potential Democratic nominees takes an opportunistic pro-Israeli view that consists of irresponsible pandering. One of my reasons for favoring the re-election of the President is that only given a second term is he likely to speak up properly. He shouldn't wait, of course. He should say immediately: 'General Sharon, tear down this wall!' Dream on, you may say. I'm not an optimist here, as you will see from my earlier reply about Armageddon without the Messiah. But I know from experience that none of Bush's liberal and Democratic rivals will even come close to this, and so I am a 'lesser evil' person on this rather crucial point."
(I had a link to this interview somewhere, but I forget where).
Update Dec. 20: The Dec. 15 New Yorker also has an article by Seymour Hersh on the shift in U.S. tactics in Iraq to making greater use of Special Forces. To some extent the Americans are learning from the Israelis in the use of unconventional and aggressive techniques including "preemptive manhunting." Hersh quotes a "former Israeli military-intelligence oficer" at some length. What is essential, he says, is to maintain a network of informants so as to penetrate hostile organizations, and "assassinate or capture potential suicide bombers along with many of the people who recruit and train them."
Then I think the passage that is relevant here:
"Israel has, in many ways, been too successful, and has killed or captured so many midpranking facilitators on the operational level in the West Bank that Hamas now consists largely of isolated cells that carry out terrorist attacks against Israel on their own....There is no central control over many of the suicide bombers. We're trying to tell the Americans that they don't want to elminate the center. The key is not to have freelancers out there."
I take it this means: at least some (probably not all) of today's terrorist leaders must, if there is to be peace, become the statesmen, even the potential Nobel Peace Prize winners, of tomorrow. If you negotiate with them as leaders, they might actually persuade a large number of people to lay down their arms.
Khaddafi may be well on the way to becoming Exhibit A.
This raises questions about the whole idea of war crimes trials, but I'll get to that later.
Update Dec. 22: Partly in response to a meeting with Egypt's foreign minister, Sharon has launched a new diplomatic initiative: promising to dismantle at least some settlements in the West Bank and Gaza if Palestinian militant groups are dismantled, and a halt to hostile acts by Israel if there is a Palestinian cease-fire within a very short time; at the same time threatening to establish a new border unilaterally if progress does not occur. Sharon calls this a contribution to Bush's "road map," not a departure from it.
The Bush administration has responded by saying any unilateral action by Israel at this time is in fact a departure from the road map. Indeed Sharon has failed to comply with some specific first steps in the road map. Richard Gwyn has written in the Toronto Star that Sharon "has just revealed himself as bankrupt of ideas about how to achieve peace".
One big problem is timing: if Sharon takes drastic steps in the next six months or so, this would be the worst possible time for Bush.
A big ending: "Among Middle East experts, it has become the predominate wisdom that real progress toward peace can only be achieved if not just Palestinian Leader Yasser Arafat, but also Sharon, step down as leaders of their nations.
"Sharon, by his lack of imagination and even more by his political amateurishness, has now confirmed the judgment of his critics. Which is why Middle East peace has just inched a little closer."
Gwyn, once again, seems to take seriously President Bush's commitment to the road map, and to peace.
In the debate from January 2003, linked earlier,
John Mueller says:
"Much of [Saddam's] obstruction of arms inspectors seems to arise from his fear that agents among them will be used fatally to triangulate his whereabouts -- a suspicion that press reports suggest was not exaggerated."
This is a helpful suggestion on the mystery of why, if Saddam really had no WMDs, he didn't simply reveal this fact to the world, or to UN inspectors. Mueller reminds us that Saddam was on the run, almost constantly, in the last years of his regime--apparently never spending more than one night in one place. Fearful of everyone, he suspected that any group of visiting experts would be infiltrated by his enemies--and he may have had good reason to think so.
Glenn Reynolds suggests that Dennis Miller is a good spokesperson for the so-called "South Park Republicans".
Some comments on Iraq:
"Explain how the war in Iraq makes sense to you as a response to 9/11."
"Like there's no chance that the secular state of Iraq and Islamic fundamentalists cohabitate? They both think we're Satan. How about that as a nice point of departure for them car-pooling? I wish there was a country called al-Qaedia that we could have invaded, but there wasn't. (Saddam was) the only one who had a home address."
I take this to mean: Iraq may not have been the right place, but close enough.
President Bush, Prime Minister Blair and their supporters have every right to celebrate the capture of Saddam Hussein. There is no reason to doubt the widespread rejoicing in Iraq at the result. The U.S./Coalition did pursue freedom for Iraq, and they did succeed.
Iraqis are enjoying freedom not only from Saddam's regime, but from various fears and bugbears: the apparently common belief that Saddam was some kind of mythological hero, who could not be defeated; and the belief that the U.S. is never much help, and is often harmful, among others.
Normally the only kind of power that would be in a position to do such a thing would be an empire. It is difficult to think of any empire that ever went to such trouble and expense to remove a brutal regime, and then made plans to leave the formerly subjugated people in charge as quickly as decently possible. Gladstone did a great deal to introduce the theme of "national self-determination for subject peoples" into the politics of late Victorian Britain. I don't think he succeeded in doing very much for the Bulgarians or the Balkans. Woodrow Wilson and the League of Nations took up this theme during and after World War I. For a while there was a flowering of European countries matching nationalities--even the Ruthenians. One can debate how much was done on this front during the Cold War. But I can't think of a single case that is comparable to this liberation of Iraq.
I think Stanley Kurtz is also correct in his assessment of how Bush's personal stature has been enhanced:
"A feeling that the president has the courage and resolve to make bold moves and stick with them, even when the going gets tough, will now take root. Nothing that has happened up to now--neither 9/11, nor Afghanistan, nor the actual war in Iraq, compares to the occupation in either difficulty or scale. To have seen this through until a corner was turned means that the president's reputation for leadership has now been deepened immensely. This is something more serious than even the president's "transformation" after 9/11."
Indeed it is commonly being said that any Democratic nominee now faces a daunting task in opposing Bush--and even that the split in American public opinion over the war divides the Democrats far more than the Republicans. William Saletan says in Slate that Dean is not necessarily "toast," the voters might forget accomplishments in Iraq, etc. The President himself has said there is a long hard struggle still to go. But the days of the clueless frat boy seem to be largely forgotten now.
There remain some puzzling things about "Gulf War II," including U.S. motivations (since there is so little evidence that any strategic interest of the U.S. was at stake).
Nick Gillespie says on Reason Online: "The day Saddam was captured was a great day for the Iraqi people, who can now turn more fully to the difficult and daunting task of creating a decent future for their country. Yet whether it's a great day for U.S. foreign policy is a very different matter." "... the removal of Saddam from power, much less his eventual capture, did very little to remove an actual threat against the United States." "...the shift from hunting Al Qaeda to invading and occupying Iraq contravened one of George W. Bush's basic directives. 'No government,' said Bush before the United Nations earlier this year, 'should ignore the threat of terror, because to look the other way gives terrorists the chance to regroup and recruit and prepare.'" (Link via Hit and Run).
Hit and Run re-posts a debate from January 2003 on whether the U.S. should invade Iraq or not. The debate is still of intense interest, I think, and the argument against intervention by John Mueller holds up especially well.
The Iraqi military performed badly, and refused to obey a direct order to stay in the line of fire, in Gulf War I in 1991; military planners "note that Iraq is even weaker now". Saddam demonstrates that he is afraid of his own soldiers, he has long since lost control of Kurdistan in the north, and "the hostility toward Saddam's rule is so great in the Shiite south that government officials often consider the region hostile territory."
If Saddam actually became a threat to Iraq's neighbours, including Israel, they would have the resources to do something about it; if he gave suicidal orders to start a war he couldn't win, this would make it even more likely that no one in Iraq would follow such orders. If the alleged threat to the oil supply is that he would jack up prices, this fear seems to be based on a misunderstanding of how OPEC, with Saddam as an apparently rational member, operates.
"A humanitarian argument could be made for a war against Iraq -- to liberate its people from a vicious tyranny and from the debilitating and destructive effects of the sanctions which the United States apparently is incapable of relaxing while Saddam Hussein remains in power. Such a war would have to be kept inexpensive in casualties, and the United States would have to be willing to hang on for quite some time to help rebuild the nation, something experience suggests is unlikely.
"But calls for war do not stress this argument. Instead, they raise alarms about vague, imagined international threats that, however improbable, could conceivably emanate from a miserable and pathetic regime. In due course, nature (there have been persistent rumors about cancer) or some other force will remove our devil du jour. The situation calls for patient watchfulness, not hysteria."
True to form, Brink Lindsey on the "pro" side emphasizes WMDs and atrocities--none of which, I believe, took place more recently than 1993, and most of which were arguably rational as a means for Saddam to cling to power--alive.
Mueller: "If Saddam does acquire nuclear arms ... it seems most likely that he will use them as all other leaders possessing such weapons have since 1945: to deter an invasion."
[Update: As an aside, Paul Knox says in today's Globe and Mail: "The probable truth is that Iraq hasn't had deployable chemical, biological or nuclear weapons for at least a decade. That would be some comfort to the United Nations teams who spent years under pressure to achieve the logical impossibility of proving a negative."
Mueller again: "The argument connecting Iraq to terrorism is mostly based on arm waving. As Lindsey notes, international terrorists are based all over the world -- in fact, just about everywhere except Iraq. Their efforts are hardly likely to be deflated if Iraq's regime is defeated. Indeed, it seems likely that an attack will supply them with new recruits, inspire them to more effort, and provide them with inviting new targets in the foreign military and civilian forces that occupy a defeated, chaotic Iraq. Lindsey suggests that a war is required to make it 'clear that the United States means business in dealing with terrorism.' I would have thought this was already extremely clear."
Now on to questions for the future. How many insurgents will continue to fight in Iraq with no hope of being led by Saddam or his senior loyalists? To what extent is there a Sunni insurgency that is not closely related to either Saddam or "international terrorists"? Is it going to be possible, in the near future, for Iraq to achieve a peaceful regime, including some kind of co-operation among many different groups? Will this involve qualifying majority rule with some kind of muscular federalism, or regional autonomy?
In any case, it looks now as though Iraq will be substantially better off because of the U.S. and Coalition invasion. Many defenders of the U.S. actions will continue to say there is a larger gain as well. It has been demonstrated that the U.S. will fight for freedom with determination and imagination. This fact may help to spread freedom in the Middle East and elsewhere.
I don't follow sports a great deal. The last time I was truly a big NHL fan was back in Bobby Orr in Boston days. Then I had a period as a CFL, especially Edmonton Eskimos fan. (I remember some of the same games that Colby Cosh does). Living in Toronto I became a big Blue Jays fan beginning in 1983--before they were really a contender. Living in Minnesota during the 1992 and 1993 playoffs, I went crazy.
We became friends with some basketball fans when we lived in the States, and I watched more basketball from 1987 to 1993 than in any other period. T-Wolves and Gophers, neither of them doing very well at that time. March Madness.
Anyway, I've followed the Raptors a bit. Now, with Vince Carter back in good health, and the recent trade with Chicago, I'm getting interested. So are a lot of other people.
Carter is getting more assists than he used to--he has scorers he can pass to. Jalen Rose is getting to play point guard, and he is helping a number of players play their best. Donyell Marshall, who came over in the trade, can make 3's among his other skills. Of course, like other 3-point shooters, he can wax hot and cold.
Toronto gave up some size up front in the trade--there was some concern in the media that they would suffer in rebounding. Rookie Chris Bosh has had to step up, getting a lot more playing time, and he has risen to the challenge. There have been comments that he seems a bit spindly compared to other NBA big men, and he may wear out at his playing time, which will go far beyond what he has experienced before. So far, though, so good.
Some numbers: Before yesterday's game against the Celtics:
Rose had averaged 7.8 assists since the deal, while still drawing more than occasional double teams from the opposing D. And you know it is hard to double both he and Vince Carter, with only five players on the court. In two of the five wins, Rose averaged 20 points, 10 assists, six rebounds, two steals, and a block in 42 minutes.
Marshall had scored 20 or more points in four of the five wins since coming to Toronto, and recorded no fewer than seven rebounds in any of the five. Through all five wins, Marshall averaged 19.5 points, 8.0 rebounds, 2.8 blocks, and 1.5 steals in 39 minutes.
Since the trade, Bosh had averaged 14.6 points, 9.8 rebounds and 1.4 blocks in 37.4 minutes, "cozying himself right up next to LeBron and Carmelo in the rookie watch".
Above all, they are an exciting team. I watched some of the Cleveland game, and the commentator was impressed at Bosh's compusure. He made an offensive rebound; but even better, he dished quickly out to Marshall at the perimeter, instead of rushing a bad shot. Marshall made the three.
In Boston on Friday, the win streak was broken. Rose had a terrible game: a total of 3 points, 1 field goal for 13 attempts (0 for 2 3's), 1 for 1 free throws. But he still got 14 Assists--most for the team. Carter led (naturally) with 35 points--5 for 7 on 3-point shots. He also had rebounds and 4 assists. Donyell Marshall was next with 31 points, 1 rebound, 4 assists. Bosh had 15 points, 5 rebounds, and 3 assists. Lonny Baxter, who also came over from Chicago, stepped up with 13 points and 3 rebounds.
I don't really doubt that there is now a split in the Democratic Party, between the Clinton faction on the one hand, now occupying many important positions in the party, and the Gore-Dean faction, recently united by Gore's endorsement of Dean.
I simply doubt that the split is really ideological, i.e. that Dean is too far to the left for the Clintons (or too far to the left to win), Gore is slipping to the left, etc.
(Update: This seems to be the view of Joe Lieberman, formerly Gore's running mate, and the candidate who is most hurt by Gore's endorsement of Dean. Link via Josh Marshall. William Safire also emphasizes that Hillary has been consistently (somewhat surprisingly) hawkish on the war, as Democrats go, and she represents Bill Clinton's "third way" against Dean's left-leaning or anti-middle class stances.)
(Update: I think Dean, like Bill Clinton, deserves to be known for ideological flexibility. Mickey Kaus, as usual, is cogent and amusing on this. (Scroll down to Wednesday, Dec. 10--An Iraq Flip Too? and Flip-Flop Flap). My favourite lines: "[because of a flip-flop on Iraq] There's the character issue ... as well as the issue of Dean's attitude toward potential wars down the road--even if, as usual, the residual ambiguity and flip-floppery in his position helps him by making him seem potentially moderate.")
(Another Kaus line: "Howard Dean is a 'fine centrist' governor who has 'flip-flopped' and moved to the orthodox left on trade, education, entitlements, and affirmative action, according to the Democratic Leadership Council [the "centrist" organization that brought Clinton to national attention]. This rightly troubles the DLC. But does that make Dean worse than, say, a politician who takes orthodox left positions on trade, education, entitlements and affirmative action without ever having been a centrist at all? Better to have flopped than never to have flipped! There's at least some hope with Dean that he'll revert back to his old self.")
My suspicion is that the Clintons decided Gore could have won in 2000, and he blew it.
All he had to do was win his home state of Tennessee, and he wouldn't have needed Florida. He failed. He could have mounted a better strategy for the re-count in Florida. He failed again. (Mickey Kaus, a Democrat, has argued consistently that Gore and his people did not ask for the right counts, early enough). Shortly after the election, Gore supporters were tossed from senior positions in the party, and Clinton people were installed.
That's why I like this story about an alleged conversation on the day of Bush 43's inauguration. Unfortunately, it comes from Maureen Dowd, who may not be a model of fact-checking. Josh Marshall doubted it as he reported it.
"At W.'s inauguration, as Bill Clinton and Al Gore walked down the stairs, Bill stopped at James Baker's row. 'You were good in Florida, man, damn good,' Elvis told the Velvet Hammer. Gesturing toward Mr. Gore, he went on: 'But if this [epithet] would've listened to me and put me out on the trail, you'd of never had the chance to be good.'"
The "effectual truth" of the story is that Clinton and Baker would recognize each other as effective, focussed operators, who know where the bodies are buried because they bloody well buried them. (I don't mean this so literally that I am lost in the weirder conspiracy theories). And they would recognize Gore as ... not one of those. Gore came across as a gormless candidate who lost a race he should have won. Come to think of it, so did W.
Although Democrats may not want to admit it, they are already thinking more about 2008 than 2004. Bush 43 will have huge advantages going into 2004. In 2008, it will be much more wide open. It is difficult to think of a promising Republican other than Jeb Bush. On the Democratic side, it may be Hillary vs. Al.
The American Conservative Union Foundation is launching an on-line magazine: Conservative BattleLine OnLine. (Link via Hit and Run).
This is not the journal called American Conservative, in which Pat Buchanan and Taki are guiding lights. But there is a similarity in the belief that the smart course for U.S. foreign policy, even after 9/11, is basically isolationist.
One article (presumably by Editor Donald Devine) is on the prospects for democracy in Iraq. (Link wasn't working; now it's fixed). I think there are some very sound observations here. As the article suggests, it is not clear that any kind of majoritarian democracy will be possible or desirable for Iraq in the near future. There are too many minorities that would fear the loss of the kind of regional autonomy they have now, or have enjoyed in the past, and too much risk that the majority Shiites, given the opportunity, will persecute minorities.
"The unconditional bottom line of the pre-war U.S.-allied Kurd factions is regional autonomy. The non-Arab Kurds of the North are divided into two often-warring parties that are only cooperating now because both are determined to first remove the Arabs from their midst and rule themselves through their own local leaders. Most of the Arab Sunni in the West-center of the country, representing only a quarter of the population, know that majority rule means their moral vision will not be enshrined in Iraqi law. That fear for their way of life is why the Sunni triangle and Baghdad are up in arms already. This will only magnify if the Shiites win an absolute majority of governmental power."
I have not seen this point about the Sunnis made so clearly before. They may be fighting the U.S./CPA/IGC not so much out of loyalty to Saddam, as fear of anything like majority rule. This is one aspect of the fact that it may be very natural to fight for freedom, even against an apparent benefactor. I also like the point about the Sunnis' "moral vision." Among the many strands and varieties of Islam, aren't the Sunnis closer to what the President calls good Islam than the Shiites?
(Update: Mitch Potter has a big piece on the Iraqi Sunnis in the Toronto Star. His point is that there are a number of Iraqi Sunnis who oppose the U.S. occupation or at least resist majority rule by Shiites, and who have no loyalty for either Saddam or mujahadeen from other countries.)
The Bush Administration is no longer suggesting that the "insurgents" consist largely of non-Iraqis. For one thing, doing so might mean admitting that the U.S. invasion has made things worse instead of better. But there is also plenty of evidence that the insurgents are predominantly Iraqis.
The article says federalism, which can reflect the many ethnic and regional differences, is probably more important than majoritarian democracy, and it warns that any lawful lasting regime will be more difficult to bring about than was the case at the American founding. Then it ends on a sober but relatively cheerful (from the U.S. perspective) note:
"The good news is that the end of the U.S. occupation is in sight and the military and civilian leaders are moving enthusiastically and rationally to implement the plan. President Bush has already announced that the number of troops will be reduced from 132,000 to 100,000 by April 2004. The scattered forces necessary during the interim are being consolidated in an operation "local standoff" so that they will become less vulnerable to attack, especially in Baghdad, after the Iraqis take control. One senior officer predicted that the number of fixed locations would be down to a handful by April in Baghdad and to a few score in the rest of the country. He flatly said the occupation would be over by the end of 2005, with the remaining coalition troops left in isolated and well-defended forts. The turnover to local councils and police is already in advanced stages and the Iraqi army is being formed on an expedited basis.
"But the political dangers remain. The Shi'a hear all of the glib U.S. talk about democracy and think that means that they will be in charge and be able to do whatever they want. The 2003 World Values Study showed that 60 percent of Arabs worldwide said democracy is "the best form of government." Among the American people, only a minority said democracy is best. The president and his administration need to become as wise as their own people. It would not be a bad idea for them to re-read the Founders' "Federalist Papers" to refresh their memory about the dangers of majoritarian democracy and for them to start talking about the rule of law, separation of powers and federalism. This combination worked for us and is the only possible solution for the Iraqis that will not lead to majority authoritarianism and harm to American's worldwide interests."
This makes a nice fit with Kaplan's speculation about Baker's mission. Baker will focus on making Iraq look as good as possible, for the President's re-election chances, by next summer. This is not exactly the same as spreading democracy, although it is likely to be a considerable improvement, for many Iraqis, over Saddam's regime.
As of yesterday, I thought I was getting somewhere in figuring out the new mission of James Baker--former holder of various Cabinet positions, including Secretary of State, and long-time loyal retainer to both Reagan and the Bush family.
Baker is travelling to various countries to which Iraqi debts from Saddam's regime are owing. His mission is supposedly to "restructure" the debt--i.e. persuade creditors to settle for a certain number of cents on the dollar, thus lightening the load for the new Iraq. Just as this mission was getting underway, the Pentagon (specifically Paul Wolfowitz?) issued a statement that only countries participating in the coalition can profit (update: in a big way; sub-contracts may be available) from the reconstruction--that is, only companies headquartered in those countries can bid on the major contracts.
Josh Marshall hinted early on that there was some connection between the two, apparently contradictory initiatives (Baker asking France, Germany and Russia for favours; Wolfowitz reminding them of a decision they won't like from months ago). Then Marshall suggested that this must be a sign of confusion in the Bush administration. "President Bush found himself in the awkward position on Wednesday of calling the leaders of France, Germany and Russia to ask them to forgive Iraq's debts, just a day after the Pentagon excluded those countries and others from $18 billion in American-financed Iraqi reconstruction projects."
I started to think, as Jonah Goldberg has suggested, that both carrot and stick are being applied. The Europeans in question can benefit from the profits of reconstruction, or continue to press for re-payment of old debt, but not both. If they hold out on the debt front, they will get nothing (update: in the short term).
Marshall scotches this idea, saying there is no comparison in the amounts of money involved. France and Germany would only get a billion or so each from reconstruction, at most; they are owed billions each. Also, if they would also have to send in troops to get in on the action, this would invite a considerable backlash from their voters.
Now Fred Kaplan seems to tell a fairly coherent story in Slate. (Some of the elements have also appeared on Marshall's blog). Baker has consistently spoken for the "multi-lateralists," including Bush Senior, who did not think it was wise for the U.S. to invade Iraq with so few allies. There were stories that Baker was going to be given a lead role in July, but that didn't pan out. Presumably the hard-liners or neo-cons won that one. Now the "multis" have won a big battle. What has turned the tide, according to Shafer, is that domestic politics are now the top priority. Iraq must look a lot better than it does now, from the President's perspective, by next August: fewer U.S. troops; those that are there less exposed to danger; more non-U.S., especially European troops; and (ideally) a more peaceful situation overall. Democracy in one country? In the entire region? Far less important than they once seemed.
Baker, on this view, is negotiating the very high price that will be paid, in cash and who knows what, to get erstwhile allies to go along and make Bush 43 look good. The Rumsfeld/Cheney crowd, seeing their defeat coming, launched one last stink bomb, saying (actually repeating) that anybody who didn't fight the good fight was out of luck.
Food for thought, anyway.
I have papers to grade, but I want to at least start a post on how Bush is the right leader for the U.S. at this time because he gives voice to a kind of moral fervour that a lot of Americans feel.
In his interview with Jessica Stern, cited earlier, Nick Cavanaugh says: "After September 11 there was a widespread feeling that the whole country was searching its soul, that we'd gotten back to what's important and had 'moral clarity' after a low, dishonest decade."
Perhaps this is what observers of the Iraq war, who are not particularly sympathetic to the U.S. effort there, are likely to forget--at least, speaking for myself, I need to keep it in mind. (To be clear, I don't really doubt that the U.S. cause is a noble one, but I do question whether the initiative was wise).
Large numbers of U.S. civilians were attacked on U.S. soil on 9/11. This was almost unheard of. Many Americans felt a strong desire for revenge. To their credit, the government gave considerable time to reflection and diplomatic initiatives, rather than striking back at someone blindly. Nevertheless, in President Bush's remarks, and in the apparent public support for the President, there is a sense that facts do not carry much weight, and in fact don't need to be investigated carefully. Attacking was simply the morally right thing to do. To Bush's defenders, it is so obvious that it was not about oil, or a few Texas millionaires, or family honour, and so obvious that it was somehow about fighting international terrorism, making the world safe for democracy, and spreading democracy, that criticism is outrageous, or beyond the pale.
The analogies between Saddam on the one hand, and Hitler and Stalin on the other, are meant to suggest that any argument against an attack on Saddam amounts to support for the worst tyrants in history. If those rationales for the attack which are actually grounded in the legitimate national interst of the U.S. are increasingly dubious, it is all the more the case that the U.S. must have aimed to liberate the poor suffering Iraqis--a noble, morally pure cause.
Bush conveys this conviction of moral purity, of not letting facts get in his way, almost perfectly. It is pretty clear that some of the regimes with which the U.S. is now allied are roughly as unsavoury as Saddam's--and some may actually be more closely linked to international terrorism. Bush responded to all such suggestions recently (here and here) by saying the U.S. will always be promoting democracy, in every theatre of international activity, from now on. (Some comments here).
For those of us who, rightly or wrongly, feel a bit detached from the prayer meeting (a bit like Ben Franklin, standing at the back and wondering how far, and how many listeners, a preacher's voice could actually reach), it is both tempting and easy to reduce the story so far to a series of jokes, which might be helpful in explaining the sequence of events to a visiting Martian.
Why the attack on Iraq, a good-sized country that might be difficult to subdue and govern, when there was still considerable debate about the merits of doing so? It's like the old poster showing two vultures side by side on a tree branch. One says to the other: "Patience be damned. I'm going to kill something." Bush felt strongly that he had no choice but to act. Afghanistan wasn't a big enough prize; Iraq was much more impressive, so to speak, as a candidate for "Westernization," or freeing a people from terrorist-style Islamic fundamentalism. As Arab countries go, it had a history of some wealth, a substantial middle class, and considerable Westernization.
Why Iraq rather than Saudi Arabia, Egypt, or Pakistan? There's a Groucho Marx routine somewhere (I know it from a Peter DeVries novel): Groucho as a teacher, in front of a class. One young man is hopeless--lounging, indifferent, sullen, saying only "I don't know," "I don't care," and "you figure it out, you're the teacher." Finally, in desperation, Groucho points to an attractive young woman and says: "That's it, you stay after school." "Me?" she says. "But I didn't do anything!" "That's true," says Groucho, "but what good would it do to keep him after school?"
Why has Bush offered a series of ultimatums to old allies, who might have contributed to a more reasoned campaign against international terrorism? He doesn't think they're good enough to live in Mayberry, or anywhere on Walton's Mountain. Of course, they might visit--God knows, we get all kinds passing through--but they're not quite up to snuff. Too cynical, defeatist, kind of like we all used to be before 9/11. Those French buggers have proved it before: they'll relax in a nice cafe, as long as the good wine is still being poured, and simply watch the German tanks roll by. Hell, they're not good enough to date Mary Tyler Moore--or even Britney Spears.
I have put the new DVD of Looney Tunes on my Christmas list--not the 4 disc set, but the 2 disc set. I can't resist suggesting Clinton was a classic Bugs Bunny character. Charming, and in many ways a popular leader, but it was an open secret that he might not be trustworthy. Too clever by half, and always trying to figure some way to get away with something. Dean seems to be trying to inherit this mantle. On the other hand, there is ... Elmer Fudd. Not just a fool who always wants to shoot at helpless creatures; a deeply moral individual, conscious of his duty to society, who sees himself fighting not just a rabbit here or there, but large, malevolent forces which rule somewhere in the dark forest. As long as people don't worry too much about whether he is clever enough for the job, they find him deeply trustworthy in an emergency.
Maybe Clinton would have done fine after 9/11. He was certainly popular enough to win in 2000, and I think he did a pretty good job on foreign policy. Dean is struggling against the perception that he is a bright guy chatting about policy, and trying to get ahead. With his now-famous anger, including a series of photos on Drudge, he may be trying to show that he cares about right and wrong as much as anyone.
Slate has a nice piece saying Dean's recent attacks on Bush for not knowing enough about defence, and not doing enough for Americans in uniform, which might appear suicidal, are brilliant. There is no way to avoid these themes in these troubled times. That would be allowing Bush to continue to own them. To have any chance of beating Bush, Dean has to be tough and moralistic, and almost bluff through his own close-to-draft-dodging record by pure bluster. As, er, Bush did in 2000.
Update: Glenn Reynolds likes the suggestion by Jonathan Rauch that Dean is more like Clinton than he is like McGovern. This basically means: tough, flexible, not too much the intellectual or Hamlet-type to win.
Reynolds also says:
"At any rate, I'm not sure that Dean, if elected, would be as bad for the war on terror as Goldberg's post, sort of, implies, or that Dean's primacy in fact reflects a policy of surrender on the part of Democratic voters. Here's Dean's secret weapon in the general election: He's an angry jerk. Okay, he's not always a jerk, but he has his angry, jerky side. And that poses risks to his campaign that have been analyzed elsewhere.
"But in the current climate (heck, probably in most political climates) an angry jerk is a lot better than a wimp, and Dean doesn't come across as a wimp. Voters may conclude, and they may be right, that a President Dean would get angry at terrorists and respond appropriately, rather than rolling over and being a wimp. This, at any rate, is one reason why I'm not so sure the Dean / McGovern parallel that some people are drawing works."
That is what I was getting at (although Reynolds would probably not accept the reference to Elmer Fudd as an example of what the public wants). Being an angry jerk, or appearing to be one, can be taken as a sign of leadership qualities. (Aristotle even says so in the Ethics).
Example: Clinton consistently held that he had to move to the right on key issues in order to win, and thereby be in a position to carry out much of the Democratic agenda. He committed to welfare reform, which he ultimately carried out, and he was staunchly for capital punishment. He showed his commitment to capital punishment by travelling home to Arkansas, early in the 1992 campaign season, to make sure everyone knew he was not exercising his prerogative as Governor to commute a death sentence.
Ricky Lee Rector, the convicted murderer in this case, had shot himself after shooting his victims, and suffered severe brain damage. It was most unlikely that he had any real awareness of what was going on, and in such a case, even staunch advocates of the death penalty tend to argue that execution is mere slaughter rather than a punishment, and should be called off. Clinton made sure the execution went ahead in order to establish himself as a national candidate, and avoid Dukasis' mistake of being "soft" on capital punishment.
My theory is that being an "angry jerk" is even part of Dr. Phil's appeal. Under the charm and nice clothes of a big-city shrink or consultant is a Southern cracker, who might say something personal and rude. I was watching once when he said to a male guest, who admittedly was saying stupid things: "If this was radio, I'd be choking you now."
Prime Minister Chretien once was photographed choking a protester; his popularity in most of the country went up, not down.
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