Giving Credit Where Credit Is Due

I have been asked in the past if I give President George W Bush credit for something - anything - he has done that has had a positive impact on the country and/or humanity. Sure, you can argue that the U.S. government gives more money to fight AIDS and like causes than any other nation, for example, but this policy is not unique to the Bush Administration: Both Democratic and Republican Administrations prior to Bush II had these policies, and Bush II simply inherited them.

In all seriousness, I could think of only 2 policies or actions that were unique to Bush that were for the Common Good that I could actively cheer. They are (in no particular order):

1. The National Do Not Call Registry
2. The Northwestern Hawaiian Islands National Monument

Now, #1 almost did not make the list, since my first several attempts at signing up for the Do Not Call registry failed for some still unknown reason (absolutely not user error), and I continued to receive unwanted telemarketing calls. I still blame Bush personally for that to this day. Item #2 is, however, actually pretty impressive, as it's the "single-largest act of ocean conservation in history." Nice job, George.

I think I may be able to add a third item to this list, if Kenneth Adelman, lifelong neocon activist and Pentagon insider who served on the Defense Policy Board until 2005, is correct:

Adelman believes that neoconservatism itself - what he defines as "the idea of a tough foreign policy on behalf of morality, the idea of using our power for moral good in the world" - is dead, at least for a generation. After Iraq, he says, "it's not going to sell."

I have long been advocating that one of the most enduring wins for humanity after 8 years of Bush in office is the full discrediting of the neoconservative "tough foreign policy" vision; in particular, the policy of "pre-emptive war."

Don't get me wrong: I don't fault neoconservatives for thinking big. All explanations I've seen from neoconservatives about their foreign policy seem lofty and perhaps even noble. Think about it: "using power for moral good in the world." Shit, even I have made similar statements: my Blogger.com profile states upfront that "government can and should be a force for good in the world" for crying out loud. The problem is not with their lofty rhetoric.

Rather, I believe the problem with their "tough foreign policy" vision is that they weren't thinking big enough: They weren't thinking about the practical implications that waging unprovoked war(!) would have. They concerned themselves only with the utopian view of pax americana and how to achieve and/or regain an American-hegemonic peace. They seemed unconcerned with the inherent moral paradox of waging unprovoked wars as the means to achieve that end - or what that would do to America's perceived "moral authority" after the first wave of pax americana, post WWII. As I noted in a previous post, their approach has a major fatal flaw:

They all fail to take into account the possibility for unintended consequences that major undertakings (for example...let's see, ah: war) inevitably bring. They ignored the warnings from experts and the (likely) possibility that things could go wrong, and worse, they failed to plan for contingencies.

Indeed:

Adelman...wrote a famous op-ed article in The Washington Post in February 2002, arguing: "I believe demolishing Hussein's military power and liberating Iraq would be a cakewalk."

Now he says, "I just presumed that what I considered to be the most competent national-security team since Truman was indeed going to be competent. They turned out to be among the most incompetent teams in the post-war era. Not only did each of them, individually, have enormous flaws, but together they were deadly, dysfunctional."

In fact, as a result of the Bush Team's dysfunction, Adelman appears to be finally breaking out of his neocon-induced bubble, and waking up to reality. If allowed a "do-over" of that 2002 WaPo op-ed:

I would write an article that would be skeptical over whether there would be a performance that would be good enough to implement our policy. The policy can be absolutely right, and noble, beneficial, but if you can't execute it, it's useless, just useless. I guess that's what I would have said: that Bush's arguments are absolutely right, but you know what, you just have to put them in the drawer marked CAN'T DO.

Exactly. Lofty goals are not justified by exploiting manipulated intelligence and voter-fears in a rush to an ill-conceived and unnecessary war. Rhetoric does not equal reality. Ends do not justify means. DON'T DO IT.

Though, that is not to say that we can't accept the 'Ends' from unjustified means or unjust actions: That Bush may have inadvertently discredited neoconservatism with one gloriously incompetent disaster is a result I'll gladly take.

But I would have preferred avoiding this absurd experiment, continuing to track Al Qaeda followers in Afghanistan with determined focus, and keeping our policy of containment intact for a militarily castrated pre-war Iraq. [Which, incidentally, was not an imminent threat to our national security -- unlike the destabilized failed state Bush has put in its place.]

So, thanks, I guess, for adding a third item to my list; it's to your credit...