dagblog - Comments for "At least Juan Cole thinks"

Didn't grok the funny; sorry.

we are stardust — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 02:38:36 +0000

In reply to The Levy comment was supposed

Didn't grok the funny; sorry.

The Levy comment was supposed

Desider — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 01:33:40 +0000

In reply to Gosh, Des. This was by way

The Levy comment was supposed to be communal levity (or levyty as he spells it when we're live chatting over epistemology/ontology or the American baseball he's so fascinated with).

Vodka and solitary, seems like you're into Darkness At Noon period, with all those Russian post-modernists, or is that post-post modernist, I never get it quite right.

And as someone noted, Cameron at least consulted Parliament, while Sarkozy may have consulted his wife or his astrologer, but most likely just visited some 17,000 year old caves and decideda bombing was in order.

But frankly I still wish we were talking about the aspirations of the desert people and how their new democracy will turn out, rather than how the use of Tomahawk missiles will help our deficit situation.

Anyway, enjoy your hot bath with carp. Count your toes afterwards.

Gosh, Des. This was by way

we are stardust — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 01:21:53 +0000

In reply to You're down with Levy? You're

Gosh, Des. This was by way of an 'inside joke'. Unlike your favorite AA, I won't chase down the comment numbers or whatever. Feh! Have a few shots on me; take a few breaths. And, uh, have a few more 'Kapows' on me, too.

I may not be the brilliant thinker you are, but at least I can appreciate 'teh irony'. Feh! (in lieu of another cuss word A-man has outlawed:

IMO, it's not only Frahhhnnnce, but Cameron in Britain, and probably the good ole' USA, who want a piece of the pie, but Sarkozy's self-serving exploits over the past few years are pretty much stand in a field by themselves. I do think that Levy does provide some absurdist humor, and at this point ist's hard to despise, in the same way that so much de facto Obama doctrine does. If it didn't have such gigantic implications, it would be funny. No; I take it back: it is funny, in the way that we're forced to see it all as some reality that we do';t have to choose to live with, but seems that we are somewhat addicted to.

(Please pardon me; i am having a bad day with pain, and a couple shots of 'wodka' to get along...ergo, my lack of self-monitoring. Also, i have been immersed in researching national solitary confinement issues and videos, which sorta put me in a spot where i required some possibly inappropriate levity, and may be about to get banned from fdl, but who cares, really?)

Anyhoo. I was watching AA's live-blogging of the Libyan not-war, and read Emma's link concerning some dude's reporting that the 'rebel forces' had formed (or re-invigorated) a Cental Bank in their names, and formed (or re-invigorated) an oil company: ditto, and AA going all "Oh; i'm so tired of those who keep saying it's about oil, yada yada,..." and thank the gods my friend Lulu complained...

And I've been reading at FP about who's winning in Lybia (har-de-har-har) and how the intervention in Libya will queer things for the true Jasmine Revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt (and according to Emma's dude) how sick it is that people like me think Obama can do dick for Bahrain, given the fucking practicalities of our oil needs (much like AA said).

So. Here I am, being dissed by you, and incredulous at those at this site who think that Obama got it right, and that the mission is humanitarian, and that the 'rebels' are still all good guys (even Juan Cole thinks some Bad Gus may be (whattt???) changing sides here and there...and well, if you have me wrong...oh fucking well. And sorry my comments on your blogs aren't 'pithy' enough to respond to.

I'm gomnna take a hot bath instead of proofing this crap. (or 'carp' as i typed first; works for me.)

From the Guardian: (Tunisia

Desider — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 00:07:35 +0000

In reply to You're down with Levy? You're

From the Guardian: (Tunisia being next door to Libya undoubtedly had strong influence in later events, and the bombshell about Qaddafi's Ukrainian blonde bombshell helped get the riots going in that country. But mostly it's that America's status in the Arab world has been *IMPROVED* by Wikileaks, in contrast to all the expensive bombing campaigns and occupations that have only weakened our image. Bradley Manning is the key to the US balancing its budget by reining in outrageous defense costs)

.....

The Tunisians were the first people in the Arab world to take to the streets and oust a leader for a generation. But, of course, they already knew their ruling family was debauched; they didn't need WikiLeaks for that.

Extraordinary effect

There was, however, a genuinely extraordinary WikiLeaks effect. "Sam", a pseudonymous young Tunisian writing on the Guardian's Comment is Free website in mid-January, specifically referenced WikiLeaks as he described how a resigned cynicism about the regime under which he'd grown up in his country turned to hope:

"The internet is blocked, and censored pages are referred to as pages 'not found' – as if they had never existed. Schoolchildren are exchanging proxies and the word becomes cult: 'You got a proxy that works?' … We love our country and we want things to change, but there is no organised movement: the tribe is willing, but the leader is missing. The corruption, the bribes – we simply want to leave.

"We begin to apply to study in France, or Canada. It is cowardice, and we know it. Leaving the country to 'the rest of them'. We go to France and forget, then come back for the holidays. Tunisia? It is the beaches of Sousse and Hammamet, the nightclubs and restaurants. A giant Club Med. And then, WikiLeaks reveals what everyone was whispering.

"And then, a young man immolates himself. And then, 20 Tunisians are killed in one day. And for the first time, we see the opportunity to rebel, to take revenge on the country's 'royal' family, who have taken everything, to overturn the established order that has accompanied our youth.

"An educated youth, which is tired and ready to sacrifice all the symbols of the former autocratic Tunisia with a new revolution: the jasmine revolution – the true one."

Corruption

Paradoxically the leaked comments by the US ambassador in Tunis, widely read across the region, played a major role in boosting Washington's image on the Arab street. Ordinary Tunisians liked the way in which the Americans – unlike the French – had so frankly highlighted corruption.

They now wanted the US to support their ongoing jasmine revolution. They asked Washington to exert pressure on neighbouring Arab leaders, and prevent them from interfering.

Muammar Gaddafi, the despot in neighbouring Libya, had no problem in acknowledging a link between events in Tunis and WikiLeaks – a demonic link, so far as he was concerned. Gaddafi said he was pained by Ben Ali's overthrow and "concerned for the people of Tunisia, whose sons are dying each day". He warned Tunisians not to be tricked by WikiLeaks, "which publishes information written by lying ambassadors in order to create chaos".

The US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, had previously denounced the leak of the cables, because it had "undermined our efforts to work with other countries to solve shared problems". But the same leak was now helping to repair America's battered reputation in the Middle East, damaged by the Iraq war, and to advance the White House's lofty goals of democratisation and modernisation.

Assange may have regarded the US as his enemy, but in this case he had unwittingly helped restore American influence in a place where it had lost credibility. It was ironic. By increasing the amount of information in the system, WikiLeaks had generated unpredictable effects.

You're down with Levy? You're

Desider — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 00:03:37 +0000

In reply to Lord, Obey; you hate the

You're down with Levy? You're more than stardust, you're supernova!

Goldhammer's whole piece is worth reading (and referencing): "Finally, there is the matter of the European Union, where Sarkozy's initiative has already proved problematic. His hasty recognition of the rebels, just as talks with European partners were getting under way in Brussels, and in the absence of any clear indications of who the rebel leaders are and what political forces they might represent, made a mockery of the idea of a common EU foreign policy -- an idea that Sarkozy championed back in the days when he was crusading for the Lisbon Treaty."

And as I think Quinn implied, what could go wrong or be misinterpreted by French planes unilaterally (okay, bilaterally) bombing targets in North Africa? They're all old amis there, n'est-ce pas? Think of it as the old cotton fields back home.

The worst in my eyes though is that all this foreign intervention overrides the aspirations of normal people who ARE PROTESTING AGAINST THE CONTINUAL COCKUPS OF GOVERNMENTS, THEIRS AND OURS. Jesus, all of this started with Wikileaks reports showing how much dickheads like Sarkozy are in bed with assholes like Qaddafi, and how little the people get off the inevitable money-rape.

The thing that pushed Bradley Manning over the edge is that normal Iraqis were coming to complain about people in their government stealing money, and Manning's superiors responded by telling Manning to shut up and help the corrupt leaders round up more complainers as "terrorists" for questioning/torture.

Swimmingly. As in "Swimming

Desider — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 23:39:08 +0000

In reply to Seems only fair. France

Swimmingly. As in "Swimming to Cambodia".

And it made Dominos (Dominoes? Dan? Dan Quayle?) a high-power strategy game for the think-tank elite.

Of course we gave Iraq back to the Iraqis and Afghanistan back to the Afghanis and Haiti back to the Haitians - no problem stuffing geniis back in bottles and toothpaste back in tubes.

I think had glossed over 1

Desider — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 23:34:12 +0000

In reply to I'm not sure if you know

I think had glossed over 1 key word on way back from a beer.

Yes, you could be advisor to the US military - "how to plan to duck and run, or avoiding fiasco from the get go".

And actually it's not the military so much - none of these engagements are hard to win. They're hard to stay won.

Or as Keith Richards famously said, "Anyone can quit heroin. It's staying quit that's the tough part."

America's a junkie fixed on shitty engagements. Not every dalliance should be a marriage - one night stands are sometimes just what was called for.

Yup. Sarkozy's inner circle

Obey — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 23:32:56 +0000

In reply to Lord, Obey; you hate the

Yup. Sarkozy's inner circle is a bunch of rappers, actors and pseudo-intellectuals. Reassuring, innit...?

Maybe I was just getting

Desider — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 23:28:18 +0000

In reply to Maybe it's just me, but I

Maybe I was just getting warmed up, consider paragraphs 1 & 2 clearing my throat...

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds"

There's no problem to have a pragmatism that informs your already laid out principles.

There are times to make exceptions to principles, but even there it helps to know why, whether it's for a gut feeling or something more tangible.

But there's a huge difference between make exceptions and acting arbitrarily.

I don't give a rat's ass about Qaddafi per se, but it just feels like the international community finally found a dog it could and wanted to kick, while the street's streaming with mongrels and mean junk-yard dogs and pitbulls and pedigrees and what not.

The only lesson I draw is not about good vs. evil, but simply that they didn't like this dog and he had the extreme misfortune to be defanged and out alone. Well he's their bitch now, but that's hardly a halo on their heads.

Lord, Obey; you hate the

we are stardust — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 21:58:52 +0000

In reply to Sure. Hand it over to the

Lord, Obey; you hate the French or something? Lookit these smoothe dealings of Sarkozy, et.al.:

"But he also hoped to draw a veil over earlier disarray in his government's response to the "Arab spring." When demonstrators in Tunis faced the armed forces of another dictator, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, then Foreign Minister Michèle Alliot-Marie proposed sending French riot police to Tunisia to help train their Tunisian counterparts in crowd-control techniques. She also vacationed in Tunisia in the rebellion's early days and accepted transportation on the private jet of a Ben Ali crony with whom her elderly parents had entered into a business deal.

These revelations eventually forced Alliot-Marie's resignation and led to the appointment of Alain Juppé, a man of vast experience as well as an old rival of Sarkozy, as foreign minister. But the president then stunned Juppé by deciding to recognize the rebels and bomb Libyan airfields while his foreign minister was in Brussels, negotiating with European partners. Juppé had not been told of this decision in advance and was visibly dumbfounded when informed by reporters. To add insult to injury, the announcement of France's policy was made on the steps of the Élysée Palace by the playboy philosopher and gadabout humanitarian [my personal friend] Bernard-Henri Lévy, an acquaintance of Sarkozy who had developed his own private contacts in the rebel camp. Juppé reportedly threatened to resign over this affront to his authority, but to date he remains in his post."

You think the reason the French defied our President and flew jets over Libya on Friday instead of waiting was about oil and gold and cash, not helping the rebels or something?? These folks clowns know what side their bread might be buttered on...