November 16, 2004
MORALITY'S VICTORY OVER REALISM:
One Way (Lawrence F. Kaplan, 11.16.04, New Republic)
With the departure of Colin Powell as Secretary of State, the Bush administration's great foreign policy rift has finally ended. The rift, which pitted Foggy Bottom against the Pentagon and the White House, made the Kissinger-Rogers and Brzezinski-Vance duels that preceded it seem trivial by comparison. The damage it wrought, too, was of much greater consequence than those earlier fights. Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Israel, China--in virtually every corner of the globe, the Bush team had not one policy but two, whose contradictions intensified precisely when America's involvement did. During Bush's second term, however, the president's foreign policy counselors will all be reading from the same page. Yesterday, after all, one side forfeited the argument.Personnel, as they say in Washington, is policy, and nowhere has this been truer than among members of the Bush foreign policy team, where the disagreements were always less expressions of personal distaste than of competing philosophical convictions--Kissingerian realism, on the one side, and Reaganite neoconservativism on the other. But with Powell's departure, what members of the Bush team knew as soon as the first shot was fired in the Iraq war became apparent to the nation at large: The argument has been settled in the latter's favor. Not because of the Pentagon's bureaucratic weight (Rumsfeld and the neoconservatives around him will be departing soon enough--replaced, in all likelihood, by a Senator, perhaps even Joe Lieberman). And not because Dick Cheney isn't going anywhere. Rather, President Bush, as evidenced by his remarks last week on democratizing the Middle East and pacifying Iraq, genuinely believes--and, indeed, clings religiously to the belief--that only the vigorous assertion of American power and ideals will make the world a better place. Chalk it up to his evangelical faith, his brainwashing at the hands of a sinister cabal, or his Manichean conception of the international scene: When it comes to the broad foreign policy questions of the day, Bush no longer needs advisers to tell him what to think. He needs them to translate his thinking into policy.
Les Gelb was on some NPR show or another today and described it thus: Realists accept the world as it is, but the President, especially after 9-11, decided to change the world and liberalize the Middle East. Mind you, Mr. Gelb thinks that's a mistake. Posted by Orrin Judd at November 16, 2004 8:11 PM
These "Realists" (or whatever euphemism you want to use) would prefer a President who does nothing in foreign affairs (someone like Clinton or even GHW Bush), and lets the wise, enlightened class take care of problems across the sea.
We've seen enough death already, thank you. Time for something different.
Posted by: jim hamlen at November 16, 2004 8:30 PMChanging the world for the better is always a noble goal, (even if it's al Qaeda trying), but usually ends in tears and failure.
(Such as with al Qaeda).
It remains to be seen whether Bush will succeed, although his actions so far ensure that more good than ill will come of his quest.
It's quite true that only the vigorous assertation of American power and ideals will make the world a better place; not because America stands alone as an example of how to order a society, but because America alone has both the ability and the desire to do it.
And, yes, the desire is motivated by the Christian religion.
Western Europe doesn't even have the desire to change Eastern Europe for the better, although they pay it lip service.
"Realists" accept the world as they perceive it, not necessarily as it truly is.
Thus, visionaries, such as Reagan or Jobs & Wozniak, can cause a paradigm shift that catches the "realists" off guard.
Really, realists have to deny all of human history, with their insistence that the status quo will always be, and that no significant change is possible.
There is no reality.
There is only perception and will.
Posted by: Michael "Siddhartha Gotama" Herdegen at November 16, 2004 8:40 PMThey don't exist either.
Posted by: at November 16, 2004 9:50 PM
By what authority does the United States get to rule the world? The answer seems to be, Because we now have the mightiest military in history and our leaders intend to use it to make the world safe for our interests, both political and commercial, throughout the world.
Such domination makes me profoundly sad because it destroys the autonomy for others that we claim to value and it destroys untold human lives.
Lamar W. Hankins
San Marcos, Tex., Nov. 13, 2004
Wouldn't a realist conclude that the status quo brought about 9/11 and would become worse given nuclear weapons?
Okay, how about this: would a realist drive around in an M1 tank, or would he make traffic laws and teach people to drive?
Posted by: Randall Voth at November 17, 2004 7:32 AMDid you ever play "king of the mountain"? Who won and by what authority did they win? Nations, play the same game. "Might makes right," in both games, king of the mountain and in king of the world.
Posted by: OpenEyedRealist at November 17, 2004 8:58 AMThe letter Robert posted reveals more about Kerry's foreign policy than the NYT understands.
And probably 60% of the Democratic party is in agreement.
Posted by: ratbert at November 17, 2004 9:44 AM"Some men see things as they are and ask, Why?"
said Bobby Kennedy in 1968.
"I dream of things that never were and ask, Why not?"
==================
The longer he goes on the more he seems to embody all that was noble in the Kennedy brothers. Their evil was inherited by Teddy.
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at November 17, 2004 6:34 PM