Iraq and Assumptions of Freedom

[dr_mabeuse]

It's assessment time.

Our failure to establish any sort of democratic government in Iraq is not simply the result of poor planning and execution, and it's certainly not the result of military failure by any means. The failure is due rather to some deep flaws we've been making in our basic assumptions about freedom and democracy and how natural they are and how easy to achieve and maintain. Because it turns out that these notions of freedom and equality and democracy are not natural at all, I think, and they're not easy to maintain and not easy to establish, and recognizing the fact that freedom is a rare and special condition of mankind radically changes everything we've been talked into believing for the past 20 years or so, such as the idea that government is the natural enemy of freedom.

Government, it turns out, is the only institution capable of guaranteeing freedom, and if you doubt this, then just take a look at Iraq, the Libertarian's Heaven.

For Bush & Company, establishing a democracy in Iraq was simply a matter of removing the oppressive hand of government in the form of the dictator Saddam Hussein and giving the Iraqi people's natural inclination for freedom a chance to exert itself. By their thinking and conservative dogma, free elections = Democracy = individual freedom and that's apparently about as deep as the thinking went. Of course it didn't work. The Iraqis voted, but they used their votes not for the greater good but to further their own self-interest, so the much-vaunted elections only succeeded in further fragmenting the nation, empowering the powerful and screwing the weak. That was the first sign that things were a bit more complicated than we'd thought.

There's no doubt that democracy's still the fairest and most efficient kind of government mankind's been able to come up with, providing the greatest good for the greatest number of people, but that's not the same as saying it's mankind's natural state, or that freedom's our default value. Freedom's a great thing, but absolute freedom is anarchy, and that's what they've got in Iraq right now. What they really want—what they desperately need—is government. Government is what draws the line between freedom and anarchy.

For the last 20 years or so the conservative mantra has been about how government is the problem and how much better off we'd be without it—how much richer, healthier, happier, freer—how we should trust our freedom and well-being to the natural democratic instincts of our fellow man and the self-regulating mechanisms of a free marketplace.

Well, now we have the results of that experiment in absolute freedom right before our eyes, and it's a horrifying spectacle.

On another thread they were just talking about the unspeakable idiot Timothy McVeigh, another man to whom all blood tasted the same. Here's his dream come true—ultra-libertyland. An entire country with no government to interfere with whatever he might choose to do.

 

[pellso27]

Iraq is like

most the whores on here. Give them their freedom and they are miserable

 

[rgraham666]

Democracy is not a natural state, Zoot. Our nature mitigates against it.

We're apes. Our natural inclination is to form ourselves into groups, do what the alphas tell us and conspire to become alphas ourselves. Most human institutions are merely variations on that.

Another way that democracy goes against our nature is that democracy demands responsibility. In a democracy, the citizen is the authority. And with authority comes responsibility. Human beings don't like to take responsibility.

This is another reason why we organize ourselves into groups.

In Iraq, most people identify themselves with a tribe, clan or religion. They are not, as we understand it, individuals. they are subsumed to their group. The group takes the authority and the responsibility. This is freeing, in a way. The person can do anything and not feel guilty. The group frees them from it.

We in the West are losing our individuality as well. We are members of our expert group, or corporation, or political party, or even our nation. But it's the group we identify with that takes the responsibility.

And again, that makes us free. We can act as we want without responsibility, or guilt, or even thought.

But just because democracy is unnatural doesn't mean we can't achieve it. But it takes a lot of work, and personal acceptance of responsibility for our actions.

 

[Guest]

most the whores on here. Give them their freedom and they are miserable

Brilliant response.

Are you done chasing pre-teens on MySpace tonight, then?

 

[TE999]

Brilliant response.

Are you done chasing pre-teens on MySpace tonight, then?

LMAO! sarahh, you rawk.

 

[Huckleman2000]

Along with the new government, when the Provisional Authority set up shop, they instituted economic reforms which destroyed the existing system of small shops owned by individuals with a distribution system that was, in Western terms, grossly inefficient. Nevertheless, the inefficiencies of the system grew out of a lack of supporting infrastructure - warehouses, refrigeration, and so forth - so when larger companies came onto the scene, it threw the existing system out the window, much like Wal-Mart in a small rural US town. Unused to the employer-employee system of retail, this forced many former shop-owners into unemployment. Almost immediately, the security began to deteriorate, which disrupted the new supply chains, and the economic system collapsed.

The whole aftermath of this war seems to have been viewed as the Great Neo-Con Experiment, and implemented with a completely blind faith in Conservative/Libertarian economic and governmental philosophies. When those did not prove to be viable, there was no position to fall back on that did not violate those principals. The whole thing fell apart, and there was no expertise nor desire to try anything different.

 

[Guest]

It's assessment time.

Our failure to establish any sort of democratic government in Iraq is not simply the result of poor planning and execution, and it's certainly not the result of military failure by any means. The failure is due rather to some deep flaws we've been making in our basic assumptions about freedom and democracy and how natural they are and how easy to achieve and maintain. Because it turns out that these notions of freedom and equality and democracy are not natural at all, I think, and they're not easy to maintain and not easy to establish, and recognizing the fact that freedom is a rare and special condition of mankind radically changes everything we've been talked into believing for the past 20 years or so, such as the idea that government is the natural enemy of freedom.

Government, it turns out, is the only institution capable of guaranteeing freedom, and if you doubt this, then just take a look at Iraq, the Libertarian's Heaven.

For Bush & Company, establishing a democracy in Iraq was simply a matter of removing the oppressive hand of government in the form of the dictator Saddam Hussein and giving the Iraqi people's natural inclination for freedom a chance to exert itself. By their thinking and conservative dogma, free elections = Democracy = individual freedom and that's apparently about as deep as the thinking went. Of course it didn't work. The Iraqis voted, but they used their votes not for the greater good but to further their own self-interest, so the much-vaunted elections only succeeded in further fragmenting the nation, empowering the powerful and screwing the weak. That was the first sign that things were a bit more complicated than we'd thought.

There's no doubt that democracy's still the fairest and most efficient kind of government mankind's been able to come up with, providing the greatest good for the greatest number of people, but that's not the same as saying it's mankind's natural state, or that freedom's our default value. Freedom's a great thing, but absolute freedom is anarchy, and that's what they've got in Iraq right now. What they really want—what they desperately need—is government. Government is what draws the line between freedom and anarchy.

For the last 20 years or so the conservative mantra has been about how government is the problem and how much better off we'd be without it—how much richer, healthier, happier, freer—how we should trust our freedom and well-being to the natural democratic instincts of our fellow man and the self-regulating mechanisms of a free marketplace.

Well, now we have the results of that experiment in absolute freedom right before our eyes, and it's a horrifying spectacle.

On another thread they were just talking about the unspeakable idiot Timothy McVeigh, another man to whom all blood tasted the same. Here's his dream come true—ultra-libertyland. An entire country with no government to interfere with whatever he might choose to do.

My parents remain confused. They believe America is the governmental model for the rest of the world. And they are not alone.

We don't discuss politics when we get together.

 

[rgraham666]

My parents remain confused. They believe America is the governmental model for the rest of the world. And they are not alone.

We don't discuss politics when we get together.

I do with my mom. Not with my dad.

Every discussion of politics with my dad devolves into a rant against 'those fuckin' Jews!'

My dad really likes his hate.

 

[Guest]

LMAO! sarahh, you rawk.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

The whole aftermath of this war seems to have been viewed as the Great Neo-Con Experiment, and implemented with a completely blind faith in Conservative/Libertarian economic and governmental philosophies. When those did not prove to be viable, there was no position to fall back on that did not violate those principals. The whole thing fell apart, and there was no expertise nor desire to try anything different.

Yes. The Plan was Not to Plan. As I understand it, they made a deliberate decision to step out of the way and let the natural urge to freedom run its course and free markets work their magic. Libertaran theory predicts that democracy and a robust economy would naturally flourish in such an environment.

It's all very reminiscent of communist theory, but rotated 180 degrees.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

My parents remain confused. They believe America is the governmental model for the rest of the world. And they are not alone.

We don't discuss politics when we get together.

I think most of America believes that America is the governmental (and cultural and moral) model for the rest of the world. I think a lot of the Western world believed that too for a while, albeit grudgingly. The people in Washington certainly did. No more though. That's why Iraq is so terrinly significant, much more significant than Vietnam.

Francis Fukiyama referred to the fall of communism as "the end of history" but it wasn't. Iraq was like the other boot hitting the floor.

 

[elsol]

Yes. The Plan was Not to Plan. As I understand it, they made a deliberate decision to step out of the way and let the natural urge to freedom run its course and free markets work their magic. Libertaran theory predicts that democracy and a robust economy would naturally flourish in such an environment.

It's all very reminiscent of communist theory, but rotated 180 degrees.

*yawh*

Politically theories are like military plans... they look good until the bullets start flying.

Every political theory has at its core a basic dependency... they start by defining the nature of the human animal. That to put it nicely is... *bad juju*

Personally, I think the 'urge for mine, mine, mine!' is too often confused for the 'urge for freedom'.

I've never had an urge for freedom that did not deal with how to convince my woman to let me 'freely and without concequence' stick my dick in her best friend.

The other stuff has been an urge for 'leave me the fuck alone' or as previously stated 'mine, mine, mine'.

 

[rgraham666]

Yes. The Plan was Not to Plan. As I understand it, they made a deliberate decision to step out of the way and let the natural urge to freedom run its course and free markets work their magic. Libertaran theory predicts that democracy and a robust economy would naturally flourish in such an environment.

It's all very reminiscent of communist theory, but rotated 180 degrees.

That's why I refer to the neo-cons as neo-Marxists.

Both are highly economically deterministic. Both are will to do anything to make their vision of a perfect world come to pass. Body counts are irrelevant. Only The Truth matters.

 

[Liar]

It's all very reminiscent of communist theory, but rotated 180 degrees.

Every ideology will fuck up, if you try to apply it 100%.


Except mine, of course.

 

[rgraham666]

Ideology does have its advantages.

You never have to think about things. Life just falls into place.

And when things go wrong, it's the world's fault. For not going along with the perfect philosophy.

Stupid world.

 

[Huckleman2000]

Rob, I think you're one of the sanest people around.

 

[rgraham666]

Rob, I think you're one of the sanest people around.

Not according to my psych evaluation.

 

[oggbashan]

My parents remain confused. They believe America is the governmental model for the rest of the world. And they are not alone.

We don't discuss politics when we get together.

We British think we are the governmental model for the rest of the world including the US (but we're not sure our lessons took well there).

The French think they are.

The Greeks think they are.

The Romans (Italians) think they are.

We're all right to a certain extent but to be successful all governments require the consent and active participation of the governed. If the majority do not want the government, the government is eventually useless and anarchy is the result.

Any system can work IF the people want it to.

Og

 

[Liar]

Not according to my psych evaluation.

That says a lot about the rest of the world, doesn't it?

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

Doc, I will make this post without tongue-in-cheek for a change because this is a serious flaw in the thinking that led us to the mess we are in today.

In the U.S. democracy grew internally out of a dissatisfaction with the ruling monarchy. The operative word is "internally." The so-called founding fathers were all young men of wealth and influence, with the notable exception of Ben Franklin, who seems to me, at least, to have been somewhat of an anarchist at the time to begin with.

Contrast that to the U.S. march into Iraq and installing an external form of democratic freedom that was neither native nor acceptable to most of the Iraqi moslem religious groups. This was doomed to failure from the beginning for exactly the opposite reason that it works in the U.S. We grew our own ideas of democracy and freedom. We forced our ideas upon the Iraqis.

Another element of this mess is the Judao-Christian ideals of this country. Basically, We think God will take care of everything in the end as long as we are good people. In the meantime we have absolute free will to be good, bad or whatever we choose. It doesn't matter, because we still have the hope of heaven, eternal life and so on. The Iraqis don't have that. They are ruled by God's law. To them, there is not other law. There can be no other law. It is inherant in their religeous culture to be slaves to that law.

To make a civil law in Iraq that is in opposition to the law as outlined in the Koran is to make a law that will be ignored. To install leadership and a parliamentry system in Iraq that violates the Koran, as we have done, is to create a government that will be ignored.

And how have we reacted to our system being ignored? We brand them as terrorists. We arrest their mullahs and religeous leaders. The outcome is and can only be dissatisfaction with us and the government we have installed.

The invasion of Iraq was is only an example of western egotism and complete misunderstanding of the Iraqi's culture and religion.

 

[rgraham666]

The invasion of Iraq was is only an example of western egotism and complete misunderstanding of the Iraqi's culture and religion.

Again.

Also it was never really meant to be a democracy. Bremer admitted as much in front of a business audience shortly he became proconsul. "We're going to be running a colony, almost."

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

Again.

Also it was never really meant to be a democracy. Bremer admitted as much in front of a business audience shortly he became proconsul. "We're going to be running a colony, almost."

I'm glad someone actually read that, Rob. It almost killed my not being a smart-ass for once

 

[rgraham666]

I'm glad someone actually read that, Rob. It almost killed my not being a smart-ass for once

Glad to be of service.

 

[rgraham666]

The best description I've ever read of democracy.

DEMOCRACY An existential system in which words are more important than actions. Not a judgemental system.

Democracy is not intended to be efficient, linear, logical, cheap, the absolute source of truth, manned by angels, saints or virgins, profitable, the justification of any particular economic system, a simple matter of majority rule or for that matter a simple matter of majorities. Nor is it an administrative procedure, patriotic, a reflection of tribalism, a passive servant of either law or regulation, elegant or particularly charming.

Democracy is the only system capable of reflecting the humanist premise of equilibrium or balance. The key to its secret is the involvement of the citizen.

From The Doubter's Companion - John Ralston Saul

 

[cantdog]

Nearly nine out of every ten United States soldiers, marines, and airmen, polled in February 2006, said the U.S. mission in Iraq is, quoting: "to retaliate for Saddam's role in the 9/11 attacks."

77 percent said "the main" or "a major" reason for the Iraq War was "to stop Saddam from protecting al-Qaeda in Iraq."

I don't see mention of 'freedom' or 'democratic institutions' in there. What they tell the troops their mission is, that's their mission, if you ask me. Retaliation is a bit different from liberation. 9/11 is what retribution looks like. Iraq is what retribution looks like. Both look a lot like rubble, tears, blood and death.

Saddam, of course, had no role in the 9/11 attacks. There were no Iraqis in any of the planes, and Saddam had no ties to al-Qaeda. Those are the facts. The belief of nine out of ten troops-- how do we explain it? They were told that, that's how we explain it. Those were lies.

Every single excuse they made for going in to Iraq has been a lie. The current one is some malarkey about 'democracy.' I'm afraid I can't give it a lot of credence. They don't allow any Iraqi input in anything, and they have taken as much control of Iraqi oil as the insurgency and militias will allow. They do not act as though it were freedom they have in mind for Iraqis. They do not act as though it were democracy, either.

Jenny's rundown about the poor benighted Iraqis and their congenital incapacity to be free is insulting. But it doesn't make a lot of difference, since we have no intention of freeing them anyhow.