A Triumph of Rhetoric over Education

I watched the following clip in amazement:



I have a theory that often ideas get their facts worn off as people use them and overuse them. People simply grab on to convenient pop culture moments and pop off. Munich has become the Right Wing's convenient handle for alleging that the left will talk the country into further danger, rather than act to head off danger.

But like others have pointed out, it wasn't talk that was the problem with the European's actions at Munich, it was believing that by giving away territory and claims to Hitler, they'd satiate his hunger for power. That didnt' work, obviously. There's something more to this, though. The Republicans neglect what lead to Munich. They neglect the aftermath of World War I.

The Allies defeated the Germans and decided to get tough with them, to create this no-tolerance kind of policy. They imposed such draconian consequences on them that it caused a backlash among the German people, lending popular within Germany and even international support to the rise of Hitler's regime.

The horrors of the previous war were not ones people were keen on repeating. For the Europeans, who sent millions of poor souls to die in the trenches, the desire to repeat that horror was low indeed. Faced with Germany's resurgence, with deep-seated repugnance towards new wars, their hawkish attitudes were hollow at best. They had some choices. They could have stood up to them and said "This Far, No Further". They could have simply refused. Instead, they appeased, and got little for it in terms of peace.

My point is two-fold here: Talking isn't appeasement. Giving problematic regimes incentives for good behavior isn't appeasement. If we have control over the situation, if we're not simply desperately offering something to keep them from attacking us, it's not appeasement. If, for example, we offer them something positive, and they fail to do what they're supposed to do, we can take whatever we were giving back. Appeasement would be Iran threatening to roll into Israel unless we give them a territorial claim somewhere around them. Then and only then would we be truly trying to appease them. Remember where you've heard the world elsewhere: you appease a God through sacrifice, a conqueror through obedience and capitulation. The Dragon asks for virgins, and you give them that so it doesn't burn down your village.

Republicans want to pose Iran as a threat, but they're not mobilizing for war. Hell, they dismantled their nuclear weapons program five years ago. The threat we face is purely speculative, and as hard as it would be at this point, we could handily muster up the forces to defeat them. We're not nervously waiting for an army parked at our border to roll over it in their tanks.

We're doing just fine, thank you. If anybody is leading us down the path to Munich, it's those who are so hawkish, so intent on exhausting this country through unnecessary wars that we will have to capitulate on our interests to maintain our own defenses at some point.

It is useful at the end of the day to recognize that we're not infinite in our power, and that our best strategy is to be effective in choosing where we use the sticks, and judicious in where we give the carrots, to understand that the credibility of both lies in our selective use of both.

In other words, if you really want to avoid appeasement, don't get so full of bluff and bluster, so quick to pick fights and get caught up in endless quagmires, that you come to a point where somebody is stronger than you and knows it, and can wring this kind of capitulation out of you. Keep yourself strong and your powder dry.

On The Reverend Wright Interview with Bill Moyers

Here's a link to my thoughts on the media reaction, the transcript, and video of the interview.

Corleone Family Tactics... Or Montana?

The question is, after she's done wiping out the disloyal, freezing out the interest groups who betrayed her, who's left to elect her in November? This is less like The Godfather, and more like Scarface, even if it works out for her. Unfortunately for her, just about everybody recognizes that whatever she says about Barack Obama's electability, she's kneecapped herself with major constituencies of the party, and many find her politics against her own party distasteful.

And that really is the heart of it: It isn't just that she attacked Obama. That's to be expected; politics ain't beanbag. It's that she's attacking her own party in a certan fashion. She's cooperated with folks on the right to do this(even folks that hounded her in the past), folks looking for strategic advantage on their own side who won't vote for her. She's taken up many of the Republican standards against her own party, with a party that no longer has any patience for the demonization of the left, and which can get independents and disaffected Republicans without having to sell themselves out.

So, in the end, she's dug her own electoral grave, and pretty soon the party's going to start burying her candidacy with no small sense of relief.

From the Files of "You know you're in deep s*** when..."

For the Republicans, you know you're in deep s*** when the Democrats beat you in Mississippi.

Should we call it Mississ-hippy now? Damn dirty hippy Southern States.

This is just Disgusting.

Read this for yourself.

This is the nightmare our government's become.

Loyalty Defined Down

I will have serious reservations about backing the Clintons in future contests because of this one. This article in the New York Times isn't what pushed me over the edge, I think their behavior over the past few weeks has been more the cause of that.

I'm really sick of politicians who define loyalty one way, towards themselves, but don't give back. It would be easier for the Clintons to keep friends if they acted like friends; friends of the party, friends of the middle class, friends to those who helped them, supported them, but have had differences of opinion.

If they took these things more maturely, if they accepted that they weren't entitled to win every contest, and that letting a few fights go might help keep them in the running for future candidacy, they might not have screwed themselves so royally. As it is, now, they've turned a huge portion of their party against them. What the hell now makes them the better candidates? Obama's not going to punish people for supporting Clinton. They won't be so forgiving, but as they decline, Obama's open arms are going to look a lot more welcoming than their turned backs.

Sorry no embedded video on this one, but...

...This is freaking Hilarious. (John Edwards doing The Word on The Colbert Report, for the click through challenged)

I want a jet-ski, too.

THE ANGER JUST COMES OFF PENNSYLVANIANS IN...

...RIVULETS.

Turns out nobody's bitter about Obama saying they were bitter, and even some really are bitter. Except they're not.

Excuse me, I've got a headache.

Gibson and Stephanopoulous Are angling for his Job...

The Brush-Off

Yes sir, brush that dirt off.

Barack Obama's Speech in Steelton

Further asskicking commences!