by Wakeley Paul; USA, published March 9, 2004
SOME FACTS AND OPINIONS ABOUT THE ON COMING AMERICAN ELECTIONS: HOW DOES IT AND CAN IT AFFECT EELAM?
I am sure my views do not meet with [the editor’s] approval and are therefore highly controverial from an average Tamil viewpoint. That is what makes it interesting. It should stimulate responses. Wakeley
The Democrats are at this very moment buoyant about their prospects of winning the November Presidential election. The credibility of the President is questioned as to why he invaded Iraq on the unproven assertion that Saddam had WMDs in his possession; and as to why he never checked the authenticity of his information before committing this nation and its young warriors to war. He is being challenged on the economic front for supporting the policy of out sourcing of jobs to foreign countries; he is being assailed on the validity of tax cuts and the accompanying increase in federal spending.
“Never before,” they cry, “has there been higher unemployment rates since Herbert Hoover; never before has there been such a massive debt since the depression; never before has the country been free wheeling backwards rather than forwards” they say with an onrush of confidence. All very powerful stuff.
So far, Bush with his several million plus dollars in campaign funds, [10 times that controlled by Kerry] has done nothing of significance to counter this wide barrage of Democratic attacks. The question is, what weapons does he have to counter attack these allegations and how effectively can he use them to bury this Democratic onslaught.
Let us begin with the Iraqi war. Here are some salient facts with which the Bush campaign could, should and probably would use, to squeeze dry the Democratic allegation that he misled the nation into war.
In 1974, then Prime Minister Chirac of France, traveled to Baghdad to meet the then Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq, Saddam Hussein. They discussed Iraq¹s purchase of French nuclear reactors. The next year, Saddam visited Paris and was given a tour of a French nuclear plant by Chirac himself, who proclaimed “Iraq is in the process of beginning a coherent nuclear program and France wants to associate itself with that effort.” Following this, Saddam told an Iraqi magazine, that working with France was crucial “toward the production of the first Arab Atomic bomb.”
The French then sold two atomic reactors to Iraq and agreed to train 600 Iraqi nuclear scientists and technicians on nuclear weapon development.
Paris further agreed to sell Iraq 1.5 billion dollars worth of weapons including Mirage F1 fighters, surface to air missiles, advanced electronics and air defense systems. Saddam in turn agreed to sell France oil at enviably favorable prices. The Germans also worked out favorable trade deals with the Iraqis. Democrats might argue that these were fair deals between the French, the Germans and the Iraqis, but the United Nations Security Council did not share that view.
After the first Gulf war, when it became evident that Saddam had used chemical weapons against the Iranians and his own fellow citizens, he wasordered by the U.N to destroy all WMD’s. U.N weapons inspectors were dispatched to ensure compliance. In 1998 however, he ordered them out of the country. This blatant defiance of the U N resolution went virtually unheeded by the U.N and the U.S.
There is a photographic record of the fact that Iraq had used dangerously prohibitive weapons against Iran and that Saddam had executed many of his own citizens with chemical and other WMDs. The President will produce hideous photographs of the victims of these brutal annihilations of Iranians and massacres of his own population, to emphasize Saddam¹s callous ruthlessness. The President will ask whether this is the kind of person who could be trusted not to use WMD’s against the U.S or any democratic nation that he resents? The fact that Saddam is both ruthless and unpredictable, will arouse a deep seated fear and the need to indulge in unbounded expenditures on national security.
On November 2002, all 15 members of the U N Security Council demanded that Saddam disarm. Was that based on the accepted assumption by all these nations that Saddam possessed WMD’s or not?, Bush will ask. President Clinton had during his regime declared Saddam a security risk to the U S, but did nothing about it. He will characterize this as the typical Democratic reaction to threats to the national security, thereby giving the U.S the pathetic image of being nothing more than the proverbial paper tiger. “Do you want this nation to submit to the policy of inaction so loudly advocated by the current Democratic candidate for President?,” he will ask. Hans Blix had agreed that Saddam had not accepted the required disarmament. Saddam in turn thwarted the efforts of the U.N weapons inspectors to function effectively at every turn and corner, forcing them to withdraw in desperation. He continued this nose thumbing defiance even after they returned. “What rational conclusion could anyone have drawn from these provocations by Saddam?”, Bush will ask.
Bush will aim his poison-tipped spear at the Democrats with rhetorical questions like, “Should I have vacillated like a Democrat and paid honor to Saddam for his thumbing his nose at not only the U N Security Council resolutions but at the US? Our planes, while traversing through protected airspace were regularly fired upon by Saddam’s planes, contrary to the UN resolution prohibiting the invasion of this airspace by the Iraqis. Should I have sided with Saddam’s allies, the French and Germans, or taken the action I did to prevent Saddam from continuing with his nuclear development, while also engaging in the more imminent danger of chemical weapon production.
This ominously was capable of being used against anyone at any time.”
As indicated earlier, when the U N inspectors were first sent to Iraq Saddam adopted every possible tactic to thwart and delay them. The U N inspectors gave up and left. Despite this, weapons inspector Rolf Ekeus reported finding “a combination of researchers, engineers, know-how, precursors, batch production techniques which constituted Iraq’s chemical threat, its chemical weapons.” David Kay, a former head of the Iraqi survey Group who was asked to hunt for WMDs found “illicit procurement networks,” a clandestine network of laboratories and facilities within the security apparatus. “One cannot estimate the damage that could be caused by 140 liters of VX in Saddam¹s hands” he said. “What was the U S to do with these pieces of information?”, Bush will ask. “Watch and wait for something to explode based on the so-called uncertainty of the situation, as it is perceived by the Democrats, or act on the obvious indicators that were making themselves self evident? France & Germany had every reason to duck a war against their most favored friend and ally. They could hardly be relied on to make an unbiased neutral judgment on how dangerous the situation was.”
Saddam in the meantime had praised the 9/11 attack on the U.S, while an Iraqi government-controlled news paper described it as. ‘God¹s punishment.’ Al Qaeda has subsequently praised the loyalists to Saddam Hussein and described the Americans as ‘criminals’, ‘heretics’ and as ‘slaves of the crusaders.’ “Yet, the Democrats do not regard my invasion as a war against terrorism,” his voice will resonate. Who perceived these dangers before they were confessed to?”, he will ask. “Can you trust those who lack the instincts to sense international dangers to manage and maintain our national security?”, will be the question he will pose. He will then go on to emphasize the fact that his very unpopular Attorney General with his even more unpopular Patriot Act have saved this nation from any internal attack since 9/11. The violations of civil rights in that act will pale into insignificance in the highly charged atmosphere of possible terrorist attack and the desperate need to protect the nation from it. National Security will dominate the guardianship of civil rights, till the Supreme Court holds otherwise. That however will not happen till after the election is over and done with.
This rhetoric will unquestionably stir up the pride and of an average citizen and also make him feel that he and his family are protected by a virtually impenetrable security blanket provided for them by the President and his men, while the Democrats rave about his having misled the nation into war. Their cry will sound like rattling silver paper compared to the sonic boom of the gong of Bush¹s call of the need for action.
The Democrats will seize on the fact that the war was planned better than the peace that was to follow; that the post-war strategy lacked planning, organization and UN support They will crow over the fact that the terrorists have set the agenda in Iraq, leaving the U S to respond with bumbling non responses to their indiscriminate attacks. Bush’s response will no doubt be that dealing with terrorism is a new and untested experience. “Terrorism is a technique, not an identifiable foe,” he will claim. “None of us, not even the Vietnam veterans of whom my opponent was one, have had experience in this field of war,” he will say, adding that they have learned a fundamental truth about dealing with terrorists, which is, that the harsher the response to their attacks, the more one serves the insurgents purposes. It alienates the hearts and minds of a much larger and wider range of people than their direct supporters, which is why this administration has wisely surrendered this task to the Iraqis. “They know their enemy and how to handle them,” he will insist with smug self confidence. He will then emphasize that the elimination of Saddam has relieved this nation of what was a continuing threat, which the Democrats, based on their criticism of his conduct, would have allowed to continue to fester.
The current fast-developing danger of International Terrorism and the need to bolster US National Security are inextricably intertwined. They must both be distinguished from the broader issue of foreign policy, which under the Bush Administration has been far more favorable to the LTTE quest for peace and the need for rehabilitation of Tamil lands and Tamil people, than any previous administration has ever been. Former Democratic Senator Torricelli of the Foreign Affairs Committee was totally sympathetic to the Sri Lankan government. He supported their effort to brand the LTTE as a terrorist organization with flag waving enthusiasm. Benjamin Gilman, a Republican Congressman on the other hand, began to both understand, sympathize and at
times empathize with the Tamil plight. The Bush administration dispatched the U.S. Ambassador in Sri Lanka to visit the Mahanayake Theros in Kandy to try to dissuade them from their anti-Tamil posture, only to be rudely snubbed by them and told to mind his own business. Despite this setback, they have lent support to the peace talks and have even had a person with the stature of Colin Powell join in the refrain that the peace talks must continue. Prabakaran has risen in stature in their eyes as a person, who at this juncture in the war against discrimination and suppression, is deeply committed to peace and rehabilitation rather than being committed to bloodshed for an indefinite future. The same cannot be said of their view of the Sri Lankan President. The English language Sinhalese-controlled newspapers in the capital are fighting a losing battle, knocking their heads together and trying to brand Prabakaran as terrorist who no one should deal with. The international set know that it is important and vital to the peace process to deal with Mr Prabakaran, who heads the LTTE, which is the other party to the conflict. All Tamil parties but one, now stand behind the LTTE. We as an active Diaspora in this country should make every effort to convey the LTTE commitment to rehabilitation over war, to our local Congressman and / or Senators. This has been emphasized by Mr Thamilselvam, the spokesman for the LTTE, time and time again. The Diaspora in other nations should do the same with the members of their legislative and executive establishments.
The state of the US Economy will dominate people’s minds in the upcoming election even more than the danger to the national security, for the ironic reason that the national security threat appears to have been successfully ontained, though not eliminated. Ironically, since, because of its success, the issue of national security will become second to the economy as an election issue. This is not to suggest that the danger to the national security will not loom large in the voters minds, as one can judge by the hysterical Democratic reaction to Bush¹s advertisement portraying the compelling tragedy of the 9/11 attack in still photographs, to emphasize his leadership role in that crisis.
The problem with the state of the economy is that economics is far too esoteric a subject for the average citizen to comprehend. It not an exact science. Even economists differ vastly in their approaches to the subject. The average citizen instinctively gauges the state of the economy on how it hurts or uplifts him personally.
The Democrats, particularly John Edwards, stressed the fact that out-sourcing was an evil which is not only killing American employment now, but will do so well into the future. The candidate John Kerry, though not quite as strong in condemning out sourcing, has now joined that choir and sings the same refrain. Bush accepts it as a consequence of preserving an open economy. My own personal view, like that of the President is that out-sourcing is one of those unfortunate inevitable consequences of maintaining an open economy, which must be secured and preserved at any cost. America has withstood a depression; fought threats by the importation of cheaper automobiles from Japan and Volkswagens from Germany, without hiding behind a protective cloud. The result was that it stimulated the American automobile industry to compete. Today, the industry also have smaller and more fuel efficient cars, but America is a big country with cheaper gas, where the larger luxurious counterpart yet remains popular. The only nations that ultimately wound up in the doldrums were Japan, with its closed and protected economy and those of many countries of the third world, including Sri Lanka under Mrs Bandaranaike. J R Jayawardena did open the economy up, but it overheated too soon after those many years of economic repression. The fact is that Sri Lanka is better off with the open economy, which no government since Jayawardena, has dared to reverse. Sri Lanka’s national debt today is expanding by leaps and bounds because of the commitment to war, not because of the open economy. Another danger with closed economies is it leads to retaliation and can, in the case of the U S, adversely affect the world economy. Out-sourcing will result in cheaper production costs, cheaper imports of our own goods even though manufactured abroad; and a cheaper export of our goods from foreign nations, thus improving our trade balance of payments on the one hand while strengthening the U.S economy taken as a whole, on the other.
Despite this, there would be a strong tendency on the part of those whohave lost jobs to be disillusioned with the policy of out-sourcing because it affects them adversely. It is hard to explain to a jobless person that this is a short term consequence which will be good for him and the nation in the long run.
We then have the burning issue of tax cuts. Tax cuts can boost an economy in three ways. It stimulates rich corporations and individual entrepreneurs to expand and grow their businesses with their vast savings; this stimulates new employment and cheaper production, which in turn stimulates both local middle class and overseas consumption. In order to balance the budget, however, this must be accompanied by curbs on spending. This President has unfortunately shown an unequaled affinity for profligacy. How will he counteract the attacks against him on this score? He will no doubt do so by claiming that there are vital expenditures for the war in Iraq, rehabilitation of those affected by that war, fighting terrorism, health care for the elderly and education and the advancement of the young.
It is doubtful that he or any politician in his right mind will adhere to Federal Reserve Chairman Greenspan’s suggestion that social security payments be reduced to reduce the national debt. So far, Bush has offered no alternative for minimizing this huge debt burden on the economy. The Democrats, by sharp contrast, counter this with a policy of increased taxes on the rich, an attractive political slogan for the average man, but a
dangerous economic phenomenon. The Democrats strongest attack on the bloated expenditures will be focused on the cost of the after-effects of the war; an expense they will argue that was tripled by miscalculation, poor planning and gross mismanagement. This could become the focus of Bush’s fight to have another term as President. The effects of the aftermath of the war are devastating. They do affect the voters who are aroused to indignation and depression by the unceasing numbers of servicemen who continue to be killed or maimed or wounded, even if with decreasing regularity. These post war traumas will probably drag on through the November election, though a sharp decrease in the regularity of such future attacks, could help the President.
The issue that has emerged suddenly and unexpectedly is same sex marriage, a fad, though non existent in Asia at present, could well spread to the region and become as universal as swiftly as drug addiction did. Most Americans are anti-gay marriage; most states prohibit it; a constitutional amendment to finalize the ban and make it applicable to every state will take time to accomplish. It requires a vote of 2/3 of each house of Congress and 3/4 of the 50 states legislatures to become valid. The Supreme Court could on the other hand rule in the meantime than the ban violates the Equal Protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, thus making the ban illegal in every state of the Union. If the Supreme Court conversely holds that it does not violate the Fourteenth Amendment Equal Protection clause, then each State will have the opportunity to determine whether or not it is permissible in that State. It is worth noting that the Supreme Court of Canada has declared Gay marriage to be illegal even though one would have imagined them to be more conservative than even the Americans. But here again, this was hotly contested in Ottawa. The French Canadian feelings on the subject might have influenced the result, but that is but a wild guess. A legislative Amendment to the Federal Constitution will bind the US Supreme Court.
What significance is there about recognizing it or not? John O;Sullivan, in the National Review of March 8 states “…gay marriage would not be a move toward greater stability in homosexual relationships; but just another domino falling in the slow motion collapse of marriage in the western world.” He goes on to say, “As Stanley Kurtz has persuasively demonstrated, the end result of this trend is visible in Scandinavia- where marriage is gradually dying away, replaced by cohabitation, family disillusion, and child rearing by the welfare state. Gay marriage has done nothing to arrest these trends. In fact they have accelerated in the period since gay marriages and civil unions were recognized.”
The implication is that people seized by a sudden onrush of romance join hands and live together. They then commence to adopt children in unions which do not last, leaving children the worst victims of these hasty easily legalized unions. What he suggests are three courses of action. [1] Make it clear that once the marriage is legalized, it is extremely difficult to release yourself from it; and if you have children under 16, it will be made virtually impossible to do so. [2] There should be substantial fiscal and social advantages in getting married; and finally [3] there should be no reforms that grant approval to non marital partnerships. In short, make marriage the meaningful institution it is, whether it be same sex or otherwise.
My greatest objection to gay marriage is that it defies the meaning of the word as well the institution. Marriage is a life long union between a man and a woman with a view to procreation and the creation of a fresh new generation, followed by a healthy upbringing of that new infusion of life into the world. Gay marriage with adoptions, can never touch that sacred concept with a barge pole. Modern fads can never substitute for the real thing.
I do not think the Sri Lankans, Sinhalese or Tamil or Muslim or others, will be attracted by this new American fad. They are more likely to be repelled by it.