October 3, 2004
TREAT THE DISEASE, OR THE SYMPTOM?:
Voting for a worldview (Kathleen Parker, October 3, 2004, Orlando Sentinel)
Reiterating Britain's necessary alliance with the United States, [Tony Blair] described two conflicting worldviews that define today's politics both here and abroad:"One view is that there are isolated individuals, extremists, engaged in essentially isolated acts of terrorism not qualitatively different from the terrorism we have always lived with. If you believe this, we carry on the same path as before 11th September. We try not to provoke them and hope in time they will wither.
"The other view is that this is a wholly new phenomenon, worldwide global terrorism. If you take this view, you believe September 11th changed the world; that Bali, Beslan, Madrid and scores of other atrocities that never make the news are part of the same threat, and the only path to take is to confront this terrorism, remove it root and branch, and at all costs stop them (from) acquiring the weapons to kill on a massive scale because these terrorists would not hesitate to use them."
While Blair expressed regret that the evidence on weapons of mass destruction was wrong, he said he couldn't apologize for ridding the world of Saddam Hussein. Advancing democracy in the Middle East is the only hope for security at home, he said.
"They (terrorists) are in Iraq for the very reason we should be. They have chosen this battleground because they know success for us in Iraq is not success for America or Britain or even Iraq itself but for the values and way of life that democracy represents. That's why they are there. That is why we should be there. "
Such is the Tolkien view and the Bush view, even if it takes a Tony Blair to articulate it clearly. Those who believe that the Orcs are hellbent on snuffing out the light of Western civilization will vote for Bush. Those who believe that we've merely stirred up a hornets' nest by taking the war to Iraq and need a more nuanced, law-enforcement approach to terror will vote for Kerry.
The thing about the law enforcement model is that it kind of assumes that if you round up the few bad guys the society will be healthy. The Bush/Blair moidel assumes, to the contrary, that the society itself is ill and the bad guys are merely the worst manifestation of the illness. Posted by Orrin Judd at October 3, 2004 11:39 AM
Very sad Pres. Bush did not/could not make this simple disticntion between his position on Iraq and Kerry's. Its just so hard, hard, hard. - Perry
Posted by: Perry at October 3, 2004 12:07 PMDid anyone else find it pecular Kerry jumped to support the concept of "premption", I thought his party base had ridiculed it as the world's policeman thing therefore bad?
Perry
Posted by: Perry at October 3, 2004 12:11 PMWell, it's an honor to be associated with Tolkien, even if it is just in terms of a common perception.
I note that the "law enforcement" paradigm didn't work so well after al Qaeda bombed the WTC in '93; the specific perpetrators were imprisoned, but that did nothing to quell al Qaeda's future activities. People who are willing to die to further a cause typically don't fear being arrested.
Further, the Clinton administration didn't accept the Sudan's offer to hand over bin Laden because they didn't think that they could successfully convict bin Laden in court.
FBI agent Kenneth Williams wrote a memo in July of '01 warning of suspicious individuals in US flight schools, but his recommendation that all US flight schools be canvassed, and suspicious individuals investigated, was not taken because FBIHQ felt that there weren't enough agents to undertake the project, on top of the cases already being worked.
FBI special agent Coleen Rowley points out that Zacarias Moussaoui was arrested on 15 Aug '01, and identified as a bin Laden associate by the French Intelligence Service within days. However, the FBIHQ refused to allow the Minneapolis office, which was handling the case, to seek a search warrent to look at the contents of Moussaoui's computer, citing what they felt was a lack of probable cause.
These are four damning examples of the failure of the "law enforcement" approach to fighting terrorism.
Given that one definition of insanity is to repeat the same action over and over, expecting to get different results the next time it's done, anyone who votes for John Kerry on the basis of turning over the fight against terror to policing agencies is insane, ipso facto.