Good questions
Here are some reader reactions posted on the BBC website regarding the current "Stay Away" boycott against Mugabe.
What is the UN's problem?! How can they allow the constant human rights abuse to continue in Zimbabwe and watch a leader slowly starve his country to death? It's pathetic. Someone has got their hand in someone else's pockets. Everyone is quick to respond when human rights abuses are racially motivated, but when its a black leader doing it to his black country men it seems to be OK. Ross Behenn, London
I feel the United Nations should be granted the power to act in a really positive way to bring dictators to heel. Words and oral warnings do nothing to rid an oppressed people of a despot dictator. Any action taken would have to be ordered and directed by the United Nations and not the president of the United States of America and any of his cohorts Edward Seyforth, Halifax, Canada
What other option do the poor suffering Zimbabweans have? The rest of the world appears to have turned their backs on the tragedy of Zimbabwe, concentrating more on the Iraq issue among other issues. What are the UN and Commonwealth doing? Phyllis Wheeler, Hemel Hempstead, Herts, UK
My reaction?
Where have all the Commies gone?
Long time passing.
Where have all the Commies gone?
Long time ago.
Where have all the Commies gone?
Gone to lunch most everyone.
Oh when will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?
posted by wretchardthecat at 6/09/2005 08:53:00 PM
35 Comments:
Sad, sad, sad. The rest of the world yearns for a "leader" to rescue the downtrodden - and they're looking toward Kofi and the U.N?
Oh, yeah, that wiil work. Sad, sad, sad.
Wicked!
I don't know when they will ever learn, Wretch. But you know, the last place they'll ever change is in BBC land. Orwell said he got his best ideas from working at "Auntie" as deBeeb was not-so-affectionately known.
There are fools all over the world and having long been one of them I'm trying to figure it out. It seems to me every people have their own distinctive kind of delusions; what is it about the rather successful ethics of the Anglosphere in world history that, when corrupted, gets us the delusions of the anglo liberal media as epitomized by the BBC? (Compare the French who at least know the UN is a tool for cynics.) If resentment is in large part delusion, is Auntie what you get when you come to resent your own people for being among the most successful historically? Perverted protestant Christianity = UN fantasies instead of the more realistic humility/idealism of, say, the Rotary Club? I don't know what to make of this Seyforth chap. You gotta wonder if this is some perverse corruption of a great regimental name. Anyway, Canadian shame...
Maybe the blogosphere should be a little more organized. It would attract a lot more interest if, say, we could declare June to be expose the BBC delusions month, and everyone piled on with their best. Since the lefty bloggers would have to counter, you never know, it might draw in some attention and even get some people to change. A job for PJmedia?
Could I just drag in a little history regarding these "poor suffering Zimbabwaens"? Can we enter our way-back time machine and go back 5 or 10 years, to when the government was allowing and encouraging black "veterans" to take over the farms of white farmers? No one was ever quite sure who these "veterans" were or what they were veterans *of*, but there seemed to be massive herds of them.
Mostly, the "veterans" seemed to be unemployed thugs, who gleefully rushed in to get their little bit of nothing for free. That the government was *stealing* from the white farmers in order to give away perfectly productive farms meant nothing to these "veterans" nor to any of the other people of Zimbabwe who all appeared to think it was just fine and dandy for the government to take functioning and owned farmland away from the people who were actually growing food, and to give it to "veterans" who had no experience at anything except death, destruction and fire.
We, all of us, KNEW with great certainty as we watched "60 Minutes" interview white farmers who described being harassed and tortured and jailed - that the populace were going to starve. We KNEW that then, and I for one, looked forward to that comeuppance.
Now that the "poor suffering Zimbabwaen's" are come-upped and their starvation is upon them -- their self-wrought starvation, I might add -- remind me again why I'm supposed to feel sorry for them, and to donate AGAIN to the latest African disaster.
If one of those white farmers that "60 Minutes" interviewed 10 years ago says I should donate, then OK, maybe. But otherwise, I just feel like we're aiding and abetting in keeping alive a dysfunctional society of undefined and lawless "veterans" that has absolutely no redeeming features.
Wretchard-
Your so bad, your bad, so very very bad...
LOL!
Sometimes humor in the face of- Oh gawd- awfulness is the only thing that helps.
Zimbabwe-just read a story about Ethiopia today-almost forgot about the woes of that place.
Africa. I compared it to the moon on one of the earlier Zim threads-but the moon is science maybe Africa is more difficult because that is human and therefore infinitely variable.
Cracked me up. Though I think we all know where they've gone.
"Gone to Berkeley everyone....."
They're there, and not hiding. I need to find another "close eye on the commies" site. The one I used to enjoy went defunct, but I learned a lot about ANSWER, ISM, and other US/international enemy groups.
Kalroy
Peter's link was missing an e in "href" so Here didn't work, but it does there.
---
Peter UK said...
Tony Blair is looking for a legacy now that the EU has gone pear shaped,he has chosen Africa.
With Gordon Brown weighing in and the forthcoming G8 Summit and Geldoff concerts there has never been a better time to put pressure on the Prime Minister of the former colonial power.
. Here .
---
BTW, Truepeers, it was not my memory in the last thread that took me to your excellent post on victimology of the left in Zim, but my search for a little "interchange" I had w/the ever angry Bengali Tiger Zub, re: Nahncee's "Veterans" and the evil Whitey.
I did not find, might have been on the defunct site, but I'll look again.
The Euro’s and the Un? Stick a fork in them…they’re done.
Article 2, item 7 of the Un-Charter:
Nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorize the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state or shall require the Members to submit such matters to settlement under the present Charter; but this principle shall not prejudice the application of enforcement measures under Chapter Vll.
…and God have mercy on the poor souls who become subject to, ‘…the application of enforcement measures under Chapter Vll.’
From Google Desktop Cache: Wonder where it went on Belmont Club?
---
Zub,
"Sure, the model turned out to be all wrong. Utopia on earth is not possible, and it took 70 years of the communist experiment to find that out. But Orwell's parable holds to some degree - most of the people who joined the Left and wanted to follow Marx and Lenin towards a more equitable society were not motivated by malice, most were motivated by a real love for their land and their people, and an equally real desire to do something for them. They may have been misguided, but not - at least, not initially - evil."
Doug,
PRICELESS ZUB;
I could not have said it better:
Results don't matter, it's those (PROFESSED) Good Intentions that matter most!
(professed refers to every left wing revolutionary I've known, either personally or through reading: HATE FILLED.)
Zub,
. To be sure, most people in the third world did not know about the Gulag or the real outcome of the Great Leap. It was not the age of information back then.
---
re:
Zub,
"It was not the age of information back then."
Doug,
Plenty of Opportunity: It's just that the left's reporters reliably lied and covered up:
AND RECEIVED AWARDS FOR DOING SO.
These awards have NOT been returned or revoked by the MSM.
Zub,
Propaganda and counter-propaganda was on all sides, and those third-world leftists who may have heard the rumours thought it was capitalist propaganda meant to discredit the socialist ideal.
Doug,
(Maybe they passed copies of the NY Times around: That would take care of all their needs for the "correct" propaganda.)
Zub,
Many were guilty of sacrificing human life at the altar of principle.
-
Doug,
(Just a hundred Million or so, worldwide - still counting in North Korea and others.)
Zub,
. But many were guilty of no more than self-deception and the desire to cling to a life's philosophy.
---
Doug,
...an atheistic, materialistic, and thoroughly error filled philosophy, I might add.
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Fred,
Well said.
re: "However, does anyone want to see another Revolution like the one in Iran in '79 going down in Uzbekhistan? Zub would argue that if the people want an Islamic "Republic" then they should be allowed to have one. Of course, he has no clue that idealism and moral absolutism are qualities that can be found in every utopian totalitarian movement..."
---
I recently heard that same argument for Rhodesia, by some black (AMERICAN) caller to Medved:
Sure, they are starving, she "reasons," but they have that right, and who are we to judge, much less intervene?
Golly, maybe the non-Britannica part of Wiki IS Left Wing: Look what's left OUT of this wonderful Multiracial Miracle:
Under the terms of this peace treaty, Britain resumed control for a brief time in 1980 and then granted independence to Zimbabwe Rhodesia during that same year, whereupon the first all-party multi-racial elections were held. There was much intimidation and violence carried out by belligerent parties on both sides. Unsurprisingly, the Marxist Robert Mugabe and ZANU won these elections. On April 18th, 1980, the country became independent as the Republic of Zimbabwe, and its capital, Salisbury, was renamed Harare two years later.
The currency of Rhodesia was the Rhodesian dollar
At "windsofchange"
http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/005055.php
I found this little tid bit quoted from Sen. Biden
"...Or Joe Biden's anecdote (Hat Tip: WSJ Best of the Web, March 15/05):
"[Biden] told me about a recent visit to Los Angeles, where he met with a group of wealthy liberals and laid out the following scenario: "Assume you're the President, and I'm your Secretary of Defense or State or C.I.A. director, and I come to you and tell you we know where bin Laden is, he and four hundred of his people, and they're in this portion of Pakistan the Pakistanis won't go into, and they told us not to go in. This is going to cost us five hundred to five thousand lives, of our soldiers, but we can get him. What do you do?" Biden said they had no answer. "The truth is, they put their heads down," he said."
Substitute Dafur, Zimbabwe or your choice of Challenge for UBL and watch everyone's head bow in shame.
According to so many folks in the Zim thread we'd have to let UBL go free.
They argue we'd be "stretched to thin" to go into Pakistan, not enough troops, no guarantee of Success. May not really get 'em, it take to long and our boys cannot be kept from Mama for such unknown periods of time.
Or would we decide to streeeeetch to kill that particular man and the heck with the innocents
W,
One of my readers left this comment on a Zim post at Adventures:
"In the case of Zimbabwe, there are two factors. One is that other nations should understand that chaos is not their friend, the Treaty of Westphalia notwithstanding, and the other is that certain portions of western society will resist this, because if you take Mugabe's pants off, you'll find his ass covered with liberal lipstick, sort of like Pol Pot."
Oh I forgot, some other T will step up and take his place, so why bother
gone to call Bush Hitler, every one
Unreal Perfection is not an option -- real oppression "in the name of perfection" is terrible.
The commenter who opposes US leadership is significant -- Bush should have asked Blair, and Howard in Australia, to begin the formation of a Human Rights Enforcement Group.
Composed exclusively of democracies, willing to put troops on the ground to end gross human rights. Exclusively in coalitions of the willing. Open to any democracy willing to donate troops.
Such a group should also inspect Gitmo. Any such group will inevitably be dominated by the USA.
Human Rights would not be so often violated with such an international group. Like the starvation of the governed.
The top leadership can be totally evil and insane, but as long as they can project a convincingly positive image, they will have a sufficient number of deluded followers to impliment their agenda.
You better not be talking about the US, man.
(just kidding papa, couldn't help it.)
Why should this be any different from North Korea? From the early nineties on over three million citizens have been starved to death, worked to death, and used as consumeables in poison gas and nuclear emmissions experiments. There are whole generations of stunted, rickety children in the classrooms now, a sorry example of extreme malnutrition.
And you know what? America looked the other way on this one...Clinton was more interested in pushing treaty mania on Kim Jong Il than slapping his hand over half a holocaust's worth of of suffering and death.
Just SOP for homo sapiens, sorry.
In some fiction book i just read, (i think it was by Dean Koontz perhaps), he came up with the term "Misery Pimp". That's what Kofi and the whole gang at the UN are-- misery pimps.
jinn
The real difference in the the cases is that in Zimbabwe or Dafur a small amount of force would create a world of good.
In Korea an application of ANY sufficent force would lead to the deaths of at least 1,000,000 or more people in Seoul, SK. The North has the tubes and the city is well within reach.
The risk/ reward ratios are far different.
Right on, Jinn. High time to do away with that waste of space. That's some prime real estate the UN is sitting on. What could we build there? A couple of real tall buildings? How about a really cool international bar. Where everyone from around the world comes and it's real friendly. Or hell, how about just go semi-traditional and turn it into a whorehouse.
If we did that, Sam, we wouldn't even have to change the personnel, just find 'em a good Pimp.
Clinton is available and I've heard rumors he wants the job.
heh heh, awesome. Nice one, rat.
To the larger world mugabe is totemic. he is where he because he is a black man on black land. he learned to manipulate western images well to his own advantage. in southern africa he is where he is because his tribe has affiliations to the leading tribes in south africa.
Charles outlines the reality, along with Steve.
Enough of that, back to fantasy:
Fernand_Braudel said...
"Every day in there it looks like the bar scene in Star Wars. "
That's the problem, Fernand, Sam has a great idea,
'Rat, w/tactical deception tactics, perverts the perception into a galactic child porn ring.
Back to good old USA tested
Whorehouses, I say.
...and don't forget the bar.
Steve's only misstep:
" Even black-on-black murder in the US generates far less outcry than one overzealous police officer beating a black suspect.
"
...you left out black on white.
I will 'til my dying day remember the story of some poor family in a minivan taking the wrong offramp in So Central LA (going to Disneyland?) and meeting their highly undeserved fate.
...a small story throughout the MSM.
...but, I try NOT to remember the horrors of the young white college kids in Wichita, who went through more than did the average Jew in Hitler's Germany.
...Some things are best left unremembered.
Maybe that's why the MSM covered that up:
"The Best of Intentions"
Finally, there was the "mixed-race homosexual couple" that tortured the 13 year old white child to death in bondage related "sex"-sicknesses, including broken Coke bottles inserted anally:
Some things are best forgotten:
We are Mainstream, you know.
"mixed-race homosexual couple"
Talk about a protected Species!
Nice song!
Here's something vaguely related to this discussion of our "responsibility" to somehow heal Zim, from Jeff Jacoby in the Boston Globe:
"AS SOON as he learned the ugly truth, the chairman of financial-services giant Wachovia Corp. issued a remorseful nostra culpa. ''We are deeply saddened by these findings," Ken Thompson said last week. ''I apologize to all Americans, and especially to African-Americans." Wachovia acknowledged that it ''cannot change the past or atone for the harm that was done." But it promised to make amends by subsidizing the work of organizations involved in ''furthering awareness and education of African-American history."
Clearly Wachovia committed some shameful racial crime. What could it have been? Did the nation's fourth-largest bank holding company rob its black depositors of their savings? Charge exorbitant interest rates on loans to black customers? Segregate its branches?
Worse: It owned slaves.
Well, not exactly. The 13th Amendment abolished slavery in 1865, and Wachovia wasn't founded until 1879. The slaves for which Thompson was so apologetic were owned decades before the Civil War, when slavery was still lawful throughout the South. They were owned not by Wachovia but by the Bank of Charleston and the Georgia Railroad and Banking Co. -- two of the approximately 400 financial institutions dating back to 1781 that over the centuries merged with or were acquired by other institutions that eventually became part of the conglomerate known today as Wachovia.
In other words, Thompson's apology was for something Wachovia didn't do, in an era when it didn't exist, under laws it didn't break. And as an act of contrition for this wrong it never committed, it can now expect to pay millions of dollars to activists for a wrong they never suffered."
The slavery shakedown
(Registration required)
I think I have figured this out.
Humans have a tendency to beleive what they hear and read.
It takes less energy than actually understanding what they have seen then coming to their own conclusions. Its a nifty evolutionary strategy.
But what if what you hear is wrong, but you believe it anyway?
Slavery Reparations have been PAID IN FULL in BLOOD.
389,000 Northern Soldiers DIED to free the slaves.
Thats about one soldier per 10 slaves. THINK about that - one WHITE son of a Northern Family died to free 10 slaves. Thats ONE DEAD MAN per 10 slaves.
Is that not sacrifice enough??
Is not a WAR and the battlefield valor of the North enough? Is not 389,000 dead WHITE men enough?
Its disgusting to hear people talk about reparations - it smears the honor and memory of the sacrifice of the North.
Reparationists need to shut their fat mouths.
http://www.phil.muni.cz/~vndrzl/amstudies/civilwar_stats.htm
http://www.mce.k12tn.net/civil_war/slavery.htm
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Mugabe is holding a grand party to the tune of nearly $5 million US, to celebrate his tenth wedding anniversary. Many of the leaders of his neighbor countries will be attending. Perhaps Jaques Chirac will choose to attend?
Mugabe is not another Milosevic or Ceaucescu. Mugabe is a pocket sized Caligula. He is resurrecting the decadence of a collapsing Rome. Unfortunately he does not really stand out from many other current African leaders.
Did someone say build a wall around the entire continent, and check back in a hundred years? I disagree with that sentiment, but I can certainly understand how someone might feel that way.
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trish -- if, "we are whatever they say we are," (HT: marshall mathers) why don't we take advantage of zim's weakness and plunder it for everything it's worth,a dn then move on to the next victim?
Now THAT would be a change in the Zeitgeist.
Even Has an Older Germanic Flavor to it.
Al fin:
This is what they were referring to.
I'd be interested in your comments.
Thanks for the link, Cutler.
I disagree with the idea of cutting off all contact with Africa. But I do agree that we should view Africa without sentimentality, with a very realistic sense of the possibilities.
The international organisations are prone to try to "fix" Africa, which is impossible. Any large scale transfer of funds from the west will end up in the corrupt and bloody hands of Africa's leaders. Only grass roots level assistance will help. Given the high death rates and low life expectancies, even that type of assistance can be ultimately futile.
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