Nah, he’s just lying.

Look, if he were committed to democratic principles and whatsis, he woulda gone to Congress and followed the law.  Instead, he’s doing a legal end-run, just like all of the other civil liberties issues.  Obama is a person who is astonishingly good at pretending to be a decent, liberal human being.  I’ve never seen someone mouth those words with that level of conviction and actually be just plain lying before.  But there’s no other interpretation.

This intervention may go fine, if only because Obama isn’t a complete idiot.  But he’s Bush’s third term on civil liberties and foreign policy, if not worse.

“And I think the reason is simply that our military is ridiculously large.  When you spend as much money as we do on a military year after year, I think it starts to seem criminal not to use it.  It’s like as if you spent twice as much on a big house and then only use two rooms in it.  You’re going to start to feel guilty.”

I seriously doubt that guilt has any significant role in our use of our grotesquely large military.  The only people who feel guilty when we fail to intervene in some conflict somewhere are Democrats, and even then, only those toward the liberal end of the spectrum.  We felt bad about Rwanda, for example, while the cold-hearted conservative attitude was, “no oil there, why bother?”

What is far more likely is an attitude of, “We have all this awesome power, let’s use it and show everyone just how awesome it is!”  Like the guy (it’s usually guys) who has a powerful V8 under the hood of his car/truck, the lure of that power is irresistible.  They just have to figure out some excuse to use it, whether it makes any sense or not.  The very existence of our vastly overblown military machine guarantees it will be used, just like the recent expansions of presidential power by Cheney/Bush end up getting used by Obama — more or less because he can and doesn’t want to see those powers taken away.

The other thing is the “Democrats are pussies/wimps/peaceniks” factor.  This lead directly to Truman getting involved in Korea (because he had been accused of “losing China” to the commies), to Kennedy executing Eisenhower’s Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba (the youngest president elected at that time has to show the commies he’s a real man by doing something stupid that seems manly) and increasing the number of “advisors” in Vietnam (gotta show the Republican assholes in Congress that Democrats can be tough) and the Cuban Missile Crisis (we gotta show the russkies we’ll take it to the brink in the game of nuclear chicken), to Johnson’s drastic escalation in Vietnam (he thought he had to show his war bonafides to get the social programs he wanted through Congress), to Carter’s failed American Embassy hostage rescue in Iran, to Clinton’s involvement in the Balkans, and now to Obama’s Wonderful Libyan Adventure.  Of course, all these examples of Democratic bravado have failed to kill the conservative-promoted meme of Democratic weakness in matters of warfare.

“Seriously, we spend so much money on our military it’s ridiculous.  It becomes a self-rationalizing thing.  If you don’t use it regularly, people are going to start talking about—-gasp!—-cutting defense spending.  Can’t have that.”

This is far closer to the truth, and it affects both Democrats and Republicans, who live in fear that Mao Zedong, Ho Chi Minh, or Fidel Castro (or Saddam Hussein) will laugh in our faces and make us look bad in the eyes of the world.

Stupid machismo bullshit…

What the fuck do we want to happen ther?  What the fuck do we expect?  Just by being there, we’re influencing things, and we’re not known for ever influencing things In a good way…at least not good for other people and not for our corporate profits.

No one supporting intervention has a right to say one word about deficit reduction or “austerity”.

The military IS too big.  It is unaccountable and corruption and theft are rampant.  It doesn’t abide by it’s own rules…and neither does the Executive.

“Moving forward” instead of prosecuting war crimes is going to end up being an even bigger mistake than Ford pardoning Nixon.

Amanda wrote:

It’s fucking ridiculous that we are perpetually at war with someone, but we’ve completely abandoned the Constitutional requirement to declare war before going to war.  I’m not an absolutist on this or anything.  If troops are attacked or our country is invaded, feel free to self-defend before a formal declaration.  But the fact that no President, Democratic or Republican, even bothers to pay tribute to this legal restraint on what has become a tyrannical power bothers me.

Unsurprisingly, I disagree.  The Constitution gives to the Congress the authority to declare war, but it does not specify that a declaration of war must say “The United States declares war on ____________.”  The elder President Bush sought, and received, congressional approval to use military force to expel the Iraqi army from Kuwait, while the younger President Bush sought, and received, congressional authorizations to use military force in both Afghanistan and Iraq.  None of them say, “We declare war,” but the effect is the same. 

It could be argued that the Framers meant to have declarations of war to have a more formal declaration language included, but if they meant to do so, they still did not.

And while you didn’t mention this part, I’d raise the subject of the President’s authority.  The Constitution specifies that he is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces; it does not specify that he can exercise that authority only within our boundaries unless we are officially at war, or that the United States military cannot operate outside of our borders and territorial waters except during time of war.  Perhaps the Framers simply expected that, but they never so specified it.

The congressional authority to declare war and the the presidential role as commander-in-chief are both logical, but they are also somewhat at odds.  The Congress does have the specific authority to state that no money can be drawn from the treasury to do certain things, but once the money has been appropriated, I don’t see how the Congress could order the President to withdraw troops.  Looked at the other way, the Congress could declare war against Lower Slobovia, but the commander-in-chief could, under his authority, refuse to fight that war and keep the troops on their bases.  The only enforcement authority would reside with the impeachment power.

Looked at the other way, the Congress could declare war against Lower Slobovia, but the commander-in-chief could, under his authority, refuse to fight that war and keep the troops on their bases.

And yet, this would obviously never happen. Why? Because executive authority is inherently biased in favor of military adventures. Unfortunately, the American electorate has itself developed a bias in favor of military adventurism, so there’s no longer any check against the executive’s millennia-old tendency to use the military for its own amusement.

Hindsight is 20/20, and a month ago, it looked like Ghadaffi was going to go the way of Mubarak, and it was just a matter of time, but the better path for Obama would have been not to try to encourage Ghadaffi to leave but rather to work out some negotiated settlement and amnesty for the rebels. Unfortunately, at the time, this would have looked like Obama was “propping up Ghadaffi.”

If we want to cut the defense budget, there’s only one way to do it.  Under the Constitution, there’s no mention of an Air Force.  Inform the Teabaggers in Congress of this, get the Army Air Corps reinstated, and we’ll save tens of billions right away.

I’m not as skeptical of poor outcomes for Libya as I was for Afghanistan (all along) or Iraq (too late.)  There are more questions than answers.  But as long as the UN and NATO (meaning the people who don’t want to do anything themselves and the organization that we enforce) are going to keep our troops out of there, I can’t say I’m overly bothered at the prospect of bombing Libyan things.  It’s going to be a mess, those people aren’t really our friends, and the oil is the elephant in the room.  Our economy runs on oil, like it or don’t, and this kind of thing is going to be more, rather than less, common in the decades ahead as we come to realize how stupid and wasteful our American way of life is.  If our bombs can make the Libyan people less unfree, it’s worth a chance.

Jon wrote:

If we want to cut the defense budget, there’s only one way to do it.  Under the Constitution, there’s no mention of an Air Force.  Inform the Teabaggers in Congress of this, get the Army Air Corps reinstated, and we’ll save tens of billions right away.

There actually has been some low-level scuttlebutt about doing just that.  Personally, I’d favor that, but I’m sure there’d be massive resistance from the blue suits.

The odd thing about that is that the Air Force really is redundant and terrible.  Folding it back into the US Army Air Corps is the best thing that could happen.

“But his strategy, as Roy as noted, is less “show them that we really mean it by not interfering” and more “make this a competition between you and your predecessor over who can do it right”.”

Bingo. There are a shitload of ways he could prove himself a better President than Bush. Why he feels it has to be a military example is what I don’t understand. Did someone tell him that Bussh’s dick was bigger?

Bussh was a bounty hunter who was only seen for about two seconds in The Empire Strikes Back.  I think he was a lizard, so he might have had two penises.  That’s hard to beat.

“There are a shitload of ways he could prove himself a better President than Bush. Why he feels it has to be a military example is what I don’t understand. Did someone tell him that Bussh’s dick was bigger?”

Just by showing up to work and not going on vacation a third of the time he’s in office already puts him a leg up on Bush Jr.  Not ceding the president’s duties regarding everything other than the ridiculous dress-up and pomp aspects of the office to his Vice President is another.  Waiting until he’s in his third year of office before launching new international adventures is another.

OTOH, to Mr. Obama’s discredit, failing to prosecute members of the preceding administration for the extraordinary number of federal and international crimes committed is way up there, as is continuing the two asinine wars he inherited, and continuing to tap phones and collecting and reading email, continuing the use of torture and military tribunals and indefinite detention, and all sorts of other unworthy-of-an-American-President abuses performed under Bush/Cheney.

Barack Obama:  Not anything close to as liberal as his opponents paint him (unfortunately), and far more conservative than his opponents will ever admit (unfortunately).  A true mixed bag.

However, thank god Obama won and not Grandpa McCain and the Wasilla Grifters…

I realize this is a problem that should have been fixed before Libya started to erupt into civil war

Small semantic clarification: it’s more of an old-fashioned tribal war than an issue-based civil war. Quaddafi and his sons may have gussied it up as the latter, but this is really the sort of clan feuding has been going on in the desert since at least the Bronze Age. The only saving grace is that the toxic Islamic sectarian elements we see elsewhere in internecine Arab conflicts are largely absent in this one.

Now it’s one thing for the US and NATO to deny a dictator the use of air power against peaceful civilians or pro-democracy demonstrators, but despite the fact that the rebellion in Libya was precipitated by pro-democracy events in Egypt and Tunisia, it very quickly devolved into a conflict between Quaddafi in the west and a mix of rebels in the east (ranging from pro-democracy types to monarchists) united by tribal identity.

So at this point, we’re taking sides with the Hatfields against the McCoys (or maybe ‘twere the other way round)—less because the McCoys have airplanes and more because they’ve been a thorn in the sides of the U.S. for 30+ years and this is seen as a chance to get rid of Pa McCoy (who, to be clear, is an undeniably scaly character). As usual, though, the U.S. is incapable of honesty regarding its goals, and displays its usual unwillingness to examine too deeply the nature of the Hatfields.

However, thank god Obama won and not Grandpa McCain and the Wasilla Grifters…

Those jingo bumblers would probably have tried to throw American ground troops into Egypt, if not Tunisia, to support “democracy on the march.” The pathetic thing is, the neoCons probably think in all sincerity that the recent pro-democracy activity is the result of Prince Bush invading and occupying Iraq.

We can expect an even more swollen military now that corporations = people for lobbying purposes.  Every nickel in the military budget is perfectly suited to lobbyists’ grabs, and progressive domestic initiatives can’t compete.  Hard to believe the US government can install even more “austerity” + more guns ‘n’ nukes, but it will.  The mind boggles.

The odd thing about that is that the Air Force really is redundant and terrible.  Folding it back into the US Army Air Corps is the best thing that could happen.

The USAF is also the branch of service most infected by Xtian Dominionists—for anyone who respects the Constitution, there’s some seriously scary thought processes going on at Colorado Springs.

Libertarian wrote:

This decision by Obama is the first thing he’s done that probably is an impeachable offense, but you won’t hear it because the Repub’s love war even more than he does.

And how is it an impeachable offense?  What part of the law or the Constitution has President Obama violated with the Libyan action?

And what the hell are we doing taking sides in Libya’s civil war, tribal warfare, whatever it is.  Let them work it out.

There are limited cases where interventions make sense, mainly those where one side doesn’t have the power to work it out (e.g. a regime carrying out genocides or strafing and bombing peaceful protestors). This isn’t one of those cases.

I don’t have trouble with the U.N. or NATO collectively enforcing no-fly zones in a very narrow set of cases. The problem (beyond the fact that we pick and choose within that narrow set) is, even if they’re done properly, even if unmanned drones are used and no troops are endangered, horrible errors inevitably happen to innocent people on the ground. For example, wedding parties seem to attract the attention of missiles the way trailer parks seem to attract the attention of tornadoes, through no fault of their own. Once that kind of thing happens, you get badwill from both sides in the conflict.

Hard to be worse than Bush, but Obama is - spending us into Bankruptcy AND continuing/starting wars across the globe.

And Bush didn’t do both, to an even greater degree? The only reason Obama has had to spend is because of all that lovely de-regulation in the financial services sector that you extreme free market fantasists love.

Now to be sure, Obama is a Chicago School centrist who has more in common with your economic viewpoint than you’d care to admit. And a good number of Dems, Bill Clinton among them, have been guilty of enabling the neoliberal agenda that led to this disaster. The difference is, Obama was genuinely reluctant to bail out the banks, if only because the political optics are terrible. And the Dems don’t make dangerous deregulation and corporate arse-kissing an article of faith like the GOP does.

Most of us here are quite aware of Obama’s shortcomings and his failures to roll back Prince Bush’s depredations on the Constitution. But really, sell your false equivalencies somewhere else. We’re not buying.

Well, thanks for that legal advice, Libertarian.  Meanwhile we are signatories to international treaties establishing the United Nations and NATO, and I believe the Constitution says that treaties duly ratified by Congress are considered to be the law of the land as much as acts of Congress are.  The Congress could vote to take us out of the UN and NATO I suppose, but they haven’t done that yet.  So I think the legal situation is at least a bit murky when it comes to requiring Congressional authorization to take actions required for adherence to treaties of which we are signatory.

Don’t forget that Bush Jr. only went to the UN before invading Iraq because the Congress demanded he do so as a condition of authorizing his use of force.  He was fully prepared to go into Iraq without any such authorization.  Indeed I think he only got the UN support because the other nations knew he was going to go in anyway; and even so, not all of our allies supported it.

I think another factor we need to keep in mind here is that military power is one of the few remaining things in which we are undeniably world leaders.  It has been the great Republican jobs program since the Reagan Administration; without a huge military to support, they would have to consider actually spending money on domestic priorities because they would no longer have the excuse that we can’t afford such spending because of national security. 

There is also the prestige and power argument:  drastically reduce military spending and what is left to command the respect of the nations of the world?  The withdrawal of the legions from the frontier was a signal of the collapse of the Roman Empire.  I think our leaders are fearful, rightly or wrongly, of giving up that powerful tool because of the signal it would send; that they no longer need to fear (or at least take into account the possibility of) American military intervention if they misbehave.

All of that said, I agree that we should not have gotten involved in Libya.  It sounds callous to object to interventions to prevent bloodbaths, but I think the ship has long sailed as far as our moral authority for humanitarian interventions; clearly, we are intervening in Libya not because of an impending humanitarian disaster but because they are a major supplier of oil.  Everyone knows that, or they should.

One of the most depressing things I’ve had to deal with in the past two years is learning that Barack Obama is just another politician.  I had hoped for so much more.

Still, a Republican administration would have been even worse, so there’s that.  For what it’s worth.

Obama from the Chicago school?

Have you looked at his economic advisors? It doesn’t get more Chicago School in terms of economic philosophy than a bunch of Goldman Sachs alums and disaster capitalists like Larry Summers. Appointing people like that is barely the act of a Keynesian, let alone a progressive or “soshalist.”

As to Obama’s relcutance with the banks, you need to look more closely at his, and the Dem’s, campaign contributors.

You say this like we should be shocked. That doesn’t make Obama “worse” than Bush, or even equivalent. Unless you live in a fantasy world where GOP-driven de-regulation had nothing to do with the current economic crisis, or where the “free-market” Republicans exhibit no reluctance at all in using taxpayer funds to bail out private corporations.

Oh, wait, you’re a Libertarian—guess you do live in that world.

The pathetic thing is, the neoCons probably think in all sincerity that the recent pro-democracy activity is the result of Prince Bush invading and occupying Iraq.

When actually, much of the provocation of the protesters and rebels is the revelations by wikileaks about the leaders and government of these countries.

Seriously, we spend so much money on our military it’s ridiculous.  It becomes a self-rationalizing thing.  If you don’t use it regularly, people are going to start talking about—-gasp!—-cutting defense spending.  Can’t have that.

This cuts to the heart of the matter.
I’m so old I can remember when the Republicans were screaming about “$900 hammers!” and “$1200 toilet seats!” and we had to “Stop this out of control spending!”

One of the most depressing things I’ve had to deal with in the past two years is learning that Barack Obama is just another politician

Well, yeah. The main thing is, as we’ve seen, there are far worse politicians. Bill Maher, who’s famously urged the starry eyed since 2008 that “Obama is not your boyfriend,” made this clear in one of the funniest bits I’ve seen on the show recently: meet Karab Amabo, the ideal Republican candidate for 2012

The odd thing about that is that the Air Force really is redundant and terrible.  Folding it back into the US Army Air Corps is the best thing that could happen.

Comment #8: Punditus Maximus

Especially since they continue to lose nuclear triggers/bombs/missles

When actually, much of the provocation of the protesters and rebels is the revelations by wikileaks about the leaders and government of these countries.

But in neoCon world, Assange and co. deserve to be incarcerated at Gitmo, alongside the Al Qaeda terrorists (who were, as everyone knows, in cahoots with Saddam).

This is why Teabaggers exist, by the way: in the Venn diagram of conservative delusions, someone has to cover the overlap between Libertarian free-market fantasies and neoCon ones about international relations (not to mention the big circle where Xtianists believe the Establishment Clause doesn’t exist).

Libertarian wrote:

And how is it an impeachable offense?  What part of the law or the Constitution has President Obama violated with the Libyan action?

He’s initiated a war without ANY approval of Congress.

This wasn’t self defense.  We were not attacked.  There was no immenent danger to us.

The irony is, if he’d asked for authorization, he would have gotten it.  But he’d rather get approval from 10 out of 15 at the UN + The Arab League.  WTF?  He consults them, but not Congress?

Impeach.

While he’d have been better served, politically, if he had gotten authorization from Congress, what he did was simply not a violation of the law or the Constitution.  Of course, Gerald Ford once defined an impeachable offense as anything a majority of the House of Representatives says it is, we all know this won’t happen.

Over at zunguzungu, Aaron Bady (who writes a lot of great stuff about Africa) has a very informative post on American involvement in the Libyan conflict. It’s really worth reading, no matter where you stand on this.

Meanwhile, we’re funding this giant SUV and its ridiculous gas bill, and telling our starving family we don’t have money to pay the mortgage or for food, and they’ll just have to pick through garbage and sleep on the street

I love this analogy. Cat food and rainwater for everyone!

Here are my concerns: Obama, rightfully, wants to right our relationships with the broadly-named Muslim world by demonstrating that we’ve grown past our imperialist tendencies.

Uh-huh.

When the mission was launched, it was largely seen as having a limited, humanitarian agenda: to keep Colonel Qaddafi from attacking his own people. But the White House, the Pentagon and their European allies have given it the most expansive possible interpretation, amounting to an all-out assault on Libya’s military.

Obama from the Chicago school?  Wow.  Stop smoking that stuff.

As to Obama’s relcutance with the banks, you need to look more closely at his, and the Dem’s, campaign contributors.  Bought and paid for, just like Bush.  He talks tough against Wall Street - how has that worked out for them?  He’s just a liar, don’t be fooled.

Comment #19: Libertarian

Libertarian knows less about economics than he does about international law.
From the Wall Street Journal, Obama Builds Ties to ‘Chicago School’   Not to mention his favoritism toward Goldman Sach executives for cabinet possitions regarding ecomomics.

Bought and paid for, just like Bush.  He talks tough against Wall Street - how has that worked out for them?

 
i.e. Chicago School of Economic.  See Also: Anything Milton Friedman said is law.

Obama’s Libyan adventure is in violation of the War Powers Act of 1973.

Impeach now.

Why is it that whenever Americans talk about a “humanitarian agenda” to war, I keep thinking I’ve seen that movie before?...

I didn’t think you were defending Bush, Libertarian, but you were calling for impeachment over the Libyan operation as though the case were clear-cut.  It is not.  You shouldn’t impeach a President just because he does something you don’t like.

That said, in theory any President can be impeached at any time; all that is required is that the House vote articles of impeachment and the Senate vote to convict, not that he has actually committed any “high crime or misdemeanor” in a legal sense.  The impeachment process is not a legal proceeding, it is a political one that follows some of the formalities of legal procedure.  Fortunately we have not yet arrived at the point where partisan politics completely trumps statesmanship in this, but it seems only a matter of time.  The Clinton impeachment opened the door.

One of the (many) things that bothers me about our political culture these days is the growing acceptance of “recall” movements as a tool of partisanship.  Someone from the other side won the election?  Just mount a recall effort and try again!  And again and again.  Eventually you’ll win and get your side in office, and then the other side can start their recall movements, and on and on until winning an election means nothing.  At that point you have government by referendum, and while in some sense that is appealing, I think the Federalist Papers made a pretty solid argument why it is not.

Personally, I would rather see the President impeached because he has not enforced our treaty obligations under the Geneva Conventions to fully investigate accusations of torture of prisoners by the Bush administration and prosecute any offenders found.  That is a clear violation of the “law of the land;” if you want to call for impeachment, I think that would be a more appropriate basis.

I think we’re more in agreement here than not, although I know that’s hard for you and Gracchus to accept.

My main point of disagreement with you, however, remains your ludicrous statement that Obama is worse than Prince Bush when it comes to economic or military policy. Once you destroy your own credibility with that sort of statement, any other item of agreement are beside the point.

Gracchus, I’ve got to admit, when I think of Chicago school, I’m thinking Miltion Friedman, not Goldman Sachs.

Theory vs practise, Libertarian. And even in terms of theory (not just methodology, which cynickal’s WSJ link discussed), Obama’s a heck of a lot closer to Friedman than he is to Marx.

Goddamnit.  I can’t help myself.  I like Dana. 

Fuck you, God.

Optimistically this situation looks like the Balkans, pessimistically it looks like Iraq, not of the 2000’s but of the 1990’s. Just endlessly enforcing a no fly zone in perpetuity, costing extraordinary sums of money and civilian life.

Just a few observations:

1. Any regular reader of Glenn Greenwald could tell you that Obama was a fraud before he was elected president.

2. With regard to the US military, how’s the saying go? When all you have is a hammer, everything starts looking like a nail. 685 billion dollar military? There must be a military solution to this problem, whatever it is.

3. Great post.

“Goddamnit.  I can’t help myself.  I like Dana.”

...I think you’ll find that familiarity, in this case, breeds contempt…

Should we not do this because Republicans won’t stop it?

Anyhow, the answer here is simple:  We’re doing what was asked, to level the playing field between the citizens and the military might of their own nation being levied against them.

It’s the right thing to do with our power.  Our military isn’t a precision instrument, but in this case, it can apply.  It can cut of Qaddafi’s head, but it can’t replace it.  It can blow up tanks but it can’t police a city.  They need tanks and planes blown up, we can do that.

So we should limit our missions to ones where the military can actually perform, and do good.  That’s what it’s for.

Besides, if we won’t stand up when a country uses its military against its people, who will?

Re: The economic stuff, it shouldn’t be a surprise. It’s not because Obama is “Chicago school”, it’s not because he’s corrupt, it’s not any of that. It’s because the political establishment/media fetishize their own interests. Nothing more, nothing less. And it happens from the left to the right, all along the spectrum.

It’s all about the mythical “swing voter” and what they want. And we’ve decided that they want rising investment markets (including housing prices), and lowering costs for other stuff. They think that uneducated individuals are lazy and deserve to be poor. They think that young people are lazy and deserve to be poor as well. They’re into thinking that their country is tough shit, and like this sort of thing…for entertainment. They like their suburban lifestyle and damnit if anybody will take that away from them.

And pretty much every “sensible” politician…I don’t even mean that as a slur. I mean people who are obviously not trolling with what they do, like the far right does. They’re worse than 4chan for crying out loud…every sensible politician to some degree is still indebted to these interests. They’re not interested in building the base, they’re interested in attracting the support of fellow “sensible” upper-middle class individuals just like they see themselves.  Not the Dirty Fucking Hippies.

And that’s the problem. The “sensible” people they’re trying to attract are by and large vile, selfish, self-absorbed monsters, or at least the put out bait for them assumes as such. It’s not a political problem as it is a social or a cultural problem.

Even if there was no military. You still would not see the economic measures that are needed because too many people believe that for winning to be worth something, that losing has to be punished. *spit*

On the constitutional question, the framers said we weren’t to have a standing army, either.  And yet we do.  So how is it that the President is violating the constitution by exercising that army, and congress isn’t by paying for it year after year?

Why are we always blaming the President for things Congress does when the President is a Democrat?

Anyhow, the answer here is simple:  We’re doing what was asked, to level the playing field between the citizens and the military might of their own nation being levied against them.

It’s the right thing to do with our power. 

Riiiiiight.

As Ken McLeod points out:

The armed forces of the UK, US, France and several other countries are at this moment attacking the government and armed forces of Libya, in the immediate interest and at the behest of an armed rebellion led by people some of whom were until very recently members of the government and armed forces of Libya. At the same time, the states attacking the Libyan state and supporting the armed rebellion are fully supportive of the governments and armed forces of Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen (today on the brink) in using armed force to put down unarmed protest demonstrations. There’s no inconsistency in their actions (and their inactions). They have to maintain their interests in the region, which are threatened by the Arab revolutions.

A huge problem that doesn’t get much attention in analyses of why this libya intervention is a really dumb idea is the fact that we (the west in general) have a shit record in North Africa, Africa in general, the Muslim world, and the Middle East.

Intervening on behalf of democracy is all noble and the urge to “do it right” rather than a thin justification for personal interests as Bush did must be hard to ignore.

But such an intervention requires trust. Requires a firm network of support so that the people on the ground do not turn on you or those you support.

And well, no, we don’t have that.

We had to stay out of these uprisings because every tinpot dictator in the reason has been trying to sell their popular uprisings as “western plots to overthrow them”. And frankly that’s a legitimate fear for the populace of these countries where we have indeed intervened to prop up western friendly dictators in the past and to shut down popular uprisings that frightened us or were threatening to cut off supply of natural resources.

By intervening here, we shut off the likelihood of many more uprisings for a good while more, possibly remove a lot of popular support in Libya for the rebel forces and instill a lot of belief in that region that we’re going to install a puppet once Qaddafi is overthrown.

And frankly, I wonder if that wasn’t a motivator for invading. Not the puppet part, but the shutdown of further uprisings. We have a very strong investment in the status quo in the region and what with our insane teabaggers and a populace trying to figure out if presidenting while black is a impeachable offense in and of itself*, we just simply can’t afford to have the middle east have legitimate self-governance that decides to cut off the oil supply from us or demands fair compensation for our inglorious looting and exploitation.

But yeah, this isn’t a good idea. I know why Obama wants to try it out and I can believe he has good intentions, but the trust just isn’t there and a failure to not make ourselves the focus of their nascent revolutions is not going to build that trust.

*Really, is there anything more obnoxious and gag-inducing than a right-wing fuck chanting “Impeach now” while trying to find the smallest loophole like Clinton to oust Obama after we’ve choked on 8 years of “laws, what laws” and “oh hey, we torture now, FYI” from the Bush administration where you were a treason monkey Stalin to even consider thinking about hoping they one day consider impeachment for the actual purpose of that fucking process?

I thought not.

But this should clue in Obama that keeping around the Bush system because “incremental improvement” and “don’t rock the boat” is a bad idea. The right is begging and hoping to pull another Clinton and the Clinton impeachment demonstrates that they have absolutely no restraint in using it for petty “technical” crimes or in ignoring massive hypocrisy to do so. He shouldn’t just dismantle the security state because its the right thing to do, would restore our international image, and so on, but because the longer he retains this shit, the more likely it will be used in the inevitable impeachment trial of “Bush, what Bush” versus Uppity Black Guy.

You ever think that you’re falling for the theme, like labeling Obama a warmonger for the attacking of Qaddafi’s troops… While skipping the point that Qaddafi’s troops were firing upon the rebels and civilians?  It’s not like there wasn’t video footage of these attacks, there are reporters on the ground with the civilians being randomly shelled.

But nooo, you have to completely ignore Qaddafi’s violation of the UN cease-fire (whether it’s due to his lack of control or lack of care), and suggest that the intervention force is attacking without cause.

Why is it that point A ‘Obama and European allies are pushing to the letter’ misses point B ‘Qaddafi’s forces are violating the UN invoked ceasefire?’

I must say that I agree with Crissa on this one, and one more thing: what the hell is up with the rampant primitivism going on in this thread? “Tribal warfare”? “Those people”? What are you implying with this? That the Libyan people are too backwards to create a legitimate government of their own? That they’re so dumb that they’ll allow radical Islamists to turn the country into another Iran or Saudi Arabia?

What. The. Fuck.

Are their tanks or aircraft firing upon civilians our military can target in Yemen, Bahrain?

No.

So your ‘comparison’ is both stupid and ignorant.

Like I said, taking the theme and running with it, without bothering to look at the actual situation of the world.

this was pres. eisenhower’s concern, when he warned of the dangers of a growing military/industrial complex: you must continuously have wars, in order to justify the expenditures.  is our intervention in libya (with its attendant costs) justified? beats me, and pres. obama’s speech was hardly convincing. sure, qaddafi’s a thug, we’ve known that for what, 40 years now? so are the leaders of syria, jordan, saudi arabia, bahrain, sudan, n. korea, red china, ad infinitum, what makes libya more special?

citing “humanitarian” reasons still doesn’t make libya uninque, just in the middle-east unless, you ignore the ongoing slaughter in sudan. of course, i don’t believe that sudan enjoys the oil reserves that libya does….............................

I think this whole analysis is really missing an international perspective, which is a pretty common theme right now in the American press coverage of what is happening in Libya.  Sarkozy was trying to rally the NATO allies to action from the very beginning of Qaddafi’s efforts to silence the protesters who dared speak out against his regime.  That led to a very organized diplomatic lobbying of the American and British governments to jump on board of France’s calls for the declaration of a No Fly Zone over Libya. The common perception among our Western European allies was that their own security was being threatened by the increasing instability in Libya, in no small part because of the close proximity of Libya to countries like France.

It’s very convenient to ignore the reality that French, British and a small number of Canadian military forces are also continually taking part in enforcing the Libyan No Fly Zone, but the it’s the truth nonetheless.  I know I’ll probably get shouted down for even suggesting this here, but I honestly think that President Obama’s willingness to get involved in this NATO mission in Libya is his way of signalling what he considers an end to the George Bush Jr. school of American Exceptionalism.  Bush Jr. was all about thumbing his nose at the International Community and arguing that the regular rules ddn’t apply to the U.S. because of its extra specialness.  We are bound by several NATO treaties to back them up with military forces when NATO allies call for interventions like one they have called for in Libya, and I think the President believes he is being a team player in a manner Bush Jr. would never dream of being by not refusing to take part in the No Fly Zone.

Obama is obsessed with the appearance of multilateral action, far more than the substance.  And we can always count on the French to be on board with killing people who live in Africa.  So yeah, I buy that interpretation.

But I still can’t agree with the idea that Obama is in any way a positive actor internationally.  We’re still fighting two wars which were started for the purpose of war profiteering, and we’re fighting both for that purpose still.  And now we’re starting another war, for reasons which are not at all clear.

And yes, of course starting an aggressive war without Congressional approval is an impeachable offense.  Few actions Obama has taken have been nearly as clear-cut in their manifest unconstitutionality, going straight to “separation of powers.”  He did it both to prove a point and because Congressional Republicans would destroy this country if it made Obama look bad.  But yeah, this is the sort of action which would have meant soldiers in the streets if the folks who originally wrote the Constitution had been around for it.

On the constitutional question, the framers said we weren’t to have a standing army, either.

The Constitution doesn’t say that, Crissa.  In fact in Article One it implies quite the opposite.  It just says that appropriations for the Army can’t be for longer than 2 years at a time.

Yeah, one of the impetuses for the Constitution was that the central government created by the Articles was too weak militarily to protect our borders.  So yeah, while the military was thoroughly constrained, it was certainly supposed to exist.

One of the ways Obama is genuinely worse than Bush is in his disdain for fig leaves.  Bush did a lot of running out the clock and disingenuous argument.  Obama pursues the same policies but does so in a way that won’t let us walk it back later.  More honest, in some ways.  But also much more imperial.  Tiberius instead of Julius.

Punditus, I know it’s the conveniently cynical route to shout about how this is an American Declaration of War but I just can’t get on board with that.  And sure, the French have a checkered history with the North Africans, but the fact still stands that NATO officially called for the Libyan No Fly Zone.  Insisting that President Obama single handedly dragged the U.S. into another armed military conflict deliberately ignores that truth.  A lot of the hand wringing that is going on right now here regarding Libya in the U.S. still smacks of the U.S. clinging to the stubborn assumption that the world starts and ends at its borders.  It’s not true, and the longer Americans refuse to come to terms with the reality that the U.S. is
no longer the sole Leader of the Free World the more it will lose the regard of its allies and appear to the international community as though it is sticking its head in the sand.

Have to agree with Lolagirl. From outside the US, this does not look at all like what some of the commentators here are painting it as. There were calls from NATO and other US allies to at least set up a no fly zone for weeks before anything happened. There was intense lobbying of the US to come on board with this action. From my side of the world it looked like Obama was reluctantly and even cautiously drawn in. In other words this is not something the US initiated. It is something that they were persuaded to do for a whole lot of reasons (yes oil but also international relations and there may even be a smidge of a humanitarian rationale in the mix).

Crissa wrote:

On the constitutional question, the framers said we weren’t to have a standing army, either.  And yet we do.  So how is it that the President is violating the constitution by exercising that army, and congress isn’t by paying for it year after year?

Many of the Framers expressed concern about the existence of a standing army, but they wrote no such prohibition into the Constitution.

Article I, Section 8 says, in part, in defining the powers of the Congress:

To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;

To provide and maintain a Navy;

The sole restriction there is that the Congress cannot make any appropriations for the Army for more than two years at a time, which is something, in a time of annual appropriations, we don’t do.

Oops, I see that liberalrob beat me to it.

Crissa wrote:

You ever think that you’re falling for the theme, like labeling Obama a warmonger for the attacking of Qaddafi’s troops… While skipping the point that Qaddafi’s troops were firing upon the rebels and civilians?  It’s not like there wasn’t video footage of these attacks, there are reporters on the ground with the civilians being randomly shelled.

Remember when President Clinton decided to intervene in the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina?  It was pictures like this which changed the horror stories from abroad into reality, with images too similar to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.

I repeat a prediction I made elsewhere: before the end of the year - perhaps well before - the US will have troops on the ground in Libya.  Maybe they’ll be “liason” or “advisors”, maybe they’ll be Special Forces or air support spotters - but they’ll be there.  And the US will be interfering to try and get a “friendly” post-Gaddaffi regime.

Just like the “democracy” in Iraq.

Would love to take that bet PIATOR.

Uh-huh.

Islamabad—The United States, Britain and France have sent several hundred “defence advisors” to train and support the anti-Gadhafi forces in oil-rich Eastern Libya where “rebels armed groups” have apparently taken over.

According to an exclusive report confirmed by a Libyan diplomat in the region “the three Western states have landed their “special forces troops in Cyrinacia and are now setting up their bases and training centres” to reinforce the rebel forces who are resisting pro-Qaddafi forces in several adjoining areas.

A Libyan official who requested not to be identified said that the U.S. and British military gurus were sent on February 23 and 24 night through American and French warships and small naval boats off Libyan ports of Benghazi and Tobruk.

The Western forces are reportedly preparing to set-up training bases for local militias set-up by the rebel forces for an effective control of the oil-rich region and counter any push by pro- Qaddafi forces from Tripoli.

Now, how would you tell?  I think that article is probably false - but if the White House denied it, would you assume they were telling the truth?

And while I don’t believe this story, the logic behind such a move is quite reasonable - the US has troops specialising in training raggedy-assed militia to fight, and the Libyan rebels are too raggedy-assed to do well against teh Libyan army, so…

And, oooops:

The top NATO military commander says Libya may need a foreign stabilization force if rebels supported by international airstrikes succeed in ousting the country’s leader, Moammar Gadhafi. U.S. Navy Admiral James Stavridis made the comment in an appearance Tuesday before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Admiral Stavridis says there has been no discussion at NATO of sending ground forces to stabilize Libya, but he believes it may be necessary.

So already the balloons are being floated for an actual occupation force.  But, relax, it won’t be an occupying army - it will be a “stabilization force”.  And the people objecting to it will be terrorists and insurgents, not rebels.  And it will totally be supporting a democratic regime, rather than just the one most acceptable to the West…

Annnnnd

About 2,200 Marines from the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit will take part in support operations based aboard USS Kearsarge at sea. Those support operations have thus far included air strikes and one rescue operation. The overall mission is to help end the violence directed at the Libyan people.

UPDATE: To date, the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit has conducted numerous successful airstrikes against Muammar al-Qadhafi regime forces as part of Joint Task Force Odyssey Dawn supporting the international response to protect civilians in Libya under threat of attack by Qadhafi military forces. The 26th MEU has also conducted a successful Tactical Recovery of Aircraft and Personnel mission in support of two U.S. Air Force F-15 pilots after their airplane crashed east of Benghazi, Libya, Mar. 21.

All of these missions were launched from the USS Kearsarge more than 100 nautical miles from the coast. Other than the small TRAP force sent to locate the Air Force pilots, no U.S. Marines from the 26th MEU have landed ashore.

2,200 Marines waiting offshore, but only used in a rescue operation - so far.

The Kearsarge, according to Wikipedia, is an amphibious assault ship - designed to put a reinforced battalion down in hostile territory.

“The blade itself…”

I feel like we are acting as if this is our first military intervention. This is nonsense. We have been involved in many countries since the 1850’s. Additionally, the US Senate voted for a no-fly zone over Libya on March 1.  President Obama had the support of the Senate, the Arab League, the United Nations, and our closest allies before implementing Operation Odyssey Dawn.

I am very angry and frustrated over the dithering that is occurring between diplomats over the issue of a no-fly zone, and whether the rebels should be armed. People are dying while bureaucrats argue over words and image. It’s pathetic and disgusting. I think the coalition must decide whether to fully support them or watch the rebels be destroyed. I think it’s very possible that Benghazi may still fall.

I am not surprised that President Obama is a follower of the Chicago School. Very few of this policies have helped the people, and most of them have helped the corporations and their agendas.

Wait, I’m lost—why is it bad that we’re thinking about the best way to keep civilians from getting slaughtered while trying to avoid getting American blood and treasure getting wasted in other people’s affairs?

Because it seems to me that that would be the sort of thing which one ought to take a moment to think about.

Wait, I’m lost—why is it bad that we’re thinking about the best way to keep civilians from getting slaughtered

To repeat that Ken McLeod quote again:

The armed forces of the UK, US, France and several other countries are at this moment attacking the government and armed forces of Libya, in the immediate interest and at the behest of an armed rebellion led by people some of whom were until very recently members of the government and armed forces of Libya. At the same time, the states attacking the Libyan state and supporting the armed rebellion are fully supportive of the governments and armed forces of Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen (today on the brink) in using armed force to put down unarmed protest demonstrations. There’s no inconsistency in their actions (and their inactions). They have to maintain their interests in the region, which are threatened by the Arab revolutions.

And let’s not even mention civilians getting slaughtered by armed forces in, um, the West Bank and the Gaza…

As somebody said above, it’s not your first ever military intervention.  that’s right - it’s not.  And every time you “intervene” in the Middle East, you seem strangely to focus on advancing your own interests, even to the point of torturing people and propping up regimes that burn schoolchildren.

And yet everyone here seems to think that “the best way to keep civilians being slaughtered” is the goal here.,,. The idea that, maybe, replacing Gaddhaffi with someone probably just as bad but fully compliant to Western interests is too surprising to contemplate, despite every fucking lesson learned from the past.  And so it goes.

http://www.infowars.com/cia-operative-appointed-to-run-al-qaeda-connected-libyan-rebels/

Why he thinks that:

“It’s necessary to have a public debate about the U.S. role in Libya, but it’s important to get the facts right — al Qaeda is not driving the Libyan resistance,” the foundation and globalist liberals insist.

They are right, but not in the way they think. The CIA is the driving force and al-Qaeda is just window dressing consisting of the usual dupes, patsies, useful idiots, and assorted psychopaths on the payroll.

The always-superb Phyllis Bennis responds to Juan Cole, and explains why millitary intervention in Libya is still a bad idea, “On Libya: A Response to Juan Cole”, ZCommunications, March 29, 2011.

excerpt

[Juan Cole makes] a very serious allegation that equates criticizing this western military assault (yes, western– I’ll get to that in a minute) with the belief that “it was all right…if Qaddafi deployed tanks against innocent civilian crowds.” Some of us don’t believe this was the best way to protect Libyan civilians, we have different assessments of what was needed, we are concerned about the civilian casualties of no-fly zones, we have a host of other concerns that do not equal supporting a massacre. Your assessment implies that anyone who did not call for no-fly zones and airstrikes in the DRC, in Cote d’Ivoire, in Sierra Leone is therefore fine with the massive bloodletting.  How about in Gaza, where we “only” tried to get the U.S. to stop enabling the Israeli assault, but we didn’t call for establishing a no-fly zone or U.S. airstrikes against Israeli military targets, does that mean we were supporting the massacre?

It is a delusion of Westerners, living as we do in safe, wealthy regions, to believe that we can change other cultures by fiat. Regime change is not like buying a new car. When you decide to invade another country you have decided to embrace violence. That should never be done lightly.

You know, I don’t like what we’re having to do in Libya either, but, for me, the operative question is: what would have happened in Libya if we hadn’t intervened?

What does a no-fly zone and enforcing ceasefire agreements have to do with invading other countries and changing them by fiat?

Also, I rather think your ‘two year budget’ is a serious dodge, and a budget that gets passed and added to every six months isn’t what the framers had in mind.  They’d be appalled.

...And I don’t know what airstrikes would do to help in any of the mentioned situations aside from Israel.  None of those are mobile, armored and air-capable militaries using those capabilities to suppress their people.  Hence, no targets for an no-fly zone or military to engage.

Honestly, that’s why I get all in the face of anyone who says Israel is in the right to use missiles against their occupied peoples.  They don’t.

@Comment #72: Dana on 03/30 at 06:17 AM

what would have happened in Libya if we hadn’t intervened?

Likely, Qaddafi would have routed the rebels. Though as Bennis points out, there are many options between the millitary invasion we’ve decided to have, and complete indifference.

@Comment #73: Crissa on 03/30 at 06:31 AM

What does a no-fly zone and enforcing ceasefire agreements have to do with invading other countries and changing them by fiat?

First, a “no-fly zone” actually involves a lot of bombing. You have to destroy any anti-aircraft weapons or command and control emplacements, as described by Hillary Clinton: http://www.npr.org/2011/03/17/134633181/Clinton-No-Fly-Zone-In-Libya-Requires-Bombing-Raids

Second, there’s some evidence that the US and NATO forces attacking Libya have already gone beyond a “no-fly zone”, into destroying Qaddafi’s ground forces as well: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/03/24/3172075.htm

I call this changing other cultures by fiat because as far as I can tell the aim in Libya is “regime change”.

What does a no-fly zone and enforcing ceasefire agreements have to do with invading other countries and changing them by fiat?

If that was all we were doing, you might have a point. However, since we are in fact pounding the crap out of Libyan ground forces whilst providing close air support for a bunch of buys firing unguided Katyusha rockets into densely-populated civilian areas (i.e. exaclty the sort of thing which apparently makes it OK for Israel to bomb the crap out of Gaza every time Hamas does it), not so much. We are not “enforcing ceasefire agreements”, we are explicitly backing one faction against another, just like we did in Afghanistan. Remind me - how’s that working out?

“You know, I don’t like what we’re having to do in Libya either, but, for me, the operative question is: what would have happened in Libya if we hadn’t intervened?”

...what happens is the same thing that happens in all the other countries where civil wars are occurring but we haven’t involved ourselves:  Sometimes the “Rebels”/“Freedom Fighters”/“Terrorists” win vs. The Government (a government which we like most-of-the-time, depending on how compliant they are with our economic/political needs), and sometimes The Government wins over the “Rebels”/“Freedom Fighters”/“Terrorists”. 

And whether those fighting the government are considered by us to be “Good/Freedom Fighters!” or “Bad/Terrorists!” depends on how compliant with our economic/political needs the existing government is.  The actual desires of a majority of the citizens of whatever country this is happening in are immaterial, except where they may be useful for propaganda reasons.  Whether the existing government is a Western-style democracy (rarely) or some bloody dictatorship (usually) has nothing to do with whether we support the government or the rebels. 

We practice “Realpolitik”, as do most Western democracies.  We and our fellow first-world countries rarely give a damn about how much of a hellish situation we may be supporting, as long as the oil keeps flowing from the ground, or the strategic minerals we need keep flowing from the mines, or the incredibly cheap products keep flowing from the exploitative factories, we’re cool with however runs the joint.

All that crap we spew about Freedom! and Liberty! and Democracy! is just a set of memes we tell ourselves to keep from having to think about the truth of what assholes we are in the rest of the world.  Thinking about the truth regarding our behavior is painful.  So we’ll just keep telling ourselves that we always fight on the side of Goodness/Jesus and turn back to our American Idol or Dancing with the Stars and push those negative thoughts out of our beautiful minds…

A “no-fly” zone is invading another country, period.  If Canada attempted to shoot down US aircraft over US airspace, that would be an invasion.

what happens is the same thing that happens in all the other countries where civil wars are occurring but we haven’t involved ourselves:

Of which the list is fairly extensive. For example, the situation in Cote d’Ivoire is every bit as bad, if not worse* than that in Libya - there’s extensive fighting throughout the entire country and at least 5% of the population has been displaced - buy absolutely nobody (as far as I can tell) is calling for UN resolutions or “Western” involvement there. The obvious difference being that Libya’s primary export is crude oil of the very finest grade, whilst Cote d’Ivoire’s primary export is chocolate.

*After all, it’s not like Gaddafhi is currently hanging on after a resounding election defeat, unlike Laurent Gbagbo. I’d be willing to bet that less that 1 in 1000 Americans have even heard of Laurent Gbagbo. Fuck, I’d bet that fewer than 1 in 10 Americans have heard of Cote d’Ivoire at all, and less than 1 in 100 know there’s a civil war on.

President Obama is also probably operating on the fear that he did not want the repeat of the world/US ignoring recent genocide/atrocities such as Rwanda, Sudan, etc and saw a realpolitik reason which will provide a tiny bit of “justification” for those who tend to only desire intervening if there is a great practical sounding national interest. 

Moreover, I was under the impression this action was initiated by France and other NATO allies with the US being a relative secondary partner in all of this. 

The odd thing about that is that the Air Force really is redundant and terrible.  Folding it back into the US Army Air Corps is the best thing that could happen.

I recalled the Air Force was created because the Air Corps and the Army had acrimonious conflicts about the role of the Air-Corps, training needed, and their military role.  In fact, the conflict got so heated one pioneering Air Corp general Billy Mitchell was court-marshaled in 1925 by a cabal of mostly old-fashioned generals who were trying to maintain the privileged position of the ground-based branches. 

Similar issues occurring during WWI were critical reasons why the Royal Flying Corps separated themselves from the British Army to form what is now known as the RAF in 1918.  In fact, the US Army Air Corps changing into the US Air Force was emulating what happened in Britain nearly 3 decades before. 

The conflict between those trained in air warfare and generals mostly trained in ground-combat along with serious issues arising from WWII experiences all contributed to the Air Corps commanders feeling they’d be better off as a separate military branch rather than an auxiliary branch of another service dominated by generals who knew little/nothing about employing aircraft beyond supporting their ground units.

A “no-fly” zone is invading another country, period.  If Canada attempted to shoot down US aircraft over US airspace, that would be an invasion.

Um, no. If the mounties came down and started trying to occupy American cities that would be an invasion. Shooting American planes down would be an act of war but not invasion. You cannot have an invasion without infantry forces. Words mean things.

Wow, lotsa copperheads in here.  I’ve had my fill of such cowards from LawyersGunsMoney, so…

Reading Helena Cobham’s reaction on the Libya no-fly zone was depressing, because the pacifist case she presented was so weak (and she is knowledgeable, engaged, and genuinely moral)—essentially, it pretty much hung on whether Gaddafi would bargain in good faith, and if you don’t buy that (and I don’t—he’s objectively pro mass-murder, given his history, bombings, Chad/Uganda, current conduct), then there is no structure around which a peaceful resolution can permeate and take hold.  In a geopolitical culture of violence, stopping violence means attacking the structure, and not the violent moments.

I.e., when a bully is going after you, best to fight, and fight hard enough such that he/she finds an easier target.  And bullies exists when schools don’t really care or likes the bully culture.  Nonviolence will not work under those circumstances.  What will work is bringing a pack of holy hell Mothers of Gods to the next school board meeting and deposing the principal for a new one that aggressively stops bullying.

Lastly, quit with the shame and honorless crap.  That’s theist talk, and some of the worst memes available (given that I hate the idea of memes, but can’t avoid using it) in their toolkit.

shah8 wrote:

I.e., when a bully is going after you, best to fight, and fight hard enough such that he/she finds an easier target.  And bullies exists when schools don’t really care or likes the bully culture.  Nonviolence will not work under those circumstances.  What will work is bringing a pack of holy hell Mothers of Gods to the next school board meeting and deposing the principal for a new one that aggressively stops bullying.

The Philadelphia Inquirer is running a series on violence in the city public schools that might interest you.  Here’s today’s article.

Wow, lotsa copperheads in here.  I’ve had my fill of such cowards from LawyersGunsMoney, so…

Riiiight - ‘cos contempt for yet another “intervention” involving bombing people to death is cowardice.

I.e., when a bully is going after you, best to fight, and fight hard enough such that he/she finds an easier target.

I agree.  And that’s why I think the Palestinians should have anti-tank weapons and SAMs, why Iraqis and Afghanis should be smuggled sniper’s rifles capable of penetrating US-issue body armour, and why Iran should develop nukes as fast as they can.

I.e., when a bully is going after you, best to fight, and fight hard enough such that he/she finds an easier target.

I didn’t know that Qaddafi had attacked us recently.

liberalrob, do you think it’s only appropriate to respond when bullies pick on bigger kids, not when they pick on litter kids?

And in no way am I going to support h8’s comments about copperheads and pacifism, because it’s really the wrong message.

Pacifists are far more brave than any fighting keyboardist.

I’m not sure what your point is, typist.  It seems to revolve in a world where armies can freely beat down inside their own borders and international organizations don’t exist.

Basically, straw-man arguments about the Ivory Coast (no tanks or planes for our military to shoot there); repeated smoke-screens about what is an isn’t an invasion (apparently it no longer requires boots on the ground or unilateral leadership)...

It’s not an invasion.  No ground troops are there, no one is holding any territory with foreign troops.

It’s not like the Ivory Coast - one involves tanks and planes, the other kids with assault rifles.

No one said the Ivory Coast wasn’t a horrible tragedy, but also no one said our military could do a damn thing about it.

You don’t like having a military.  Great.  Say that.  People are assholes for calling you cowards for choosing a pacifistic path?  Say that.  Don’t bring up unrelated points.

And lastly, of course it’s about oil now.  Why do you think Qaddafi has all those tanks and planes?  Why are there so many guns in the Ivory Coast?  We’re at/past peak oil.  Any disruption is a global recession now… It no longer takes all of OPEC to do it.

However, since we are in fact pounding the crap out of Libyan ground forces whilst providing close air support for a bunch of buys firing unguided Katyusha rockets into densely-populated civilian areas (i.e. exaclty the sort of thing which apparently makes it OK for Israel to bomb the crap out of Gaza every time Hamas does it), not so much. We are not “enforcing ceasefire agreements”, we are explicitly backing one faction against another, just like we did in Afghanistan. Remind me - how’s that working out?

Look at this argument.  It’s not even an argument!  It asserts that the rebels re attacking civilians with rockets.  I didn’t see that on the news… Got any citations?

And then says that supporting these rebels makes it okay to support Israel.  WTF.  No, supporting the rebels have absolutely nothing to do with Israel.  But now that you brought it up, there should be a fucking no-fly zone over the occupied territories and we should blow up Israeli tanks or aircraft that attempt to attack in those zones.  Because it’s not fair, and it’s not right.

Crissa wrote:

No one said the Ivory Coast wasn’t a horrible tragedy, but also no one said our military could do a damn thing about it.

President Clinton faced the same dilemma: he could do something about Bosnia-Herzegovina, but Rwanda was a tougher problem, and he couldn’t do anything there.  He got pilloried for not doing something about the Rwandan genocide—unfairly, in my mind—because he couldn’t do everything at once.

But just because you can’t do everything at once doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do anything.

do you think it’s only appropriate to respond when bullies pick on bigger kids, not when they pick on litter kids?

Your analogy is inapt.  We don’t respond to schoolyard bullies by sending in the National Guard to drop bombs on their parents’ houses or (better analogy?) blow up the SUVs they ride in to school.

This policy will inevitably lead to the deaths of hundreds if not thousands.  It would be nice if we would think carefully about the consequences before embarking on such a course…maybe they would have died anyway, but the difference is who is doing the bombing and killing.  Why does it need to be us?  Just because we can?

It’s not like the Ivory Coast - one involves tanks and planes, the other kids with assault rifles.

Are the Ivory Coast dissidents therefore less dead?

no one said our military could do a damn thing about it.

Has anyone asked?  And if so, and our military can’t do a damn thing about kids with assault rifles, what the heck is our military doing in Afghanistan?

we should blow up Israeli tanks or aircraft that attempt to attack in those zones

And yet, we don’t and we won’t.  Why do you think that is?  No, it’s not fair, and it shows the cynicism and hypocrisy of our Middle East policies in general.  Yet you stubbornly cling to the humanitarian argument that at least in Libya, we’re doing the right thing.  Are you sure?  I’m not.

Look, in our own revolution, the French refused to help us until we won a major battle.  The Libyan rebels won jack shit and were getting their asses handed to them, yet here we are with no-fly zones and ground support and maybe weapons supplies.  Why should we just barge in and start militarily helping “pro-democracy” rebellions as soon as they spring up?  Is that really what the United States’ role is in the world?  That’s not what I pay taxes for.

liberalrob wrote:

et you stubbornly cling to the humanitarian argument that at least in Libya, we’re doing the right thing.  Are you sure?  I’m not.

Perhaps there is no right thing, just a less wrong thing.  I’d be perfectly willing to say that President Obama and the NATO allies are doing the less wrong thing.

Look, in our own revolution, the French refused to help us until we won a major battle.  The Libyan rebels won jack shit and were getting their asses handed to them, yet here we are with no-fly zones and ground support and maybe weapons supplies.

‘Cos supplying weapons to Islamic rebels can never go wrong…

Perhaps there is no right thing, just a less wrong thing.  I’d be perfectly willing to say that President Obama and the NATO allies are doing the less wrong thing.

For those who are unaware of Dana’s weasel like attributes, here’s his take on global politics when he’s among his own kind and NOT playing to a rational audience.

No, the United States has the right, because we do have the power! Other nations have the right, right up to the point where they don’t have the power to make it stick, the point where a stronger nation bitch-slaps them into submission.

So Dana talks here about “less wrong things”, but among his own ilk he crows that the US has the right to do whatever it wants because it can do whatever it wants.  He’s already endorsed electoral fraud as long as his side wins - here he’s endorsing a “might makes right” ethic.  He would have gone far in the National Socialist Party.

Dana’s comments here should be regarded as, what’s the word, lies.  He’s talking humanitarianism - but what he wants is simply for the US to bomb sand niggers and suck away their oil.

Dana: But just because you can’t do everything at once doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do anything.

Translation: “You should only do something when there’s a chance you can get something out of it for yourself, and the people who will die don’t matter”.

PiaToR: I repeat a prediction I made elsewhere: before the end of the year - perhaps well before - the US will have troops on the ground in Libya.  Maybe they’ll be “liason” or “advisors”, maybe they’ll be Special Forces or air support spotters - but they’ll be there.  And the US will be interfering to try and get a “friendly” post-Gaddaffi regime.

typist: Would love to take that bet PIATOR.

One:

WASHINGTON — The Central Intelligence Agency has inserted clandestine operatives into Libya to gather intelligence for military airstrikes and to contact and vet the beleaguered rebels battling Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s forces, according to American officials.

While President Obama has insisted that no American military ground troops participate in the Libyan campaign, small groups of C.I.A. operatives have been working in Libya for several weeks as part of a shadow force of Westerners that the Obama administration hopes can help bleed Colonel Qaddafi’s military, the officials said.

In addition to the C.I.A. presence, composed of an unknown number of Americans who had worked at the spy agency’s station in Tripoli and others who arrived more recently, current and former British officials said that dozens of British special forces and MI6 intelligence officers are working inside Libya. The British operatives have been directing airstrikes from British jets and gathering intelligence about the whereabouts of Libyan government tank columns, artillery pieces and missile installations, the officials said.

Two:

WASHINGTON - The new leader of Libya’s opposition military spent the past two decades in suburban Virginia but felt compelled — even in his late-60s — to return to the battlefield in his homeland, according to people who know him.

Khalifa Hifter was once a top military officer for Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, but after a disastrous military adventure in Chad in the late 1980s, Hifter switched to the anti-Gadhafi opposition. In the early 1990s, he moved to suburban Virginia, where he established a life but maintained ties to anti-Gadhafi groups.
[...]
Since coming to the United States in the early 1990s, Hifter lived in suburban Virginia outside Washington, D.C. Badr said he was unsure exactly what Hifter did to support himself, and that Hifter primarily focused on helping his large family

Copperheads have about as much to do with pacifism as “pro-life” advocates are with people who are already born. 

I’m fine and dandy with *real* pacifists.  It just means we just have to work harder and accept our share of the burden of complexity and ambiguity in our lives.  Also, quite a bit a forsight.  Pacifism works best by anticipating conflict, and attempting to solve for the Libyan issue over the past day or so pretty much led me to conclude that it’s all Tony Blair’s fault ?:~)  But seriously, the rehabilitation of Gaddafi was the key mistake, along with plenty of peripheral stuff, like the failure of the carbon tax early on in the Clinton era.

Basically, straw-man arguments about the Ivory Coast (no tanks or planes for our military to shoot there);

They have artillery pieces. Much of what we’re hitting in Libya is artillery.

Look at this argument.  It’s not even an argument!  It asserts that the rebels re attacking civilians with rockets.  I didn’t see that on the news… Got any citations?

BBC’s Newsnight a few days ago. The rebels were attacking the town of Sirte, which is very much pro-Gaddafhi. The UN mandate is to “protect civilians” - it doesn’t say anything about which side they’re on. And of course you didn’t see it on the fucking US news - it doesn’t fit the narrative.

And then says that supporting these rebels makes it okay to support Israel.  WTF.  No, supporting the rebels have absolutely nothing to do with Israel.  But now that you brought it up, there should be a fucking no-fly zone over the occupied territories and we should blow up Israeli tanks or aircraft that attempt to attack in those zones.  Because it’s not fair, and it’s not right.

No, the point of the comparison was to show that “our” claimed concern for civilian casualties is bullshit. Therefore, it seems reasonable to conclude that “we” are in Libya for other reasons which have absolutely nothing to do with peace, justice or human rights.

I oppose intervention in Libya because I expect it to make the situation worse, over the medium-to-long term. We’re teetering on the edge of a massive regional conflict which could engulf everywhere from Tunisia to Afghanistan, which in turn would destabilise the world order to the point where a full-blown World War is not entirely implausibe.

Phoe, we aren’t going into Libya to seize their oil; the President has said we aren’t going to occupy Libya, and, with Iraq still taking up some troops and Afghanistan occupying more of our effort, we don’t have the troops to occupy Libya even if the President did want to do so.

@Comment #100: shah8 on 03/31 at 03:09 AM

Copperheads have about as much to do with pacifism as “pro-life” advocates are with people who are already born.

Just as there is no need to label all supporters of wars as “Fascists”, there is also no need to label those against wars as “Copperheads”. Unless what you really want is to demonize, rather than understand or convince.

Phoe, we aren’t going into Libya to seize their oil; the President has said we aren’t going to occupy Libya, and, with Iraq still taking up some troops and Afghanistan occupying more of our effort, we don’t have the troops to occupy Libya even if the President did want to do so

Dana, you fucking weasel, I said “troops on the ground”, not “occupy”.

For example, installing a CIA plant as a replacement strongman who will keep the oil flowing and the rabble suppressed will do nicely.

You’re not fooling anyone with your little schtick of changing the goalposts and hoping no-one notices, you know.

we aren’t going into Libya to seize their oil

We don’t need to “seize” it.  Libyan oil is already being produced by the oil companies.  We just want to “stabilize” the country so they can continue to produce it and explore for more.

http://seekingalpha.com/article/259072-major-oil-companies-exposure-to-libya

“The oil companies with the largest percentage of oil production in Libya are ENI (E) at 12% of production, Marathon Oil (MRO) at 12% of production, OMV Group (WBAG: OMV) at 10% of production, Gazprom (OGZPY.PK) at 7.4% of production. The large U.S. companies with significant Libya exposure are Hess (HES) at about 5% of production, and Conoco-Phillips (COP) at 3.3% of production. I couldn’t find any other publicly traded companies with more than 3% exposure, although Total (TOT), Occidental (OXY), and Statoil (STO) all have some production in Libya.”

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/22/us-libya-usa-oilcompanies-idUSTRE71L5Y820110222

“ConocoPhillips, the third-largest U.S. oil company, holds a 16.3 percent interest in Libya’s Waha concessions…Marathon has a 16 percent interest in the outside-operated Waha concessions in the Sirte Basin…In 2009, Hess produced 22,000 bpd of crude from Libya, or 8 percent of its crude output. At the end of 2009, 23 percent of its proved reserves were in Africa, with Libya making up 11 percent of that. Along with its Oasis Group partners, Hess has operations in Waha, with an interest of 8 percent…Occidental, the fourth-largest U.S. oil company, earned $243 million in net sales from Libya in 2009, or less than 2 percent of its total. Production increased in 2010, and Oxy has plans to double its output from Libya by 2014.”

The always polite Phoenician wrote:

Phoe, we aren’t going into Libya to seize their oil; the President has said we aren’t going to occupy Libya, and, with Iraq still taking up some troops and Afghanistan occupying more of our effort, we don’t have the troops to occupy Libya even if the President did want to do so

Dana, you fucking weasel, I said “troops on the ground”, not “occupy”.

For example, installing a CIA plant as a replacement strongman who will keep the oil flowing and the rabble suppressed will do nicely.

You’re not fooling anyone with your little schtick of changing the goalposts and hoping no-one notices, you know.

Who is moving the goalposts?  You wrote:

The US is using the UN resolution as a fig-leaf for whatever the fuck it wants to do. I predict that that will include troops on the ground – probably with Obama weasel-wording that they’re not “an occupation” but rather “there to protect” or to “liase with the new government”.

Believe me, I noticed exactly what you said.

Believe me, I noticed exactly what you said.

Fine then, you fucking weasel - where in that quote did I say Obama would occupy the country with troops?

I suspect a better model will be Central America during the eighties.

You said that President Obama would have troops on the ground, and that if he called it anything other than an “occupation,” it would be “weasel-wording” the situation.  As for “where in that quote did I say Obama would occupy the country with troops?” we can go to another one of your comments:

It’s March. I expect American troops in Libya by the end of the year – maybe they’ll be called “advisors” or “humanitarian peacekeepers”, but they’ll be there.

So, it took two comments of yours, not one, but you’ve managed to predict “American troops in Libya by the end of the year,” and stated that if the President called it anything other than an occupation, he’d be weasel-wording it.

Of course, now you’ve changed your prediction, citing what you see as a better model.

So, it took two comments of yours, not one, but you’ve managed to predict “American troops in Libya by the end of the year,”

That’s right - and we now see that CIA people scouting for air strikes are already there - troops not wearing uniforms

and stated that if the President called it anything other than an occupation, he’d be weasel-wording it.

Nope - I did not state that. He will be weasel-wording IN THAT he will be using whatever mealy-mouthed expression he can to evade the fact that there are troops there.  The US doesn’t have enough free troops for another full-blown occupation - it does, however, have enough to help prop up a compliant strongman and train Libyan forces to torture and repress in order to keep the oil flowing.

Friggin’ weasel.

Of course, the big fat fucking difference between Libya and Iraq and Afghanistan is that this time there is actually a UN Resolution authorising the action.  I realise it’s a US tendency to downplay the UN, but that really does matter here in the rest of the world.

Now, there are plenty of complexities, and discussions about tactics, and ultimate aims to be had.  But this isn’t Iraq and Afghanistan, and that’s pretty fucking obvious on the face of it.

And can you get this into your heads?  It’s not always just about America.