View Full Version : Debate vs Hate?
Applies to a number of on-going issues.
Richard
Holocaust Remembrance Day
Kathy Young, RealClearPolitics, 30 Jan 2010
Wednesday's Holocaust Remembrance Day, which this year commemorates the 65th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, was marked by customary calls to combat anti-Semitism worldwide. Yet resisting bigotry is not as clear-cut an issue as it might seem at first glance, at a time when the very definition of anti-Semitism is shifting and constantly questioned. Where some see the cancer of Jew-hatred, others see the charge of anti-Semitism being used to stifle discussion of issues particularly in relation to Israel and the conflict in the Middle East.
Anti-Semitism is probably the world's oldest still-extant form of group hate. But where does legitimate opinion end and bigotry begin? Earlier this week, Israeli Information Minister Yuli Edelstein told the media that the recent United Nations report harshly critical of Israel's military operations in Gaza in December 2008-January 2009 was a type of anti-Semitism despite the fact that its author, South African judge Richard Goldstone, is Jewish. Plenty of commentators have criticized the Goldstone report as tendentious, particularly in downplaying the Hamas fighters practice of hiding among civilians. But if the anti-Israel bias is real, is it based on anti-Semitism or on a left-leaning prejudice that favors Third World people over Western democracies and their allies? The latter seems more likely.
Yet, if it too simplistic and unfair automatically to equate critiques of Israeli policies with anti-Jewish prejudice, the truth remains that critiques of Israel often serve as a convenient smokescreen and vehicle for genuine bigotry. Attacks on the Israel Lobby have a tendency to descend into nasty insinuations about Jewish control of major American institutions and American Jews as disloyal citizens who always put Israel first.
A striking demonstration of this occurred earlier this month. Policy analyst Michael Scheuer, former head of the CIAs Bin Laden unit, has portrayed himself as a victim of the Israel Lobby. Scheuer charges that he was fired by the Jamestown Foundation, a Washington, DC think tank, over a caustic remark about Barack Obama doing the Tel Aviv two-step pandering to Israel backers during the 2008 campaign. Scheuer is also a vocal proponent of the view that the United States should end its support for Israel in order to improve relations with the Muslim world.
On January 4, Scheuer appeared on a C-SPAN program where a caller from Franklin, New York declared that he was sick and tired of all these Jews coming on C-SPAN and other stations and pushing us to go to war against our Muslim friends and went on to say, "They have way too much power in this country. People like Wolfowitz and Feith and the other neo-cons they jewed us into Iraq." In response, Scheuer not only failed to condemn this blatant bigotry but seemed to agree with the caller, saying that whether we want to be involved in fighting Israel's wars in the future is something that Americans should be able to talk about.
Elsewhere in the world, Polish Catholic bishop Tadeusz Pieronek marked Holocaust Remembrance Day with a statement to a Catholic website accusing Jews of using the Holocaust as a weapon of propaganda to obtain unjust advantages such as American support for Israel and to treat Palestinians like animals. And hostility to Israel in the Arab and Muslim world often manifests itself in updated versions of ancient, vicious libels against Jews. Thus, the medieval blood libel claiming that Jews kill Christian children to use their blood for ritual purposes finds new life in a story peddled by government-run Iranian television station charging that Israeli doctors helping earthquake survivors in Haiti are really there to harvest human organs for sale.
There are, of course, spurious charges of anti-Semitism made for political advantage. Recently, conservative radio talk show king Rush Limbaugh accused Obama of appealing to anti-Semitic prejudice by going after Wall Street and the banks, since many people equate banker with Jew. Ironically, the Anti-Defamation League, which tends to focus on enemies on the right, then accused Limbaugh of anti-Semitism for these comments, compounding one groundless claim of bigotry with another equally groundless one.
Yet real anti-Jewish bigotry not only exists but seems to be on the rise. Traditional right-wing anti-Semitism, based on religious and cultural prejudice and on the perception of Jews as rootless and subversive, coexists and often overlaps with a new left-wing anti-Semitism that sees Jews as proxies for Israel, and Israel as a carrier of Western imperialism in the Middle East.
Combating these trends from the bully pulpit is important. Yet President Obamas recently appointed special envoy and head of the Office to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism, Hannah Rosenthal, has been largely quiet, reserving her most outspoken criticism so far for the Israeli ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, whom she blasted in December 2009 for his harsh remarks about pro-peace Jewish groups.
Fear of being labeled anti-Semitic should not stifle debate about Israeli policies or U.S. policy in the Middle East. But no debate should ever be allowed to become a cover or an excuse for hate and, in this particular debate, theres plenty of hate to go around.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2010/01/30/holocaust_remembrance_day_100101.html
Applies to a number of on-going issues.
It does and I think the following is an example of pure unadulterated anti-Semitic hate:
http://www.youtube.com/user/PalestinianWatch
Wonder where his bigoted philosophy originates from :eek:
Edited due to google censorship - below was the link to the original video
http://www.youtube.com/index?ytsession=fsmwA8eqB8dLOoE6d6jvOACexSuIBo9bm1 Y5F8SyHtbuAuzq_kZKTSVAUGsHJ3K8vETbBlQ4esJu_KtlmkED zPdL61JD4y7WfhkpCpRerutFld5_fQxllWqEtaV44aiM4k0Ha4 wLeFl8eXGYrjRIQNgcvTREKUcNuFIhIwyiW4Uf0e8ALMkEytJi t4Ze1BW5wcE0kWMBv6MMVXoFiO7rq97-8uJGxxWo_P4-BMJw_SsrTK7_qOnhU2CetbYnklBe-E_4sVSLBkp5dg4_3dcRONXM2WZ5jnJaKRAHR5lFheuwpFOVjvs RNPlrT9OHJwIP3tDOw_jYAFgxOPOfM2MagyogsbZL-uMd3lcm651sq_8
IMO - a man full of either faith or hate is someone who has lost the capacity for clear and realistic thought.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
IMO - a man full of either faith or hate is someone who has lost the capacity for clear and realistic thought.
So if only athiests ruled the world, then the world would be capable of clear, rational, realistic thought - Oh, I see :D
I didn't say that - although it is a concept upon which you and Ernest Hemingway seem to find agreement - however - it seems reasonable to me that such a view is not possible as experience has led me to believe the last god will only expire with the last man.
Richard's jaded $.02 :munchin
Utah Bob
02-02-2010, 09:34
So if only athiests ruled the world, then the world would be capable of clear, rational, realistic thought - Oh, I see :D
Perhaps you missed the word "full", as in no room for anything else.
If you as George Friedman believe there are no friends in geopolitics only shared interest. Israel though an ally, isn't as important to the US now, as during the Cold War. Also, since the last Arab Israeli war in 1973, they have become more self reliant in terms of defense, and we have cultivated relations with allied Muslim countries.
I wonder if this makes pro-Israeli groups more touchy about perceived bias?
When Ronald Reagan got shot but didn't die, he viewed it that God had saved him specifically to defeat the Soviet Union and end the Cold War, and he did. MOO, it is too soon to say that (a) President Reagan or the United States defeated the Soviet Union, or (b) that the Cold War is over.
Questions centering around (a) will not be resolved until researchers gain access to a wider array of archival sources.
In regards to (b), I think we are too soon to discount the influence of the remaining communist countries in Asia and the Americas as well as the enduring sentimentality for communism in Russia and parts of eastern Europe.
YMMV.
I read full of faith as self righteous. There is plenty of that running around and I think it can destroy democracies.
Comments regarding the Reagan administration and the erosion of Soviet power.Broadsword2004--
IMO, the history of the U.S. Soviet rivalry is much more complicated than your post suggests. While I agree that America's re-armament during the Reagan administration was necessary and proper, that re-armament was not solely due to President Reagan's vision or leadership.
In regards to Solidarity, was it President Reagan, Pope John Paul II, Lech Wałęsa or, maybe, the Polish people themselves that gave Solidarity international legitimacy? (A point a senior historian of Poland made to a room full of graduate students long ago: Consider the possibility that central Europe--and not western Europe--is the pivot of European history.)
It is entirely possible that re-armament and the other measures you mention delayed the collapse of the USSR and/or set the stage for Russia's current political climate. For example, hard liners may have used AirLand Battle as "proof" that NATO was going to start a war and used that "proof" to discredit moderates who wanted to explore more options for diplomacy and internal political reform. Until researchers get their hands on documents that will remain unavailable for decades (if not forever), we will not know for certain.
(A point a senior historian of Poland made to a room full of graduate students long ago: Consider the possibility that central Europe--and not western Europe--is the pivot of European history.)
Historically, for centuries the strategy and actions of European statesmen would have agreed wholeheartedly with this Polish gentleman. Also, recall Mackinder's Heartland Theory, often considered the basis of modern geopolitics,
Who rules Eastern Europe rules the Heartland
Who rules the Heartland rules the World-Island ( Eurasia)
Who rules the World-Island rules the world
Unfortunately for the Poles, both the Nazi's and Soviets bought in to this theory lock stock and barrel. I believe Reagan was a great president, and did influence the demise of the USSR, but if one considers the human tragedy of events experienced by the Russians the past century, and their political and economic infrastructure it's amazing the USSR lasted as long as it did.
Also the Star Wars program, the concept of which scared the daylights out of the SovietsIIRC, neither President Reagan nor any members of his administration nor advocates of the Strategic Defense Initiative ever called SDI "star wars." That sobriquet was used by Reagan's critics.
True, although I would still think Reagan's supporting it was an aide. You say "true" when I've suggested numerous different interpretations.:confused:Comments about hardliners versus moderates in the USSR.I'm not sure what you mean when you say "hardliner" or that they'd been in control for "decades." Do you mean in an ideological sense, in regards to Soviet domestic policies, or in regards to international relations?:confused:
FWIW, based upon my reading of the declassified documents available at the National Archives and Records Administration facility know as "NARA II" (specifically, RG263 Records of the Central Intelligence Agency, National Intelligence Estimates Involving the Soviet Union, Second Set), discussions within the USSR over U.S.-Soviet relations sounded as if there were moderate views calling for both indirect competition and beneficial cooperation--that is, a continuation of detente--rather than direct confrontation well into the 1970s. Also, recall Mackinder's Heartland Theory, often considered the basis of modern geopolitics.AKV--
I respectfully disagree with you on this point. While George F. Kennan, Thomas Spykman, and Walter Lippman probably would have agreed with the importance of Mackinder, and John Lewis Gaddis might argue for the continuing relevance of Mackinder and Spykman, I would point to the Peace of Westphalia (1648) as the basis of modern geopolitics.
This disagreement aside, it goes without saying that Mackinder et al were all wrong. It is all about sea power.:p
To return to Ms. Young's editorial, I think she may be overstating slightly the recent resurgence of anti-Jewish sentiment in political and strategic discourse. IMO, insinuations about "New York intellectuals" remain unabated from some elements of the political right and I remember claims from some elements of the left that Israel is responsible for the "Palestinian question" during the mid 1980s.
I find Ms. Young's observation highly problematic.But no debate should ever be allowed to become a cover or an excuse for hate and, in this particular debate, theres plenty of hate to go around.How does one "not allow" arguments one finds hateful without compromising the concept of free speech?:confused:
The Reaper
02-02-2010, 18:36
This disagreement aside, it goes without saying that Mackinder et al were all wrong. It is all about sea power.:p
I knew you would find a way to drag Mahan into this.:D
TR
My mistake, I thought it was just a nickname for the program; my point though was that the SDI struck a lot of fear into the Soviets.Was it just SDI that inspired the concern or were the Soviets mindful of SDI within the strategic concept of "escalation dominance"?International relations (although I think "hard" was their domestic policy as well!).I think your definition of "hard" may merit significant reconsideration. As an example, within context of Soviet-Polish history, which reflects a "hard" policy--the temporary and unsuccessful oppression of the Solidarity movement in the early 1980s or those bleak days in early 1940?Comments about the U.S. Soviet rivalry.With respect, I think you are making a teleological argument that compresses too many events, actors, and developments in a thumbnail sketch that ends up being a portrait of Ronald Reagan triumphing over the Soviet Union.
I think that disciplined historical inquiry is the best way to celebrate his legacy.
Utah Bob
02-03-2010, 08:28
I think that disciplined historical inquiry is the best way to celebrate his legacy.
Nah. This is America. We prefer legends to fact. ;)
Nothing is more dangerous than a dogmatic worldview-- nothing more constraining, more blinding to innovation, more destructive of openness to novelty.
- Stephen Jay Gould (Dinosaur in a Haystack)
Richard's $.02 :munchin
greenberetTFS
02-03-2010, 15:03
Faith by itself isn't the answer,it's important in "whom" you believe in,not what you believe in!..........:):):)
Big Teddy :munchin
Well Reagan I do not view like a deity. He was a man and a politician and had his faults, but I do believe he played a critical role in bringing down the Soviet Union.The same argument could be made of most presidents from Woodrow Wilson onwards.
Metaphorically speaking, just because a basketball player hits a game winning shot, it doesn't mean that his shot won the game.
Personally - I view Reagan's role in bringing down the former Soviet Union as being similar to that of an actor who gains recognition for being a cast member in a movie which plays well at the box office and receives an Oscar for Best Picture - he had his part.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Personally - I view Reagan's role in bringing down the former Soviet Union as being similar to that of an actor who gains recognition for being a cast member in a movie which plays well at the box office and receives an Oscar for Best Picture - he had his part.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
I disagree with your post. It implies anyone who was President during that time period would have gotten the same results.
IMO - a man full of either faith or hate is someone who has lost the capacity for clear and realistic thought.
Richard's $.02 :munchin
Amen.
Metaphorically speaking, just because a basketball player hits a game winning shot, it doesn't mean that his shot won the game.
Sigaba,
History classes I recall taught individuals matter less than circumstances or geography. This is pragmatic, but aren't there limits to pragmatism, especially if one considers the multiplying impact for better or worse of an exceptional leader? On the one hand, for example the terms of the Treaty of Versailles likely ensured further German aggression, even if Hitler had been killed in the trenches of WW1. Geography matters too, since the best leader of all time if in Iceland probably wouldn't have a huge world impact.
But then you consider, the strength of a Lincoln in holding the Union together in the bleak days before Gettysburg. Would English resolve during the Blitz been the same under Chamberlain instead of Churchill? Or, along the lines on an individual's impact on history Genghis Khan, a boy thrust into slavery who ended up conquering a vast empire.
I'm not sure how to weigh this equation, but I don't think one should underestimate leadership?
HowardCohodas
02-03-2010, 17:16
I just read this thread. I smacked my hand several times as I began a reply without reading further. So here I am at the end left with some random thoughts.
It seems to me that sometimes the mark of a great leader is to recognize the right parade and to get out in front of it. If all Regan is ever credited with is getting in front of the right parade and making changes only at the margin, I will be quite satisfied.
Much of the discussion in this thread seems to dance around the logical concept of "necessary vs. sufficient." I think the circumstances that Regan found were "necessary but not sufficient" to bring down the Soviet Union. He became the catalyst and therefore was necessary to bring the desired result. Was he the only catalyst extant? I leave that to those with superior gifts than mine.
I continue to have very mixed feelings about Scheuer. I believe in his analysis of the problems of the past and recommendations for the future re. Ben Laden. I have just the exact opposite feelings regarding his position on Israel. Anecdotal only, but it seemed to me that during his early career as a commentator he frequently went on anti-Israel riffs. He still appears as a commentator, but now stays away from comments on Israel. I cannot judge if his virulent anti-Israel positions are based on anti-Semitism.
Entire postIn regards to Winston Churchill, I would remind you that the greatest advocate of the value of his leadership during the Second World War was Churchill himself. (And at this point, I'm breaking into a fit of coughing that sounds a lot like "John Dill / John Dill.")
There are many schools of thought as to what makes history happen. While the "great man" approach took a drubbing during the last quarter of the twentieth century, it does say something that some social historians are now writing biographies.
IMO, any historical event is going to be shaped by a "constellation of causal factors." Leaders will always be a part of that matrix but they may not always be pivotal. Sometimes, the leaders we think insignificant, or even detrimental to victory may be the ones who set the conditions for victory.
Here's an example of what I mean. Much is said about the Soviet-Afghan War and how contributed to the erosion of the USSR's power and prestige. Do we know all there is to know about the role the Carter administration played in baiting the Soviets to invade? What about the steps that Carter took to facilitate the ensuing insurgency <<LINK (http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/coldwar/interviews/episode-17/brzezinski2.html)>> <<LINK2 (http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/BRZ110A.html)>>?
If the Soviet-Afghan War was the boulder that broke the back of the USSR, the leaders that may merit the most historical inquiry actually may not be politicians in Washington and the Kremlin but some of the QPs on this BB.
Utah Bob
02-03-2010, 17:49
I disagree with your post. It implies anyone who was President during that time period would have gotten the same results.
I think that rather than that, Reagan, by quirk of fate or alignment of the stars, just happened to be the right guy in the right place at the right time. Some would have been worse. Some would have been better.
The Soviets were going down regardless of who was at the helm. A weaker man would have delayed their fall perhaps. A cleverer one ( and clever was one thing I never used i the same sentence with Reagan) might have hastened it. The end result, I believe, was inevitable.
HowardCohodas
02-03-2010, 17:51
In regards to Winston Churchill,
My view of Churchill conforms more with that of Larry Arnn, the president of Hillsdale College.
Entire postHow do we know this for sure...? How do we know if not for certain actions taken by the United States, if it would not still be in existence today?Broadsword2004--
IMO, a point that you're missing is that, in the absence of definitive archival evidence, the benefit of the doubt should not necessarily go to the United States or to President Reagan.
You are offering controversial interpretations of events with a degree of certainty and confidence that even senior historians who have spent their careers studying the Cold War do not posses.
Why is that?:confused:
I disagree with your post. It implies anyone who was President during that time period would have gotten the same results.
No it doesn't - it implies that the event as a whole was far larger and more complex than just the efforts of one person.
Richard
RRs PR machine was as good as Dugout Doug's.
FWIW - I was at the AmEmbassy-Bonn during that time period - and the situation was far more complex (and even whimsical) than you can imagine.
Richard
Broadsword2004--
Before you continue your reading on the Cold War or any other historical topic, I strongly urge you to spend some time with David Hackett Fisher's Historians' Fallacies : Toward a Logic of Historical Thought. Or, at the very least, D.C. Watt, "Britain and the Historiography of the Yalta Conference and the Cold War," Diplomatic History, 13:1 (January 1989). While one may profit from reading Watt's entire essay, I recommend specifically pages 68-73.From what I understood, they weren't so controversial (guess I should do more research). I believe Gorbachev in his memoir even said that the U.S. spent the Soviet Union out of existence, in terms of the arms race.In his memoir, Gorbachev writes about SDI--a program often considered as the back-breaking straw. Gorbachev told Reagan during the 1985 Geneva summit:I think you should know that we have already developed a response [to SDI]. It will be effective and far less expensive than your project, and be ready for use in less time.In his recollection of this meeting, Gorbachev goes on to tell his readers.Statesmen are not entitled to disclose everything they learned in office. Even today I cannot reveal certain facts to the reader. Still, I can assure you that we were not bluffing. Our studies had proved that the potential answer to SDI could meet the requirements I had mentioned.IMO, this statement supports Gorbachev's position that ending the arms race with the U.S. was vital for global security and domestic politics.
This is to say that Gorbachev's desire to end an arms race that "gain[ed] momentum even after [the USSR achieved] military and strategic parity with the United States of America" under Brezhnev centered around his agenda, not President Reagan's.*Where Reagan was very smart I think was in that he recognized that the Soviet economy was a lot more fragile than many realized.Here, I think you are giving too much credit to Ronald Reagan for understanding what had been the received wisdom in many components of western strategic and political culture for decades. As a convenient example, in the winter of 1980, an essay in the New Left Review (http://www.newleftreview.org/?view=1167), pointed out that:It has become customary on both right and far left to stress the weaknesses of the Soviet economy. The French book market is well stocked with works such as Emmanuel Todd’s La Chute finale, picturing the USSR as a land where nothing works and everything disintegrates. Senator Jackson’s advisers tell him that it is in a state of crisis so acute that the United States can demand major political concessions in exchange for its grain and technology. A variety of neo-Marxist critics point to extremes of inefficiency and waste. Indeed a catalogue of blunders and distortions can be assembled without difficulty from the pages of the Soviet press. Shortages, corruption, confusion, seem endemic, while growth has slowed.(IIRC, I have a nice example inconveniently buried in a box somewhere.:confused:) Of course then when the Soviet Union collapsed, everyone was shocked. Even experts on the Soviet Union were stunned at just how degraded and horrible the standard of living in it had been.
Reagan knew from the get-go that socialism did not work though, and that the Soviet economy thus had to be a lot weaker than everyone else thought, and that what one needed to do was push it in various ways, to break it.This argument undermines your advocacy of President Reagan's leadership. If President Reagan knew about the weakness of the Soviet economy, was an arms race the best way to push them over the edge? What were the political and geostrategic risks of building a fleet second to none if one knew beforehand that it would never be needed? What does it say about America's intelligence agencies if, under Reagan, they committed such a grave oversight?Reagan also recognized the problem of too much government with our own U.S. economy, and embarked on tax cuts and deregulation. This also was considered nuts, because by the Keynesian economic view at the time, tax cuts would create inflation by creating too much demand. And we already had double-digit inflation at the time, and this guy Reagan is saying to slash taxes, was he nuts!?!President Reagan was not nuts. Nor was he original nor alone in holding this position. Again, I think you are acting as if the man developed his political philosophy in a vacuum. Such is simply not the case.
(A question for consideration. Was President Reagan really a fiscal conservative? Defense spending is still government spending. And naval expansion creates a ripple effect all its own.)
_________________________________________________
* Mikhail Gorbachev, Memoirs (New York: Doubleday, 1995), pp. 407, 138.
HowardCohodas
02-03-2010, 20:54
Broadsword2004--
IMO, a point that you're missing is that, in the absence of definitive archival evidence, the benefit of the doubt should not necessarily go to the United States or to President Reagan.
Some perspective here. The US Civil War ended in 1865. And yet new books continue to be written with new insights based on newly discovered material.
Yet contemporaneous analysis has some importance in order to reap the rewards, political and/or financial, to be gained. Therefore I'm hesitant to deprecate those who make an effort at contemporaneous analysis, imperfect as we know it to be from historical perspectives.
Therefore I'm hesitant to deprecate those who make an effort at contemporaneous analysis, imperfect as we know it to be from historical perspectives.
Always ask yourself, "Now why would they be doing this?"
Richard
Will check those sources you stated, thanks.The pleasure is mine.:cool: It is interesting if Mr. Gorbachev claimed they had a response to SDI, does he elaborate what it was exactly? The citation for the following quote is in post #40. Statesmen are not entitled to disclose everything they learned in office. Even today I cannot reveal certain facts to the reader. Still, I can assure you that we were not bluffing. Our studies had proved that the potential answer to SDI could meet the requirements I had mentioned.A point that may be worth considering. All the talk of the "revolution in military affairs" that have driven many policy debates in America since the 1990s grew out of the west's understanding of similar discussions in the Soviet Union during the 1970s and 1980s. And if the Soviets did and it was very cheap, why was Russia so upset about our current missile defense systems, which President Obama thus removed? Why would they care about those systems in place if they could counter them with something much cheaper?What the Soviets said they could do in the 1980s may be a lot different than what the Russians can do today. Also, given the broader historical framework of Russia's relations with its neighbors to the west, it makes sense that the Russians might not see missile defense as defensive.Also, if much of the knowledge on the Soviet economy was considered received wisdom by many in the West, why were Reagan's policies considered so radical by many?MOO, there are two reasons. First, President Reagan believed that the U.S. should have the will and the means to win a general war against the Soviet Union if deterrence failed. This concept ran counter to the prevailing view that "mutual assured destruction" would be the only outcome of a direct confrontation with the Soviets.
Second, Reagan was not (and still is not) taken seriously by many Americans on the left and on the right. As an example, in 1986, Stephen Ambrose told a gut busting joke towards the conclusion of his last lecture of the fall semester.
Ostensibly, the joke was about high school football in Louisiana. However, every student in the packed lecture hall understood that he was comparing Eisenhower to Reagan.I don't think the idea was they would never be needed, it was to re-build the ability of the U.S. to defend itself properly and also to help break the Soviets. Given the ferocity and wide range of critics of the maritime strategy, especially within the navy, I think it is safe to say that what constituted a "proper" defense was subject to interpretation. (Tom Clancy squared the circle rather neatly in [I]Red Storm Rising, but it seems that few noticed at the time.) But national defense I'd say is different from other government spending. For example, you never have to worry about defense spending ballooning permanently out of control. Defense spending isn't like entitlements, like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and other government programs, which only grow bigger and bigger.IMO, this statement is overly broad. The type of system/program is crucial in assessing the total costs.
During his time as secretary of the navy, John Lehman frequently sparred with Congress and the Congressional Budget Office because both wanted to talk about the long term hidden costs of the 600-ship fleet. Lehman's vehement objections reflected that he understood that the criticism of hidden costs was correct.*
My opinion is you might spend more on a big defense, which costs lots, but if you spend little and have a weak defense, you might incur a really big cost if you ever have to take action against your enemy.
Imagine the Gulf War with just M-60 tanks and no Apache helicopters or any of that good stuff, or the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.Jeffrey Record's Hollow Victory: A Contrary View of the Gulf War (1993) presents a sustained critique of this line of reasoning. The leading edge is not always the best cutting edge. YMMV.
__________________________________________________ _____
* John F. Lehman, Manning the Navy, 24 April 1981, John F. Lehman, Jr. Papers, Operational Archives, Naval Historical Center, Washington Navy
Yard, Washington, D.C., box 9, folder 6, Policy Issues—Naval Policy Issues, 1981. In this document, Lehman suggests that the navy's manpower issues would be solved as new ships were being built. IMO, this "if you build it they will come" approach may work in movies about baseball but it was a risky assumption to make in the early 1980s.
ZonieDiver
02-04-2010, 00:43
I think that rather than that, Reagan, by quirk of fate or alignment of the stars, just happened to be the right guy in the right place at the right time. Some would have been worse. Some would have been better.
The Soviets were going down regardless of who was at the helm. A weaker man would have delayed their fall perhaps. A cleverer one ( and clever was one thing I never used i the same sentence with Reagan) might have hastened it. The end result, I believe, was inevitable.
I think Reagan's strength was that he realized it WAS "a movie"! There were "good guys" and "bad guys" - and they had to be painted thusly. He could communicate. Obama is a good speech-maker, but we are finding, a poor communicator!
Much like the 05B who can send code to beat the band, but whose antennas suck! All show and no results.
HowardCohodas
02-04-2010, 04:27
Obama is a good speech-maker, but we are finding, a poor communicator!
I suggest he is at best a good speech-reader. In the rare, but recorded, occasions he has allowed Q&A immediately after reading one, it seems to me that he cannot recall the contents. Makes me wonder if reading the speech was the first time the words passed through his brain.
At least he is well enough educated that unlike news readers who do not write their own copy, some extremely well paid, he rarely mispronounces words in his speeches. Or maybe his writers just stay away from words they know he cannot pronounce. ;)
FWIW, the work to which I referred in my previous post is N. A. Lomov, ed., Scientific-Technical Progress and The Revolution in Military Affairs (A Soviet View), Soviet Military Thought, number 3, trans. United States Air Force (1973; Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1975).If many had the same ideas/knowledge about the Soviet economy that Reagan had, but didn't consider Reagan himself that smart, wouldn't, as opposed to considering his policies "radical," more have just considered Reagan himself a dunce...?IMO, this is a good question for you to have in mind the next time you visit a library.For example, many agree with much of what Sarah Palin says, they just say she speaks too much in conservative platitudes and talking points and doesn't know the meat of the subjects. This statement is contradictory. If one agrees with Governor Palin but doesn't think Palin really knows what she's talking about, then is that person really agreeing with Governor Palin?Whereas with Reagan, many seemed to consider his policies, both economic and foreign, crazy. The Left said his economic policies would skyrocket inflation and his foreign and defense policy would lead us to war with the Soviets.IMO, you are over simplifying very complex arguments that were made for and against President Reagan's policy preferences.
Exactly who were the "many"?
What do you mean by "the Left"?
(Were the critics just from "the Left"?)
Just how did "they" think President Reagan's policies would lead to a general war with the Soviet Union?
What were the alternatives?
Were those alternatives viable?
The ability to summarize complex arguments into succinct statements is important but such summaries need to reflect an understanding of those arguments.At the same time though, this I think partially makes my point: that heavy defense spending always comes under heavy criticism, even in times when one really needs it. Some may have held the view that such a fleet wasn't required, but others I am sure held the opposite view.
If found that such a fleet truly was not needed, that you could in fact do the job with a smaller fleet, I do not think it would have been hard to scale back defense spending, not in the way it would be to scale back entitlement spending for example.I do not agree that this "partially makes" your point. You are saying that since debate over military spending is a constant, that the debate does not merit close attention. This position allows one to sidestep entirely the opportunity (if not the obligation) to look more closely at the debate itself.
If one were to take a closer look, one would find that debates over naval policy options were much more complex than one side arguing for fleet expansion and the other arguing the "opposite." There were (and are still) several varieties of American navalism.
The debate wasn't just over expanding the fleet, the debate was also about the types, mix, and numbers of ships and boats that America needed at that time as well as how they would be used in peace and in war.Notice today, we do not see people saying, "That Reagan, with his big military buildup, now we are stuck dealing with an enormous over-sized navy fleet, with trillions in unfunded liabilities!" Are you sure this is an accurate assessment of the debates over naval policy over the last two decades? Just what evidence do you have to support this conclusion?
There are thousands and thousands of pages of congressional testimony on this topic. Are you saying that no one has asked the question: Was this fleet really necessary? What about numerous works of naval history produced during the 1990s that were implicitly and explicitly critical of the 600-ship fleet?
Will have to check that one out, thanks. An interesting-sounding new book on Reagan I am planning to check out is called Reagan's Secret War: The Untold Story of His Fight to Save the World from Nuclear Disaster. It says it uses newly de-classified documents and access to Reagan's private papers, and reveals a lot of new things about Reagan.Bluntly but respectfully, I think your focus on works that celebrate President Reagan is not helping you to understand the history of the Cold War. There are other trees in the forest. Hagiography is not historiography.EDIT: Also one other thing on Gorbachev and SDI, and maybe I am remembering wrong, but didn't Gorbachev try hard to get Reagan to stop pursuing SDI? Or maybe it was the defense spending? And if so, wouldn't this have shown that the defense spending and/or SDI was straining the Soviet system? From what I remember reading, Gorbachev offered Reagan a lot, but Reagan never would budge on cutting defense spending (or SDI), no matter what Gorbachev put on the table.I think that rather than tossing out question after question for others to answer, it might be more helpful if you were to do the research to get the answers to your own questions.
You yourself have referred to Gorbachev's memoirs. That may be a good place for you to start (but not to stop).
My $0.02.
HowardCohodas
02-04-2010, 12:46
I think that rather than tossing out question after question for others to answer, it might be more helpful if you were to do the research to get the answers to your own questions.
Your personal profile viewable to me does not give me any insight, but from some of your posts I'm guessing you are an academic in the Berkley area.
Some students of pedagogy would disagree with you.
Although perennially maligned by most academics, I still like to go to Wikipedia for a first cut. Socratic Method (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socratic_method)
Socratic Method Research Council (http://www.socraticmethod.net/)
YMMV
HowardCohodas
02-04-2010, 12:49
I suggest he is at best a good speech-reader. In the rare, but recorded, occasions he has allowed Q&A immediately after reading one, it seems to me that he cannot recall the contents. Makes me wonder if reading the speech was the first time the words passed through his brain.
At least he is well enough educated that unlike news readers who do not write their own copy, some extremely well paid, he rarely mispronounces words in his speeches. Or maybe his writers just stay away from words they know he cannot pronounce. ;)
Leave it to Obama to prove me wrong again. It has been reported that in today's speech, he mispronounced the word "corps." I'm tracking down a sound-byte for your amusement.
I forwarded the original post to a friend to gain his thoughts on the subject.
Returned email attached as follows:
"...thanks for sending this to me and mostly I agree, I am not a fan of Israeli politics.
This is a true democracy with so many parties it becomes almost an anarchy. The swing party is the ultra orhodox jews, (who reproduce like many arabs and have equally fanatical views, (e.g., pro settlement, intolerance to Palenstinians) and view themselves as the only true Jews, but they have the power...very sad...
My major concern at present is that Israel does not attack Iran (unless they were guaranteed to be effective).
Regarding anti-semitism , obviously that is an entirely different issue and of course I am opposed to this as much as stereotyping Muslims.
What is interesting is that we are all very prejudiced . I took the implied association test (you can look it up on line) and found out I really was prejudiced against people my age.
Again thanks for sending this to me. Hope you are doing well."
Thoughts,
WD
The interview is well worth listening to in reference to the debate of how much Reagan influenced the end of the Cold War.
Re-Examining The Cold War Arms Race
Interview with David Hoffman, author of The Dead Hand.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123656590
Richard's $.02 :munchin
In regards to the OP, an article from the on-line edition of the New York Times, available here (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/05/nyregion/05rabbi.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all) may be of interest.Lessons on Love, From a Rabbi Who Knows Hate and Forgiveness
By MANNY FERNANDEZ
Postscript Appended
The new rabbi of the Free Synagogue of Flushing began his Friday night sermon with a topic he knew well: hatred’s power, and its antidote.
The rabbi, Michael Weisser, had spoken earlier that day at a Queens mosque. He was warmly greeted by the imam who invited him there. But as he left the mosque, still wearing his tan kipa, the Jewish skullcap that resembles the one Muslims wear, a man driving by who had apparently mistaken him for a Muslim shouted that he should go back where he came from, Rabbi Weisser told the congregation.
“Hatred comes forth from some pre-existing prejudice,” he said, “and only when we create the need within ourselves to hate, do we then develop reasons to justify our hatred.”
Rabbi Weisser is the uncommon leader of an uncommon place, a soft-spoken man from Nebraska who has tangled with the Ku Klux Klan and is now trying to revitalize a small synagogue in the bustling heart of Queens.
The Free Synagogue, the oldest Reform Judaism synagogue in the borough, is a symbol of Flushing’s nearly forgotten past, when the area around Main Street was lined not with Chinese, Vietnamese and Korean restaurants and supermarkets, but with Jewish grocers, tailors and butcher shops.
Signs of that old neighborhood have all but disappeared. In the 1980s, Flushing’s Jewish population began steadily falling, making way for waves of immigrants who transformed the neighborhood into one of the most ethnically diverse in the country. Its last kosher delicatessen, Flushing Delight, on Union Street, shut its doors in 1995.
The Free Synagogue, which decades ago had several hundred members, now has only about 100. Its religious school closed a few years ago.
Yet the synagogue has held on, surviving for 91 years with a loyal core of longtime supporters. Many are elderly men and women, who come from around Queens to sing and pray beneath the stained-glass windows of the domed sanctuary.
Rabbi Weisser, 67, held his first service there in early September. It was a homecoming of sorts: In the 1970s, he studied at Hebrew Union College in Manhattan, where he received his certification as a cantor. He was ordained a rabbi years later, in 2001.
He is a study in contrasts, with a penchant both for meditation and for hitting the gym five times a week. As a young man, he spent a few years in prison for burglaries in New York and New Jersey. “I had a really troubled youth,” he said. “It helped me understand some of the troubles others are going through.”
That empathy taught him a powerful lesson about hatred — and brought him national attention.
In 1991, he was living in Lincoln, Neb., with his wife at the time, Julie Michael, and three of their five children. He was then the cantor and spiritual leader of the South Street Temple, the oldest Jewish congregation in Lincoln. One Sunday morning, a few days after they had moved into their new house, the phone rang.
The man on the other end of the line called Rabbi Weisser “Jew boy” and told him he would be sorry he had moved in. Two days later, a thick package of anti-black, anti-Semitic pamphlets arrived in the mail, including an unsigned card that read, “The KKK is watching you, scum.”
The messages, it turned out, were from Larry Trapp, the Grand Dragon of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan in Nebraska, who kept loaded weapons, pro-Hitler material and his Klan robe in his cramped Lincoln apartment. Then 42, Mr. Trapp was nearly blind and used a wheelchair to get around; both of his legs had been amputated because of diabetes.
In a 1992 interview with Time magazine, Mr. Trapp said he had wanted to scare Rabbi Weisser into moving out of Lincoln. “As the state leader, the Grand Dragon, I did more than my share of work because I wanted to build up the state of Nebraska into a state as hateful as North Carolina and Florida,” he said. “I spent a lot of money and went out of my way to instill fear.”
Rabbi Weisser, who suspected the person threatening him was Mr. Trapp, got his telephone number and started leaving messages on the answering machine. “I would say things like: ‘Larry, there’s a lot of love out there. You’re not getting any of it. Don’t you want some?’ And hang up,” he said. “And, ‘Larry, why do you love the Nazis so much? They’d have killed you first because you’re disabled.’ And hang up. I did it once a week.”
One day, Mr. Trapp answered. Ms. Michael, the rabbi’s wife, had told him to say something nice if he ever got Mr. Trapp on the line, and he followed her advice. “I said: ‘I heard you’re disabled. I thought you might need a ride to the grocery,’ ” Rabbi Weisser said.
Then, one night, Rabbi Weisser’s phone rang again. It was Mr. Trapp. “He said, quote-unquote — I’ll never forget it, it was like a chilling moment, in a good way — he said, ‘I want to get out of what I’m doing and I don’t know how,’ ” Rabbi Weisser said.
He and Ms. Michael drove to Mr. Trapp’s apartment that night. The three talked for hours, and a close friendship formed. The couple’s home became a kind of hospice for Mr. Trapp, who moved into one of their bedrooms as his health worsened, and Ms. Michael became Mr. Trapp’s caretaker and confidante.
Mr. Trapp eventually renounced the Klan, apologized to many of those he had threatened and converted to Judaism in Rabbi Weisser’s synagogue.
The relationship later inspired a 1995 book by Kathryn Watterson, “Not by the Sword: How the Love of a Cantor and His Family Transformed a Klansman.”
It has become popular reading among members of the Free Synagogue, where Rabbi Weisser’s arrival has created new optimism and some new traditions. The rabbi started a meditation class on Tuesdays, and plans other new programs in hopes of attracting younger families to the synagogue.
“In Yiddish, there’s a word — mensch,” said Allan Goldberg, a longtime member and former president of the synagogue, describing a term for an honorable person. “He’s a mensch.”
Last Friday night, the topics of hatred and understanding took on a larger meaning, as the rabbi discussed the escalating violence between Israelis and Palestinians. He told the congregation that God had taken clay from the four corners of the earth and breathed life into it to create humanity. “Our religion teaches that we’re all made of the same stuff,” he said.
Mr. Trapp, the former Klan leader, died in Rabbi Weisser’s Lincoln home in September 1992, less than a year after they met. The rabbi spoke at his funeral.
“People were taken by the idea that an act of kindness can make a change,” Rabbi Weisser said. “ ‘Need a ride to the grocery?’,” you know?”
Postscript: January 14, 2009
An article in some editions on Jan. 5 about Michael Weisser, the new rabbi at the Free Synagogue of Flushing, Queens, reported that the synagogue’s religious school closed some years ago. The article may have left the incorrect impression that the synagogue currently offers no religious instruction at all. It still provides preschool and family education classes on weekends, as well as preparation for bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs.
Surf n Turf
02-15-2010, 23:16
From your post #40
Statesmen are not entitled to disclose everything they learned in office. Even today I cannot reveal certain facts to the reader. Still, I can assure you that we were not bluffing. Our studies had proved that the potential answer to SDI could meet the requirements I had mentioned.
This is to say that Gorbachev's desire to end an arms race that "gain[ed] momentum even after [the USSR achieved] military and strategic parity with the United States of America" under Brezhnev centered around his agenda, not President Reagan's.*
*Mikhail Gorbachev, Memoirs (New York: Doubleday, 1995), pp. 407, 138
Are we using Gorbachev as a neutral observer as to what agenda prevailed, or what the USSR was or was not capable of.
Are we using Gorbachev as someone who “had the answer to SDI”, I would say tsk-tsk for someone validating their own assertion. :D
SnT
Interview with David Hoffman, author of The Dead Hand.
Richard,
The “Epidemic of Mystery” is also covered in detail in Plague Wars – Mangold &Goldberg. Much later, a mutated much stronger strain is discovered in the sewers where it was initially flushed.
SnT
In regards to the NPR interview, I read it rather than listened. And based upon the laughs that Ms. Gross and Mr. Hoffman had at President Reagan's expense, I feel I made a good decision.
(I have noticed that when someone who has studied Reagan's presidency deliberately calls the strategic defense initiative "Star Wars" they either have an ax to grind with President Reagan or their understanding of the concept is under developed. Both seemed to be the case with Mr. Hoffman. YMMV.)Comments on Reagan and The Day After.Broadsword2004, I agree that President Reagan should not have been mocked by Ms. Gross or Mr. Hoffman for being moved by The Day After.
President Reagan should, however, get a little ribbing for all the Barbra Streisand films he watched at Camp David! A Star is Born on 10/15/83; Yentl on 12/02/83; Funny Girl on 01/20/84; Funny Lady on 02/03/84; The Way We Were, 06/15/84.* Clearly [?], these were Mrs. Reagan's choices! "And that's my ruling!" <<LINK (http://www.hulu.com/watch/116305/the-westerner)>>**
Question about post #40IMO, there's no such thing as a neutral observer and few things are more suspect to a historian than a memoir written after the fact--except maybe a memoir written by a leader of the Soviet Union. If Mr. Hoffman's account is reliable, it seems that Mr. Gorbachev may have been doing more than posturing for posterity's sake.
__________________________________________________
* Films President and Mrs. Reagan Viewed at Camp David, document created from http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/resource/handout/Films.htm, on 27 May 2004.
** I would really like to know why Walter Brennan is not included in discussions of great actors. Four Oscar nominations, three wins. I am just saying.