"A hero who has become the scandal of his generation, aware that he is a paradox that cannot be understood, cries undaunted to his contemporaries: 'The future will show I was right!'"
No, this is not a reference to our soon-to-be-former President George W. Bush (although it certainly applies). The quote dates back to 1843. Soren Kierkegaard, an influential philosopher, penned them in his seminal work, Fear & Trembling.
So, is Bush a misunderstood hero? Will the future prove him right? No one knows, especially when it comes to Iraq.
With the election upon us, we conclude our series on Obama's 'Chump Change'. Today, it's his change with foreign policy we have our doubts about.
Obama Change: Pull out all troops from Iraq in 16 months and meet with rogue dictators without preconditions.
Chump Change: Leave Iraq and the entire Middle East in a state of chaos by pulling out troops too quickly and make a huge diplomatic mistake by meeting with rogue leaders without preconditions.
If history has taught us anything, it’s that countries in turmoil are great at rebuilding themselves. For example, Germany after World War I.
Neville Chamberlain, the British Prime Minister before World War II, was the Bill Buckner of 20th century politics. Buckner cost the Red Sox the ‘86 World Series by letting a routine groundball roll between his legs. Chamberlain’s error was just as avoidable but far more costly. In 1938, Chamberlain broke his promise to protect Czechoslovakia and gave away part of that country to Adolf Hitler to appease the dictator and secure peace. Encouraged by Chamberlain’s weakness, Hitler broke the agreement and took the rest of Czechoslovakia.
At a glance Chamberlain and Barack Obama couldn’t be more different. Chamberlain was nearing seventy when he served as Prime Minister, the son of a prime minister, and in many respects epitomized the British aristocracy. Who could be so foolish as to compare the inspiring, rags-to-riches political saga of Barack Obama with Chamberlain, one of history’s greatest failures?
There are more slaves today than ever before in human history. This slave trade is worth $32 billion a year - more than what Nike, Google, and Starbucks make combined. Human trafficking (which is a nice way of saying slavery) involves victims who are forced, defrauded, or coerced into labor or sexual exploitation.
If you're like most Americans, it seems impossible this is still happening. It also makes you wonder why you haven't heard more about it.
Thankfully, the Republican Party has a plan in their 2008 Platform to fight human trafficking: "We advocate the establishment of an Inter-Agency Task Force on Human Trafficking, reporting directly to the President, and call for increased diplomatic efforts with foreign governments that have been negligent toward this evil."
As with most issues, we shouldn't just look to our government to solve the problem. That's where nonprofit organizations and individuals come in. One way to fight slavery is by creating awareness, which is just what the film Call + Response set out to do. Below is their (slightly graphic) trailer. Be sure and check out their website to see if the movie is playing in your city.
Gov. Palin stopped the bleeding last night. She's bounced back from punch line status to legitimate Vice Presidential candidate. It looks like Tina Fey is back to her day job (aka 30 Rock).
Palin's interview with Katie Couric was a dark day for the GOP ticket—she stumbled over several questions which replayed repeatedly for the viewing public. If you watch CNN with any regularity, you've probably seen the clip a dozen times.
Certainly the media has been too critical of Palin, but that's not the most unfair part. It's hard to understand why our media literally makes fun of a Vice Presidential candidate for not having vast foreign policy experience. Since when was that a prerequisite?
Lyndon Johnson was probably the best negotiator in U.S. political history. Known as “Master of the Senate” before becoming president, he was often able to get other Senators to do what he wanted. Perhaps his greatest feat in the Senate was getting civil rights legislation passed when Segregationists dominated his party.
As president, he even talked a justice of the Supreme Court into resigning to become ambassador to the United Nations.
There was one battle, however, Johnson couldn’t negotiate his way out of...the Vietnam War. Johnson felt sure that if he could just sit down with Ho Chi Minh, the North Vietnamese leader, he could talk him into ending the war. Regrettably, Ho was of the opinion that as long as Johnson was willing to talk, he wasn’t willing to fight hard enough to win. Even more regrettably, Ho was right.
The Olympics officially kick off tonight at 8:08pm. As Olympics go, it's an historic event, and China has spared no money in making sure their “coming-out party” goes off without a hitch.
In fact, China has spent close to $40 billion building 19 new venues, doubling the capacity of their subway system, and adding a new terminal to the airport. Beyond wanting to impress the world with their infrastructural and architectural prowess, Beijing want us to see Chinese culture at its finest. Chinese officials have even gone so far as to launch etiquette campaigns forbidding spitting, smoking, littering, and cutting in lines by its citizens.
What do dictators, nuclear proliferators, and genocidal regimes all have in common? It's certainly not that they conjure up images of bunnies and daises. China has often protected these different types of countries and leaders from international pressure, reversing any progress made on human rights and humanitarian principles by Western countries.
These “problems” (i.e. Iran, North Korea, and Sudan) have grabbed the attention of many in our generation, and for good reason.
For many Chinese, the upcoming Olympic Games highlight the gap between the attractive face Beijing is trying to present to the world and the much uglier political reality of their daily lives. China's human rights record is nothing new; in fact, it's been all over the news for decades. The Beijing Olympics have shed more light on these violations, though. From San Francisco to Seoul, protests seemed to follow the Olympic torch like a shadow.
So, what's behind the global community's concerns with China's human rights record? Mainly, it comes down to two types of violations: religious persecution and political discrimination.
The Relevant Elephant recently presented ideas from Mickey Edwards about how the conservative principle of restraint should apply to the United State’s foreign policy. He claimed that Americans should champion liberty and justice, not necessarily democracy.
In the most recent edition of Foreign Affairs, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice defended the US’s foreign policy, including the spread of democracy and the war on terror. Today, we’ll provide a summary of her defense for the war on terror – specifically in Iraq.
There is much debate on whether we should have invaded Iraq to overthrow Saddam Hussein. Interestingly enough, the war in Iraq did not start with President Bush.
The Relevant Elephant recently presented ideas from Mickey Edwards about how the conservative principle of restraint should apply to the United States’ foreign policy. He claimed that Americans should champion liberty and justice, not necessarily democracy.
In the most recent edition of Foreign Affairs, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice defended the US’s foreign policy, including the spread of democracy and the war on terror. Today, we’ll provide a summary of her defense for spreading democracy.
The spread of democracy is a high calling, and a responsibility of the United States. Democratic development is not only an effective path to wealth and power for other countries; it’s also the best way to ensure that these benefits are shared justly across entire societies, without exclusion, repression, or violence. For the United States, promoting democratic development must remain a top priority.
On April 15, Barack Obama said that, as president, he would tell the Chinese government, “You guys keep on manipulating your currency, we are going to start shutting off access to some of our markets. If you are doing the right thing and not trying to manipulate your currencies to our disadvantage, then you will have access.”
This isn’t simply campaign rhetoric for Obama. Last July, he co-sponsored legislation with his former rival-turned-pal, Hillary Clinton, addressing the US trade deficit with China (the result of our importing more goods from China than we export to them).
The highly anticipated 3G iPhone arrives tomorrow. Along with its 8:00 am launch comes the further domination of American life by Steve Jobs and his Cupertino crew. Have you ever wondered where the iPhone came from? What was its little life like before you force-fed it your favorite tunes and enslaved it in service of your every communication-oriented whim?
Maybe you remember that fateful day last year. Perhaps you sat in a lawn chair for 10 hours to be one of the first to experience the incarnation of the “Jesus Phone”. You thought about your little, lonely friend sitting on the stockroom shelf, just yards away from your heart and life. Or, maybe that was just us.
