Kevin Sullivan, the most right-leaning “liberal” in the blogosphere, wouldn’t attend the UN’s funeral and James Joyner seems to think a different, democratic, alternative would be better for U.S. interests than the UN is, writing that “Attempting to get that business done through a smaller coalition of more like-minded states only makes sense, and it’s a far sight better than either going it alone or waiting on the UN to achieve consensus.”

But here’s the rub – what happens when the League of Democracies tries to impose its authority on a non-democracy and the latter says it doesn’t recognise the authority of a body it hasn’t been invited to send representatives to and has no voice at?

We bomb them? 

I think Cernig’s primary hang-up here is how he views the UN, and what precisely the role of such a global, deliberative body should be.  The problem with his argument is that the UN was not an institution built for growth, but rather, an institution built for results.  There were 50 founding members in 1945; including the permanent members of the Security Council.  Even then, there were nations outside the organization that weren’t going to immediately recognize the authority or the legitimacy of the body (and you also had Stalin attempting to pack the body with his Soviet satellites, like Belarus and the Ukraine).  There were in fact membership regulations imposed on applicant nations, and even upon membership you had efforts to incorporate weaker states into the global system (the Group of 77, UNCTAD, and so on).  These groups have to start somewhere, and the opinions held by those who are outside looking in shouldn’t be the roadblock to a good idea.

I think something resembling the Bretton Woods System would be a good start.  You can lay out the rules for membership, but the ideals must be the core of the institution.  Building a global body premised on democratic planning, freer markets and collective action is a good thing, and it’s no wonder that it bothers someone with a Socialistic outlook on the world.  To Cernig, “liberalism” means non-aggression and bureaucratic haggling.  This doesn’t, however, foster peace or progress.  Cernig relishes the thought of a global body that impedes the democratic nations of the world; instead focusing its time on perfunctory activity like condemning Israel and scolding the United States. 

Such wasted time, energy and resources would madden a genuine liberal (as it does!), but it’s precisely the kind of world Cernig wants to live in.  Peace, prosperity and trade are all fine in rhetoric, but throwing that monkey wrench into the machinery of the evil corporate powers makes for a much nobler goal in their minds.  To the global socialist, this is the job of the UN.  But we mustn’t confuse this as progress, or liberalism, or whatever else they’ll call themselves.  We’ve tried their bad ideas, so maybe it’s time to start over.  

Oh, and as for who the “league” bombs or doesn’t bomb–Woodrow Wilson and Harry Truman bombed plenty of people during the era of global deliberation and compromise.  Nations that bomb other nations unjustly will be held accountable by other global actors.  With the merging of markets and finance, it doesn’t make sense for arbitrary bombing campaigns and invasions to go on, because they’re obviously bad for business. 

This is another one of those ideals I was talking about.                         

The broader point that needs to me made is not that Iraq specifically has prevented money from being funneled directly to your specific demographic group, but that excessive military spending in places like Iraq drains massive amounts of money from our nation as a whole. The Iraq war is our major national project right now, equivalent to the Apollo program or the New Deal. Do we want that as our national project? I don’t think many Americans would agree. Do we want a series of transactions to specific demographic groups and issues to be our national project? Even if is vastly preferable to making the Iraq war our national project, the truth is that isn’t very appealing either. We need a different framing around what we want our national project to be, and we need a Democratic leader who is willing to make that case to the country as a whole.

This discussion about the appropriate “national project” is kind of a curious one.  After all, the Apollo program–which was, obviously, the “Apollo program” of its time–wasn’t directly beneficial to the American people in a policy sense.  Of course, the program indirectly helped us make advancements in rocketry, avionics, medicine and computer technology, but those were otherwise secondary products of the stated goal–”landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth.”  That was it.  It was inspiring, exciting and a wonderful Cold War victory, but it didn’t produce the substantive results that a national “project” would presumably yield. 

The New Deal is a whole other matter, and shouldn’t even be compared to the Iraq War.  If something of that magnitude were attempted today–in real, post-inflation dollars–it would be seismic.  They’re not even in the same ballpark.

Secondly, I find it kind of ironic that the far Left sees strategic value in appealing to the isolationist and illiberal sentiment throughout the country.  Their basic assumption goes as follows: Americans supported invasion, but don’t want to build up a nation they don’t care about.  Promise them a direct financial benefit in the place of said nation building, and you can precipitate a more rapid withdrawal.  I suppose they’re right to think this, but that doesn’t necessarily make the policy right.  I, for one, think rebuilding and stabilizing a nation once terrorized by tyranny makes for a pretty good “national project.”  Making sure, at the very least, that our allies in Kurdistan and other parts of Iraq are safe and allowed to live free from such tyranny seems like a pretty Liberal ideal, but apparently this money could be put to better use elsewhere.

In his latest installment, Matt blah blah blahs all over the pages of FireDogLake about some book Eric Alterman wrote.  I like Alterman–he strikes me as a pretty reasonable guy, and his comic strips make me laugh.  Matt Stoller tends to make me laugh as well, but for entirely different reasons.  Take this doozy for example:

Now, I have fought with traditional top-down liberals a lot. And I believe in fighting and argument, and I don’t always think the liberal groups deal in good faith. But it rubbed me the wrong way that an argument for a strong independent movement, once that operates to influence both parties, is considered a mark of ideological purity. The right-wing has been successful by taking over the Republican Party, but also by influencing the Democratic Party through politicians like Joe Lieberman and through funding networks like the DLC and the Koch brothers. They own the GOP, and about a fifth to a third of the Democratic Party depending on the issue. I don’t see how that can be considered anything but an independent and strong conservative movement, and while I don’t agree with their value system, I don’t understand why we shouldn’t recognize this as a remarkable organizing success and something to replicate.

So if conservatives own the GOP, and if they own a healthy chunk of the Democratic Party, why hasn’t the welfare state been dismantled?  Why is the size of government only growing?  Why did George W. Bush–with a Republican Congress, and apparently at least 1/5 of the Democratic Party in his pocket–fail to pass social security murder reform through the Hill?  I’m sure Stoller would equate war and tax breaks with conservatism, but that would be stupid.  So yeah, he probably does believe that.  The problem with that theory is that Liberals started a whole bunch of wars throughout the 20th Century, and even cut taxes.  Democrats have wavered on matters of trade since the party’s inception.  The problem is that Stoller confuses genuine Liberalism for all the stuff Matt Stoller thinks is right.  Thus, conservatism is basically the stuff he doesn’t think to be right.

Throw in the usual references to Joe Lieberman, get a DLC mention in there, and something about the ”right-wing noise machine,” and you have the usual inanity that is Matt Stoller.  I won’t go any further, but feel free to catch up on my previous love letters to Matt.          

I avoided the whole kerfuffle over Jonah Goldberg’s book Liberal Fascism, mostly because I haven’t read the book yet.  I don’t care about snippets, and would rather give the book a fair shake in its entirety.

With all that being said, here’s my problem with the crux of Goldberg’s thesis:

• The book is clearly not intended to create meaningful or constructive dialogue.  I suppose most books aren’t, as the idea here is to sell books.  But with that kind of title–essentially correlating Liberalism with statist Fascism–you are obviously pandering to a particular audience that will lap that kind of hyperbole right up.
• I think Goldberg confuses authoritarianism with outright Fascism.  The American Left is certainly capable of being intolerant and illiberal, but mostly in how they choose to achieve their ends.  But Fascism is a much different “end” than the stated goals of most American Liberals and Progressives. 
• The kind of Liberal elitism Goldberg warns against–which he links somewhat questionably, it would seem, to the eugenics movement (pull out the Pivot of Civilization quotes)–seems to run contrary to the “fasci” in Fascism.  This is not a binding national ideology, but rather, a collection of do-gooder know-it-alls who want to run your life for you.  The two are in conflict, since one relies on the people, whereas the other at time spurns them.
     

With that said, I appreciate this sentiment:

The way to achieve Edwards’ and Huckabee’s populist goal of reducing the role of “special interests,” meaning money, in government is to reduce the role of government in distributing money. But populists want to sharply increase that role by expanding the regulatory state’s reach and enlarging its agenda of determining the distribution of wealth. Populists, who are slow learners, cannot comprehend this iron law: Concentrate power in Washington and you increase the power of interests whose representatives are concentrated there.

Barack Obama, who might be mercifully closing the Clinton parenthesis in presidential history, is refreshingly cerebral amid this recrudescence of the paranoid style in American politics. He is the un-Edwards and un-Huckabee — an adult aiming to reform the real world rather than an adolescent fantasizing mock-heroic “fights” against fictitious villains in a left-wing cartoon version of this country.

Ouch.

I’m not a fan of the phony baloney style of populism Edwards and his ilk espouse.  Will’s point is well taken–you can’t treat the electorate as an insurgency and then advocate for more and more power in Washington.  The idea that a Big Government crusader will rein in on the Evil Corporations and foster legitimate change is somewhat fanciful.  Even the New Deal–perhaps the blueprint for American Liberalism–cooperated at various turns with the business community.  The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, for example, embraced Roosevelt’s plan for allowing price stabilization within certain trade sectors.  Hoover’s administration ignored these deflationary measures, as they would’ve violated anti-trust regulations imposed by the federal government.  Roosevelt, as history would soon inform, had little concern for such trifles.  Government and business mustn’t be on par at all times, and Liberals understand that government must regulate in order to maintain fairness.  However, they also know that government shouldn’t always be in the business of replacing business. 

There are a few candidates who get this.  John Edwards is not one of them. 
UPDATE:

With this issue, I’d say it’s important to distinguish policy from approach.  Most of us understand that John Edwards and Barack Obama are closer on the issues than Huckabee and the former.  I’m sure George Will would agree, too.   

But for those who would like to see ”a clean energy economy, a strong safety net for the sick, a progressive tax code, and a government that respects privacy,” I’d recommend a quick and cursory review of how legislation gets passed in America.  Check out some of the more seminal pieces of legislation from throughout the 20th Century.  The government is built for compromise, with the senate especially suited as a way to curb the whims and impulses of a fickle populous.  Whipping up outrage and exaggerated divisions works well in campaigns and direct mail, but it doesn’t really resemble governing.  That was Will’s point.           

Style and form are important in a power sharing relationship. 

But their real gripe here is with the so-called independents themselves.  Activists view these voters–who often vary by region–with contempt and condescending pity.  Disregarding their significance in both 2004 and 2006, the self-identified independents frustrate and stymie the partisan apparatchiks, making it more difficult to triage and target them.  Obama–primarily due to his charisma and compelling message–can do what these activists cannot.  Because of their refusal to get on the grid and become a target, these voters become a nuisance.  If they don’t contribute to ideologically consistent organizations or candidates, it’ll make them less viable for list selling.  This affects direct mail and other targeting measures.  Because they won’t shut their damn mouths and register with a party, well, it makes the party apparatus less necessary.  In some states–NY for one–the two party system has a monopoly on party membership services at the county level.  This infrastructure makes less sense if more and more voters break with purity for the sake of independence.  There are careers at stake here.

But the important take away point here is the sentiment.  Obama’s message is appealing in 2008, but somebody else will grab the torch in future elections.  The candidate(s) who grab at this, hone it and know how to mobilize on it will be better off.  2006 was a tossing of the bums, and hopefully, we’ll see more bipartisan dispensing in the future.  Other global legislative bodies–whether they work of some proportional system or whatever–see the merit in upfront compromise (either via a list system, or some other power sharing measure).  Yes, people disagree.  They will and they should.  But it’s the ability to bridge those differences and produce results that builds the elusive brand of statesmanship this country has been lacking.   

The spit and vinegar activism of the Netroots and the MoveOn.org crowd depends on the ability to whip up panic and outrage over token issues (just as conservatives will always revert back to taxes, guns, gays and God in a crunch).  If voters refuse these comfortable categories, it will shake the system as we know it.  The country is ripe for a middle way states(wo)man who can chip away at the system birthed after 1968 and McGovern-Fraser. 

(h/t Meme)    

Should we ignore Iran? Should we negotiate with them directly? Should we put them on par with the Soviet Union? All of these options have glaring flaws, and frankly, don’t seem to be very well thought out. Here’s a bit of a roundup on neo-progressive sentiment on the issue:

AlterNet:

After the Second World War the Soviet Union annexed the Baltic states, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, part of East Prussia and part of Slovakia. Then, mostly through rigged elections, it turned Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria into puppet states and used military force, when necessary, to maintain that status.

Neither the United States — nor anyone else — seriously challenged any of that.

Basically, we accepted that anything that happened inside the Iron Curtain — formed by the positions where the Red Army stopped at the end of the war — was inside its sphere of influence.

Booman Tribune:

This also explains the open hostility of many in the Bush administration to Iran, as evidenced by the statement by Debra Cagan, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Coalition Affairs to Defence Secretary Robert Gates (as reported in ask’s recommended diary at Booman Tribune) to visiting British MP’s that "I hate all Iranians." Clearly her attitude reflects the general zeitgeist within all levels the Bush administration, which after the fall of Saddam Hussein, and the utter failure of the Iraqi occupation, have now focused all their attention on Iran as the "next enemy" to be taken down, whatever the cost in lives, money or worldwide economic turmoil.

Ezra Klein:

At the end of the day, I don’t think we’re going to stop the Iranian nuclear program. We’re not serious enough about doing so. The country’s politicians have committed to it going away, not trading it away. But the former isn’t much of an option and the latter is unlikely. So it will likely proceed apace. That’s why I’m so insistent on politicians actually signaling whether or not they’d attack Iran to end their atomic pursuit — because that will probably be the choice they face. And so I’m glad to see that Hillary Clinton is atoning for her vote in favor of Lieberman-Kyl by cosponsoring a resolution that states that any funds used to attack Iran must go through an explicit process of congressional approval. The bill, of course, is unlikely to pass, but if Democrats are willing to stand behind it, they can publicize the problem and make action by the Bush administration significantly less likely.

So the thought process seems to be as follows: War with Iran is an unacceptable negative, whereas immediate capitulation should be viewed as nuanced and positive. After all, people who talk to their enemies are serious, and those who consider military action are simply jingoistic and "hawkish."

This seems to be the preferred logic by critics on the far Left, despite any lack in clarity and specifics. For starters, this method limits your leverage immediately if negotiations were to ever occur. As Jason Steck points out, it’s pretty routine to play out attack scenarios and wave the big stick. You do this because you can. Iran is also playing this game to the best of their ability by declaring to the world that they have missiles pointed towards Israel.

There is a place here for coercive diplomacy, as Iran certainly doesn’t want to be attacked or harmed all for the sake of a nuclear program that’s in its infancy. It’s a Power Strategy Mix, one that has yielded some positive results in dealing with North Korea. So why would we begin the process with immediate limitations and fewer options?

Even more confusing is the constant referencing of the Soviet Union in this matter. Dan Senor recently dismissed this argument in the Wall Street Journal:

Iran is not the Soviet Union and the post-9/11 struggle is not the Cold War. The deterrence camp is willing to stand by as Iran develops nuclear weapons, presumably on the model that Iran will eventually collapse as the Soviet Union did. But the Argentinean case demonstrates what Tehran was willing and able to do when it had no nuclear umbrella. If, as the 9/11 Commission Report argues, the U.S. suffered from a "failure of imagination" regarding how far terrorists would go, a nuclear Iran risks encouraging the terrorist imagination to take another quantum leap.

Not only that, but Iran’s extensive history of imperialism via proxy makes it far too difficult to simply "contain" them. How do you contain Hezbollah? How do you contain Hamas? Does such containment involve Syria as well? Following the Cold War logic, what line do we draw, and where would we define the Iranian "sphere of influence"?

The Iranians do not have the position of power that the Soviets held. We tolerated their sphere (which isn’t entirely accurate, unless you want to call supporting outspoken dissidents living behind the curtain tolerance), because they could utilize their power to make good on their ambitions. The Iranians can still be stopped, and approaching them any differently grants them an undeserved legitimacy. We should avoid such a mistake at all costs. So why then do the progressive bloggers prefer this method?

None of these questions have been answered by the Left. Instead, we’ve had hyperbolic ranting and raving about neo-cons and Norman Podhoretz. We hear an awful lot in the blogosphere about progressive values and progressive candidates.

What does progressive diplomacy look like? 

(Cross posted at RCBlogs)

Nothing is truly quite as frustrating as watching war critics rush to smear those who may still believe that the United States holds a moral obligation to remain in Iraq.  Kevin Drum has served up something of the sort this week, excoriating anyone who has concerns about leaving a failed state to the tribal warlords, militias and terrorists.  Allow me to introduce you to the theory of the Chaos Hawks:

Having admitted, however, that the odds of a military success in Iraq are almost impossibly long, Chaos Hawks nonetheless insist that the U.S. military needs to stay in Iraq for the foreseeable future. Why? Because if we leave the entire Middle East will become a bloodbath. Sunni and Shiite will engage in mutual genocide, oil fields will go up in flames, fundamentalist parties will take over, and al-Qaeda will have a safe haven bigger than the entire continent of Europe.

I’m not entirely sure who it is that Drum is speaking of, but as a Liberal who ascribes to this derided theory of his, I certainly don’t believe success in Iraq is an unattainable prospect.  Drum also attacks those who followed Colin Powell’s Pottery Barn theory, apparently arguing that we have no responsibility to maintain a presence in the shattered region.  In his view, history has proven that when occupiers leave the occupied, puppy dogs and sunshine certainly must ensue.  May the historical parallels commence:

Needless to say, this is nonsense. Israel has fought war after war in the Middle East. Result: no regional conflagration. Iran and Iraq fought one of the bloodiest wars of the second half the 20th century. Result: no regional conflagration. The Soviets fought in Afghanistan and then withdrew. No regional conflagration. The U.S. fought the Gulf War and then left. No regional conflagration. Algeria fought an internal civil war for a decade. No regional conflagration.   

Huh?  For pithy’s sake, I won’t even address the ridiculous Algerian example, nor will I even begin to broach the very obvious conflagration that is the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.  The example of Afghanistan is perhaps the most relevant, and should in fact be our working model if we’re to ever understand what’s potentially at stake in Iraq.  In Drum’s mind (and words), the following never happened in Afghanistan after the Soviet withdrawal.  Let’s read it again:

Because if we leave the entire Middle East will become a bloodbath. Sunni and Shiite will engage in mutual genocide, oil fields will go up in flames, fundamentalist parties will take over, and al-Qaeda will have a safe haven bigger than the entire continent of Europe.

Geography and oil fields aside, can anyone dispute that the abandonment of Afghanistan in fact led to precisely these things?  The disorder and fractured state of the pummelled nation led to the growth of the Taliban, who returned order and stability to places such as Kandahar, while also applying arguably the strictest form of Sharia law ever witnessed in the Muslim world.  Oh, there was also that whole Al Qaeda training camps thing.

Now, a likely retort will be that Al Qaeda, much like the Taliban, is Sunni.  Since Iraq is predominantly Shi’a, well of course Al Qaeda could never truly flourish there.  This assumption is flawed however, since it relies on the unlikely notion that the Shi’a majority could pacify and stabilize the entire war torn country.  A more likely scenario is the one predicted by that bastion of Chaos Hawkery, the editorial board of The New York Times:

Americans must be clear that Iraq, and the region around it, could be even bloodier and more chaotic after Americans leave. There could be reprisals against those who worked with American forces, further ethnic cleansing, even genocide. Potentially destabilizing refugee flows could hit Jordan and Syria. Iran and Turkey could be tempted to make power grabs. Perhaps most important, the invasion has created a new stronghold from which terrorist activity could proliferate.

The Iranian power grab theory is not unfounded, nor is the belief that Turkey might feel it necessary to invade in order to quell PKK activity in Kurdistan.  Fear that the Kurds might take advantage of the turmoil and move their borders southward could lead to even more sectarian conflict, only lessening the likelihood of a national consensus upon American departure.

Point being, Iraq is far too fractured to do anything about AQI.  Their presence is undoubtedly smaller than what is often proclaimed by the administration, but it’s mostly thanks to the presence of American forces that has guaranteed that reality to this point.  When AQI extortionists and thugs are free to once again roam the Anbar Province, who will stop them?  The PSF?  The Tribes?  We’ve already seen that their ability to do this is unlikely without a little help.  With the American military withdrawn, that help will no longer be available.

I’m sure these possible scenarios fall upon deaf ears with the Neo-Progressives.  So intent are they on leaving “Bush’s war” behind, they have completely lost the ability to objectively look at the dire possibilities for the people of Iraq were we to leave too soon.  If you follow their logic, our presence only accelerates the likelihood of genocide, however our departure, if you believe Drum, would of course lessen it.  Make sense?

I didn’t think so.  Welcome to Isolationism 101.

(Cross posted at The Van Der Galien Gazette)

He links to Bruce Bawer, who shares the following thoughts on this “field”:

it’s opposed to every value that the West stands for — liberty, free markets, individualism — and it despises America, the supreme symbol and defender of those values.

Yikes.  Well I don’t know about all of that.  I’m sure most of these Peace junkies are well intentioned, albeit misguided at times.  There’s nothing inherently wrong with wanting to prevent violence, death and pain.  However, a question I’ve often returned to myself are the terms on which we reach these presumably “peaceful” scenarios.  What is peace?  Bawer digs deeper:

George Orwell would have understood the attraction of privileged young people to the Peace Racket. “Turn-the-other-cheek pacifism,” he observed in 1941, “only flourishes among the more prosperous classes, or among workers who have in some way escaped from their own class. The real working class . . . are never really pacifist, because their life teaches them something different. To abjure violence it is necessary to have no experience of it.” If so many young Americans have grown up insulated from the realities that Vegetius and Sun Tzu elucidated centuries ago, and are therefore easy marks for the Peace Racket, it’s thanks to the success of the very things the Peace Racket despises above all—American capitalism and American military preparedness.

I think there is a strong strain of this present in the current neo-progressive movement.  There’s a big difference between armistice and genuine peace, a reality I believe the ambitious peace wonks tend to neglect.  The former is merely a documented agreement to stop fighting, whereas the latter is an actual state of being.

This is a reality the Israelis have had to live with since 1949.  A cessation of violence doesn’t necessarily mean that there is peace.  Peace requires a common understanding, and a consensus on shared values.  These same students of “peace” would no doubt prefer we have no presence in the Middle East, at least not in the military sense.  If guns don’t fire, and bombs don’t drop, well then surely we have a peace, right?

Wrong.  We know that the enemy we face now doesn’t forget, and knows how to bide their time very well.  The absence of violence does not a peace make, but rather, often serves as the incubator of worse things to come.

(Cross posted at The Van Der Galien Gazette)