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Missile Defense

Russian military leaders have expressed concern about US plans for a national missile defense system. Will defense technology be limited by possibilities for a strategic imbalance? Is this just SDI all over again?

rshowalter - 10:34am Jul 24, 2001 EST (#7375 of 7381)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

For all sorts of big and little reasons, to deal with inefficiency and ugliness at all sorts of levels, we need effective presses -- that present the truth -- and we need ways of getting things checked.

lunarchick - 10:36am Jul 24, 2001 EST (#7376 of 7381)
lunarchick@www.com

!

lunarchick - 10:43am Jul 24, 2001 EST (#7377 of 7381)
lunarchick@www.com

The EU also offered many more concessions to Japan, Canada and Russia on the use of forests and crops to soak up carbon dioxide.

rshowalter - 10:57am Jul 24, 2001 EST (#7378 of 7381)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Pollution deal leaves US cold by Charles Clover in Bonn http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/07/24/wkyot24.xml

" Michael Meacher, the environment minister, said: "This is a brilliant day for the environment. . . . . . He said the agreement would enable British industry and the City of London to set up the first emissions trading system in the world, a forerunner of international emissions trading. . . . . Mr Meacher said he expected tons of potential carbon saving to become a commodity traded on the markets within two years.

. . . .

" Margot Wallstrom, the European environment commissioner, said: "We can go home and look our children in the eyes. Something has changed in the balance of power between the United States and the EU."

" The head of the American delegation, Paula Dobriansky, was booed by ministers and officials when she said: "The Bush administration takes the issue of climate change very seriously and we will not abdicate our responsibilities."

Note: These were not protesters. They were not "outsiders" in their own nations. They were ministers and officials.

On missile defense, and other issues, the US will have a far harder time saying "trust us, defer to us" than in the past. In politics, a crucial key to power is the power to persuade. That power of ideas is slipping away from the Unites States at a rate that no one, to my knowledge, would have thought possible even a few months ago.

I'm not a church-goer, myself. But sometimes things seem miraculous. It is as if George Bush has been divinely inspired, sent to earth to make peace possible, by humbling and degrading his own country, and unifying the rest of the world, as never before, in ways that can make complex cooperation possible.

lunarchick - 11:05am Jul 24, 2001 EST (#7379 of 7381)
lunarchick@www.com

Nite!

rshowalter - 11:08am Jul 24, 2001 EST (#7380 of 7381)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

MD7078-79 rshowalter 7/16/01 9:54am

Ideas matter. . . . According to Berle, frameworks of power are always subject to five rules.

If a case is insupportable on evidence, people notice. And power declines or evaporates.

. . . .

rshowalter - 01:34pm Jul 24, 2001 EST (#7381 of 7381)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Because of my background, I'm deeply concerned, and believe that it is vital that the United States come to act on the basis of right answers, and conduct itself in ways that can stand the light of day.

MD6057-59 rshowalter 6/26/01 7:22am ... MD6397-9401 rshowalter 7/2/01 8:00am

MD6613 rshowalter 7/4/01 11:46pm ... MD6614 rshowalter 7/4/01 11:48pm

" When the Soviet Union fell, and everyone, on all sides, had so much hope, we didn't have an end game -- and the United States was so tied up with lies, that it could not sort out problems before it -- or help the Russians sort out their problems."

We should work to fix things now -- not go on making them worse.

I've suggested in MD6808-10 rshowalter 7/9/01 4:43pm . . . that gisterme , who has posted so extensively on this thread, could not have done so, without the knowledge and backing of the very highest levels of the Bush administration, including Rice , Rumsfeld , Armitage , Wolfowitz , Hadley , and their bosses.

MD7009 rshowalter 7/13/01 2:07pm . . . MD7010 rshowalter 7/13/01 2:11pm
MD7011 rshowalter 7/13/01 2:11pm ... MD7011rshowalter 7/13/01 2:32pm

By facing some facts gracefully -- facts that are coming out anyway, and making reasonable accomodations, in the interests of the whole world, including nearly all American citizens, we could have a much safer, more reasonable world.

Why doesn't it happen? The number of possibilities is getting narrowed down.

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