Posted on 10/05/2001 12:58:33 AM PDT by YaYa123
"SOME might have preferred Tony Blair to make his best-ever Prime Ministerial speech to Parliament, but there was a certain aptness to the setting of the Labour Party Conference. In recent years, traditional words like "solidarity" and "internationalism" have fallen into disuse or been considered faintly embarrassing in Labour circles. Indeed, Mr Blair didn't use them himself. But they were the underpinning principles of his oration and they are the reason why it worked. He got all the essential points right.
Anybody could have been a victim of the death-squad attack on the most cosmopolitan city in the world and thus we must think and act as if we have all been hit. This solidarity is international by definition and requires a view of the world as our common home and of the death-squads and their sponsors as our common enemies.
Mr Bush could have said as much, and he almost did, though not quite in the same terms, and using the word "America" in every other sentence. But Mr Bush could not have written the speech he read to Congress. Nor would he have been as consistent in his internationalism, stressing the misery of Africa and the injustices of the Middle East. Nor would he have mentioned the Kyoto accords on global warming; a problem from which he seems to believe that the United States is exempt.
One of the Prime Minister's unstated objectives, one hopes, is to gently remind the man in Washington that he cannot treat globalisation as a one-way street.
Mr Blair also grasped another vital point, which is that we owe some- thing to the people of Afghanistan. They did not elect the Taliban regime, which has reduced their women to the status of slave-objects and plunged a whole society into a mediaeval nightmare of superstition and beggary.
If the Taliban and the bin-Ladens would do this to their own people, what might they have in mind for us?
Blair seems to know this instinctively and to accept the consequences, which are "No Compromise". It is us or them; we did not start this but we can and must and will finish it. A very invigorating contrast to the dithering idiocies and self-blaming babble one hears in some quarters. It ought to go without saying that any response, however outraged and justifiable, should consciously seek to avoid embroiling or harming innocent Afghans who have already suffered enough.
But then again, why not state it plainly? The Prime Minister did just that. A fair warning has been given to the disgusting fanatics who occupy Kabul and who, as we speak, are forcibly conscripting young men into their army. They have been told they cannot win. If they try to put a human shield around the ghastly network that they incubate and shelter, then humanitarianism will find a way around that shield and will destroy the hostage-takers, mass-murderers and narcotics-traffickers who have made their own homeland into a desert.
Blair's speech had a bracing effect in Washington where - public rhetoric notwithstanding - there are still some who wish they could avoid the responsibility ahead, or perhaps hand it on to some Afghan mercenaries who will do the fighting by proxy.
Since the Prime Minister's remarks were accompanied by action - the moving into position of British forces, in some cases rather faster and rather nearer to the scene than the American ones - it has become crystal clear that this is not a task to be fobbed off.
If we mean even half of what we say about defending what is of value in civilisation, then we have to assume the burden ourselves. And, since civilians have been in the front line since the very first day of this, and will remain in the front line while the death-squads look for an opening for even more terrible actions, there need be no embarrassment about cheering on our forces from the rear. Some of them are probably safer than we are.
But those who take on the Taliban today, and who will be working in the dark to grapple with those who escape justice to try and spread infection and death, will also be on the front line for culture and humanity. It does no harm, as they set off, for a Prime Minister to speak up boldly and to call things by their right names. What if we fail? What if there are reprisals? The answer to this is simple, and Blair put it in plain words. There may well be reverses.
There will almost certainly be further atrocities, though to dignify them by the name of reprisals is to degrade the language. But we have no alt-ernative. The option of not combating this evil does not exist. One might spare a moment to remember Kosovo. All through that campaign there were those who muttered that it would not work, that it would increase support for Milosevic, that it was none of our business anyway, and that it might annoy the Russians or the Chinese. One cringes to remember these arguments.
Milosevic is in jail, where he belongs. The Kosovo refugees got home, where they belong. The sky did not fall. This will be tougher. So must we be, therefore. The great thing with any important enterprise is to start as you mean to go on. Mention of the Kosovo operation also reminds us of the way in which a British Labour leader can make a difference in Washington itself.
If Tony Blair is something of a hero in the American press and public opinion today, it is not just because he knows the meaning of the word "alliance". It is because he is prepared to fight an individual corner. Again, this is not the "poodle" role some so sneeringly attribute to him. By announcing that the war will now be taken directly to the enemy, Tony Blair has hit precisely the right note."
Then there is the Invisible Viceroy, Cheney. What is disquieting to the American people is how MIA Bush and Cheney seem compared with Blair.
In fact, I'm buoyed by Blair's articulate, steadfast, emphatic presence. The world knew from the beginning we would respond. Blair has let them know we aren't alone, his enthusiastic support is significant, to friend and foe alike.
No, it's because the LIBERAL media wants to diminish Bush.
George W. Bush is leading this fight and Tony wants to take credit. How typical!
This is great.! The line in the sand! The war this time is Civilization vs the Barbarians. A rather clear distinction - even the Labour Party gets it. The Democrat Party over here are solidly with President Bush, too.
For those that think a One World Government is just the rantings of the right-wing fringe from the front page of the London Telegraph
New currency for a new world
By George Jones, Political Editor
TONY BLAIR yesterday gave his strongest signal that he wants to join the European single currency within four years as he outlined his vision of a new world order rising from the ashes of the terrorist attacks on America.After months of sending out conflicting messages on the euro, he indicated that he would use his enhanced authority as a war leader and the changed world circumstances since September 11 to argue for greater co-operation with Europe.
As in "humble". Remember how important that word was to President Bush as he assumed office? Proof once again, that President Bush lives by the words he speaks, it's not just impressive sounding but empty rhetoric He isn't a glory hog, a grandstanding gladhander, always seeking the limelight, always sensing where the camera is. This unselfish behavior must be so bizarre to the mainstream media, so un-Clinton, they don't know how to describe it...and they don't want to give him kudos anyway.
Ha!
Go Dubya!!!!!
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