Keeping up with Blogging

As usual, it has been difficult to keep with with blogging along with other needed pursuits, such as work and family and music.

The key things I've been noticing lately are that more people in the media (Joe Scarborough) seem to be at least bringing up the idea of the middle class taking the brunt of the current poverty trend we're all on, while the very rich sail away on their yachts. They don't do what's really needed which is to challenge the idea of tax cuts for the rich along with cutting government to balance the budget. Only Robert Reich and Thom Hartmann write about the logic of raising taxes, especially on the very rich to get the economy going again.

I've also been sensing the corner that history and speeches have painted President Obama into regarding Libya. He talks about liberty, (without helping in Bahrain, where the US 5th Fleet is based) but we shouldn't start bombing another country to try to free people, like we've done to Iraq and Afghanistan, yet Obama has said Quaddafy "has to go," so what now? The Arab states don't like American intervention, but they don't seem to be bellying up to do a no-fly zone on their own, so once again, the US and Europe will go in with guns blazing and make things worse.

The problem with the Arab states in all of this is they are largely authoritarian and don't like these uprisings and so would rather leave the Libyan rebels to die. So we're in a position of having to do something militarily that we'd rather not, because of our experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan, but we feel obligated to because to do nothing would draw attention to our hypocritical foreign policy where we support dictators and undermine democracies whenever it suits the cause of "stability" which is what our leaders really value over any silly notions like "freedom" or "democracy."

If I was president, here's what I would do. I would insist that Arab states take the lead militarily (if they are so opposed to US intervention in the region) and I would provide logistical support and would air-drop food and materiel to the Libyan rebels. This would help them continue their fight.

The fundamental mistake the Libyan rebels made was pursuing a violent revolution. Tunisia and Egypt were peaceful and successful revolutions because modern media exposes harsh reprisals and most nations (except China) care enough about their international image that they will refrain under the glare of FaceBook and Twitter (and CNN...) Because they rebels chose violence, we are being drawn in and we should not be.

- Universal