Andrew Hagen

Bernard Lewis’s New Yorker article from last year is an excellent and concise guide to the historical conflict. (*) Michael Feher provides a fascinating review of Robert Fisk’s faulty journalism, and in the process takes us through a detailed look at the contemporary origins of militant Islamic fundamentalism. († Theory and Event, Volume 5, Issue 4)

The Fall issue of Dissent is out. Michael Kazin has a good article on the patriotic Left. (‡). Elaine Scarry has an interesting article in the Boston Globe concerning how the defense establishment is not up to the task of defending the country. (§). I see this as fitting within my argument about how the nation-state is unable to win long-term victories in the new age of warfare that has emerged since 9/11.

The Bush Administration has painted Iraq into a corner. If Saddam Hussein makes another misstep, the world will know it. Recently, the White House issued its report on the “decade of deception.” (**) Then the Bush Administration released its new national security strategy. (††) The most recent jab is the UK’s assessment of Saddam Hussein’s WMD program. (‡‡ PDF)

Al Qaeda had attacked the US before, but on September 11, 2001, the struggle between Al Qaeda and the US became sharply drawn. A different, wider struggle also began on 9/11, but has not been widely recognized by the political left-wing. A new age of warfare is upon us. Before, the most serious threat to the security of societies came from nation-states, the only entities capable of raising armies. Now, the most pressing danger to nation-states comes from nongovernmental small groups with access to technology capable of mass murder. The ultimate result threatens all of civilization and forces us on the left-wing to realign our political strategy in order to fight this “war on terrorism” in defense of human life and left-wing ideals.

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Ian Williams writes an excellent article in LA Weekly. (*). I find it very persuasive. He is not beating the war drum, but he recognizes that there may be no other choice but to strike against Iraq militarily.

My problems with the proposed military campaign against Iraq have almost all been resolved. Bush now seeks the approval of Congress, and the UN. These two concessions help a lot.

Weapons inspectors will now go into Iraq in mid-October. The new weapons inspection team has safeguards in place to prevent its arms control mission from morphing into an intelligence gathering mission.

By the time the inspectors go into Iraq, Congressional and UN approval for using force against Iraq should already exist.

Scott Ritter says inspect first, then use force if necessary. That is exactly what will now happen. If the inspectors are given trouble or find their job impossible, Bush will then have Congressional and UN authorization in hand to deal with that problem.

The Congressional resolution proposed by Bush needs change. It should require Bush to keep Congress informed on a timely basis of important events. The resolution should not give Bush the ability to use military force to keep “peace and security” in the entire region. It should focus on Iraq. The final resolution will probably satisfy these and other concerns.

Should Iraq not cooperate with the weapons inspectors, and no UN approval is given, I believe the US would have the right to preemptive action to protect itself under the UN Charter. I’m not a lawyer, but I believe that would be the case.

The oil issue is resolved by Bush’s internationalist turn. By involving other nations that have oil interests in Iraq, meaning France and Russia, a US move into Iraq no longer looks like an oil grab. Practically, French and Russian interests will be represented on the ground soon after regime change. Their economic interests will be protected.

It may very well be impossible to “democratize” Iraq. Forced democracy is not democracy. The people of Iraq should have the opportunity to try democracy if they want it, however.

The overriding problem is Iraq’s WMD. Either the inspections or the US military will soon resolve that problem.

Once the Congressional resolution is dealt with, the political argument about Iraq between the Left and Right should be over how to handle Iraq in the event of regime change. We on the Left will be pushing for more effective nation building than the Right will want.

Originally posted to Democratic Left.

The woman recently caught on videotape hitting her child is a member of the little known group called the Irish Travellers. This group is sometimes compared to the Roma—better known as the Gypsies. The Irish Travellers have a long and fascinating history in the US. When they are discussed, they are often the victim of stereotypes and misconceptions. (*)

Marc Cooper’s superb retrospective on the failures of both the Right and Left since 9/11 was published in LA Weekly. (*) Cooper says both the Right and Left have failed to overcome their old ideologies. My only criticism would be that Cooper does not make it clearer that neither the Right nor the Left can be cast into the single molds he disparages. For example, I’ve argued that the progressive, independent Left has sharp differences with the establishment Left, which is now only a dead branch. Others say much the same thing, with Brad DeLong referring to the loony Left, Todd Gitlin the far Left, and Leo Casey the fundamentalist Left. Overall, it’s a great essay that makes an important moral point. Hopefully, in the coming year we will put aside those old ideologies once and for all.

In a recent discussion in PEN-l, some list members are discussing whether Karl Marx may have stated his unconditional support of “anti-colonial revolts.” The exact motivation of the discussion is not important, because it leads us to consider the ideology of the establishment Left.

Let us suppose that we, for whatever reason, place intrinsic value on everything Marx said or wrote. Then let us suppose that Marx actually stated his unconditional support for anti-colonial revolts. Then let us suppose that what occurred on 9/11 was actually a revolt against “colonialism” as perpetrated by the United States people.

To grant all these premises is a quite unjustified gift. Nevertheless, still unsupported is the proposition that the 9/11 attacks were justified. The problem is that individuals on the side of the colonizers but who are not colonizers themselves can become victims of the revolt. That will constitute a separate tragedy from colonialism. In the case of any revolt, one can engage in either selective, just violence as necessary, or one can engage in mass slaughter. Even if an anti-colonial revolt is supportable in general, individual acts of the revolt may yet be unjustified. The tragedy of the former colonizers would be truly pointless if the revolt in question does not succeed in saving anyone from colonialism.

In 9/11, the attackers were not interested in stopping colonialism or any kind of tyranny, but only in installing tyranny of a new sort. The attacks were designed to destroy a country, the US, and to force all American citizens into compliance with sharia, Islamic fundamentalist law. While this outcome may seem remote, it is apparent from history that fortunes can change swiftly and that great countries fall. Furthermore, in ethical judgment, the motivation is at least as important as the likelihood of success. Viewing 9/11 as justified and thus any self-defense response to 9/11 as not really self-defense but only more “colonialism,” the establishment Left would have had the US acquiesce in its own downfall were it to occur, even though such a downfall would have resulted in massive suffering and been without purpose. Finally, the currently “colonized” peoples would not have been freer or better off under the rule of Al Qaeda.

All this is denied by the establishment Left. The deep problem with the establishment Left is that their sympathy is only for some people. That is, they have sympathy for all so long as they are not American. This profound gap in human sensibility must have its roots in either some psychological phenomenon or an awful lack of morality. I believe that in too many cases, unfortunately, it must be the former.

Do not cry for the establishment Left. Cry for their victims: the youthful who seek answers to the difficult questions posed by today’s world and unfortunately come under their manipulative sway. I hope those who fall under that sway engage their critical faculties.

Originally posted to Democratic Left. Last edited 23 September 2002.

Fox News has somehow picked up on the murmurs amongst the Left about how the defeat of Cynthia McKinney could lead to divisiveness between African-Americans and Jewish Americans and hence trouble for the Democratic Party. (*) McKinney was targeted by AIPAC in her primary election, which she lost. Various people on the Left have blamed her defeat on Jews. Were it not for the Jews, she would have been reelected, they say. Take a look at what McKinney stands for, however, and one can see that the blame lies solidly on her own shoulders. She has implied repeatedly that President Bush and other administration officials knew of the September 11 attacks ahead of time, most recently in her post-defeat speech to the Congressional Black Caucus. (†) McKinney’s conspiracy theory is laughable, and so was she as a candidate, even as an incumbent. That, not “meddling,” was the real reason she lost her primary race.

The White House is renewing its campaign to educate the public about the links between illegal drugs and violence, including terrorism. (*) (†) Good. It’s about time. We on the Left should be fully supportive of this. The use of addictive drugs detracts from one’s capacity to exercise the individual liberties that we promote. The use of mind-altering drugs is also harmful to the autonomy enjoyed by the individual, because by occluding one’s ability to perceive and discern reality, one’s ability to consider and act as a free agent is debilitated. The drug trade is indeed violent, and should be targeted more fiercely by law enforcement. Thanks to recent investigations, we know that some terrorist groups receive money from drug traffickers. To really address the problems of drugs and terrorism, we need to stop denying the links between them.

Update: 4 May 2004. Additional links. (‡) (§) (**)

For some reason the FBI is calling the anthrax investigation “Amerithrax.” (*) I have no idea why that is. It is an execrable mutant of a word, and it should be discarded in favor of something else—anything else.

A recent Tapped web log entry states:

The New York Times‘ Tom Friedman debunks the myth of public support for the war here. Not authoritatively, we should point out, but anecdotallly [sic] — and convincingly.

(*) Where? Actually, the debunking is in the New York Times. Even had Tapped put the hyperlink in the right place, it would still be confusing. It’s too common a custom of web designers and web loggers to reference objects on the Internet with the odd description “here,” as if one were pointing at it, and then providing a link for leaving one’s site, which was presumably “here” at the beginning, but “here” now being there, “here” is here no longer. Leaving aside whether Friedman’s argument—that the American public really does not support the war, despite poll results—Tapped makes the ungrammatical and doubly dubious statement at the end of the paragraph that Friedman’s argument is both not authoritative and yet convincing. Authoritative means either of the nature of authority, or possessing a conclusive or convincing quality. Polls are not authoritative in the sense of having authority. To say that a poll may or may not be authoritative in that sense—the sense of political authority or power—misrepresents the fundamental design of our democratic system. Polls are not democracy in action, at least not in our democracy. Polls are informal. They do not have the stamp or seal of authority. When done well, a poll result is accurate of the population studied. That is all a poll does. A poll has no power, sovereignty, or authority per se. If Tapped was using authoritatively as a synonym for convincingly, then what could it have meant by saying it was “[n]ot authoritatively. . . but. . . convincingly [made]”?

Although I cannot be correct every time myself, or hold up an offender for chastisement more than rarely, I believe that some should keep to a higher standard, and far from anything being wrong with that, high standards are quite important to civilization.

In news that is just now breaking, Iraq says it agrees to weapons inspections on an unconditional basis. (*). Obviously, this might really happen or it might not. Let’s hope it does, and let’s hope weapons inspections will be able to accomplish their mission. It would put enormous international pressure on President Bush to give up on his drive to go to war with Iraq, supported only by reasons that do not quite add up. It would be a luxury to savor if we could all recline in easy chairs a few weeks from now, with war averted, wondering if the whole thing was just a pseudo-event. A fine luxury, indeed, if only war is truly averted.

It’s now widely acknowledged that the split in the Left, at least here in America, is irrevocable. A recent article by Adam Shatz in the Nation tries to paper over the split by talking up a new consensus. (*) By the end of article, however, the “consensus” that Shatz desires is based on nothing but Chomskian rhetoric. The Left must fight against the war on terrorism, according to Shatz and others.

One of these others is Tom Hayden, the 60s radical. Not only is any war against Iraq unjust, but, according to Hayden, so is any war on terrorism. (†) Hayden’s vision, the amelioration of global poverty, is just a repeat of the reassignment of blame for 9/11 on American foreign policy, globalization, and impoverishment. Though fighting poverty would be worthwhile, it would not stop terrorism. The 9/11 hijackers did not come from predominantly poor backgrounds. Terrorists are politically disfranchised outsiders who end up in the paranoid cults of manipulators and brain washers. That is what breeds terrorists. Fix poverty and you still have terrorism.

The establishment Left perspective was forcefully debunked in an essay last year by Michael Walzer. (‡) If we want to be a serious Left, we have to start taking foreign policy seriously.

The New Republic angrily calls for progressives to stand up and be counted on Iraq. (§) As TNR deftly observes, such a crucial decision as whether to go to war against Iraq ought to be argued before the voters in the upcoming election. Merely saying that Bush has not made the case is hardly the same as taking a position oneself. The problem is not that the Democrats are cowards or cynics in not putting forth their real views, however. The problem is that there is no progressive view to put forth. The only clearly stated alternative to the neoconservative position of the Bush Administration and the realist position of the old conservatives like Brent Scowcroft is stated by Noam Chomsky. The vital progressive Left has yet to speak up as it has yet to complete its thinking process.

A recent New Yorker article delves into the controversy, and finds a liberal vision in that of Joseph Nye. (**) Nye is an internationalist. It is difficult to boil down broad principles of internationalism into a coherent policy alternative on Iraq or on the war on terrorism, however.

The conservative Weekly Standard cries a few crocodile tears for the lack of a “better Left.” (††) Indeed, that is precisely what is needed.

Seemingly answering the call, the conservative Front Page magazine offers Michael J. Totten’s liberal perspective: go to war with Iraq for the sake of democracy in the Middle East. (‡‡) If the war proceeds against Iraq, it must indeed have as its goal the establishment of a secular, democratic state in Iraq, as Bush has called for. The trick will be living up to the promise. Iraq has no history of democracy.

Meanwhile, Michael Berube writes a touching, eloquent essay in the Boston Globe to sum of the current schizophrenic state of the American Left. (§§) So, where do we go from here?

Perhaps we should go back to Paul Berman’s essay of a year ago, where he called for the Left to support the war on terrorism wholeheartedly. (***) With what we know now, the handling of the war on terror stands to be improved. The Bush Administration’s secretiveness alone is worrisome. Can progressives fill that niche?

Brent Scowcroft helped kickstart the debate over Iraq a month ago. (*) Since then, the Bush Administration and its coterie of nongovernmental ideologues have scrambled to answer the criticism laid out by Scowcroft and others of the Administration’s plans.

Over the past month, the Bush Administration has withdrawn many of its extreme positions on how to initiate such a war. Bush now says he will rely on Congressional approval before engaging in this war. Bush will also seek approval from the UN Security Council, though, he will still engage in war if the Security Council does not approve of it. Yesterday, on Face the Nation, Scowcroft took note of some of these changes and said he would support an action that does not have UN approval. (†)

The Wall Street Journal believes that Scowcroft has switched his positions in the face of the leadership of the Bush Administration. In fact, the reality is just the opposite. It is Bush who switched positions. Where before, weapons inspections were scoffed at, now Bush implies that they would be acceptable. As Bush said in his speech to the UN, if Iraq complies with all of the UN resolutions, including those requiring weapons inspections, war will be averted. (‡). Bush did not explicitly say that in his speech, but reading between the lines, that is what he meant. Additionally, now that Bush is going through the UN, the chances are greatly reduced that an attack on Iraq would be truly unilateral and thus disruptive to the global counterterrorism campaign. Going through the UN wins allies. Thus, the objections of Scowcroft and others have largely been recognized and acted on by the Bush Administration’s new approach to Iraq.

It is Bush who now supports the position his advisors were advocating against so wildly over the summer: that Bush first give Saddam Hussein an ultimatum on re-admitting weapons inspectors, then if Hussein eschews that ultimatum, get Congressional approval and preferably UN approval before taking military action. That is Bush’s position now, thanks to the leadership of Scowcroft and others.

Of course, it may be that a new round of weapons inspections would be unworkable. This could be for technical reasons if Hussein’s facilities are now too spread out, or for political reasons, if Hussein refuses to cooperate. That, however, is a separate issue.

You should never go to war unless there is no other option. To the extent that weapons inspection represents a potential alternative to war, that possibility should be fully explored.

Last Friday’s Florida terrorist scare is not fully resolved. There are a few discordant facts that make me believe that the three medical students are lying when they say they were not talking or joking about 9/11 in the restaurant. This case has become a showpiece for how Americans are supposedly all discriminating against people who look different. I am skeptical of that conclusion. The scare has become a media circus. While little of substance actually occurred, there are important lessons to be drawn from what happened.

I believe they were joking about 9/11 in the restaurant, and lying about not joking about it. They say that neither 9/11 nor “9/13″ ever came up in their conversation. I don’t believe them. I also believe they are lying about their interaction with the woman, Eunice Stone, in the restaurant.
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In Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.’s book, A Thousand Days, Daniel Patrick Moynihan is quoted recalling a conversation with the columnist Mary McGrory after President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Moynihan said. “Mary McGrory said to me that we’ll never laugh again. And I said, `Heavens, Mary. We’ll laugh again. It’s just that we’ll never be young again.’” Perhaps that is the best summary of the perspective of those who are able only to watch from a distance as their country is wounded. As I look back upon that day more than a year ago, I feel old when I never did before.

The term “first principles” is ancient, stretching back thousands of years. The first principles of progressives are, or should be: liberty, human rights, democracy, equality, property, entrepreneurship, and the rule of law.
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Noam Chomsky’s recent article in the Guardian is worth a look. (*). Unfortunately, Chomsky remains stuck in his old mindset.
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Noam Chomsky’s recent book, 9-11, is worthy of critical examination.
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Let us always remember September 11, 2001. (*) May we never allow such evil to again occur.

Last updated: 10 December 2002.

Osama Bin Laden led the conspiracy to perpetrate the September 11 attacks. CNN reports that on September 11, 2001, Osama Bin Laden raised two fingers before the second plane hit, three fingers before the third hit, and four fingers before Flight 93 crashed. He never raised all five fingers. Let the conspiracy theorists try to explain themselves out of this brutal evidence. (*).