[Peace-discuss] A new left/right antiwar movement?

Tue Mar 22 18:54:50 CDT 2011

--The inscrutable and amoral world of geopolitics/foreign relations. The inscrutable oriental mind (?) comes to mind. 

On Mar 22, 2011, at 6:28 PM, E. Wayne Johnson 朱稳森 wrote:

> I thought that too, Mort.  
> 
> Amazingly, I was not consulted.  
> 
> I suppose the local PTB decided I was too busy teaching pig farmers down in Jiangsu to be bothered with such trivial matters that they could manage on their own.
> 
> My interpretation is that a vetoing No by those who could veto would have been interpreted as an act of aggression against those with ardor for the resolution.
> 
> 
> On 2011-3-23 6:07, Morton K. Brussel wrote:
>> 
>> So why did China abstain, instead of vetoing, the UN Security Council resolution?
>> --mkb
>> 
>> On Mar 22, 2011, at 11:58 AM, E. Wayne Johnson 朱稳森 wrote:
>> 
>>> This statement about opposition to use of force and recognition of Sovereignty seems to come directly from Libertarian fundamentals, albeit from a somewhat unexpected source.  Given such a "message in a unknown tongue" (in this case, Mandarin Putonghua Chinese) one could hardly refrain from the "amen" given the clear interpretation provided in standard English.
>>> 
>>> When I saw it on CCTV9, I told Dr. Qiao, "Hey, this guy is a Libertarian!"   She smiled.
>>> 
>>> BEIJING, March 18 (Xinhua) -- China on Friday said it had serious reservations with part of the latest U.N. resolution on Libya.
>>> 
>>> "We oppose the use of force in international relations and have some serious reservations with part of the resolution," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said in a statement on Friday.
>>> 
>>> Jiang's comments came after the United Nations Security Council adopted a resolution which authorized a no-fly zone over Libya Thursday.
>>> 
>>> The resolution also called for "all necessary measures," excluding ground troops, to "protect civilians and civilian populated areas under threat of attack" in Libya, "including Benghazi," a key eastern city currently held by the rebels.
>>> 
>>> "Considering the concern and stance of Arab countries and the Africa Union as well as the special situation in Libya, China and some countries abstained from voting on the draft resolution," Jiang said.
>>> 
>>> Apart from China, Russia, a permanent Council member with veto power, and Brazil, Germany and India, the three non-permanent Council members, also abstained from voting on the draft resolution.
>>> 
>>> "We support the commitment of the UN Secretary General's special envoy for Libya, the Africa Union and Arab League to deal with the current crisis in Libya in a peaceful way," Jiang said.
>>> 
>>> China has always maintained that actions of the UN Security Council should follow the objective and principle of the UN Charter and international laws, respect Libya's sovereignty, independence, unification and territorial integrity, Jiang said.
>>> 
>>> "The current crisis in Libya should be resolved through dialogue and by other peaceful means," Jiang said.
>>> 
>>> "We expect Libya to restore stability at an early date and avoid an escalation of armed conflicts and worsening humanitarian crisis," Jiang said.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On 2011-3-23 0:02, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> "[Rep. Ron Paul] said his opposition to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan give him an edge over other Republicans and could help him defeat President Barack Obama in a national election. At CPAC, Paul drew thunderous applause for bashing the Patriot Act, US aid to foreign nations, and US military bases overseas during his speech. The conservative group Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) later announced that he would be expelled from the group's National Advisory Board because of his 'delusional and disturbing alliance with the fringe Anti-War movement.'"
>>>> 
>>>>    Rep. Ron Paul wins another Republican presidential straw poll
>>>>    By Eric W. Dolan
>>>>    March 21, 2011 @ 8:14 pm
>>>> 
>>>> Texas Congressman Ron Paul beat out top Republican presidential hopefuls Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich in a straw poll for the second time this year.
>>>> 
>>>> Nearly 18 percent of Republicans voted for Rep. Paul in the straw poll conducted at a GOP Convention in Sacramento on Saturday.
>>>> 
>>>> He was followed by former governor Mitt Romney, who received 10.9 percent of the vote and 2010 president candidate Sarah Palin, who received 7.9 percent of the vote. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich came in fourth place, with 6.9 percent of the vote.
>>>> 
>>>> The informal survey was conducted by the libertarian-leaning Republican Liberty Caucus of California [1] (RLCCA).
>>>> 
>>>> "Given that Congressman Paul and the RLC share a common commitment to individual rights, limited government, free enterprise and constitutional principles we are happy with the results," RLCCA Chairman John Dennis said. "In these times of big government and even bigger deficits, it is exciting to see increased conservative interest in candidates such as Paul."
>>>> 
>>>> The results of the RLCCA poll reflect another presidential straw poll conducted at the Conservative Political Action Conference [2] (CPAC) in February, where Paul took 30 percent of the vote, followed by Mitt Romney with 23 percent.
>>>> 
>>>> Paul describes himself as a libertarian and is hardly the party's typical standard bearer.
>>>> 
>>>> He has said his opposition to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan [3] give him an edge over other Republicans and could help him defeat President Barack Obama in a national election.
>>>> 
>>>> At CPAC, Paul drew thunderous applause for bashing the Patriot Act, US aid to foreign nations, and US military bases overseas during his speech. The conservative group Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) later announced that he would be expelled from the group's National Advisory Board because of his "delusional and disturbing alliance with the fringe Anti-War movement."
>>>> 
>>>> URL to article: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/03/21/rep-ron-paul-wins-another-republican-presidential-straw-poll/
>>>> 
>>>> URLs in this post:
>>>> 
>>>> [1] Republican Liberty Caucus of California: http://www.rlc.org/2011/03/21/ca-gop-convention/
>>>> [2] straw poll conducted at the Conservative Political Action Conference: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/02/12/ron-paul-wins-cpac-presidential-straw-poll/
>>>> [3] said his opposition to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/02/14/congressman-ron-paul-slams-obama-hes-a-warmonger/
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> On 3/22/11 10:16 AM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>> The so-called Tea Party is as we know a mood rather than a movement, much less a party, and is even more various than the anti-war movement.  Unlike the antiwar movement, it has moneyed interests (such as the Koch brothers) and traditional political groups that re trying to co-opt it.
>>>>> 
>>>>> But we can't simply ignore the anti-war currents within the TP/Libertarians, e.g.
>>>>> 
>>>>> ~ the Ron Paul movement: Paul won the straw poll for president at both recent CPACs; he's been consistently anti-war, anti-intervention, anti-Pentagon.
>>>>> 
>>>>> ~ <antiwar.com>, one of the best sites on the web, is a Libertarian site.
>>>>> 
>>>>> ~ paleo-conservative elements, such as the journal American Conservative, have been against the neo-con wars in principle from the beginning; Pat Buchanan has attacked the Libyan adventure as unconstitutional (which it is). 
>>>>> 
>>>>> For the anti-war movement itself, the co-option has already taken place, by the Democrats and Obama. We forget that the Democrats were given control of Congress in 2006 specifically to end the war, as they recognized.  The firing of Rumsfeld after the election was the administration's recognition of the fact. But the Democrats quite consciously and cynically pissed it way - e.g., with "timelines" - when they could have de-funded the wars (which required only 41 votes in the Senate) in the SE Asia and LA were finally defunded.  Then the coup-de-grace was provided by Obama's smiling lies and the foolish trust that so many people who should have known better put in him.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Remember that the antiwar movement of the 1960s grew up in opposition to both business parties.  There were attempts to co-opt it, notably by Robert Kennedy and Richard Nixon.  Nixon (whom Obama much resembles in this regard) was elected in 1968 as the "peace candidate" because in part it was widely believed that he had "a secret plan for ending the war."
>>>>> 
>>>>> Events of this week have shown once again how much a new antiwar movement of that sort is required.  The percent of the population opposed to the administration's wars is now about where  it was in 1968.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Regards, Carl
>>>>> 
>>>>> On 3/22/11 9:13 AM, Corey Mattson wrote:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> I support what Iraq Veterans Against the War did in Madison on March 12 --- bring the anti-war cause to our natural allies, workers and students fighting the Tea Party. When I was in Madison February 19th, there were about 1,000 Tea Party counter-demonstrators to our 80,000. Those 1,000 Tea Party activists were way more than any of their number ever protesting the war.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> An anti-war Tea Party movement? Where is it? Fledgling right-wing libertarian groups clearly haven't been that successful in bringing them to the anti-war cause. It's not worth diluting the substance of our opposition to the war to attract a handful of libertarians who are opposed to the war for the wrong reasons and are our enemy on practically every other issue. In the proposed movement to "Stop the War, Stop the Spending," what are left-wingers supposed to say when their right-wing partners attack the poor, bust our unions, and make U.S. capitalism even more savage and inhumane?
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> By the way, in the piece below, David Boaz gets the timeline wrong as to when the anti-war movement weakened, and I believe he does it purposefully for political points. The anti-war movement was already seriously weakened by 2006, maybe as early as 2005, as demoralization set in. Surely hopes in a electoral victory played a role, but there was no sudden death of the movement upon Obama's election. If Boaz is going to blame the Democrats for the movement's demise, he should at least get it right. I suspect that he wasn't involved in the anti-war movement back then and wouldn't know what happened.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> --- Corey      
>>>>>> Bloomington-Normal Citizens for Peace and Justice
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> On Mon, Mar 21, 2011 at 11:29 PM, C. G. Estabrook <galliher at illinois.edu> wrote:
>>>>>> [From a director of the 'libertarian' Cato Institute.]
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> "...the $64,000 question — though these days it would have to be at least a $64 billion question — could a new antiwar movement hook up with the Tea Party movement in a Stop the War, Stop the Spending revolt?"
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> What Ever Happened to the Antiwar Movement?
>>>>>> David Boaz - March 21, 2011
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> About 100 antiwar protesters, including Daniel Ellsberg of Pentagon Papers fame, were arrested Saturday outside the White House in demonstrations marking the eighth anniversary of the U.S.-led war in Iraq. It’s a far cry from the Bush years, when hundreds of thousands or millions marched against the war, and the New York Times declared “world public opinion” against the war a second superpower. Will President Obama‘s military incursion in a third Muslim country revive the antiwar movement?
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> On a street corner in Washington, D.C., outside the Cato Institute, there’s a metal box that controls traffic signals. During the Bush years there was hardly a day that it didn’t sport a poster advertising an antiwar march or simply denouncing President George W. Bush and the war in Iraq. But the marches and the posters seemed to stop on election day 2008.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Maybe antiwar organizers assumed that they had elected the man who would stop the war. After all, Barack Obama rose to power on the basis of his early opposition to the Iraq war and his promise to end it. But after two years in the White House he has made both of George Bush’s wars his wars.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> In October 2007, Obama proclaimed, “I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank.” Speaking of Iraq in February 2008, candidate Barack Obama said, “I opposed this war in 2002. I will bring this war to an end in 2009. It is time to bring our troops home.” The following month, under fire from Hillary Clinton, he reiterated, “I was opposed to this war in 2002….I have been against it in 2002, 2003, 2004, 5, 6, 7, 8 and I will bring this war to an end in 2009. So don’t be confused.”
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Indeed, in his famous “the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow” speech on the night he clinched the Democratic nomination, he also proclaimed, “I am absolutely certain that generations from now we will be able to look back and tell our children that . . . this was the moment when we ended a war.”
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Today, however, he has tripled President Bush’s troop levels in Afghanistan, and we have been fighting there for more than nine years. The Pentagon has declared “the official end to Operation Iraqi Freedom and combat operations by United States forces in Iraq,” but we still have 50,000 troops there, hardly what Senator Obama promised.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> And now Libya. In various recent polls more than two-thirds of Americans have opposed military intervention in Libya. No doubt many of them voted for President Obama.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> There’s another issue with the Libyan intervention: the president’s authority to take the country to war without congressional authorization. As many bloggers noted over the weekend, in 2007 Barack Obama told Charlie Savage of the Boston Globe,
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Candidate Hillary Clinton spoke similarly:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> If the country is under truly imminent threat of attack, of course the President must take appropriate action to defend us. At the same time, the Constitution requires Congress to authorize war. I do not believe that the President can take military action – including any kind of strategic bombing – against Iran without congressional authorization.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> And candidate Joe Biden:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> The Constitution is clear: except in response to an attack or the imminent threat of attack, only Congress may authorize war and the use of force.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Fine words indeed. Will their supporters call them on their apparent reversal?
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> It’s hard to escape the conclusion that antiwar activity in the United States and around the world was driven as much by antipathy to George W. Bush as by actual opposition to war and intervention. Indeed, a University of Michigan study of antiwar protesters found that Democrats tended to withdraw from antiwar activity as Obama found increasing political success and then took office. Independents and members of third parties came to make up a larger share of a smaller movement. Reason.tv looked at the dwindling antiwar movement two months ago.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> With his launch of a third military action, President Obama seems to have forgotten a point made by Temple University professor Jan C. Ting: “Wars are easy to begin, but hard to end.” Americans haven’t forgotten, though.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Nearly two-thirds of Americans now say that the war in Afghanistan hasn’t been worth fighting, a number that has soared since early 2010. Where are their leaders? Where are the senators pushing for withdrawal? Where are the organizations? Could a new, non-Democratic antiwar movement do to Obama what the mid-2000s movement did to Bush? And the $64,000 question — though these days it would have to be at least a $64 billion question — could a new antiwar movement hook up with the Tea Party movement in a Stop the War, Stop the Spending revolt?
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> http://www.britannica.com/blogs/2011/03/happened-antiwar-movement/
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>>>>> 
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