Decatur's Warning
The recent events, involving the CANF's protests
against the Bush administration, followed in short
order by the Lieberman campaign's attempt to attack
the administration; over its Cuba policy leaves me more than a little puzzled;One would think the local paper; the Herald would provide some context for these events; but you'd be wrong;
It's true the Administration; which has been distracted
of late, (although I can't quite think of what in particular;
hint; it rhymes with Shaq and Error) has not adjusted
its policy to the a recent regime's practice of shooting
emigre's from the Island and rounding up and jailing every
writer and poet of note; therein); however their opponents
have taken every instance to ignore till now and focus on
the idea that every migrant from a troublesome yet less severe archipelago;be granted asylum (The Island, i'm talking about has received at least instances of' regime
change,' in 1915 and 1994; yet it hasn't taken the lessons to heart: interestingly enough this is exactly the moment, a supposed opponent of the regime has taken to find a political space (about as appropriate as returning to Russia in 1937; of Hungary in 1957) The Helms/Burton Act has not been affirmed, even though the main obstacles to it; (The EU) has taken almost an identical
stand; against further investment in Cuba; and not just
Spain and Italy. Yet despite the fact, that many of the
opposition, have been jailed; precisely because they were
too enthusiastically associated with the former US envoy
there
But this ignores, the political environment in Washington;
which seems to be circa 1974. The President's first choice
to head the Latin Am bureau of the State Department, was
so opposed by former supporters of Castro and the Sandinistas like Senator Dodd and Harkin, so vigorously that he, a Cuban whose parents had fled from Austria,
because they were Jewish was characterized as a NAzi! In the end, he had to be installed by recess appointment. His successor, a fellow protege of Cuba hawk Jesse Helm's has finally been confirmed; which makes him the first official nominee of that post in 5 years
The recent retirements and shifts of relevant committee
chairs has not helped; With Helm's and Thurmond's retirement, came Warner, a conscientous moderate who
never fails to obstruct aggresive acts toward rogue regimes (his most pronouncements on Iraq are of a piece)
for the State's overseer, came Lugar, who despite having
been a one time aide to Adm Burke; seems unwilling to
confront the major threats involved: Pat Roberts on the
appropriation & intelligence subcommittees seems only
interested in selling Kansas wheat to Cuba;
The recent events, involving the CANF's protests
against the Bush administration, followed in short
order by the Lieberman campaign's attempt to attack
the administration;leaves me more than a little puzzled;
One would think the local paper; the Herald would provide some context for these events; but you'd be wrong
The recent events, involving the CANF's protests against the
Bush administration, followed in short order by the Lieberman campaign's attempt to attack the administration;
leaves me more than a little puzzled; One would think the
local paper; the Herald would provide some context for these
events; but you'd be wrong
Carl Hiassen's latest attempt at wit, continues the campaign
of disparagement I mentioned below; Ostensibly about the
President's admitting to a lie; it twist the truth so often it
is need of a fisking;
In a world that really cared about history, the false sophistry of Gore Vidal,(now on display in The Bush Cheney Junta and the Permanent War for Oil) would be totally ignored, in stead of the writings of John Gates, whose work on early American colonial interventions; in the Phillipines, the Caribbean & Vietnam, shows a balanced view of those interventions
http://www.wooster.edu/history/jgates/book-contents.html Yet shouting quagmire, the junta, the selected president, passes for wisdom and wit, just
ask Michael Moore, whose agitprop docu?diatribe just
won the Oscar for Best Documentary. You have to do a long and complicated google search;ie Phillipines; Gates;
Vidal. If you can't learn history right, to paraphrase Santayana, how can you even discern what mistakes can
be made
You will rarely find references to those similar and dissimilar events, Only after the eve of war, did my local paper the Miami Herald, run an article on the British experience in Mesopotamia, focusing on exactly the differences that would make it a warning of quagmire, like makeup of the expedition, the difference in logistical considerations,which would telescope a three year endeavor into three weeks
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/miamiherald/news/special_packages/focus/5394419.htm
Then again, in a milieu, where Howard Zinn and Gore Vidal pass for acceptable historians, one is lucky the distortion is so slight, this being the Herald, not the
New York Times or the Guardian/Independent/Observer. The BBC's reporter in Miami, admitted in a socalled alternative publication, that although the NY Times had the most damaging print view of the Iraq war, among major USdailies, the Herald's pictures were as graphic a rebuttal to the 'official administration view of the war; which turned out to be the correct one
The BBC, being the purveyor of the "Jenin massacre", the looting of the Baghdad
Museum, the whole Jessica Lynch was a hoax, and the Phantom WMDs along with aother parts of stories, that complete the Bush McCarthyism, Junta template. has become a go to source, for the most rabid critics of the current scene. in effect a real version of Orwell's Ministry of Truth, used as rebuttal material for Paul Krugman
(pkarchive.com) Michael Wolff,http://www.nymetro.com/nymag/author_211/ htttm(who couldn't find a story in Quatar, without consulting the Saddamophilic, Islamic sympathizing Al-Jazeera) and scores of others, too many to name.
The Herald, with a generous contribution from NY Times stringer and Castro acolyte Anna Louis Bardach, was responsible for making Luis Posada Carriles, the greatest threat to the world, in the summer of 1998, when we should have been focusing more on; I don't know Osama Bin Laden
One of the reasons that prompted me, to create this journal, is the outright criminal abuse of history, that seems to permeate most media, (and I'm not referring to Jason Blair or Stephen Glass, right now) It has always been present, but it has become more acute in the aftermath of September 11, and the Afghan War. Leave aside the 'looting of the Iraqi museum, the CIA created Saddamm meme, the Iraq quagmire, (as compared to the original Mesopotamian experience by the British ,1914-1932, the French experience in Algeria, 1830-1860 the Russian experience in Chechnya, the American experience in the Phillipines and Cuba, The Arab experience in Spain, and the Spanish resistance, at the heart of Bin Laden's Andalus gripe: when one talks of 'occupied territories, how about from 711-1492, what's the standard for comparison.
This journal is designed to focus on the many issues, and
ideas of the day, that involve US national security, and the
war on Terror. It is named after Stephen Vincent Decatur
(1779-1825) One of the first American naval heroes, who
was the first to confront the predecessor of our current
foes; The Barbary Pirates, he led expeditions into Libya,
which involved the Marines, into the battles that frame
the second line, of the Marine Corp Anthem, "The Halls
of Tripoli. He was also the John McCain of his day, in the
latter years, of the War of 1812, when his ship , The
Constellation, was captured and he served a term in the
notorious Dartmoor Prison. He was also famously known
for stating an expression, most appropriate for our times
"Millions for Defense, Not one cent for Tribute"
