Democracy has been much in the news of late. At the G-8 Summit in Georgia, one of the main items on the agenda was the democratization of the Middle East, and the recent commemoration of the D-Day anniversary and the passing of President Reagan both generated discussion concerning the defense and spread of democracy.
The mining industry and environmentalists are onboard. As are liberals and conservatives in the U.S. Senate, but ratification of the 1982 Law of the Sea Treaty is being held up by half a dozen right-wing Republican senators backed by a coalition of national groups who see the agreement as another step toward world government.
Six years after they blasted their way into the Global Nuclear Club and dangerously heightened their mutual rivalry even further, India and Pakistan have begun a wide-ranging bilateral dialogue to resolve disputes and normalize relations. Since the new United Progressive Alliance government led by Manmohan Singh was sworn in six weeks ago, Indian and Pakistani officials have held two rounds of talks.
More than a year and a half has passed since the U.S.-led coalition’s invasion of Iraq, and yet little progress has been seen in the daily lives of Iraqi people. Not only has reconstruction stalled, but human rights abuses by U.S. soldiers at the Abu-Ghraib prison and the crackdown on political opposition groups have undermined Washington’s efforts to emerge as a champion of democratic and human rights in Iraq.
Increasingly desperate to find a winning formula in Iraq, Vice President Dick Cheney and other Bush administration officials are promoting Lebanon as a political model for Iraq. Agreed, the situation in Iraq is looking more and more like Lebanon–but not the “Lebanese model” Cheney talks about. The vice president appears to have in mind a pre-1967 Lebanon in which an elite of notables presided over a pluralistic republic, open to foreign capital, and free enterprise. Beirut in those days was known as the Paris of the Orient.
Editor’s note: This is a condensed version of a report prepared by the Education for Peace in Iraq Center (EPIC) which can be found at http://www.epic-usa.org/Default.aspx?tabid=262.
President Bush, in his January 2001 inaugural address, described the United States as “a place where personal responsibility is valued and respected,” pledging “to call for responsibility and try to live it as well.” Four years later, in his September 2004 speech accepting the Republican nomination for a second term, the president returned to this theme, telling Americans they would have a choice to make on election day “based on the records we have built.” That said, his acceptance speech was notable, not for what he included but for what he left out–the problems and missteps that have plagued the Bush administration’s foreign policy. It’s time for the president to speak “on the record,” accepting responsibility for his flawed policies and discussing what he would do differently, if anything, in a second term.
The reason why Washington is having such a difficult time persuading the world of its good faith and its good works in the “war on terror” was best illustrated on the day U.S. President George W. Bush went to the United Nations.
If President Bush wins a second term, can the world expect a radically different foreign policy in the Middle East and elsewhere? Optimists suggest that the answer is yes. As evidence, they argue that the White House has rejected the counsel of neoconservatives and is reaching out to moderate Republicans in search of a more balanced foreign policy. In turn, realists suggest that recent events leave little hope for change. What would a second term foreign policy look like?
For tens of thousands of fans, it was a happy September–the pro-football season resumed, diverting attention from the political campaign and natural disasters.