Radical Avenue

Here is what Vice President Cheney told the Veterans of Foreign War on August 26, 2002.

Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt that he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us.

As we now know, Cheney was either dishonest or spectacularly wrong on that day. When we’re about to invade a foreign country, America can’t afford to make mistakes like that. Recently Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul shared a much more honest assessment of Iraq.

JUDY WOODRUFF: On Iraq, as you know, the president, all your fellow Republicans say the U.S. has got to stay there in one form or another to fight Islamic extremism. Why are they wrong about that?
REP. RON PAUL: Because our presence there makes extremism worse. We’re more vulnerable to terrorism because we’re over there occupying their country, and they resent it. We would resent it if China occupied our country. What if China came? They look different, they have a different religion, they’re going to impose their religious values and their political values on us. We’d be furious, and yet we’re over there, so we incite the radicals against us. After 9/11, we went into Iraq. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11, we’ve occupied two countries now. They were already complaining that our support for countries like Saudi Arabia and our military presence in Saudi Arabia was one of the inciting reasons for them to come here. So we did exactly the opposite of what we were supposed to do. Now we’re in worse shape.
Our military is run down. We’ve spent a half a trillion dollars. We’ve lost all these men and women. We’ve had 40,000 serious casualties. And all we can do is dig in our heels and say, “Well, we can’t leave because there will be chaos.” We’ve created chaos. The longer we stay the more chaos and the more expenses we’re going to have.

Here are Mr. Paul’s thoughts on Iran and the CIA.

JUDY WOODRUFF: You’d do away with the CIA, I saw. Is that correct or not?
REP. RON PAUL: Well, not all of the functions, but essentially so. The CIA is what gets us into trouble. I mean, the CIA is what really started things in the Middle East, because the CIA went in and overthrew Mosaddeq in 1953. We put in the shah. The CIA murdered Diem, or participated in the overthrow of the government in Vietnam, which leads to trouble.
It’s a secret government. Congress has no idea what the CIA is doing, because nobody knows, other than what the CIA is. It is one of the things that is not characteristic of a free society.

It’s too bad we can’t elect three of the presidential candidates to share presidential duties for the next four year term. Mr. Paul has the right take on foreign policy. Our Constitution does not describe an empire. We declared our independence from the British Empire back in 1776. Is that too long ago for anyone to remember?

Here are some reasons why the United States should get out of the empire building business.
- We insinuate ourselves into the internal politics of foreign countries and it blows up in our face.
- Innocent people get killed.
- We end up taking sides in civil conflicts and compromising our principles as a result.
- Policing the world is expensive.
- It puts our military in untenable positions. Quagmires don’t end well.
- We have plenty of internal problems to deal with.
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George Bush must admire Pervez Musharraf. While Bush regularly complains about trial lawyers, Musharraf actually makes them pay for their litigious ways. The Pakistani ruler has his Army rounding up attorneys and carting them off in paddy wagons. And the Supreme Court is on the top of Musharraf’s hit list. No doubt Bush would love to hand down a few house arrests to our Supreme Court Justices, especially after they told him he couldn’t detain “enemy combatants” indefinitely without a trial.

President Bush also has to admire Musharraf’s cool as a cucumber persona. Musharraf’s a lot like the avuncular Dick Cheney in this respect. If you knew Cheney and Musharraf strictly from written accounts, you’d think they were delusional megalomaniacs.

Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt that he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us. Time is not on our side.

Dick Cheney, August 26, 2002. It’s all in the delivery.

Pervez Musharraf also looks comfortable both in his general’s uniform and in a coat and tie. People make fun of George Bush when he dresses up in his flight suit. Shoot, Bush doesn’t even get to wear a general’s outfit in public.

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When you listen to General Pervez Musharraf on TV, he sounds measured, calm and quite reasonable. That’s why it’s important to judge people by their actions. Musharraf governs like a totalitarian dictator. When he realized that the Pakistani Supreme Court was about to rule that he couldn’t command the Pakistani Army and run for president at the same time, he responded by declaring martial law. He has now suspended the Pakistani Constitution and is in the process of rounding up and detaining his political opponents. Musharraf seems hell bent on staying in power until he’s forced out. And thanks to the short sightedness of George Bush, he continues to enjoy the full support of the United States.

Does all this sound familiar? It should. The US supported the Shah of Iran throughout the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s. While the Shah used American tax dollars to brutally repress the Iranian people, the US looked the other way. It was all part of our Cold War containment strategy. A series of American presidents foolishly believed that supporting the Shah was better than having Iran fall into the hands of the communists. It all blew up in our faces in 1979 when the Shah was deposed and our embassy overrun. We’ve had terrible relations with Iran ever since.

When will our leaders learn? The United States should always stand for democracy and human rights. It doesn’t matter that supporting Musharraf may possibly help us in the short term against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. The truth is, his country has sheltered Osama Bin Laden, Aymin al Zawahiri and the Taliban for the past 5 years and he has done next to nothing about it. He’s likely just playing us for fools. In any case, one day Musharraf will be overthrown, perhaps by violent means. Then where will be?

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No one listens to the leader of the free world anymore. Bush made a speech asking world leaders to join him in condemning the brutal repression of pro-democracy forces in Burma. No one did. It’s business as usual in Burma. In Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf has declared martial law over the objections of the Bush administration. Musharraf is supposed to be our ally, but he takes our money and goes his own way. Vladimir Putin ridiculed our Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense when they visited Russia about a month ago. George Bush has virtually no influence on the world stage.

Traditionally other nations follow the US out of either respect or fear. But countries neither fear us nor respect us these days. Our enemies see the US Army bogged down in Iraq with no help from our allies, stuck in the middle of a brutal civil war with no feasible plan for withdrawal. So they know that the most our military can do is drop bombs on other countries. And no one respects our President because he’s never shown any respect for the opinions of others, especially those with whom he disagrees.

The shortcomings of Bush’s cowboy diplomacy should be obvious to everyone by now. Bush’s attitude never changes. It’s always my way or the highway. When it comes to world affairs, most of our allies have chosen the highway. Now that we’ve traveled down the long road in Iraq, our soldiers could sure use some help. But no one is there for us. Even the British troops are pulling out.

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Apparently the nomination of Mike Mukasey for Attorney General has run into a snag over his refusal to acknowledge that waterboarding is torture. Actually Mukasey’s response to a simple question is torture. Of course the Senate Judiciary committee may choose to bring Mr. Mukasey back in for more questioning. I imagine it might go something like this:

Senator Leahy: Good morning Judge Mukasey, how are you today?
Mr. Mukasey: It would be inappropriate for me to discuss specifics with regard to my overall health at this time. I can assure that once I become Attorney General, I will speak with all of the doctors on my staff and if necessary go through a complete medical evaluation. After I have gathered enough evidence to determine how I am, I will provide this committee with a comprehensive report on the matter once I have reviewed it with the President. The United States does not torture.

Senator Leahy: Ok. Can I at least assume that you’re feeling well enough to testify?
Mr. Mukasey: While I have no reason to believe that I’m not feeling well enough to testify, I can not in good conscience tell you that I am indeed feeling well enough to testify. The question requires me to consider information which is not available to me at this moment. I can tell you that if it turns out that I am in fact feeling well enough; then in that case I would be able to testify. Naturally I would also need to brief Administration officials on how I am feeling. I must point out to you that Congress has never passed any laws indicating how I am feeling. By the way, torture is personally abhorrent to me. It’s worse than brutal and barbaric, it’s naughty.

Senator Leahy: I gather from your testimony thus far that you will not be providing a straight answer to any questions today.
Mr. Mukasey: It would be inappropriate for me to speculate about the nature of my testimony before I have actually completed such testimony. The United States does not torture.

torture, waterboarding, Mukasey, Attorney General, Senate, Senator Leahy, Senate Judiciary committee

How nice of Nancy Nord to rebuff efforts by Congress to more adequately fund the Consumer Product Safety Commission. You remember Nancy Nord right? She’s the person who testified that her agency has one person testing children’s toys for safety in America. Her tone indicated that she found the matter humorous. She certainly doesn’t give an indication that she understands that this is a matter of life and death for children in our country. Apparently Ms. Nord believes that Congress would be better off sending our tax dollars to Halliburton so that they can build more concrete road blocks in Baghdad.

This is hardly the first time a federal agency has shown a complete disregard for the safety of Americans. The Mine Safety and Health Administration allowed Bob Murray to keep pumping coal out of the Crandall Canyon mine in Utah in spite of numerous safety violations and repeated warnings from the United Mine Workers of America. Mr. Murray received permission to engage in retreat mining, a questionable practice which unnecessarily endangers coal miners. The Crandall Canyon mine collapsed and permanently buried six miners last August. It’s no coincidence that Bob Murray is a major Republican Party contributor. Bob Murray belongs in jail, but that will never happen as long as GW is in charge.

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