Between the rescue of Pvt. Lynch (which seems an interesting comment on the Greenberg piece linked yesterday) and the advance of American forces to within 20 miles of Baghdad, we’ve gotten a recent spate of good news on the war front. But, as Terry Neal of the Washington Post notes, trouble is now brewing in the rest of the Arab world. And given both Saddam’s deliberate attempts to incite Muslim rage and the shocking, extremely graphic images of civilian carnage being broadcast on Al-Jazeera, it’s little wonder why. (I caught ’em via Week in Review, but the Al-Jazeera site seems to be down now.) Even if Saddam’s regime falls soon, and let’s hope it does, we have our work cut out for us in rebuilding the region’s faith in America. And, as I said before, it will take reservoirs of diplomacy and goodwill that the tone-deaf and heavy-handed Bushies have yet to manifest.
Category: World at Large
Stop me before I think again.
When times are this crazy, trust The Onion to come through in the clutch. “True patriots know that a price of freedom is periodic submission to the will of our leaders — especially when the liberties granted us by the Constitution are at stake. What good is our right to free speech if our soldiers are too demoralized to defend that right, thanks to disparaging remarks made about their commander-in-chief by the Dixie Chicks?” I should not be allowed to say the following things about America, especially during wartime.
Radio Ga-Ga.
Radio conglomerate Clear Channel’s role in promoting the war, as noted earlier here, has raised new concerns in Washington about consolidation of the airwaves. Closer to home, the Voice isn’t very happy about the company’s major push into NYC.
Next Stop, Moynihan Station.
As Senator Moynihan is laid to rest in Arlington Cemetery, New Yorkers devise a fitting tribute for their fallen statesman: Moynihan Station, to be completed on the site of the Post Office atop Penn Station by 2008. Update: Here’s some computer generated mock-ups of the future station, by way of Do You Feel Loved? (Thanks for the kind words, by the way.)
Missing in Action.
My current favorite columnist at Slate, David Greenberg (he’s right up there with Dahlia Lithwick), offers another short history lesson – this time on the changing outlook on American POWs.
Mad as Hell.
The inimitable Mr. Cranky is firing on all cylinders right now in his review of Iraq war coverage. (Via High Industrial.) Regarding Fox News, I’m surprised Dick Cheney doesn’t call to tell them to tone it down a bit…it must drive the audio technicians nuts to keep having to pod down all that goose-stepping in the background. Mr. Cranky’s been hit-or-miss as the years have gone by, but this piece is Onion-esque to the extreme.
Now We live in Infamy.
Historian Arthur Schlesinger mourns America’s fall from innocence under Dubya. (Via Medley.)
Delusions of Grandeur.
Mickey Kaus often gets on my nerves, but I have to admit he’s probably dead-on with his assessment of General Rummy’s Iraq strategy. This is the only reading of his behavior I can think of that doesn’t paint Rumsfeld as criminally inept, and while Rumsfeld is many things, I don’t think he’s stupid. Nevertheless, if it turns out the Secretary put his dreams of neocon hawk domination above the lives of America’s fighting men and women, neither stupidity or anything else will save him from the opprobrium of the nation.
One Bad Apple.
Alas, our recent Columbia teach-in on the war, which included some of the university’s leading luminaries in all departments, was singlehandedly derailed by the asinine comments of one anthro prof, Nicholas De Genova. Said De Genova, “The only true heroes are those who find ways that help defeat the U.S. military…I personally would like to see a million Mogadishus.” He also argued that all self-proclaimed patriots are in fact white supremacists. Sigh…it’s freak show guys like this who give the entire anti-war movement a bad name. As you can see, Eric Foner calls the guy idiotic in the article, and Alan Brinkley has also declared his comments “abhorrent” and “immoral.” (In fact, even Columbia’s President has now distanced himself from De Genova.) The point is, this joker in no way speaks for the majority of Americans against the war, although he’s already getting a lot of run in the warblogger nation regardless. And, while I don’t want to disparage an entire department, I’m not entirely surprised he emerged from anthropology – I’ve heard similar rants from other radical post-structuralist and post-colonialist-enamored students over in Schermerhorn.
Dollar Diplomacy.
This is old news at this point, but I missed it back in the day. 2000 Presidential candidate Bill Bradley comes out against the Iraq war after hearing Dubya’s State of the Union address. Particularly with Moynihan now gone, we could use Dem statesmen like Bradley to cultivate a higher profile. The questions facing America today aren’t going to get any easier, even if we took out Saddam tomorrow.