mattp

For someone who rarely ever expresses their actual opinon, but habitually just harasses their opponent in an argument and, for example, still hasn't told us their opinion on the Iraq war despite promising to do so, you have a lot of nerve. I have been quite clear about my opinions here. Have a good evening Sir.

The basic problem I see with your idea of broadly imposing economic sanctions when we don't like how a country runs their affairs is that they don't seem to work. Cuba, Iraq, and Burma come to mind. Any upside is offset by making ourselves look like we are trying to impose American values on the rest of the world, a loss of influence because we restrict our communication with these other nations in the process, a real expense in terms of lost trade if not enforcement costs, and a general damage to our prestige.

What is the massive distortion in the case of Cuba? Did I say anything about what freedoms Cuba does or does not maintain? Is the freedom to carry guns or to maintain them in your home a "basic liberty? How about the freedom to choose who you sleep with? In many nations, healthcare is seen as a fundamental right, not quite the same thing as a fundamental liberty I suppose but probably equally fundamental as compared to, say the right to private or commercial TV broadcasting. Should Europe consider imposing sanctions on us until we adopt universal health care? Where do your views on abortion fit into this? Is it a "basic liberty" to be born? Or to control what happens to and in your own body? Women's right to vote or ???? you name it. I'm sure you get the idea: one man's "fundamental liberties" are another man's "politically correct." I understand your "they are perfectly free to take it or leave it" argument - but aren't you suggesting that we can and should seek to impose our values on - as Cocoa points out - poor nations?

? I can't really figure out what you are saying in either of your last two posts that appear to be directed at me. In the last one, are you suggesting that anybody who doesn't have and maintain a bill of rights like ours - or whatever exactly you list as the fundamental liberties that should be protected - should face economic sanction? Is the freedom to be healthy a basic liberty? Education? Or are you just thinking about being able to watch tv, surf the internet, and say bad things about the government.

By the way, if you agree that we should tell other countries who to put in jail, where exactly do you draw the line? I agree that nobody should be jailing political dissidents but in the case of some of our middle eastern friends they jail women who won't wear the burka. Do we tell them that is not OK? What if our friends in Europe try to tell us that it is barbaric to use the death penalty? OR to have such a huge percentage of our population in jail for minor drug offenses?

I think it'd be a better idea to unilaterally drop all sanctions. In cases of genocide we have some responsibility to intervene but where the complaint is that the State controls the TV or even some of the more egregious offenses on Jay's list I generally don't think we should try to tell other countries how to run their affairs. You can certainly convince me this should not be a hard and fast rule, but in general it just doesn't seem to serve us well. My comment about the elections that sent you guys into a tizzy the other day was based in part on this idea: there is an obvious hypocrisy inherent in Bush's telling other countries how they need to run fair elections when his own elections have at best been controversial even if you guys bristle at the suggestion, and by ALL accounts our elections are far from perfect. We insist on full access for our observers to monitor foreign elections while denying or allowing only selective access for foreign observers to monitor ours. How obviously bogus is that? If you really believe that free market trading will reshape any country into a democracy resembling our idea of what it should be, why WOULDN'T you let let the free market do its thing and thereby prove to the world just how great capitalism really is?

Wow, Jay. You really think we should be in the business of telling other countries how to run their internal affairs? You're hard core. I'm sure lots of right wing nut jobs will agree with the sentiment - those bastards are no good and we are good and they should be like us - but I doubt such a foreign policy agenda would turn out well.

Are you trying to say that Bush could really help us out if he cut back on our food supply?

Get a grip, Jay: Did I ever express unremitting and unconditional affection for Castro? Did anybody in this thread? Do those birkenstock clad hippies you love to deride? Sure, Che Guevara was the hero on posters bandied about in 1970 and Fairweather has revealed that he was in fact a drug addict and a crook and in no way heroic, so yes: I'll agree there is some romanticism about Cuba or the Cuban Revolution and maybe some of us think it is pretty cool that they know how to make a good smoke but really those things will kill you so they should be reviled for this. Now: tell us what you think about any of these issues - instead of simply mocking your opponent here and trying to tie them in knots. Take your time.

Admittedly, Fairweather was claiming that Castro had all those people EXECUTED and they were not killed as "collateral damage." That's fine. But how many have been EXECUTED by our proxy's over the last 50 years? I don't think we'll ever know but the point is that we can't claim we don't do/order/support the same thing. I remember one past cc.com discussion where Fairweather argued that it was OK for Pinochet to have killed all those Chileans after we helped install him because the communists were going to kill even more people. The ends justify the means, I guess. I think rather than argue whether we are better than Cuba, it might be better to talk about the present: what should we do now? If you want to talk about broader issues, I think a fair point could be made that George Bush is a much greater threat to world peace than Fidel Castro.

For the purposes of THIS discussion - what should we say about how many people Castro has killed in the last 50 years - let's just use your number. 60,000 then.

OK KK: what do you think is the "right" count? a fair and balanced study No matter how you look at it, we're responsible for more deaths than Castro could ever even imagine and the only defense you can raise is that "the ends justified the means." Or maybe "we didn't mean it." I don't think that cuts it.

Yo Fairweather: if you want to talk about killing innocent victims, lets not forget about the fact that our war in Iraq has killed over 500,000 Iraqis. Torture? Lets acknowledge what we’ve been doing in Guantanamo and Abu Graib and in our proxy prisons hidden away elsewhere around the world. How many people has Castro jailed without trial for the last 5 years? How many deaths is he responsible for? The point you made certainly has some merit: Castro’s government has not respected human rights and they have almost certainly killed and tortured thousands or tens of thousands. But if you are talking about the last fifty years, we are responsible for far greater amounts of death and torture. Maybe the ends justify the means, but I'm just saying... The fact that our own actions around the world have not always shown respect for human life certainly doesn’t excuse anybody connected with Fidel Castro - but what do YOU think we should do about that now? what should our next president seek to do with respect relations with the next leader of Cuba?

Peter: do you like Cuban cigars? How about Russian vodka? State an opinion on something -- anything -- so we can have a discussion. How 'bout this: Guantanamo: keep it or close it?

Yes: the left sucks. We know. Does that have anything to do with Toad's sttatement?

?

I bet Fairweather's fair and balanced history of the Cuban Revolution is all you need to know.

I gotta say, Joseph, it is pretty funny to see the "fair and balanced" Fairweather write that Clinton should be tried for treason in connection with anything related to arms peddling or weakening U.S. security.

"A habitual and extremely important complement in the life of a guerrilla is smoking cigars ... for the smoke that he can expel in moments of relaxation is a great companion to the lonely soldier.” Che Guevara.

I'm guessing there is lottsa truth to what you write here, Bill, but I wonder: I have not heard much good about Cuba for many years but 30 years ago I heard about how there were schools and hospitals and stuff like that on a scale pretty much unknown in the region. Was there perhaps a shining moment when the M*f*ckers came through, if only in a limited way, for the Cuban people? Am I an apologist for asking? My father actually went there in the 1970's so there is some basis for my question.

Good old vote fraud. So Bloomberg says there were some districts miscounted in the New York primary and it was reported in the New York Post, of all the reputable newspapers. Your point is - what? This shows something about whether or not the Bush machine or their supporters influenced the election outcomes in Ohio and Florida? You’ve blown a hole in my assertion that Bush and his supporters have eroded our faith in the American electoral process just how?

Not a far-fetched scenario.

My central claim was twofold (1) our election system is seriously flawed and (2) the Republicans have as late taken advantage of some of the flaws. Thus, I concluded, I thought it was hypocritical of Bush to make the remark he did about Cuba. As you say: lets focus.

Jerrymandering? You twice argued with the assertion that I did not make that it was a new development or that only Republicans do it. Ohio? You make the idiotic rhetorical argument that I am the only one who has noticed a problem. For whatever political reasons, just as they have decided not talk about impeaching Bush and Cheney, the Democrats have decided not to pursue the issue. I am not arguing that manipulation can be proven as I don't know whether or not it can. I have some concerns, though, and the discussion really hasn't been undertaken. Here's a little reading for you. Rolling Stone Article As to the concluding retort of your post? WTF? OUR president is the expert on fairness in elections? Even if you apparently believe as maybe you do that the Republicans did not cheat even the tiniest bit, our system does not look good. For LOTS of reasons. Even Fairweeather and KK agree with me that Diebold (they have a new name) is questionable and optical scanning machines should be the standard. I think we've established that gerrymandering should be curtailed, at least. Defensive denials aside, there should be no question about whether there has been voter suppression. The Electoral College is totally obsolete. Everyone except maybe you agrees that campaign financing is needed. Etc. etc.

Actually, Jay, we have discussed several times -- as recently as last week -- that I think optical scanning of paper ballots is the way to go. And, of course, you may be "clever" in catching the fact that I overlooked that part of woofie's post, but you know full well that I don't agree that there was no credible showing that Diebold machines were not used to alter election results in Ohio during the last presidential election. Are you going to argue once again with my assertion that just because gerrymandering is 150 years old doesn't make it right?