ace,

Thank you, sincerely, for sharing that with me (us). That really goes a long way towards understanding you and your positions.

Also, I agree with you entirely regarding black voting trends, and their actual beliefs. I have the pleasure of living and working with a wide variety of races. Of my many black friends and colleagues, I have seen exactly this. The most striking positions are social issues, where blacks tend to be far more conservative than me...well, that's not a good comparison since I'm pretty liberal on social issues. My neighbor across the street is one of the most conservative men I know. He's black and he votes straight ticket democrat EVERY election. It's a strange phenomenon which I would love to start a thread on, but won't for fear of being called a racist. :lol:
/ threadjack

Your views on an "ace-mask" is irrelevant. You should be able to respond to a post based on the contents not on the individual. Every time you start a posting addressed to me you go down the wrong path, in the future you can stop if you ever get the urge to address your comments to me as an individual - otherwise your post is pointless. Anyone who reads this thread can easily see where and when it went south. Rather than responding to direct questions or to direct rebuttals to your comments, you have the need to go off on tangents related to who you think I really am and what you think I really believe. Your level of arrogance in this regard is truly amazing.


Yes, I have problems.

Discussions are like my hobby in life, I handle them well. I even start discussions with strangers in grocery stores, which is met with mockery here - but gives me an insight that it is clear many don't have.

My initial posts often include a simply stated personal point of view. I read what others write and I ask questions. When people ask me questions, I answer them. If you think that is a monologue, you are mistaken. I suggest you take an honest personal assessment in this regard.

My starting point in this thread was that Obama's actions and words lack clarity. I explained why I hold that view, some disagree - I go on. I either add further clarification to my view point or I ask questions of others. Once it runs its course I drop it. I can do this all day long and not have problems with people.

On the issue of Obama lacking clarity, I am not the only one who holds that view. So, in your quest to go after me, you should simply focus on the premise - which you fail to do in any specific or in a rational manner. Your style is that of a playground bully. When it comes to me, I won't back down under any circumstance.

If by this you mean that I don't bend over and play by your rules, you are 100% correct.
When something is my fault I admit it, apologize and move on. When something is not my fault, I don't walk away from it, ever.


You control what you do, I control what I do. I am not done.

---------- Post added at 07:17 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:06 PM ----------

I don't get the "unilateral invasion" point regarding Iraq because it is not true. In fact to me it seem that your country wanted it both ways, and it has never been made clear to me if and how you folks to the North think bush acted unilaterally. Or, are we simply talking WIIFM

Canada Quietly Supported U.S. Iraq Invasion - The NewStandard

ace, over 30 countries were a part of the multinational force that took part in the Iraq War. How many of these countries did the U.S. get authorization from to invade Iraq? What resolution did they draft up and sign?

Now you're comparing Canada's minor role of providing surveillance and communications, shipping security, military planning, and limited airspace (some of which may or may not be directly attributed to support of the Iraq War) to the roles played by these 30+ nations who actually went into Iraq at the time (and those who still remain). This is confusing because I don't know what it has to do with comparing the Iraq War to the Libya no-fly zone. Are you suggesting that even Canada was at fault for not operating under a U.N resolution? Well, fine. I think I would agree with that because we should have done so rather than support a unilateral military operation of one of our allies. This is why the Canadian bombing runs conducted in Libya are more legitimate than what Canadian military personnel may or may not have done in Iraq or regarding Iraq.

But let's stay on topic. We can debate the legitimacy of the invasion of Iraq in another thread. The issue remains the same: comparing the invasion of Iraq to the no-fly zone in Libya isn't very helpful unless you want to use it, in part, as a justification for the U.N. resolution.

There was no UN resolution. However, the implication of a unilateral invasion to me suggests that the US without any prior knowledge of any other nation arbitrarily invaded Iraq. As I recall United Kingdom troops were actively involved in the invasion planning and involved in military action from day 1. I also recall Canada being made aware that military action was going to occur and that the US received the "blessing" of the Canadian Prime Minister even though Canada would not officially declare war without a UN resolution.

The US debated the issue publicly in Congress, authorization was approved for all the world to see. In addition behind the scenes the US had the support of over 30 nations going into the invasion.

BBC NEWS | Americas | US names 'coalition of the willing'

I was not comparing, I was pointing out something I don't understand. Canada's role could have been to take a stand against a unilateral invasion. the stance could have been to insist that the US get a UN resolution. Canada could have stood with some who condemned the US and Bush for the invasion. They did not. They were aware of the invasion before it occurred, they endorsed it in a passive manner, they participated, and they wanted credit for their participation.

I don't get it.

You would need to read the entire thread to understand why the issue of Iraq came up in this context. At some point I was told I held a double standard. I do not.

In my view UN resolutions are virtually worthless. Fault is not a word I would use in this context.

My position in this thread has been repeated several times in several ways - Obama's actions and words regarding Libya lack clarity. There are historical political and military actions that support my point, including the invasion of Iraq.

---------- Post added at 09:55 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:39 PM ----------

I re-read Bush's speech to the UN months prior to the invasion. I can not see how the US taking military action surprised anyone.

Text Of Bush Iraq Speech To U.N. - CBS News

I think there is even a legal principle that may apply regarding the invasion of - constructive knowledge. So, to say the US acted unilaterally seems to be weak at best but actually simply not true.

Okay, so your comments on Canada are irrelevant. Let's set those aside.

Who's in charge of the war in Iraq? Has this responsibility changed in the past? Will this responsibility change in the future? I didn't say the U.S. decided to "go it alone." I said it was a unilateral decision. It's called the "coalition of the willing": as in "who's with us?" If no one were willing, would you say that the U.S. would have waited for support?

The Iraq War is America's war. Are you going to suggest that the approaches to the invasion in Iraq are remotely similar to what happened in Libya?

Even if we set aside whether Iraq was a unilateral decision—as we appear to disagree as to what that means (let alone disagree whether it's true)—the comparison still doesn't hold up. It's confusing.

How are they similar?

Also, if Obama's actions and words regarding Libya lack clarity, why don't you discuss them? You always tend to do this. You say Obama lacks clarity. You make it seem like he lacks so much clarity that you can't even decipher his signals. Are they in an unearthly language? Why don't you discuss them? Does he lack clarity or do you just disagree with him? You've said this a lot about Obama. Have you read anything editorially in the media about Obama's lack of clarity if it's such a problem? Is he going to go down in history known as the Nebulous President?

Do you really not get the U.N. resolution in Libya, or do you just not agree with it?

Thanks for writing that B_G so I don't have to.

There is no comparison between Iraq and Libya. A better comparison would be the Clinton administration's actions during the War in Kosovo.

Just want to say one thing about this...... :thumbsup: for getting back on subject.:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

Which makes me sad that I have to put this input in. Since I was writing it and then saw your post.

I find it odd that some (NOT ALL) of the more left leaning group here tend to complain about those they disagree with as feeling "attacked and not knowing how to play the game". To me, personally, my beliefs and convictions are not a "game" that is why I will defend my beliefs so vapidly. I believe you who believe "it is a game" are the weak ones in that you argue and make believe that people are stating they are attacked when in actuality that is the only way you feel you can "win your game" and not have to answer legit questions posed. YOU are the ones that refuse legitimate debates and when tested you start talking about how the "others do nothing but whine"....lol as you said get a clue.

Not for nothing but defending your beliefs vapidly would make for pretty boring reading.

Vapid : Dull, lifeless, without excitement

I had the same thought about the no-fly zone over Bosnia....it was a NATO operation, not a unilateral action by the US.

Only this time the US and NATO allies didnt wait for the slaughter of civilians to reach such a level of atrocity.

I dont think Clinton got Congressional approval for participating in the initial action, he acted on the UN mandate, but I might be wrong. As a matter of fact, I dont think Reagan got Congressional approval for invading Granada, nor GHW Bush for invading Panama.

Well given my life that word would pretty much describe it. :):crazy::lol:

this is interesting.

this is obviously a swirl of rumors and the downside of the rise of twitter (for example) as an information source is that it's more difficult than ever to sort rumor from fact or rumor from rumor. nonetheless, it is interesting and maybe hopeful---if true---that there are feelers being put out about a way to climb down by people around gadhafi. that would certainly supply a coherent endgame.

it's also interesting that the oau is starting to act in concert with the action against gadhafi's regime. they hadn't been willing to endorse it exactly to this point. i read somewhere that representatives of both gadhafi and the benghazi government will all attend the oau summit this weekend which is gearing itself up as a space for negociations.

things keep moving, which is good. obviously it's too early to say anything about outcomes.

I disagree. In the context of discussing what is and what is not unilateral action I think when there is passive support and cooperation, as was the case with Canada, the argument comparing how Obama put together a coalition and Bush did not begins to fall apart.

It was not. The US was not able to get security council approval for military action, but there were countries other than the US that supported military action against Iraq.

The US did wait for support, they just did not wait for the support required for a UN resolution, some countries have veto authority - the US was not able to over come that. I believe there was about 6 months between Bush's speech to the UN and when the US invaded Iraq. On a side note the argument that Bush rushed into war has no real merit either.

They are different. My issue has more to do with leadership.

I don't know how you define the concept. I tried to explain how I see it.

Again my issue is with the differences in leadership. They are different. This line of post has to do with double standards and hypocrisy. I never made the charge that anyone was a hypocrite or held a double standard.

I try to discuss the primary issue. If you have read this thread you would see where it goes off point.

I am not the only on who is confused by Obama. Today, I read an article written by Peggy Noonan, a person I respect, we see the issue of Obama's leadership the same way.

The Speech Obama Hasn't Given - WSJ.com


I understand it. It fails to address some very important questions. I fear it will prolong the civil war and in the end I fear that the rebels will be left hanging out to dry.

1. again, ace, "leadership" for you has to do with the type of sentences in used in the marketing of war. "leadership" is a matter of short punchy statements that reassure people like yourself because they enable you to eliminate complexity when you imagine the war fantasy of your choice. it has no relation whatsoever to actual strategy in the actual conflict.

recall that the bush administration's "strategy" for iraq really was the farce called the "wolfowitz doctrine" at the time---grateful natives lining the streets to welcome their heroic liberators---and now we're 8 years on during a fiasco of a war the stench of which can easily be judged by looking at sources like the iraqi oil report and reading about the state of basic service delivery---you know, stuff like electricity---or reading almost any actual information about the empirical situation in actually existing iraq and not relying on simple sentences and assuming that the therapeutic effect those simple sentences have on you reflects anything beyond the state of affairs that obtains in your skull.


so you may have had "leadership" on tv but you certainly didn't have it on the ground.

i'd prefer it on the ground.
tv is for chumps.


2. that the operation in libya is open-ended at this point in a disconcerting way is given.
anyone who looks at what's going on comes to the same conclusion.
why do you imagine the operation is happening?
well, in reality---you know, that shifting complicated place---it was triggered by gadhafi's decision to attempt to crush the revolt against his regime militarily.
it was pressurized by the progress he was able to make and the speed with which he was able to make it.
if you remember, tanks were outside of benghazi when the operation finally got under way.

if you remember, the united states did not support the action until the end of the week. the security council resolution was cobbled together quickly and passed last friday. by saturday night the bombing started.

it's no surprise that things are not as clear as one might prefer.

it's also no surprise that the statements about what's happening, what the operation is, what it's military goals are and what are their relation(s) to the political goals (not the same) are not as clear as one would like.

but i would prefer that the war marketing be closer to the real than you and peggynoonan apparently do. you want to be lied to. i don't.

again---i support this phase of the action with ambivalences. i do not support the idea of ground involvement.

and to head off the usual projection, i am not a real fan of the obama administration. way too centrist/conservative for me.

Leadership, particularly as it relates to US relations with Arab nations, is not one size fits all, or as the Bush crowd would suggest, respond in the same (consistent?) manner with a standard boxed solutionl, regardless of any unique circumstances in those nations.

In effect, the Bush/neo-con approach was to show how tough and threatening the US can be.

What does that often accomplish? Inflaming anti-Americanism and giving dictators in the region the rationale to claim that any popular uprising is a US plot or a front for US action.

Leadership is not speaking with the loudest, most aggressive voice, particularly when it applies to US relations with other cultures.

IMO, one sign of leadership was when Obama went to Egypt early his administration and told the Egyptian people that we are not their enemy (despite the non-step anti-Muslim rhetoric that continues to exist on the US right), but that they, the Egyptian, people must also acknowledge that some among their religion are the enemy.

What ace fails to recognize is that recent circumstances in Egypt, Bahrain, Libya, etc are not the same. One does not need to stand in front of the international media (and the American people) and proclaim that the US will lead an effort to overthrow a tyrant....but one can take actions behind the scenes (freezing assets, working in the background towards a UN mandate, with France in the lead, quietly encouraging other Arab nations to participate) to further that common goal with the people of those nations.

---------- Post added at 11:45 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:44 AM ----------

No, I think your problem is that you only see one solution, a simple, ideological solution, to complex and evolving issues in the Arab world. You see quietly working behind the scenes until a situation evolves to a point where a greater presence may be productive as lacking clarity or leadership. I see it as effective, deliberative leadership, making decisions without the ego that has to publicly proclaim "I am the decider" in order to project a macho image.

Just my opinion.

Leadership requires the ability to communicate how and why collective goals and objectives are aligned with individual goals and objectives. If this is what you consider marketing. I agree that leaders need to be able to market their cause and in this case war. The type of statements that appeal to me are going to be different than the types of statements that appeal to you. It is clear that Bush presented his argument in terms I understood but he failed to present his argument in terms that many others could understand. I agree with Noonan, no matter what statements work for ceertain individuals, there is a speech that has not been given. There are questions that have not been answered.

In my study of history no effective leader ever succeeded in making the simple complex or not being able to communicate complex matters in simple terms. In my mind the highest level of intellect involves the ability to simplify the complex. to me the greatest speech ever given was the Gettysburg Address. If there is a problem in the way that speech appeals to me, so be it.

The "dancing in the streets" thing was empty rhetoric in my opinion. What was not empty to me was when Bush said the war would be difficult. Many including me, had mixed feelings about the occupation after removing Saddam. Eventually I agreed with Powell's assessment of "you broke it you fix it" approach. Regarding Lybia I still have mixed feeling on the point of "you break it, you fix it" - are we going to be there until the end? Should we be there to the end? At what cost? Etc. Etc. Again, I asked what have we learned?

The occupation strategy was developed after removing Saddam. I agree we should have had a better occupation plan.


After a strategy was developed, your point assumes war is static and predictable. It is not. The enemy responds to a strategy, that requires adjustment, and it is on going. To say there was no strategy is simply wrong. We can argue that the strategy was wrong, inadequate, etc., but there clearly was and is a strategy.

Again, I am not clear on your assessment of Iraq today. If you think Iraq is a failure, I understand your position. If it is not a failure, are you suggesting that it was simply chance that got us to this point?


This is the point where we go off point.

You suggest to know what I care about. This illustrates a level of arrogance that is absurd. For you to pretend to know what I care about is irrational. Try again.

i meant the remark about libya as a comment on the direction your posts have taken, which is not about libya but about the kinds of statements the obama administration's talking heads and/or pentagon have generated about libya. so judging from the tack you take, libya is just another pretext for being critical of the administration. which i don't care about particularly---i'm critical of a lot of things about the administration as well, though not on the same grounds as you---but let's not pretend that the discussion is about libya. your "leadership" critiques are about communications strategy. i'm more interested in what's happening in the actual libyan theater.


btw apparently the syrian army has committed a massacre of their own:

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/mi...817688433.html

Who suggested this? Be specific.

I am the one who raised the question, what have we learned from Iraq as it may apply to Libya. This includes my concerns for prolonging a civil war and then abandoning those we support.

I would love to see objective data that could support your point of view. Otherwise, you have your opinion others have theirs.

On what basis have you arrived at this conclusion. There is no basis. You simply made it up. Why?

Are we at war? That question is not even been clearly answered by the administration. How does Obama, or you define war? Is the goal now to overthrow a tyrant? Is a no fly zone gonna do that? Please don't get me started with all the questions...

No you are trying to tell me what I think. I still have not given my personal view on Lybia. I have only shared my opinion regarding how Obama has handled the matter.

For the record, I know there are multiple ways to accomplish an objective. In fact, if you read this thread, you would know about my surprise that Obama was so fast to start dropping bombs rather than use other means, if his objective is to remove Kadafi, including communicating to the rebels to exercise patience rather than the initiation of a civil war that they could not win without outside help.

Much of the issue here is that the Libyan situation doesn't have a heck of a lot of precedent. It's based on a U.N. resolution that aims to intervene in a sovereign nation to prevent the wholesale loss of lives among a civilian population. You can point to the NATO intervention in Kosovo in 1999 and also the 1995 intervention in Bosnia. Both of these interventions followed massacre/ethnic cleansing.

Thousands have already died in Libya as a result of the uprising. And we know what can happen when intervention fails or is passed over: Rwandan genocide - 800,000 people dead.

This kind of intervention is going to have wildcards. You can't plan as though it's an invasion with the intention of occupation. That's not what the goal is in Libya. The goal is to stop a dictator from killing his own people.

I think it's a bit early to be criticizing leadership. A major part of evaluating leadership is measuring results, isn't it?

One of my very first posts in this thread, and the points have been repeated several times, was about the tragedy in outsiders prolonging civil wars. In addition, I talked about the tragedy of providing rebels false hope. The Libyan rebels can not defeat Kadfi, and if he is not removed they will be killed one way or another. A no fly zone is a joke in the context of saving lives. More is going to be needed. If you have read my posts you would know this. I think you have read them but insist on trying to take these discussion in the gutter for some reason.

---------- Post added at 04:24 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:21 PM ----------

I think there are many lessons from history that can be used in the Libyan conflict. Civil wars, rebellions are not new.

"leadership" is the stuff of management literature.

it's not useful as a category for historical or social analysis. it's prescriptive---it's about elaborating norms to guide the captains of industry in their efforts to appear in control.

from any sociological viewpoint, that control is limited to specific registers and says nothing at all about anything that makes any given firm actually operate---"leadership" is theater, not analysis. you won't understand the organization of production by looking at "leadership". you won't understand capital flows by looking at "leadership." you won't understand anything at all about the material operation of a firm by looking at it.

what you will understand is image management. and that's an aspect of the operation of firms---but a limited one. you have to do some editing to conflate that register with the whole.
and it's not even a metonym---a part that can coherently stand in for the whole.
it's just a register of activity.

if it is the case---and it is----that looking to "leadership" in the case of a firm only tells you about normative assumptions that obtain within a particular register of that firm's operations and nothing whatever about 98% (metaphorically speaking) of the material realities and their organization that constitute what a firm actually **is** sociologically....then why on earth would you rely on that framework to talk about something as diffuse and complex as a military action?


nb: if you read my posts, you'd also know that i think every last one of your assumptions about what's happening in libya is wrong empirically. i've provided information both in this thread and others to that effect.

what you're arguing, in effect, is that the massacre should have been allowed to continue.

i think that's obscene.

Let's discuss these. Let's discuss the ones where interventions from outside were a factor.

---------- Post added at 01:01 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:58 PM ----------

I think ace would argue that either nothing should have been done or Libya should have been handled like Bush handled Iraq.

Though the Iraq mode wasn't used in either Bosnia or Kosovo.

What do you think is the best example from the past to use for comparison?

people are referencing kosovo as a kind of precedent---i think i linked to a juan cole piece from last week that made the case pretty well. the strongest parallel seems to be the fact that the political opposition grew out of the intervention, was galvanized as a function of it and structured itself in that context.

let's look at what ace actually wrote:


1. the assumption that "outsiders prolong civil wars" comes from where exactly? it's presented as a matter of fact, but really...i don't think so. in machiavelli, though, there is advice given to the prince to the effect "do not invade a revolution" because you cannot win. the reasons for this are obvious.

but outsiders prolong civil wars...interesting. so it would follow that without "outsiders" there's some kind of natural course that civil wars take....

2. and apparently ace thinks that the natural course of this civil war is the extermination of the rebels, who are being"given false hope" and who "cannot defeat kadhafi".....

now where does the assumption come from that the rebels are "being given false hope"? the best i can figure it, it operates in a circular relation to the potted assessment of the rebels military capabilities---which are obviously problematic---but the fact is that the nato strikes have pretty decisively tipped the balance away from where it was last saturday. at the same time, as i've pointed out via actual information about real people in this thread, the rebels haven't been able to capitalise on that because they simply aren't organized yet. this as a function of the speed of events. obviously.

but the reality on the ground belies this "false hope" business. it's not true.
and the claim that "the rebels cannot defeat gadhafi" presupposes that the nato strikes would do nothing to alter the situation. this is also false.

fact is that what's happening in libya on the ground appears to be quite open-ended. nobody who knows what they're talking about is making terribly confident assertions about the future.

at the same time, the factoid from reuters this morning that i linked above and which was ignored by our pal ace indicates that gadhafi might be looking for a way out. it's not clear, however. and the moves on the part of the organization for african unity are interesting---trying to get negociations under way.

so it's not true that the "rebels are being given false hope"---the dynamic has been changed. but it's not over yet.

3. "if gadhafi is removed, the rebels will be killed one way or another."

what is this based on? anything at all?

if you look at what's happening in egypt and tunisia, it's clear that ridding oneself collectively of a repressive security apparatus isn't an overnight affair, it's true. but at the same time, the repressive security apparatus cannot continue to function as it had in defense of an autocratic status quo absent that status quo. exposed for what they are and have been by the collapse of the context that partially hid them, these secret police agencies imploded.

so it's not at all clear that there's anything to this assumption that the "rebels will be killed one way or another" even on those grounds. but that assumes there were grounds for this statement. i don't think there are any.

4. "a n0-fly zone is a joke in terms of actually saving lives."

this is wrong. unless what's surfacing here is a sympathy for gadhafi's forces. their lives are certainly not being saved by the no-fly zone. but that was the point of it, yes?

at the same time, the no-fly zone is not solving all problems. but this is obvious from actual information about real people in libya in misrata and elsewhere. snipers in hospitals and all that.

5. "More is going to be needed"

this is quite possible. but it's also likely that if it turns out that this is the case, the obama administration has managed to navigate the situation such that the brunt of it will not be bourne by the united states.

whether this is a failure of "leadership" or not for a conservative i don't know.

I think I could take some of you much more seriously if you applied the same set of rules to both sides of the political fence. Unfortunately, there seems to be a double standard applied that is directly correlated to which party currently resides in the White House.

If you think that is the case, perhaps you can explain how a limited action under a NATO banner and UN mandate is in any way comparable to a full scale unilateral (in all but name) invasion and occupation of an Arab nation against the wishes of most other countries, particularly those in the Arab world.


If, in fact, the same set of rules applied - no UN mandate, commitment of over 100,000 US ground forces, a long-term occupation, etc - then you might have a legitimate argument.

---------- Post added at 08:32 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:18 AM ----------

What double standard as compared to Bush's invasion and long-term occupation of Iraq?

I think I could take you much more seriously if you explained the double standard...instead of just taking a shot and running away.

The ability to draw false equivalence is an art. All one has to do is omit enough detail- then every situation is the same.

On the other hand, there are uncomfortably many situations where Obama has gone further down the wrong path than Bush did, and many of his partisans somehow magically muster up rigorous arguments for why Obama's actions are now right even though these folks were the same ones who screamed bloody murder at Bush.

I don't think these folks hang out around here do this all that much, so while I understand and share questions about the shameless hypocrisy of many of Obama's most ardent supporters, I don't think that this place is the right place to confront them.

Came here to discuss Biden's urge to impeach, and Obama's lack of power. Someone beat me to it, but the liberals still cling to the Messiah's infallibility. Perhaps another Nobel Peace Prize would smooth things over.

Carry on.

you'd almost think that somewhere out there in the happy valley that conservatives live in when they inhale those special ideological sentences that the assumption is abroad that there could not possibly have been any rational basis for opposing the neo-fascist policies of the bush 2 administration and that such opposition as there was driven by some imaginary resentment shaped along partisan lines. it also appears that this peculiar scenario is situated as a description of normal political engagement.

this scenario concerning this characterization of "normal" political engagement is plausible because it amounts to a projection onto a largely imaginary Other of attributes which are the negative of those held by people who allow themselves to be interpellated (positioned by) conservative ideological statements.

this is an old feature of contemporary american neo-fascism by now. it's function has consistently been to erase the radical character of american neo-fascist conservatism (which is not all conservatism btw) by making it appear reactive....o They already do x, o They already think y...

so you have this bizarre recurrent claim that somehow or another it is "hypocrisy" for "liberals" to not oppose the libya thing when they opposed iraq....the ludicrous empirical claim subtending that----one of the lines ace has been trying to defend with predictably incoherent results---is to attempt to make equivalences between the invasion of iraq and the action over libya. that this is a reality-optional statement apparently does nothing to diminsh the fun that some conservatives seem to have repeating it.


take marv's steaming little fetid heap of reality-optional projection for example....
actually, maybe take something interesting instead.

on another note....

michael tomasky has an interesting-ish edito in this morning's guardian:

Obama's maddening silence | Michael Tomasky | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

in which he expresses and exasperated puzzlement over the fact that obama hasn't made a national teevee address to explain the libya action.

do you think such a statement is necessary?

i can't remember if clinton made a speech(es) that explained the action in bosnia-herzigovina or not....did he? that would seem a more obvious precedent for communication strategy than the actions tomasky points to...

Here is some further context on how Obama handled his decision-marking about going with the no-fly zone in Libya:
Obama, Libya and the authorization conflict - Politics - msnbc.com

So, again, you see a contrast between such instances as the decisions on full-on wars such as Iraq I & II and Afghanistan vs. such instances as the actions taken in Haiti, Bosnia, Yogoslavia, and Libya (in 1986), which included peacekeeping missions and air strikes.

I never really understood the concept of how you can keep the peace by dropping bombs on people.

It is the same as breaking up a fight on the playground between a bully and someone else. If you prevent the bully from being aggressive by taking out their air capability and tanks, then you prevent the creation of thousands of refugees or the massacre of thousands of rebels.

And doesn't UN approval supersede congressional approval? International treaties (like the UN charter) are treated as US law. I bet a bunch of conservatives won't like this... :rolleyes:

like I said... which arguments for intervening in Libya didnt apply for intervening in Somalia when Ethiopa was kicking the shit out of a (just about) popular Muslim govt?

There is no "well they are TOO strong" argument here... Ethiopa would have backed off in the face of 100 US troops, let alone a bombing campaign.

But Somalia has no oil.

What kills me is that we're bankrupting ourselves trying to save the world from each other. All this debt can't be sustained. Before we even dream about deploying US soldiers somewhere other than where they're directly needed to protect the US (and not just it's interests), we need to make sure that the budget is not just balanced, but functional. None of the political parties have managed to pull off that trick in the last two decades, and I hold them equally responsible.

But if you criticize Bush you're a dirty Democrat, Obama and you're a racist Republican.

The action in Libya is fine and in that instance I think Obama assumes we're smart enough to know what is happening there and why.

There is oil there, but its commendable we're not trying anything more, we also have plenty of reasons to hate Gaddafi anyway. Funny how just a year or so back McCain is over there making kissy face and working deals and now its all different. All of them are guilty of that one even our own corporations, who gave into pressure from Gaddafi and paid him money he used to pay for the terrorism he caused. Even Sarkozy had him in France with his little tent on the lawn. However, I have real issue with the war in Afghanistan, where the is no real oil and we're simply not winning and not going to, and the lack of action in Bahrain. Frankly overall our military stance for decades has been a mishmash of seemingly double standards and complete nonsense that serves our own interests and little if nothing more most of the time.

I'm not going to kid myself though. Even playing a left/right game is playing into a lie to some degree, one we all seem to know about but we all equally act like we cant see or smell. At some level i see no difference between any of these presidents. These people are politicians, career politicians. There is left and right but come on. I dont care how it looks, on anything big it goes how it works out to get those big lobby dollars from all those banks, mineral, oil, gas, military, food, and on and on. Presidents balance the bad they do in that way with the few things they pass for thier party/constituents as good, even Obama. The minute they become a politician I seriously doubt any real tie back to the citizen, which is obvious by how little if anything changes for "main street" and how much has changed for corporations and big business of which I count the military in. Bush II is a perfect example, he got voted in again. We either play our party lines blindly hoping the next person will keep it real or we accept the little slices we get or god forbid some of us are actually that blind or stupid. At least it seems like that for most people. I voted Obama cause I did like the message even though I tempered my belief with alot of realism, and because there was no way I was letting another complete moron chosen by another moron dumb enough to pick her get elected.

Beyond that, the budget isnt any politicians long term problem its a tax payer problem. That is the bottom line. They could fix it. Lets say, cut away everything raise taxes even and get balanced, really make it work and more will come along once some other subject is the big deal and spend it away. It took all of eight years to put us in the hole for real, just like it does for any American family to get in the hole. Thats how the nation spends why are we surprised the government is any different? You dont buy outside your means, if you want more, you get a better job. pay for what you want or you really dont want it.

Yup. Unfortunately they care more about getting a turn to steer then where the heck they're driving us to.

Dont we have bases of some sort or another in over 100 foreign places? how much is that costing and why arent they at home helping with this issue at the southern border?

Yeah, something like that. I can't even think far enough ahead to wonder if we should stay deployed all over, it has it's pros and cons, but the mixed up priorities is baffling.

empire is expensive. isolation is nothing more than a pipe dream. it's been that way since 1945. the misplaced priority lay with the entire national security state, which was elaborated as institutional frame and patronage network from the immediate post world war 2 period onward in the context of the cold war. good for business, that. republicans love the national security state. they can't throw enough money at it. democrats aren't much better.

what i am curious about sometimes is how the industries that get military procurement deals are organized. because there's an argument that shiny weapon systems provide jobs---and they do----but it's not obvious americans get those jobs. and that's necessarily ok. profit uber alles. o yes.

I don't know how much I buy into the military-industrial complex conspiracy I keep hearing about. And honestly I'm not even talking about isolationism or sticking our head in the sand, there could certainly be circumstances where intervention would be the right thing to do, even if we're not directly involved. It's the when and how, not as much as the why that gets to me.

Well said, but... for me... For one, Military should not be a business, period. Two, of the 895 billion spent on military and security to be spent in 2011, I find about 2/3's of it to be too much and too popular. The rest of the budget is about 600. Three, I'd rather see those jobs in education or otherwise. To me that is a smaller argument in a bigger picture in which we are ignoring the wheel that is powering and causing all of this.

---------- Post added at 12:17 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:02 AM ----------

I would not call it that. There is no conspiracy, that denotes an unprovable but arguably plausible scenario happening in back rooms and dark cars amongst invisible men and organizations. This is just good business, its no secret. Just like everything else going wrong. It's money, its always money or power, period. We're in here and theres talk of isolationism, this is so far beyond that. We're always in conflict of some sort or another.

I think you forgot about Sudan and the Congo. And Sudan has oil too.

Look how our non-interventionist policies turned out though. If the bad people are killing all the good people, evolution will lead to more bad people and destabilized countries. If we intervene too much, Russia and China won't appreciate it however.

There are better 'options' to change the course of history without getting involved like we have in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya...

Fair enough. I thought you were rolling down a tinfoil road. :lol:

it's not a conspiracy at all. the national security state is the institutional framework created in 1948 as a modification of state of emergency law that was to enable the united states to respond to some (imaginary) action by the soviets without the bother of that pesky democratic process stuff. it also refers to the logic of the cold war---endless war without events that involved empire against empire, so was the logical extension of nation-state/nation-state war---shiny pretty expensive weapons systems, nuclear weapons, stockpiles all over the world. the cold war was basically a logistics chess match. it was subject to principles of turn over--self-perpetuating in that way--if one side introduced a new shiny weapon system, the other felt compelled to match it. on and on.

the term military-industrial complex was used by dwight eisenhower to refer to the oligarchy that was taking shape in the middle 50s out of the national-security state apparatus. a massing of political and financial power within the patronage system linked to the military by the logic (and practices) of cold war production.

the cold war enabled a partial resolution of the old problem of over-capacity in production for the united states. war economy, this once was. war was good for bidness. capitalism at its finest.

despite the fact that the cold war is over--it resulted in the soviet system spending itself into a problem that opened onto a political crisis---and despite the fact that no wars have been fought on a strategic plane symmetrical with the procurement protocols of the cold war, the whole patronage system is still in place an still **very** lucrative. conservatives owe a lot to the military. a. lot. so they protect the national-security state as a way of protecting the patronage system.

it can and should be dismantled. what the military is, its role as a motor of economic activity, all of it should be rethought. there is absolutely no justification for the levels of spending. there is no justification for the strategic assumptions that enable such levels of spending. none.

and the political logic of the national-security state is quite dangerous. witness the bush regime. think: iraq. that should be taken apart as well.

but the american system has a self-correction problem. it has an introspection problem. its design seems to be such that quite enormous problems like a war launched on false pretenses and war crimes (torture/rendition) are not actionable. and this quite apart from the retrograde defenses of the national-security state by the right.

irony is that you can see the revolts in north africa/middle east as revolts against the consequences of exactly this model, of this version of the american empire. so it's more than passing strange that the action in libya is being carried out....there's apparently some misunderstanding of what the revolts are about----just as there is some misunderstanding within the united states about what this place is---is it the way people inside the bubble of ideology like to think it is, or is it a military-industrial machine? does it stand for democracy (even though there isn't one in the united states really) or for whatever is politically expedient?

it's both, yes?

military bases are only a relatively small aspect of the expenditures on the military. something on the order of 26-29% of total federal expenditures goes into military expenditures. and that does not count any of the war actions (not on the books) nor the obscene levels of money that's been pissed down the drain in the name of "homeland security" since 2001. fear is never boring, as the song says. and it is profitable. this spills over into the prison complex, another conservative favorite. and you thought the right wasn't aware that their policies generate intensified class war...well....

Of the discretionary spending. Of the 1.4 some trillion. 895 billion is defense.

I don't know what to say. The separation in how we see this key point is so wide we could not even begin to have a reasonable discussion. However, if your statement is superfluous to illustrate an ideology, there might be hope.

Just for the record I did read the above.

---------- Post added at 09:33 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:05 PM ----------

My gut tells me no matter how I respond, it won't make a difference.

My premise is that outside intervention in a civil war can prolong the civil war causing more death and destruction than what would have occurred without the intervention and that history has examples where that can be proven to be true. I am not sure what your premise is or if it is just that you simply think that mine is wrong.

One of the longest civil wars in history the Eighty Years' War is an example that I believe supports my premise. More information is here:

Eighty Years' War - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Also, looking at one of the bloodiest civil wars in world history, the US Civil War - France and England did make a point not to intervene. However, key to the Confederacy strategy was to obtain both British and French intervention. It was this hope that extended the war unnecessarily. Hence, my view that we will do the rebels in Libya more harm than good if we create the perception of the type of support that won't materialize.

Why do you folks do this, why not ask???

I think the cause of the rebels is doomed to fail, unless we remove Kadafi and his military apparatus from power. Anything short of that will lead to the death of the rebels in mass. I think the rebels initiated their revolt prematurely. We should have advised them to exercise patience before the initiation of protests and their attempts to take control. I believe Kadafi is the most isolated political leader in the ME and that if non-violent means could be employed, no better circumstance exists than the one face by Libya. Prolonged fighting will not be of benefit to anyone in this circumstance. The UN either needed to go in with one clear objective or like I said encourage the rebels to be patient. I do understand that is easier said than done. But, it appears that the Libyan issue came as a surprise to many in the world, that should not have been the case.

Comparison to what?

---------- Post added at 09:51 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:33 PM ----------

How would you classify the Vietnam war? Was it a civil war? Was there outside intervention? Who intervened? What was the result of that intervention?

When one side has a material advantage the war will go in a predictable manner. If outside intervention eliminates a material advantage what do you think will happen?

Conventional war strategy is pretty clear on this point - if you initiate an attack or a war when you are at a significant strategic and tactical disadvantage it is a lost cause. The rebels initiated their revolt prior to even having the support of a no fly zone - it was going to be a massacre. Hence their failed strategy required outside intervention to prevent the massacre. The problem has not been resolved with a no fly zone - Kafafi can simply employ a different strategy - how is the UN going to respond??? That is the key question, isn't it? Obama, nor the UN is clear on this point. It is easy to see how the rebels may have been given false hope. Isn't that obvious?

ace,

It looks like Obama's teleprompter is going to explain all of this to us in a couple of hours. I'm certain we will all feel better about the Libyan campaign after this speech. :rolleyes: Honestly, I can't decide whether I will watch or not. Maybe I'll DVR it.

Today, Qatar became the first Arab country to formally recognize the rebel forces and council as the people's sole legitimate representative. Kuwait and the Gulf Cooperation Council are likely to follow suit in the coming days.

At the same time, the US has turned nearly all of the lead enforcement of the UN mandate over to NATO.

Why is this combination of political, economic and military actions by NATO and the Arab nations not a positive development?

ace: first, i used hayek to talk about the management literature meme "leadership"---sheesh. suffice it to say that i think your approach methodologically so problematic that it hardly seems worth the effort to run out critiques of it. so we're back where we started.

do you actually know anything about the history of the anti-colonial wars in vietnam?

so far as your repeated demands for make-belief certainty concerning variables that are in flux---whatever.

there are real questions, however---i think it's a waste of time to bother trying to turn them onto the terrain of image control/war marketing.

i don't think it's a foregone conclusion that the endgame in libya will be military---there are reports today about italy attempting to work out an escape route for example. it's also not a foregone conclusion that the endgame will not be military. today the rebels move to just outside sirte. it's not clear what that will end up meaning. there's a lot of questions.

i doubt that a reassuring tidy bed-time tale will be told tonight that will allow conservatives who only rest easy thinking that Dad is taking care of that scary bad complexity.



dc: it can't be a positive development because it's not a republican who's running the show. obviously. everyone knows that conservatives are the only real americans.

It seems to me that other than being fairly low-key in explaining the US actions to the American people to-date (for which criticism may be justified), the US measured approach w/o either over-reacting or doing-nothing strikes a reasonable balance.

But I suspect you are correct. Its not about the set of foreign policy actions that may be in the best interest of the country, but crass political opportunism....particularly by those who claim to know the outcome with absolute certainty or flip-floppers like Newt.

in this case, i think the new republic piece from the head of human rights watch is pretty good. post 144...the main grounds aren't particular national interest. it's more preventing a massacre. humanitarian grounds. and the rest of the planet seems to find this acceptable as an action--within limits of course. go figure.

The fact that Obama's speech had to be moved up to 7:30 (from 8:00) so as not to force ABC to pre-empt Dancing with the Stars is a commentary about the attention span of the American people.

---------- Post added at 07:36 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:23 PM ----------

I agree that the actions are more to prevent a massacre.

Unfortunately, our European allies, with perhaps the exception of the Brits, are all bark and no bite when it comes to committing military resources or, giving them the benefit of doubt, they just dont have an equivalent level of force capacity that could do the job quickly w/minimum loss of lives.

Should we have let Kadaffi follow through on his threat to massacre rebel forces and civilian supporters by the thousands (x 10 or x 100)?

One can only imagine the outrage on the right if we had not stepped up and Kadaffi did exactly what he threatened to do.

I suspect that this is all about refugees. They are an expense to everyone apart from the country they leave. They create other problems too. In time, I suspect that any country that has a substantial number of refugees leaving it, will have their government removed under UN mandate and a new government inserted which will act for the benefit of the people of the country rather than filling the pockets of those in government. Those who were in the removed government will then be prosecuted under UN law. I think this is early days and that in time the removal of toxic governments will apply as a matter of routine. Hopefully, it's now in process of discovering how it's best done.

Can does not mean will. I take it from this your not willing to take that risk. i wouldn't argue French, Dutch or Spanish intervention in the Revolutionary War. Even if it did prolong it, which I dont believe it did, I'm happy they did. I have no personal stake in anyone being wrong, I simply dont agree on the factor of the risk in this case... It is a case by case sort of thing though.

The difference is that the rebels dont expect our help via troops, nor do they want it. Thats been made clear by them since the beginning.

---------- Post added at 11:47 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:27 PM ----------

No. Saying that ignores countless historical instances in which seemingly unwinnable battles have been won. This also omits that this is not just a no fly zone, does it not?

At least 191 cruise missiles
at least 455 precision guided bombs

Libya had over 600 high value targets? Not including the targets the British and French took out? Really?

$1,000,000,000 more debt


Obama looked pissed last night. Pissed that he had to explain himself to all of us mouth-breathing peasants. Pissed that we won't just blindly trust his judgement that our money is being well spent. Pissed that the teleprompter wouldn't keep up. There was one part in the speech where he looked straight ahead and spoke from his heart. It was striking and surprising and welcome. For that brief moment, there seemed a human inside the polish...and then the Stepford President reclaimed the shell.

jesus cimmaron. is there a shallowness contest on that i don't know about? why does no-one ever tell me about such things? damn it. sometimes i think the only reason memos exist is to be something that i am the last to get.

so on your first "argument"---you're an isolationist. that's been quaint since 1945. catch up.

you object to the expense of libya, but not so much to that of iraq and afghanistan seemingly. nor to that of the metastasis of the domestic surveillance apparatus since 2001. nor to the national-security state in general, with it's bloated outlays on shiny manly weapons systems. go figure.

but your real "argument" is you don't like obama. he talks too smooth and must be selling you some snake oil. well, i don't like lite beer: i think it tastes like nothing. and i don't like that voice-over guy who does all the hollywood trailers. he oversells things. i like chunky peanut butter. i like paper that makes my hand go all tingly when it runs over the surface.

so there. a lovely exchange of consumer preferences.
let's all hold hands and sing kumbaya.

rb-

The thread isn't really about Iraq or Afghanistan, so I didn't feel I needed to compare and contrast my positions. This lack of information led you to assumptions about what they must be. Doesn't my proposed isolationist stance directly contradiction your assumptions regarding my support of Iraq and Afghanistan? I mean, at least give me credit for some consistency, if anything. For the record, I don't support the domestic surveillance, which you should have derived from my libertarian tendencies. Again, I didn't know I needed to state my position on EVERY federal issue in a thread on Libya. I don't think that's what you want me to do. Is it?

To go back to my original posts in this thread, as a compassionate human being, I watched the impending slaughter of a people who seemingly want freedom and liberty and democracy...or at least a peaceful end to this form of dictatorship...and I didn't want those people to be slaughtered. I wanted somebody, anybody, to do something (much like you with the Quaran burning). However, because of our involvement in so many other "pet projects", our debt, the inevitable (and realized) negative opinion of our KaPows killing muslims, and the potential longevity of any action - I felt that we should support with our vote, not our shiny weapons systems. There were other countries that can, should, and did step up. I question whether we needed to drop our bombs when other countries wanted to (and did) drop theirs. I think our federal government, oops, not our federal government because only one branch decided to use our shiny weapons systems. I believe our President should have used his speech to explain to us why we couldn't just vote for the resolution which enabled France and Britian a quick and decisive enforcement of the no-fly zone. I think he should have explained why WE needed to drop bombs. I don't think Obama supplied that. His speech was a compilation of every talking point of the past 10 days. It was disappointing.

So, my "shallowness" is really a defense mechanism against actions I have concluded are not in our best interest and can only watch with my hands thrown in the air. And I hope you see that conclusion was drawn out of far more consideration than the credit you provided...which was none.

P.S. I just brewed one of the best batches of non-Lite beer yet. I look forward to your visit so I can share.

Just for the record, defense contractors have probably received more than $1 billion in tax benefits or tax avoidance by moving off-shore, Halliburton/KBR most notably.

So has GE. What's your point?

that is certainly a more reasonable position than complaining about some imaginary condescension in the delivery of the speech. and the explanation for the american role is likely two-fold: (a) logistical and (b) empire. the logistical claim rests on the fact of the matter: given that the un resolution passed at the last possible moment (tanks outside benghazi, the showdown maybe 24 hours away) and the time required to get a nato structure into place (about a week as it turned out) in response to the security council resolution....that the us because it is in a position to act did so is no surprise. it is possible that france could have done the same thing---or england----and i have no answer for why neither of them took the lead except to point to the second factor---the persistence of the american empire----and strangely enough, in geo-political terms, i would argue that this action in libya restores something of the credibility of the american imperial presence that was---i thought fatally---damaged by the bush administration (read: iraq war) in part de facto and in part because of the discursive shift away from the simple/simplistic dick-waving preferred by the neo-cons. the neo-cons made the mistake of allowing american imperial power to refer to itself and to follow that by fucking up in a genuinely epic manner. it's smarter to pretend to have the interests of "humanity" in mind. if you think about it, rhetorically at least, that's a better tactic for the long haul of empire maintenance. we give and give and give.

at the same time, i don't buy the claim that there's no national interest involved with the action. i see the revolution(s) as primarily directed against the national-security state model, which can be extended to include the cold-war inspired realpolitik that justified supporting friendly dictators (and using them to avoid legal niceities as the bush people used egypt as torture proxies---no fucking problem there---no reason to prosecute those assholes for war crimes----o no----but i digress).....the united states has clearly made a policy decision that it makes sense to try to get out in front of these revolutions in some way so as to contain them.

want proof? look at what's happening in egypt.

the united states is self-evidently acting in order to preserve, to the greatest possible extent, continuity in its geo-political position. this position is centered around several factors---among the most important if control of access to petroleum. this does not require that the americans buy it from country x or y. this is clear. there are some good books about this. the second is the spineless policy toward israel. but this is getting more and more complicated---syria for example is in a complicated space at the moment. if asad falls. then.....

of course the us will say "yay democracy" while it manoevers through the military to make sure this democracy business doesn't get out of hand.

not that different from the management of democracy in the united states, if you think about it.

aside: we should be learning from north africa---learning to mobilize against the national security state and what happens if you win. egypt is way ahead of us in this respect. but i digress.

My point is that budget considerations dont exist in a vacuum and concerns over costs (even inflated as yours were) are, IMO, a weak argument to oppose a limited US role in protecting civilians from a despot intent on massacre, if not prevented...and if you so concerned about the costs, they are easily offset by reaching into the pockets of defense tax dodgers.

This morning, the good ladies of Fox News, Palin and Van Susteren, wildly exaggerated the cost, putting it at $600 million/day

dc-

As rb agreed, it was the President's responsibility to explain to us why US bombs had to be used. Weeks ago, the US moved warships to the region? Why? Why couldnt Britian and France? If there is a good reason, I want to hear it, and I'll accept it. Since that explanation is not forthcoming, I can only assume there isn't one - and frankly, I deserve one.

As for your taxes conversation, I'll avoid it. It's not the right place. I agree it is not a vacuum.

i just gave you one, cimmaron.

As rb noted and I thought Obama explained, the US was best equipped in the region to respond in the timely manner necessary.

I would also note that the Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Greece, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Turkey (the only Arab member of NATO) and the UK, along with the US (not in the lead role) are enforcing the naval arms embargo.

http://www.nato.int/nato_static/asse...-factsheet.pdf

Wait. We were only better equipped/prepared because we got off our asses weeks ago with a little foresight and positioned our equipment - something that France and Britian could have done, if it wasn't the perpetual assumption that the World's policemen do it.

Yes, I want the explanation to go back that far - three weeks ago. Explain to me why all of those nations couldn't have moved their forces the way way we did, with the understanding that the US would NOT be dropping bombs in this endeavor. We have provided roughly 640 KaPows so far. Certainly those other nations could have scrounged around for that many and kept our flag and President from being burned in Sri Lanka.

---edit----

rb, indeed you did. And while you may even be correct on all points, I need it to come from the man who signed the order. One of the challenges we all face in formulating our opinions is that we do so with whatever information we have available and choose to consume. Clearly, the President knows things about this that we don't. I'm sorry, but I think we should all have high standards when it comes to military involvement. I know that you do. I believe that I do. Did his explanation truly satisfy you, or perhaps you are injecting your assumptions...benefit of the doubt, if you will...into your rationale?

Again, I've come to a different conclusion than you guys. I'm willing to change it if I consume some information which indicates that WE had no choice (three weeks ago) but to get in position and, ultimately, act.

i get that, cimmaron----but i doubt there's a single consideration in what i wrote that would be politick to run out in a national television address. for example, it'd be a bad idea to make too explicit the geopolitical interests around petroleum at an official level. better to pretend something else is on----focus on the high ground and all that.

no president is ever entirely transparent about interests. ever. not part of the game. hell, augustus caesar knew that. anyone whose held power knows that. machiavelli is a theory of it. an instructional guide. you know.

i think obama did a reasonably good job of laying out the overall rationale for acting, btw.

I'll say what Obama couldnt say...Our NATO allies can be chicken hawks.

IMO, that is not a reason for the US to not prevent an immanent massacre of thousands if you take Kadaffi at his word at the time...while at the same time, forcing those NATO allies to take over the lead of both the air and naval operations.

at the same time, there's a controversy unfolding across the newspapers in france over the question of whether sarkosy got out in front of this in the way he did in order to shore up his imploding public approval ratings. this is linked to the fact that the socialists did reasonably well in the local elections over this past weekend....

LIBYE - Fait-on la guerre pour la popularité de Sarkozy ? - Big Browser - Blog LeMonde.fr

very little is obvious.

another perspective, which i think kind of interesting, from this morning. the article is entitled: the obama doctrine. why libya and not syria?

Doctrine Obama: pourquoi la Libye et pas la Syrie - Big Picture - Blog LeMonde.fr

notice that when obama pointed to countries where the "arab spring" (a kind of irritating expression that implies this is in some sense a re-run of 1989 which was a rerun of 1968, as if nothing new can ever happen-----so a purely ideological meme) was being met with force/suppressed, he pointed to iran and not syria. or bahrain. or yemen for that matter. or algeria. the blog entry poses the simple question: so.....why is that?

which le monde's writer interprets as an example of "that mix of idealism and cynicism characteristic of obama"....

so there are varying interpretations. just fyi.

---------- Post added at 04:20 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:19 PM ----------

at the same time, there's a controversy unfolding across the newspapers in france over the question of whether sarkosy got out in front of this in the way he did in order to shore up his imploding public approval ratings. this is linked to the fact that the socialists did reasonably well in the local elections over this past weekend....

LIBYE - Fait-on la guerre pour la popularité de Sarkozy ? - Big Browser - Blog LeMonde.fr

very little is obvious.

another perspective, which i think kind of interesting, from this morning. the article is entitled: the obama doctrine. why libya and not syria?

Doctrine Obama: pourquoi la Libye et pas la Syrie - Big Picture - Blog LeMonde.fr

notice that when obama pointed to countries where the "arab spring" (a kind of irritating expression that implies this is in some sense a re-run of 1989 which was a rerun of 1968, as if nothing new can ever happen-----so a purely ideological meme) was being met with force/suppressed, he pointed to iran and not syria. or bahrain. or yemen for that matter. or algeria. the blog entry poses the simple question: so.....why is that?

which le monde's writer interprets as an example of "that mix of idealism and cynicism characteristic of obama"....

so there are varying interpretations. just fyi.

I agree with both of you. I've just gotten to a point where I'm going to expect more candor to earn my support. We don't have surplus funds, bombs, troops or good will to throw around anymore, especially when others are available/capable. For the record, I believe I would feel the exact same way about this 3 years ago (if you know what I mean). I have to run guys. I enjoyed it.

this from tariq ali---who, btw, you would never see get a prominent spot in a us-based media outlet, such is the extent of the exclusion of actual left viewpoints from the round of interchangeable reactionaries that comprise the american punditocracy:

Libya is another case of selective vigilantism by the west | Tariq Ali | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk


the problem here is that ali is also correct, in my view.

it is possible to hold these positions simultaneously---supporting the fact of the nato intervention on humanitarian grounds while asking oneself---why libya and not elsewhere? why is the united states saying nothing about bahrain? is ali correct about the american response to any threat to the saudi royal family? is that option not foreclosed by the other tactical choices that the us has made (i think it is.....i think the decoupling that the obama administration is trying to argue for isn't ultimately going to hold water and that if they act to protect the saudi regime they'll entirely squander any positioning advantage they've acquired so far....advantage that presupposes one does not read the game in cynical terms....but is requires being read in cynical terms)...

more exactly---and accurately---there is obviously an attempt playing out in front of us to co-opt or contain these revolts.

that this is not primary thematically in the spineless american press---which has never met a corporate status quo it did not worship---changes nothing.

what i think ali overstates is the cynicism of it. i think it's all predictable that geopolitical interests would be acted upon following one logic and sold following another. the only difference between obama moderates and extreme right wingnuts and neo-cons is the style of the selling. but it's a rhetorical difference only. that's also obvious.

but i suppose if you actually believe what's being said as if it were a self-contained description of why the dominant powers are acting in libya and the fact that there's nothing self-contained about it were to suddenly dawn on you



o shit





then it'd appear cynical, yes?

Yesterday, 43 Somalian civilians died when they were caught amongst heavy gunfire and mortar shells. January 26 marked the 20th anniversary of the overthrow of their dictator.

They haven't had a functioning government since.

The "what ifs" can not be proved definitively one way or another. All we can do is look at the circumstantial evidence, that is why I chose the word can rather than will.


There are ways to help other than troops but more than a no fly zone. Also, this is a dynamic situation - one day they may say X and the next they may say Y, based on conditions. And, my question remains the same, what are we willing to do? Has it been made clear to the rebels, the rest of the world, Kadafi, the American public? I believe each could listen to Obama and walk away with a different view of what we are willing to do. Is Obama doing this on purpose? Does he even know what he is willing to do, what his level of commitment is? Does he have the right to do this without the authority of Congress?

I enjoy good fairy-tales but I don't believe in fairy-tales. Unwindable battles by definition are unwindable. In the case of Libya and the rebels they need at least enough outside support to make it a fair fight.

---------- Post added at 03:47 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:29 PM ----------

As was expected, Kadafi is employing a strategy to minimize his military's exposure to the no fly zone. The rebels have no response, how are we going to help? Are we going to provide air support to advancing rebels? Are we going to provide weapons? Training? Other offensive assistance? Does anyone know? Are we simply going to play games with the rebels and then leave them high and dry? Obama needs to clarify what the hell his goal is and what he is willing to do!

Rebels retreat from Libya oil port under attack - Yahoo! News

You do not fight wars by committee.

christ, ace, it's always the same nonsense. you want a different type of marketing. that's it. you want marketing made up of decisive sounding sentences. then you peer into marketing and imagine that you're looking at something else. well, you aren't. get a clue. jesus christ.


right now, in the real world, there's a debate going on about whether the un resolution authorizes arming the rebels. the united states and britain are officially of the opinion that it does. but this is not clear:

Arming Libya rebels not allowed by UN resolutions, legal experts warn US | World news | guardian.co.uk

there's also the related problem of whether it'd be enough to just toss weapons at the rebels. maybe they'd have to be shown how to work them?

it's obvious that gadhafi's military capabilities are not crippled and it's obvious that all he has to do at the moment anyway to operate outside militarily is (a) move during the day and (b) don't fly planes.

there are also reports that gadhafi's forces are laying anti-personnel mines.

it's a real problem, this whole situation. the situation is far more important than what talking heads say on teevee about the situation. your priorities are entirely out of whack, ace.

except of course that you don't like obama and never seem to tire of saying you don't like obama. but on that, i really couldn't care less. for you, it's like putting "i am writing the sentence that says:" in front of every sentence you write. it's not interesting. it's an a priori.

I heard a commentator on...I think it was NPR...flat out declare that special forces were on the ground in Libya. However, I haven't seen any other reference to that. Has anyone else seen anything?

Yesterday, the Pentagon listed the first 11 days as costing $580M. So, I stand corrected on the $1B estimate I said the day before.

Ace,

I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I believe you want the administration to say what their limits are (so we feel better about the expense/longevity of this op) and then stick to those limits. Part of me would welcome a delivery of those terms. There have been so many changes over the course of the campaign, that I don't think it is possible. For example, if we said that our limit is defensive airstrikes to support a no-fly zone and then Quaddafi started shelling the rebels with Mustard Gas, I'm pretty sure the limits would change. Would our leaders then have "lied" to us? Politically, it is a no win situation to describe those limits, if there are so many astericks for when those limits would change. The other disadvantage of setting limits is that it can show your cards to your adversary - much like putting a "pull out" date on our other two wars. The enemy knows they need only sit and wait.

However, I do see your point that current history demonstrates that the US only gets into things like these for the long haul and rebels may feel any US presence implies that the Abrams Division will be coming up behind them in a day or two. The "false sense of hope" that one might feel from not being capable of truly reading the political climate within the US and translate that into what it really means in terms of support. So, I see where you are coming from, but I think this situation represents some unchartered territory in US diplomacy. There isn't a page in the playbook for this. We'll all look back and know exactly what we should have done. Hell, we'll all revising this history in a matter of weeks to suit our case.

Since ace finds counterfactual arguments compelling, I'm going to point out that counterfactual Ace is complaining about counterfactual Obama tipping his hand to Qaddaffi by being too explicit in our constraints with respect to Libyan intervention.

there's a swirl of rumor about nearly every aspect of this action. over the past few days reports surfaced that arms are getting to the rebels through egypt. there was a long denial from the provisional government in cairo this morning that sounded persuasive, but could either really mean (a) the arms aren't going through egypt or (b) they are but it really shouldn't get any attention. i haven't heard anything directly about us or uk special forces being on the ground since early on when the uk squad was caught and then released, to the embarrassment of london. but given the debate that's happening about weapons delivery and the problem that attends those deliveries of showing people how they work, i'd be more surprised if there were not people on the ground than i would be to find out there are officially.


one place i think everyone who's paying attention to this is in agreement, though: this is a new kind of situation and not a whole lot is clear about it. not a lot of precedent. and the precedents that exist shouldn't be precedents because they were fucking disasters (iraq anyone? or for the Really Big Show, vietnam?......and for france, there's always algeria, which turned out real well for them...)

and none of this is to even start talking about syria, which could well be the next place to blow up. that'll be ugly. and the policy complications that attend libya will be a walk in the park in comparison if it does. there's little doubt---at this point---that asad will massacre people to stay in power. he's already moving (accepting the resignation or firing the government for example, the promise to lift martial law and institute reforms) but that's balanced by the speech from this morning blaming some "conspiracy against syria" for all that's happened. so the options are all on the table. and the americans have a realpolitik interest in syria along much the same lines as they have with egypt----israel.

and then there's saudi arabia...

More to Ace's point: One has to be concerned that other potential uprisings will have a false sense that the US will provide similar support to their cause, since they did it in Libya - thus emboldening them out of a slower, peaceful protest and reform - and into violent confrontation.

As we both said, this is new territory for the US. The path is more evident when there is an invasion of an ally. This? It's terribly easy to make a really big mistake.

There are people actually fighting in a war. It is real. It is interesting reading and listening to the ramblings of "intellectuals" far removed from the field of battle, but the fate of real people lay in the hands of people debating what they think needs to be done or what they are willing to do. All of this should have been resolved before getting involved. Thomas Sowell put it well in a editorial peice appearing in IBD:

Obama Speech: Full Of Rhetoric, Bereft Of Logic - Investors.com

I hope Obama has a plan.

---------- Post added at 06:01 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:56 PM ----------

Or, more simply put -

http://media.charlotteobserver.com/s...iliate.138.jpg

Libya Speech - CharlotteObserver.com

Don't let roach see this, he will go off on some leaders don't matter...Ace needs marketing slogan, tangent.

cimmaron: that assumes---again---that there's no gap between war marketing and what's being said and done on the ground. which is ridiculous to assume. and that is what ace has consistently been doing---pretending to be able to evaluate the actual situation on the ground through the war marketing that this administration---like any other, sadly---is doing. all that varies is the style. ace doesn't like that style. i can't really imagine caring about that.

but i do think it's pretty hilarious that thomas sowell of all people is attempting to position himself as more authentic than obama. smacks of all kinds of ugly shit. surprised that sowell didn't call obama an uncle tom. i suppose he's saving that bon mot for later.

the editorial page of idb. ace-gospel. funny shit.

to the underlying point: this is a nato operation. i too hope there is a plan. another thing that the conservative set can't seem to get through their heads is that the bush unilateralist period is not only over, but was a debacle. the united states is not john wayne. it is not dad. it is a partner in a coalition. i know it stings to have the sacred nation-state not the Center of All Things---but really, there are drugs for other pathologies and maybe sometime there will be a drug for excessive nationalism.

Not going to be funny if Kadafi is left in power. Wake up and understand that we have gone down a road that absolutely requires that Kadafi be removed or the pretense of saving civilian lives was b.s.

ace---do you actually think about what you write before you write it? during the speech--hell during EVERYONE's speeches whose said ANYTHING about this operation, the statement has appeared: getting gadhafi out of power is the political goal. obama has said it is not the americans' military goal. but that the united states will pursue that objective by non-military means. other countries have not said that they will so limit themselves.

it's a nato operation, ace dear. you can't seem to wrap your little mind around that, so can't seem to figure out that the united states isn't the only player.


that said, i don't have a clear idea of what the next move will or should be--i mean like tomorrow. gadhafi's forces have apparently retaken brega. their military capacity is not eliminated by any means.

i don't think the rebels have been sold a bill of goods by anyone. the only place there's been a promise of unlimited aid is in your imagination, ace. and that isn't a place that interests me.

the reality looks quite the opposite---i am thinking that there's likely to be a ground intervention sooner rather than later. hello libyans. excuse us while we hijack your revolution. thanks.

rb: I agree with your analysis that this really is just "marketing". You are absolutely correct that the words do not reflect what is going on covertly. We only know what we are told, and they like it that way.

There is the complexity of cultural consumption of that marketing coupled with the cultural interpretation of recent American involvement in other theatres. Some middle eastern and north african tribes even have customs where if one commits to defend someone, that commitment is to the death. I don't want to imply that that definitely plays a role here. The broader point is to say that any words our administration may say (that actually reach the rebels) are being parsed through such a different filter than ours.

at the same time, the military situation is really fucked up, for lack of a better term:

from reuters, about an hour ago.

Libya and Middle East unrest - live coverage | World news | guardian.co.uk


not good not good at all.

rb-

I did want to ask your opinion on something. The NATO charter is really a mutual defense charter - an attack on one is an attack on all. Obviously the operative words there are "an attack on." Did you have any feeling one way or the other about NATO running a UN operation, since it does seem to be outside the bounds of the charter?

This is not a setup for ambush. I just wondered how you felt about it. Personally, I'm pretty agnostic about that part of it. You already know my two personal concerns (no congressional vote and telling us why OUR bombs?)

NATO - Official text: The North Atlantic Treaty, 04-Apr.-1949

looking at the charter quickly (first time in a while) i would think that the action would be legitimated via article 3 and 5, which introduce the category "security" as a justification for acting, and the repeated references to co-ordination with the un that run throughout. i don't see it as a problem from that viewpoint.

my ambivalences have much more to do with the kind of objections tariq ali outlined in the guardian yesterday---the hijacking of a revolution, the selective application of this "ethical" argument for justifying intervention, etc.. even as i think that there had to be some kind of intervention in libya to prevent a massacre (which still might happen)....

Thanks, I can see that. NATO is certainly the most organizationally competent entity for executing the UN resolution. The UN is not as strong in military coordination/communication - for obvious reasons. If they'd tried to spin this up as quickly as the NATO group did, well, they wouldn't have been able to.

We agree. I'm not fond of American bombs falling on a new set of Muslim heads. I am even less fond of the possibility of U.S. fatigues being photographed pulling down ceramic Qaddafi walls.

another aspect of complexity: the military situation is only part of the game. there are others. and people are motivated by complexes of things--the see their surroundings in mobile ways. even folk you wouldn't think it of:

which bbc's live blog guy goes on the interpret:

BBC News - Live: Libya and Mid-East crisis

go figure.

I know you get confused in the way you want to portray complexity when it does not really exist - but try to understand that Kadafi would not be in power if that was our goal. Obama wants Kadafi out of power only under certain conditions. His goals appear to be focused on creating conditions, not an end result. There are big contradictions in what Obama says, what he is doing and what is needed.

Right. This is a US operation. I don't play pretend games. Obviously you and others do. You folks can pretend that wars can be fought and won by committee or some form of a democratic consensus - but in the real world there has to be a command and control structure to a single point of accountability.

The UN passed a resolution basically for a no fly zone, it can easily be argued that the resolution has already been violated. In your mind you can continue to think things are what they are not, people in the real world don't have the luxury that you have - we live in a dynamic world where every action has a reaction, constant monitoring and adjustments. This is not theoretical stuff where you can plug in assumptions to generate predictable results.


I bet you are a weak chess player. True masters of the game can envision their moves to games end forcing their opponent's actions. Some player's can't even see their next move, just as you can't. Here is a clue:

No fly zone, advantage rebels.
Use of smaller arms and tactics, advantage Kadafi.
Tactical air support against smaller arms and tactics, advantage rebels.
Or,
Put foreign boots on the ground.
Or,
bomb Kadafi's military into next week.
Or,
pray for the rebels.

See the pattern. Then expect a response form Kadafi or a response that is unexpected, like what if he gains an ally? Who might it be? what kind of help would they give. I as well as others have already given this thought, have you? Has Obama? Then what? bottom line is we went into war, half assed - shame on us.

Am I to conclude that you can not read, I never said there was an actual promise of unlimited aid. Why make stuff up, if you can read?

People, can listen to Obama's speech and walk away hearing what they want to hear, including the rebels.

After all the above, you agree that Obama's words are b.s., and that he was never clear on his actual objectives. Gee, why all the dramatics?

Not quite right, ace.

In addition to authorizing the No-Fly Zone, the resolution authorized "protecting civilians" ("to take all necessary measures...to protect civilians and civilian populated areas under threat of attack in the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, including Benghazi, while excluding a foreign occupation force of any form on any part of Libyan territory), enforcing the arms embargo, freezing assets...

Security Council Approves ‘No-Fly Zone’ over Libya, Authorizing ‘All Necessary Measures’ to Protect Civilians, by Vote of 10 in Favour with 5 Abstentions

Perhaps if you are looking at this as being a spectator, I can see the "marketing" point. When our military is being used overtly or covertly, I don't consider myself a spectator. Wars are not won based on "marketing". A leader who wages war has to have the commitment of his army and of his public. The commitment has to be real.

---------- Post added at 10:22 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:06 PM ----------


Here is item 4 under in the Protection of Civilians section:

And here is what a couple of people had to say about the resolution:

Security Council Approves ‘No-Fly Zone’ over Libya, Authorizing ‘All Necessary Measures’ to Protect Civilians, by Vote of 10 in Favour with 5 Abstentions

The resolution "basically" is a no fly zone and it can be argued that the resolution has already been violated. Foreign forces have allegedly been reported on Lybian territory. Also, the resolution does not call for Kadafi's removal, which according to Roach is Obama's clearly stated objective. Nor, does the resolution call for military support of the rebels, outside of protecting civilians.

Your interpretation that the resolution is basically a no-fly zone interesting to say the least and simply incorrect to be more accurate.

The expressed hope or objective of NATO and the Arab League (and probably most everyone else who cares) is that Kadafi will be removed from power or step down to save his sorry ass as a result of a growing national rebellion facilitated in part by the limited UN authorized mandate to prevent the rebellion, and civilians, from being indiscriminately slaughtered, not be the insertion of ground forces from the West.

ace..this whole factual thing is hard for you isn't it?

on your first "point": you don't like obama. i think we all get that. that you can't figure out the distinction between a military and a political goal is your problem.

at the same time, in the real world, lots of very basic things are not yet clear. maybe they never will be. i don't like it---you don't like it. no-one cares.

on your second "point": here you decide it's time to be a neocon cartoon. in this episode, you are so ideologically opposed to international co-operation that you're forced to simply make shit up in order to make the reality in front of you go away. from there you proceed to pose fake dilemmas. and you act like you know stuff you patently don't know. it isn't a united states operation ace. there is a command structure. transfer of control is likely tonight or tomorrow. you'll just have to deal with it.

on your third "point": i've been reading military assessments of the situation for days----the most explicit and informative have been in the french press, where the pet generals like to read from janes and make prognostications about strategy. on tv they stand behind model railroad-style maps with croupier and move tanks and army men around. it's very adolescent. you'd love it. most of what you say is problematic if facts are of any consequence. but they're obviously not, so we'll pass over to the more obviously surreal moment.

which comes when you veer off into your imaginary ally scenario. and that's just goofy. here's the situation: gadhafi's allies are incorporated into the mercenary forces he's got working alongside the militia units that two of his sons control. these units and not the libyan army are what the rebels are up against. and there is a considerable assymetry in terms of professionalism and weapons. but he's never trusted the conventional army and so has worked to keep it weak. which it is. the bulk of the mercenaries are from chad and nigeria, so far as is known. they're in libya in part because gadhafi has funded most of the breakaway fighting that's happened in those two countries over the past 30 years or so. so he has friends, but none are in power. because he's fucked around for so long and with such an obvious paper trail in trying to destabilize governments in the region, he's not got a whole lot of friends in the region. at this point he doesn't even have friends in the oau.

that's reality. who's the magic ally gonna be? you?


the **only** thing you say that's factually accurate is that the rebels are in a bad way militarily. but everyone is saying that. everyone.

i think you're the kind of chess player who doesn't know when he's lost the game.

Well the war never really stopped.

Libya conflict: revelations emerge that Obama has authorised undercover help | World news | The Guardian

um...yeah. if you've been following the mobile cloud of infotainment about libya----which is, regardless of how things turn out, less problematic an infotainment cloud than that which emanates from fukushima----this isn't exactly shocking. but still, it is not good. the crossing of a line. the set-up came along with the traces of argument over whether it was ok legally to arm the rebels. this was, so far as i can tell (speculating) playing for time on the one hand and a form of public relations on the other.

the curious thing about this particular war marketing is that it's closer to the situation on the ground than the mythologically based war marketing preferred by conservatives. this seems almost not worth mentioning, so obviously reality-optional is conservative mythology these days.

at the same time, the defection of moussa koussa is a really big deal. who this guy is and the information he has is only just beginning to surface in the press.

curious developments all around.

obviously one can hope that the latter constitutes a real blow to gadhafi and to his regime (indications are that it is such a thing, but within the fog of infotainment) such that the unfortunate (at best) possibilities opened by the de facto announcement of the arrival of "advisors" does not turn out to be what the past indicates it could turn out to be.....

Wow, an evident conclusion to our involvement is getting further away and far more complicated.

Does anyone have a feel for the size of the rebel forces overall? Does it have a net growth or loss as a trend? I've never seen anything regarding how many there are.

i don't think anyone quite knows, including the rebels.

If true why didn't they put their expressed hope or objective in the resolution? It is clear that not everyone shares the same hopes or objectives and the resolution contains what they could agree on.

NATO and Arab League objectives don't translate well into UN objectives, when there exists such a powerful veto card. I would imagine including anything of the sort would have had Russia and China vetoing the entire resolution.

No.

Not an important point. People who like him and people who don't have similar concerns to the concerns I have presented here.

I know what the political goals are, I have no clear idea what the military goals are, do you?

This is not clear, can you elaborate. Kadafi is clear. The rebels are clear. The UN resolution is clear. Members of the Arab league have been clear. The lack of clarity comes from the West and I argue primarily Obama.

Here again you simply make stuff up. There have been many instances where I support international cooperation. I simply believe in there being a single point of accountability and clearly defined objectives.

There are known things I know. Known things I don't know. And, unknown things that I don't know. Isn't that true of every person on this earth - your failure to be specific is problematic. Let's move out of the childish playground game of - you saying I am dumb and me saying you are dumb and you saying I am dumb, etc. - try to be specific in your critique. If you have something of value for me, being vague and insulting is pointless.

You can split hairs on this point all day long, if you want. The US has and will put the most at risk. The US will spend the most money. Nothing will happen without US involvement, cooperation and approval. So they can say authority has been passed to NATO, I won't buy that. I wasn't born yesterday.

You miss the point. War is dynamic, decisions have to be made fast within a line of command. The UN resolution was crafted to narrowly to allow for it to be usfull in a war situation. Again, it can be argued that the resolution has already been violated. What does this say about the coalition?

Clarify. Are you suggesting what I have said is problematic is of no concern and that you you have taken your clue on this from the French press? Why not take your clues from Kadafi's press? Again, your failure to be specific is not helpful, I have pointed out many problems.

Come on, be serious. I think of all kinds of possibilities, I like to exhaust them, even those that are unlikely. anyone who read what I wrote can understand the context. And the context is that people with your outlook get surprised and can't see what comes next, it rarely happens to me. In fact if you look at many of my posts and compare the dates and times, you will find that I am often ahead of the curve - you on the other-hand are often behind it. For example, early on I said the no fly zone was going to be inadequate and that Kadafi was simply going to change his strategy, which he did - it was very easy to see.

---------- Post added at 04:05 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:00 PM ----------

Others insist that there is a clearly expressed and shared objective to remove Kadafi, this is not true. The only shared objective was the no fly zone ( and freezing assets and weapons embargo) to save civilian lives. And in the context of the rebels, it is not even clearly defined if they are or are not defined as civilians, an assumption has to be made.

ace,

I think you quoted the wrong post of mine.

I do agree with dux and rb that NATO and the Arab League have been clear that they want Qaddafi gone.

I believe that China and Russia would have vetoed any UN resolution which included a fate for Qaddafi.

I believe that the resolution's language stating "protect civilians and civilian areas targeted by [Qaddafi]" is broad enough to imply, "you can bomb every tank you see near a house." That provides quite a bit of latitude.


As an aside, I would implore the two of you to resist the personal comments. As a reader, it becomes increasingly more difficult to get to the substance of your arguments because of the mixing with non-substantive observations about each other's character. You both have worthwhile and opposing viewpoints. It's a shame it is becoming so much more difficult to consume them. I find myself skipping, perhaps something of value. You can do as you will, I'm just asking politely...

this article (in french) is among the more extensive analyses of moussa koussa's defection:

Libye : fin de règne pour Kaddafi ?

the gist of it is that koussa has been close to gadhafi for over 30 years and is the last of the inner circle---apart from his sons. most of the commentators who are cited in this piece take the defection as meaning that the regime's days are numbered.

before becoming the foreign minister in 2009, koussa was for many years head of libyan intelligence---so the head of the gadhafi's secret police. this guy knows. there is no-one with more comprehensive information about the gadhafi regime than this.

what's remarkable is that he defected without a guarantee of immunity just after handing in his resignation, according to the article. it's not yet known how he managed to get out of tripoli----gadhafi apparently said repeatedly that "we are all prisoners here"----which is oddly close to that vile eagles song. but i digress----the article says that the current head of libyan intelligence---aboud dourda---is also on the run. it says he's being shuttled out of libya by way of the russian embassy. there's different speculations about where he'll land.

the trigger for these departures publicly is disgust over the violence of the campaign against civilians. i'm sure that's a part of it. i suspect there are other factors too, not least must be some kind of calculation about how the endgame is going to go.

if all this is correct, then it would appear that gadhafi's situation is crumbling from the inside. but given the way it's organized, and the centrality of his kids in running the show that remains, it's not obvious how much further in the crumbling process things need go following on these departures.

there's other stuff in the article, but that's the gist.