KO just said that we 'paid' for the Afghanistan which sentenced a man to 20yrs. for blasphemy

[bigtree]

. . . 'with blood and treasure'.

He might want to rethink the conclusion of his rant, if not the understandable sentiment behind his assertion. His is a notion which fits perfectly with the delusions of empire that the last administration regularly used to justify their arrogant militarism abroad in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Our government and military is in Afghanistan because of a self-serving grudge against the Taliban for 'harboring' al-Qaeda', not because their laws and practices violate human rights. Our nation-building, 'spreading of democracy' is a cynical attempt to deny the Taliban (and their growing supporters in Afghanistan) a role in the government there.

We may well be sacrificing 'blood and treasure' defending and supporting the government the military helped install in Kabul, but that doesn't make it our 51st state. That heavy-handed opportunism doesn't give America the right to dictate how they make or execute their laws, no matter how abhorrent the laws or sentence are to our own understanding of the importance of free speech and political expression.

KO knows this.

[Berry Cool]

1. I don't think Keith is particularly into "respecting the laws of other cultures" when they violate

his personal sense of morality.

Just a guess, but I would bank on that.

[BzaDem]

2. "doesn't give America the right to dictate how they make or execute their laws"

Could you imagine a scenario where the laws or execution of laws of a country are so abhorrent that international intervention would be justified? Or do you believe that without exception?

Just curious.

[bigtree]

3. intervention, maybe

. . . but, not the invasion and occupation which is the subject here.

[phillysuse]

4. How about Nazi Germany?

The only regrets are that they didn't intervene sooner to stop Hitler and that they did not bomb the railroad tracks taking Jews and others to the concentration camps.

[bigtree]

5. you believe our mission in Afghanistan is analogous to the fight against Hitler?

KO didn't make that argument. He suggested that the Afghan government owes the U.S. some sort of surrender of their system of law to our own sense of justice because of our regime-changing invasion. That's imperialism of the order that Hitler assumed in his early military 'interventions'. The issue here is a 20 year sentence imposed by Afghan courts (as well as the other practices and beliefs of Sharia law) - certainly abhorrent and unjust, but not anything equal to the Nazi campaign for world domination.

Our self-serving occupation shouldn't be regarded as legitimate in primary opposition to Afghans' practice and adherence to Islamic or objectionable laws. That's akin to the 'crusade' that Bush described in his justifications for his nebulous 'war on terror'.

[anaxarchos]

6. The blasphemy was advocating equal rights for women.

Might as well be fully aware of the scale - the layer upon infinite layer - of the hypocrisy here.

1. The U.S. government created "Government" of Afghanistan, which is supported by the new administration on the increasingly narrow "moral" premise that the Taliban would crush women's rights, just threw a guy into prison for 20 years for advocating women's rights.

2. The Taliban was the last "Government" of Afghanistan, which was created out of whole cloth by the U.S., in opposition to the previous government, on a handful of social justice issues, of which the most important was the previous government's advocacy of women's rights.

3. The previous government was the "Soviet-supported" government of Afghanistan which actually did support women's rights - it was the first Afghan government to do so since the 1920s - and it was NEVER supported by the U.S. Quite the contrary, it was opposed from the beginning, almost two years before the Soviets intervened.

Having lived through Vietnam, the hypocrisy of this is on that same - maybe even a higher - level.

Your story is very nice, but you might be missing a bit.

[bigtree]

7. I don't dismiss any of that

What I'm reacting to is the slippery slope folks risk in expecting the government we've helped into power behind the force of our military invasion and occupation to comport their laws and execution of them to our own country's standard, just by virtue of our self-serving military assault and activity.

Was KO just being sarcastic when he said we'd 'paid' for that result? It's 2:30 and I'm more inclined to believe that because my mind is even duller than it was at 8:00.

I acknowledge that there should be pressure to secure the fellow's release. The charges are ridiculous and point up the hypocrisy and lie behind the notion that the emergence of the Karzai regime represents the establishment of democracy in Afghanistan.

That pressure to reform the legal system of Afghanistan, however, shouldn't be predicated on, or dictated by the type of military aggression that the U.S. has committed in their grudging seven-year occupation.

Maybe he wasn't saying that? :shrug:

[G_j]

11. a tangled, convoluted, bloody mess,

the last thing they need are military "solutions'.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/02/03-13

Published on Tuesday, February 3, 2009 by The Nation

Helping Afghan Women and Girls
by Katrina Vanden Heuvel w/ Kavita Ramdas

As the coalition I'm working with--Get Afghanistan Right--continues to make the case that the Obama administration would be wise to rethink its plan to escalate militarily in Afghanistan, I've tried to engage the arguments made by some feminists and human rights groups who believe that such an escalation is necessary to protect Afghani women and girls. I share their horror when I read stories like this one by New York Times reporter Dexter Filkins describing an acid attack against girls and women--students and their teachers--at the Mirwais School for Girls. But how will escalation or increased US troop presence improve their security or make their lives better?
I thought it would be important to speak with someone who has experience working on the ground with Afghan women's organizations. Kavita Ramdas is President and CEO of the Global Fund for Women. For 15 years she has worked with groups like the Afghan Institute for Learning--which serves about 350,000 women and children in their schools, health care centers, and human rights programs.

This is what Kavita said:

We're hearing from groups we've worked with for over a 15 year period now, on the ground inside Afghanistan and with Afghan women's groups and Pakistan as well.

First, I think it's remarkable that our approach to foreign policy --not just for the last eight years, but with regard to Afghanistan and Pakistan in general over the last thirty years--has been almost entirely military focused. There hasn't been any willingness to take a cold hard look at how effective or ineffective that strategy has been in whether or not it has helped stabilize the country. And there has been much less attention paid to whether this militaristic approach has done anything positive for the women of Afghanistan. It's doubtful whether America's foreign policy has ever had the welfare of Afghan women at heart. As many Afghani women have said to us, 'You know, you didn't even think about us 25 years ago,' and then all of a sudden post 9-11, we're sending troops to Afghanistan and ostensibly we're very concerned about women. But there's very little willingness to really look at the implications of a military strategy on women's security. It is very important to begin with the following question: If the strategies that we used up to this point have not succeeded in ensuring the safety and well being of women and girls, what makes us think that increased militarization with 30,000 additional US troops is somehow going to improve the situation and security of women in Afghanistan?

The second question is, what has been the role of the existing troops in Afghanistan with regard to the situation and the security of women? In general, what happens when regions become highly militarized, and when there are "peace-keeping forces," militias, as well as foreign troops--which is NATO and the United States, primarily? In most parts of the world, highly militarized societies in almost every instance lead to bad results for women. The security of women is not improved and in many instances it actually becomes worse.
..more..

[orleans]

8. about 1:30 into video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSa_RbJvfiw

[bigtree]

9. okay, I listened again.

Is he saying that these things happened in the wake of the sacrifices of lives and resources? That would be right.

Is he saying, further, that our forces were meant to (our should) prevent them from ultimately happening?

Or, is he saying that it's just a wash and the whole thing is a waste?

I'd give him the best interpretation,

[orleans]

10. my interp was more of "what a shame--what a waste--all we've

been through, all the sacrifice and money, and this is the end result? they are no better than this? way to go george & all you fucking neocons"

that was my thought/feeling when i heard it.