Here’s a surprise. People in other countries hate Mitt Romney and will think less favorably towards America if we elect him president. Who could have guessed it? Over in Britain, they are particularly disdainful of the Mittster (only 3% want to see him elected). And they only perceive three areas where he has articulated a foreign policy. They are real crowd-pleasers:
…the findings play into a larger question over Romney’s foreign policy credentials. Little is known about his position on these issues, mainly because he has had little to say, espousing only three positions: support for Israel in the event of it bombing Iran; a threat to launch a trade war against China over alleged currency manipulation; and identifying Russia as America’s main threat.
I believe that is three strikes and you’re out.
Apparently, the Romney campaign believes that no one cares about foreign policy and the election will be decided solely on the condition of the economy (which is not that bad, by the way). But Team Romney should consider a simple fact. One of the three presidential debates will be devoted exclusively to foreign policy, as will half of the vice-presidential debate. That’s 37.5% of the total debate time. Do they think they can concede almost 40% of the debates and still come out on top?
The presidential foreign policy debate is the last debate, scheduled for October 22nd. It’s probably not as important as the first debate, since first impressions are very important, but it will be the send-off note for the electorate. It will provide the taste in everyone’s mouth when they cast their ballots. Telling people that you want to start another war in the Middle East, revive the Cold War, and start a trade war with China is not going to sit well with people who can still remember unpleasantries in all three areas.
You want to know how unpopular Mitt Romney is abroad. About the only place where people would be modestly happier if he won is Pakistan, and Obama has been bombing their country for four years. The numbers?
…the prospect of [Romney] winning the White House was greeted with less dismay in Pakistan, where about 13% of respondents said it would make them more favourable to the US, compared to just 9% who said it would make them less favorable.
I don’t think Americans suffer from total amnesia. They may be taking Obama’s saner foreign policy a bit for granted, but they don’t want to see the neo-conservatives back in charge of our foreign policy. A brief look at today’s New York Times tells us why.
Meanwhile, the Egyptians are mad at us, but no one seems to really understand what set them off.
“the Romney campaign believes that no one cares about foreign policy”
Personally I think the Romney campaign might be close on this. I think about 10-15% are interested in foreign policy. I think about 70% of Americans have foreign policy hopelessly tangled up with militarist values, “cop for the world” attitudes, national security issues and national defense. In other words, this is pretty much their understanding:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TmoeZHnOJKA
But I DO think it’s great that it is the last debate. As I said in an earlier thread. I think Obama will win the FP debate big time. Unfortunately only 5-10% of the American public will notice that. Hopefully undecided voters will hear some good analysis and remember it at the polls.
Looks like the Libyans are mad at us as well. That could be Gaddafi deadenders, though.
Because of the attack today, Google won’t cooperate with helping find a link, but our consulate in Benghazi was stormed in the 1970’s, not long before our Embassy in Teheran.
See my diary – The film, the protest, the mob and turmoil in Libya and Egypt
That could be Gaddafi deadenders, though.
With simultaneous attacks in Egypt and Benghazi, this is almost certainly not Gadhaffi supporters.
Much more likely are religious fundamentalists.
Meaning our allies against Gadhafi and
fighting Syriansoverthrow of Assad.No, our allies against Gadhaffi engaged in a gun battle trying to fight off the attackers.
Religious fundamentalist parties got wiped out in the Libyan elections. Characterizing the mainly liberal, nationalist, and leftist rebels as Islamic fundies is a Buchananite slur.
Although religious fundamentalists do seem to be playing a larger role in the Syrian uprising – which is probably why we’ve taken a much less supportive stance in that situation, and why we’re working to boost the non-fundie factions and steer the flow of arms away from the fundies.
Whatever they were .. guess who caused this? .. Yeah .. that hateful, wackadoodle preacher from gainesville, Florida .. Terry Jones I think
See my diary – The film, the protest, the mob and turmoil in Libya and Egypt
How do you figure he caused this? I have no love for this asshole, but the only people who caused this are Egyptian fundamentalist Muslims whose faith is so thin-skinned and weak that they throw a tantrum anytime someone disrespects or depicts The Prophet. The fundie Christians deserve their fundies. Made for each other.
The video is a mere pretext.
George Bush : Iraqi WMDs :: Libyan attackers : Mohammed video
The YouTube video came out in July. The notion that these people just happened to wait two months and then launch an attack on September 11 is absurd on its face.
I’ll post this once but I’d like to ask you and Seabe both: what are the chances that the video was still relatively unknown until Jones began promoting it? I doubt at this stage we can know yet if it had gained any attention in the Middle East at large up to that point.
My memory is a little fuzzy on the precise chronology, but as TPM notes a correlation between Jones’ Koran-burning stunt with the riot that killed 12 people at the UN mission in Afghanistan, and a similar situation seems to have occurred here. It doesn’t stretch the imagination overmuch to suppose that Jones is probably on a lot of radars in the Islamic world.
Not to condone in any way or paper over the murderous and irrational impulses behind these killings; I agree with every word of condemnation for those who carried out these acts.
But knowing how irrational and easily offended these people are, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to go around whacking them indiscriminately like a hornet’s nest. The Obama administration clearly recognized the potential fallout from this promotion of the movie and tried to get out ahead of it by denouncing it as disrespectful.
Jones isn’t responsible for the actions of the killers, but I have no doubt he was hoping to incite just this sort of reaction in order to hold it up as proof backing his position on Islam as a competing faith to his own. I bet he’s delighted at the results. I don’t know what that makes him, but “innocent” doesn’t leap to mind.
And for Romney to seize upon the Obama admin’s attempt to head this event off with words of tolerance and respect as “disgusting” and “apologizing for America” is beyond grotesque. He’s not responsible for this event either, but I think he fully deserves to be called un-American for his remarks about it.
Now it’s looking like Jones’ involvement was minimal. But parts of the trailer were aired on Egyptian TV on the 9th, I think with Arabic translation, so that would more than explain the sudden late attention on a YouTube clip posted in July.
Everyone hates Mitt. It’s pretty universal- a singularly unlikable shitheel.
I don’t like this type of article, however, as it motivates goopers to support him against furriners.
They are mad about this:
Muhammad Movie Trailer
I don’t know who produced it, but Terry Jones and his Rightwing Religious nutcakes were having a “Trial of Muhammad” today.
The movie breaks the taboo about showing representations of the Prophet–the same thin that got the Danish cartoonist in trouble.
There are people inflaming hatred on both sides of this one.
I’m glad Islamists in Libya took the opportunity of the anniversary of 9/11 to storm the US consulate in Benghazi and murder one of the workers there.
So helpful.
Official statement of the Libyan General National Conference:
Statement of the Libyan General National Conference
More about the film:
Apparently in addition to representing Muhammad with an actor also accuses Muhammad of being a pedophile.
That depends on your definition of Pedophilia.
There is plenty on the web about Mohammad marrying a 9 year old. What isn’t included on those righteous denounciations is that marriages of that sort were performed through out western history to cement political alliances.
I don’t know that much about the history of Islam during the 6th century, but a dynastic marriage to cement alliance with a bedouin tribe wouldn’t have been out of the ordinary.
You know, Mitt could use this to his advantage with the Crazy Wingnut Base, many of which are ready to just stay home on election day. Just go around and brag about how much the Soshulist Yurpeans and the Brown Countries are afraid of him becoming Preznit cuz he’s no wuss, like Obama is. “No Appologies!” And tell them the UN is gonna take away their guns! And GOD & JESUS & stuff!
They’d probably fall into line and actually vote FOR him once Limbaugh & friends validate his claims. And these lies are not any more bald-faced than any of his other claims, so the press shouldn’t even notice.
But he and his campaign staff would fuck it up somehow.
Wingnut base is not enough to elect him. Who he’s losing are sane independents.
You must know I wasn’t being completely serious there, except with the punchline.
Yeah, it’s the wsj, but:
MATT BRADLEY in Cairo and DION NISSENBAUM in Washington, Wall Street Journal: U.S. Missions Stormed in Libya, Egypt
The film is a pretext, being used by people looking for any excuse to engage in anti-American violence.
George W. Bush : Iraqi WMDs :: Egyptian and Libyan fundies : this film.
The film was created and distributed precisely to get this result. Christian fundies and Islamic fundies and an Israeli-American want to pour gasoline on the fire.
And the Christian fundie was old Rev. Mr. Burn-the-Koran Terry Jones.
It is being used as an excuse to drive those revolutions in a Salafist direction. It likely will not succeed.
The preview was widely circulated as a YouTube. In fact, the preview seems to be the entirety of the movie.
So now reporters are following the money trail for the movie.
Whether it was deliberate or not, the essence of your comment is spot on: these most passionate of enemies have a symbiotic relationship.
What would the Salafists do without people like Terry (NOT the Monty Python guy) Jones, and what would he do without them?
I suppose we should thank Romney for relieving us of the burden of determining for ourselves the relevance of the various campaign issues: foreign policy, tax returns, women’s issues, etc. But I’d love to see someone challenge his casual dismissal of foreign policy by reminding him of the economic consequences we’ve incurred as a result of grievous foreign policy blunders made unapologetically by many of his supporters and advisers.
Whaddayou, kiddin’ me or what?
Mubarak was our frontman. Egypt became a stinking, military dictatorship-enforced mess under his rule.
Here’s what Egyptians see when they think “U.S.”
Thugs on camels trying to break up their relatively peaceful revolution.
And:
Frank Wisner Jr…the son of the CIA operative Frank Wisner who oversaw Operation Mockingbird, the CIA takeover of American who was also:
1-One of the Enron bosses who managed to evade prosecution. (Hmmmmm….)
2-The U.S. frontman who was sent by some portion of the PermaGov to publicly contradict its “official” anti-Mubarak stance during the Arab Spring.
(Only a partial list, of course. He’s a real piece of PermaGov spook work. Bet on it.)
The U.S. is widely considered to be the biggest worldwide villain of the last 50 years or so. Especially in the Muslim world.
But you think that “no one seems to really understand what set [the Egyptians] off?”
Lord, Booman!!! What planet are you living on?
Get used to it.
Until the U.S. backs of the economic imperialist food trough, this shit is going to continue. In fact, it’s going to intensify/
Why do you think the Egyptians elected an Islamist government the first chance they got? To continue to play pattycake with the U.S. mob?
Please!!!
WTFU.
AG
In this case, Arthur is right. This is perma-gov with a vengeance. American diplomatic positions in the Middle East have not significantly changed since 1943. British positions haven’t changed since 1917 (the Balfour mandate) except insofar as the Empire collapsed and their asses couldn’t keep up with their eyes.
Obama made a big first and second step when elected, by his reasoned, unimpassioned speeches about the state of the world in the Middle East. The stage was set for new operation in the Arabic World.
With the onset of the Arab Spring, Obama’s fairly strict hands-off until we have a real idea of what is happening, was perceived to be real diplomacy and was appreciated by the “moderates” (there aren’t any more moderates in the Arab world, than here). But if you want to make up for 75 years of perceived arrogance and aggression, it’s going to take more than 3 years.
A small correction.
The sentence below Frank Wisner Jr.’s picture should have read:
Frank Wisner Jr…the son of CIA operative Frank Wisner who oversaw Operation Mockingbird, the CIA takeover of U.S. media and eventually committed “suicide”. Wisner Jr. was also:
AG
Actually, Boo, you missed an essential fourth plank of the foreign policy of Romney and his base: restarting the Civil War, so as to rid “us” of all those people who aren’t “real Americans.” To them, we’re just as foreign as any Yuropean or other furriner, and more of a threat.
His True Colors
TPM has full story at link
Romney, Priebus, and the entire GOP establishment are thoroughly vile, as expected.
The business with Netanyahu is a serious problem, though. Apparently he wants war with Iran so bad that he intends to interfere with the US elections to get his way.
So far it looks like Obama’s not having it. But if Netanyahu and AIPAC start running actively against Obama and the Dems as anti-Israel, I can’t guess how damaging that might end up being. One could argue that, given Israel’s influence in US politics, a confrontation like this was bound to happen sooner or later, but we really can’t afford it right now. And another war would be beyond stupid.
Oops, sorry that was last year. President Obama must really be pissed off, doesn’t appreciate Bibi Netanyahu’s arrogance in openly advocating a Mitt Romney’s presidency. See cartoon in link and the many brutal comments in Israel!
Between Romney’s desperate ass and this di*ck Rinse Penis…ugh!
No Limits
Jeez, there is a line ain’t there?
I wonder how many non-Americans believe Mitt Romney is “most responsible” for the death of Bin Laden.
The Egyptians are mad at us. They are the Muslim Brotherhood. We are not. QED When Mubarak fell, it was an exact analog to the Shah’s fall. Expect the same anti-Western results.
Re trade war with China. The time to get touggh was ten years ago. Now the economy is so hollowed out that it is an empty threat. Our economy is based on selling products made in China on credit. Only the vast bloated military keeps Great Power status. Soon we won’t be able to afford that. Then we will fall to a 1776 GDP.
Yes.
Precisely.
And then…only then…will a true recovery be possible.
We have become a junkie nation.
Hooked on bullshit.
Hooked on credit.
Hooked on the substitution of military power for real achievement.
But we also remain the most racially and culturally diverse large nation in the world. It is that diversity…a vast pool of many kinds of talents and cultures that remans largely untapped…that will save us in the end. (If of course we are to be “saved” at all.)
First things first, however, We have to kick our jones before anything real will happen. Cold turkey is the only way to go, and cold turkey is so painful and so drastic that it usually has to be forced on an addict by drastic means and/or circumstances. It’s also dangerous. Some junkies never make it through and others are so damaged by the experience that they no longer remain line-level functional.
So it goes, and so will it go.
One way or another this empire is going to be forced to step away from bogarting the feed trough of the world.
Bet on it.
The question is, when will this happen?
Now?
We now have a gradualist in the White House. A compromiser. It looks like he’s going to be there for another four years, and if he loses we will instead have a dedicated pusher and consumer of the drugs to which we are addicted in the same office.
Lose/lose.
Bet on it.
Lose slowly or lose fast.
Some choice, eh?
In my own vast personal experience…I have been a jazz and latin musician for 50 years and I have seen just about every addiction known to man during that time…one cannot forever compromise with an addiction. Eventually the junk must be forever cut out of the system no matter what the costs. People ask me time and again how I can rationalize my opposition to Barack Obama and my support for Ron Paul. Well…there it is. A junkie simply cannot compromise his way out of an addiction. Ron Paul proposed radical actions as a cure for this addiction when no one else seemed to have a clue, so I supported him. Were they dangerous? Risky? Unproven in some respects? Yes. Were they as dangerous as further addiction? Hell no!!!
Bet on that as well.
See ya somewhere.
Back in 1776?
Starting all over again?
If necessary.
Later…
AG
I agree with you and Engels on the problems. I just do not agree with either of you on the solutions.
I am afraid that i have not read much of him. Is he an addiction theorist?
I guess that you could stretch Marxist theories far enough to include “addiction” in the capitalist process, but if I have a political influence at all in my work it is more likely to be William Burroughs than Friedrich Engels. Plus some other people of whom I will almost guarantee you have not heard.
All human political history…especially the failures…can be considered as reactions to the addictive tendencies of human beings.
Drugs are just one form of addiction. There are so many more. The root addiction? Addiction to self. The hardest to kick, too. Thus the history of all so-called religious movements. Each one starts as an attempt to communicate a method for kicking the “self” jones, and each one eventually ends up becoming an addiction in and of itself.
So it goes.
Solutions?
Ain’t none.
Just delayers.
Best we can do, I guess.
Have a nice day.
(Also the best we can do, really.)
Later…
AG
I meant the problems with Capitalism in regards to Engels and specifically the American economy in regards to you.
In the first case, no, Dictatorship of the Proletariat is not the answer, and the Proletariat (my class!) is in no way morally superior.
In the second case, no, Ron Paul and his views on turning back the economic and political clock by a century or two is not the answer.
I used to respect Ron Paul for intellectual integrity until he caved in to the fundies on abortion.
Oh.
That’s what he did, eh?
Hmmmm….
I find it truly amazing that so plain-spoken a man…one who has been plainly speaking quite publicly for several decades…is so often accused of things that he has publicly refuted.
Here is what he has said what initiated about his stance on abortion:
“I walked out of that room a different person…”
Like dat.
Now…call him a liar if you so desire, but if he was to have “caved in” to any special interest group it would have been the PermaGov/media construct that quite plainly denied him any chance whatsoever at winning the presidency.
He is a moral man, Voice, and he follows his own voice. Say he’s wrong? Fine. But do not misjudge his integrity. I don’t buy it no matter how many times it’s been hynomediaed, and neither should you.
AG
When he said state governments have the right to ban abortion he deviated from Libertarian principles. Big time. I call that caving. Maybe you don’t. I can’t call a man Libertarian who thinks any government has the right to dictate anyone’s reproduction. Period. Don’t bother arguing. I’m just sticking my fingers in my ears. I’ve already heard it all.