Why Obama's Comment Stings My Soul

...Or, Fear And Loathing in the 1980's.

I don't mean this to be a hit diary, or a pile on. But in reading the discussions around the blogs today on Obama's growingly-infamous comment about Reagan's legacy, I feel like some folks just don't get it, they truly do not empathize with those of us on the left who hear the word "Reagan" and see red. I think a lot of this is due to not sharing a common history.

So, briefly, these are some recollections that jump into my brain when I hear "Reagan"...

It was 1980. There was no internet. There was no cable (or at least none in my neck of the woods in small town Nebraska). We got our news from the local paper, the Lincoln paper and four broadcast network stations. I was a bored thirteen-year-old, walking the school hallways with her head stuck in a book and glasses perched on my nose, trying to grow through these years as quickly as possible so I could Get Out. Escape To The Great World Beyond.

In 1980 a lot of stores in our small town still closed on Sunday...and they were still huddled around the town square, encasing the county courthouse. If you wanted something you had to either get it Saturday or drive into Lincoln. We had a local movie theatre that was still open (although the local businesses stopped giving out "movie money" coupons a few years back).

The big news of the day was the Iranian hostage crisis. On the radio in the car, on the TV news at night, in the schools during our discussions of current events, everyone would get updated on "Day Number ____ ", a macabre notation of how many days the hostages had been held. This would be followed up with blurry film footage and photographs of men and women, blindfolded, surrounded by young men with guns. We were treated to reports of what happens when one is being taken hostage. What that feels like. Whether they let you go to the bathroom.

Analysts would discuss the Carter administration's action - or lack thereof. Carter refused to negotiate with terrorists. Eventually we heard news of a downed plane and a failed rescue attempt. People were frustrated and scared. It felt like the one battle in the Cold War that we were losing (regardless of the reality of things - trust me, this *is* what it felt like)...and we all collectively understood the threat that loomed if we let that happen.

It is this environment that elected tough-talking Ronald Reagan. The Man of Action. The choice of "Other" on your ballot. It was hardly the masses yearning for "...a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing." After Reagan was elected and the hostages were freed the country breathed a sigh of relief, patting itself on the back for making the right choice. It was only later on that we would learn it was secret negotiations with these terrorists before we even cast our votes - and not all that tough talk - that freed these hostages.

But with the hostages freed we were still under a threat even more dire, that of total nuclear holocaust. Mutually Assured Destruction had been our policy since Kennedy, and - because we couldn't figure out any other way of going about things - it remained our policy since that time. We watched The Day After on the TV, and talked about that woman's hair falling out after being poisoned by radiation. In Nebraska we had a special network news treat: seeing a model of downtown Omaha being blown to bits in a nuclear blast. Unlike the rest of the country, Omaha would be ground zero in a nuclear war as it was the home of the Strategic Air Command.

We drove down gravel roads that suddenly became paved - roads with no names, only the ones that the locals gave them: "missle base roads". Because, well, they were built to lead to a missle base.

And in the middle of all of this the economy boomed, I went to high school and then college and I have to say, even for the eighties I had *really big hair*. And skin tight jeans. (Ah, to have my pre-mommy body back again).

But I digress.

I went to an Ivy League school "back east", where the campus was buzzing about who got the latest job on Wall Street, where the best place to go shopping was and where everyone wore the standard uniform of leather bomber jackets. And in the middle of all of this we learned, and studied, and discussed the Russian threat, the Eastern Block Countries, the history of La Belle Epoch, and, yes, Mutually Assured Deterence. Professors openly questioned the government's assessments of the Soviet threat, the number of missles they had and the numbers we needed to defend ourselves (as opposed to launching a first strike).

I was fortunate enough to go to Russia.

I hung out with engineering students there who openly questioned *their* government's allocation of resources to build these nuclear warheads. Their lack of testing them, and their dictates to just swap components when there were shortage issues. I saw people carrying briefcases and bookbags, to stock up on certain items that hit the store shelves and then disappeared just as quickly. I saw the cheaply made shoes, smoked the cheaply made local cigarettes and walked the streets where small three cylander vehicles - "put put cars" my friend called them - cruised the streets looking for the impossible to find parking spot.

And after all of this I thought to myself: *this* is the Evil Empire? It seemed like a surreal joke, knowing the trillions we had spent in "defending" ourselves against these folks.

It was then I understood I had been lied to. By Reagan. And that the trillions of dollars of debt we incurred at the expense of mentally retarded people being forced into the streets and government programs being stripped to the bone wasn't about protecting us. It was about something else, a more sinister remake of society that was being enabled by a combination of fear and consumption, forcing us to become a more "me" oriented society and less of a "thou" oriented society.

This is why, today, I was deeply saddened listening to Senator Obama's remarks on Reagan. It just took me right back there to that moment in time when, for me, the lie began.

Again, this isn't a hit diary. Just an explanation of where I'm coming from.

Peace.

UPDATE: I was originally just trying to keep this as an expression of what Reagan was really like and what that election was like, but maybe that was a little too subtle. Sorry about that.

To answer everyone, here is Obama's quote, with the part that I take umbrage at highlighted:

I don't want to present myself as some sort of singular figure. I think part of what's different are the times. I do think that for example the 1980 was different. I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not. He put us on a fundamentally different path because the country was ready for it. I think they felt like with all the excesses of the 1960s and 1970s and government had grown and grown but there wasn't much sense of accountability in terms of how it was operating. I think people, he just tapped into what people were already feeling, which was we want clarity we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

If you notice, people actually *weren't* feeling that they wanted clarity, optimism and a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing.

People were *in fear*. The 1980 election was about *fear*. It was not about *hope*. The GOP has been attempting to spread the message of Reagan the Great Optimist/Hopemonger/etc. in an effort to cannonize him. This spin is far from reality.

I hope this explains my feelings on the subject a little more directly.

This is a crosspost of a blog entry originally posted on Daily Kos: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/1/16/202428/519/291/438030

Why We Can Do Better Than Hillary

I've been cruising the blogs for some time now, and I've always been intrigued at the ardent Hillary Clinton supporters I've found on the web. I'm intrigued because, frankly, they're some of the angriest people out there.

My purely anecdotal experience in talking with some of these folks is their number one, big, huge, over-riding reason for supporting Hillary Clinton is not that she will push for the changes necessary to address things like Iraq, health care and global warming. It is not that she will address the gross economic inequities that have lead to working folks barely able to get by. It isn't that she'll even do anything about our outrageous gas prices or halt the spread of the Iraq war to neighboring states like Iran.

It's that...she'll rub the Rethuglican's noses in it. Yes, I am using the term "Rethuglican" because more often than not this is how these folks refer to our fellow human beings who register themselves with the GOP. While Hillary Clinton herself speaks of the wonders of compromise, and incremental change, and How Lobbyists Are People, Too, her most ardent supporters are pinning their hopes and dreams on the day that they can turn to their conservative coworkers at the water cooler and give them the glare that says "we beat you, stuff it!"

Forget issue oriented politics. Forget the fact that you might actually need the support of some of these folks in order to govern.

Forget the fact that it is our system that is the problem: the lobbyists who corrupt it; the corporate media who acquiesces to it and the politcians who have a vested interest in business as usual.

No, let's all turn our hatred and ire on our brothers and sisters who are struggling to make ends meet, who also have a vested interest in fixing global warming and who also want us to get out of Iraq like it was yesterday. Let's engage in the same politics of division that we've been doing for the past eight years, but this time let's put a Democrat in office. That'll show 'em.

And while we're so busy "showing 'em", the artic ice cap will continue to melt, soldiers and civilians will continue to die in Iraq and possibly Iran, millions of families will not be able to get the health care we need and our corrupted system will still let in lead-enhanced toddler toys and toxic apple juice in the name of unfettered, unregulated free trade.

Democrats: we are better than this. Yes, it is right to be outraged at the state of our nation right now. But let's direct the outrage at the folks who deserve it: the corporate lobbyists who have corrupted our democractic system and the politicians that have let them do it. Don't be horn-swaggled into thinking that one-upping Bob at the office will make your life any better. Bob ain't your problem.

The problem lies with politicians who excuse the corrupt system, who think that small, incremental change and protecting the status quo is the way to make our country better.

We are better than this. We can elect politicians that are better than this. We can elect folks like John Edwards, who understand that you can't accept big money and expect big change.

Let's take our country back. Now.

What is John Edwards's Foreign Policy?

Here’s what they mean by preventive war—if we see a possible threat, we go to war; we don’t exhaust diplomatic, political, and economic options, we go straight to war. Under this Bush doctrine, military force is no longer the option of last resort.

snip

Now, I want to be very clear about something. I believe very strongly that any commander-in-chief must retain the right to respond with appropriate force when there’s real intelligence about an imminent threat to America.

But there is a difference between doing everything in our power to keep America safe and a reckless, belligerent policy that actually makes us less safe. The preventive war doctrine was a stunning departure from the policy that had kept America safe during both world wars and during the Cold War. It is wrong on the merits, wrong on the morals, and wrong for America.

From John Edwards's "Learning the Lesson of Iraq: A New Strategy for Iran". Link: http://blog.johnedwards.com/story/2007/11/5/122520/049

I've seen a number of diaries lately question what John Edwards's foreign policy vis a vis Iran would be. Would he invade Iran? What does "leaving all options on the table" really mean in our post 9/11, post-Bush the Younger world?

The purpose of this diary is to discuss Edwards's foreign policy, both in broadstroke and specifically with regard to Iraq, Iran and terrorism. The purpose of this diary is not to play "gotcha". No other candidates will be "called out". These are literally life and death issues as they deal with war and peace, and my hope is that we treat them with the proper amount of gravity and respect that they deserve.

Removing the Bush Doctrine of "Preventive War"

That being said, let's start with broadstrokes. Edwards is a multilateralist, which basically means he favors a "concert of nations" approach to international conflict resolution. Whether discussing Iran, Iraq or terrorism, or indeed other transnational issues like Global Warming or poverty, Edwards leads with statements like the one he wrote in his essay for Foreign Affairs:

Rather than alienating the rest of the world through assertions of infallibility and demands of obedience, as the current administration has done, U.S. foreign policy must be driven by a strategy of reengagement. We must reengage with our history of courage, liberty, and generosity. We must reengage with our tradition of moral leadership on issues ranging from the killings in Darfur to global poverty and climate change. We must reengage with our allies on critical security issues, including terrorism, the Middle East, and nuclear proliferation. With confidence and resolve, we must reengage with those who pose a security threat to us, from Iran to North Korea. And our government must reengage with the American people to restore our nation's reputation as a moral beacon to the world, tapping into our fundamental hope and optimism and calling on our citizens' commitment and courage to make this possible. We must lead the world by demonstrating the power of our ideals, not by stoking fear about those who do not share them.

Link: http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20070901faessay86502-p0/john-edwards/reengaging-with-the-world.html

This is in contrast to the Bush administration, which favors a unilateralist approach in any conflict they really want to take on (note that the glaring exception of this is North Korea, which the Bush administration in my opinion has just simply placed on the back burner, in favor of utilizing their time and resources in trying to clean up Iraq, escalate the conflict with Iran and deal with all of the known and unknown knowns and unknowns that arise along the way).

In September, 2002, President Bush put on paper his administration's policy of "preventive war". This doctrine holds that the United States can take action against threats "before they are fully formed", which flies in the face of years of international jurisprudence regarding the right of a State to defend itself from imminent attack. As the Brookings Institute explained:

The concept is not limited to the traditional definition of preemption—striking an enemy as it prepares an attack—but also includes prevention—striking an enemy even in the absence of specific evidence of a coming attack. The idea principally appears to be directed at terrorist groups as well as extremist or "rogue" nation states; the two are linked, according to the strategy, by a combination of "radicalism and technology.

As quoted in "Preventive War and International Law After Iraq", link: http://www.globelaw.com/Iraq/Preventive_war_after_iraq.htm

It is this doctrine of preventive war that Edwards railed against in his Foreign Affairs article when he called the "War on Terror" a "bumpersticker":

But I believe we must stay on the offensive against both terrorism and its causes. The "war on terror" approach has backfired, straining our military to the breaking point while allowing the threat of terrorism to grow. "War on terror" is a slogan designed for politics, not a strategy to make the United States safe. It is a bumper sticker, not a plan. Worst of all, the "war on terror" has failed. Instead of making the United States safer, it has spawned even more terrorism -- as we have seen so tragically in Iraq -- and left us with fewer allies.

He has also specifically stated that the doctrine of preventive war has no safe haven in an Edwards administration:

First and foremost, we need to ensure that the preventive war doctrine goes where it belongs—the trash-heap of history. As he has done with so much else, Vice President Al Gore got it right about the preventive war doctrine. In 2002—the same year that George Bush introduced his preventive war doctrine—Gore made a speech at the Commonwealth Club in California. He said, and I quote, “What this doctrine does is to destroy the goal of a world in which states consider themselves subject to law, particularly in the matter of standards for the use of violence against each other. That concept would be displaced by the notion that there is no law but the discretion of the President of the United States.”

These are especially chilling words to read five years later—after Iraq, Guantanamo Bay, and the president’s refusal to condemn torture, and they are particularly relevant to the situation with Iran.

link: http://blog.johnedwards.com/story/2007/11/5/122520/049

The only instance Edwards would use force in a pre-emptive strike is in the instance of imminent threat, and he would therefore return the United States to the norms of accepted international law with regard to the use of force.

Terrorism

So, how would an Edwards administration deal with an issue like international terrorism? By using a multilateral approach to deal not just with security and counter-terrorism, but also with systemic issues like poverty that help terrorism to take root. He plans to implement this multilateral approach through a newly formed organization, the Counterterrorism and Intelligence Treaty Organization (CITO):

Every nation has an interest in shutting down terrorism. CITO will create connections between a wide range of nations on terrorism and intelligence, including countries on all continents, including Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Europe. New connections between previously separate nations will be forged, creating new possibilities.

CITO will allow members to voluntarily share financial, police, customs and immigration intelligence. Together, nations will be able to track the way terrorists travel, communicate, recruit, train, and finance their operations. And they will be able to take action, through international teams of intelligence and national security professionals who will launch targeted missions to root out and shut down terrorist cells.

The new organization will also create a historic new coalition. Those nations who join will, by working together, show the world the power of cooperation. Those nations who join will also be required to commit to tough criteria about the steps they will take to root out extremists, particularly those who cross borders. Those nations who refuse to join will be called out before the world.

It's important to note that CITO is not a panacea, nor will it be perfect. But it would represent the first step in a new direction. As President John F. Kennedy observed when he signed the treaty that first limited the testing of nuclear weapons, we must begin with the common recognition of a common danger. President Kennedy said then, "A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step." Today, this new anti-terrorism organization would be such a first step.

link: http://www.johnedwards.com/news/speeches/a-new-strategy-against-terrorism/

Think of CITO as a NATO that is specifically tasked to fight global terrorism. Is it needed? Absolutely. Global terrorism is our generation's Cold War - it probably won't go away within our lifetimes and it is a big enough and - with enhanced global communication technology - a new enough threat to warrant an international organization of people who live, breath and eat how to combate it within the rule of international law (instead of leaving it up to the next belligerent superpower to sort out on their ownsome).

For the snapshot of Edwards's full plan to combat terrorism, visit his issues page here: http://www.johnedwards.com/issues/terrorism/

Iraq

In-tuned and hep bloggers are probably most familiar with this part of Edwards's foreign policy, so I'll be brief: immediate draw-down of 40,000-50,000 combat troops, a cessastion of combat missions and a standing force to protect the embassy and humanitarian endeavors in country.

For more of Edwards's Iraq policy, visit his issues page here: http://www.johnedwards.com/issues/iraq/

Iran

The main thing that sticks out for me in Edwards's approach to Iran is his insistence on including Russia and China in dealing with Iran as part of his consistent multilateralism:

We must work with China and Russia on the problem of Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Both nations have economic relationships with Iran on trade and energy. But both nations also have a strong interest in stability in the Middle East. And neither nation wants the nuclear club to expand. In the first year of my administration, I will convene a conference with my Secretary of State and representatives from the “E.U. 3”—Great Britain, France, and Germany—Russia, China—and Iran, to discuss a way out of the stalemate of the Bush administration.

link: http://blog.johnedwards.com/story/2007/11/5/122520/049

The problem with the current sanctions authorized under Kyl-Lieberman and implemented by the Bush administration is that they are practically unilateral in nature. Couple this with the Bush doctrine of preventive war, and you have a number of our European allies uncomfortable in backing them, Russia and China not supporting them at all and Iran defiantly saying they will have no effect on their nuclear program (check out news articles on this here: http://www.reuters.com/article/reutersEdge/idUSL3051339620071106 and here: http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=182484&version=1&template_id=37&parent_id=17 ).

Indeed, John Bolton, the Mighty Moustache, the Guy Who Roots for Diplomacy to fail, gleefully opined in today's New York Post:

I believe it was obvious from the outset that Iran wasn't going to renounce its quest for nuclear weapons voluntarily because it was part of a much larger strategy. The stakes were and are high: whether Iran and its radical Shiite version of Islam become dominant throughout the Muslim world, whether largely Persian Iran achieves effective hegemony in the Persian Gulf and the Middle East and whether a nuclear, terror-financing Iran emerges on the global stage as a real power.

snip

Regime change in Iran is the preferred option, and a feasible one given the regime's weakness. Rampant economic discontent caused by 28 years of economic mismanagement, the desires of younger Iranians to be freed from the mullahs' theology and dissatisfaction among Iran's ethnic minorities are all fertile breeding grounds for discontent. If we had supported and encouraged this dissent for the last four years, we might now be on the verge of regime change.

Absent regime change, the targeted use of force against Iran's program is the only option left. Risky and unattractive as it is, the choice may well be between the use of force and a nuclear Iran, which is really not a choice at all. Iran is already asserting itself in ways profoundly hostile to our interests and those of our close friends. Imagine adding Iranian nuclear weapons to that equation. That's why surrender is not an option.

link: http://www.nypost.com/seven/11062007/postopinion/opedcolumnists/dithering_diplomats_959824.htm?page=0

The issue with regard to Iran is this: do you really believe the Bush administration is willing and able to use sanctions in order to competently pursue diplomacy that results in peaceful conflict resolution? If not...don't give them the ability to escalate this conflict through practically unilateral sanctions, as it gives guys like Bolton just more air in their lungs to pronounce the Death of Diplomacy.

For more on Edwards's policy regarding Iran, visit this link: http://www.johnedwards.com/issues/iran/

Bottom line: a multilateral approach to conflict resolution, that removes the doctrine of preventive war and returns the United States to operating within the standards of international law is sorely needed right now, and this is the foreign policy Edwards is proposing. As Edwards stated in his recent speech on Iran:

In his first inaugural speech, in 1933, Franklin Delano Roosevelt rejected the failed Republican policy of military intervention in Latin America and Europe. Instead, he told the nation, we should “dedicate this Nation to the policy of the Good Neighbor . . . the neighbor who respects his obligations and respects the sanctity of his agreements in and with a world of neighbors.”

That’s the America we should be.