I never understood the Kantian imperative when I studied philosophy, but somehow Wikipedia makes it all clear.
The criticism of it in the article seems technical and trivial.
The principle itself is a fine concept for applying to the actions of nations: if it was alright for the US to invade Iraq and depose what we called a dictator, it should be alright for any country to invade another to depose what it calls a dictator. Similarly, it should be fine to invade Saudi Arabia or Egypt to install democracy there. Or, to invade Israel to remove its weapons of mass destruction.

Maybe the Democrats should brush up on Kant and find some better talking points.

Posted at July 23, 2006 7:18 AM in response to Cleansing

"Wright may be right, which would be great; but if he’s serious, he’s going to have to spend a lot more time figuring out how to sell it."

This is an ambiguous and probably meaningless thing for Alterman to say. Matthews's comment on it is right: an idea has to be true before it can be sold.

There are several kinds of truth in Wright's article (e.g. self interest works best when it incorporates the interest of others. . .), but ultimately the article is a melange of bits and pieces from the realist and idealist camps that sounds like not much more than Clintonism revived. Wright accepts free trade and free markets as the only functioning economic system, and makes such meaningless recommendations as empowering the WTO to enforce labor and environmental protections. At the same time he endorses the Rumsfeldian fantasy of better intelligence (which essentially means global undercover surveillance)and the profoundly hypocritical and unrealistic idea of more intrusive weapons inspections (hypocritical because it would never apply to Israel or the US.)

Matthew's comment is right on and one I really could have used about thirty years ago in graduate school: "this is not wrong. But it's also not right."

Posted at July 22, 2006 10:09 AM in response to Selling the Product

Cohen's assertion that Israel itself was a mistake means that the founding of Israel falls in the category of actions that have created blowback. It was an action that made sense, for certain purposes, at the time, but also one that needed careful management if it was to succeed.
It is very difficult to tell whether Israel over the years has been the tail wagging the dog of US policy, or whether it has been the tool of US policy.
Most of the failures of managing Israel, though, are due to some conception of US policy at the time, usually having to do with oil. So, whether Israel was originally a mistake or not (or, as it seems to me, something inevitable at the time), over a time it has become a great failure (or mistake) or US foreign policy.

Posted at July 18, 2006 11:23 AM in response to Mistakes Were Made

Some have said the US (or neocon) objective in Iraq and the ME, is to turn every country into a failed state and create a general chaos. If so, then you'd expect the US to be behind Israel's latest madman aggressions. But Bush is acting as if he doesnt really know what to do, asking Egypt, Lebanon and Jordan for restraint. Billmon thinks Frankenstein's monster has escaped the lab here,and is out of control.

I think the focus of "all hell breaking loose" is more apt to be US forces in Iraq, and oil, than any nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan. When other nations knock each other out, standing on the sidelines is good policy.

Posted at July 14, 2006 7:40 PM in response to The Other Shoe

Billmon's essay today on the Israeli situation is an important read. He correctly observes that speculating about Iran or Syria's involvement is a distraction from the real issue -- what exactly is Israel trying to accomplish? I think he is saying that Israel is acting recklessly, without a real policy, trying an old style of intimidation that cant work anymore. Billmon is the most nuanced of writers, always a pleasure to read. He quotes Martin Van Crevelt as saying (paraphrasing) the only just war is one between nations of roughly equal power. The longer a nation persists in any other kind of war, the more unjust it will seem.

Posted at July 14, 2006 9:20 AM in response to More Israel/Lebanon

Of course governments, and government-leaning pundits, will throw up a haze of possibilities, "likely" connections, "high level" sources, to confuse the issue and take our eyes off the simple meaning of the action. It's clear Israel's response is disproportionate, both to Hamas and Hezbolah, and that it is part of a long-standing Israeli pattern of over-kill and intimidation. In speculating about the motives of Hezbolah,, Syria or Iran, we are merely taking Israel's view, that it was the innocent victim. We should speculate about Israel's motives instead. Israel has all the cards, as it has for forty years. What is it's objective at this time? Does Israel appear to be acting rationally, or recklessly?

Posted at July 14, 2006 7:33 AM in response to The Crisis

The question of how or whether we should be fighting counter-insurgency wars is the dark side of the bigger question how and whether we need to be an empire. Some writers have said we have stumbled onto the role (forced into it, by luck and circumstance, and have no choice but to take it up.) Others, like French demographer Emanuel Todd, say we have already failed as an empire, since we have lost the moral legitimacy and belief in the rule of law that is the main gift of empires to their clients. Alexander Cockburn remarked that empires' first duty is to provide security to their subjects, and that we are not doing either.
In Todd's view, we are militarily incapable of empire, reduced to displays of force (shock and awe) but incapable of occupation. So, unless you believe that empire is our destined role in the world, we should have no business with counter-insurgency wars.

Posted at July 10, 2006 9:00 AM in response to Counterinsurgency for Fun and Profit

Has anyone mentioned the fact that Nixon, during the Vietnam war, claimed at times that he was trying to appear the madman, so that Russia and China would be more fearful of his reactions?
Generally, though, our righteous self-image requires that the other be mad. The comparisons to Hitler get a little stale though, dont they?

Posted at July 9, 2006 9:16 PM in response to The Madman Theory of World Politics