 2008-11-18 - What Moral Authority?
No need to cover points already made by others. There's one underlying assumption of the book I want to take issue with. Repeatedly, author Suskind alludes to America's lost moral authority, which he sees as a principal casualty of the Bush administration's cynical war on terrorism. Now, I'm wondering just where that lost moral authority resides or has resided. Seems to me that an unbiased reading of the country's history provides little evidence of any repository of moral authority that could be lost. From genocide of the Native Americans to ruthless territorial expansion to WWII fire bombings, plus the many recent bloody imperial adventures, the list of major crimes is a long one. In short, looks to me like we've acted pretty much like any other expansionist state since our founding. By what actions, then, can our historical narrative have accumulated the kind of moral authority that in Suskind's opinion could be lost. Nowhere, I believe, does he take up this key question.
Sure, the Bush regime has been particularly brazen in waging aggression abroad and assaulting civil liberties at home. Nonetheless, these are not unprecedented violations, as any unexpurgated account of international and domestic law reveals. In fact, torture has been routinely practiced from the Indian wars to McKinley's Phillipines to Johnson's Vietnam. But instead of concealing these deceptions, as in the past, this hubristic administration redefines the prohibitions and institutionalizes them at Gitmo. And I'm willing to bet that had Iraq not gone so badly sour, such violations would be popularly overlooked.
This doesn't mean that energized people shouldn't terminate as many of the abuses as possible. But, Americans need to be clear that in dealing with our government, we're also dealing with an empire, and empires are not managed on the basis of doing what's morally right. Such practices as torture, domestic spying, and rights violations will continue underground, just as before, not because government is evil, but because the imperial dynamic requires foul means as well as fair. Reforms can change the above-ground and give liberals something to brag about. But that's as much as good people such as the book's Candace Gorman can hope to accomplish when dealing with empire.
Perhaps there is hope that a very real moral energy can be mobilized at some point around common human problems, as Suskind desires. But what's sorely missing in the international equation is a common vision that would rally those hopes, the sort of alternative social order that might well borrow from the best of America but not seek to duplicte it. And it's that vision that should be sought after, not restoring some illusory moral authority that no empire has ever possessed in the first place.
 2008-11-16 - Thank you
Got the book in a few days, and it was in a good condition! Thanks!
2008-11-13 - Individual perspectives amidst geopolitical issues
This insightful book melds individual stories of "east and west" and the urgent geopolitical issues we face today. An amazingly good read.
2008-11-02 - great book
The book is a must read if you want to understand the assault on the constitution during the Bush administration.
2008-10-28 - stunning clarity, clear sense of purpose...
The war on terror has never been broken down so clearly as Ron Suskind has in this engaging, thought provoking book. The author so deftly takes us around the world and weaves the stories of people working to protect the 'idea' of American values as our own government demolishes that hope by it's own arrogance and hunger for power. We are the last great hope of a mankind that is governed by it's own people. Most Americans live in some sort of dangerous bubble, not aware of our Country's influence on the rest of the world that in itself should make this book required reading.
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