Morning Joe 6/22/2011 - McCain, isolationism and history

On Morning Joe today there was an interview with Jon Huntsman, talk about Afghanistan and the disagreement over pulling out or staying to establishment stability, a big deal over Gingrich's Tiffany's account which Gingrich's campaign says was never used and was closed, but the only thing of real interest was the clip of John McCain calling anyone who wants out of Afghanistan an isolationist, then claiming they don't understand history. McCain is an arrogant fool when it comes to foreign policy -- just because he was a prisoner of war doesn't give him special wisdom regarding foreign policy issues. Here's some history for McCain -- in the 50s, after several failed attempts to achieve Israeli/Arab peace, John Foster Dulles decided to effect regime change in Egypt by any means necessary, except assasination. Dulles helped stage coups in the region and attempted to shift the power game among Arab states, and the US withheld aid from Nasser. In response, Nasser, in 1956,  nationalized the Suez Canal, sparking a series of convulted events involving Britain, Irael and France, then Russia -- America eventually saved Nasser after previously plotting his overthrow. In his book, Power, Faith and Fantasy, Michael B. Oren describes the results:

Spurred by romantic notions of Middle East nationalism and an anticolonialist creed, the United States had banded with its perennial Soviet enemy against its European friends and saved an Egyptian dictator whom Dulles had plotted to depose. In return for pursuing this meandering course, America earned contempt from the Soviet Union, acrimony from the British and French, and antagonism from many Arabs. Rather than express gratitude to the nation that had saved him, Nasser denounced the United States as the new imperialist power in the Middle East.

This is the point which history makes, and which McCain/Graham/Lieberman, and now Obama and all statists who intervene internationally to create some cherished form of change, can't understand -- our interventions have failed because we can't change the world through military might, we shouldn't try to change the world, especially when the rest of the world doesn't want to change according to our plans. We can protect our borders and citizens from attack, and that should be all we do. In Afghanistan and Iraq and Libya and Yemen and Pakistan we are making the same mistakes which led to Mideast hatred of America in the first place. We have tried to change the Mideast from the beginning of our country, and it hasn't worked. McCain should read the history.

Oh, Huntsman is a perfect centrist darling -- he's going to be civil, intelligent and articulate while Obama's attack dogs chew both his legs off.

Morning Joe 6/13/2011 -- 2012 Presidential Election

Morning Joe, like most news shows now, was mainly about the 2012 Presidential election. Is Obama making a come-back? Will Romney hold out and get the nomination? Will Huntsman catch on? Then, of course, there was the usual trashing of the other candidates -- a "circus" as Joe S. described it.

Richard Wolffe was on, and he's pushing a book about Obama's 2.0 comeback from certain defeat after the 2010 election. It's really a ridiculous angle, especially when it's so transparent that the book is a partisan ploy to support Obama, who's been up and down in the polls, and the media will likely report many polls showing many different results until 2012 when the voters will have their say, and everyone will then say the results of the election were "unexpected".

It appears that centrists like Scarborough are pulling for Romney or Huntsman, while the Republican base prefers the likes of Cain, Pawlenty and Bachmann. There's still a lot of time, though, and so far I don't see any chance of a revolutionary movement on the Right to make big changes. It appears that caution is the strategy -- to promote moderate changes in order to get spending under control, and maybe relax a few regulations, but nothing major. Republicans are scared to death of the "extremist" label.

The Morning Joe crew talked about Obama's attempt to win back Wall Street. Obama hasn't lost the big banks and crony corporations who depend on government to protect them from competition. What Obama has lost, or never had, is the small business owner, and if the right amount of urgency is experienced among independents, Obama will lose big, as many qualified voters who have been sitting out will go to the ballot box -- but you won't see any poll reflecting this possibility.

Go, Ron Paul, Go!

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/269184/ron-paul-rising-robert-costa

I want Paul to get grass roots support and scare the hell out of the establishment. I want him to win. We don't need a weathervane like Romney, or a statist like Huntsman -- we need someone who understands that major change is required and isn't afraid to tell the truth -- we need somebody crazy like Paul. Crazy is exactly what we need -- have you seen the sane people running things?

An example of media framing

http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/05/jon-huntsmans-climate-problem

The above is an example of how liberal media will push Huntsman closer to Obama and make it impossible for Huntsman to take a rightwing position without being associated with earth-destroyers and bigots. Many on the Right will concede that the climate is changing, but they disagree on the responsibility of the government to "do something" about it. Many on the Right have compassion for gay people, but they still uphold the tradition of marriage being between a man and a woman, but rags like Mother Jones will hold up the stereotypical far rightwinger/hatemonger as the average Republican who is clearly and vigorously opposing Obama's policies -- so if Huntsman takes any stand that would upset a Democrat, he's pandering to the Republican base, and they are all kooks, you know.

These partisans on the Left are becoming so obvious and collectivized it's both funny and frightening.

One good reason to choose Jon Huntsman

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/20/jon-huntsman-afghanistan_n_864668.html

In doing a little research on Huntsman, although his language is careful, I found he appears to be against the war in Afghanistan and wants to reassess our military position in the world. I just wish he would state what he thinks that position should be.

Huntsman should be much clearer in his positions, unafraid to state what he means.