PDF VersionChaos in the Middle East is not the Bush hawks’ nightmare scenario–it’s their plan. |
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Imagine it’s six months from now. The Iraq war is over. After an initial burst of joy and gratitude at being liberated from Saddam’s rule, the people of Iraq are watching, and waiting, and beginning to chafe under American occupation. Across the border, in Syria, Saudi Arabia, and Iran, our conquering presence has brought street protests and escalating violence. The United Nations and NATO are in disarray, so America is pretty much on its own. Hemmed in by budget deficits at home and limited financial assistance from allies, the Bush administration is talking again about tapping Iraq’s oil reserves to offset some of the costs of the American presence–talk that is further inflaming the region. Meanwhile, U.S. intelligence has discovered fresh evidence that, prior to the war, Saddam moved quantities of biological and chemical weapons to Syria. When Syria denies having such weapons, the administration starts massing troops on the Syrian border. But as they begin to move, there is an explosion: Hezbollah terrorists from southern Lebanon blow themselves up in a Baghdad restaurant, killing dozens of Western aid workers and journalists. Knowing that Hezbollah has cells in America, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge puts the nation back on Orange Alert. FBI agents start sweeping through mosques, with a new round of arrests of Saudis, Pakistanis, Palestinians, and Yemenis. |
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Neoconservatism was once deemed dead—’Buried in the sands of Iraq.’ But it persists, not just as the de facto foreign-policy plank of the Republican Party but, its proponents assert, in Obama’s unapologetic embrace of American military might.
By David Margolick | NEWSWEEK
For all his eminence—or maybe because of it—the funeral for Irving Kristol this past September was an understated affair. Some thought Dick Cheney might show up, but neither he nor any other Republican leader did; it seemed almost ungrateful, given Kristol’s extraordinary contribution to the GOP—how he’d brought intellectual legitimacy and heft to what he himself had once called “the stupid party.” None of the Republican congressional leadership was there, nor any of the would-be candidates for 2012—not even Sarah Palin, whom Kristol’s ubiquitous son, Bill, had helped turn into a political phenomenon.
The assemblage of about 200 people wasn’t exactly small, but in the gargantuan sanctuary of Adas Israel Congregation, built at a time—1951—when American Jews of Irving Kristol’s generation wanted to proclaim they’d finally arrived and planned to stick around awhile, it was dwarfed by its surroundings; the burgundy back benches were empty. Adas Israel is Washington’s most powerful Conservative congregation, the one to which every Israeli ambassador to the United States in history has belonged. Instead of the usual parade of celebrity eulogists, though, only two people—the rabbi and Bill Kristol—spoke, and briefly at that. In 40 minutes or so it was over.
WASHINGTON, Aug 12 (IPS) – With all the attention paid to neo-conservatives in the global media today, one would think that a standard definition of the term would exist. Yet, despite their now being credited with a virtual takeover of U.S. foreign policy under President George W. Bush, a common understanding of ‘neo-cons’ remains elusive.
A brief description of their basic tenets and origin can help distinguish them from other parts of the ideological coalition behind the administration’s neo-imperialist trajectory; namely, the traditional Republican Machtpolitikers (Might Makes Right), such as Vice President Dick Cheney and Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld, and the Christian Rightists, such as Attorney General John Ashcroft, Gary Bauer, and Pat Robertson.
As neo-con godfather Irving Kristol once remarked, a neo-conservative is a ”liberal who was mugged by reality”. True to that description, neo-cons generally originated on the left side of the political spectrum and some times from the far left. Many, such as Kristol himself, have Trotskyite roots that are still reflected in their polemical and organisational skills and ideological zeal.
Although a number of prominent Catholics are neo-conservatives, the movement remains predominantly Jewish, and the monthly journal that really defined neo-conservatism over the past 35 years, ‘Commentary’, is published by the American Jewish Committee. But at the same time, neo-conservative attitudes have reflected a minority position within the U.S. Jewish community, as most Jews remain distinctly liberal in their political and foreign-policy views.
William Kristol and Robert Kagan
THE TEPID CONSENSUS
IN FOREIGN policy, conservatives are adrift. They disdain the Wilsonian multilateralism of the Clinton administration; they are tempted by, but so far have resisted, the neoisolationism of Patrick Buchanan; for now, they lean uncertainly on some version of the conservative “realism” of Henry Kissinger and his disciples. Thus, in this year’s election campaign, they speak vaguely of replacing Clinton’s vacillation with a steady, “adult” foreign policy under Robert Dole. But Clinton has not vacillated that much recently, and Dole was reduced a few weeks ago to asserting, in what was heralded as a major address, that there really are differences in foreign policy between him and the president, appearances to the contrary notwithstanding. But the fault is not Dole’s; in truth, there has been little attempt to set forth the outlines of a conservative view of the world and America’s proper role in it.
Is such an attempt necessary, or even possible? For the past few years, Americans, from the foreign policy big-thinker to the man on the street, have assumed it is not. Rather, this is supposed to be a time for unshouldering the vast responsibilities the United States acquired at the end of the Second World War and for concentrating its energies at home. The collapse of the Soviet Empire has made possible a “return to normalcy” in American foreign and defense policy, allowing the adoption of a more limited definition of the national interest, with a commensurate reduction in overseas involvement and defense spending.
Tác giả: NGUYỄN LƯƠNG HẢI KHÔI
Thử nhìn lại lịch sử, tham chiếu Nhật Bản, một nước cũng là láng giềng Trung Quốc như Việt Nam, nền văn minh cũng sinh sau đẻ muộn như Việt Nam, và quy mô quốc gia cũng nhỏ bé như Việt Nam, đã định vị Trung Quốc như thế nào trong một bối cảnh lịch sử tương tự như Việt Nam.
LTS: Thế giới, đặc biệt là các nước ở châu Á, xem sự trỗi dậy của Trung Quốc có tính cách thời đại, đang bàn thảo sôi nổi về tác động này. Định vị Trung Quốc đang trở thành một chủ đề nóng ở nhiều nước trong khu vực.
Bài viết dưới đây đưa ra một góc phân tích về cách nhìn Trung Quốc của Việt Nam và Nhật Bản thời phong kiến. Đây là góc nhìn riêng của tác giả cần được tranh luận, làm sáng tỏ thêm. Mời bạn đọc phản biện bài viết này.
Nếu như lịch sử hiện đại của các nước Đông Á (Việt Nam, Trung Quốc, Triều Tiên, Nhật Bản) là lịch sử quan hệ với Phương Tây, thì trong các thời kỳ tiền hiện đại, lịch sử của Việt Nam, Triều Tiên và Nhật Bản là lịch sử của mối quan hệ với Trung Quốc.
Trong thời đại ngày nay, khi Trung Quốc đang ôm tham vọng giành lại vị trí lịch sử đặc biệt trước đây. Để định vị chính mình, Việt Nam không thể không định vị Trung Quốc. Chúng ta hãy thử nhìn lại lịch sử, tham chiếu Nhật Bản, một nước cũng là láng giềng Trung Quốc như Việt Nam, nền văn minh cũng sinh sau đẻ muộn như Việt Nam, và quy mô quốc gia cũng nhỏ bé như Việt Nam, đã định vị Trung Quốc như thế nào trong một bối cảnh lịch sử tương tự như Việt Nam.
Trung Quốc không phải là “thiên triều”
from → General, Public Policies, Social concern, Studying Law
The apolitical politics of progressivism.
“I am not the first president to take up this cause, but I am determined to be the last.”
The words are those of President Barack Obama speaking to Congress on health care reform on September 9, 2009. They contain the secret of his appeal—and the cause of his first-year failure.
His appeal from the first has been to be beyond ordinary politics. Ordinary politics is partisan politics, and to be beyond it is to be nonpartisan or, as sophisticates say, postpartisan. Obama has the cool of a nonpartisan, quite unlike the late Edward Kennedy, who was a paragon of partisan heat and sweat. But beyond politics is not just a mood, it’s a place and a situation. Obama’s aspiration, the goal of his politics, is to put the country in a situation that no longer requires parties, when at last partisan rhetoric has accomplished its task, advocacy is inapt, sympathy and zeal are no longer needed, and postpartisan cool is correct.
Postpartisan cool is not, however, the mere sign of an intellectual fad such as postmodern relativism. One can see Obama’s aspiration in the first Democratic president, Thomas Jefferson, who founded not only the Democratic party but also the idea of party government in America. After forming the first publicly avowed party against the Federalists, he proceeded to announce in his first Inaugural Address that “we are all Republicans, we are all Federalists.” “Republicans” meant Democratic-Republicans, later Democrats. Yet the best word to describe Obama is progressive, for -nonpartisanship in politics is inherent in the idea of progress.
Understanding the US Declaration of Independence – 9 Key Concepts Everyone Should Know
Dư địa chính sách không còn; tình hình bức bách buộc chúng ta phải thay đổi, mà bước đột phá đầu tiên là thay đổi phân bổ nguồn lực, ông Nguyễn Đình Cung, Viện phó Viện Quản lý Kinh tế Trung ương nói.
Dư địa chính sách trong nước không còn
Ông Nguyễn Đình Cung – Viện phó Viện Quản lý Kinh tế Trung ương CIEM: Năm 2010 là một năm không dễ cho Việt Nam, vì dư địa chính sách có thể làm được chúng ta đều đã làm từ năm ngoái, 2009.
Các chính sách mở rộng cung tiền, mở rộng thâm hụt cán cân thanh toán, hay tăng đầu tư đều đã tận khai. Đó là cái khó của năm mới này.
Trong bối cảnh đó, lại thêm mọi sự của Việt Nam đã quyết rồi. Quốc hội đã quyết định chỉ tiêu tăng trưởng, lạm phát của năm 2010.
Hai yếu tố này khiến cho điều hành của Chính phủ 2010 cực khó, phải xoay xở trong một dư địa chính sách hạn hẹp và phải hướng tới mục tiêu cao.
Chúng ta kì vọng nền kinh tế thế giới sẽ phục hồi để bù lại sự thiếu hụt dư địa chính sách trong nước, để phần điều hành của Chính phủ dễ thở hơn.
Tuy nhiên, sự phục hồi của kinh tế thế giới hiện cũng không phải theo nghĩa dựa vào đầu tư tư nhân, thương mại mà vẫn là đầu tư nhà nước. Do đó, cầu bên ngoài với hàng hóa trong nước vẫn chưa phục hồi được. Cạnh tranh lại khốc liệt hơn, gây áp lực giảm giá. Khi đó, DN phải tính chuyện giảm lương, giảm lợi nhuận, những cách làm tác động không thuận tới kinh tế trong nước, không tạo được sức phục hồi của nền kinh tế.
from → Economics, General, Public Policies, Studying Law, Vietnam
Remarks by the President Barack Obama in State of the Union Address
from → American Perspective, General, Studying Law
