Ralph Nader and Dennis Kucinich have some things in common. For instance, some of today's Nader/Camejo supporters are former Kucinich supporters.
Nader didn't announce his candidacy publicly until February 22, 2004, a rather late start for an independent campaign. I suspect that he delayed his announcement until it became really clear to all -- including rank-and-file Kucinich supporters -- that the Democratic Party will not nominate anyone who may be remotely associated with opposition to the invasion of Iraq, let alone Kucinich.
>What if most of the Iraqi people DON'T care if a true peacekeeping
>and re-building force is exclusively 'Islamic' or from 'Islamic'
>countries (I admit my sample of opinion is small; I asked two
>Iraqis). This perceived need for an Islamic force seems to be more a
>fantasy of the Gulf States, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan (and even
>Syria), who betrayed Iraq but who now think that somehow they can
>still help the US finesse a success in Iraq. Hell, the Serbians,
>Cubans or North Koreans would be more popular in Iraq than the US or
>the UK could ever be (and anyone who thought about it would have
>known that in 2001-2; all you have to do is remember the USuk
>alliance's continuous slaughter of Iraqis from the first Gulf War
>on).
In my personal opinion, neither the masses nor governments of predominantly Muslim nations have much appetite for joining the dangerous Iraq venture; nor do they have many troops they could supply for foreign deployment even if they had been eager and willing to. If any government of a predominantly Muslim nation -- especially one in the Middle East -- went ahead and had its soldiers serve to occupy Iraq, it would be politically explosive at home, too.
I do not believe that foreign Muslim soldiers of the occupation would be treated any differently by Iraqis than foreign non-Muslim soldiers of the occupation have been either.
For the record, I voted against both Option 1 and 3 in the debates that I mentioned in <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of-Mon-20041004/022379.html>. What is ironic about all the debates among US anti-war organizers and activists about how to end the occupation of Iraq is that anti-war organizers and activists who insisted (and may still insist) on a plan for UN peace-keeping to replace the US occupation by and large have not and will not back the only presidential candidate whose position is essentially the same as theirs, focusing instead on AnybodyButBush-themed actions that are thought to further the fortune of Kerry, the candidate whose position is diametrically opposed to theirs. As long as they continue to support Kerry and the Democratic Party against the Republicans, there will be neither a strong anti-war movement nor any effective mobilization for US withdrawal, so UN peacekeeping (which is unpractical in any case) is a moot question.
>As I've said before, the only forces for liberation and getting the
>USuk alliance out of Iraq are coming from the Iraqis. A solution
>would have to work with the liberators and acknowledge their victory.
I agree with you. Only Iraqis would be able to take leadership in liberating their own nation from the US occupation -- there is no foreign "solution" that can be imposed on them from above.
>[lbo-talk] RE: Klein's response to the hitchens, coopers, etc.
>John Bizwas bizwas at lycos.com
>Mon Oct 4 19:24:20 PDT 2004
>
>John Bizwas wrote:
>>Wouldn't it have been nice if this thread had evolved into a more
>>in-depth exploration of Sadr, anti-occupation Shiism, anti-Iranian
>>Shiism, and the militant Shia in full cooperation with militant
>>Sunna (and just what are they actually being 'militant' about?).
>
>DH replied:
>>It would have been nice. Why don't you take the lead? It's not very
>>helpful when people complain about the discursive failings of
>>others.
>
>I did take the 'lead'. But then you took it back from me and used
>your space to complain about my own discursive failings. Or hadn't
>you noticed?
>
>Anyway, for the sort of discussion I was proposing someone besides
>myself on the list would have to notice--and then make note of the
>fact--that al Sadr is an anti-Iranian Shia Arab Iraqi cleric. The
>drift of the list seemed more about ritualistically denouncing
>clerical fascists or the leftists who supposedly love them. You
>might see my previous posts which addressed the miscalculations
>about Iraqi nationalism.
Another irony is that the New York Times is given to less prejudicial language than some leftists are concerning Moktada al-Sadr:
<blockquote>A reporter, photographer and interpreter with The New York Times recently spent nearly 24 hours being guided through the battleground streets -- and even to a guerrilla bachelor party -- by one of Mr. Sadr's midlevel aides. It became apparent that the Mahdi Army here is less a discrete military organization than a populist movement that includes everyone from doctors to policemen to tribal sheiks, and whose ranks swell with impoverished men willing to die. (Edward Wong, "On Baghdad Streets, Loyalty to Rebel Cleric Is Still Fierce," <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/04/international/middleeast/04militia.html>October 4, 2004</a>)</blockquote>
Will we see furious letters to the Editor condemning the New York Times for being soft on "theocratic fascists," or are critics of Naomi Klein just interested in ganging up on her for her at best ambivalent support for the AnybodyButBush hegemony? The real crime of Klein is that, even though she doesn't support Nader or any other anti-war candidate for presidency and probably recommends votes for Kerry in swing states, she was correct to point out that Kerry was a problem, not a solution, and that the occupation cannot be ended by voting for the Democratic Party:
<blockquote> United for Peace and Justice states that "there are two key moments this year when people throughout the United States will have the opportunity to send a resounding message of opposition to the Bush Agenda: November 2, election day, and August 29, in New York City." Sadly, this isn't the case: There is no chance for Bush's war agenda to be clearly rejected on Election Day, because John Kerry is promising to continue, and even strengthen, the military occupation of Iraq. That means there is only one chance for Americans to express their wholehearted rejection of the ongoing war on Iraq: in the streets outside the Republican National Convention. It's time to bring Najaf to New York. ("Bring Najaf to New York," <a href="http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040913&s=klein">August 26, 2004</a>)</blockquote> -- Yoshie
* Critical Montages: <http://montages.blogspot.com/> * Greens for Nader: <http://greensfornader.net/> * Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/> * Calendars of Events in Columbus: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html>, <http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/> * Student International Forum: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>