The Farce Forum

[John Simkin]

Conservative commentator Pat Buchanan has frequently praised America First and often uses its name as a slogan.

Now if I can only persuade John to accept some of Buchanan's other policies!

Of course I am aware that the American First Committee was made up both the right and the left. For example, it included Norman Thomas, the leader of the American Socialist Party (By the way, Evan Thomas is Norman Thomas's grandson).

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAfirstC.htm

Although it was in the British interest to get involved in the Second World War, it was not in the interest of the American people. That is the point I am making. The American people grasped this concept in the 1930s but have allowed themselves to be brainwashed into thinking it is in their interest to become the world's policemen since 1945.

I agree that the Marshall Plan was a good use of American taxpayers money and did a great deal to keep countries in Western Europe from electing communist governments in the post-war world. That is very different from sending troops to invade countries like Iraq.

[Tim Gratz]

Well, I guess I have to agree with FDR here. It WAS in the interest of all civilized nations to stop Hitler. Have you read the Phillip Roth book imagining a scenario if the America First ideology had prevailed in America?

[Mark Stapleton]

Or, in the famous words of JFK himself:

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that

we shall pay any price,

bear any burden,

meet any hardship,

support any friend,

and oppose any foe

to assure the survival and the success of liberty.

"What kind of peace do I mean? What kind of peace do we seek?

Not a Pax Americana enforced on the world by American weapons of war....."

JFK speech on nuclear testing, Washington DC, June 10,1963.

[Greg Parker]

Thanks for the interesting explanation, John. I know you are interested in sports as well as history.

We Americans did invent baseball, didn't we?

Derived, like cricket, from centuries old European folk games.

The US did invent basketball, dwarf throwing, and the concept that a "World Series" only had to involve one nation. Well done on all 3 counts!

greg

P.S.

I do note you had no answer to my question about the excessive English use of "u"s.!

Edited November 14, 2007 by Greg Parker

[Charles Drago]

October Revolution Red yet again is my -- Charles Drago -- color of choice!

Mark;

So, in addition to foreign extremists who for whatever reason seek to punish America, we are now cultivating our own "home grown" varieties such as McVeigh and his group.

Additionally, the American Government is fully aware that talk shows such as this one and all of the other "blogs" where dis-satisfied americans such as the Drago's and the Gray's can spew their vitriolic

garbage, will attract others of the same class of understanding who will actually believe much of what they say.

So! Ashton and I are to be conflated with the patsy you believe destroyed the Murrah Bulding. And we are to be made aware that the "American Government" has our respective numbers? OOOH, I'm scared!!!

Just checking.

Thusly, the greatest enemy of our freedoms is in fact those who as a result of the freedoms given, spew forth and generate hatered against the same government which ensured those freedoms to criticize it.

The first function of government is Control of the Populace.

Heil say!

When portions of this populace generate uninformed fanaticism, we will all suffer as more and more of our personal freedoms must be curtailed in order to counter this.

You sorry, Fascist S.O. B.

Those who have no understandings of much of anything, are also unaware that this is the central problem in Iraq!

How does one control fanaticism without becoming another Saddam?

Don't sweat the small stuff, Mein Herr. Just do your thang ...

There is actually little trouble controlling fanatacism, as death is relatively permanent, and when one knows that if they participate in such activities, that their dog; cat; children; mother; father; grandparants; and most of their cousins will be shot for their participation in such actions, few are willing to participate.

Put your ordinance where your mouth is, big shot.

And, those few who are willing, usually will be either eliminated by their own family or at least turned in to the government.

Wait a minute. Are you funnin' us, Jethro?

Unfortunately for you, as well as my children, and all other younger generation americans, life in America as it was, can no longer exist.

Oh fiddle dee dee. What ARE we to do with all these puhfectly good nooses?

And, as more and more uninformed fanatics are bred, more and more of those freedoms which we took for granted will have to be curtailed in order to counter the fanaticism.

"Don't you mean 'uniformed fanatics'"??? You're too hard on yourself, soldier boy.

Those who speak truth to power are to be blamed for power's excesses?

So unfortunately, it will in all probabililty continue to get worse.

Purvis, if you're trying to be funny, you should stick to stand-up tragedy.

If you're serious, you are to be pitied.

Why don't you go sit on the front porch and wittle yourself a new Constitution.

In the mean, don't ever forget that you are the laughing stock of this Forum, a figure to be lampooned, pitied and otherwise avoided.

Ladies and gentleman, this man is in extremis. Let us tred gently with him. I'm ashamed of myself for hitting back with such a vengeance. If Mr. Purvis's children read this, please seek help for your father before it is too late.

Unless, of course, he is advocating a Fascist agenda. Can this be?

Mr. Purvis, I pray for your immortal soul and for a quick resolution to your search for peace.

Charles Drago

Edited November 15, 2007 by Charles Drago

[Cliff Varnell]

Cliff, the long and short of it is that we won the Cold War and we need no longer fall asleep worrying if there will be a nuclear exchange between superpowers.

Some of us figured out this scam at an early age.

The leaders of the two most populous Caucasian nations were never

a threat to annihilate their own race.

The "Cold War" was white folks' imperialism by another name.

Here's a bit of trivia for you, Tim: at the height of the Vietnam War, where

did Soviet military big shots go for top flight medical care?

Walter Reed.

The thrust of our foreign policy was supported by "wise men" from both parties, any one of whose intelligence and experience exceeded ours put together.

As if they had a choice! The "wise men" from both parties would not have

held on to their jobs long if they didn't rubber stamp the National Security

State.

So to complain about intervention in a specific nation is nothing but Monday morning quarterbacking.

I suppose it would look that way from within the moral vacuum of your

world view. Are you teaching your daughter to violently attack those with

whom she disagrees, Tim?

Had we intervened in Cuba as we did in Guatemala, the Cuban people would now have a much better life.

Tell that to the hundreds of thousands of Guatemalans slaughtered in the

wake of the CIA's overthrow of their democracy.

You hate freedom and democracy, Tim. Face it.

The point is we were fighting a war with real enemies who meant to destroy our way of life and our freedom.

I love the smell of hysteria in the morning...It smells like...napalm.

Perhaps there were occasional excesses in our activities, but winning the Cold War as we did was surely better than the horrors of World War II.

We only had to fight WWII because criminal pukes like the Harrimans, the

Rockefellers, the du Ponts, the Warburgs, Joe Kennedy, Henry Ford, IBM

and ITT built the Nazi war machine.

[John Simkin]

Thanks for the interesting explanation, John. I know you are interested in sports as well as history.

We Americans did invent baseball, didn't we?

P.S.

I do note you had no answer to my question about the excessive English use of "u"s.!

No, baseball is an adaption of a game played by young girls called rounders. That is rounders with a "u".

[Tim Gratz]

Cliff, your view that the Cold War never existed is beyond belief. I suggest you try to peddle that to the millions who were enslaved in the Soviet Union and the millions whose parents and grandparents were ruthlessly slaughtered by the Communist butchers. Perhaps you would also deny the Communist holocaust as some deny the Nazi Holocaust. But scholars have concluded there were as many innocents killed under Communism as there were under Hitler and just as in Germany many were Jewish.

You complain about civilian casualties in Guatemala (isn't "collateral damage" the modern euphemism for such non-combatant deaths). Clearly collateral damage is regrettable but it happened in WWII to an even greater extent than it happened in the Cold War. Perhaps the Allies should never have bombed Dresden but even if that is the case that does not mean that we were not justified in fighting the horrors and evil of Naziism. To cite Guatamela as proof the United States should have never intervened in any foreign countries is irrational. There is an old legal adage that says that terrible cases make bad law. In other words, it is error to draw broad generalizations from isolated cases. This discussion started with John's argument that the US should have pursued an isolationist foreign policy after WWII. He now, however, agrees that the Marshall Plan was advantageous both for the rebuilding of Europe and for the interest of the United States in containing Communism. It is a complete non sequitur to argue that because of what happened in Guatemala the US should never have initiated the Marshall Plan nor brought democracy to Japan.

You respond to my argument that the "wise men" of the US "establishment" uniformly supported our bipartisan foreign policy states that they did not have a choice or they would have been replaced by "the National Security State". Well, who do you claim constituted the "National Security State"? And do you really posit that men such as Acheson and McCloy did not truly believe the policies they advocated?

It is wrong for you to bring up my daughter. Moreover it is wrong to believe that the moralisms of interpersonal relationships apply to the foreign policy of a nation state. Obviously all parents should teach their children basic self defense. There are cretins ought there who rape and kill children of both sexes. But my daughter is also in danger right now from the terrorist fanatics who want to destroy this country. It is up to the state to protect her, me and all of us from the scourge of international terrorism. To date, our President has been successful in preventing terrorist attacks in the United States. It is ridiculous and myopic to claim that terrorism does not exist as a threat to this nation.

And it is absolutely wrong for you to state that I hate freedom and democracy. It was a President who I supported who, over the vocoferous protests of your ilk, brought freedom and democracy to millions of Eastern Europerans. Just last week was the anniversary of the demolition of the Berlin Wall. Freedom and democracy exist in this world today in large part due to the sacrifices of the United States.

Fortunately your bizzare world view which is utterly divorced from reality is probably shared by about a dozen people other than those who live in your home state.

[Tim Gratz]

A prediction: just as Reagan won the Cold War, George Bush will win the war in Iraq and he will end his presidency with his reputation greatly enhanced.

[Tim Gratz]

Peter, history has already rendered its verdict on Reagan. His name will ever be associated with the collapse of Communism.

I find it strange that you believe that if the US succeeds in replacing the horrific butcher Hussein with a democracy in Iraq that is frightening to you.

Let's compare what we are attempting to do in Iraq with Iraq under Hussein.

You contend that under Hussein Iraq was a democracy with a constitution, the rule of law, fairness, peace and justice? That is really your position?

[Pat Speer]

Tim, an honest right-winger can make the case that our invasion of Iraq was a well-intentioned mistake. But I doubt you'd find one soul who's been to Iraq who would actually make the claim that the people of Iraq, 15% of whom are now homeless, are currently better off than they were with Saddam.

Your claims about St. Reagan are also off the mark. Read any book by ANYONE who really knows about the cold war--I don't mean some right-wing revisionist hack, but a real scholar or witness--and they will say that it was the combined efforts of every president from Truman to Bush that helped the fall, and that the efforts and attitudes some guy named Gorbachev had a lot to with it as well. Read Robert Gates' book. He gives Jimmy Carter--who right-wingers like to paint as a weakling because YIKES he thought that morality should play a part in foreign policy--major props.

The right-wing move to sanctify Reagan--whose first term was a decisive failure and whose second term was a haze due to his Alzheimer's--is truly horrific. It's as if to say the economy doesn't matter (Clinton did a far better job), and foreign policy doesn't matter (both Bush I and Clinton did a better job)...all that matters is that we FEELS GOODS about ourselves, by golly. Reagan appealed to the ugliness in America, the stupidity of America. In his world, poor people were lazy, and Aids patients deserved it for putting the square peg in the round hole. He led by smiling and telling people everything is gonna be alright. He, as GWB, was notoriously lazy, and had a notorious distaste for actually knowing what he was talking about. He believed the world was black and white and surrounded himself with lackeys who let him keep on believing it. The father of the current president once reflected that Reagan never could understand that he traded arms for hostages. The implication was that in Reagan's child-like mind, trading arms for hostages sounded bad, and he thought himself incapable of doing anything that was bad. He probably never grasped the evil that he did at other times in his life as well, such as when he sold out the members of his union, and cut a sweet-heart deal with mob-affiliated MCA, which just so happened to be his own agency. He probably never thought about the mentally ill people he put out on the street as Governor, or the students whose heads he helped bust during the sixties. I saw him speak once in 1980. He was warm and friendly, and talked glowingly of the good old days when blacks got lynched and young girls died with coat-hangers in their wombs.

At one point he was walking through the crowd, maybe 15 feet from me. Sometimes I think there was something I could have done that would have prevented what came after, and the incredible decline he helped hasten would have been averted.

[Tim Gratz]

Pat and others, I will post a detailed reply to your post tonight. Did Reagan defeat Communbism single-handedly? Of course not. But was it his policies which led to its demise, or was it just a coincidence that Communism collapsed under his watch?

As much as I normally admire your writing and incisive analysis, Pat, I think your hatred of RR (it almost seems it comes down to that) has affected your judgment here. Almost all of your litany of complaints against RR have nothing whatsoever to do with the importance of the role RR played in the defeat of communism, which is the topic of discussion here. IMO your recitation of complaints about RR demonstrates that your dislike of his policies on other matters clouds your assessment of his decisive role in ending the Cold War. Even your critique of his intellectual capabilities and his laziness demonstrates that point because recent scholarship proves rather conclusively that RR was neither a dullard nor lazy, and that he knew just what he was doing when he adapted new strategies that helped defeat Communism.

I have no doubt that had Communism collapsed after eight years of a JFK presidency, had JFK utilized the same methods as RR, you would suggest carving some more stone in Mt. Rushmore for JFK. I do not mean that as an insult--I think RR ought to be up there for what he did re the Cold War! It would be as if FDR had been able to defeat Hitler without any bloodshed.

One of the reasons your work on this case is so outstanding is that you are a prolific reader. Am I correct in speculating that you have not read a single book on RR and the cold War written by a defender of RR? Or even "The Cold War" by John Gaddis?

Edited November 15, 2007 by Tim Gratz

[Tim Gratz]

In the famous words of a much maligned American politician, "I am not a--" NO, NOT THOSE WORDS! These: "Let me make this perfectlly clear", when Pat states that it was the combined efforts of every President from Truman to Bush that led to the fall of Communism he is rejecting John's argument that America should have withdrawn into its fortress after WWII.

Of course I think John himself rejects the idea he put forth of a totally isolationist America because he has stipulated to the wisdom of the Marshall Plan.

Were there Cold War abuses? Well, of course there were. But abuses do not destroy the wisdom of the policy itself. There were avoidable abuses and there were mistakes made. But in an enterprise as important and vast as the Cold War, some mistakes were inevitable.

Edited November 15, 2007 by Tim Gratz

[Tim Gratz]

For those who want to debate the role of RR in the end of the Cold War, I think the only rational way to do so is to:

1. Determine the policies that RR adopted that were different than those of his predececessors.

2. Then determine the significance if any of those policies to the collapse of Communism.

What I will post tonight will demonstrate that RR had consciously thought out policies that he believed would defeat Communism. And that they did. Certainly Gorbachev deserves some credit for his restraint but Gorbachev was in part a product of his times and the strategic balance when Gorbachev was in power was created by the policies of RR.

[Guest David Guyatt]

A prediction: just as Reagan won the Cold War, George Bush will win the war in Iraq and he will end his presidency with his reputation greatly enhanced.

Yum! I like predictions, Tim.

The thing about enhacing Bush boy's reputation is that it's going to take a real feat of spin to achieve -- at least outside of his small niche of supporters ("the wealthy and the more wealthy").

The spin-meister commissioned to achieve the feat will have an armoury of tricks for sure. For example, if you start from the ground zero of a cockroach and hope to enhance said cockroach, a sleight of hands is necessary. The trick, I suppose, will be to begin calling Mr. Cockroach by his Latin name "Blatta". Over a period of time you slowly modify this name by Anglicising it, for example dropping the "B" from it - then maybe the "l". Then you slowly, over time, transform Mr. Cockroache's Christian name from "George", then Romanticise that (the voters love that) to "Jorge", and shorten it to "Jo", then to "Mo" (for a folksy wider appeal). The final phase is to introduce a name more fitting to the "Mad Gordon of Khartoum" image you wish to create for your subject and his generalship of Iraq. The obvious answer is to introduce a "handle". Say, for example, "Big Bad Muvver of Baghdad", then combine the Mo to this handle, abbreviate it until you have a simple name that conveys a sexy and headline grabbing meaning.

Extracting all these elements (in the fullness of time) the end result is the greatly enhanced:

Mohamed Atta.

Which is fitting, I think, as from where I sit George Bush and Mohamed Atta are entirely synonymous anyway.

David