Posted on 02/27/2006 2:46:40 PM PST by Diana in Wisconsin
In a recent speech in Washington, Gen. Wesley Clark called for an American grand strategy to replace the Cold War strategy that held the world together for a half century after World War II. Good idea.
Even some Republicans are now privately admitting the failure of their party's grand strategy, which as I understand it involves instituting democracy in countries around the world, by persuasion and example or by force. President Bush says it is working. Events in Palestine, Iran, Iraq, Egypt and elsewhere suggest otherwise.
The second leg of Republicans' grand strategy is to shrink the role of government in people's lives. That, too, is failing. Budget deficits, trade deficits and the federal government's incompetent response to Katrina and rebuilding New Orleans, to say nothing of the Medicare Part D headaches, are evidence enough.
Democrats have been criticized for offering no alternative grand strategy. We might forgive them on two counts. Republican control of the White House and Congress virtually dooms any Democratic ideas. And if an idea has any merit, the other party would take credit for it a Washington custom.
I propose a grand strategy for the Democratic Party. Republicans, at least the far right wing, are not likely to appropriate it as their own. It is one that all but the most deluded religious zealots must embrace. Properly presented, it will sweep Democrats into power, probably for decades. It will do more for humanity than all the wars we might conceive in the cause of democracy. And it will cement our nation's role in 21st century history in the way that World War II and the Cold War sealed our place in the 20th.
The grand strategy? Simple: Eliminate poverty throughout the world.
Take a few minutes to get all the guffaws and harrumphs out of your system, then consider it seriously. Let's begin by agreeing that eliminating (or greatly reducing) poverty will do more than war to nurture democracy. Can we also agree that eliminating poverty will reduce resentment toward the United States among the people of Africa, South America and the Middle East (a leading cause of terrorism)? A couple of worthy objectives right there. And, oh yes, eliminating poverty is a dominant message of the Bible, if that means anything to you.
This will not cost the United States as much as you might think, if we follow the "teach a man to fish" school of charity. America's main contribution to the worldwide war on poverty would be our brains, our technology, our roll-up-our-sleeves problem-solving ability. We know that, properly utilized and husbanded, the Earth's resources are adequate to support its current population and then some. It would be America's role to provide the know-how to make that happen. And where current knowledge falls short, we would find ways, using the vast research resources of our universities and corporations.
In the course of finding those technologies and practices, we will find new products and services to export, putting Americans to work and generating profits for American companies. It should be noted that the first poverty to be eliminated would be here in the United States.
Eliminating poverty would solve environmental problems including global warming because many of the solutions are the same. It would involve some sacrifice on the part of American citizens. But hey, shouldn't we have been doing that all along? We're not talking sack cloth and ashes.
Spend a bit more on education and energy, medical and agricultural research; a bit less on automobiles and extravagant lifestyles. Increase our foreign aid to the level of other industrialized countries. Agree that all humans deserve food, shelter, medical care and a shot at the good life.
Skillful budgeting and coaxing other developed countries into this effort must be parts of the grand strategy, talents present day Republicans seem to lack.
If there is a leader in the Democratic Party, let us hear him or her spell out a grand strategy that Clark called for. If it's not a war on poverty, then something else. If there is a Republican leader out there with a bold vision, let's hear it.
Please, anything but the childish, petty, destructive partisan squabbling and nibbling at the edges of horrendous problems that make all thinking Americans want to put a foot right through the TV screen.
Actual (or real, whichever you prefer), are you sure you aren't thinking of nominal- that I will happily agree with you on?
"Well, if you want to get technical, a certain level of socialism seems like a good idea, ..."
Only if you are ignorant of history and economics.
Socialism causes poverty, and this has happened so many times in the last 100 years, and so many millions have died
due to socialistic failures (and I dont just mean communist dictatorships, I mean even democratic socialist economies; look at African socialist economies, or even some European countries now suffereing from underemployment, eg, France vs more freemarket Ireland, the one country that moved towards free markets in Europe since 1980s has coincidently been their most successful economy.)
" not all out- but you can't really treat any element of socialism as bad for virtue of it being a component of socialism."
- price fixing doesnt work: It destroys the efficiency of allocation through price scarcity
- government ownership destroys the ability to incentivize efficient use of capital, which capital markets enable
- redsitribution of wealth require taxes, which disincentivize production and lower the standard of living
etc.
" Keynes, anyone?"
What about Keynes. His ideas were abused by politicians to such an extent that
Neo-classical economics trumped his ideas, which were based on incorrect underlying notions of how to incentivize
Say's Law proved more correct than Keynes (check out the Supply Side bible "The Way The World Works" for more on this; or read an Austrian economists view of the credit cycle).
" (It's worth noting also that Norway currently owns bragging rights to the highest quality of life in the world, despite a significantly smaller GDP- clearly some socialism can't be that bad.)"
Socialism has nothing to do with it. A highly cultured small country gets handed a windfall of oil riches. Yippee.
Now do real apples to apples - south korea vs north korea; east vs west germany, 1945-1989; or cuba versus puerto rico 1959-today.
Or just look at Zimbabwe today... socialism indeed is killing thousands.
"Like everything else, the best is gained from a mixing of both elements."
So, you put arsenic as a seasoning on your food?
The way to fix poverty and despair in Zimbabwe is to send anti-government forces guns and bullets, then sit back and watch the show...
In fact they tried socialism and forgot it, remember Aninas and Safira?
"The only real objection here is that I am a firm believer in mercantilism and that there is a set amount of actual capital in the world."
ROFLMAO! That's a belief as real as the tooth fairy.
Ever hear of a guy named Adam Smith, who debunked that a mere 200 years ago?
"you can't deny that there have been very few times a nation has risen to economic power without bringing another nation down."
I deny it. What nation did US bring down in our 200 year rise?
So we should just give up, because the Bible says so? Rather, you say that the Bible says so...
"I not an expert on the Bible, but where does it say this?"
He's just being snotty, because his stereotype of Conservatives is that they're all bible-thumpers.
The Bible generally refers to a "Poverty of the Spirit" and how to cure that, though it does instruct us to help others, but not give away the store while we do it. :)
"You are a stronger woman than I am to have to deal with that type mentality on a regular basis..."
That's why I work from home and refuse to socialize with idiots. ;)
Right. Maybe I'm just being picky here but I don't see a theme of eliminating poverty in the Bible, as this author alleges. Help those in need certainly, eliminate poverty, I haven't seen.
I wish democrats would run on ending global poverty with American taxpayer money. Global wealth redistribution would be a great platform for the Dummies. Hillary! Go for it.
"The grand strategy? Simple: Eliminate poverty throughout the world."
"The poor you will always have with you." Jesus
(Mark 14:7)
OOps, beat me to it :)
I don't have an opinion about General Clark's "grand strategy" -- but honesty compels me to admit that the critics are correct when it comes to the GOP's failure on the big government issue.
While I've been constantly surprised by the accomplishments of this euro-socialist trend (which, as early as six years ago, was reported by many to doubtlessly be a 'fad') and the successes of the smaller European markets as well as the EU as a whole, I wouldn't hold my breath.
Neoconservative advocates must challenge the European model actively, lest contemporary supply-side systems be cast into even further doubt by the accomplishments of the European models. While europhobia is hardly new to armchair right-wing punditry, the arguments against EU economies have been mostly forced into the realm of conceptuals and unsustainability theories, of varying tenability.
To acknowledge some things, such as higher GDP for the EU in a smaller geographic landmass than the US, would cast a pall upon the modern-day trade axioms of the Reagan-fashionable. It might even be, dare I say, the dreaded concession, to be avoided in nearly any degree.
Oh, it might be unsustainable. Most of us have issues of unsustainability at this juncture of world economic development. I won't venture to guess who will come out on top in the coming world economic shitstorm, or whether the United States will fare better than, say, Norway.
And how fitting indeed that sustainability issues should happen to have been that most prominently featured against poor Norway. Such a judgement is incomplete without an observation of our own nation. Say, how's that trade deficit of ours doing?
Well let's see, shift in major areas of capital exchange from London to New York (then from New York to Tokyo and then back to New York again) Spain, though in that case we kind of helped it along militarily, and the general clusterfuck of the West's adventures in China during the 1800s are another fun example, though that really is more general US and European example and not exclusively U.S. Regional competition also comes to mind, say suffering of the cotton industry post-civil war, admittedly the North had already begun to industrialize- but if you consider the influx of blacks to Northern factories and the wayning effectiveness of sharecropping, well you get the picture.
I can't recall any scripture that calls for the elimination of poverty.
"Better the little that the righteous have than the wealth of many wicked." Psalm 37:l6
"Defend the cause of the weak and fatherless; maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed. Rescue the weak and needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked." Psalm 82:3,4
Let me get this straight - you think the world economy is a zero-sum game?
CA....
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