Liberal’s Deficit of a Sense of Reality
By Con George-Kotzabasis
Jane Mayer and the reviewer of her book Andrew Bacevich both of them have an unfathomable deficit of a sense of reality and are oblivious of the lessons of history. Like beatific angels they descend from “a fine cloud of solicitous idealism” to critique and accuse the Bush administration of American-made Gulags. Disregarding and forgetting that the normal and complacent days of America ended on 9/11. On this fateful day America was attacked by an invisible deadly enemy whose only transparency was that he was wearing civilian clothes. In such circumstances the Administration was in the morally unenviable position to apprehend people not on hard legal evidence but on suspicion and to hold them for a long period because of the possible great danger. In the darkness of this war against global terror the enlightened civilized processes of the Geneva Conventions and due process became totally obsolete, not by the nefarious practices of the government but by the dicta of reality and history. On the latter criteria, Mayer and Bacevich are irredeemable failures. To quote the great Austrian writer Robert Musil, “to the mind good and evil... are not sceptical, relative concepts, but terms of function, values that depend on the context (M.E.) they find themselves in.”
Further, desperate to make their case against the Administration they throw the latter into the pool of the politics of fear. They are deliberately not making the nuanced distinction between the words threat and fear. While one can threaten even the fearless it does not follow that the threatened reacts out of fear. He merely reacts to a plausible threat like any reasonable person would in the same circumstances. And this is exactly what Americans are doing in the aftermath of 9/11. To claim as Mayer and Bacevich do that the Bush administration deliberately let loose the winds of fear to batter Americans for their own nefarious ends, whatever the latter happen to be, is on their part legerdemain par excellence.
I rest on my oars: Your turn now.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Friday, July 25, 2008
Kevin Rudd Escalating his Political Dilettantism
By Con George-Kotzabasis
In our times when rogue states bristling in their apocalyptic beards, like Iran, could produce stealthily nuclear weapons, to set up an International Commission for nuclear disarmament, as Prime Minister Rudd proposes to do, is the ultimate stupidity that any one could suggest. And in the aftermath of 9/11, the magnitude of such stupidity takes astronomical dimensions. Just imagine that countries such as America, Britain, France, and especially, Israel, which could be the targets of a nuclear attack by an Islamist state or by proxies of the latter, would even consider their nuclear disarmament.
Rudd’s proposal limpidly illustrates that Australia does not have a statesman at the helm but a political dilettante and a populist to boot who is more concerned to ingratiate himself with the celestial wishes of its liberal minded constituency than to deal with geopolitical realities.
Moreover, what is rather surprising and amusing is to see that Gareth Evans is willing to underwrite such political buffoonery by accepting the chair of the International Commission for nuclear disarmament. It seems that his Tasmanian “Biggles” days are not over.
Over to you
By Con George-Kotzabasis
In our times when rogue states bristling in their apocalyptic beards, like Iran, could produce stealthily nuclear weapons, to set up an International Commission for nuclear disarmament, as Prime Minister Rudd proposes to do, is the ultimate stupidity that any one could suggest. And in the aftermath of 9/11, the magnitude of such stupidity takes astronomical dimensions. Just imagine that countries such as America, Britain, France, and especially, Israel, which could be the targets of a nuclear attack by an Islamist state or by proxies of the latter, would even consider their nuclear disarmament.
Rudd’s proposal limpidly illustrates that Australia does not have a statesman at the helm but a political dilettante and a populist to boot who is more concerned to ingratiate himself with the celestial wishes of its liberal minded constituency than to deal with geopolitical realities.
Moreover, what is rather surprising and amusing is to see that Gareth Evans is willing to underwrite such political buffoonery by accepting the chair of the International Commission for nuclear disarmament. It seems that his Tasmanian “Biggles” days are not over.
Over to you
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Obama’s Plan for Withdrawal Replaces Living Victorious Strategy with Dead Strategy
By Con George-Kotzabasis
Obama is no leader but a pretender! The sentence in the first paragraph of his Op-Ed in the NT on July 14, 2008, says it all. “The phased redeployment of combat troops that I have long advocated,” which he trumpeted before the surge, he continues to consider as being wise in conditions when the surge has been successful in subduing the insurgency and decisively defeating al Qaeda in Iraq (his goal), and the Iraqi government meeting 15 out of the 18 benchmarks set up by Congress.
Further, he fabricates a grand fiction when he states that “nearly every threat we face-has grown.” If this was true one would have expected that America would have been attacked at least once since 9/11. And he distorts the real goal of the surge which was to win the war, and inevitably that would involve some strain in the overall number of U.S. military forces, and not because, the reason why he opposed the surge, it would not ease “the strain on our military.” Did Obama expect to win a war without perforce some strain on the military?
Obama’s op-ed is redolent with hypocrisy and cant to justify his pro-surge position, and to transpose this position in the new situation of a victorious war in Iraq as continuing to be politically and strategically viable is laughable. It is no less than the attempt of someone to resuscitate a dead carcass which unceremoniously is fit for burial and to give it a ‘second life’ in the overwhelming liveliness of victory.
Obama’s plan for withdrawal rides on the ignorant and obtuse brain-wave of populism that is against the war justified to an extent by the initial mistakes of its strategists in the conduct of the war. But now that these mistakes have been addressed and corrected by the new strategy of the surge which is defeating the insurgency, for Obama to stick to his populist promise to pull out U.S. troops from Iraq in sixteen months in this new situation, is to lead from the tail and not from the front the American people.
And in American history Obama will be everlastingly cursed for being the only Commander-in-Chief who ignominiously and doltishly withdrew his magnificent brave soldiers from a war at the threshold of its victory. Can you imagine President Lincoln after the Battle of Gettysburg ordering General Ulysses Grant to withdraw his troops from the field of battle and stop pursuing the army of Robert Lee whose ultimate defeat, at astronomical cost of men and materiel on both sides, led to the end of the civil war? Obama is making a mockery of the great tradition of wise, intrepid American presidents. He was wrong in his prediction that the surge would fail, wrong in his assessment that Iraq is not presently the frontline of global terror and al Qaeda, and wrong in his strategy to pull out U.S. troops from a war that the latter are winning. On this score alone, he does not deserve to be the Commander-in-Chief of a Great Nation.
Over to you
By Con George-Kotzabasis
Obama is no leader but a pretender! The sentence in the first paragraph of his Op-Ed in the NT on July 14, 2008, says it all. “The phased redeployment of combat troops that I have long advocated,” which he trumpeted before the surge, he continues to consider as being wise in conditions when the surge has been successful in subduing the insurgency and decisively defeating al Qaeda in Iraq (his goal), and the Iraqi government meeting 15 out of the 18 benchmarks set up by Congress.
Further, he fabricates a grand fiction when he states that “nearly every threat we face-has grown.” If this was true one would have expected that America would have been attacked at least once since 9/11. And he distorts the real goal of the surge which was to win the war, and inevitably that would involve some strain in the overall number of U.S. military forces, and not because, the reason why he opposed the surge, it would not ease “the strain on our military.” Did Obama expect to win a war without perforce some strain on the military?
Obama’s op-ed is redolent with hypocrisy and cant to justify his pro-surge position, and to transpose this position in the new situation of a victorious war in Iraq as continuing to be politically and strategically viable is laughable. It is no less than the attempt of someone to resuscitate a dead carcass which unceremoniously is fit for burial and to give it a ‘second life’ in the overwhelming liveliness of victory.
Obama’s plan for withdrawal rides on the ignorant and obtuse brain-wave of populism that is against the war justified to an extent by the initial mistakes of its strategists in the conduct of the war. But now that these mistakes have been addressed and corrected by the new strategy of the surge which is defeating the insurgency, for Obama to stick to his populist promise to pull out U.S. troops from Iraq in sixteen months in this new situation, is to lead from the tail and not from the front the American people.
And in American history Obama will be everlastingly cursed for being the only Commander-in-Chief who ignominiously and doltishly withdrew his magnificent brave soldiers from a war at the threshold of its victory. Can you imagine President Lincoln after the Battle of Gettysburg ordering General Ulysses Grant to withdraw his troops from the field of battle and stop pursuing the army of Robert Lee whose ultimate defeat, at astronomical cost of men and materiel on both sides, led to the end of the civil war? Obama is making a mockery of the great tradition of wise, intrepid American presidents. He was wrong in his prediction that the surge would fail, wrong in his assessment that Iraq is not presently the frontline of global terror and al Qaeda, and wrong in his strategy to pull out U.S. troops from a war that the latter are winning. On this score alone, he does not deserve to be the Commander-in-Chief of a Great Nation.
Over to you
Monday, July 07, 2008
NO TRUCKLOAD OF CARROTS WILL PERSUADE IRAN UNLESS IT'S ACCOMPANIED WITH A TRUCKLOAD OF MISSILES
By Con George-Kotzabasis
A response to:
Talking to Iran is our Best Option
By Ivo Daalder and Phillip Gordon of the Brookings Institution, and advisers to Barack Obama
Washington Post, June 29, 2008
We cannot tolerate the survival of a political system which has both the increasing capacity and the inexorable desire to destroy us. We have no other option but to adopt the strategy of Cato. (Delenda est Carthago)
Raymond Aron
Ivo Daalder and Phillip Gordon, the two savants of the Brookings Institution, have a brief to advise Barack Obama to start “talking to Iran without preconditions”, but they should not allowed to do so at the grief of America’s national interests and the security of the civilized world. The rationale of such advocacy is based in “rescuing a failed policy” of not talking to Iran for 7 ½ years that has made the latter, according to our two analysts, stronger and therefore more intransigent toward American and European demands encapsulated in the precondition that Iran suspends its nuclear enrichment program before any commencement of negotiations between the opposing parties. Further they claim that such diplomatic overture by the U.S. would enable the latter to “test that proposition” of the Iranians, that they “seek only the peaceful use of nuclear energy and the right to nuclear technology”.
It’s almost beyond belief that Daalder and Gordon would be proud to present themselves as the enfants terribles on the stage of diplomacy and in the art of Talleyrand, as their suggestion to “test” this dissembling proposition of Iran behind which is attempting to build its nuclear arsenal, is terribly infantile and politically doltish. It’s like a law officer testing a professional thief whether he has stolen the goods of a house by asking him to show him the master key that has opened the door of the house.
As for their claim that for the last 7 ½ years there have not been any talks with Iran is completely in opposition to the facts. The Europeans, and many of them enunciating and voicing the proposals of their American “ventriloquist”, have been speaking with the Iranians openly as well as sotto voce for a number of years. And have put their own, and indirectly American, proposals before them to no avail. Indeed, Daalder and Gordon concede this by saying that “all of them… [The Europeans] repeatedly presented Iran with a list of benefits Iran would receive if it suspended enrichment”. The latest truckload of carrots were transported to Tehran by Javier Solama, European Foreign Policy Chief few weeks ago only to be turned over and rejected by Iran’s unappeasable Mullahcracy. And this rejection was sealed when Gholam Hossein Elham, a spokesman of the government said that Iran would not comply with Security Council resolutions requiring it to stop enriching uranium.
It’s incomprehensible that Daalder and Gordon do not realize that Iran is undeviating in its goal and determination to acquire nuclear weapons as the latter is the sine qua non of Iran’s leadership of the Muslim people and the implementation of the religious doctrine of the Ninth Mahdi, i.e., the creation of a new world order under the Holy Crescent of Islam. This theological doctrinal lunge for power by Iran cannot be stopped by the humdrum conventional instruments of diplomacy, as the two analysts suggest, but only by diplomacy in the carapace of a bristling hedgehog. And such diplomacy can only be effective by setting certain preconditions at the outset before talks can begin. In the event that such preconditions are unacceptable by the Iranian regime, as presently is the case, then the latter must unambiguously understand that since all roads to diplomacy are closed a bridge too close to war is only open.
Further, Daalder and Gordon seem to be ill-equipped for the art of diplomacy since apparently aren’t aware of some of its cardinal principles. Once one has made strongly clear to his opponent one’s position that the diplomatic avenue can only be opened on meeting certain preconditions to back down from this initial stand is to irretrievably weaken one’s position in the diplomatic stakes as one would give the perception to his adversary that one enters the negotiations with cap in hand. The military analyst Francois Heisbourg of the International Institute for Strategic Studies comments drily that “dropping a unanimous Security Council condition (stop enriching uranium) would simply be interpreted by Iran and American allies as unconditional surrender”. (M.E.)
Do the two advisers to Barack Obama consider that by such “surrender” in the diplomatic field the U.S. would have a chance to achieve by talks the latter’s primary goal, i.e., to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear arsenal? Moreover, such advocacy for diplomacy rests on the assumption that the present Iranian leadership under Ahmadinejad is a rational actor, and its participation in such negotiations would be well-grounded in its hope to resolve the problems confronting the two parties in a reasonable manner. Such assumption however is contrary to all the evidence as the long-bearded Mullahcracy of Iran continues to load its inter-state relations and actions with the afflatus of millenarianism. This is illustrated both by its annihilation stand against Israel and its apocalyptic confrontation with the West and the Great Satan America. In such a situation for anyone to advocate the wiles of conventional diplomacy as our "best option" that would accomplish a benign turning point in the relations between the American-European condominium and Iran is to have one’s head in the clouds.
I rest on my oars: Your turn now
By Con George-Kotzabasis
A response to:
Talking to Iran is our Best Option
By Ivo Daalder and Phillip Gordon of the Brookings Institution, and advisers to Barack Obama
Washington Post, June 29, 2008
We cannot tolerate the survival of a political system which has both the increasing capacity and the inexorable desire to destroy us. We have no other option but to adopt the strategy of Cato. (Delenda est Carthago)
Raymond Aron
Ivo Daalder and Phillip Gordon, the two savants of the Brookings Institution, have a brief to advise Barack Obama to start “talking to Iran without preconditions”, but they should not allowed to do so at the grief of America’s national interests and the security of the civilized world. The rationale of such advocacy is based in “rescuing a failed policy” of not talking to Iran for 7 ½ years that has made the latter, according to our two analysts, stronger and therefore more intransigent toward American and European demands encapsulated in the precondition that Iran suspends its nuclear enrichment program before any commencement of negotiations between the opposing parties. Further they claim that such diplomatic overture by the U.S. would enable the latter to “test that proposition” of the Iranians, that they “seek only the peaceful use of nuclear energy and the right to nuclear technology”.
It’s almost beyond belief that Daalder and Gordon would be proud to present themselves as the enfants terribles on the stage of diplomacy and in the art of Talleyrand, as their suggestion to “test” this dissembling proposition of Iran behind which is attempting to build its nuclear arsenal, is terribly infantile and politically doltish. It’s like a law officer testing a professional thief whether he has stolen the goods of a house by asking him to show him the master key that has opened the door of the house.
As for their claim that for the last 7 ½ years there have not been any talks with Iran is completely in opposition to the facts. The Europeans, and many of them enunciating and voicing the proposals of their American “ventriloquist”, have been speaking with the Iranians openly as well as sotto voce for a number of years. And have put their own, and indirectly American, proposals before them to no avail. Indeed, Daalder and Gordon concede this by saying that “all of them… [The Europeans] repeatedly presented Iran with a list of benefits Iran would receive if it suspended enrichment”. The latest truckload of carrots were transported to Tehran by Javier Solama, European Foreign Policy Chief few weeks ago only to be turned over and rejected by Iran’s unappeasable Mullahcracy. And this rejection was sealed when Gholam Hossein Elham, a spokesman of the government said that Iran would not comply with Security Council resolutions requiring it to stop enriching uranium.
It’s incomprehensible that Daalder and Gordon do not realize that Iran is undeviating in its goal and determination to acquire nuclear weapons as the latter is the sine qua non of Iran’s leadership of the Muslim people and the implementation of the religious doctrine of the Ninth Mahdi, i.e., the creation of a new world order under the Holy Crescent of Islam. This theological doctrinal lunge for power by Iran cannot be stopped by the humdrum conventional instruments of diplomacy, as the two analysts suggest, but only by diplomacy in the carapace of a bristling hedgehog. And such diplomacy can only be effective by setting certain preconditions at the outset before talks can begin. In the event that such preconditions are unacceptable by the Iranian regime, as presently is the case, then the latter must unambiguously understand that since all roads to diplomacy are closed a bridge too close to war is only open.
Further, Daalder and Gordon seem to be ill-equipped for the art of diplomacy since apparently aren’t aware of some of its cardinal principles. Once one has made strongly clear to his opponent one’s position that the diplomatic avenue can only be opened on meeting certain preconditions to back down from this initial stand is to irretrievably weaken one’s position in the diplomatic stakes as one would give the perception to his adversary that one enters the negotiations with cap in hand. The military analyst Francois Heisbourg of the International Institute for Strategic Studies comments drily that “dropping a unanimous Security Council condition (stop enriching uranium) would simply be interpreted by Iran and American allies as unconditional surrender”. (M.E.)
Do the two advisers to Barack Obama consider that by such “surrender” in the diplomatic field the U.S. would have a chance to achieve by talks the latter’s primary goal, i.e., to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear arsenal? Moreover, such advocacy for diplomacy rests on the assumption that the present Iranian leadership under Ahmadinejad is a rational actor, and its participation in such negotiations would be well-grounded in its hope to resolve the problems confronting the two parties in a reasonable manner. Such assumption however is contrary to all the evidence as the long-bearded Mullahcracy of Iran continues to load its inter-state relations and actions with the afflatus of millenarianism. This is illustrated both by its annihilation stand against Israel and its apocalyptic confrontation with the West and the Great Satan America. In such a situation for anyone to advocate the wiles of conventional diplomacy as our "best option" that would accomplish a benign turning point in the relations between the American-European condominium and Iran is to have one’s head in the clouds.
I rest on my oars: Your turn now
Thursday, June 26, 2008
SHOOTING DOWN LATHAM'S FLIGHTS OF FOLLY
The following essay was written on December, 2003, in the midst of the electoral campaign when Mark Latham was close to dislodging John Howard from the Canberra Lodge. The essay was first published in my book titled, Unveiling the War against Terror: Fight Right War or Lose the Right to Exist, on May 9, 2004, in Melbourne.
By Con George-Kotzabasis
Mark Latham is reputed to be a man of ideas. But his ideas on the war against global terror and on Iraq, as described in his article titled, 'Reversing Australia's March of Folly,' Published in the summer issue of Defender, the journal of the Australian Defense Association, are not flying with the solid balanced wings of an eagle, but with the undulating flaps of a kite threatening to take a dangerous dive.
He fires his grapeshot against America's foreign policy, not as a result of a thoughtful strategy that would replace the presumed flawed strategy of the Americans, but as a result of the reception President Bush was given in Britain, that is, by the fervent mass demonstrations against him. Hence, the cool man of ideas deduces the flawed strategy of Bush, from this emotional heap of burning hate against America, fuelled by a politically variegated throng of old and born again socialists, communists, and anarchists, followed by the ever present caravanserai of fellow-travelers.
Could it be conceivable that Latham, the driest of economists in Labor's ranks, and an unflappable supporter of the free market and free trade, would get his afflatus, divine inspiration, for his stand against the Bush administration, from this politically and historically witless throng of anti-war protestors? Or is this a gig of a consummate dissembler, with the aim to ingratiate himself with this populist bouleversement against the U.S., and with the purpose of augmenting the value of his political stocks?
It is shown pellucidly by his own actions, although this time by the volte face of his former position, since his elevation as leader, that the latter is the leitmotif of all his outrageous and politically senseless statements, such as Bush being 'the most incompetent and dangerous President in living memory' ( If he is consistent with his own logic, then Tony Blair would also be included in this category. ), or that he would not share Australian intelligence with the U.S. Administration, - with whom would he share it, with al Qaeda? More "seriously", with the "Rainbow warriors" of the French But this poseur as keeper of the high principles of the Labor Party and of Curtin, from whom Latham proudly claims to have derived his ideological heritage, is already exposing the great fraud he is, as well as the treachery of his nature. And it will be revealed by his own actions in the near future, if not already, that the leader of the Opposition is not a man of unshakeable principles, but a political chameleon. In his insatiable greed and grab for power, he will abandon and cut adrift all his principal stands, as he is doing already, in the area of foreign policy and in his relations with the U.S. and the war in Iraq, hence proving himself to be a Shylock opportunist. He will do anything to get his pound of flesh in the leadership stakes, this time backstabbing his own principles, unlike when as mayor of Liverpool he was stabbing his colleagues' backs - but he will no longer need to do the latter, since he already rode on the obtuse-donkey backs of those who voted him in as leader.
The above is confirmed by at least two people who knew him well. The first one is a former colleague who was close to him during Latham's tenure as mayor of Liverpool. He said of him, after he called him a bastard that it's all very well for Latham to talk about climbing ladders, but he doesn't say anything about the number of backs he stabbed during his climbing. The second one is his former wife, who stated that Latham would use anyone, including his children, if this would 'enhance his public image'. And Latham himself revealed this sinister trait of using anything that would advantage his position, in his first and dramatic press conference. And in the latter I would aver, symbolically uncovered an even more sordid trait, that of the "political pimp". Flanked on his right by Kevin Rudd, another vehement and populist critic of American foreign policy, although presently with less hardened edges than his criticism had been in the past, and on his "left", by the backdrop of the stars and stripes - which only a few months before when he wrote the above- named article criticizing America, had considered "politically" to be the clothes and colors of a 'skanky ho' , to use his term for a filthy whore from another context ( This is no hyperbole. If he can describe a female journalist who criticized him as a skanky ho, why can't he describe likewise, the U.S. government which is killing women and children, as an administration of ill-repute? ). Nonetheless, he promoted his new self as a supporter of the U.S. alliance "huddled" in these clothes and colors. And with the sangfroid of a political shyster, he gave his reasons for his apostasy from his former principal stand against U.S. foreign policy, whose goal, to quote him, ‘of regime change was killing women and children in Iraq'. The magnitude of this treachery can only be explained not in his stars but in himself...
But let us revert to his article in Defender ‘...March of Folly’, which he also repudiated since his elevation as leader, claiming that when he wrote it he was not fully informed. Such admission however, has profound implications to the leadership of the nation, if he happened to be elected as the next prime minister. That on such a vital issue as national security, he launched his attack against the U.S. and criticized the Howard government, from a state of ignorance. And this ignorance is deeper and more extensive. While he was still fulminating against Bush's war on Iraq, the prestigious American magazine Weekly Standard had published a leaked memorandum written by the third in command of the Pentagon, Undersecretary Douglas Feith, which was presented to Congress, identifying 51 cases of contact between Iraqi intelligence and key and top figures of al Qaeda. Iraq not only had trained terrorists of bin Laden, but also in some cases financed his operations. The editors of the magazine designated the evidence of the memorandum as 'case closed', in regard to the links of Saddam’s regime and al Qaeda.
In view that this information was available, how is it possible that the latter was not in the pending tray of Latham's desk? And if it was, why did it not influence by a modicum his thoughts on the subject of the war? How such an insouciant, heedless and flippant attitude on his part, on such a most important issue, can vouch his credentials to be the next prime minister of this country? Latham has an imprudent tendency to brush off and dismiss events of the past, as water under the bridge, and is wont to talk about the future. He is apparently unaware, that what has happened in the past, especially for politicians, can irreversibly compromise one's future. And this unawareness reveals the caliber of his thinking.
As far as the gist of his argument about global terror, he is depressingly uninspiring and backward in his strategic thinking of how to fight terrorism and whom to have as major and steadfast allies against this great threat to the nation and to the world. He opines that Australia should fight terrorists and not states. The war on Iraq, seems to him to be a serious diversion from fighting terrorists, and weakens a country's ability of fighting them effectively. He believes and argues, that Australia should redirect its strategy and concentrate its forces in the region, 'cleaning out terrorist networks in South-East Asia' and protecting the home front from attacks. But Muslim fanatic terrorism has global dimensions, and you cannot confine it and compartmentalize it in regional ones. By definition it's a global war and one must fight it on a global terrain.
The terrorist’s attacks in Bali, Nairobi, Riyadh, and Istanbul, may have been perpetrated by local terrorists, but they were sired, fomented, and financed from outside these countries, from the global networks of al Qaeda or its affiliate bodies. That is why it's a stupendous strategic folly to believe, as Latham does, that Australia should deploy its forces only in the region. If the protection of Australia is to be genuine and effective and not a dud, then Australia must deploy its forces not only in the region, but deploy them as well, in combination with the forces of its allies, against the mobile centers of terrorism, wherever they are, as well as against the states that support them. It's a war on two fronts, as I've been arguing for two years now. The U.S. attack on Iraq was a quintessential part of this strategy. Moreover, one has to realize, that the only country in the world that can fight and defeat global terror, is America. Countries, such as Australia, therefore, those that are targeted by this lethal foe and are serious in protecting themselves from this mortal enemy, have no other option but to ally themselves to the U.S. with the unbreakable chains of destiny.
It's the ultimate mindlessness, to denigrate and downgrade this alliance, in these most critical times, as Latham did by his intemperate and politically stolid and banal statements against the Bush administration. But such thoughtless statements reveal that Latham's tongue is on a faster track than his mental processes. It's the typical characteristic of intellectual pretenders, and of people who crave to be impressionistic. Statesmen measure their words and they're never loose cannons. It's obvious however, that with the ascension of Latham as leader of the Opposition, verbal glibness and mental flippancy will be the occupants of the leadership of the ALP. Furthermore, it's most unwise to denounce the stand of the U.S. and its war against Iraq, because mistakes and errors have been made by the planners of its strategy. In all wars errors have been made and one must not cover them up, but on the contrary, one must criticize them constructively. No less a figure than Churchill, who was the major strategic planner of the failed Gallipoli campaign, made an error, not to mention others in the First World War. But can one reasonably rebuke the alliance and its war against Germany because of these mistakes?
Tony Blair as a statesman, identified with wisdom and historical insight that the greatest threat of the twenty-first century is this 'emerging nexus of terrorists and rogue states’. That is why with acumen and courage he took a head-dive against the current of public opinion against the war. His Labor leadership caricatures here in Australia, of Crean, Rudd, and Latham, had neither the wisdom nor the courage to do the same and cowardly refused to swim against the tide of populist opinion. But they are fated to be the subject of political cartoonists and not the subject of historians on statesmanship.
History will aver and judge, Bush's, Blair's, and Howard's stand as an historic stand against this necrophilous rush of fanatic barbarians at the gate of universal freedom. Latham, as a fugitive from this historic stand, is totally unfit to lead the nation at these critical times. The Australian public must not allow themselves to be conned and be used by this treacherous political chameleon.
I rest on my oars: Your turn now
The following essay was written on December, 2003, in the midst of the electoral campaign when Mark Latham was close to dislodging John Howard from the Canberra Lodge. The essay was first published in my book titled, Unveiling the War against Terror: Fight Right War or Lose the Right to Exist, on May 9, 2004, in Melbourne.
By Con George-Kotzabasis
Mark Latham is reputed to be a man of ideas. But his ideas on the war against global terror and on Iraq, as described in his article titled, 'Reversing Australia's March of Folly,' Published in the summer issue of Defender, the journal of the Australian Defense Association, are not flying with the solid balanced wings of an eagle, but with the undulating flaps of a kite threatening to take a dangerous dive.
He fires his grapeshot against America's foreign policy, not as a result of a thoughtful strategy that would replace the presumed flawed strategy of the Americans, but as a result of the reception President Bush was given in Britain, that is, by the fervent mass demonstrations against him. Hence, the cool man of ideas deduces the flawed strategy of Bush, from this emotional heap of burning hate against America, fuelled by a politically variegated throng of old and born again socialists, communists, and anarchists, followed by the ever present caravanserai of fellow-travelers.
Could it be conceivable that Latham, the driest of economists in Labor's ranks, and an unflappable supporter of the free market and free trade, would get his afflatus, divine inspiration, for his stand against the Bush administration, from this politically and historically witless throng of anti-war protestors? Or is this a gig of a consummate dissembler, with the aim to ingratiate himself with this populist bouleversement against the U.S., and with the purpose of augmenting the value of his political stocks?
It is shown pellucidly by his own actions, although this time by the volte face of his former position, since his elevation as leader, that the latter is the leitmotif of all his outrageous and politically senseless statements, such as Bush being 'the most incompetent and dangerous President in living memory' ( If he is consistent with his own logic, then Tony Blair would also be included in this category. ), or that he would not share Australian intelligence with the U.S. Administration, - with whom would he share it, with al Qaeda? More "seriously", with the "Rainbow warriors" of the French But this poseur as keeper of the high principles of the Labor Party and of Curtin, from whom Latham proudly claims to have derived his ideological heritage, is already exposing the great fraud he is, as well as the treachery of his nature. And it will be revealed by his own actions in the near future, if not already, that the leader of the Opposition is not a man of unshakeable principles, but a political chameleon. In his insatiable greed and grab for power, he will abandon and cut adrift all his principal stands, as he is doing already, in the area of foreign policy and in his relations with the U.S. and the war in Iraq, hence proving himself to be a Shylock opportunist. He will do anything to get his pound of flesh in the leadership stakes, this time backstabbing his own principles, unlike when as mayor of Liverpool he was stabbing his colleagues' backs - but he will no longer need to do the latter, since he already rode on the obtuse-donkey backs of those who voted him in as leader.
The above is confirmed by at least two people who knew him well. The first one is a former colleague who was close to him during Latham's tenure as mayor of Liverpool. He said of him, after he called him a bastard that it's all very well for Latham to talk about climbing ladders, but he doesn't say anything about the number of backs he stabbed during his climbing. The second one is his former wife, who stated that Latham would use anyone, including his children, if this would 'enhance his public image'. And Latham himself revealed this sinister trait of using anything that would advantage his position, in his first and dramatic press conference. And in the latter I would aver, symbolically uncovered an even more sordid trait, that of the "political pimp". Flanked on his right by Kevin Rudd, another vehement and populist critic of American foreign policy, although presently with less hardened edges than his criticism had been in the past, and on his "left", by the backdrop of the stars and stripes - which only a few months before when he wrote the above- named article criticizing America, had considered "politically" to be the clothes and colors of a 'skanky ho' , to use his term for a filthy whore from another context ( This is no hyperbole. If he can describe a female journalist who criticized him as a skanky ho, why can't he describe likewise, the U.S. government which is killing women and children, as an administration of ill-repute? ). Nonetheless, he promoted his new self as a supporter of the U.S. alliance "huddled" in these clothes and colors. And with the sangfroid of a political shyster, he gave his reasons for his apostasy from his former principal stand against U.S. foreign policy, whose goal, to quote him, ‘of regime change was killing women and children in Iraq'. The magnitude of this treachery can only be explained not in his stars but in himself...
But let us revert to his article in Defender ‘...March of Folly’, which he also repudiated since his elevation as leader, claiming that when he wrote it he was not fully informed. Such admission however, has profound implications to the leadership of the nation, if he happened to be elected as the next prime minister. That on such a vital issue as national security, he launched his attack against the U.S. and criticized the Howard government, from a state of ignorance. And this ignorance is deeper and more extensive. While he was still fulminating against Bush's war on Iraq, the prestigious American magazine Weekly Standard had published a leaked memorandum written by the third in command of the Pentagon, Undersecretary Douglas Feith, which was presented to Congress, identifying 51 cases of contact between Iraqi intelligence and key and top figures of al Qaeda. Iraq not only had trained terrorists of bin Laden, but also in some cases financed his operations. The editors of the magazine designated the evidence of the memorandum as 'case closed', in regard to the links of Saddam’s regime and al Qaeda.
In view that this information was available, how is it possible that the latter was not in the pending tray of Latham's desk? And if it was, why did it not influence by a modicum his thoughts on the subject of the war? How such an insouciant, heedless and flippant attitude on his part, on such a most important issue, can vouch his credentials to be the next prime minister of this country? Latham has an imprudent tendency to brush off and dismiss events of the past, as water under the bridge, and is wont to talk about the future. He is apparently unaware, that what has happened in the past, especially for politicians, can irreversibly compromise one's future. And this unawareness reveals the caliber of his thinking.
As far as the gist of his argument about global terror, he is depressingly uninspiring and backward in his strategic thinking of how to fight terrorism and whom to have as major and steadfast allies against this great threat to the nation and to the world. He opines that Australia should fight terrorists and not states. The war on Iraq, seems to him to be a serious diversion from fighting terrorists, and weakens a country's ability of fighting them effectively. He believes and argues, that Australia should redirect its strategy and concentrate its forces in the region, 'cleaning out terrorist networks in South-East Asia' and protecting the home front from attacks. But Muslim fanatic terrorism has global dimensions, and you cannot confine it and compartmentalize it in regional ones. By definition it's a global war and one must fight it on a global terrain.
The terrorist’s attacks in Bali, Nairobi, Riyadh, and Istanbul, may have been perpetrated by local terrorists, but they were sired, fomented, and financed from outside these countries, from the global networks of al Qaeda or its affiliate bodies. That is why it's a stupendous strategic folly to believe, as Latham does, that Australia should deploy its forces only in the region. If the protection of Australia is to be genuine and effective and not a dud, then Australia must deploy its forces not only in the region, but deploy them as well, in combination with the forces of its allies, against the mobile centers of terrorism, wherever they are, as well as against the states that support them. It's a war on two fronts, as I've been arguing for two years now. The U.S. attack on Iraq was a quintessential part of this strategy. Moreover, one has to realize, that the only country in the world that can fight and defeat global terror, is America. Countries, such as Australia, therefore, those that are targeted by this lethal foe and are serious in protecting themselves from this mortal enemy, have no other option but to ally themselves to the U.S. with the unbreakable chains of destiny.
It's the ultimate mindlessness, to denigrate and downgrade this alliance, in these most critical times, as Latham did by his intemperate and politically stolid and banal statements against the Bush administration. But such thoughtless statements reveal that Latham's tongue is on a faster track than his mental processes. It's the typical characteristic of intellectual pretenders, and of people who crave to be impressionistic. Statesmen measure their words and they're never loose cannons. It's obvious however, that with the ascension of Latham as leader of the Opposition, verbal glibness and mental flippancy will be the occupants of the leadership of the ALP. Furthermore, it's most unwise to denounce the stand of the U.S. and its war against Iraq, because mistakes and errors have been made by the planners of its strategy. In all wars errors have been made and one must not cover them up, but on the contrary, one must criticize them constructively. No less a figure than Churchill, who was the major strategic planner of the failed Gallipoli campaign, made an error, not to mention others in the First World War. But can one reasonably rebuke the alliance and its war against Germany because of these mistakes?
Tony Blair as a statesman, identified with wisdom and historical insight that the greatest threat of the twenty-first century is this 'emerging nexus of terrorists and rogue states’. That is why with acumen and courage he took a head-dive against the current of public opinion against the war. His Labor leadership caricatures here in Australia, of Crean, Rudd, and Latham, had neither the wisdom nor the courage to do the same and cowardly refused to swim against the tide of populist opinion. But they are fated to be the subject of political cartoonists and not the subject of historians on statesmanship.
History will aver and judge, Bush's, Blair's, and Howard's stand as an historic stand against this necrophilous rush of fanatic barbarians at the gate of universal freedom. Latham, as a fugitive from this historic stand, is totally unfit to lead the nation at these critical times. The Australian public must not allow themselves to be conned and be used by this treacherous political chameleon.
I rest on my oars: Your turn now
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Who Has the Right to Declare War?
Reply by Con George-Kotzabasis to:
Now to Say Never Again
By George Williams
On Line Opinion June 18, 2008
Professor Williams with the typical lawyer’s chicanery and the arrogance of historical and political ignorance argues that Parliamentary approval should be the prerequisite for the declaration of war. To do so however is to deprive the sagacious right of statesmen to make the decision for war and give it instead to the “swirl”, to use Paul Keating’s word describing his colleagues in the Senate, of mediocre politicians.
War being an instrument of last resort is not made by a lightly populist decision, as Williams implies, but by a well –informed resolute and wise leadership that leads its people to war as an absolute necessity when a nation is threatened or attacked by a deadly irreconcilable enemy.
Williams’ proposal is neither intellectually and historically wise, nor does it have the depth, prudence, and firmness of statesmanship. It’s instead the proposal of an unreconstructed political wimp pontificating from his left-leaning academic chair and echoing the constant refrain of the illusionist pacifists of No to War, as if the world was and is a loving circle of holding hands.
Your opinion...
Reply by Con George-Kotzabasis to:
Now to Say Never Again
By George Williams
On Line Opinion June 18, 2008
Professor Williams with the typical lawyer’s chicanery and the arrogance of historical and political ignorance argues that Parliamentary approval should be the prerequisite for the declaration of war. To do so however is to deprive the sagacious right of statesmen to make the decision for war and give it instead to the “swirl”, to use Paul Keating’s word describing his colleagues in the Senate, of mediocre politicians.
War being an instrument of last resort is not made by a lightly populist decision, as Williams implies, but by a well –informed resolute and wise leadership that leads its people to war as an absolute necessity when a nation is threatened or attacked by a deadly irreconcilable enemy.
Williams’ proposal is neither intellectually and historically wise, nor does it have the depth, prudence, and firmness of statesmanship. It’s instead the proposal of an unreconstructed political wimp pontificating from his left-leaning academic chair and echoing the constant refrain of the illusionist pacifists of No to War, as if the world was and is a loving circle of holding hands.
Your opinion...
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Scorpion of Racism Running with Raised Fangs to Sting Obama
A short reply by Con George-Kotzabasis to:
Paul Krugman: It’s a Different Country
Race has become less important in American politics, argues Krugman.
Economist’s View, June 09,2008 http://economistsview.typepad.com/
In the normal circumstances of the last few years in America “racial division” may have “lost much of its sting”, to quote Krugman, by burrowing itself in a hibernating state. But with the nomination of Obama as the Democratic candidate America is no longer in its benign state of normalcy--with the war in Iraq, with economic recession and rising unemployment--and racism will be rising from the slumbers of its hibernating habitat. As Nietzsche has said in another context, the true character of a person is revealed in critical circumstances. Likewise, the true character of a society is also exposed in critical circumstances. This is no longer the case that blacks are moving into a white neighborhood but of a black man moving into the White House. It’s this critical issue that will make the scorpion of racism to raise its fangs and sting Obama.
My prediction is that the white backlash and its auxiliaries, the Latinos and the Asian-Americans, will squash Obama’s ambition to ensconce himself into the Oval Office. America at this stage is not ready to have a black president, especially of one who carries the arrogant public onstentatiousness and spiritual baggage of Jeremiah Wright.
Your opinion
A short reply by Con George-Kotzabasis to:
Paul Krugman: It’s a Different Country
Race has become less important in American politics, argues Krugman.
Economist’s View, June 09,2008 http://economistsview.typepad.com/
In the normal circumstances of the last few years in America “racial division” may have “lost much of its sting”, to quote Krugman, by burrowing itself in a hibernating state. But with the nomination of Obama as the Democratic candidate America is no longer in its benign state of normalcy--with the war in Iraq, with economic recession and rising unemployment--and racism will be rising from the slumbers of its hibernating habitat. As Nietzsche has said in another context, the true character of a person is revealed in critical circumstances. Likewise, the true character of a society is also exposed in critical circumstances. This is no longer the case that blacks are moving into a white neighborhood but of a black man moving into the White House. It’s this critical issue that will make the scorpion of racism to raise its fangs and sting Obama.
My prediction is that the white backlash and its auxiliaries, the Latinos and the Asian-Americans, will squash Obama’s ambition to ensconce himself into the Oval Office. America at this stage is not ready to have a black president, especially of one who carries the arrogant public onstentatiousness and spiritual baggage of Jeremiah Wright.
Your opinion
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