DKL,

Please tell us what the word “appeasement” means.

Please tell us, did Reagan appease Iranians during the 1980s? Mind you, this was during Jeanne Kirkpatrick’s infamous days. I do believe the record is clear. Reagan illegally sold weapons (that would be considered aiding and abetting our enemies) to the Iranians. He negotiated to have the hostages released. I wonder, will you ever see your dear holy Reagan in the proper light? Let us not forget that Reagan was the dog that fled with his tail between his legs when his nose got bloodied in Beirut. That’s Reagan.

What about Donald Rumsfeld appeasing some dude named Saddam Hussein. I do believe we sold him weapons and technology too. I do believe that Saint Reagan turned a blind eye when that same Hussein turned his weapons of mass destruction on his own people.

What about Reagan appeasing Gorbachev? Did Reagan not work to lower our strategic nuclear capability with the Soviets? That appeaser! Or is it a matter of IOIYAR (It’s Okay If You Are Republican)?

This is the illusion of the left wing of the Democratic party, and no matter how much Obama waves his arms and shouts, “Look, the president is talking about me!” the problem is bigger than Obama — much bigger.

Uh, White House officials told reporters that indeed Bush was talking about Obama. Nice try. But revisionist history will not work in this day and age. Go back to the drawing board, DKL.

Oh, and I hope you do a better job at defining “appeasement” than Kevin James did, or well, didn’t do. Or is that just a silly label for you right-wingers? Do you guys even know your own terms?

Queuno,

Ah, but Obama’s strategy is not a doomed strategy. In fact Bush’s own Secretary of Defense says we should talk to Iran, just like Obama says. Is Gates following a “doomed strategy?” If so, why does Bush keep him on? Would not Bush then become complicit in the “doomed strategy” if he continues paying for the services of a man who says we should “talk to terrorists?” Appeasing them and all? Please, queuno, let’s drop the silliness and get on to debates on substance.

My first point just shows the hypocrisy of a stance that those like DKL like to take. IOIYAR.

Dan, you’ve yet to bring up anything but red herrings. The problem here is that you don’t know enough about foreign policy to recognize this. I don’t have enough patience to wade through your infantile argumentation to teach it to you about foreign policy right now. I’ll just give you a quick rundown, point by point:

Reagan as working in concert with Israel to befriend and influence moderate elements in Iran. You use the term “Iranians” to imply that he was dealing with the Iranian government, when he was dealing with Iranian freelancers who were trying to gain influence in Iran.

Hussein was not our enemy when Rumsfeld was dealing with him.

Reagan’s arms control was different from SALT I (which guaranteed strategic parity) and SALT II (which guaranteed Soviet strategic superiority) in that it didn’t unilaterally sacrifice American interests and it had a cogent verification interests. That’s why he was so sharply criticized for jeopardizing the progress of the talks (e.g., when he refused to put SDI on the negotiating table).

Gates is talking about ways to gain leverage with Iran, the goal being to negotiate from a point of strength.

And White House officials certainly did not say that it was about Obama. White House officials said that Bush was talking about a group of people, of whom Obama was a member — which is exactly what I indicate. It’s odd that you’d say “nice try” when you make something up out of whole cloth to make your point.

I’ll grant that the difference between engagement and appeasement can be a subtle one that many people don’t grasp, but your problem isn’t actually that you don’t grasp it. It’s that you think that you’re actually not a complete moron.

As far as a definition: Appeasement means sacrificing key interests to an enemy for little more than the promise of future concessions. This can include granting talks to an enemy unilaterally insofar as it grants them legitimacy in the eyes of peers and potential enemies; e.g., the Catholic church has been haunted for decades by the photos of Vatican officials with Nazi leaders. A more recent example is J. Earl Carter’s discussions with Hamas.

Um, I realize that DKL thinks I am stupid anyway, so I’ll just go ahead and ask…what does the title have to do with the text?

I don’t see any connection.

Naismith, first of all, I don’t think that you’re stupid. There needn’t be any doubt about that, because I’d tell you if I thought so. Second, I was waiting for someone to ask about the title.

The point of the title that it’s as true that people have died because of Obama’s “lie” as it is that they’ve died from Bush’s.

But rest assured, if Obama gets elected to the US presidency, cute and innocent little children everywhere will die as a result! Just to prove that this is true, if Obama does get elected, then I’ll buy t-shirts for my kids that read, “I died because Obama lied.”

Is the Atonement of Christ appeasement?

Lincoln–it absolutely is, and it shows that Jesus Christ was not energized or experienced when it came to recognizing his enemies and dealing with them accordingly–preferably with pre-emptive strikes. He actually said we were to LOVE them. That would imply that we would TALK to them as though they were like us, or do ridiculous, pacifist stuff like the Sons of Ammon did, or give coat as well as cloak, walk two miles when THE ENEMY required only one. And the resurrection, promising life to all equally, even “enemies,” was clearly naive.

What I find morally naive is the assumption that diplomacy can’t work. We tend to hear more about diplomacy failing than we do about it succeeding, because the success stories are not publicized nearly as much.

And the Kevin James debacle was a hoot, wasn’t it? It was the perfect demonstration of the circular, ignorant, repetitive slogans which have replaced nuanced thought.

DKL,

You resort once again to personal attacks instead of sticking to the points of the debate. Perhaps I should not continue attempting a debate with you because clearly you cannot hold back your passions.

Dan, you’ve yet to bring up anything but red herrings. The problem here is that you don’t know enough about foreign policy to recognize this.

Actually, I do know that I am bringing up a red herring. My point is not to directly refute your main point, but to show the hypocrisy of your point. See, it is okay for a Republican to talk to our enemies, because by default Republicans don’t appease. No siree. It’s part of the illusion, the fake act, to pretend that Republicans stand from a position of strength (when really the opposite has generally been true) vis-a-vis our enemies. See, by taking out Saddam, Republicans gave Ahmadinejad Iraq on a silver platter. Ahmadinejad and his ilk didn’t need to much at all to gain huge control and influence in Iraq. Just a few Iraqi militias to train here, a few to fund there, and poof, he has control of most of Iraq. Meanwhile, we spend hundreds of billions of dollars, lose over 4000 American soldiers so far, and still Iran has more influence and power in Iraq than we do. We do not work in Iraq from a position of strength, and that is solely due to the silly Republican ideology.

Hussein was not our enemy when Rumsfeld was dealing with him.

Ah yes, he was our freedom fighter. IOIYAR.

Gates is talking about ways to gain leverage with Iran, the goal being to negotiate from a point of strength.

It is your burden of proof to show that Barack Obama’s position differs from Bob Gates’ position. You are the one challenging that Obama’s foreign policy is that of appeasement. Prove it. Show us his words. If you cannot, then you must recant your words.

And White House officials certainly did not say that it was about Obama.

Um, yes they did.

The president did not name Obama or any other Democrat, but White House aides privately acknowledged the remarks were aimed at the presidential candidate and others in his party.

You use the term “Iranians” to imply that he was dealing with the Iranian government, when he was dealing with Iranian freelancers who were trying to gain influence in Iran.

Nice try again, but no matter how many degrees Reagan tried to get himself from the Iranian government, it doesn’t change the fact that Reagan tried to negotiate the release of the hostages with the Iranian government. You accuse me of a lack of foreign policy knowledge, but then you go spinning the events to reflect well on your Saint Reagan. That doesn’t do you well, DKL, but shows that you’re nothing more than a partisan hack who cannot stand reality.

Dan: You resort once again to personal attacks instead of sticking to the points of the debate.

Look, Dan: You’ve either have to say intelligent things or suffer being told that you’re a moron. Saying stupid things and objecting to being called stupid is trying to have your cake and eat it, too.

DKL,

I do not say stupid, moronic things. The fact that you resort to calling it that proves that you cannot handle actually debating the merits of the points. Fundamentally, anyone that doesn’t think like you do, DKL, is stupid or moronic.

“No one who prays to the God of Abraham could strap a suicide vest to an innocent child, or blow up guiltless guests at a Passover Seder, or fly planes into office buildings filled with unsuspecting workers. In truth, the men who carry out these savage acts serve no higher goal than their own desire for power.”

What an idiotic statement. If the guys were only in it for “power” they wouldn’t be killing themselves, would they.

Personally, I’d be embarrassed to admit I was even listening to Bush anymore, let alone analyzing what he says.

You’d have more fun analyzing a day old monkey turd.

“Do you guys not realize how badly you will lose in November when everybody gets to vote?”

Dan, both the most recent Gallup and Rasmussen polls show McCain in the lead in a head to head against Obama. So I guess most of us don’t realize.

Bill: Remember, Dan, you’re dealing with someone who was sure that Romney would get the nomination.

If you actually read what I’ve written about the Republican primary process, then you’d know that I was sure that Romney would not get the nomination. I wasn’t sure of who would win, but I thought it likely that Giuliani would get it. It’s pretty clear that you have no idea who you’re dealing with.

Dan, nearly everything that you’ve said about politics since you’ve started commenting here is either incorrect or irrelevant. Your skills with logic are terrible. And your habit when you’re shown to be wrong is to drop the issue rather than concede — the hallmark of intellectual dishonestly.

In this case, I knew exactly what you’re trying to get at in your first comment. You’re trying point to instances of Republican administrations doing what you think J. Earl Carter did when he spoke to Hamas last month. Each of instances remains irrelevant for the reasons I gave. You respond by stating your intent, which doesn’t change anything, but because you’re no good at logic, you think it does.

And again: You cite a news source that indicates that Bush was referring to “the presidential candidate and others in his party”, i.e., Bush was referring to a larger group that was inclusive of Obama. This is exactly what I’ve indicated twice. The fact that your assertion that Bush referred to Obama is a distortion of mainstream media reports doesn’t make it any less fabricated. Again, you’re making this stuff up. What’s worse is that the source you cite for evidence of your position actually proves mine. How can you expect me to not call this kind of behavior idiotic?

Yes, I should have said “with someone who predicted Romney would win Iowa, New Hampshire, and Florida.” And there was that post, “Romney the Frontrunner” (followed up by “Romney the Underdog”).

wow, it’s scary to see the viewpoints taken by some of our fellow members here on this political thread. No wonder we try not to get into politics in church. What a load of crap this appeasement arguement is. Ahmadinejad is nothing at all like Hitler was. He has no imperial designs and has never attacked another country. There has never been any good evidence he was seeking after nuclear weapons (unlike the only nuclear armed nation in the region… Israel). Looks like some on this blog have been drinking the official Kool-aid of the Bush administration. Just like the Kool-aid that was ingested before the Iraq war. There is no need to get vicious with Iran. In fact, we should go back to the Iranian proposal of 2003 when they offered to give recognition of Israel and withdraw support of Hamas and Hezbollah in return for normalization of relations with the USA. But, Bush threw that one back in their face didn’t he. No appeasement of the “terrorists” there.

For some sensible commentary on this appeasement nonsense, check this LA Times op-ed:

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-scoblic17-2008may17,0,6293795.story

which includes this gem from the late, great WFB:

When Eisenhower welcomed Premier Nikita S. Khrushchev to the United States in 1959, William F. Buckley Jr., the right’s leader, complained that the act of “diplomatic sentimentality” signaled the “death rattle of the West.”

DKL,

It seems to me you are preparing yourself for an Obama Presidency, no?

David–blogging is not really the place to display nuanced thought, is it. We have room for a little satire and a few incendiary words. Most of your introductory blog-post is a quite of a man whose father did actually know something about diplomacy. (Why on earth would China be granted “most favored nation” status given the plethora of human rights abuses there? There IS a reason, but you need to understand a different mindset and culture–or depend on diplomats who’ve made it their life’s work to understand.)

A real answer to George W. Bush’s simple-minded speech, which uses false analogy in a way few presidents have had the simplicity to pursue, should come in a much longer format than a blog. The questions are actually complex, and phrases like “embolden our enemies” etc. reveal themselves as what they really are–hollow slogans for lazy people who maybe don’t know much at all about history or even the definition of appeasement.

I am assuming that, given the chance, you could pursue a meaningful discussion of the real issues and keep away from ad hominem arguments (as, I hope, everyone else could). I am pretty confident in my sense of history and lessons we should’ve learned. I agree, sadly, that sometimes war is a necessary evil. But we spend far too much time finding excuses to quickly pursue what should be the last option–to be used only when all others are exhausted.

Ultra-conservatives only “know” one factoid from all of History. And even though they live in that shallow kiddy pool of historical interpretation, where the only thing that the past can teach us is that it was wrong for Neville Chamberlain to appease Hitler, they consistently misinterpret the one event they know of.

It was not wrong of Chamberlain to give the Sudetenland to Hitler. It was right. Have all of Czeckoslovakia, Hitler — for all it matters — frankly, we can’t afford this month to keep it from you. Likewise, it wouldn’t matter if we gave South Vietnam to China in 1963 or Afghanistan to the Soviet Union in 1979. Want to eat that, Russia? Why not eat more? Gorge yourself and collapse all the sooner.

The problem with ultra-conservatives is that they don’t really believe in America, in capitalism, and in democracy. If they actually believed the in the philosophies they wear on their lapel pins, ultra-conservatives wouldn’t feel compelled to cheat (counterproductively). You wouldn’t feel compelled to support anti-Communist totalitarian dictators, if you actually believed in that capitalism and democracy were stronger forces than central-planning and Marxism. What a wonderful world we’d live in today if Afghanistan were a despondent, irreligious, post-Soviet Kazakhstan, instead of the terrorist hotbed that it is.

Chamberlain’s error was not selling out the Czechs. Who cares? They weren’t a real county yet anyway. Chamberlain’s error was imagining that letting Hitler digest a bit of central Europe would be the end of it. What he should have done was appease Hitler with the Czech Republic (and then later give Hitler Poland, for all it matters), while meanwhile building up British military defenses to withstand the inevitable naval and air invasion that was coming. That was Chamberlain’s error, quite contrary to the standard interpretation of the only event that ever occured in the human history, as remembered by modern ultra-conservatives.

Guy Murray: It seems to me you are preparing yourself for an Obama Presidency, no?

LOL. Yeah. I’m more than a bit resigned to it. The Republican party is in a shambles, and only a really loud wakeup call is going to bring it around.

John Hamer, that’s an interesting analysis. I agree that Chamberlain’s appeasement (that’s Chamberlain’s word, btw) causes him to get a bad rap. That’s one reason I quoted Churchill’s eulogy. Most people don’t know that his was the government that declared war on Germany after its invasion of Poland. You’re right that one of his errors was his assumption that Hitler’s appetite could be satiated (though I don’t believe it was his only error). Moreover, this error presupposes the outlook I describe in my post in which one relegates her opponent to the role of someone who is merely reacting. Chamberlain erroneously supposed that Hitler had some justification for his actions, and that once his justifications ran out his behavior would improve.

Moreover, I believe that it would have been easier to stop Hitler sooner rather than later. William Shirer and Hugh Trevor-Roper certainly thought so.

I also disagree with whether Czechoslovakia was a real country. It was the only successful democracy remaining from the nation-building efforts that followed in the wake of WWI.

It’s possible that the entire Holocaust might have been avoided if Churchill had ascended to the Conservative party leadership sooner. When he was talking early on about how dangerous Hitler was, everybody dismissed him as a crank. Alas, the Holocaust is an indelible part of the 20th century, the ultimate tragedy sitting atop the laundry list of civilization’s shattered dreams that filled the last century from end-to-end. Subsequent history is inconceivable without it. Asking how history might have unfolded if the Holocaust hadn’t occurred is like asking “what if Caesar hadn’t been assassinated?” The way WWII played out has shaped our thought about world affairs more than any other event before our since.

You’re opinion about the durability of capitalism and democracy reminds me of the famous statement by John Stuart Mill in On Liberty (he was, interestingly, addressing the perceived threat of Mormon Polygamy in Utah):

If civilization has got the better barbarism when barbarism had the world to itself, it is too much to profess to be afraid lest barbarism, after having been fairly got under, should revive and conquer civilization. A civilization that can thus succumb to its vanquished enemy must first have become so degenerate that neither its appointed priests and teachers, nor anybody else, has the capacity, or will take the trouble, to stand up for it. If this be so, the sooner such a civilization receives notice to quit, the better. It can only go on from bad to worse until destroyed, and regenerated (like the Western Empire) by energetic barbarians.

This bursts with the brilliant confidence of Victorian optimism; to read it is to want to believe it. Indeed, the world would be a better place if the brutal course of history hadn’t repeatedly dashed such lofty sentiments to bits. I can’t speak for others, but for me, it’s not so much that I don’t believe in democracy or capitalism. It’s that history teaches us to be fearful for the permanence of human achievement.

Margaret Young, And nuanced expression isn’t as fun as soundbites. Even so, your accusation that Bush is being simple-minded reminds me of the criticism offered against Reagan’s “evil-empire” outlook. Some people really did think that he’d bring about WWIII. It’s difficult to remember how controversial it was for him to say “Mr. Gorbochev, tear down this wall.”

I look forward to that conversation. I’ll bring a Bush/Cheney bumber sticker for you.

So DKL,

why don’t you write a post as nuanced and thoughtful as your comment #40? Can you see the difference between the two?

DKL–thank you for the offer of the bumper sticker. I know exactly where I’ll put it.

Margaret, I certainly picked up on the sarcasm of most of your comment, but I missed that your initial sentence was in that same posture. My apologies.

ESO, if you have a complaint about inserting Obama into Bush’s speeches, you should take it up with Obama, since he’s the one who’s inserted himself into Bush’s speech by alleging that he’s the primary target of the speech.

But if you’re intent on offering a lazy reading of my post, I’ll give you an executive summary: There has always been people who imagine that we can simply work out our differences with our enemies. The core mistake in this way of thinking is that it assumes that our enemies are doing little more than reacting to our own actions, and that they are in some way legitimately justified in their own beliefs. Though Obama is certainly one of these people, the problem is much larger.

If you think that Bush’s speech was childish, then you should also take it up with the Knessett, who interrupted Bush with applause after he made the remarks that I cite in my post.

I’ve already brought up Reagan’s approach to the Soviet Union, which was hailed as childish by his enemies. I’ll offer a more specific example.

In 1981, when the Soviets brutally put down strikes by the Polish Solidarity Union, the Washington Post ran the headline, “Soviets Reacting with Restraint,” and the editor of the Washington post gave a radio interview placing the blame for the crackdown on the Reagan administration. He believed that if we’d have offered the Soviets more aid, they’d have been more lenient. Like Borah, who quixotically believed he might have prevented the inevitable, the editor of the Washington Post believed (a) that the Soviets were in some sense justified in pushing marshall law onto Poland, and (b) that the human-rights violations that resulted could have been prevented if Reagan had used the right measure of incentives.

There’s a certain innocent logic to this type of position. But when you combine it with vain delusions of sophistication, you get institutions like the Washington Post scoffing with puffed-up, self-imagined sophistication at the very notion that the Soviets were being pro-actively evil. This is just as prevalent among today’s liberals as it has been for the past 40 years.

And this notion that people have mentioned that you shouldn’t refer to domestic policy disputes in speeches on foreign soil is utterly without basis. The real shame is that ignorant people everywhere take this week-old invention as a timeless truth.

The problem with this whole appeasing the enemy arguement in the first place, is that we wouldn’t have very many enemies if we didn’t go around creating them to begin with. Was Iran our enemy before 1954? Did Iran chant death to America before we sheltered the Shah and refused his extradition? Was Iran proclaiming herself our enemy in 2003 when the Ayatollah reached out to the US government in with an unprecedented list of concessions that Bush threw back in Iran’s face?

No children will die if we talk to Iran.

We need to let the IAEA continue to do it’s work. We need to press for IAEA inspections to begin in Israel. We need to support measures like FISSBAN at the UN in which fissile nuclear material production would be banned (usually it is only the US and Israel that oppose that good piece of legislation while nations like Iran and the rest of that region support it).

Iran is killing no children now. However, our biggest ally in the middle east is killing children on a regular basis in Gaza. Bush called Israel a beacon of democracy recently. On almost that same day, Israeli police brutally suppressed a Nakba march by Arab-Israeli citizens.

Iran has its problems to be sure, but they are not the Nazis Bush would make them out to be.

Iran is killing no children now…

Just criminals, converts, and homosexuals.

In spite of killing criminals (not a whole lot different from the US), and homosexuals (crimes that are definitely hyped up in our media) these constitute no reason for us not to talk to them. Heck, we talk to Uzbekistan who boil their political opponents to death, we loved Suharto who killed upwards of a million landless peasants in 1965 and committed genocide in East Timor. We talk to North Korea all the time. We talk to Pakistan and India who have just developed nuclear weapons. We talk to Saudi Arabia who commit crimes against its people at least on par with Iran if not worse. Worse of all, we talk to Israel who have developed nuclear weapons, (probably with the partial help of secrets stolen from the US) and regularly massacre people under their own occupational care.

Nate C.,

I wonder if you knew that the CIA placed the Ba’ath Party in power in Iraq in the 1960s…We do indeed create enemies.

DKL,

What do you care who I’m grouped with? You already think of me as an “inveterate anti-American,” to use your words. As for the CIA putting the Ba’ath Party in power, that’s fairly factual, if you read Legacy of Ashes, which cites original CIA documents. I don’t know why you see it as anything conspiratorial. I mean, if you were to ask someone to describe a “secret combination” you could not do worse than to point firstly to the CIA.

As for the rest, that’s okay, DKL. I accept your concession and defeat.

Dan, the problem isn’t that it’s not factual (unlike you, I was aware of this fact long before I read Legacy of Ashes). The problem is that it’s not relevant. As I’ve said before, when you’re not making stuff up, you’re using loopy logic. You’re really not any more liberal than a whole bunch of people that I discuss politics with on a regular basis — including some of the commenters on this thread to whom I’ve responded thoughtfully.

I honestly don’t care how you read my contempt for you. Though it’s direct to clever insults at you, it’s not something that gets me worked up or angry. On a good day, you make me shrug. On a bad day, I roll my eyes. In either case, I think to myself, “What a moron.”

Thanks for posting that, Dr. That’s a very shrewd article.

Don’t worry DKL, I don’t take your insults personally. It is par for the course. Your comments are actually fairly light compared to others that I have endured. I feel just fine because to this point I haven’t been wrong on foreign policy.

Dan,

You are amazing. “I haven’t been wrong on foreign policy.” “I’ve never been wrong on Iraq.” In 1193+ comments, you’ve never been wrong on those subjects. Just saying that makes you a fool. Just imagining that makes you a fool.

For the record, you have been, and continue to be, terribly wrong in matters of foreign policy/war. Your comments are asinine and entirely political, rather than based on complete facts or even the truth, for that matter. Just look at an Iraq war now relegated almost entirely to one province.

You continue to march 1-2 biased sources and profess some form of moral high ground where none exists. Not to mention the paradoxical double-standard arguments you only repeat from the liberal toolbox. Intervention creates enemies and suffering for us. But open dialogue with everyone is good under all circumstances. Sure they might have an agenda of blood and horror, but shoot, we should hear them out, legitimize them. In and of itself, morally an intervention. Chomsky would be proud of Bush to some extent, if he had no political agenda.

Sometimes diplomacy doesn’t work. There is no perfectly repeatable answer to any question, unless you simply avoid the question. DKL has actually shown that very well in his example. And he also shown that you can’t blame the people who tried, they had the best intentions. The question is whether you simply repeat the misfortunes of the past, or do you try something different.

The only thing that “creates” enemies is one person’s choice to hate another, perhaps for no other reason than skin tone, and often less than that. Politics is the ultimate straw man for simple hatred. That is Bush’s speech writer’s point. And he’s dead on. What Bush does with that and what he can put together verbally on the spot is another story all together.

On with the cat fight…