There are more things in heaven and earth, Mr. MacEachern, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. With apologies to William Shakespeare

 

A Note to the Reader

To be honest, I was not comfortable writing what I wrote. The problem is that in today's world, that is what it takes to get anyone's attention. I have discussed these issues in reasoned tones for years, and succeeded in engaging the attention of few other than colleagues. During that time I have seen the Doug MacEachern's and Karl Roves and Swift Boat Veterans of the world command extraordinary amounts of attention, simply by virtue of their willingness to adopt "in your face" tactics. So I thought I would give it a try. Sure enough, two provocative lines about Colin Powell, and I succeeded at least in stimulating some lively discussion.

In a world dominated by right wing hacks, I suppose that I'm willing to step up to the plate and go face to face with them if that is what it takes. Will it do any good? I honestly don't know. But the tone and content of the current political dialogue is so far gone that it is difficult to imagine that I will do any harm.

It is not the way that I would have preferred to do it, but then I don't make the rules.

Jeff Hester

Original response to Doug MacEachern

When Doug MacEachern e-mailed me two weeks ago concerning a short submission I had made to the Arizona Republic editorial page, I took his questions about my position at face value, and answered them honestly. My response to Mr. MacEachern was sent the day after I received his e-mail, before I knew that he was writing an editorial. Here is an edited version of my e-mail. I have two reasons for posting this:

1. To belie Mr. MacEachern's claim that I had nothing to say to his e-mail concerning my comment about Colin Powell. Had Mr. MacEachern truly been interested in my response to his question, he would have given me at least a few days to respond. (He himself took three days to respond to my original submission to the Republic editorial page.) But he was not interested in my answer to his question. Rather, he simply wanted to be able to assert in his editorial that I had no response.
   
2. To stimulate discussion. To that end, I have included additional supporting information below.

Relevant links:

Mr. MacEachern's 11/21/04 editorial, "Don't know nothin' 'bout birthin' no stereotypes," written in response to my comment about Colin Powell.

My 12/5/04 editorial, "Powell an 'Uncle Tom'", written in response to MacEachern's editorial.

Respond to my editorial

Send me e-mail at: response@eagle.la.asu.edu

I'm interested in reading what you have to say, and reserve the right to post any responses that I receive. However, I make no promise that I will answer your e-mail.

Supporting Information

The following provides additional information and reference material supporting statements made in my published editorial and unpublished response to Mr. MacEachern. Topics include The Project for the New American Century, media issues, Powell's historical positions, Uncle Tom as a metaphor, and Related Topics such as the new McCarthyism.

 

• The Project for the New American Century

In my article I state that the Bush administration used 9/11 as political cover for a war that they had been calling for since 1992. The Project for the New American Century is the principle policy group for this group, who call themselves "neoconservatives." Their stated goal is U.S. world domination by means of application of military force. At first glance this sounds like an extreme claim, and it would be were it not so well documented, especially by the writings of the group itself. Here are a few relevant links:

• This is a good introduction to the issues from Jay Bookman, an editorial page editor for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The article dates from before the war in Iraq.
  
• www.pnac.info provides a compilation of information exposing the PNAC and its agenda.
  
• The most direct source of information about the PNAC is their own website. Among the most significant of the articles posted there is the September 2000 report which became, almost verbatim, what is often referred to as the "Bush doctrine," which includes such elements as preemptive warfare. Quoting the September 2000 PNAC report:
  
  "The United States has for decades sought to play a more permanent role in Gulf regional security. While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein."

  The document provides a "blueprint for maintaining global US preeminence, precluding the rise of a great power rival, and shaping the international security order in line with American principles and interests. This American grand strategy must be advanced as far into the future as possible."

  The plan describes the U.S. military as "the cavalry on the new American frontier," going on to state that the "new American frontier is wherever our government says it is."

  It also states that a "core mission" of this program is for the U.S. to "fight and decisively win multiple, simultaneous major theatre wars."

  The report goes on to state: "New methods of attack -- electronic, biological -- will be more widely available ... combat likely will take place in new dimensions, in space, cyberspace, and perhaps the world of microbes ... advanced forms of biological warfare that can 'target' specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool."

  Tam Dalyell, father of the House of Commons in the UK, and one of the leading British voices against war with Iraq, said: "This is garbage from right-wing think-tanks stuffed with chicken-hawks -- men who have never seen the horror of war but are in love with the idea of war. Men like Cheney, who were draft-dodgers in the Vietnam War. This is a blueprint for US world domination -- a new world order of their making. These are the thought processes of fantasist Americans who want to control the world. I am appalled that a British Labour Prime Minister should have got into bed with a crew which has this moral standing."

• The list of founding members of the PNAC includes Vice President Cheney, his Chief of Staff Lewis Libby, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, his Deputy Paul Wolfowitz, and the President's brother, Jeb Bush, to name a few.
  
• PBS Frontline did a program on the evolution of the Bush doctrine.
  
• In the spring of 2003, as we were just entering the war, I engaged in an on-line discussion with my introductory astronomy class about the application of the scientific mode of thought to the question of war. Two postings from that discussion include "A Logical Analysis of the Motivations for War in Iraq," and "More on the Root Causes of the War." I post them here as evidence that most of the recent "revelations" about shortcomings in the administration's case for war (e.g., no WMDs, no links to Al Qaeda, etc.) were not "revelations" at all. They were both knowable and known before we ever invaded Iraq.

• How can it be that you didn't know about this?

How can it be that the Bush administration's clearly and publicly stated agenda behind the invasion of Iraq has been largely ignored by media outlets such as the Arizona Republic? The answer is left as an exercise for the reader. The Media Reform Information Center is a good place to start researching the question.

This is part of a much larger and very important question. Quoting from Bill Moyers' 2003 keynote address to the National Conference on Media Reform:

"[W]hat we’re talking about is nothing less than rescuing a democracy that is so polarized it is in danger of being paralyzed and pulverized.

Alarming words, I know. But the realities we face should trigger alarms. Free and responsible government by popular consent just can’t exist without an informed public."

But the biggest reason you probably didn't know about the PNAC is because you rely on outlets such as the Arizona Republic for your news. Given the wealth of information available on-line, there is no excuse for this. Among my personal morning stops:

• The New York Times on-line. The service is free.
• The Carpetbagger Report. Yes, this is partisan. It is just partisan in a different direction than most of what you run across these days, especially in Arizona. But The Carpetbagger Report is usually cogent, and always provides a heads-up on relevant developments that you can follow up on by typing a few keywords into Google's New Search service.
• First Read is a daily memo from the NBC News political desk.
• Not surprisingly, the Wall Street Journal is a pay service. It is also decidedly conservative. (Make a point to read reasonable sources from all sides of the political spectrum.)
• The Washington Post on-line.
• There is a world out there beyond our borders. The British Guardian is a place to start.

So don't waste your time reading the Arizona Republic's editorial page or reading local coverage of national and international news. Instead, skim the Republic for local news, then spend half an hour or so on-line reading diverse news sources over a cup of coffee and a slice of toast. The world will be yours, and you'll find that you have all sorts of interesting things to add to the conversation around the water cooler that the gang from the office doesn't know about!

You can even build yourself a comics page to your own liking.

And whatever you do, never ever ever under any circumstances watch Fox News, or anything else that Rupert Murdoch has anything to do with. It will melt your brain, and you will soon find yourself walking around like a zombie, arms extended, mumbling in a monotone "War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength...". (If you don't know what I'm talking about, pick up a copy of OutFoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism and give it a watch.)

• Powell's Longstanding Opposition to Invastion of Iraq

Powell is well-known for the "Powell Doctrine" concerning use of military force.

The G.Q. article Casualty of War presents an insightful portrait of Powell based on interviews with Powell and his staff. The tag line for the article reads:

Four years into an embattled Bush administration, Colin Powell is hard at work at something he's never had to worry about before: salvaging his legacy.

Powell, along with then-President George H. W. Bush specifically chose not to use military force to overthrow Saddam Hussein in 1993. The reasons were outlined by George H. W. Bush in a speech at the 8th anniversary Operation Desert Storm. The following is from the U.S. Army Public Affairs account of this speech.

Former President George Bush took the opportunity at the "8th Annual Reunion of Our Victory in the Desert" Feb. 28 to explain his reason for stopping Operation Desert Storm after 100 hours.

Bush said he didn't get into the business of second-guessing his military commanders when they told him the mission was complete.

Bush said that within 30 seconds [Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Colin] Powell had Schwarzkopf on the phone assuring him that the mission had been accomplished.

"Whose life would be on my hands as the commander-in-chief because I, unilaterally, went beyond the international law, went beyond the stated mission, and said we're going to show our macho?" he asked. "We're going into Baghdad. We're going to be an occupying power -- America in an Arab land -- with no allies at our side. It would have been disastrous."

Bush said, "We don't gain the size of our victory by how many innocent kids running away -- even though they're bad guys -- that we can slaughter. ... We're American soldiers; we don't do business that way."

Powell maintained this position following Desert Storm. Of note is a press conference on February 24, 2001 with now Secretary of State Powell and Egyptian foreign minister Amr Moussa. This press conference is interesting for several reasons, including Powell's direct (and correct) statement that Iraq had no significant WMDs and posed no threat:

"...the sanctions [against Iraq] exist ... for the purpose of keeping in check Saddam Hussein's ambitions toward developing weapons of mass destruction. ... And frankly they have worked. He has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors."

• Uncle Tom as a metaphor

In my article I invoke "Uncle Tom" as more than a trivial symbol of a subservient Black man, but also as a metaphor for much deeper divisions in the nation. Read a bit about Harriet Beecher Stowe's work then judge for yourself whether my use was appropriate.

I draw parallels between racism and current attitudes toward homosexuality. Relevant readings include "Why the Ugly Rhetoric Against Gay Marriage Is Familiar to this Historian of Miscegenation" by Peggy Pascoe, PhD, and "Mix and match" by Nicholas Kristof.

• Related Issues

The New McCarthyism.

The Southern Strategy.

Loyalty oaths and free speech zones.

An overview of the "Right" from PublicEye.org.

The Lancet study, estimating 100,000 Iraqi civilian casualties caused by the U.S. invasion.

Roughly 250,000 tons of Iraqi munitions are unaccounted for. Many of these munitions, left unguarded by U.S. forces, are presumably now in the hands of insurgents and terrorists.

Do we have a draft? Ask Luis Trevino.

If you got this far, you might be ready for The Blatant Truth.

The American Heritage Dictionary defines "demagogue" as "A leader who obtains power by means of impassioned appeals to the emotions and prejudices of the populace." This description fits our current President so precisely that the dictionary should add "See Bush, George W." to its definition.

This could go on ad naseum. Most sentences in the piece published in the Republic or my more extensive response to Mr. MacEachern could be the subject of pages of references and discussion. In particular, I have not elaborated at length on the hypocrisies of the "Religious Right," since it would take months to do justice to the topic. The United States, along with electric lights, airplanes, and the internet are all descendants of The Enlightenment. It would be a nice thing to keep going for a while longer...

I will finish with a link to A Field Guide to Critical Thinking. Read it!

Jeff Hester

http://eagle.la.asu.edu/hester