Stop saying that the "Democrats can prevent this." The Democrats and the Republicans are the two faces of one political party. This is proven by Kerry's failure to mount a serious court challenge to Bush's theft of the 2004 elections. If the Democrats and Republicans were two separate parties independent of each other, simple self interest would motivate politicians to challenge election thefts by candidates of the other party. Kerry's behavior, as well as Gore's in 2000, fit in with the contention that some elections are alloted to one party and other elections to the other party. This could only be true if the Democrats and Republicans really were two separate faces of one party. Those who own the property in this country, i.e. the ruling class, have cleverly arranged for a winner take all electoral system which leads to the electorally viable political options dividing into two major parties with third parties marginalized. Then they arranged for one face of their party being slightly to the left of the other in order to bait the lesser evil trap for the majority of the electorate. But whatever the differences between the two faces, neither offers any hope of real change. Abolishing welfare was once considered one of the most reactionary things you could advocate. Yet it was Clinton who "ended welfare as we know it." In the 1940's when the Taft Hartley bill was passed to curb the advances of the labor movement, the majority of the Democrats voted for it so that, even if all the Republican had been magically removed from Congess, Taft Hartley would still have passed. Clinton promised to abolish discrimination against Gays in the military but, within days of his assuming office, gave us "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," which led to AN INCREASE in the number of Gays expelled from the military. The number of examples of how supporting the Democrats as the lesser evil never leads to real change could fill up an encyclopedia. In fact, it is only when sufficient numbers of people are in the steets demanding real change that the two parties don't follow each other to the right so that supporting the Demcrats as the lesser evil is comparable to being on the second, as opposed to the Republican first, car of a train running towards the edge of a cliff. The results are the same whether you are in the Republican lead car or the Democratic rear car. The deadly lesser evil trap can lure people even when masses of the people are in the streets demanding change. Several million people in this country and fifteen million people worldwide were in the streets protesting the Iraq War in 2003. But it had all melted away in 2004 because everybody had dropped everything to campaign for Kerry, a candidate who said he would have invaded Iraq even if he had known there were no weapons of mass destruction hidden there and that he would send more troops "if the generals asked for them." It should be a no brainer that you cannot fight the Iraq war by supporting a candidate who said he would have been for invading even if he had known there were no WMD's there and that he would send more troops if the generals asked for them." Within days of the Democrats winning the 2006 election, Nancy Pelosi said "impeachment was off the table" And John Conyers indicated he would not pursue investigating the theft of the 2004 elections. The danger the Democrats face, however, is that if they take impeaching the President who lied us into the Iraq War "off the table" and drop investigating his theft of the 2004 elections, not to mention voting for sending more troops to Iraq, the millions of antiwar activists who supported them might realize there is no point in fooling with either the Democrats or Republicans. This is why they are trying to pacify us with a few concessions such as an increased minimum wage and ethics reforms in their "first 100 hours." Why they might even vote against funding additional troops for Iraq if those whom they duped into supporting them keep demanding it! Robert Halfhill

by rhalfhill (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 327 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 4:51:46 AM

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As a one time Green Party activist, I'm far from advocating the Dems as the lesser evil, and that's not what I intended. My point was rather that an enraged electorate may well pressure the Dems to act as never before, in spite of what you say. It might even happen to the Republicans. Unfortunately, there is no functional political alternative to the system we're stuck with. Even if millions of people got back on the streets, they could only hope to persuade elected officials. What I'm trying to point out is that for any kind of anti-war movement to succeed, it must be anti-imperialist as well, and that the defeat in Iraq must be turned into a victory, into a sobering realization that we are better off downsizing and rethinking America rather than trying to shove America down everyone else's throat.

by Kuzminski (6 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 93 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 3:17:48 PM

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The only way I see to being anti-imperialist, as you suggest, is to DEFEAT the Empire. Or haven't you seen Star Wars?-) Or join the Amish. As a student of History, I don't see much in between. Power begets power. Power may not corrupt, but it certainly makes one serve "the system" that you would oh! so love to white wash over!

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 3:34:25 PM

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It would be a very neat world if an empire that "lost" a squibble like Iraq would just give up its World Wide Warfare machine. Didn't happen after Viet Nam and it won't happen after Iraq. I agree too with the previous comment, that the Democrats are hardly different than the Republicans - although my reasons are completely different. My answer is simpler - both serve the same "system". Kerry, for instance, never straight out said he was against Iraq. He just said Bush did it wrong. The goal of both parties are the same, even if one does it with a "liberal" ideology and one does it conservatively. Threats to a reigning system usually do not help the system to change (see the soviet union) but to do much more of the same or try to change and collapse. Good thing that I see things so positively, don't you think?-)

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 3:08:09 PM

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Quoting Mark Twain - the rumors of the death of the American Empire (and especially of the Dollar Hegemony) are greatly exagerated!!

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 3:13:48 PM

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I would even go so far to say, once the dollar loses its hegemony, the world will fall into a depression worse than the Great one in the 20s and 30s. This may quite well correspond with an advancing Peak Oil..

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 3:16:23 PM

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And if you are talking about a return to any sort of isolationism, which is a common American phenomenon, it just means that the Empire just keeps ticking without being in the news every night. ! ps PLEASE don't put your hopes in the UN.

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 3:20:22 PM

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Defeat in Iraq may be very different from Vietnam. In the 70s the US still had a powerful domestically based economy, and nothing economically geopolitical (like oil or the dollar) was at stake. I agree that the dollar will likely go south, and a major depression will take hold, especially here (some places, like the EU, will fare better, perhaps much better). But this is all an opportunity as well. There's a whole local sustainability eco movement going on under the radar which may provide us with clues for a way forward, for reorganizing our political economy. Political success in the US will ultimately come to whoever figures this out, in my opinion. Whatever one may think of Al Gore, he's at least pointing in that direction, and beginning to frame the issues we need to understand, even if his efforts are still incomplete and hesitant and somewhat pollyannaish. (This doesn't mean I support Gore; I only cite him as an example.) It's defeatist, in my opinion, to dwell too much on how impossible the American political system is, how tough it is, how America will continue as a superpower, or else totally collaspe. The truth will be somewhere in between these more-of-the-same vs. doomsday senarios.

by Kuzminski (6 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 93 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 3:37:43 PM

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Comment 1: Yes, Iraq and Viet Nam are quite different. For starters, the war in Iraq WAS WON. The occupation has been less than optimal. The "implementation of democracy" has not worked. The strengthened American base of power in the Mideast, however, still exists. The "war" in Viet Nam was never a war and it was never won. A war would have had to have been directly fought against the Chinese, which no one at the time could have supported politically. I know these may be in your book unnecessary distinctions, but as an historian.. You are surely right that the win-lose psychology of the two are quite similar.

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 4:17:33 PM

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"nothing economically geopolitical (like oil or the dollar) was at stake" Do you forget that the war (Viet Nam)was between Communism and "the free world?" POWER was at stake. POWER determines the extent of one's economy. The US's POWER enables the modern world economy, the dispersion of the world's oil wealth and the determination of a world currency. The US is the world's Empire, like it or not. It's power has become a means in and of itself. This cannot be changed. The power can be used responsibly or not..

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 4:26:59 PM

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You are assuming that "being defeated" in Iraq, ie moving our troops out and losing face, will have any real consequences. I doubt that somehow. In this point, "the journey is our destination". Fighting in Iraq is/was a good idea at the time and has served its purpose of supporting the military-industrial complex.

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 4:32:27 PM

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..meaning the USDollar will lose its position as world currency 1)years after Peak Oil has ravaged our economies 2)the US / Chinese symbiosis is somehow destroyed. An oil exchange in Euro, for instance, will hardly do the trick.

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 4:37:24 PM

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"There's a whole local sustainability eco movement going on under the radar" Like I said, join the Amish. Although I don't think they're sustainable in a world of almost 7 Billion people. I don't think ANY eco movement is, although I would happy to be proven wrong. The "movement"s you are talking about can only work as long as the present regime remains in place. Get out of Iraq 'cause it was stupid in the first place, not because it has any consequences on the American Empire..

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 4:44:03 PM

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"It's defeatist" ..as you wish. ", in my opinion, to dwell too much on how impossible the American political system is" ..I'm talking about the world system. The American role is mostly pre-determined. ", how tough it is, how America will continue as a superpower, or else totally collaspe. The truth will be somewhere in between these more-of-the-same vs. doomsday senarios." .. again, as you wish. I don't see much middle ground. The paradigm has to play itself out, and that usually means an exageration of the same, or collapse.

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 4:50:43 PM

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1. The war in Iraq was not won, any more than Germany 'won' WW II by initially occupying most of Europe. Our occupation of the county in 2003 was only the opening phase of the war, as we can now see. 2. 'Power determines the state of one's economy,' you say. One can argue, I think more plausibly, that it's the other way around. No economy, no power. Look at that military budget and how it gets paid for. 3. Defeat in Iraq will have real consequences, as the neocons and Bush well know. Failure there will be a demonstration of US military and economic limits, and weakness, much more than Vietnam. And Vietnam was bad enough, with recession and serious stagflation following in the late 70s. And it perhaps made the oil shocks of that era more likely, given perceived American weakness. 4. You say exageration or collaspe, that's the way paradigms play themselves out. But how do we know this? There's also the scenario of more or less partial collaspe and partial continuity, like, say, the Great Depression.

by Kuzminski (6 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 93 comments) on Saturday, Jan 13, 2007 at 9:06:47 PM

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I didn't figure you would like my historical distictions, my ideas of power and basically of my world view. But I think we're getting there! 3. What real consequences will there be when we move out of Iraq? Losing face might lose an election, but the political damage to the whole mess was done as Colin Powell stood up in front of the UN and shortly thereafter as the troops marched into Iraq. Like many wise commentators over here saw, the problem is not the fighting of a war, but what to do after it is over? Said goal was to remove Sadam. And then??? (Now we know!) Many US citizens supported it because they thought DEMOCRACY would be implemented. Whenever I said "won't work" in discussions with friends and family, I got answers like "well it did in WWII". Well, we now know the limits to military might. It is destructive, not constructive. This should be the lesson learned in Iraq. Again: since we alread know the limits to the US military power, WHAT CONSEQUENCES WILL APPEAR AFTER WE MOVE OUT OF IRAQ? You seem to think that the economic difficulties of the late '70s and early '80s was a result of Viet Nam. Was the destruction of the Soviet Empire also a result of Viet Nam? I hardly see a correlation for either of them. With the peaking of oil production in Texas and in the entire US (1971), on the other hand, I see an ENORMOUS correlation to the economic difficulties of the time. With the coming of age of the Baby Boomers - all looking to get into the workforce at once, I see an ENORMOUS correlation with the high unemployment of the time. Viet Nam?? 2. Of course you're right. My point is that power gives the framework in which the economy funtions. Chaotic states can hardly build up well-functioning economies. The British Empire was the most powerful nation since The War of Spanish Succession 1712. THEN came the Industrial Revolution as a method of helping support the enormous empire. 4. I hardly see The Great Depression as the end of any major paradigm. Minor paradigms, like the move of the center of the world's economy from London to New York after WWI, perhaps. Correspondence to the End of a Kondratiev Wave, with a shift from "old" overriding technologies to "new" overriding technologies (train to car, for instance), certainly. But what major paradigm came to an end? Back to our coming paradigm shifts: If you are talking about the US giving up its role as leading world power, that in itself could be a minor shift and would not mean certain collapse, for instance. Then I agree fully! If this loss of power, however, happens in correspondence to or partially as a result of peak oil, this will mean the end of a MAJOR MAJOR MAJOR paradigm and will tend to look ugly. BTW this will more than likely also happen in correspondence to the retirement of the Baby Boomers, making matters much worse. There are forces at work here which are much much bigger than local movements of sustainablility, if you ask me. I'm just saying that it's a matter of calliber..

by GermanDom (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Sunday, Jan 14, 2007 at 4:42:45 AM

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You seem to doubt in some of your statements that there will be serious consequences to defeat in Iraq, and you wonder about consequences after Vietnam. In other statements you see the Iraq defeat as part of a major paradigm shift, so I'm not clear in following you. Not everything that happened in the 70s was caused by our defeat in Vietnam, to be sure, but perhaps the most important was the inflation of the period (remember Johnson refused to fund the war by raising taxes) which stalled the US economy. By many measures per capita US wealth and income reached a peak in the early 70s it has not regained. The collaspe of the Soviet Union was another, much later matter. Yes, US oil production peaked around 1970 as Hubert predicted, but nobody noticed and there was plenty of cheap world oil at the time. As for the consequences of defeat in Iraq, I'm thinking psychologically as well as materially. The realization of defeat is just now sinking in, domestically and internationally. For reasons I gave earlier, I think those consequences will be more severe than Vietnam, so I will agree that they may end in what you call a paradigm shift. My earlier point about the extremes of business-as-usual and total doomsday (with most people still holding to the former, and some to the latter) was only that the outcome will be somewhere in the middle, which is not to say that it won't be profound and closer to doomsday. As for local sustainability movements, I invoked them because they are the only evidence I can see of some kind of alternative to what may be the partial collaspe of the cheap energy distribution system. I don't know where you live, but in upstate NY where I live and around the country there are various initiatives at least looking at decentralizing political and economic power. They are in their infancy, true, but they seem to me to be the seeds of a viable alternative down the road. See, e.g., the work of the Schumacher Society in western MA. What I was trying to get across in my original piece was some kind of platform for political leadership focused on withdrawing from our empire, gracefully if possible, and concentrating on decentralizing and restructuring our domestic political and economic life.

by Kuzminski (6 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 93 comments) on Sunday, Jan 14, 2007 at 7:45:07 AM

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