Rice to moderate Arabs: Get ready for chaos
Rice Alarms Reformist Arabs with Stability Remarks
Condolezza Rice is just getting warmed up. Maybe she doesn't know she's Secretary of State. Maybe she doesn't know that what she says is, like, important.
Rice said in an interview with the Washington Post last week the Middle East status quo was not stable and she doubted it would be stable soon. Washington would speak out for "freedom" without offering a model or knowing what the outcome would be.
It would be so much better if Rice were merely speaking out of turn, or rattling words off the top of her head without really thinking about the. Unfortunately, she means what she says and planned to say it. Helena Cobban:
She (Rice) reveals a totally cavalier attitude to the whole non-trivial concept of social-political stability in Middle Eastern countries."
"So it looks as though Arc of Instability may now actually be the goal of U.S. policy, rather than its diagnosis of an existing problem
Karen Hughes has quite a job ahead of her.
posted by Chris Dykstra @ 1:28 AM |
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4 Comments:
"social-political stability in Middle Eastern countries."
So women being property, state supported terrorism, and dictatorships are preferable to change?
I'm not thinking so.
None of that stuff is good, but it's a red herring, decaf, and you know it.
Those aren't the real choices. The real choices are do we want to foster a culture of ongoing war in which we are the central participants or do we rely on allies, diplomacy and time to do the hard work?
If we choose the former, then we can count on going broke and sending our kids to die over there for the forseeable future. And for what? To make al qaeda bigger?
Plus, it makes no sense in a global context. Pakistan treats women like crap, supports terrorism and is, by all accounts, a dictatorship. We can't and shouldn't do jack about it. Why? Because we need Pakistan in our corner.
Take a look at who Rice offended. . It's our friends - even though their governments are less than perfect by our standards. Still, we need more friends, not enemies.
Chris -
I couldn't disagree more. Propping up illegitimate dictors like the Shah of Iran is waht got us here in the first place. Its certainly not the solution we need more of.
Our parents have left us more heavy lifting than I want to leave my kids and their kids.
We need to do what is right, even though its hard. "Stability" it has been proven not to be.
decaf - what makes you think the current leadership in iraq isn't as illegitmate as the shah? purple fingers?
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