Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal (2004)

He's an ass to lump Afghanistan and Iraq in the same bag, but then again, isn't it what the Bush administration wants us to believe?

The most absurd line in that cartoon -- and it is hard to pick just one -- is "when Tillman got killed by the Afghan resistance," as if this crew of local warlords and remnants of the Taliban is a modern-day version of the Maquis. Infantile anti-Americanism at its worst.

Assuming that this posting was inspired by Monday's cartoon about Pat Tillman (as opposed to, say, last month's Terror Widows Revisited column about Daniel Pearl's widow), given the extent to which Tillman's death is being exploited to encourage young men and women to go off and fight and die in Bush's wars, the cartoon seems like a reasonable/neccessary corrective.

Pissing on graves is neither reasonable nor necessary, and "corrects" nothing.

Hey what are the chances the NFL will contribute the $3.6M that they didn't have to pay St. Tillman to pay for astroturf to re-cover the Fallujah Football Stadium/Mass Burial Site?

That cartoon is definately over the top. The mistake is going personal and dumping salt in the wounds of grieving friends and family.

Not to defend Rall, but as someone who has spent a lot of time in that part of Asia, Rall has a great deal of anger about policies that have turned a prosperous region into chaos. Afghanistan used to be a tourist and vacation desitnation in the 1960s and 70s. Would you go there on vacation now?

Since Reagan started in on it, Afghanistan has not been safe. The US undermined a secular Soviet supported government by training and arming religious fundamentalists, ethnic separationists and warlord bandits. When the Soviets left, the US lost interest. The Taliban came to power because they provided a more stable environment than the warlords. Meanwhile the religious fundamentalists trained by the US have been released upon the world like a plague.

Mr. Bush and his advisors seem not to understand that stability is a necessary prerequisite for achieving their goals and do not give it a high priority. Or, they grossly underestimate the level of resources required to achieve stability. Either way, Bush policies have destabilized two countries where most individuals have more firepower than the average American. Once the shooting starts, it is much more difficult to stop it than to prevent it from occurring in the first place.

Rall is clearly as motivated by hate as so many on the right. He's an embarrassment to us all. The great thing about Pat Tillman was that he represented what has been so rare in the US of late -- someone who truly had the courage of his convictions. He understood that supporting a war ought to carry the burden of participating in it. I supported the war in Afghanistan, but it never really occurred to me to sign up: because I have a kid, and a mortgage, and a new job, and whatever. They're all excuses. I'm sure Tillman had his share, too. That those excuse weren't good enough to keep him from his duty to his country makes him a better man than me (not to mention Sully and Galt and Instahack). We're all lesser for his loss.

"Rall has a great deal of anger about policies that have turned a prosperous region into chaos. Afghanistan used to be a tourist and vacation desitnation in the 1960s and 70s. Would you go there on vacation now?

"Since Reagan started in on it, Afghanistan has not been safe."

Great history lesson. You only left out the part about the Soviet puppets overthrowing the constitutional monarchy, and eventually "inviting" in the Red Army.

Good Lord. This guy is certainly a real jerk, but, he actually represents a very considerable group on the far left that is so committed to their narowly focused, somewhat abberant view of the world that they feel justified in their complete lack of empathy for other human beings who just happen to see things a bit differently.

Several of this type post on this blog as is apparent from their nasty unthinking reactions to posters who don't share their opinions. These are the types who justify terrorism of any depravity as "legitimate expressions of the oppressed."

There is a serious sickness on the left half of your party.

Adrian

Adrain

Whose "party"? The greens? Ted Rall is not a democrat. He didn't support Gore, he doesn't support Kerry, and that's because there is vast chasm between his repellent views and the democratic party.

On the other hand, the loony right runs the Congress for the republicans.

"his repellent views and the democratic party...
Posted by pj"

BJ

I haven't noticed the difference between him and several of the nasty posters on this blog, have you?

Adrian

So, Ted Rall is denounced by the far-left Max Sawicky, and Adrian Spidle claims that this means that Rall represents a "very considerable group on the far left" and that "There is a serious sickness on the left half of your party".

This is why denunciations of idiots "on our side" aren't worth it. The wingnuts, since they are sociopathic, only understand them as declarations of weakness.

"...since they are sociopathic, only understand them as declarations of weakness.

Posted by Rich Puchalsky"

My my, a wonderful example of what passes for Left Wing erudition. I'm really impressed.

Adrian

The "far-left Max Sawicky"? LOL! Here's my idea of left:

"The Congress declares that it is the continuing policy and responsibility of the Federal Government to use all practical means consistent with its needs and obligations and other essential considerations of national policy, with the assistance and cooperation of industry, agriculture, labor, and State and Local governments, to coordinate and utilize all its plans, functions, and resources for the purpose of creating and maintaining, in a manner calculated to foster and promote free competitive enterprise and the general welfare, conditions under which there will be afforded useful employment opportunities, including self-employment, for those willing, able, and seeking to work and to promote maximum employment, production, and purchasing power."

-- Employment Act of 1946

"Great history lesson. You only left out the part about the Soviet puppets overthrowing the constitutional monarchy, and eventually "inviting" in the Red Army."

... which, of course, justifies sending Afghans to hell, and following policies which ultimately resulted in 9-11.

"Several of this type post on this blog as is apparent from their nasty unthinking reactions to posters who don't share their opinions."

I don't think you will have any moral authority on these matters, Adrian, until your front lobe manages to take over your hypothalamus.

"These are the types who justify terrorism of any depravity as 'legitimate expressions of the oppressed.'"

You have half a point here. The problem is that your side of the political spectrum defines a terrorism anything that is politically convenient. Your beloved Richard Cheney used to call Mandela a terrorist and fought hard to keep him behind bars, for example.

"There is a serious sickness on the left half of your party."

Half a point here too, although this is why there is a Green party that causes so much trouble to mainstream Democrats. There is even more sickness on the extreme right of the political spectrum, but the difference is that it pauses no problem to the Republican party, and in fact these deviances are intensively used by the GOP as a way to coop what's called its 'base'. Of course, the GOP knows it has to be very discreet in those matters, see Trend Lott.

Since Reagan started in on it, Afghanistan has not been safe.

Wrong.

It was started by CARTER.

It wasn't just supplying rebels, he, along with Brezinski, CREATED the rebels.

The King of Afghanistan was overthrown by his brother, who was in turn overthrown by a Soviet stooge, and things continued to go pretty much as normal there.

"Normal" means some banditry in the outlying areas.

Carter and Brezinski, about 18 months before the Soviets invaded, hired local tribes to create a civil war out of this banditry.

They did it because they (correctly) thought that this would tie the Soviets up.

Brezinski boasted of this not too long ago.

This is repulsive, and Carter's getting a Nobel prize after engaging in actions that would FORSEEABLY kill many thousands of innocent Afghans, is straight from bizarro world.

In the bipolar world of the cold war, there is a difference between supporting your side in a civil war and creating a civil war, and Carter deliberately created one.

His actions were worse than Nixon's secret bombing of Cambodia.

Patick, once again you have your facts wrong. The Afghan monarchy was overthrown by a coup in 1973. Afghanistan started to destabilize in 1978, with a coup. That was followed by another coup by Amin in 1979. The power vacuum at the top was leading to instability throughout the country. Only then did the Soviets get involved and place Karmal in charge. Amin and Karmal were both Soviet supporters, but Amin was viewed as part of the "problem".

The US viewed Soviet involvement in cold war terms and enlisted the help of Iran, China and others that opposed Soviet "expansion" The Soviets were clearly worried about religious fundamentalists as far back as the 1970s.

Karmal never had popular support and neither did the Soviet reforms that were pushing Afghanistan toward a modern secular state. These moves were resisted by the traditional fundamentalists within Afghanistan. The Soviets were seriously meddling in Afghanistan affairs. Political means could have been used. However, Reagan, against all things communist and Soviet, supported and funded the traditionalist ethnic and fundamentalist forces against the secular forces backed by the Soviets. The US funding and arming of religious fundamentalists and warlords and the Soviet heavy handed tactics at suppressing the rebellion destroyed the country in a proxy war. Eventually, the fundamentalists won, the US lost interest and Afghanistan was left to its fundamentalist traditions and ethnic tensions without a basis to move forward as a modern secular state.

"The war left Afghanistan with severe political, economic, and ecological problems. More than 1 million Afghans died in the war and 5 million became refugees in neighboring countries. In addition, 15,000 Soviet soldiers were killed and 37,000 wounded. Economic production was drastically curtailed, and much of the land laid waste. At the end of the war more than 5 million mines saturated approximately 2% of the country, where they will pose a threat to human and animal life well into the 21st cent. The disparate guerrilla forces that had triumphed proved unable to unite, and Afghanistan became divided into spheres of control. These political divisions set the stage for the rise of the Taliban later in the decade."

http://www.factmonster.com/ce6/history/A0802662.html

This is why Rall is angry.

Did the Soviets have some blame? Yes. Did the US? Yes. This is the major problem with the cold war and viewing the world through that lens. The cold war was a hot war in many areas of the less developed world. Countries like Vietnam, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Laos, Argentina, Honduras, Guatemala, Angola and others paid a very heavy price from the proxy wars and reigns of terror that were supported by the superpowers in the name of ideology. The American Right continues to believe in ideological purity and prefers violent regime change to a slower process of reform. The US very much had short term policies to win at any cost. We won the short term. The cost is still being paid over the long term.

Matt, you are correct about Carter starting the ball rolling on funding of the Afghanistan fundamentalists. The Carter policy was to fund the insurgents to harass the Soviets, but not actually give them enough support to win. It was a cynical short term policy meant to do harm to the Soviets with willful disregard for the long term harm to Afghanistan.

Reagan enormously increased support and weaponry and escalated the war and the Soviets were eventually driven out. Reagan had the full support of most Democrats in Congress. Reagan administration trained the religious fundamentalists in the use of C4 and the latest CIA tactics in urban sabotage. They also recruited Muslim fundamentalists from around the world who would return to their home countries with American training.

ADRIAN SPIDLE IS CLEARLY THE SMARTEST PERSON ASSOCIATED WITH THIS BLOG AND HERE’S WHY…

Putting aside my customary reticence, it has become obvious to me that I am the only person on this blog who can tell the difference between a hamburger and the picture of the hamburger on the menu.

Even though I never graduated from college and all of you guys probably have; some from elite universities even. I suggest that you are more indoctrinated than educated, except, perhaps, for those of you trained in real science. The rest of you expensively schooled wonders are almost totally ignorant of the real world. Theories and models are not the real world although they may look like it to a greater or lesser degree (like the picture of the hamburger).

The problem is that you can only see what you’re looking at. That is to say, for example, if you ignore the evils done by Saddam Hussein then, of course, the Iraq War is wrong. Otherwise…

It all comes down to the inherent structures and limitations of human understanding. Besides being unable to include what we don’t know and, what we don’t know we don’t know, in our theories and models; what we do know will look different from different points of view.

This is why my attempt to understand the real world and its’ politics has brought me to this blog to see how it looks from the other side and to try and understand why you guys see it that way.

Since I already knew that Brad was the most brilliant and informed polymath I’d ever met, I expected to find stimulating debate and enquiry into how the economic and political world might best be managed.

Sadly, I’ve been very disappointed by the one-sided presentation of all things combined with a downright nastiness focused on those who see things differently.

I invite you guys to try and approach my highly evolved level by engaging in respectful enquiry into how to best manage the problems of the day.

Modestly,

Adrian

Was that Adrian engaging in self-parody?

The question is not, "Was that Adrian engaging in self-parody?", but "Was that Adrian CONSCIOUSLY engaging in self-parody?"

The former seems to be SOP for him.

FWIW, no one on this board is suggesting that Saddam was a good guy.

What has been suggested, is that the Neocons believed that the army would be greeted as liberators for an extended period while a con man (Chalabi) is placed in power while the economic infrastructure of the country is looted (oops, sorry, I meant privatized) was delusional.

War and occupation are a dirty resource intensive business, and they assumed that it would be neither.

Given a more realistic assessment of the costs, the decisions might have been, and probably should have been, different.

It's like determining whether or not your community needs a new sewage treatment plant based on the assumption that you all sh*t ice cream.

I love the picture of the hamburger and the actual hamburger story. This applies to ALL ACADEMICS that I know, right and left. When are we going to get back to making things in this country, and quit producing useless theories and ideas that get us all bushwhacked? (and not just by Bush, Clinton did a lot of stupid things with trade agreements.) I want to see our colleges graduate more native born engineers and scientists and fewer useless thinkers. Wasn't our college system set up after WWII for the good of our citizenry? It has failed, big time. I am about to the point where I am going to stop reading blogs, they depress me.

" I want to see our colleges graduate more native born engineers and scientists and fewer useless thinkers...
Posted by Lynne"

From your post to God's ears.

Amen,

Adrian

I see bakho is even more historically illiterate than I gave him credit originally. The king was overthrown in 1973 by his cousin, Mohammed Daoud who was assisted by Afghan army officers trained in the Soviet Union (thanks to Daoud's prior stint as Prime Minister).

But Daoud was insufficiently subservient to Moscow, so they backed other communists who overthrew him, killing Daoud and his family. Those communists fought among themselves for power. After a few more murders the Soviet Union invaded and place Babrak Karmal in charge. By this time, different communist factions, and different ethnic and religious factions were all fighting a civil war. Outside support coming from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, China and the U.S.

Eventually the Soviet army withdrew and the factions fought each other. Anyone familiar with the history of Afghanistan would not be surprised (see Rudyard Kipling's career for instance). So for anyone to be angry over the Cold War's role (or Reagan's), that person would have to be truly stupid. Doubly so for anyone who thinks Afghanistan was ever prosperous.

I think the argument over the particulars of who did what to whom in the history of Afghanistan misses the point of the cartoon. Rall is making a fairly standard/generic argument about deluded proles laying down their lives for the ruling class on the basis of a lie. (Per Rall's editorial columns, he views the war in Afghanistan as being less about displacing the Taliban as part of a war on terror and more as an effort to find a more pliable business partner in the building of an oil pipeline.)

As for metaphorically pissing on graves, if Rall's cartoon convinces one young American to ignore the hero-making pagent built around Tillman's death and not go off to sacrifice their life in one of Bush's ill-concieved, poorly executed foreign adventures, then piss away!

Whewre Ted Rall is concerned I have only this to say:

Free Dirty Danny Hellman!

Ted Rall is the Georg Grosz of our time.

He has a bee in his bonnet, that's for sure; he only knows one note; he only has one arrow in his quiver, one trick in his bag; and his work is by no means pleasant to look upon.

But he is performing an essential function, one that, if he were not performing, someone else would have to.

And history will thank him.

Other than engaging in rampant adoration of his own perceived brilliance, what essential function does Ted "I can sure dish it out, but don't expect me to take it" Rall fulfill? Tom Tomorrow does social and political commentary better. So does Derf's In The City. For that matter, so does Dykes To Watch Out For.

The troll writes:

>I invite you guys to try and approach my highly evolved level by engaging in respectful enquiry into how to best manage the problems of the day.

You invite it, but you pretend not to notice when it rings your bell. Or did you want to rethink the idea of addressing the questions I posed to you here:

http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/cgi-bin/mt_2004/mt-comments.cgi?entry_id=755

Kinbote is, of course, insane.

Charles Kinbote sez: As for metaphorically pissing on graves, if Rall's cartoon convinces one young American to ignore the hero-making pagent built around Tillman's death and not go off to sacrifice their life in one of Bush's ill-concieved, poorly executed foreign adventures, then piss away!

If the result in sum of Rall's quite nasty cartoon were one fewer self-sacrifice to the Iraq fiasco, or even one fewer supporter for it, maybe it would have been tolerable. But Kinbote, Gut mag alkan, Pern dirstan. The result - in this country, so sentimental, so weak at reasoning - of Rall's unwarranted insult to a dead man will surely be more volunteers, more supporters.

Regarding an anti-Rall backlash evidencing itself at the Army Recruiters, I think you give him too much credit for his influence (or even readership) among the young and sentimental. At best we can perhaps hope that this discussion may persuade Adrian Spidle to re-enlist.

Patrick, by any standard, Afghanistan in 1972 was much more prosperous than Afghanistan today. My uncle has pictures from back then. It was not LA but it had beautiful architecture and bucolic landscape. Much of the agriculture, irrigation and olive groves have been destroyed, the landscape is littered with anti-personnel mines, commerce persists under the demands of warlord tariffs. Major parts of the large cities are in ruin.

Why are you in denial that countries like Afghanistan and Vietnam that suffered through proxy wars during the cold war had serious damage inflicted upon their economy, infrastructure and peoples?

Much of the destruction occurred after the Soviets left with weapons left behind by the Soviets or provided by the Americans.

Charles, if you are ready to overlook the stupidity and indecency of Rall's work because there's some possibility that it might turn somebody, somewhere against the war, what would stop you from extending the same courtesy to a neo-Nazi cartoon showing the war as a conspiracy of the greedy Jews? That cartoon also has some chance of discouraging some prospective recruit somewhere.

Or are you denying that Rall's piece was a stupid and indecent performance?

Rall is the sort of unbearable lefty asshole who makes a great recruiter for the right. When right-wing demagogues say liberals don't share "our" values, sometimes they're right.

Adrian, stop whining.

I thought it was reasonably clear that my remarks pertained to that specific cartoon, and that the way in which his death is being exploited in the real world justified the disrespectful cartoon treatment. I can't think of any basis on which any anti-semetic cartoon could be appropriate.

Ted Rall's essential function is to *effectively* express the absolute evil of the Republican Party and its supporters and adherents. This evil is, in the strictest sense of the words, unthinkable and inexplicable; accordingly Rall does not appeal to thought, because thought cannot cope with what we face. He does not seek to explain, because there is no explanation for Evil, which is always and everywhere the same.

So his essential function is to avoid the crucial, ubiquitous and crippling error of bringing rationality to bear upon an irrational situation.

Ted Rall has isolated himself from Americans, Liberals as well as conservatives.

He is truly a sick, self involved, weasel!!

"If Rall's cartoon convinces one young American to ignore the hero-making pagent built around Tillman's death and not go off to sacrifice their life in one of Bush's ill-concieved, poorly executed foreign adventures, then piss away!"

I'd say that pretty clearly implies 'it doesn't matter how disgusting something is; as long as it gets in the way of this war, I'll applaud it.'

And in what system of moral logic does it follow that if an individual's death is being exploited by the "bad" side, the "good" side is relieved of any obligation to treat that individual and his survivors with any decency? That sounds remarkably like the moral logic employed by the jolly crew at Little Green Footballs after the death of Rachel Corrie.

Is Rall effective? I suspect that if his Tillman cartoon has any effect at all, it will push more people away from the postion he wants them to adopt than pull them toward it.

Suffice to say, Ted Rall is a polarizing figure. For all those who took offense at Monday's cartoon, let me offer the URL below, which will take you to a cartoon on CNN's website that also deals with Pat Tillman's death, but which should not provoke offense.

http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/analysis/toons/2004/05/04/lang/index.html

The main problem with a guy like Rall is he and those who believe his cartoon was acceptable (like the Michael Moores of the world) can't relate to a person who finally says my own personal gain isn't important, rather it is time for me to give something back to the country that has allowed me to flourish. No one in the Army is using Pat Tillmans death to motivate youngsters to join. Instead it is simply being used as an example of a person taking personal responsibility for not only his benefit but the benefit of his country. If the country had been full of Ted Ralls during the Revolutionary War we would still be drinking tea and talking with a british accent. Ralls is a punk. He sits in in his office drawing his little cartoons and making a very good living from it and has the gall to criticize someone who stood up to take a stand over what he felt was a threat to America. I hope Ralls speaks Arabic because if the crowd Tillman died fighting has their way you will be. By the way,.... Ask Ted Ralls what happened to people stupid enough to criticize the government in Afghanistan under the Taliban or Iraq under Hussein. You may not like the policy of the US government, but don't be so pitiful so as to insult a guy who died trying to save his friends who were caught in an ambush. If you think they deserve to die then have the courage to go to Ft Benning and tell them (the 75th Ranger Regiment) to their face. Just make peace with what or whoever you happen to believe in prior to doing it because given your model they will be perfectly within their "constitutional right" to stomp your ass into oblivion and then say you brought it on yourself. But then no I guess Rall won't do that. He doesn't seem to have the guts Tillman had when it comes to willingly facing physical danger to back up your belief in the rightness of what you believe. Ted Ralls is a coward.

If you want an insight as to how Rall operates, google on "Ted Rall Dirty Danny Hellman". It is a rather sordid affair.

"Rall has a great deal of anger about policies that have turned a prosperous region into chaos. Afghanistan used to be a tourist and vacation desitnation in the 1960s and 70s. Would you go there on vacation now?"

No I wouldn't, although many millions of Afghanis have gone _back_ there to live.

bakho and Matthew are having the real conversation that needs to be had. Thank you! Please let us embrace the great liberal tradition of questioning authority, even when Democrats are involved. Yes Carter patrticipated in the-enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend approach to foreign policy. As Americans -and citizens of the world- we need to decide how we feel about this approach. Personally I'm very sceptical about it and feel we owed it to the Iraqis to liberate them from Saddam because we propped that bastard up too.

I personally was happy to someone in the media question the idea that people who die in this war are heroes. Wars are rarely justified and I would venture to say that the only heroes in a time of war are the conscientious objectors. In my opinion the current war is unjust and wrong-headed, motivated mainly by politics and the neo-conservative wing of the Republican party.

I'm sick of the everyone labeling anyone who dies in the service of our military a hero. Were the Soviet soldiers who fought in Afghanistan heroes? They certainly went to war based on their convictions.

Harold Baines?

Isn't he still playing for the White Sox.

Ted Rall was hired as a consultant to the government after 911.
He was hired by LA's foremost conservative talk station to report from Afghanistan.
He was traveling and writing about the importance of the region long before 911.

Few persons alive today know more about what is going on in this region than Rall.

here is an excerpt from his summer 2000 trip.

http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/columns/2000/08/rall1.html

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