I just spoke to both Democrat Senators from NY who
voted for the insane war resolution in Congress. What a
bunch of immoral Cynics. Krugman compares it to a man who lost his
keys and only looks where the light is just right. I would compare
it to the American Revolution where the Brits fought a conventional war and the
Americans fought like Indians and like today's terrorists. We
can't win this war unless we murder one billion Moslems just like America
did to the Indigeneous peoples. What no one mentions is that it
cost America one million dollars per Indian to do the job.
Today they can't even find a sniper who is killing people in one of the most
populous areas of the nation. Our crazy militias are
Disneyworld compared to these guys and you had better hope that Pakistan doesn't
vote the current administration out and put in a more radical one. I
think this is the most telling statement to prove that GWB and Falwell are cut
from the same cloth.
Cussin REH
Still Living Dangerously
By PAUL KRUGMAN
By PAUL KRUGMAN
smart terrorist understands that he is not engaged in conventional warfare. Instead he kills to call attention to his cause, to radicalize moderates, to disrupt the lives and livelihoods of those who would prefer not to be involved, to provoke his opponents into actions that drive more people into his camp.
In case you haven't noticed, the people running Al
Qaeda are smart. Saturday's bombing in Bali, presumably carried out by a group
connected to Al Qaeda, was monstrously evil. It was also, I'm sorry to say, very
clever. And it reinforces the sinking feeling that our leaders, who seem
determined to have themselves a conventional war, are playing right into the
terrorists' hands.
Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim
country, has not been a major breeding ground for terrorists. It is, however, a
nation with severe economic, social and political problems � the kind of
problems that could radicalize the population and turn it into a terrorist
asset. And Saturday's bombing was clearly an attempt to intensify those
problems.
To understand why the attack was so clever, you
need to appreciate Indonesia's fragility. Five years ago the country became the
biggest victim of the Asian financial crisis. When inflows of foreign capital
dried up, the economy's modern core imploded; big companies that had borrowed
overseas found that their debts had ballooned to unpayable levels.
What saved Indonesia from complete economic
collapse, and made a partial recovery possible, was the resilience of the
country's economic and geographical periphery. The big companies on Java were
devastated by the plunge in the rupiah, but smaller enterprises, especially on
the other islands, saw the weak currency as an export opportunity. That
included, in particular, the tourist industry of Bali, which has flourished in
post-crisis Indonesia as an affordable destination for foreigners.
Now who will vacation on Bali? Indonesian officials
are putting a brave face on it, assuring tourists that they are still safe,
insisting that the economy can handle the blow. But it seems all too likely that
the bombing has effectively destroyed one of the country's key industries. And
given the already wobbly economy and the already weak authority of the
government, a serious setback might set the stage for social and political
turmoil � maybe with an ethnic and religious edge. For Indonesia is an
overwhelmingly Muslim country in which a small ethnic Chinese minority, mainly
Buddhist or Christian, dominates the economy.
In short, the people who set off that bomb knew
what they were doing.
The bomb blast in Bali followed bad news from the
world's second-most-populous Muslim country. Hard-line Islamic parties did
unexpectedly well in Pakistan's election last week, and Pervez Musharraf's hold
on power may be slipping. Do I need to point out that Pakistan is a lot bigger
than Iraq, and already has nuclear weapons?
And that gets to my worries over the direction of
U.S. policy. I don't think we could have done anything to prevent the blast in
Bali � but the attack does suggest that our early military success in
Afghanistan has done little to weaken terrorist capabilities. It's not clear
whether the U.S. could have done anything to improve the situation in Pakistan,
though it might have helped if we had done a better job in Afghanistan, both in
pursuing our foes and in helping our friends; it might also have helped if the
administration had made good on its promise to let Pakistan increase its textile
exports to the U.S. .
What's clear is that the biggest terrorist threat
we face is that one or more big Muslim countries will be radicalized. And yet
that's a threat hawks advising the administration don't seem to take seriously.
The administration adviser Richard Perle, quoted by Josh Marshall in The
Washington Monthly, brushes off concerns that an invasion of Iraq might
undermine the stability of Middle Eastern regimes: "Mubarak is no great shakes.
Surely we can do better. . . ."
Meanwhile, plans to invade Iraq proceed. The
administration has offered many different explanations, some of them mutually
contradictory, for its determination to occupy Baghdad. I think it's
like the man who looks for his keys on the sidewalk, even though he dropped them
in a nearby alley, because he can see better under the streetlight.
These guys want to fight a conventional war; since Al Qaeda won't
oblige, they'll attack someone else who will. And watching from the alley, the
terrorists are pleased.
