Re: Beyond Quagmire

[Jim Devine <jdevine03@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 3/14/07, Yoshie Furuhashi <critical.montages@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> we can't assume that all members of the power elite have
> economically rational and geopolitically realist goals, rational in
> the sense of promotion of a better capitalist business environment,
> and realist in the sense of desiring to change geopolitical landscape
> to one's perceived economic and political advantage.  We live in a
> country where some people shout at anti-war protesters, "Nuke them
> all!"  The public face in high places is never _that_ crude, but, for
> some powerful Americans, clearly blind adherence to ideology and
> fanatical hatred that grows out of it trumps economics and
> geopolitics.

the goals of (for example) the Bush League involve a ideology based on
blind adherence to ideology and fanatical hatred, in fact large
dollops of those. But no policy would go far without a broader
coalition -- involving (some) corporations and rich people, among
others  --  to back it up. And if they thought that a policy would
create a new Somalia or some other version of Hobbesian chaos, they
wouldn't pursue it. My point was that it's not an acceptable policy
goal.

Now, it's true that they may have been so blinded by ideology that
they fell for "the Iraqis will greet us with roses" crap and will thus
ignored all of the other possible results, including Hobbesian hell.
Indeed, this scenario seems a likely part of what happened in early
2003. But that doesn't go against my point: they didn't _want_ to
destroy Iraq as a society.
--
Jim Devine / "The truth is more important than the facts." -- Frank Lloyd Wright