Perceptive Paranoia
By Steve Hynd Wednesday Aug 20, 2008 12:50pmDave Schuler at Outside The Beltway:
... like us, Russia is quite paranoid. Or, as Woody Allen once quipped, what’s a three syllable word beginning with ‘P’ that means you think that everybody’s against you? Answer: perceptive.
Dave argues that the Bush administration simply went along "fat, dumb, and happy" with the Clinton Administration's policy of making clear to Russia that there had only been one winner of the Cold War and I think there's a lot of truth in that, although the Bush hawks have taken it to a whole new level. But as Clinton-era hawks commenting on the Georgia crisis have reminded us, they don't really believe in compromise and diplomacy. While in domestic politics "It's Clinton's Fault" doesn't hold water 8 years later, in foreign policy, where other nations see "America under successive leaders" while Americans see "the Clinton and Bush administrations", 8 years is just enough time to put a good hoppy head on the home-brew of resentment.
The real problem, however, is that we're in danger of turning that perception into one of "three successive American leaders".
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1st
The Bush policy.....four more years. PUMA approves this message.
The U.S. is just looking for more ways of keeping the weapons manufacturers in business, and pretending that we're more important than China in the world. Meanwhile every U.S. action has the effect of making oil prices rise some more.
We'll keep on playing this game until the oil runs out or the U.S. economy completely tanks.
Brace yourselves for a new cold war!
Didn't McTard's envoys, graham crackers and joe "zeller 2008", save the day?
The Guardian (London Newspaper)
This is a tale of US expansion not Russian aggression
by Seumas Milne
War in the Caucasus is as much the product of an American imperial drive as local conflicts. It's likely to be a taste of things to come.
The outcome of six grim days of bloodshed in the Caucasus has triggered an outpouring of the most nauseating hypocrisy from western politicians and their captive media. As talking heads thundered against Russian imperialism and brutal disproportionality, US vice-president Dick Cheney, faithfully echoed by Gordon Brown and David Miliband, declared that "Russian aggression must not go unanswered". George Bush denounced Russia for having "invaded a sovereign neighbouring state" and threatening "a democratic government". Such an action, he insisted, "is unacceptable in the 21st century".
Could these by any chance be the leaders of the same governments that in 2003 invaded and occupied - along with Georgia, as luck would have it - the sovereign state of Iraq on a false pretext at the cost of hundreds of thousands of lives? Or even the two governments that blocked a ceasefire in the summer of 2006 as Israel pulverised Lebanon's infrastructure and killed more than a thousand civilians in retaliation for the capture or killing of five soldiers?
Western hypocrisy
All nations, large and small, have an inherent right to protect their interests, to protect their national security, their citizens etcs.
Or does America no longer even maintain the facade of respecting those principles.
I'm pretty sick and tired of this media narrative that giant, mad, evil Russian invaded small, innocent, defenseless Georgia for no reason, other than that they hate democracy.
I wish people would do some research on the history of this region. And I wish they'd also remember that Georgia attacked S. Ossetia first!! After many warnings by Russia that they would respond decisively if this happened!! Saakashvili is a dope and a liar.
Actually, the U. S. has been an imperial power since 1898, when we defeated Spain in the so-called Spanish-American War and we liberated Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines. The residents of the Philippines did not take kindly to being run by American colonists, so we slaughtered some two hundred thousand of them until they cried, "Uncle (Sam)."
In the first part of the 20th century, the U. S. ran the Caribbean islands and Central America as our own private banana plantation.
We have been helping ourselves to oil in the Middle East since after World War I, when we helped ourselves to a 23.75% share of the Iraqi oil reserves.
john j @ 6 & Red Headed StepChild @ 8, Thanks! Some one needed to speak the truth here!
Western Media:
The results of Russia's aggression
64 Russian soldiers were killed in the fighting and 323 were wounded
Georgia said it lost 160 soldiers and that 300 were missing.
Civilian casualties remain unclear. South Ossetian officials said 1,492 had been killed.
Non-mainstream:
Georgians, supported by U.S. and Israel, killed 1492 South Ossetians in attack on August 8. Approximately 30,000 people fled from Georgia’s offensive. 5000 refugees in refugee camps in Russia. More casualties are being counted after Russia's invasion.
Anyone notice the Georgia and Date? Western media gives the death toll, were as the other points out Georgia's death toll, while pending info on Russia
Georgia started this military attack apparently in South Ossetia and Russia tried to defend their citizens in the region. I don't even know what is the truth and what is not regarding atrocities on both sides of this situation. All that it looks like to me is that despite everything it has apparently made several of the surrounding countries concerned as to what is the purpose of this whole mess and how they might be impacted in the future. How all concerned reacts to this situation bottom line will either make or break any possible hope of a reconciliation.
Red Headed StepChild @ 8:
It's not that simplistic. The tensions have been going on, back and forth between the baltic states and Russia for years. Your description of a faultless Russia is as extreme as the alleged perspective that you say the media has. There is plenty of blame to go around everywhere: the US, Georgia and Russia. And each country has it's spin on events, that naturally put themselves in a positive light.
There have been plenty of winners of the Cold War. It just turns out that the United States isn't one of them. Russia and China have clearly benefited from being able to divert resources previously spent on pointless weapons build-ups to more productive uses. Meanwhile, the fools and evildoers in Washington D.C. have presided over the gradual destruction of the U.S. military, infrastructure and economy, pursuing insane policies that will leave us a second-rate power for decades to come. Well done, ruling class. Please step up to the docket for your just rewards.
NIST released a report today about the collapse of World Trade Center building 7:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26331842/
Who here trusts what the government agency would report about the event?
Is the coast clear?--- @ 13:
To me it seems that shrubbie wanted indirect control of the newly opened oil pipelines and asked Georgia to attack, this pissed off the Russians who then decided to use that as a pretext for a land grab of their own all the while making shrubbie look impotent.
Red Headed StepChild @ 8:
Oh come on. The media is the 4th Estate. They investigate things, they wouldn't lie for the government; they wouldn't spread propaganda, they wouldn't lie by omission or cover-up something.
this is a democratic republic and we don't do things like that here. After all, WE ARE FREE.
and the media also told us the trooth about Anthrax, WMD's, Tillman (each version was true) and Lynch. And don't even think of questioning the HOLY GRAIL of AMERICAN PATRIOTISM, 9-11.
No one can 'win' a cold war.
There was an experiment shown on tv to show just how such a thing is not a 'victory':
Take two (or more) people and have each of them bet on a virtual item.
But unlike on ebay, the loser(s) also must pay what they bid.
I think the show did it over a 20 Euro bill and they had to stop the experiment at around 49 & 50 Euros.
See in the cold war, money was spent by the bucket loads and nothing really gained because there was nothing to gain.
Kinda like saying you beat the cold war by building a bunker. No you just waisted a lot of money on your own fears that could have been better spent somewhere better.
Maybe like on poor Arab and African children that are now older and really pissed.
Both major party candidates are in agreement as to the "Let's Blame & Punish Russia" for the South Ossetia Conflict, one wants to "punish" Russia a li'l more than the other but they dwell in the same fantasy.
Bismarck @ 14:
One man can rightly be held responsible (& to blame) for the conflict, he is a Georgian but he is also long dead. A fellow by the name of Joseph Stalin, in a mad crayon attack upon his map of the Soviet Republics, sliced Ossetia in two, landing the southern portion in his motherland. While we can't transfer that responsibility to the modern Georgians in some "sins of the father shall be visited upon the son" scenario, we do have to go forward recognizing the fact that Ossetia together with Georgia is the same as the Czech Republic combined with Slovakia. And how many independent mini-states out of the old Yugoslavia are we up to recognizing now?
euthyfro @ 20:
Whoa, let's back it up here.
Ossetia straddles the Caucasus Mountains. Big chunks of South Ossetia have been part of Georgian territory going back to, at least, the 15th century. Earlier than that, Ossetia- aka Alania- was a dependent of Georgia, at a time when Russian boundaries didn't reach as far south as the Caucasus or even the Black Sea.
So, while you might be right that Stalin had personal reasons for the division, it kind of makes sense that South Ossetia would be under the administration of the Georgian S.S.R..
Bismarck @ 13:
Georgia is nowhere near the Baltics....
S. Ossetia wants independence from Georgia, and fought a war over it. That's why there were peacekeepers in S. Ossetia. Why aren't we defending S. Ossetia's right to independence, a la Kosovo?
Red Headed StepChild @ 22:
I'm not so sure they want independence. Do they want to separate from Georgia? Yep? But then what? Listen to the story here. It starts getting interesting at the 2:45 mark.
Oh, and read this, too.
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