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December 31, 2009

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Sobering to realise that this merely extends the parallels between the Taliban and the dominionist/tea-bagger/so-called-conservative political movement that's been growing in the USA for the last 40 years.

Each is a product of relatively isolated, relatively ignorant, relatively irrational cultural elements and areas; each displays a comparatively violent, unilateral, emotionally reactive character compared with the home culture as a whole, and each wields disproportionate power as a result of the typical manifestations of the sub-cultures generating the movements.

I fear it will go very, very badly for the US as a nation and a people if we continue to obsess over the Taliban mote while ignoring the beam in our domestic eye.

But then, the is the land of the theoretically free & home of the "proud right-wing terrorist," in spite of our history with the Klan and the Know-Nothings, so perhaps it's inevitable that we follow in the footsteps of the Pashtun. Something about refusing to learn the lessons of history, I think....

I just cannot understand the basis for the utopian thinking that believes that you can culturally transform a society through occupation and development, that you scratch a peasant goat-herder or a soldier in a private army in a basically medieval society and underneath is someone ready for the give-and-take of democratic society. It took centuries for democratic societies to take root in Europe and America, driven by changes in education and religious belief, by industrialization, and through the growth of a secular civil society. I think you can accelerate that, but you're still talking about decades, as the examples in the post-colonial era would seem to indicate.

One of the reasons I'm optimistic about democracy in Iran (and to a lesser extent in Iraq) is that they do have a long tradition of civil society even if not exactly democracy. Afghanistan is not like that, outside of maybe Kabul.

But this is the problem with getting involved with foreign adventures. Only in cartoons is there a good side and a bad side. In the real world all sides in a country like Afghanistan are going to be unacceptable to American sensibilities. By intervening you force yourself to have to take sides.

We intervened to 1) capture OBL and defeat AQ in Afghanistan and 2) punish the Taliban for harboring him. We should've done that and gotten out, left them to pick up the pieces - which is what happens to countries whose ruling party harbors people who attack other countries. That's called "an incentive against harboring terrorists" and I don't think we would have been pilloried for it.

Sure, we should have given them what assistance we could, but not committed to a military occupation on behalf of one faction. Instead we chose to pretend that the Taliban did not reflect a significant political faction in Afghanistan, or that they were thoroughly discredited, neither of which was true. Afghanistan wasn't 1945 Germany and the Taliban weren't the Nazis.

I don't know when minding your own business fell out of style. Maybe it was never in style, I dunno. But what people do to each other in Afghanistan is not my business, at least, not to the extent that justifies a military occupation. (Civil support, sure.) People behave terribly to one other all over the world. As long as they're not killing each another en masse, or invading neighboring countries, that is their problem to solve.

(Doesn't help that we and the Soviets flooded the world with weapons during the Cold War, and backed any number of evil despots. But you don't fix that by extending the policy.)

I don't know when minding your own business fell out of style. Maybe it was never in style, I dunno.

Sometimes "follow the money" is just a glib catchphrase. But sometimes there's really no better explanation.

"What's the point of having this superb military you're always talking about if we can't use it?" --Madeline Albright

And bear in mind that Albright represents the sane, cautious, non-insane wing of the American polity.

"Sane" and "non-insane" -- oy. Too early on a post-party morning to be doing this.

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