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TechnoratiGeorge W. Bush's New 'So?' Man
"So?"
Few one-word comments better summarize how the Bush administration views American public opinion than the above reaction of Vice-President Dick Cheney to the statement by ABC's Martha Raddatz in March that "two-thirds of Americans" say the Iraq War "is not worth fighting."
As we have seen for the past seven plus years, this "So?" attitude is shared by members of the Bush administration who don't really care about what US citizens think about the policies of the 43rd president. When, to cite one of many examples, Americans were deeply concerned about the disaster caused by Hurricane Katrina, Mr. Bush's most remembered role was to look at the scene of devastation from his presidential jet and praise a subordinate handling the disaster for "doing one heck of a job."
The new Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, James Glassman, appears to be a representative of the Bush/Cheney "So?" coterie as pertains to America's place in the world. In one of his first public statements since his swearing-in June 8 -- an article in the International Herald Tribune (June 15), a daily with a wide international readership -- Glassman writes bluntly that "in the end, global public opinion polls cannot determine the foreign policy of the United States."
In all fairness to Glassman, no novice to public diplomacy -- defined by the State Department as "engaging, informing, and influencing key international audiences" -- he politely does tip his hat to one its basic tenets -- that the United States should listen to what foreigners have to say. "We can listen better and, through exchanges, information programs, and ideological engagement, we can rectify the lies and misconceptions" about the U.S., he writes.
Glassman's bottom line, however, is that no matter how negatively other countries view and react to US policy, the United States government should go about doing exactly what its leaders have set out to do. Moreover, he gives no hint that, as foreign policy is formulated, world public opinion should be taken into consideration. "Foreigners," he proclaims, "recognize that the United States is the world's most powerful nation and that ultimately we will do what is in our own national interest, as we should." In other words, US might makes right, a view Mr. Glassman somehow believes is universally held by non-Americans.
Such a rigid, unimaginative perspective on policy -- and public diplomacy -- is, in fact, not in America's national interest. We live in an interconnected world where national decisions cannot be made and carried out in a vacuum. US policy must adapt to local overseas circumstances -- and public opinion abroad -- to implement those steps that are best for the United States. At a time of increased global communications, we cannot afford a "So?" approach to what the world thinks. How can it possibly help the U.S. to pursue policies hated by our increasingly small planet?
Even in the pre-Internet age, the Declaration of Independence, arguably America's first public-diplomacy document in its effort to present America's case overseas, underscored the importance of showing "a decent respect to the opinions of mankind" and submitting "Facts" to "a candid world" that "prove[d]" America's right to independence. Clearly, the founding fathers took foreign public opinion seriously as they were defining the new nation's role in the world.
If the Bush administration had been inspired by the founders' respect toward other countries rather than by its conviction that "we do what we want because we're no. 1," America's standing in the world would not have deteriorated as much as it has in recent years. It is high time to abandon the Bush/Cheney "So?" attitude toward foreign public opinion and replace it with one that takes what our fellow human beings say seriously. Only then will the U.S. play the more constructive global role to which we Americans aspire.
John Brown was in the US Foreign Service from 1981 until March, 2003, when he left the State Department in opposition to the planned invasion of Iraq.
37 Comments so far
Show AllGovernment by the people went out when these people came in . The amazing thing is we voted for this gang twice . SO , whose fault is it ?
Glassman = Stupidassman. Do these sick fools learn to mistreat the truth from their mothers?
Gee, isn'nt what is "good" for Amerika, good for the whole world too??
Global Imperialist Adventures R US.
This is what the authors of OUR Constitution warned us against.
True Americans arise. The crooks- who would send our National Guard to a HELL they invented, for unlimited, repeated tours while our own Nation drowns, deserve to be told, "SO?" to whatever they have to say!
Impeachment off the table?
So?
I Believe there is nothing more important than using the ONE tool we have been given to eradicate the criminals that have taken charge over this Nation and (if they havent already)are coming soon to a global destination near you!
IMPEACH NOW.
Then, War Crime Trials.
"SO" equals disdain, contempt, extreme vanity as well as a childish retort made by kids in a sandbox.
When one reviews the conduct of the US Empire during John Brown's years of service, 1981-2003, why did it take the planned invasion of Iraq for him to resign? Oh I see, he had to get his 20 years in so he could collect his pension.
Good point canuckchuck. Most foreigners realize that the US government is held hostage by a rich and powerful cabal of corporate CEO's. Unfortunately foreigners seem more aware of this than most Americans do. Part of this is do to the tightly controlled and manipulated campaign of misinformation doled out by the MSM.
However public opinion is also becoming less and less relevant as corporate America and its favorite child, the Neo-Cons, continue to improve their methods of voter registration manipulation. Plan B is simply putting in a maleable Democrat. The enlightened populist is corporate America's biggest threat.
People are disgusted by Bush's Iraq war and many are putting their hopes on Obama as someone who will end the war.
Unfortunately, Obama is extremely vague about his plans on troop withdrawl. Both Obama and McCain plan on leaving unspecified thousand os US troops on the ground in Iraq. Today's Washington Post has a story about Obama's phone conversation on Monday with Iraq's Foreign Minister Zebari. It quotes Zebari as saying that there was "not too much difference" between Obama's position and McCain.
Here's the link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/17/AR2008061702596.html
We have to keep building an independent movement to bring all the troops home now. A good place to start is the June 28-29 National Assembly to End the War and Occupation happening in Cleveland. For more information on what will be the broadest anti-war conference in this country since the Vietnam war, visit www.natassembly.org
RE:
"Zamboni_fahrer June 17th, 2008 1:07 pm
If somebody shot Dick Cheney in the face with a shotgun, my reply would be: "So?" "
Ha Ha! Mine would be "YES!" with a raised fist in the air. It will be dancing in the streets for me when his time comes -- and bushie boy's too, and Wolfowitz, and Rumsfeld, and Condi and Powell, and Yoo, that piece of shit Yoo's time will be sweetest yet for it is his lies and immoral declarations that have given legal wings to this gamut of brutality in our names. May they NEVER rest in peace. Amen.
"I wonder if all these banks called in their loans what would happen? Can you spell depression?"
No problem. George and Dickey would have the treasury print up 10 Trillion dollars and pay them. The only people that would hurt would be American citizens and can you name one instance where that was of concern to them?
So, the USA is the most powerful country in the world; a country owing some $10 trillion dollars to Japanese, Chinese, European, South American, and even Mexican banks!
I wonder if all these banks called in their loans what would happen? Can you spell depression?
This Bush administration stooge has the same opinion of our country that many others have: the best in this, that, and the other, when we don't even have a high speed rail system, a lack of funding for public transit altogether, automakers who continue not to built only hybrid and electric vehicles, no socialized medicine for all, etc., etc.!
I also wonder just how powerful we'd end up showing ourselves to be militarily if Iran was attacked, and the neo-con nazis who would have made that decision, would find out that the biggest military blunder in history just occured!
I could have told you this 8 years ago. What the hell's new about this article? Nothing. The country is run by a corporatocracy who's motto is "So?" -- they just need to give the "mob" enough of an illusion of control to keep us pacified. We need a purge -- the system is corrupt from head to toe.
PissantNobody for president. Ignore his message and look forward to countless more years of bureaucrats like Glassman directing the future of the world . . . into extinction.
peerooz21 June 17th, 2008 3:52 pm
George Dubya was elected twice as president of the USA. If the first one was in question there was no serious question about the second election.
George Dumbass was nominated twice, he has NEVER been elected by the people. Both elections were hacked and stolen, thanks to the rovian scum that pulled strings.
With that out of the way nothing would please me more than seeing that entire cabinet swinging from the gallows.
Let's see: Georgie, dickwad, rummy, rOVE, condi, ashcroft, that michael whatever replacement, feith, libby, and the rest of the cabal can all go to the torment they deserve.
So? Like I am supposed to be surprised that the illegitimate nuclear tyrrants don't give a rat's arse about general humanity?
C'mon, people! These are the spawn of heartless imperialism, and if it were not them it would be an alternate imperialist - like Obama. It is mistaken to attack personalities, except as a mechanism to illustrate a greater point. The way forward is not to vote out the latest pathetic sociopath, but to replace the decadent capitalist system that created these monsters with an international socialist system. That will take a mass political party with a solid program. If we don't get to buiding that party soon, almost all of us will fry in the coming world war.
I am old, and have worked unsuccessfully on this for my entire adult life. For me, maybe instant incineration is better than the cancer that is now part of my body, but what about all you younger folks that deserve a full life? What are you going to do? The recipe is distilled in the previous paragraph, if you care enough to face it. Your choice: Socialism, or barbarism.
It is remarkable that so many can be critical of Bush. Blame for his dreadful policies and their outcome lie with the morons who helped him steal two elections, a legislator that has defaulted their duties by allowing these abuses, and the five supreme Court Justice who placed politics over honor when they planted this inept zealot in office.
"So?" is not just an insolent rebuff to "we the people" whom those in government are suppossed to serve, it is a challenge to the voting citizenry.
"So, what are you gonna do about it, huh?" Sadly the majority in the House of Representatives who were elected to "do something about it" have just rolled over like some fat lazy dogs itching to get their collective bellies scratched and done nothing.
So what are "we the people" going to do about it? Maybe retiring Nancy Pelosi and replacing her with Cindy Sheehan would be a good start.
"Foreigners," he proclaims, "recognize that the United States is the world's most powerful nation and that ultimately we will do what is in our own national interest, as we should."
It's useful to contrast Glassman's approach to foreign policy with that advocated by Al Gore in his book, The Assault on Reason. In a chapter entitled "National Security," Gore criticizes the Bush administration's doctrine of preemption when he writes (on page 166):
"At the level of our relations with the rest of the world, the administration has willingly traded in respect for the United States in favor of fear. That was the real meaning of 'shock and awe.' This administration has coupled its theory of American dominance with a doctrine of preemptive strikes, regardless of whether the threat to be preempted is imminent or not."
On page 168, he continues:
"The consequences of an emerging national strategy that not only celebrates American strengths but also appears to glorify the notion of dominance could actually strengthen the very enemies we seek to defeat. If what America represents to the world is leadership in a commonwealth of equals in which we are preeminent, then our friends will be legion. But if what we represent to the world is empire, then it is our enemies who will be legion. Over two decades ago, the Soviet Union claimed the right to launch a preemptive war in Afghanistan. We properly encouraged and then supported Afghanistan's resistance movement, which a decade later forced the Soviet army to retreat and withdraw. Unfortunately, however, when the Russians left, we abandoned the Afghans, and the lack of any coherent nation-building program led directly to the conditions that allowed the Taliban to take control and give al-Qaeda a home and a base for their worldwide terrorist operations."
Striving for preeminence, rather than dominance, better serves our national interest because it shows "a decent respect for the opinion of mankind." If we attempt to impose our will through dominance, we can expect the world to push back.
Again, let's put a hardcore Likudnik in the position of representing America's face to the world, especially Arab and Muslim countries. Sure, that's just waht all americans want!
Here's a piece of shit from the American Enterprise Institute, who demonstrated the same psychic ability as that of his fellow travelers — Kristol, Feith, Frum, Wolfowitz, Adelman — when he stated that the Dow Jones Industrial Average would reach 36,000 during the last bull market.
More prophetic wisdom from Glassman? Here ya go (from Wikipedia):
In an April 2003 column in Capitalism Magazine, Glassman ridiculed the "Stop the War on Iraq" peace protests planned that month. He wrote: [8]
Actually, the military might and presidential resolve of the United States are already stopping the war in Iraq. Stopping it by destroying its regime. This is not what Sean Penn, Michael Moore, Susan Sarandon, Howard Dean, Jacques Chirac, Jude Wanniski, Pat Buchanan, Wallace Shawn, Robert Novak and their pals had in mind, but it is the best way to end a war - by defeating an enemy that threatened the peace of the world, a regime that oppressed, tortured and killed its own people.
Glassman went on to call the protesters "clueless," saying "they should be apologizing" because:
Before the war, they told us that 500,000 Iraqis would be killed in Dresden-like bombing, that we would precipitate an eco-catastrophe by pushing Saddam to set fire to his oil wells, that millions of people would flee the country, that thousands of our own troops would be killed, that the Arab "street" would rise up, that terrorist attacks would resume ferociously on our homeland, that Iraqis would tenaciously resist our colonization of their land, that we would become bogged down in urban warfare, and on and on.
In fact, none of that has happened. It has been a war unmatched in history, with relatively few civilian and allied casualties and the prime objectives - control of the capital and the destruction of Saddam's regime - achieved in only a few weeks.
Just the man for the job.
Bernice,
We call this process "elections", and not long ago we "elected" "new" members of congress with "unstolen" "elections". Still the results were the same.
Since the special interests and corporations decide for us, we will "elect" a new president and by the time he/she gets to the White House the only "change" may be the color of his/her skin.
RICH M: Thanks for relating the source of the "undervalued" stock market assessment. I remember reading an article in Harper's on this topic.
The name Glass-man strikes me as an interesting metaphor... to see through a glass darkly, to see through rose-colored glasses, and like any who come close to the dark powers consistent with the Bush insider-circle, one must be gleefully able to dispense with consensual reality and trade it in for loyalty to a dark & dangerous cabal that sees itself above the general laws of nations and sane men & women.
When we consider various movements towards justice, equality or enfranchisement, we recall that progress often took years. Justice comes slowly, but it does arrive. The lords of karma keep track. Twenty years ago we didn't have microchips, and computers were large, cumbersome machines. Only a small few can explain how it is that a tiny bit of silicon can record and hold vast amounts of data. Our universe is immersed in an etheric pool that is sentient, or at least HOLDS data... carries imprints the way tree rings record weather, the way ice sheets also record geological events. THERE IS A RECORD... the mystics of all sects have across the long ages understood this. It may seem the murderers in chief are getting away with carnage, and my heart goes out to those who have been mowed over by their modern carnivorous caravan... the SPIRIT is eternal and a good percentage of the world believes in reincarnation. As I do. All that has been done unto others will need reparation, but it will take lifetimes... and this earth will likely not be capable of sustaining the population levels now upon Her. This is why the great sages teach patience, forgiveness and learning to change what one can, and trust that the rest will fall eventually into Divine Order.
peerozz21: Actually, Bush et al stole the second election, too, in Ohio, where Secretary of State Blackwell had the oh-so-hackable Diebold voting machines installed and where they WERE hacked by so-called repair technicians.
Another interesting thing about the Ohio election was that exit interviews -- amazingly accurate gauges of actual voting outcomes -- suddenly weren't accurate. After someone changed some of them at about one in the morning after the polls had been closed for hours.
THEY ALL BELONG IN JAIL.
US voters have not yet been able to elect, not to mention even consider, a President (or any other elected official) who has an ego smaller than the Grand Canyon.
That's a large problem. The smallest men have the largest egos.
There's nothing new about a "So What?" president. Back in the 1970s and 1980s, Nixon and Raygun were "So what?" presidents. This author should do its research homework first before posting a flawed article !
Language tells it all---When you are so contemptuous of "average Americans" who are dying in "your" war, and respond "So?" when challenged about its premises/purposes and all, then it is clear that there is nothing inside left to consider a human being or responsible official. When they cannot even be bothered to spin more lies, you know that we the people have hit the bottom of a psychopath's contempt. I hope that we and history return it with interest....since we cannot "return" all the death and damage that our lifestyle-wars are doing....
"There are two kinds of people in this world - those with loaded guns, and those who dig. You dig."
In this case, of course, 'you' means the rest of the planet.
Actually, the "you" are the people of this nation who will be electing McCain Chief Honcho in November, thus insuring the continuing and rapid decline of the United States. They're having as swell a time pulling the chain on the USA as a junkie goofing on his latest injection of heroin.
fanman
With this kind of discussion no wonder we are where we are. We definitley deserve our government.
""Foreigners," he proclaims, "recognize that the United States is the world's most powerful nation and that ultimately we will do what is in our own national interest, as we should."
How very short-sighted and irresponsible! When will we start to value people who can see beyond the the next quarter's bottom line or the next election cycle?
peerooz21
I'm surprized that you could dig your head out of your flabby ass long enough to produce the above drivel.
Now put your hatrack back where it belongs and turn on FAUX Nuuzz to keep to tranquilized.
George Dubya was elected twice as president of the USA. If the first one was in question there was no serious question about the second election. This meant at least Americans agreed with his performance in the office. If you have any question about his performance ask Amricans who elected him , or qustion the soundness of our system of government. We are stuck with him till the end of his terms. And don't tell me about the "congress" and impeachment.
i nominate mukasey for the supreme "so?" man! thanks, feinstein! thanks, schumer!
""Foreigners," he proclaims, "recognize that the United States is the world's most powerful nation and that ultimately we will do what is in our own national interest, as we should."
Or, as "Blondie" says in "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly":
"There are two kinds of people in this world - those with loaded guns, and those who dig. You dig."
In this case, of course, 'you' means the rest of the planet.
Glassman is the rightwing sack of sh*t who wrote a much-touted article & book during the dot-com boom in 1999, predicting that the Dow Jones Industrial Average was on its way to 36,000. He called the market "undervalued" -- shortly before it lost 30+% of its value.
The rule in the US power structure seems to be that those who get it most wrong, get promototed. Glassman, accordingly, instead of being a laughing stock, is now "Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_k_glassman
"Foreigners," he proclaims, "recognize that the United States is the world's most powerful nation and that ultimately we will do what is in our own national interest"
foreigners also recognize that currently the USA is not acting in its own national interests, but rahter the interests of a small international cabal of the rich and powerful
Most politicians, though thankfully not all, are megalomaniacs and sociopaths. But Dick (Fat Death) Cheney really is someone special in this realm of pure poisoned human beings. I think he is the closest we have had to a Joseph Stalin figure and I expect that when they bury him, his taxidermied corpse will be stuffed inside that man-sized safe he has in his office and the location of his burial site will remain totally unknown, even to his family. How typical of this thorough;y evil human being.
If somebody shot Dick Cheney in the face with a shotgun, my reply would be: "So?" :)
Other country's public opinions, in fact, do matter with war crimes. These criminals could be arrested and put on trial when they leave our borders. Let's hope that some countries out there care more for international law and justice than we do here at home.
The imperialists in Washington DC take it for granted the the US should act in its own interests (whatever those are), and that OTHER nations should also act in the interests of the US...or else.