Opinion of "Clash of Civilizations"

[The Duke]

Beet,

You are wrong about a few things.  The first is that soehow, democracy is the middle east is met with resistance by the native peoples.  This is certainly not true in Afghanistan, were the same dynamic exists as in Iraq (a foreign nation imposing democratic governance).  The trouble in iraq is a direct result of not enough democratization at an early stage.  When Paul Bremer runs Iraq like a viceroy, imposing a flat tax and refusing to give Ali Sistani a voice in forming the new government, he alienated a lot of people.  It was our shutting out democratic voices and processes that led to our troubles, not too much democracy.

You are wrong that neoconservative policy disregards cultural differences between regions.  The necon vision for democracy is necessarily broad.  No American would spend an election cycle in Turkey and consider it a real democracy, yet it is a model for our transformation of Iraq.  While neoconservatives do emphasize the universal nature of human desires for freedom, they are only saying what is obvioulsy true.  It is their opponents who disregard the similiarities between cultural traditions.

You are wrong that there is a broad public rejection of neoconservative foreign policy.  Those that believe Iraq is part of the war on terror support it, and those who do no believe Iraq is part of the war on terror oppose it.  An exit poll question that asks if your highest priority issue is Iraq or terrorism produces a self selected sample.  Almost all Iraq war supporters will say terrorism, since to them iraq is part of that equation, and almost all anti-war voters will say "Iraq" because to them, it was a distraction from the war.  This self selected sample of ant war voters cannot be used to substantiate a borad based opposition to neoconservative principles.


Clash of Civilization theory gives us a good paradigm for udnerstanding certain aspects of globalization and the culture clashes that go with it, but it fails to explain certain things and leads to conclusions that are not always wise (Like hi anti-immigrant posture).  He assumes that people are genetically wired to act a certain way, although he doesn't say it that explicitly, and that they will be in inevitable conflict with each other.  He is wrong.

[The Duke]

Beet,

Go to the Weekly Standard's website and tell me that Bush is listening to the neocons.  There may be an association in the public's mind between the war and neoconservatives, but in reality this is not a neocon policy or a neocon advisory team.  Agreement only existed on broad policy questions, so the association is far from fair or accurate.

[The Duke]

There is no new developement of division, it was always there.  The adminstration's foreign policy was/is dominated by Rice, Rumsfeld, Cheney, and Powell, none of whom are neocons.

Neoconservatives believe in large militaries, nation building, rejecting international institutions, and the INC.

Rumsfeld sent an intentionally small force.

No serious nation building effort is taking place, only bare bones efforts.

We spent 7 months working through the UN.

Chalabi and the INC have been targets of Bremer & Co. since day one, including insubstantiated criminal charges.

You may not agree with neoconservatives, but stop pretendeding that anyone listened to us on how to run the occupation.