Politics: Where we struggle to kneel in the muck.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by taxwonk
I don't disagree with the notion that it would be good if we did something. I don't even necessarily disagree with your statement that we could do something if we had the will. But where do we draw the line? I think we have to draw it somewhere.

After all, You have genocide of one form or another or massive repression of ethnic or social minorities going on in parts of India, Pakistan, China, Mexico, Sudan, Chad, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Niger, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Indonesia, all of the Middle East, Chechnya, Croatia, Serbia, Tibet, Brazil, Turkey, Cyprus, Korea, and too many other places to list. Surely we can't stop it all.

Where, Bilmore, where?

We can't stop it all, now, en masse, because through our failure of will, we've let it happen over the years everywhere. Had we hit these problems when they started, (a not-too-expensive proposition, actually, given some of the venues), it would have been spread over time.

Had we, years ago, taken a strong stand against bullies killing innocents, I think the threat we would present might have even kept a few of these from happening in the first place.

I can't seem to seperate this from the more basic concept - I see a guy severely beating up a kid across the street, I cross the street and make him stop. (It's a safe model, for the moment, as there is no bully we can't beat, really.) To argue that the kid isn't my responsibility seems craven.

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
Start with the Basques. You can't trust those fuckers.

But they're such good cooks. Can't we just buy them all restaurants in Chicago?

[dtb]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
Even a conservative pro-choice estimate of abortions will show (I'm fairly certain I've seen several) that abortions skyrocketed after it was made legal

Uh... DUH!

Perhaps because once it was no longer a crime, there was no penalty associated with admitting to it.

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by bilmore
We can't stop it all, now, en masse, because through our failure of will, we've let it happen over the years everywhere. Had we hit these problems when they started, (a not-too-expensive proposition, actually, given some of the venues), it would have been spread over time.

Had we, years ago, taken a strong stand against bullies killing innocents, I think the threat we would present might have even kept a few of these from happening in the first place.

I can't seem to seperate this from the more basic concept - I see a guy severely beating up a kid across the street, I cross the street and make him stop. (It's a safe model, for the moment, as there is no bully we can't beat, really.) To argue that the kid isn't my responsibility seems craven.

The problem is that for so many years we subsidized so many of those bullies, and put more than a few of them in place. Or, even more problematic, we turned today's bullies into the savage haters they are today by propping up even worse bullies, on the theory that at least they weren't commies.

We not only let it happen for years, we supplied the bats, guns, and electrodes. To take your basic example. If we spend thirty years helping the guy beat up his kids, how can we come back and pound him now? Or, another variation, what if every Dad on the block is beating up his kid but you. Can you take them all on at once?

[bilmore]

Originally posted by taxwonk
The problem is that for so many years we subsidized so many of those bullies, and put more than a few of them in place. Or, even more problematic, we turned today's bullies into the savage haters they are today by propping up even worse bullies, on the theory that at least they weren't commies.

We not only let it happen for years, we supplied the bats, guns, and electrodes. To take your basic example. If we spend thirty years helping the guy beat up his kids, how can we come back and pound him now? Or, another variation, what if every Dad on the block is beating up his kid but you. Can you take them all on at once?

Can't disagree with any of that. Having said that, though, does that mean we shouldn't improve?

[Diane_Keaton]

Originally posted by taxwonk
But where do we draw the line? I think we have to draw it somewhere. After all, You have genocide of one form or another or massive repression of ethnic or social minorities going on in parts of India, Pakistan, China, Mexico, Sudan, Chad, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Niger, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Indonesia, all of the Middle East, Chechnya, Croatia, Serbia, Tibet, Brazil, Turkey, Cyprus, Korea, and too many other places to list. Surely we can't stop it all.

What an excuse to do nothing or to let sanctions go on for so damn long. Because bad stuff is all over the place and Gee it's so hard to draw lines. You modern day liberals are such pussies.

I don't disagree with the notion that it would be good if we did something.

How NICE of you to not disagree with that notion. Pretty sad that you even have to qualify that statement with so many words.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Diane_Keaton
I mentioned thousands of children dying each month and suggested that I favored the use of force in Iraq to put a stop to the killing fields and the horrific sanctions which were not, in my mind, working based on my definition of “working.” You chose to respond and said “our tactics in Iraq -- aimed at force protection -- have resulted in more "collateral damage." I do not believe civilian war casualties have exceeded the number of dead children I mentioned. So I fail to see your point.

I was going back to the conversation we were having last week. I am not going to tell you that civilian casualties in Iraq are higher recently than they were before the war. I don't know whether that's true or not. But since you were lamenting civilian casualties as a general matter, I made the related point that our tactics in Iraq are causing more civilian casualties than other tactics would. I take it you don't disagree, but don't want to talk about it either.

Whatever. Shit or get off the pot, Ty. If our administration had said they were going in based on humanitarian reasons would you support it? Or will you take the weasel-ly approach and whine how the administration DIDN’T use this as the reason for going in and therefore it doesn’t matter. It matters to me. Would you or would you not have supported the war to end human rights abuses and the devastating effects of the sanctions?

No, I don't think I would have. Not because I didn't see a problem, but because it's not clear to me that in the long run we're going to have done much to make things better. In that respect, it's another Somalia. I suspect that -- for various reasons -- it will take a relatively brutal regime to exercise power in Iraq, with all that entails. The alternative is a failed state, with all that entails. Maybe, if things go well, we'll end up with an authoritarian regime that is less repressive than Hussein was. For the same reason, I don't favor invading Zimbabwe -- I don't see good odds of making a bad situation better.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Diane_Keaton
What an excuse to do nothing or to let sanctions go on for so damn long. Because bad stuff is all over the place and Gee it's so hard to draw lines. You modern day liberals are such pussies.

No -- it suggests that we'll get more done if we use tools other than hammers. E.g., modern-day liberal pussies brought you the Peace Corps. You don't have to invade these countries to find ways to help them.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
We have 19 year olds living in public housing with 3 kids next door to the public housing apartments where they grew up with 7 more. I don't mean to sound like I'm optimistic that all of this (misallocated incentives) gets fixed.
Hello

And the GOP's justification for not funding birth control for the poor is?

The only way you're going to slow/stop abortion is by making birth control cheaper and easier for everyone who might have trouble affording it. You can forget about stopping abortions among the people with money - that ain't going to happen for reasons I articulated yesterday. So tell your GOP pals... get those pills, condums, patches, etc... flowing.

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
At the risk of sounding libertarian, market-based solutions usually function better, which is to say, better to structure the market to give better incentives before the fact, rather than relying on government regulation to police compliance ex post.

Yesterday it was against taxes, today it's for free markets. A good week indeed.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
And the GOP's justification for not funding birth control for the poor is?

The only way you're going to slow/stop abortion is by making birth control cheaper and easier for everyone who might have trouble affording it. You can forget about stopping abortions among the people with money - that ain't going to happen for reasons I articulated yesterday. So tell your GOP pals... get those pills, condums, patches, etc... flowing.

2. And I'd add sex education.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by bilmore
We can't stop it all, now, en masse, because through our failure of will, we've let it happen over the years everywhere. Had we hit these problems when they started, (a not-too-expensive proposition, actually, given some of the venues), it would have been spread over time.

But this is murder we're talking about. How can we just rationalize letting it happen?

Like I said... "once you're born, go fuck yourself."

[Diane_Keaton]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
I was going back to the conversation we were having last week. I am not going to tell you that civilian casualties in Iraq are higher recently than they were before the war. I don't know whether that's true or not. But since you were lamenting civilian casualties as a general matter, I made the related point that our tactics in Iraq are causing more civilian casualties than other tactics would. I take it you don't disagree, but don't want to talk about it either.



No, I don't think I would have. Not because I didn't see a problem, but because it's not clear to me that in the long run we're going to have done much to make things better. In that respect, it's another Somalia. I suspect that -- for various reasons -- it will take a relatively brutal regime to exercise power in Iraq, with all that entails. The alternative is a failed state, with all that entails. Maybe, if things go well, we'll end up with an authoritarian regime that is less repressive than Hussein was. For the same reason, I don't favor invading Zimbabwe -- I don't see good odds of making a bad situation better.

I appreciate the "first do no harm" approach, and I also recognize the possibility that the new regime in Iraq may not be immune from human rights abuses. Where we differ is that I believe the scale of inhumanity had reached an intolerable level so that these risks outweighed the benefit of continuing for another 15 years as is.

[Say_hello_for_me]

Originally posted by dtb
Uh... DUH!

Perhaps because once it was no longer a crime, there was no penalty associated with admitting to it.

I was waiting for that. But it shows why a comparison to 1990 ain't exactly what I'm lookin for sweetie.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

This picture is from the second debate. WTF?