No intervention in the affairs of other nations

[question everything]

claimed Ron Paul on Bill Maher and he earned a lot of applause on DU. Kucinich and Gravel said something similar in the debate.

I guess we have to be "grateful" that Hitler started a World War, otherwise the concentration camps where Jews and Homosexuals, Gypsies and Jehova Witnesses and other "undesirables" were systematically killed would have been considered as an "internal affair."

Same with the killing in Kosova, and Rwanda and now in Darfur.

I thought that many on DU are upset about the lack of activity in Darfur. Is this how the ones who are excited about Ron Paul, Kucinich and Gravel feel about Darfur? That it is an "internal affair" of the Sudan?

[Captain Angry]

1. I took the non-intervention policy to mean something different.

Stop picking governments to overthrow based on financial reasons, and help where we can.

Therefore, don't overthrow Iran in 1953 to help British Petroleum take over. Etc.

Therefore get the UN to get into Darfur, and when they waste their time, move in and help out. Etc.

I'm sure that's not what some of the candidates are looking for, but it's what I'd like to see.

[question everything]

2. Thank you. This makes sense

Right now China - a permanent member of the UN security council - is against any resolution that does not get the Sudanese government stamp of approval first. Why? China is a major importer of Sudanese oil.

[Captain Angry]

3. We should have said...

Hey world, Darfur is in trouble, anybody helping? If so you have exactly 48 hours to decide to help.

We're going in on Monday, and are loading the planes now. If you'd like to join us, we'll clear the runway for you.

Let China go whine to the United Nations about how we dared to airlift food in, and then set down peacekeepers so that the villagers could gather wood and water without being killed.

When people started dying, the local government lost its veto power. There is no excuse for inaction.

[sandnsea]

6. That's what Bush did with Iraq

How can you suggest it is a plan of action?

And again, UN peacekeepers go in when there's some sort of peace to keep. Unless you mean US occupiers... er, peacekeepers.

There really aren't easy answers. No internal war is without some sort of economic influence, and most have been influenced by the British, French, US exploitation of resources around the globe. This is NOT just a US behavior. Thus the words British Colonial and French Colonial.

[Captain Angry]

11. Certainly makes sense.

The difference here is that the whole world knows that Darfur is a desperate situation.

We wouldn't be building permanent bases or embassies.
We wouldn't be rebuilding the infrastructure.
We wouldn't be bombing anybody.
We wouldn't be there with any pretense of promoting democracy.
We wouldn't be securing the resources.

There is certainly no easy answer, but I don't believe that a country as powerful and wealthy as we are can't help out a situation like that. I know we didn't get Katrina right, but that is another example of Bush's inability to do anything right.

I do think that if there was a real force there that was able to stop the shooting that some good could come of it for the people.

[magellan]

4. Bush** is treating Khartoum with the same kid gloves

...for the same reason. That's why we aren't in there helping to stop the genocide in Darfur. We're up against China for Sudan's oil and don't want to tick off Khartoum by pushing too hard.

Of course, we don't push China on its human rights violations either, for similar reasons. We can't afford for them to cut off trade.

Darfur is precisely the sort of intervention we SHOULD do, of course, because it's the decent, just, American thing to do. But since WWII we have not intervened in another country's deplorable affairs except to manipulate it for our own selfish and greedy purposes.

[question everything]

10. Apparently Bush is calling for sanctions

against the Sudan

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070529/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_darfur

[cynatnite]

5. K&R! n/t

[SoCalDem]

7. "Intervention" wears many coats

joining with others to eliminate a guy like Hitler is different

so is Kosovo
so is Darfur
so should have been Rwanda

Intervention hidden behind the WMF-World Bank-IMF, Oil companies, mega-conglomerates in search of water, gas, minerals ...those kind of "interveners" are the ones we should have NO PART in.

Peace Corps was an "interventionistic" program, but sending fresh-faced kids, and well-meaning, generous professionals to countries where they LIVED WITH THE PEOPLE, (and in the same way as the people most of the time) was a POSITIVE way to interact with other countries.

My guess would be that when the peace Corps was in its hey-day, many of the pplaces they went had large populations that had very little contact with the "outside world". That cannot be said today. Even the remotest areas have TV antennas sticking out from mud huts..and kids who have ipods..

Even with globalization run amok, we can and should try to concentrate on the problems of the US and stop trying to steal other countries' wealth.

If we rebuilt our own infrastructure and started providing for ourselves for a while, we migth have the money to buy what we need, instead of maintaining an expensive military so we can steal what we want..at gunpoint

[question everything]

8. Agree. Only when we intervene in places that have no oil

or other "benefits" will we truly prove that we do care about poor people dying and raped by the truck loads.

And we can rebuild our own infrastructure by reigning over the obscene compensations for CEOs.

No, we cannot "tell" the boards how much CEOs should get, but we can pass a tax legislation that forces such companies to provide proportional compensations to the employees in terms of health and retirement benefits.

And when we have a true "tide that lifts everyone" this will mean more tax benefits for government agencies.

[The2ndWheel]

9. WW2 was for our own interests, not because Jewish people were being murdered

Same with Kosovo, same with Darfur if we ever get there.

Each of the issues though, are the same problem. Expanding centers of power must conquer abroad, and repress at home.

http://www.derrickjensen.org/corp.html