Oh lucky Gov. Dean, talking about Bush's foreign policy shortfalls just after Bush -- with a noble assist from the armed forces -- pulls rabbit No. 5465 out of the hat. Maybe Gore can advise the Gov. on how to avoid the fate of the coyote in the road runner cartoons. Or, at least, how to sigh loudly when the rock hits him or he steps off the cliff.

"Dean certainly represents continuity with the bipartisan centrist line that has characterized American foreign policy from 1948 until shortly after 9/11," said Zbigniew Brzezinski

I wonder if Brzezinski, at the time, characterized Reagan's foreign policy as "bipartisan" and "centrist"? My memory slips on that one, but I doubt it.

Oh lucky Gov. Dean, talking about Bush's foreign policy shortfalls just after Bush -- with a noble assist from the armed forces -- pulls rabbit No. 5465 out of the hat.

Ummm...yeah. Now if he'd only make some progress on the other 5,464 rabbits. Like, say, Osama.

The idea that they were able to nab Saddam only six months after taking over the country while still not having found any of the WMD that were allegedly the cause of the war is a huge victory doesn't pass the laugh test.

Yeah, it's better that he's been caught than that he's running around loose, but it doesn't make everything else that's been wrong suddenly all right.

I think Saddam's capture is over-rated. Saddam - and to a lesser extent Osama - are symbols and used as such by both Republicans and Democrats. Bush has captured one of the symbols, forcing Democrats to adopt a new rhetorical strategy. If their underlying point about conditions in Iraq remains valid, one will emerge, and the debate will continue as before. If catching Saddam really does end the resistance - and I remain skeptical on that point - then that is when Bush will be vindicated.

Help me out here. I'm trying to think of any country, with a generations-long history of brutal despotism, populated by diverse and mutually antagonistic religious-ethnic groups, that did not fractionalize into bloody genocide once the strongman was gone.

We're stuck in Iraq, because the minute we leave, the US-backed governing council is overrun and shot en masse.

How does Saddam Hussein's capture change that?

"The French will always do exactly the opposite on what the United States wants regardless of what happens, so we're never going to have a consistent policy," he (Howard Dean) said.

Obviously Howard Dean now feels a need to suck up to the liberal establishment. The wise words he spoke in 1998 have been abandoned because the former Vermont governor wishes to be invited to the trendy white wine and brie cheese get-togethers.

Zbigniew Brzezinski and Benjamin J. Barber are mediocre appeasers who grovel at the feet of the Old Europeans. I haven’t the slightest intellectual respect for either gentleman. They might make excellent neighbors and are kind to stray cats, but that’s not sufficient. Barber’s book about the so-called MacWorld is one of the silliest works I’ve ever read. It caused a fair amount of damage. What about the others on the list? I don’t know enough t o say anything adamant concerning their views of international politics. No, I am not initially impressed. This just seems like more of the “America is always in the wrong and we should bow down to the wisdom of the Old Europeans” type of nonsense. Am I too cynical? We’ll see.

S-Y-J. I have a country for you -- Spain. The Castillians and Basques and Catalonians and Galicians are a fairly disparate group of folks. And this was a country that went through a famous civivl war before its Fascist dictatorship. (You said name one...)

Mike -- Whatever you think of Bush's policies, he has Reagan's talent for making the other side look bad or at least ill-timed. (Ask Al Gore, Max Cleland, and Tom Daschle.) And now, he's done it to Dean.

Brian -- I would not make a judgment on whether Saddam's capture is either over or under rated just yet. Let's wait to see what happens to the insurgency. But the capture has got to be important symbollically to those who feared Saddam, and those who are currently fighting under his banner.

We already have a inexperienced president who surrounded himself with 'experts'. What you end up with is a group of people who manipulate the figurehead to their own ends. Let's go with experienced authority over delegated authority in 2004. Vote Clark.

Surelyyoujest - Too bad you don't have the use of Richard Feynman's brains only the title of his hilarious autobiography.

Since there would be no way to convince you how wrong you are, we will just have to wait see.

I hope you're not a physicist and if you are, you aren't working on anything that requires good judgment.

Appalled moderate - Thanks! I never thought of Spain. I knew about the Basques, but not that the other groups were still disparate (non-assimilated) enough to represent potential fracture lines.

Spain's sort of an odd case, though, don't you think? It went from totalitarian dictatorship to democratic monarchy mostly due to the resolve and grit of Juan Carlos, if I remember correctly.

Your memory is right on the facts.

Catalonia (the North-eastern part of Spain,including Barcelona) is rather different from the rest of Spain in attitude,and, importantly, in langauage. There is an independence movement up there, but they never developed anything like the ETA.

The Galicians speak Portugese, and have a land that looks unlike the rest of the country. (Very green.) The rest of Spain seems to treat it as akin to Applachia.

I think the Juan Carlos experience may have some utility in Iraq. It teaches that perseverence can get you to Democracy, even with internal nationalities. Love to know what the folks at "Innocents Abroad" think of the idea.

I think in societies that don't have the same deeply embedded concepts of the linguistically determined nation-state one finds in Europe, the chances of such inter-ethnic violence decrease. This is not always the case, as seen in East Timor, Biafra, and Katanga, but if you look at India, for example or most of Indonesia or Mali, any conflagorations that have existed have not been nearly as bad as some might guess based on, say, the break-up of Yugoslavia.

At least, that's my general impression.

What is Dean signalling? That he wants a foreign policy just like Clinton's?

“It (Spain) went from totalitarian dictatorship to democratic monarchy ....”

Spain was never a totalitarian dictatorship. It was, however, authoritarian---and that’s a major difference. An authoritarian society is somewhat laissez faire as long as one doesn’t involve themselves in politics. Totalitarian societies demand that every aspect of your whole life is devoted to the political sector. Franco was not exactly a democrat leader, but he was also neither a Mao or a Hitler.

What is Dean signalling? That he wants a foreign policy just like Clinton's?

And Carter's.

Well Dean certainly isn't backing down. From his POV he can't afford to. The capture of Mr. Ace of Spades is a great windfall for the coalition. That having been said, it's benefits are likely limited. It was a good day. A few good days don't make a war or an occupation stick. But we could have waited a few days before going back to sniping at each other. Unity in this culture is really getting fractured, the polarization is as bad as I've seen it since the Vietnam era.

Here’s Howard Dean speech---and it’s downright awful! It should make you want to puke:

http://www.deanforamerica.com/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=10993

Howard Dean is an appeaser who believes that America should lick the rear ends of the Old Europeans. Any friction between them and us is our fault. The United States is always in the wrong. The Old Europeans are the shining light of the world and it is our duty to adhere to the wished of Jacques Chirac. Dean fails to comprehend that terrorism often has nothing to do with poverty. The radical Muslim, for instance, are simply enraged and bitter that the West is now the preeminent power of the world. Their ancestors made choices which leave them behind the curve economically and politically. America and Israel have done little, if anything, to justify this rage. It is up to them to become mature adults and stop acting so childishly.

Howard Dean must not become President of the United States. He will only embolden our enemies and discourage our true allies. Dean might even want to consider moving to France.

David:

Yes, the idea of having a principled foreign policy should make you puke. God forbid America served as a beacon of hope to the world.

You should move out of your parent's basement.

"I'm trying to think of any country, with a generations-long history of brutal despotism, populated by diverse and mutually antagonistic religious-ethnic groups, that did not fractionalize into bloody genocide once the strongman was gone."

What is the universe we're looking at here? The Soviet Union and what else? Given David Tompson's definition above, even Yugoslavia doesn't count.

The Soviet Union didn't "fractionalize into bloody genocide" in general. Yeah, a couple of small conflicts broke out. But there was no genocide of Kazakhs or Ukrainians by the Russians. Lithuanians did not persecute Estonians or Russians. There was no war between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

“Yes, the idea of having a principled foreign policy should make you puke. “

We already possess a principled foreign policy. Howard Dean merely wants France to dominate the process. They supposedly should have the ultimate veto power over our actions.

“God forbid America served as a beacon of hope to the world.”

We are the beacon of hope to the world. Have you noticed our immigration totals? People vote with their feet. How’s that phrase go?: “Americans must leave my nation--and take me with them!” Unfortunately, some people will be embittered by our successes and there’s little we can do about that. Once again, why should France determine on how we are to achieve this goal of being this beacon of hope?

I just heard that France is seriously talking about forgiving much of the Iraqi debt. This would have likely never happened had we not slapped a little sense into them a few days ago. That is why I so strongly disagreed with our host. Daniel Drezner fails to see that sometimes you’ve got to get people’s attention before they will really begin to negotiate.

I'm not going by David Thompson's definition of authoritarian v. totalitarian, which is an ersatz distinction used by Jeanne Kirkpatrick during the Reagan years to gloss over US support for murderous devils like Pinochet.

The distinction would be irrelevant in any case. My question had to do with what happens when *any* strongman -- whose repressive government has served to both inflame and repress internacine hatreds -- is suddenly gone, and the pressure that has built up for lo those many years can suddenly express itself.

By which scenario, one could argue whether Yugoslavia qualifies. Tito held things down and then was gone, but the worst of the genocide was done while Milosevic was in firm control.

Russia -- "Soviet Russia" -- I think does qualify: i.e., Chechnya. Afghanistan definitely qualifies, as the loss of Taliban control has resulted in a renascence of warlord-tribal rule.

Please note: I am NOT making a case that continued strongman rule is in any way a good thing! I loathe that model. I'm just wondering about the consequences of the strongman suddenly going away, and whether those consequences are inevitable.

it's amazing how right-wingers instantly recycle their buddies' words -- this "Old Europeans" thing being repeated all over the warblogs really does tell you something. when you borrow catchphrases from donald rumsfeld, well, you're ideologically toast

I mean, who remembers here the hilarious "homicide bombers" ari fleischer routine? (that put unabomber and hamas on the same level)
that was too weak even for our dittohead friends!
heh

Ummm...yeah. Now if he'd only make some progress on the other 5,464 rabbits. Like, say, Osama.

Oh, this has to wait until, say, next August. Just wait to see that reaction.

I'm not going by David Thompson's definition of authoritarian v. totalitarian, which is an ersatz distinction used by Jeanne Kirkpatrick during the Reagan years to gloss over US support for murderous devils like Pinochet.

Since the alternative was a Stalinist thug in the form of Allende who was allowing Castro to land troops in Chile and deliver it into the loving hands of the Soviet Union, I would say that we chose the lesser of two evils. Or rather the people of Chile who overwhelming supported the coup did.

I take it, Thorley, that elections count only if you like the winner. If not, it's coup time. Stalin thought much the same.

The Chileans didn't like their new junta for very long, either. Now they're mostly ashamed of it.

Oh, I get it: "Stalinist thug" = A person who nationalizes key industries so the money stays in the country as opposed to flowing into the hands of a neo-Colonial overlord.

Allende was never brought up in the UK on criminal charges. The murderous fascist thug who replaced him, Pinochet, was.

There's a reason Henry Kissinger can never travel to London: It's because the second his plane hits the tarmac, he's under arrest for his role in helping Pinochet murder Allende and a few thousand others during Pinochet's bloody reign of terror.

By the way:

Saddam's probably looking forward to telling us all about how Donald Rumsfeld shook his blood-stained hands and awarded him a pair of golden spurs back in the 1980s:

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/handshake300.jpg

Meanwhile, we're still buddies with murderous thugs like Pervez Musharraf (who not only is a murderous thug, he's a murderous thug with nukes who lets terrorists like the Taliban and bin Laden's groups operate at will in his country) and Islam Karimov, who likes to boil people alive just for grins.

Either of these guys make Saddam look like Mother Teresa, yet they're Bush's buddies.