[Peace-discuss] Liberal opinion

Fri Aug 21 11:13:41 CDT 2009

[Justin Raimondo of Antiwar.com comments on York's article, but he seems to
reduce the Long War to a desire of revenge for 9/11 and fails surprisingly
enough to note the long-term policy the War Party (Republican and Democrat) is
following in the Mideast.  --CGE]

...York, a conservative who writes regularly for National Review, is mystified:
he thinks these "progressives" are dedicated to anti-interventionism in
principle. If only it were so. The answer to his bafflement is that it’s their
war now, and they’ll fight it, defend it, and support it because their man is in
the White House. It’s as simple as that.

York probably realizes this, but since it doesn’t fit in with the typical
neoconservative view of the left he can’t come right out and say what is
glaringly apparent to all: that the ostensible "left" is no different than the
neoconservative "right" when it comes to foreign policy. Politics really does
stop at the water’s edge, where both wings of the War Party unite to fight the
foreign "enemy."

"Many observers," avers York, "have remarked that Obama’s decision to escalate
the war in Afghanistan, and also to escalate the campaign of targeted
assassinations using drone aircraft, both in Afghanistan and Pakistan, will
cause him trouble on the political left. … But if the Netroots Nation results
are any indication, Obama may have more room than previously thought on the war.
  Not too long ago, with a different president in the White House, the left was
obsessed with America’s wars.  Now, they’re not even watching."

York is giving the Netrootsters too much credit: to whatever degree they opposed
Bush’s foreign policy, they heard Obama pledge to escalate the Afghan war during
the campaign, and still they supported him. Indeed, they thought it was awfully
clever of him to out-hawk the Republicans on the Afghanistan question: they
believe it inoculated him against criticism from the right. Aside from that,
they agreed with him. Most of them are very far from having any firm principles
when it comes to foreign policy. They know they support health care "reform" –
but they aren’t so sure when it comes to the question of whether or not to kill
large numbers of dark-skinned foreigners. Maybe, maybe not …

This is hardly shocking, at least to me. After all, the "progressive" vision is
steeped in a kind of mystical reverence for the US government and its essential
beneficence: Washington, we are told, is taking the lead in solving the nation’s
problems, and that’s a wonderful thing – and so it makes perfect sense that a
good progressive would transfer that panacea to the realm of foreign affairs.

If the government can fix problems here at home, then why not overseas, too?
The victims of foreclosure, and the victims of the Taliban – all will be lifted
up out of the mire and into a state of grace by the blessed Obama!

So who remains to oppose our foreign policy of unbridled hubris, which is taking
us to the edge of ruination, both fiscal and moral?

Not the conservatives, who are, today, not conservative at all, but – in foreign
policy terms – Jacobin revolutionaries who want to "transform" the Middle East,
and, indeed, the world, by force of arms and constant bullying. Stylistically,
the "progressives" would go about it a bit differently, but, in the end, both
neocons and the "new" progressives" are quite willing to sign on the so-called
Long War, a struggle that will last for at least a generation or two and require
the expenditure of lives and tax dollars on a grand scale. This is nothing less
than a war of revenge, a reflexive reaction to the 9/11 terrorist attacks that
has yet to play itself out – even though Osama bin Laden and his cohorts are
long gone from Afghanistan, and we really don’t know where they are, or where
they’ll strike next.

Yet still an American President invokes the danger posed by al-Qaeda as the
justification for the Afghan war, just as his predecessor did – and the
"progressives" are swallowing it, hook, line, and sinker. We are told that
Afghanistan would be a "safe haven" for those who are "plotting to attack
America," and yet where did the real plotting for the 9/11 terrorist attacks
take place? In Hamburg, Germany – and the Atlantic coast of Florida.

The desertion of the "progressives" from the antiwar movement explains, at least
to some degree, the extreme difficulty Antiwar.com is having with the current
fundraising effort – an effort, by the way, which is absolutely essential to our
continued survival. Those fair-weather friends have fled the field – but who
will step forward to stake their place? Please – we need reinforcements! We need
thinking conservatives and moderates, as well as libertarians, to fill the gap –
or else Antiwar.com is history, along with any principled opposition to our
war-crazed foreign policy.

"I agree with you, I want to do it, now make me do it" – Digby’s advice to her
progressive confreres applies to domestic policy, but is null and void when it
comes to the vital issue of war and peace. That’s what progressives are afraid
to discover, or acknowledge: when it comes to the wars in Afghanistan and
beyond, he doesn’t agree with them, he doesn’t want to disengage, and nothing
short of harrying him as Lyndon Baines Johnson was harried out of office, will
make him cut short our futile Afghan crusade, or nix the coming confrontation
with Iran. Or, I should say: he doesn’t agree with their former selves, as they
were back in the Bush era. However, now that Obama has inherited – and expanded
– his predecessor’s wars, they embrace the War Party as if they were old
friends. As they are, indeed ….

http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2009/08/20/war-what-war/

Robert Naiman wrote:
> I think this analysis is misleading. It takes as a barometer of whether a
> group of progressive activists care about the wars, whether they say it is
> their top issue, at a time when, understandably, there is a lot of focus
> among progressive activists on the health care issue. Not only is it
> misleading, I think it could be unnecessarily divisive. In order to reform
> U.S. foreign policy, we need the support of people for whom reforming U.S.
> foreign policy is not likely to be their top issue. Why piss on them
> unnecessarily?
> 
> It should be noted that Greenberg is not a neutral observer.
> 
> There was a lot of progressive activism around the McGovern bill. Now people
> are trying to figure out what the next hook is...
> 
> ...it would help significantly I think, if there were a hook in the Senate.
> Could we generate some pressure on Mr. Durbin...?
> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, Aug 19, 2009 at 2:29 PM, C. G. Estabrook<galliher at illinois.edu>
> wrote:
>> The netroots agenda: War? What war? By: Byron York 08/15/09 11:22 AM EDT
>> 
>> It's not getting much attention, but the Netroots Nation conference 
>> (formerly known as YearlyKos, a spinoff from the left-wing website
>> DailyKos) is going on in Pittsburgh this weekend.  Democratic pollster
>> Stanley Greenberg has conducted a straw poll of the participants and found
>> that a majority of those surveyed, 53 percent, say they "cannot support a
>> health care reform bill that does not include a public option."  Other
>> results include word that most of the attendees are willing to compromise a
>> bit on environmental legislation, even though it gives a lot of benefits to
>> big corporations, and the finding that, amazingly enough, attendees voice 
>> near-unanimous approval, 95 percent, of the job Barack Obama is doing as 
>> president.
>> 
>> What's truly striking in Greenberg's poll is the degree to which the wars
>> in Iraq and Afghanistan have fallen off the progressive radar.  I attended
>> the first YearlyKos convention, in 2006, and have kept up with later ones,
>> and it's safe to say that while people who attended those gatherings
>> couldn't stand George W. Bush in general, their feelings were particularly
>> intense when it came to opposing the war in Iraq.  It animated their
>> activism; they hated the war, and they hated Bush for starting it.  They
>> weren't that fond of the fighting in Afghanistan, either.
>> 
>> Now, with Obama in the White House, all that has changed.  Greenberg 
>> presented respondents with a list of policy priorities and asked, "Please 
>> indicate which two you think progressive activists should be focusing their
>>  attention and efforts on the most."  The winner was passing comprehensive 
>> health care reform, with 60 percent, and number two was passing "green 
>> energy policies that address environmental concerns," with 22 percent.
>> Tied for eighth place, named by just eight percent of respondents, was
>> "working to end our military involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan."
>> 
>> Then Greenberg asked which one of those issues "do you, personally, spend 
>> the most time advancing currently?"  The winner was health care reform,
>> with 23 percent, and second place was "working to elect progressive
>> candidates in the 2010 elections," with 16 percent.  In 11th place -- at
>> the very bottom of the list -- was "working to end our military involvement
>> in Iraq and Afghanistan." Just one percent of Netroots Nations attendees
>> listed that as their most important personal priority.
>> 
>> Many observers have remarked that Obama's decision to escalate the war in 
>> Afghanistan, and also to escalate the campaign of targeted assassinations 
>> using drone aircraft, both in Afghanistan and Pakistan, will cause him 
>> trouble on the political left.  Indeed, some members of Congress have 
>> suggested that the president has just a year to show significant results in
>>  Afghanistan before lawmakers begin to pressure him to pull back.  But if
>> the Netroots Nation results are any indication, Obama may have more room
>> than previously thought on the war.  Not too long ago, with a different
>> president in the White House, the left was obsessed with America's wars.
>> Now, they're not even watching.
>> 
>> http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/The-netroots-agenda-War-What-war-53296592.html
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> 
> 
> 