Carville: Wake up Democrats; you could lose

[evilsoup]

I'm pretty sure the point of that analogy is to demonstrate that you keep speaking in false dilemmas - it's either outright war, or complete non-resistance, and nothing in between. (I think a mentally ill person would be a better fit than a child, for the Axis powers)

Now, I can't think of anything short of actual war that would have stopped the Nazis. What would be the geopolitical equivalent of putting Germany on the Naughty Step?

Really, Destructinator, I think you're barking up the wrong tree here. Obviously, we should work towards a better future where there would be no more wars or genocides (because everyone would be materially well-off enough that there would be no need or desire to commit those crimes); and obviously, the Allied nations were also quite evil... but the Axis powers were objectively worse, and were actively engaged in genocide and so on.

Unfortunately we do not and did not live in the perfect world that we should be aiming for (and a large part of the responsibility for that is borne by our respective countries, as former and current hegemons), and yes policy should have been concerned with preventing the rise of totalitarianism through fostering friendship and common feeling amongst all the people of the world - but nevertheless, once the Nazis were goosestepping over Europe and gearing up for the holocaust, I don't see how they could have been stopped without violence.

[HMS Conqueror]

The implication is more like that it's unreasonable or even immoral to use 'too much' force to stop Nazis/Japs. Which is crazy.

and yes policy should have been concerned with preventing the rise of totalitarianism through fostering friendship and common feeling amongst all the people of the world

Actually that was the policy. Rather we should have bombed the totalitarians into the dust while they were still weak, rather than trying to foster friendship and common feeling with them.

[evilsoup]

Do you think that the bombing of Dresden (which AFAIK offered very little, if any, military advantage and was done in revenge for the Blitz) was justified? One could certainly make the argument that the Allies used too much force.

EDIT: No. That wasn't the policy. The policy was to encourage the Nazis as a buffer against the communists, which got out of control; then the policy was to avoid war, which isn't the same as promoting friendship.

If the policy had been based around fostering friendship, we wouldn't have crippled Germany after the first world war.

...actually, it would be an idealized version of the international socialist movement. And yes, I know that no nation ever acts except in its own interest, but I consider that to be a bad thing.

[HMS Conqueror]

I think the war should indeed have been prosecuted with the utmost vigour right to the end. If NG had had enough it should have surrendered (which, I agree, it should have done long before that).

However that's not what DXIII is saying. If he only objected to actions on the basis of serving little military purpose that would be one thing, but he seems to be saying it was wrong to fight NG/Japan when they were strong too.

[evilsoup]

Yes, and I disagree with him on that, when you see someone beating up their kids you should intervene.

What I agree with him on is that we should also work towards a society where people wouldn't want to beat their kids in the first place.

[HMS Conqueror]

I agree, but that's more wishful thinking than a policy. Given the reality of totalitarian and potentially dangerous states, that fundamentally don't share a liberal worldview, eventually there comes a point when the stronger will survive and not the one that is more morally justified. It is important that the free countries are always the strongest, and willing to act when it is necessary.

[SirNitram]

Do you think that the bombing of Dresden (which AFAIK offered very little, if any, military advantage and was done in revenge for the Blitz) was justified? One could certainly make the argument that the Allies used too much force.

To my knowledge, there still exists no consensus of whether the bombing of Dresden was for destroying the infrastructure(Industrial center, railways) or simply a terror attack. Without a time machine, I doubt we'll ever know the choices of those who ordered it. The reports for Churchill's eyes only suggest it was largely to mess up an organized, fighting retreat from the east to open the way for the Soviet allies. The additional destruction of Chemische Fabrik Goye and Company's poison gas factory could only emphasize the value of it as a target.

It did go over the line, though. High explosive bombing was accurate, but when they switched to incendiary and basically spawned a hellmouth(15 mile wide firestorm) it moved to clear atrocity.

[evilsoup]

Man, the western democracies are involved in fucktonnes of shady shit. Backing Israeli settlements, knocking over democracies all over the world because they are acting against the interests of the Holy Corporations - how do you think Iran ended up with a theocracy? There's a reason why so many countries don't share liberal viewpoints. If they were allowed to develop peacefully and treated as equals and with respect then I have no doubt that in time they would end up as much better places to live.

The first step towards the shining new world is for the 'free countries' to stop acting like massive assholes all the time.

[WmLambert]

This thread should be moved to one about world history vs. Chamberlain.

Let's go back to Carville. He is a complex strategist and can separate his personal life from political chicanery. His lament about Democrats losing their focus and allowing their control over power to wane was important to him, and he brought it up for a reason.

Of course he is primarily a Clinton acolyte, someone who was angry at Obama outfoxing his candidate by seducing the media. My take is that when his candidate was pushed to the sidelines, he took up the effort to help the party, regardless. The party now is completely separate from Obama and he sees Obama's poor record and unvetted life coming back to haunt him - and in the process tearing down the progress of his party. Obama's submitted budgets were rejected 100% by his own party - which underscores the game being played.

Carville sees not only a decisive loss for Obama, but a coattail effect in the House and Congress. The two best Democrat strategists of the past three decades were Carville and Morris. Morris left the Dems completely - but they both see Obama's numbers differently than the media-pushed numbers.

[Simon_Jester]

What unvetted life?

Obama's personal history only hurts him in the eyes of conspiracy theorists. Other people may have a lot of problems with the man, but they all have to do with what happened after he was sworn in, decisions of high policy and strategy. Not with obsessing over whether all his third-grade report cards are in perfect order.

Carville is not predicting "a decisive loss for Obama," that sounds more like wishful thinking out of you than much else. What Carville's criticizing is the notion among many Democrats that this election will be easy, not that it will be winnable.

[WmLambert]

Sorry, I guess my contemporaneously seeing Carville speak shouldn't Intrude into my thinking. He is a very clever man and knows what he is saying.

BTW, I am probably the world's most solid debunker of Conspiracy Theory. My issue is debunking disinformation, not fanciful wish-fulfillment. Obama was not vetted before his election. Let's start there. Do you agree or not? A hundred thousand articles about him with no research being done is not vetting.

[Rogue 9]

Do you understand mockery, you pathetic shell of a man? Oh, I forgot that this is about scoring points and blood-evangelism rather than discussion, lol.

Yes, I understand it very well. Unfortunately, you apparently do not, because you're not mocking anything anyone's actually said.

[Simon_Jester]

Sorry, I guess my contemporaneously seeing Carville speak shouldn't Intrude into my thinking. He is a very clever man and knows what he is saying.

...This doesn't make sense. You've got the whole random capitalization thing going, and "contemporaneously" doesn't mean what you think it means.

BTW, I am probably the world's most solid debunker of Conspiracy Theory. My issue is debunking disinformation, not fanciful wish-fulfillment. Obama was not vetted before his election. Let's start there. Do you agree or not? A hundred thousand articles about him with no research being done is not vetting.

What does "vetting" mean? You never actually answered this question, simply insisting that "Obama was not vetted." Who is responsible for vetting? What is their job, what do they do with information they find?

Also, how do you know that all those articles have "no research being done?" Can you tell the difference between something that disagrees with you and something that did no research? Did YOU do your own research?

Also, "world's most solid debunker?" How modest of you...

[Blayne]

Isn't the whole primary process that got him as the candidate the vetting process in the first place? Palin was unvetted, they had maybe a week or so to figure out her history and positions and got it nearly all wrong? How is this comparable to Obama?

[HMS Conqueror]

Man, the western democracies are involved in fucktonnes of shady shit. Backing Israeli settlements, knocking over democracies all over the world because they are acting against the interests of the Holy Corporations - how do you think Iran ended up with a theocracy? There's a reason why so many countries don't share liberal viewpoints. If they were allowed to develop peacefully and treated as equals and with respect then I have no doubt that in time they would end up as much better places to live.

Acting against interests of == stealing property on a massive scale. And while I don't support propping up useful-idiot coupists as a response, the only reason that's done is because gunboating thieving governments is no longer acceptable.

The sad fact is there are a lot of honest authoritarians in the world and in most of it they run things.

[Zinegata]

I'm pretty sure the point of that analogy is to demonstrate that you keep speaking in false dilemmas - it's either outright war, or complete non-resistance, and nothing in between. (I think a mentally ill person would be a better fit than a child, for the Axis powers)

Actually, nobody is arguing that only outright war is the solution. I have mentioned international condemntation in the Belgian Congo (not war), and US sanctions against Japan (also not war). People are arguing that war was "necessary" during the Second World War for the Allies - but I think nobody except DXIII is going to deny that.

DXIII however does seem to be advocating complete non-resistance ("Just say no"), which as Akhlut has shown doesn't really work when the other side has guns and are willing to use them. And then he makes the mistake of thinking that anyone who disagrees with him is actually adopting the completely opposite stance (outright war for everything!) when no one is doing anything of the sort. In fact, what Simon is advocating is a comprehensive, wholistic, and - most importantly - truthful assessment of each and every situation, before deciding on a course of action.

You cannot invade Belgium for what happened in the Congo. Likewise you cannot simply send letters of condemnation against Nazi Germany when it was invading Poland. These are different situations.

Moreover, the biggest problem with the analogy is that nation-states are fundamentally different entities from individual people. A child cannot declare war, drop bombs on another country, or gas millions of innocent people. A nation-state can.

[Blayne]

I think the only examples of where non violent resistance kinda worked were in nations that were ostensibly allies of Nazi Germany and were still sufficiently sovereign that NG couldn't kick down the door however it pleased. So not something that would work in territory occupied by the Germany army or god forbid the SS.

[Grumman]

Isn't the whole primary process that got him as the candidate the vetting process in the first place? Palin was unvetted, they had maybe a week or so to figure out her history and positions and got it nearly all wrong? How is this comparable to Obama?

I think the vetting process of the primaries failed in Obama's case too. Or at least, I never heard anyone predict that the Obama administration was going to protect torturers, persecute whistleblowers and use indiscriminate CIA airstrikes.

[Simon_Jester]

That's not the kind of "vetting" Lambert's been rambling about. Lambert is apparently thinking in terms of a deep cover investigation meant to reveal that Obama is actually a Manchurian Candidate like Lambert's wanted to believe all along...

[Panzersharkcat]

Isn't the whole primary process that got him as the candidate the vetting process in the first place? Palin was unvetted, they had maybe a week or so to figure out her history and positions and got it nearly all wrong? How is this comparable to Obama?

I think the vetting process of the primaries failed in Obama's case too. Or at least, I never heard anyone predict that the Obama administration was going to protect torturers, persecute whistleblowers and use indiscriminate CIA airstrikes.

The closest I can remember is the February 25, 2008 issue of the American Conservative. As far as I can remember, since access to it is for subscribers only, they don't mention torture. They just predicted he'd be another warmonger. This article sums up the main points of the one from that issue, though.

[D.Turtle]

Actually, nobody is arguing that only outright war is the solution. I have mentioned international condemntation in the Belgian Congo (not war), and US sanctions against Japan (also not war). People are arguing that war was "necessary" during the Second World War for the Allies - but I think nobody except DXIII is going to deny that.

It depends on the time when you want to stop them. Drastic economic sanctions right at the beginning might have undercut them immediately. The exact time after which they were no longer stoppable except through military means can be debated, but its not like they were unstoppable the moment they got to power. Hell, if there had been additional support for Weimar Germany - instead of a "let them suffer" mentality - it would have probably been possible to stop the radicalization in its politics from getting as bad as it did.

[Simon_Jester]

Weimar? Yes. Could have been nipped in the bud, I'm sure.

Although... it's honestly hard for me to imagine human beings so benevolent, that after the totally unprecedented and horrible chaos and destruction of the World War, they'd be able to do that.

And yes, that's not a typo. The World War, because if you were alive in 1925, there'd only ever been one and it had been the worst thing anyone had ever imagined. To describe it, in the frame of reference of a man brought up in the prewar era who saw it at both the government level and the trench level:

The Great War differed from all ancient wars in the immense power of the combatants and their fearful agencies of destruction, and from all modern wars in the utter ruthlessness with which it was fought. All the horrors of all the ages were brought together, and not only armies but whole populations were thrust into the midst of them. The mighty educated States involved conceived - not without reasons - that their very existence was at stake. Neither peoples nor rulers drew the line at any deed which they thought could help them to win.

Germany, having let Hell loose, kept well in the forefront of terror; but she was followed step by step by the desperate and ultimately avenging nations she had assailed. Every outrage against humanity or international law was repaid by reprisals - often of a greater scale and of longer duration.

No truce or parley mitigated the strife of the armies. The wounded died between the lines; the dead mouldered into the soil. Merchant ships and neutral ships and hospital ships were sunk on the seas and all on board left to their fate, or killed as they swam. Every effort was made to starve whole nations into submission without regard to age or sex. Cities and monuments were smashed by artillery. Bombs from the air were cast down indiscriminately. Poison gas in many forms stifled or seared the soldiers. Liquid fire was projected upon their bodies. Men fell from the air in flames, or were smothered, often slowly, in the dark recesses of the sea.

The fighting strength of armies was limited only by the manhood of their countries. Europe and large parts of Asia and Africa became one vast battlefield on which after years of struggle not armies but nations broke and ran. When all was over, Torture and Cannibalism were the only two expedients that the civilized, scientific, Christian States had been able to deny themselves: and they were of doubtful utility.

After experiencing something like that, something that takes everything you fondly dreamed you knew about civilization and progress and stamps it into the mud, something you sincerely think was caused by the warlike aggression of certain people...

...Well. It's possible to respond to that by magnanimity. But it's sure not easy.

[evilsoup]

Since when was doing the right thing supposed to be easy?

[Simon_Jester]

Politics is the art of the possible, except when it's the art of people who don't have to do it demanding the impossible...

If nothing else, I think it's good for us to have a realistic understanding of human limits, rather than making absurd predictions about how hypergood and turboevil people will be on a routine basis. Knowing that makes it a lot easier to understand real societies, both for better and for worse.

[Akhlut]

Man, the western democracies are involved in fucktonnes of shady shit. Backing Israeli settlements, knocking over democracies all over the world because they are acting against the interests of the Holy Corporations - how do you think Iran ended up with a theocracy? There's a reason why so many countries don't share liberal viewpoints. If they were allowed to develop peacefully and treated as equals and with respect then I have no doubt that in time they would end up as much better places to live.

Acting against interests of == stealing property on a massive scale.

Those damn dirty third worlders, stealing property from giant corporations after those same corporations had rightfully stolen it from the natives and slaughtered them to maintain it in the first place! It's a fucking outrage!

And while I don't support propping up useful-idiot coupists as a response, the only reason that's done is because gunboating thieving governments is no longer acceptable.

Killing impoverished farmers who want their ancestral lands back after having them stolen by the US military to be given to United Fruit = JUSTICE.

The sad fact is there are a lot of honest authoritarians in the world and in most of it they run things.

Maybe they wouldn't be so attractive if the dishonest authoritarians in supposed democracies weren't constantly trying to impose dictators on other nations that rule for the benefit of Europeans and the USA.


Anyway, do you long for the days of Kitchener of Khartoum and Britannia bearing the white man's burden over those filthy, unwashed heathen masses?