I don't think that voting in the presidential election will make that much of a difference, in that in practice Bush is not going to reverse the course to which the U.S. government has already committed itself, aside from the rhetoric of national-interest bean-counting which is better than liberal internationalism.
***** No deadline for removing troops from Kosovo
The two candidates generally share the philosophy of internationalism that was the hallmark of President Bush and that has animated President Clinton's policy. Governor Bush supported the Clinton administration's use of force in Kosovo last year. And last week, when some congressional Republicans wanted to establish a deadline for removing US troops from Kosovo, Bush questioned the move, saying it would tie his hands if he became president.
Source: Boston Globe, p. A41 May 25, 2000
<http://www.issues2000.org/George_W__Bush_Kosovo.htm> *****
Gore may be, however, even worse than Clinton, though, especially if he makes efforts to coopt the rhetoric of Nader & the Green Party & to woo them on their rhetorical terms, which aren't that different from the Dems' to begin with:
***** Ralph Nader on Kosovo
Should have anticipated Yugoslav breakup by "waging peace"
Q: Your views on the Balkans and the bombing of Serbia? A: Our foreign policy is often too little too late, and then too brutal. Everyone could foresee Yugoslavia deteriorating after Tito. We need a policy of "waging peace" to anticipate problems. And we need a multilateral "peace force" ready to go. Q: UN or NATO-US or what? A: With heavy regional content depending on which continent. Source: National Public Radio, "The Connection" Jul 11, 2000
Bosnia: Force acceptable to help against mass slaughter
Q: Foreign policy, the Middle East, Bosnia: your general view in that area? A: Well I think when there's mass slaughter going on or about to go on, as in some countries, there should be a multinational expeditionary force to help those people. Burundi is an example. And second, I think we should be very careful about getting into foreign difficulties, because we're protecting big business, investments like oil in the Persian Gulf, which led us into that whole morass to begin with. Source: Interview on "Larry King Live" Oct 6, 1996
<http://www.issues2000.org/Ralph_Nader_Kosovo.htm> *****
***** RALPH NADER AND THE ABSTENTION OF THE LEFT
By Justin Raimondo:
When Ralph Nader entered the presidential sweepstakes as the candidate of the Green Party, I thought: At last, we will hear from the American Left on the vital questions of war and intervention. A well-known and much respected public scold, Nader, I knew, would get major attention, and in spite of my own political views, which are quite conservative, I have always given him a kind of grudging respect: here is one socialist who realizes that he is living in America, for godssake, not 18th-century Russia, and looks to William Jennings Bryan instead of Vladimir Illyich Lenin as a model to be emulated. As the heir of the old "progressive" movement that took root in the American West and Midwest, Nader, I thought, would represent all aspects of that tradition, which not only wanted to "bust the trusts" but also railed against the war profiteers who dragged us into two world wars. I anticipated rhetoric in the spirit of, say, Senator George W. Norris, Republican of Nebraska, whose speech against US entry into World War I underscored the distinctly anti-oligarchical flavor of the antiwar Left in those days. The warmongers were the men of the trusts, he declared,
"Concealed in their palatial offices on Wall Street, sitting behind mahogany desks, covered up with clipped coupons Š coupons stained with mothers' tears, coupons dyed in the lifeblood of their fellow men."
A GOOD QUESTION
With the entry of Nader, I imagined, we will hear once again the question posed by Senator Robert LaFollette, that icon of progressivism, on the eve of World War I:
"Shall we hind up our future with foreign powers and hazard the peace of this nation for all time by linking the destiny of American democracy with the ever-menacing antagonisms of foreign monarchies? [Europe is] cursed with a contagious, deadly plague, whose spread threatens to devastate the civilized world."
A HEARTENING PROSPECT
Instead of apologias for "humanitarian" imperialism, a la Todd Gitlin, and the embarrassed silence of our congressional left-liberals, most of whom supported Clinton's conquest of Kosovo, I felt certain that the voice of the Green Party would be raised against our bipartisan foreign policy of global hegemony. With Patrick J. Buchanan attacking the globalists from the right, and Nader assaulting their left flank, I was hoping that foreign policy would be an important issue in this presidential election: contrary to the predictions of the pundits, who claim that Americans could care less about the crimes of the US in Kosovo and Iraq - and would much rather keep it that way. Go Ralph go! The voice of a new LaFollette - I thought - is about to be raised, and the prospect was heartening. But, alas, it was not to be . . .
NADER COPS OUT
In a linguistic display of almost Clintonian evasiveness, the supposedly principled "progressive" cops out bigtime. In a February 23 interview with something called "Alternative Radio," Nader serves notice that he has decided not to take any specific foreign policy positions aside from general blathering about "democratic processes," and I quote:
Q: "People will want to know your views on sanctions on Iraq, the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, Chechnya and Kosovo. You've got to be prepared to answer those questions."
A: "They'll be answered in terms of frameworks. Once you get into more and more detail, the focus is completely defused. The press will focus on the questions that are in the news. If Chechnya is in the news, they'll want to focus on that. We should ask ourselves, What kind of popular participation is there in foreign and military policy in this country? Very little indeed. We want to develop the frameworks. For example, do we want to pursue a vigorous policy of waging peace and put the resources into it from our national budget as we pursue the policy of building up ever-new weapons systems?"
IN TERMS OF WHAT?
Say what? Everybody knows Nader's a policy wonk, but isn't this taking it a bit too far? If US troops get into a firefight with Serbs on the Yugoslav-Kosovo border, does he really plan on answering the question of where he stands "in terms of frameworks"? And this business of how getting into detail "defuses" the focus is nothing but a crock - and shows a contempt for the language, as well as elementary logic, that one would expect of Bush or Gore: being in focus means getting down to the details. And what, exactly, is a mere "detail" in Nader's considered opinion - the decimation of Yugoslavia, the murder of an entire generation of Iraqis, the prospect of a war for Caspian oil?
NONINTERVENTIONISM AND NOSE-RINGS
These are not "details," but major issues that cannot be evaded by appeals to "popular participation" and exhortations to "wage peace." By reducing a moral question that transcends politics - what constitutes a just war? - to a question of pure process, democratic or otherwise, Nader thinks he can get away with in effect taking no position at all. This has certain political advantages, in solidifying his base of support in the Green Party and in the (generally pro-war) media. While the Green Party platform clearly states its opposition to all overseas interventions, the Kosovo war (and before that, the Bosnian intervention) was not a clear-cut issue with the dreadlocks-and-nosering crowd that makes up the party's constituency and much of its activist base. Anything he says on the Kosovo issue is bound to get him into trouble, and so - like any politician of a more traditional stripe - it is best to say nothing.
NOT THAT MUCH
Indeed, the whole question of Nader's stance on the Green Party platform has come up before in the context of foreign policy and defense-related issues: In a May 7 [2000] interview on "Meet the Press," Tim Russert asked him:
Q: "The Green Party platform says about defense spending: "We strive to cut the defense budget by 50% by the year 2000, from approximately $300 billion - aggregate spending - in 1996." Is this your position?"
A: "Not that much. But [even former Reagan officials say the] defense budget can be cut by $100 billion. Look, our traditional adversaries are no more. Soviet Union is gone. Historically, we demobilized after our enemies have disappeared or have been conquered. We're not doing that now. We have F-22s, tens of billions of dollars. Analysts in the Pentagon are opposed to it. B-2 bombers forced down the Pentagon's throat while the global infectious disease efforts of the Pentagon, a great story, is starved for its budget."
PLATFORM PLANKS
Not that much? Well then how seriously should we take the Green Party platform on the question of foreign intervention? The platform calls for a "pro-Democracy foreign policy," and offers up a laundry list of Green policy prescriptions in slogan form::
"Support International, Multilateral Peacekeeping to Stop Aggression and Genocide ."
"No Unilateral US Intervention in the Internal Affairs of Other Countries."
"Close All Overseas US Military Bases."
"Disband NATO and All Aggressive Military Alliances."
"Ban US Arms Exports."
"Abolish the CIA, NSA, and All US Agencies of Covert Warfare."
"End the Economic Blockades of Cuba, Iraq, and Yugoslavia."
"Cut Off US Military Aid to Counter-Insurgency Wars in Columbia and Mexico."
"Require a National Referendum of the Whole People to Declare War."
GLOBAL DO-GOODERS
Which, if any, of these positions does Nader agree with? We've already noted his dissent from the Green platform on cutting the military budget - Nader would cut it only by a third or so - but what else doesn't he agree with? You'll notice, by the way, that the Greens say they oppose only unilateral US military intervention, and - more ominously - start their list of demands by declaring their support for multilateral "peacekeeping to stop aggression and genocide" - precisely the language used by the Clintonistas to justify the subjugation of Kosovo. The Green Party leadership, for all its emphasis on grassroots organizing, stayed away completely from the antiwar protests during the Kosovo conflict, no doubt because a good portion of the Greenies were for what was, after all, an allegedly "humanitarian" war. The strain of international do-gooderism is very strong among the Greens, as can be seen in the following astonishing passage from their platform, which promises a "global Green Deal," the first step of which is that
"The US should finance universal access to primary education, adequate food, clean water and sanitation, preventive health care, and family planning services for every human being on Earth."...
...THE FISCHER-IZATION OF THE GREENS
Kosovo was a turning point not only for the Right, but also for the formerly antiwar Left - which for the most part jumped on the bandwagon of Clinton's "humanitarian" war, and, if anything, criticized him for his tardiness. The transformation of the Green Party of Germany - which entered the Social Democratic government of Herr Schroeder and captured the Foreign Ministry - from a party of peaceniks to the vanguard of the War Party (European branch) was dramatized at their national convention held during the Kosovo war. The so-called "radicals" - who insisted on adhering to the original antiwar principles of the Greens - succeeded in splattering Joschka Fischer, the Green Foreign Minister, with red paint during the debate on Kosovo - but the "realos," the pro-war "realist" wing of the party, carried the day and voted to support the government. Will the American Greens go the same route? Time will tell....
...LOWER YOUR SIGHTS
Now, in all fairness, Nader's 1996 "no foreign policy, please" position may change, this time around - we'll just have to wait and see. In any case, a stubborn refusal to comment on a sudden foreign policy crisis - say, if Kosovo blows before Election Day 2000 - could cost him his credibility. It could also get people (including his supporters) to ask a very pertinent question: Instead of running for President, why doesn't Nader lower his sights and run for something like California insurance commissioner? Now there is a job made for Nader, our number one Public Citizen - and, what's more, he would probably win. The incumbent, Republican Chuck Quackenbush, is in deep trouble because of alleged financial collusion with the very industry he was charged with regulating. It would be a feather in the cap of the California Greens, who have put most of their emphasis on local organizing and campaigns for city and county office - and there's still time for Nader to drop out.... <http://www.antiwar.com/justin/j052600.html> *****
I used to think that liberals & leftists, on average, are smarter than conservatives.
Yoshie