DroppinScience
09-03-2004, 12:14 AM
Does the rest of the world care about the U.S. election more than the U.S.? :eek:
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0902-13.htm
Published on Thursday, September 2, 2004 by the Guardian / United Kingdom
The World Election
Europeans don't have a Vote in the United States - but Americans do care What We Think
by Timothy Garton Ash
Welcome to the most important American election in living memory. A world election, in which the world has no vote. Four more years of Bush can confirm millions of Muslims in a self-defeating phobia against the west, Europe in hostility to America, and the US on the path to fiscal ruin. Four more years, and the Beijing Olympics will see ascending China dictating its terms to a divided world. Don't be fooled by those who say that one lot is as bad as the other, or even, like the New Statesman's John Pilger, that Bush's re-election may be the lesser evil, because "supremacy is the essence of Americanism; only the veil changes or slips". Don't be put off by John Kerry's attempts to out-Bush Bush, as he attacks rather than applauds the president for inadvertently admitting that this "war on terror" cannot be "won" in the way that the second world war was won. Beyond the electoral posturing, Kerry knows that is true. As president, he would act accordingly, and the change would make a vast difference to every one of us.
The American election will have far more consequences for Europe than the last European elections. It's probably more important to Britain than the next British election. Yet there seems so little we can do to affect the outcome. We feel like a punter whose life savings have been invested in a bet on a single boxer in a single bout. All we can do is cheer our lungs out from the ringside. Except that if we shout too loudly for Kerry we may actually help the other man - especially if we shout in French.
George Bush's chances of winning depend on convincing a sufficient number of American swing voters of the truth of his narrative about "America at war". While his close supporters fund accusations that John Kerry marginally falsified his own war story in Vietnam, the president's whole campaign is premised on selling a false war story.
"Like the second world war," he declared in mid-August, "the war we are fighting now began with a ruthless, surprise attack on America." Well, tell that to the Poles. (I'm writing this on the 65th anniversary of the true beginning of the second world war, which was indeed a ruthless, surprise attack - on Poland.) Or the British. Or the French. But for President Bush, the second world war began only with the Japanese attack on America at Pearl Harbor.
The contemporary analysis is as bad as the history. Again and again, the war on terror - Wot, in Washington shorthand - is compared to the second world war or the cold war. There's only one way to win the war on terror, his key political adviser Karl Rove told an audience of young Republicans in the run-up to the convention. And that is "to chase the enemy to the ends of the earth and utterly destroy him". Like the cowboy hero of a hundred westerns. At the convention, they rally support with a film of US army tanks advancing down a road and warships cutting through the seas. Bush's own re-election website (www.georgewbush.com) has a homepage link entitled "Winning the war on terror". Of course, Republican leaders can make more sophisticated arguments in private conversation, but this whole campaign depends on projecting a grand narrative in which the US is engaged in a conventional war, which it will win mainly by martial valour and force of arms.
But it isn't, and it won't. "Utterly destroy him," cries Karl Rove. But who is he? Osama bin Laden? A Palestinian suicide bomber? An Iranian mullah? The unknown terrorist? The whole point of this new kind of struggle is that there is no single clearly identifiable leader or regime, no Hitler or Soviet Union, who can be thus destroyed. (Obviously, capturing Osama bin Laden, if he's still alive, would certainly help.) And if we accept, as we should, that we face a serious array of new threats, among which Islamist terrorism plays an important part, what is the role of military force in reducing the threat? Much less than in earlier wars. If military force was 80% responsible for the west's victory in the second world war, and perhaps - through the impact on the Soviet Union of the arms race - 30% responsible for the west's victory in the cold war (and even that figure may be too high), it will only be 10% - or perhaps 15% - responsible for winning this one.
The victory will depend on courage, resolution, and a determination to defend what we value - American leaders are right to remind us of this. It will depend on skilled intelligence and police work. But it will depend, above all, on addressing the political and economic causes of terrorism, to dry the swamps in which al-Qaida mosquitoes breed, and preserving and unfolding the magnetic attractions of our own free societies. It's here that Bush has been such a disaster. He has presided over the largest build-up of the American military since the end of the cold war, and the swiftest, most comprehensive dismantling of the country's popularity in the world since Vietnam. In the weapons categories that really count, no one has done more to disarm America than George Bush.
A surprising number of Americans see this. In a recent Pew poll, 67% of those asked said that the US had become less respected in the world, and 43% thought this was a major problem. It's not just wishful thinking that makes Democrats constantly harp on the argument that Bush has ruined America's standing with its traditional allies and friends. They know it means votes.
So perhaps we are not such impotent bystanders at the ringside, after all. Yes, we don't have a vote. Yes, if we shout too loudly for Kerry it may help his opponent. But most Olympic contenders testify to the importance of the crowd. And this election, unusually for an American election, is as much about events and reactions outside America's borders as about anything at home, including even "the economy, stupid". In that same Pew poll, 41% of those asked say the most important problem facing the nation is "war/foreign policy/terrorism" against just 26% for economic issues.
It would obviously be disastrous if only those European countries that opposed the Iraq war now explicitly support Kerry. That would give credibility to the conservative senator Mitch McConnell's acid jibe that "Kerry wants to outsource our foreign policy to Paris and Berlin." It would be even worse if those countries that supported the Iraq war, especially Britain, Poland and Italy, did anything to suggest that Bush could carry on as he has since 2001 and still enjoy their support. No European government would be wise to endorse either candidate. They can leave that to us unofficial Europeans. But European leaders can spell out clearly the terms on which Europe stands ready to be a full partner of the US in reducing the threat of terrorism that concerns Europe at least as much as it does America. From the ringside of the world election, we should shout not for Europe, not for Bush, not even for Kerry, but for America to win. They'll know which America we mean.
· Timothy Garton Ash's new book, 'Free World: Why a Crisis of the West Reveals the Opportunity of Our Time', was recently published by Penguin, UK
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0902-13.htm
Published on Thursday, September 2, 2004 by the Guardian / United Kingdom
The World Election
Europeans don't have a Vote in the United States - but Americans do care What We Think
by Timothy Garton Ash
Welcome to the most important American election in living memory. A world election, in which the world has no vote. Four more years of Bush can confirm millions of Muslims in a self-defeating phobia against the west, Europe in hostility to America, and the US on the path to fiscal ruin. Four more years, and the Beijing Olympics will see ascending China dictating its terms to a divided world. Don't be fooled by those who say that one lot is as bad as the other, or even, like the New Statesman's John Pilger, that Bush's re-election may be the lesser evil, because "supremacy is the essence of Americanism; only the veil changes or slips". Don't be put off by John Kerry's attempts to out-Bush Bush, as he attacks rather than applauds the president for inadvertently admitting that this "war on terror" cannot be "won" in the way that the second world war was won. Beyond the electoral posturing, Kerry knows that is true. As president, he would act accordingly, and the change would make a vast difference to every one of us.
The American election will have far more consequences for Europe than the last European elections. It's probably more important to Britain than the next British election. Yet there seems so little we can do to affect the outcome. We feel like a punter whose life savings have been invested in a bet on a single boxer in a single bout. All we can do is cheer our lungs out from the ringside. Except that if we shout too loudly for Kerry we may actually help the other man - especially if we shout in French.
George Bush's chances of winning depend on convincing a sufficient number of American swing voters of the truth of his narrative about "America at war". While his close supporters fund accusations that John Kerry marginally falsified his own war story in Vietnam, the president's whole campaign is premised on selling a false war story.
"Like the second world war," he declared in mid-August, "the war we are fighting now began with a ruthless, surprise attack on America." Well, tell that to the Poles. (I'm writing this on the 65th anniversary of the true beginning of the second world war, which was indeed a ruthless, surprise attack - on Poland.) Or the British. Or the French. But for President Bush, the second world war began only with the Japanese attack on America at Pearl Harbor.
The contemporary analysis is as bad as the history. Again and again, the war on terror - Wot, in Washington shorthand - is compared to the second world war or the cold war. There's only one way to win the war on terror, his key political adviser Karl Rove told an audience of young Republicans in the run-up to the convention. And that is "to chase the enemy to the ends of the earth and utterly destroy him". Like the cowboy hero of a hundred westerns. At the convention, they rally support with a film of US army tanks advancing down a road and warships cutting through the seas. Bush's own re-election website (www.georgewbush.com) has a homepage link entitled "Winning the war on terror". Of course, Republican leaders can make more sophisticated arguments in private conversation, but this whole campaign depends on projecting a grand narrative in which the US is engaged in a conventional war, which it will win mainly by martial valour and force of arms.
But it isn't, and it won't. "Utterly destroy him," cries Karl Rove. But who is he? Osama bin Laden? A Palestinian suicide bomber? An Iranian mullah? The unknown terrorist? The whole point of this new kind of struggle is that there is no single clearly identifiable leader or regime, no Hitler or Soviet Union, who can be thus destroyed. (Obviously, capturing Osama bin Laden, if he's still alive, would certainly help.) And if we accept, as we should, that we face a serious array of new threats, among which Islamist terrorism plays an important part, what is the role of military force in reducing the threat? Much less than in earlier wars. If military force was 80% responsible for the west's victory in the second world war, and perhaps - through the impact on the Soviet Union of the arms race - 30% responsible for the west's victory in the cold war (and even that figure may be too high), it will only be 10% - or perhaps 15% - responsible for winning this one.
The victory will depend on courage, resolution, and a determination to defend what we value - American leaders are right to remind us of this. It will depend on skilled intelligence and police work. But it will depend, above all, on addressing the political and economic causes of terrorism, to dry the swamps in which al-Qaida mosquitoes breed, and preserving and unfolding the magnetic attractions of our own free societies. It's here that Bush has been such a disaster. He has presided over the largest build-up of the American military since the end of the cold war, and the swiftest, most comprehensive dismantling of the country's popularity in the world since Vietnam. In the weapons categories that really count, no one has done more to disarm America than George Bush.
A surprising number of Americans see this. In a recent Pew poll, 67% of those asked said that the US had become less respected in the world, and 43% thought this was a major problem. It's not just wishful thinking that makes Democrats constantly harp on the argument that Bush has ruined America's standing with its traditional allies and friends. They know it means votes.
So perhaps we are not such impotent bystanders at the ringside, after all. Yes, we don't have a vote. Yes, if we shout too loudly for Kerry it may help his opponent. But most Olympic contenders testify to the importance of the crowd. And this election, unusually for an American election, is as much about events and reactions outside America's borders as about anything at home, including even "the economy, stupid". In that same Pew poll, 41% of those asked say the most important problem facing the nation is "war/foreign policy/terrorism" against just 26% for economic issues.
It would obviously be disastrous if only those European countries that opposed the Iraq war now explicitly support Kerry. That would give credibility to the conservative senator Mitch McConnell's acid jibe that "Kerry wants to outsource our foreign policy to Paris and Berlin." It would be even worse if those countries that supported the Iraq war, especially Britain, Poland and Italy, did anything to suggest that Bush could carry on as he has since 2001 and still enjoy their support. No European government would be wise to endorse either candidate. They can leave that to us unofficial Europeans. But European leaders can spell out clearly the terms on which Europe stands ready to be a full partner of the US in reducing the threat of terrorism that concerns Europe at least as much as it does America. From the ringside of the world election, we should shout not for Europe, not for Bush, not even for Kerry, but for America to win. They'll know which America we mean.
· Timothy Garton Ash's new book, 'Free World: Why a Crisis of the West Reveals the Opportunity of Our Time', was recently published by Penguin, UK