Higgly
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Posts posted by Higgly
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I do get a chuckle out of many of the leftist Canadians here who support the Democrats in the US. The Democrats are much further to the right than they would hope. A lot of CPC supporters here would be much more comfortable with the Democrats than with the Republicans.
You speak the truth. The US is a lot more right-shifted than we are.
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Nukes should be off the table. If one sees nuclear weapons as a defensive weapon, then why even complain when countries like Iran, North Korea (another example is India/Pakistan) develope nuclear weapons for self defence and to act as a deterrent from being attacked?
You are absolutely right. Again, I reference the PBS broadcast interview with Robert McNamara. He was Kennedy's Secretary of Defense; his final analysis of the Cuban Missile crisis was that we only escaped Armageddon by the narrowest margin of luck. I can't remember the exact wording, but McNamara related how he asked (I think Andrei Gromyko) whether the Russians had ever come close to launching nukes. Gromyko reponded that Castro was insisting on a nuclear attack and that it was Kruschev who held back. But then one might understand Castro's position if one takes into consideration that at the time Robert Kennedy had gone into the business of repeated attacks on Cuba and his brother had gone into the hit-man business.
The problem with the nuclear weapons debate is that we have a whole coterie of military wonks who look at these things from strictly a tactical and strategical perspective. These people need to be viewed as raving lunatics and put into a corner where they have little wooden swords so they can poke each other's eyes out whenever they please.
Thank god politicians are civilians. They may not be perfect, but if you let a general run your country, sooner or later you are going to be finding yourself missing a few body parts.
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You gotta learn to stay away from the topic of international relations.
Hey. What can I say. I clicked on the link and got a logon page. You want informed debate? Then inform the debaters.
But then how can I argue with a guy who knows more about Vietnam than Robert McNamara?
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All this is to say that with Iran, the dance fundamentally changes. It's not that Iran will be all about firing its nukes in every direction, but that it will be prone to miscalculation in the same way Hitler miscalculated over Poland. Europe has cringed repeatedly to all threats from the east, and a huge movement in the US is in favor of adopting cringing as a foreign policy as well, and Iran may well think that all it has to do is shove and the answer will be a retreat. It can be forgiven that mistake, given recent history. The fact that its values lie in a different direction makes it almost impossible to come to a working understanding.
But there's one universal clincher to this argument. Deterrence works when both sides want stasis. Deterrence would not have worked had the early Comintern continued its programme of world revolution, because that isn't stasis. Iran does not want stasis. It has made that quite clear in various ways, including just saying it. Its actions are quite out of keeping with a maintainance of the status quo; supporting the "insurgents" in Iraq, supporting Hezbollah in Lebanon, and generally helping out every Jihadist movement around the world. If Iran gets nukes, one way or another they'll be used.
You missed the report of the IAEA which gave Iran a clean bill of health. But then that's not surprising. You really should stay aaway from the subject of international relations.
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Now this - this is thread hijacking writ large. Let's look back a few pages - hmmm...
Ooops, I guess I wasn't the only one to spot this little tidbit of hypocrisy.
I am not the one who keeps leading the discussion off-track. If you or anybody else wants to do so, then, as the thread starter, I am going to exercise the right to respond. If you don't like it, then tough.
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That is not an answer to my question. Perhaps there is no real answer. Whether the Vietnam conflict constituted a civil war (and I tend to believe it falls outside of the definition - I guess I disagree with McNamare - but then he foguht the whole thing badly as well so what the heck) is not really relevant to any judgments we are discussing here. Why then is that "fact" constantly trotted out?
You can disagree with McNamara as you may please, but I take his word over yours in the matter, and over that of any other member of this board.
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Pure scare-mongering. The Islamofascists. Good grief. You want to use nuclear weapons to do battle with a bunch of guys in Toyota trucks using RPGs? You are crazy.
The use of nuclear weapons in modern warfare is unnecessary and just a tad crazy. If you stay with conventional weapons, you have a chance of having something left on the ground you can work with when the whole thing is over. What have you got if you use nukes?
I can see possessing nuclear weapons: the genie is out of the bottle and it is the only deterrent to nuclear weapons that others may have.
As for Luttwak, the idea of the Russians launching a conventional attack on North America through what, Alaska? is pretty far-fetched. The country was devastated after the second world war, had to worry about China on its southern flank (especialy after Nixon) and went bankrupt trying to keep up with the arms race. The Russians didn't even have enough juice to wage conventional war against the Chinese for crying out loud.
Those who support nuclear weapons against conventional warfare are the "useful idiots" playing into the hands of the military-industrial complex Dwight D. Eisenhower warned us about.
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Yes, well you see it is my thread
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...however the Feds have given control of the reserves to local bands.
Actually, they haven't. The Band governments are controlled through funding and most reserves are perpetually underfunded. Band control of the schools has only been an option the last 8 or so years. However, INAC only funds native schools at about 1/10 to 1/5 of the same non-native schools. In a moment Bands can be seize and put under third party management without input or concurrence from any band member.
Reserve Police forces....
Very few reserves have autonomous police forces that are under the funding control of the bands. In Ontario most of the reserves have police that are trained, funded and supervised by the OPP. In other parts of Canada, the RCMP totally police the reserves, sometimes with aboriginal officers, but full RCMP none the less. The RCMP also have a policy of keeping aboriginal officers away from their home reserves, so even though the officers patrolling the reserve are aboriginal, they often have cultural differences that make it difficult to understand each other.
Native Children placed in foster homes (usually their grandmother's home)....
Rarely are native children placed in family homes for care. If a child does end up in a family member's home it is because the family has intervened long before the Children's Aid Society has entered the picture. However, once the CAS does come in, children are most often placed off the reserves, sometimes in far away towns and villages and many times in non-native culturally detached families. Chief Fountaine last spring mentioned that there are now more native children in foster care than all the children that went through the residential school system. That in itself indicates to me that government-sanction genocide is still taking place, using different methods but with the same goals.
We gave them control of their lives....
That is a paternalistic statement that is far from the truth. In reality we have controlled their lives and continue to insist (just listen to some of the ignorant rants on this forum) that we know what is best for them. We control almost every aspect of their life - even on reserve - by creating funding shortfalls, education lotteries, and even making sure that their drinking water stays contaminated in the hopes they will move from their remote communities and get out of the way of resource developers. At Kasetchewan, the government installed a sewage treatment plant 10 years ago that was upstream of the water intake pipes despite being warned of the possible contamination. Last year when they had to be evacuated, the suggestion was to move them to Timmins and let them integrate into a more urban culture. However, what the government hasn't been honest about is that DeBeers is intending to file a claim about a mile from their village in the heart of their hunting territory to mine diamonds. Interesting to say the least but THAT was not a coincidence.
We need to work together, not isolate each other but work together to protect these children from the never ending cycle of Social Experiments.
While noble, your suggestion would create yet another social experiment. The high incidents of alcoholism, substance abuse, child and spousal abuse, poverty and unemployment are not the causes of their issues. They are merely symptoms - most of which can be directly traced back to the residential school experience; the loss of family, community, culture and language. It has been suggested that the government spent about $800 million on residential schools and their target of "taking the Indian out of the child." IMO they have a responsibility to put at least the same amount of money in 2008 dollars back into a system that helps restore these things. The Kelowna Accord woutl have started that process but eh Conservatives are more interested in maintaining genocide than they are of finding solutions. Yet their limit seems to be confined to the $3000 per year residential school common experience buy-out...totally unacceptable IMV. It they want to help, then funding must be provided to let First Nations find their own solutions to the common experience. There is no "one size fits all" and no mainstream model that can help FN out of the rut they are in. Recovery in any "ism" is the property of the individual - they must make a decision to stop their behaviors, ask for help and realize they are helpless over their addictions. Once they hit their bottom then the government has a duty - a fiduciary duty - to provide the funding for full recovery, whether that means paying for full time support groups, treatment centres or traditional healing sessions. That is the only path to recovery that we can offer. Anything more constitutes interference and anything less perpetuates the genocide.
The "Native Culture" needs to change......
There are only two ways to change culture. Genocide or assimilation. Both have been tried. Both are crimes against humanity. And both failed. Culture cannot be changed. By the same token our society is filled with a culture of entitlement, a culture of superiority and a culture of violence. These things clash with native culture. The only thing we can do for now (at least until there is a revolution against the corporations that promote and protect our cultural icons) is to accept their culture, support it to the degree that we have a responsibility to, and provide them the freedom to operate in parallel to us. That could mean sovereign self government. It could me family based communities and systems within the framework of a third tier of Canadian governance and it could be willful assimilation into the mainstream while retaining cultural centres. However, none of the solutions are up to us. We must let them decide and then provide the funding, settle the land claims and protect their aboriginal rights with every resource at our disposal.
One of the key points that gives natives power in today's world is money - through economic development. The ED must include royalties, employment and community improvements as a result of resource extraction on their lands. Currently many reserves are benefiting from the tobacco sales, which is producing millions of dollars a year in ED to the community. And those involved in tobacco trade are fully aware of the ED sustainability by reinvesting their profits back into the community in the form of new and innovative businesses, local employment and support for many of the community social systems that have always been underfunded. That power scares government as they sick the RCMP after the tobacco sellers and manufacturers, citing lost revenue, contaminated tobacco and contraband sales. Yet they routinely stop vehicles on numerous highways, confiscate shipments destined for other reserves and impound their vehicles they rarely follow up with substantial charges fearing the courts will rule against them. The RCMP claim their authority comes from laws that allow them to use extraneous measures to counter gang crime. Yet the majority of people operating the tobacco shops are ma and pa operations. The RCMP know this but are breaking the law anyway and hiding behind obscurity to interrupt native economic development because they realize that with all that money and control over their lives, native people are beginning to stand up and question the government on their continuing attempts at genocide and oppression (like Shawn Brant did in the spring and summer of 2007). The charges are bogus and yet no one has the authority to tell the RCMP to stop breaking the law.
Change can only come within and in a democratic society one cannot impose change on another. If that change is going to happen to either us or the natives, then we must first eliminate corruption from our own political systems, demand that the police stop abusing the law and issue ultimatums to racists and white supremacist that their ignorance and hate will not be tolerated. We must get control of the corporations that continue to destroy land and people's livelihoods all for the interest of the investor. We must force the protection of our environment, prosecuting anyone in abeyance to the full extent of the law. We must stop urban sprawl and raise as much concern for farmers and our food and water sources as we do for the stock market evaluation of the rising Canadian dollar. Only then, when we have become models of an ideal society can we ask someone to joins us.
Good analysis, Posit.
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Fair enough yet there is not one communist gov't that hasn't had a bloodbath while you can find numerous non coms who haven't.
And I would say it is precisely because of its ideaology that makes it possible. It demands that the greater good be met, come hell or high water, individuals or groups who stand in the way get beaten down. This may be true of non com dictatorships too, but then again, all communist gov'ts are dictatorships.
Allende was democratically elected and there are a few Indian states with democratically elected communist governments. Italy would likely have peacefully elected one in 1948 were it not for CIA interference.
Here's a link to a list of general mayhem and bloodbaths the US has instigated in its search to bring freedom and democracy to the world. There are a few inaccuracies, but it still tells a pretty sorry tale: Gautemala, Panama, the Congo...
Guatemala 1953-1990s: A CIA-organized coup overthrew the democratically-elected and progressive government of Jacobo Arbenz, initiating 40 years of death-squads, torture, disappearances, mass executions, and unimaginable cruelty, totaling well over 100,000 victims -- indisputably one of the most inhuman chapters of the 20th century. Arbenz had nationalized the U.S. firm, United Fruit Company, which had extremely close ties to the American power elite. As justification for the coup, Washington declared that Guatemala had been on the verge of a Soviet takeover, when in fact the Russians had so little interest in the country that it didn't even maintain diplomatic relations. The real problem in the eyes of Washington, in addition to United Fruit, was the danger of Guatemala's social democracy spreading to other countries in Latin America.The Congo/Zaire 1960-65: In June 1960, Patrice Lumumba became the Congo's first prime minister after independence from Belgium. But Belgium retained its vast mineral wealth in Katanga province, prominent Eisenhower administration officials had financial ties to the same wealth, and Lumumba, at Independence Day ceremonies before a host of foreign dignitaries, called for the nation's economic as well as its political liberation, and recounted a list of injustices against the natives by the white owners of the country. The poor man was obviously a "communist." The poor man was obviously doomed.Eleven days later, Katanga province seceded, in September Lumumba was dismissed by the president at the instigation of the United States, and in January 1961 he was assassinated at the express request of Dwight Eisenhower. There followed several years of civil conflict and chaos and the rise to power of Mobutu Sese Seko, a man not a stranger to the CIA. Mobutu went on to rule the country for more than 30 years, with a level of corruption and cruelty that shocked even his CIA handlers. The Zairian people lived in abject poverty despite the plentiful natural wealth, while Mobutu became a multibillionaire.
Nicaragua 1978-89: When the Sandinistas overthrew the Somoza dictatorship in 1978, it was clear to Washington that they might well be that long-dreaded beast -- "another Cuba." Under President Carter, attempts to sabotage the revolution took diplomatic and economic forms. Under Reagan, violence was the method of choice. For eight terribly long years, the people of Nicaragua were under attack by Washington's proxy army, the Contras, formed from Somoza's vicious National Guardsmen and other supporters of the dictator. It was all-out war, aiming to destroy the progressive social and economic programs of the government, burning down schools and medical clinics, raping, torturing, mining harbors, bombing and strafing. These were Ronald Reagan's "freedom fighters." There would be no revolution in Nicaragua.Question from reporter: "Was it really worth it to send people to their death for this? To get Noriega?"
George Bush: "Every human life is precious, and yet I have to answer, yes, it has been worth it."
Manuel Noriega had been an American ally and informant for years until he outlived his usefulness. But getting him was not the only motive for the attack. Bush wanted to send a clear message to the people of Nicaragua, who had an election scheduled in two months, that this might be their fate if they reelected the Sandinistas. Bush also wanted to flex some military muscle to illustrate to Congress the need for a large combat-ready force even after the very recent dissolution of the "Soviet threat." The official explanation for the American ouster was Noriega's drug trafficking, which Washington had known about for years and had not been at all bothered by.
Panama, 1989: Washington's mad bombers strike again. December 1989, a large tenement barrio in Panama City wiped out, 15,000 people left homeless. Counting several days of ground fighting against Panamanian forces, 500-something dead was the official body count, what the U.S. and the new U.S.-installed Panamanian government admitted to; other sources, with no less evidence, insisted that thousands had died; 3,000-something wounded. Twenty-three Americans dead, 324 wounded. -
According to wiki....
And in the following 600 months.....
Perhaps, but to say that this was attributable to Communism alone is mis-leading. You can find many non-Communist governments with a more sorry track record than this.
However, this thread is not about Communism, and I am not interested in being a defender of a form of government that I do not believe in.
I merely want to make the point that it is not the form of government, but its leaders who are most to blame for the murderous activities of any given regime, and I lay the slaughter of millions of Ukrainians at the feet of Stalin, which is where this began.
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I hate to break this little historical tidbit to you, but the South wasn't fighting to occupy North Vietnam, it was fighting to keep North Vietnam out of South Vietnam. I have another newsflash for you too...Vietnam wasn't a civil war; it was two sovereign nations at war. And just what does the overthrow of Diem have in parallel with some hypothetical never-contemplated occupation of North Vietnam?
In a recent PBS interview Robert McNamara said otherwise. He admitted that it was in fact a civil war and that the US administration was badly informed. So too are you.
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And don't forget the happy smiling faces in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge! BTW, Batista didn't make a habit of slaughtering thousands under extra-legal whim judgements by Che, the psychotic under-endowed freakshow.
And some would argue that Bush arranged 911 and that man never set foot on the moon. Some would even argue that the earth is flat. You're aligning yourself in good company!
Nobody mentioned Cambodia, but since you brought it up, it has been argued that the Suspension of US Aid to the government of Lon Nol is what made it possible for the Khmer to Gain power in Cambodia.
Batista was a violent guy. After taking power (1933), he executed many of the old guard and he used violence and torture throughout his administration(s)s to repress resistance. The Wikipedia article on Guevara says the show trials involved hundreds, not thousands of people. Since the Castro revolution was a popular uprising, there was not a lot of need for the kind of violence Batista had to employ.
Your last sentence is unsupported, but typical of you.
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Or the burning of Atlanta.
In a civil war you have two sides fighting for control of one country. They fight until one side defeats the other.
If the south had won in Vietnam you can be damned sure there would have been a bloodbath in Hanoi. Just look at what happened to Diem while the US conveniently looked the other way. You think the south was run by a bunch of school ma'rms?
However, I concede that the execution of landowners by the North Vietnamese (which I missed)3 takes them off the list.
I see Cuba has still not been mentioned. I take then, M.Dancer, I have named the one you asked for ?
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Ummm......the boat people fled or in the case of the chinese there, were forced to leave and were leaving years after the war ended.
The laotians were murdering Hmong up until the 90s and beyond, if amnesty int'l can be believed.
As I recall, those boat people were being referred to as economic refugees when they tried to apply for refugee status here and in Australia.
Don't forget that the Hmong fought with the US against the North Vietnamese. Reprisal killings are wrong, I agree, but I would argue these are special circumstances that would fall outside of a general statement that Commuist governments slaughter their own people.
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Right!
And the boat people were just economic migrants.
You betray a serious deficiency is modern history if you think the Laotians or the NV did not wage war against their own peoples.
In the case of Laos it was against the Hmong.....with the NV it was the ethnic Chinese and anyone who was in their mind, Bourgeois.
Not withstanding your irrelevant jab at the US, while there are dozens of non communist countries who have never sytematically tries to murder their own people, not one communist country is so lucky.
The boat people were south Vietnamese who fled after the collapse of resistance and the defeat of the Americans. Don't forget this was a civil war. The south would have done exactly the same to the north had they won.
The Chinese and the Vietnamese have fought for centuries. After the Americans left, the Chinese attacked.
As for Laos, that too was a civil war, and nothing compared to the heavy bombardment of Laos by the US.
I notice you didn't mention Cuba, though...
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I have appeared before many honest, hardworking and sincere judges. Youir attack, while your constitutional right, is totally out of bounds.
I know some very decent people who work in the justice system, although I don't deny there are also some really bad characters. The Toronto Police Commission tried to get Personality testing introduced into the hiring process, but was fought tooth and nail by then chief Julian Fantino. I always thought it was good idea. Some real horror stories have come out of that outfit, although most cops are decent people. Any police service tends to attract a certain element that is not much better than some on the other side...
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Pinochet doesn't hold a candle to Stalin in that area.
Chang Kai Shek's brutality doesn't hold a candle to Mao's many bloodbaths.
Not saying who is worse, but the mothers of "los desperados" wouldn't be too impressed. Chiang Kai Shek was dealing with a much smaller population but he was a very brutal character. Sterling Seagrave's book "The Soong Dynasty" is educational on the antics of that scumbag.
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find one communist nation that didn't have a reign of terror.
North Vietnam and Laos. You might include Cuba under this category. While Castro does imprison political prisoners, Batista before him did much worse.
Some would argue that the US has had several reigns of terror - they just do it to someone else. For example, Iran under the Shah.
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My Ukrainian mother tried to stuff blades of grass in her fathers mouth to keep him alive - this huge Christian holocausts is ignored..The jews get theirs - why can I not have mine - being the child of survivors of this horror.
First person accounts like this are sadly gong untold as the generation that experienced this crime against humanity die out and it goes largely unnoticed.
Rather than make negative comments about issues that others hold dear, however, I hope we can all agree to be positively focussed on this one.
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Good post. Hopefully all the death penalty fetishists here will read it.
How many of these cases are we up to in Canada now? Must be a good dozen or so in the past 5 or 6 years. This Smith thing in Ontario is bound to result in a whole bunch more.
For those unfamiliar with the case, Dr. Charles Smith worked for the Ontario Coroner's office and testified as an expert witness in many cases involving murder, rape, and other such heinous crimes. It has since been found out that Smith was just plain wrong in a significant number of instances and as a result many innocent people went to prison. Recently a man was released when it was proven that the child he had been convicted of raping and murdering had in fact died of natural causes. Smith's testimony is what had sent him to prison.
If I'm not mistaken, there was a similar instance down in Texas ten years or so ago. The difference of course is that in Texas they execute convicted murderers.
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Without the communist economic ideas that were enforced on the Kulacks...there would be no famine....whether Stalin or Trotsky...the effect would have been the same, a hideous evil social economic experiment.
Brutality heeds no doctrine. Allende was a Communist, Pinochet was not. Who was the most brutal? Mao was a Communist, although his brutalilty - for example the many millions who died during the Great Leap Forward - was often due as much to ignorance as anything else. Chiang Kai Shek, on the other hand, after being chased out of the mainland by Mao, arrived in Formosa and proceeded to execute everyone who was politically active and might resist his rule.
I do not advocate Communism. It's a lousy form of government. But it is the leadership, not the system, that creates this kind of brutality.
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Great post. I wish other people who support "progressive" forces would come to understand that Communism is a force for bad rather than good.
Was it Communism or was it Stalin? I'd say Stalin.
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What are you saying here? That had this been a justice system jailing, this atrocity would somehow not be so horrendous?
Oh now I get it. You devised a preamble to offer this standard condemnation of police officers.
Very shallow.
Not at all. The girl was jailed on police suspicion, she is the responsibility of the police. If you want to talk about incarceration resulting from due process, then that is another matter.
George W Bush
in Canada / United States Relations
Posted