Secretary of State Hillary Clinton testifies before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on February 24. Clinton will meet Wednesday with Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Foreign Minister Celso Amorim in Brasilia during her five-country tour of Central and Latin America. (AFP/Getty Images/Astrid Riecken)By Justin Delacour
Latin America News Review
February 28, 2010
It's election year in South America's regional power, but somehow that point seems to be lost on the State Department's spokesman, Philip Crowley. Crowley's words about Brazil's opposition to a campaign to isolate Iran shows just how arrogant and hypocritical the U.S. foreign policy establishment is. In preparation for Secretary of State Clinton's visit to Brazil, Crowley is quoted as saying, "clearly Brazil is an emerging power with growing influence in the region and around the world, and we believe that with that influence comes responsibility."
Never mind that, in an election year, an emerging power like Brazil is probably not going to take kindly to U.S. lectures about how it needs to act with greater "responsibility" on matters of foreign policy.
Funny how U.S. policy-makers so rarely apply to themselves the principle that with power comes responsibility. How much "responsibility" did the United States show in obstructing a resolution to a Honduran coup whose precedent poses real dangers to democracy in the region?
Given that the Iraq war was justified on the false pretext of weapons of mass destruction, how much "responsibility" is Clinton showing by banging the war drums on exactly the same pretext on Iran?
Are we really in any position to be lecturing Brazil about "responsibility"?
11 comments:
Obama lets Clinton play the bad-guy. And she is so damned good at it.
One wonders if the Obama administration has any definative foriegn policy. They seem intent to tweek policy in few areas, as a matter of 'style' and PR--but the same anti-democratic and savage imperial dna stays in place.
Look no farther than health care reform. We see a diseased giant totally incapable of developing anything in the way of sane, healthy policy-making.
The military adventures and the debt will hobble the giant. Just give it enough time.
Hopefully, a more democratic, humane, and englightened world leadership conglomeration will come to the fore to address the myrid problems that pose serious threats to our survival.
The military adventures and the debt will hobble the giant. Just give it enough time.
Oh, I think it's already hobbled. But the really scary thing is that the American people are so propagandized that they don't even bat an eye at the fact that 44 percent (!) of their tax dollars go to defense. The fact that that's not an issue of grave concern to our body politic is a sign of collective insanity.
yeah, it's not only the broad public that is hyper-propagandized with respect to the insane military budget--also, left of center, astute political scientists describe those out-lays as a component of 'defense'. LOL
Really, when they changed it from the 'war' to the 'defense' department, the propaganda craft was moving full steam ahead.
The fact that so much of the general public view organized labor as bothersome, or less legit than corporate power...well, let's just say that they (the ruling elites) have this nation in the bag.
Por ahora...
Christ, we need a Chavez-like figure with military bone fides. Something tells me that it will take a couple of decades of pain--or, at least a major crisis before people wake up.
It is interesting to observe how priviledged pundits and others in the intelligensia can't muster any moral outrage with respect to the limitless, unending wars, off-shoring jobs, and tens of thousands dying for lack of basic and decent healthcare.
yeah, it's not only the broad public that is hyper-propagandized with respect to the insane military budget--also, left of center, astute political scientists describe those out-lays as a component of 'defense'.
You know, of course, that I don't really mean that all (or even most) of that spending is really for national "defense." It's just the language we use, unfortunately. Next time I'll make sure to just refer to it as military spending.
And Hillary is coming to Chile to offer "help", scares me to death.
Of course , I was just razing you. But it is really interesting how our conciousness and critical thinking capacity is formed by how language is used and abused.
For example, when commentators assume that Iraq is about our naive faith in "democracy building". Folks should know better given the decades of support for Saddam, the Shah, and a host of others.
But they wouldn't be consulted as 'experts' if their views were not within acceptable parameters.
Critical thinking is developed and honed, and we are all lulled into lazy habits of conceiving and living our world. There is a pragmatic component to belief to a large degree.
I am sure you see this well enough in your teaching.
Slave Revolt said :
"But it is really interesting how our conciousness and critical thinking capacity is formed by how language is used and abused."
and later :
"Critical thinking is developed and honed, and we are all lulled into lazy habits of conceiving and living our world. There is a pragmatic component to belief to a large degree."
My comment :
These are interesting thoughts .. For a time in my life I studied philosophers David Hume and Jose Ortega y Gasset.
These two men doubted everything, Hume is very rationalistic, he doubts of every belief and wants to subject everything to proof, and Ortega wondered if we are not born with beliefs, ingrained and innate beliefs.
Is there an innate predisposition to certain beliefs ??
Experiments with animals and the simple fact of living in a farm shows that animals are born with beliefs in the consistency and rationality of the World.
Chicken and Calves know a lot about the World when they leave the maternal womb or the egg.
That may be a problem with International Politics, People may have innate beliefs, ingrained beliefs, DNA beliefs, and they are not going to be changed so easily by arguments or ideas.
Youth, Minorities, Politics :
Milenials.com
Vicente Duque
Vincent, interesting thoughts. Chomsky hypothesized that human language has a genetic component. There could be beliefs that are 'deep', etched into our dna, having to do with gravity, fight-or-flight, etc. I don't pretend to be up on the latest thinking on most issues.
With political/ideological thinking, I am dogged by doubts, and I see my politics as invariably tethered to that which I oppose. Idenity is configured in the differential relations of every other 'identity' or concept that I become aware of.
As I get older, it is pretty clear the patterned-nature of my
behavior and that of others.
Doubt, the negative component of belief, has its limit points. For my mental health, and to enjoy life, I have a need to believe in people, to form solidarity with people.
Again, I have some gut ideas, but these I haven't situated properly in the history of ideas, biology, etc.
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Obama lets Clinton play the bad-guy. And she is so damned good at it.
One wonders if the Obama administration has any definative foriegn policy. They seem intent to tweek policy in few areas, as a matter of 'style' and PR--but the same anti-democratic and savage imperial dna stays in place.
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