09 November 2006
False dawn or real sea change?
By now, it seems clear that the US Democrat party has reclaimed control of the House of Representatives and provisional control of the Senate; after 12 long years of Republican domination. While on the surface much has been made of the Iraq disaster being the principle reason for the Republicans being booted out, a BBC report suggests domestic issues were strong reasons in many states.
Traditional Republican heartland voters seem to have cast their ballots with eyes on the economy and the sex and corruption scandals afflicting mostly Republican congressional representatives in both houses. In the case of the latter, the moral hypocrisy obviously reached intolerable levels for many diehard Republicans. In the case of the former, the heartland voters' sense of standing still economically despite the ruling elite becoming even more insanely wealthy, had finally broken through into their consciousness.
But an important point to note is that for many heartland voters, Iraq was less of an issue than good old personal economic interest. Nothing wrong with that. Except when your country is involved in an illegal war of aggression, THAT should be a real moral issue taking highest priority.
And in other cases where Iraq was the issue, most of the voters' concerns revolved around the war being unwinnable, mismanaged or costing too many US casualties. You seldom hear concerns about the original immorality and illegality of the war. Yet it is these issues that are the underlying drivers of global opposition to US policies.
As an aside, remember how Team Neo-Con and its supporters love to label war critics as un-American if they were US citizens, and anti-American if they were foreigners? Well now that the majority of US citizens have rejected Bush and the neo-con cabal, is this majority now un-American too? Or are the neo-cons the real un-American traitors guilty of subverting the constitutional foundations of their country?
Will the return of the Democrats warrant a change in negative world sentiment against the US? I think the answer depends not only on whether a military withdrawal from Iraq occurs but also if America's claim to being a real democracy plays out in holding Team Neo-Con accountable for its moral and war crimes.
If the new US Congress has the moral fibre to investigate and prosecute the likes of Big Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condi Rice, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith and General Geoffrey Miller (the culprit directly responsible for Abu Ghraib) for their crimes, then you don't have to be a Neo-Con Einstein to realise the world will get the message that true accountability exists in an American democracy.
This of course, begs the question for what crimes should the Neo-Con cabal be charged? Well, the last time I checked, it is still a war crime to prosecute unprovoked wars of aggression unsanctioned by the UN Security Council. And to test what's good for the goose is good for the gander, the same criteria used by the victorious Allies (of whom the US was one) at the Nuremburg Trials should be applied.
Remember that Hitler and his henchmen committed one of many war crimes when they fabricated an excuse (code named Operation Himmler) to invade Poland in September 1939. There is no difference between what the Nazis did then and what Team Neo-Con did in March 2003. So if ever the new US Congress wanted to prove that their notion of democracy is more than myth and much methane, then they should start cleaning house in earnest. That would silence critics and doubters immediately.
What are the implications for Poodle Tony?
Let's remember that the more highly principled British voters were the first to register their disgust with Blair involving them in an illegal war. They did so even after their American and Australian counterparts actually rewarded their respective leaders for involving them in the same illegal war (see "Blair bleeds a little more").
British voters disciplined Blair by cutting his parliamentary majority from 167 to 66 seats in May 2005. And the poodle has little choice but to relinquish office to Gordon Brown next year, after much pressure from his party colleagues to get out.
In contrast, US voters not only re-elected Big Dubya, they also increased his share of the vote. Likewise in Australia, voters not only returned Chi Hua-hua John to office, they also gave him control of the upper and lower houses of parliament. In short, Australian and American voters appear to be more similar than British voters.
This now brings me to Chi Hua-hua John.
Despite recent polls now showing that a majority of voters think he's a liar, he still enjoys a relatively high rating as preferred leader over the astoundingly unimpressive Opposition leader, Kim Beazley. While this is more a reflection on Beazley than on Howard, it also says a lot about the heartland voter in Australia.
Iraq is simply not a vote losing issue in Australia because the country hasn't suffered any direct casualties in battle. Were Australian soldiers to return home in body bags, then like their US cousins, heartland voters would become concerned over military casualties BUT not over Iraqi casualties. They've had plenty of opportunities to express concern over Iraqi civilian casualties from March 2003 but they weren't deterred from re-electing Chi Hua-hua John in a landslide.
What are we to make of this? The answer lies in understanding how Chi Hua-hua John won the election in November 2004. This self-proclaimed statesman cynically played racial and religious cards to exploit latent racism and xenophobia unhappily rife in many heartland voters.
On the eve of the election, Howard falsely claimed that a boatload of Middle-Eastern asylum seekers (ironically Iraqis fleeing the war in Iraq!) were throwing their children overboard in a vain attempt to stop a Navy ship from towing them out to international waters. He infamously said that these weren't the sort of people fit to enter Australia and that he wouldn't be surprised if some were terrorists.
Note that when Howard made these claims, he had already been informed by the then acting Chief of Defence Forces, Air Marshal Angus Houston, that the claims of children being thrown overboard were simply untrue. But of course, this didn't stop the self-proclaimed US deputy sheriff from smearing and demonising a boatload of people fleeing from a war he helped to start.
Uttering these disgraceful lies boosted his security and "tough on terrorists" image. This played very well to a heartland rife with resurgent racism and xenophobia, and so these voters went on to deliver a landslide victory to this odious character. How's that for a stunning demonstration of the "fair go" cultural value Chi Hua-hua John now demands newcomers adopt if they wish to become citizens and permanent residents?
So without Australian military casualties, what will unseat Chi Hua-hua John? I'm sorry to say that it'll be crass personal economic interest on the part of the voter. In the absence of a moral imperative driving voting decisions, it is most often the economic imperative that will dominate. In such situations, only when people lose jobs in a recession or lose homes when interest rates are too high, do governments lose office.
If inflation continues unabated and the Reserve Bank of Australia is forced to increase interest rates a few more times closer to the next election around November 2007, there will be a good chance Australian voters will punish Howard. Whether they do so sufficiently for him to lose office remains to be seen.
But they have clearly demonstrated that illegal wars and immoral leaders take a back seat to good old personal economic interest.
Traditional Republican heartland voters seem to have cast their ballots with eyes on the economy and the sex and corruption scandals afflicting mostly Republican congressional representatives in both houses. In the case of the latter, the moral hypocrisy obviously reached intolerable levels for many diehard Republicans. In the case of the former, the heartland voters' sense of standing still economically despite the ruling elite becoming even more insanely wealthy, had finally broken through into their consciousness.
But an important point to note is that for many heartland voters, Iraq was less of an issue than good old personal economic interest. Nothing wrong with that. Except when your country is involved in an illegal war of aggression, THAT should be a real moral issue taking highest priority.
And in other cases where Iraq was the issue, most of the voters' concerns revolved around the war being unwinnable, mismanaged or costing too many US casualties. You seldom hear concerns about the original immorality and illegality of the war. Yet it is these issues that are the underlying drivers of global opposition to US policies.
As an aside, remember how Team Neo-Con and its supporters love to label war critics as un-American if they were US citizens, and anti-American if they were foreigners? Well now that the majority of US citizens have rejected Bush and the neo-con cabal, is this majority now un-American too? Or are the neo-cons the real un-American traitors guilty of subverting the constitutional foundations of their country?
Will the return of the Democrats warrant a change in negative world sentiment against the US? I think the answer depends not only on whether a military withdrawal from Iraq occurs but also if America's claim to being a real democracy plays out in holding Team Neo-Con accountable for its moral and war crimes.
If the new US Congress has the moral fibre to investigate and prosecute the likes of Big Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condi Rice, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith and General Geoffrey Miller (the culprit directly responsible for Abu Ghraib) for their crimes, then you don't have to be a Neo-Con Einstein to realise the world will get the message that true accountability exists in an American democracy.
This of course, begs the question for what crimes should the Neo-Con cabal be charged? Well, the last time I checked, it is still a war crime to prosecute unprovoked wars of aggression unsanctioned by the UN Security Council. And to test what's good for the goose is good for the gander, the same criteria used by the victorious Allies (of whom the US was one) at the Nuremburg Trials should be applied.
Remember that Hitler and his henchmen committed one of many war crimes when they fabricated an excuse (code named Operation Himmler) to invade Poland in September 1939. There is no difference between what the Nazis did then and what Team Neo-Con did in March 2003. So if ever the new US Congress wanted to prove that their notion of democracy is more than myth and much methane, then they should start cleaning house in earnest. That would silence critics and doubters immediately.
What are the implications for Poodle Tony?
Let's remember that the more highly principled British voters were the first to register their disgust with Blair involving them in an illegal war. They did so even after their American and Australian counterparts actually rewarded their respective leaders for involving them in the same illegal war (see "Blair bleeds a little more").
British voters disciplined Blair by cutting his parliamentary majority from 167 to 66 seats in May 2005. And the poodle has little choice but to relinquish office to Gordon Brown next year, after much pressure from his party colleagues to get out.
In contrast, US voters not only re-elected Big Dubya, they also increased his share of the vote. Likewise in Australia, voters not only returned Chi Hua-hua John to office, they also gave him control of the upper and lower houses of parliament. In short, Australian and American voters appear to be more similar than British voters.
This now brings me to Chi Hua-hua John.
Despite recent polls now showing that a majority of voters think he's a liar, he still enjoys a relatively high rating as preferred leader over the astoundingly unimpressive Opposition leader, Kim Beazley. While this is more a reflection on Beazley than on Howard, it also says a lot about the heartland voter in Australia.
Iraq is simply not a vote losing issue in Australia because the country hasn't suffered any direct casualties in battle. Were Australian soldiers to return home in body bags, then like their US cousins, heartland voters would become concerned over military casualties BUT not over Iraqi casualties. They've had plenty of opportunities to express concern over Iraqi civilian casualties from March 2003 but they weren't deterred from re-electing Chi Hua-hua John in a landslide.
What are we to make of this? The answer lies in understanding how Chi Hua-hua John won the election in November 2004. This self-proclaimed statesman cynically played racial and religious cards to exploit latent racism and xenophobia unhappily rife in many heartland voters.
On the eve of the election, Howard falsely claimed that a boatload of Middle-Eastern asylum seekers (ironically Iraqis fleeing the war in Iraq!) were throwing their children overboard in a vain attempt to stop a Navy ship from towing them out to international waters. He infamously said that these weren't the sort of people fit to enter Australia and that he wouldn't be surprised if some were terrorists.
Note that when Howard made these claims, he had already been informed by the then acting Chief of Defence Forces, Air Marshal Angus Houston, that the claims of children being thrown overboard were simply untrue. But of course, this didn't stop the self-proclaimed US deputy sheriff from smearing and demonising a boatload of people fleeing from a war he helped to start.
Uttering these disgraceful lies boosted his security and "tough on terrorists" image. This played very well to a heartland rife with resurgent racism and xenophobia, and so these voters went on to deliver a landslide victory to this odious character. How's that for a stunning demonstration of the "fair go" cultural value Chi Hua-hua John now demands newcomers adopt if they wish to become citizens and permanent residents?
So without Australian military casualties, what will unseat Chi Hua-hua John? I'm sorry to say that it'll be crass personal economic interest on the part of the voter. In the absence of a moral imperative driving voting decisions, it is most often the economic imperative that will dominate. In such situations, only when people lose jobs in a recession or lose homes when interest rates are too high, do governments lose office.
If inflation continues unabated and the Reserve Bank of Australia is forced to increase interest rates a few more times closer to the next election around November 2007, there will be a good chance Australian voters will punish Howard. Whether they do so sufficiently for him to lose office remains to be seen.
But they have clearly demonstrated that illegal wars and immoral leaders take a back seat to good old personal economic interest.
Labels: anti-american, cabal, cheney, condi rice, corruption, feith, geoffrey miller, iraq, john howard, neo-cons, neo-conservatives, neocons, perle, rumsfeld, tony blair, un-american, war crime, wolfowitz
