MTCR White Paper

This is a background paper on the MTCR, which interests me since I used to work on the MTCR, and was one of the creators of it (maybe in the same sense that Al Gore created the Internet). Anyway, when you go back to the 1980s and the early 90s, I was there, for better or worse. It would have been a better agreement if not for the opposition of Richard Perle's offices. But since it is about the only non-proliferation agreement around covering missiles, it's still in use.

Neocon Regrets

In the new issue of Vanity Fair, several neocons come out with their regrets about the war in Iraq and their contempt for George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld. Interestingly all the neocons interviewed appear to be Jewish, except perhaps for Frank Gaffney, an acolyte of Perle's, who apparently writes a weekly column for Jewish World Review.

This appears to be an example of, "Success has many fathers, but failure is an orphan." I find it particularly galling, that the person most responsible for the Iraq debacle, Paul Wolfowitz, goes on leading the World Bank. This is much better for him than the Presidential medals that his colleagues Tenet, Franks, and Bremer got, while he deserves much worse.

In a way, I feel sorry for Bush, because he is such a midget in the job of President. He has neither the education nor the moral character for the job. If he is not stupid, then he is lazy, which is worse. However, he didn't want to the war on terror President, he wanted to be the education president or the tax-cut president. The first real war he ran into, Vietnam, he ran from. We should not have a coward leading America when it is attacked by anybody.

Of course, I don't really believe that there is a "war" on terror, any more than there is or was a "war" on poverty or a "war" against organized crime. We did start a war against Iraq, and we appear to be losing it.

We'll see what happens in tomorrow's elections. While it may be something of a referendum on the war, it does not allow people to vote on those who might be the best leaders to get us out of the war -- Chuck Hegel, John McCain, Joe Biden, John Warner. We don't need a plan so much as we need intelligent, courageous, well intentioned, patriotic leaders. They are sadly lacking in this our hour of need. Of course, Iraq is a little war, and we can walk away from it without too much loss to the US, although it will have been devastating for Iraq.

Draft Congress

This Rosa Brooks column in the LA Times straightens out some details about where our troops in Iraq come from. I may have been too pessimistic about their educational status. She says almost almost all are high school graduates, although this is not too great a recommendation in these days of poor high schools. Furthermore, she says most come from families with more than average income, but that there is an almost complete cutoff at $60,000. None come from families with incomes of more than $60,000. And although many, mainly officers, have college educations, almost none come from elite universities, like Harvard.

As a draftee in the Vietnam war, I think a cross-section is important to the military. It would help prevent torture, and other evils sometimes committed by today's troops who come from less advantaged backgrounds. Of course, this administration encourages them to torture, but now torture is delegated mainly to CIA agents, who are probably even better educated than military troops.

I am hoping that this election will be something of a political earthquake that will return us to traditional American values. I would be very pleased to see Rumsfeld go. For one thing, Rumsfeld hates the troops. He loves Star Wars missiles and stuff like that, and he likes special forces troops, but hates regular GIs, who bear the brunt of the fighting in Iraq and almost every other war.

Rumsfeld's Surrender

In hindsight, SecDef Rumsfeld surrendered to the Iraq insurrection way back, when just after the US reached Baghdad and the looting started, he said "Stuff happens." That was the beginning of the end. The US should have cracked down right then, hard. Our failure to do so was a sign of weakness that led us to the morass we are in today.

When we heard about what was going on then -- looting antiquities, burning files in ministries, stealing office equipment -- it didn't sound right. The invasion should have been accompanied by law and order. Instead, law and order broke down right away. And it's only been getting worse since then. What was anybody in power thinking when that happened? We were supposed to be introducing democracy. Democracy doesn't look like anarchy. The generals, Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney, they all should have known that something was wrong. The mission had not been accomplished.