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Missile Defense

Technology has always found its greatest consumer in a nation's war and defense efforts. Since the last attempts at a "Star Wars" defense system, has technology changed considerably enough to make the latest Missile Defense initiatives more successful? Can such an application of science be successful? Is a militarized space inevitable, necessary or impossible?

Read Debates, a new Web-only feature culled from Readers' Opinions, published every Thursday.

almarst2002 - 10:48pm Jun 16, 2002 EST (#2566 of 2592)

Bush's new international order - http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20020611-84205636.htm

For Mr. Bush, there is no other "model of human progress." ... this means that what the United States is now promoting with this liberty doctrine is not a model. It is the answer, and it is final.

What Mr. Bush is saying here is that the United States will never allow a "peer competitor" (in the international relations lingo) to arise. We will never again be in a position of "superpower rivalry," let alone a cog in a multilateral balance of power. The current vast imbalance in power promotes peace most effectively because it teaches governments that any aspirations they might have to pursue war are "pointless."

Thus, essentially, the vision of a universalist, transnational civilization is on the march. "America has no empire to extend or utopia to establish. We wish for others only what we wish for ourselves — safety from violence, the rewards of liberty, and the hope for a better life." And we have every intention of helping the "others" become part of us.

lchic - 03:39am Jun 17, 2002 EST (#2567 of 2592)

' .... what the United States is now promoting with this liberty doctrine is not a model. It is the answer, and it is final. '

Final Solution?

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Wasn't the WestPointSpeech the one where Bush emplored the new graduant to look to making a career working for him, his BigOil government ...

http://www.observer.co.uk/magazine/story/0,11913,738196,00.html

almarst2002 - 05:53am Jun 17, 2002 EST (#2568 of 2592)

A global strategy based on the new Bush doctrine means the end of the system of international institutions, laws and norms thatthe United States has worked for more than half a century to build. - http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A54644-2002Jun14?language=printer

rshow55 - 07:14am Jun 17, 2002 EST (#2569 of 2592)

It is as serious as it looks, and Watergate didn't go nearly far enough. The surface was barely scratched . . . I'm having to deal with some of the unfinished business from that era still.

Watergate Legacy: More Than a Tired Suffix By ADAM CLYMER http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/17/politics/17WATE.html

Yesterday had stunningly good pieces, and this editorial was one of the most exciting:

The Bad Old Days at the F.B.I. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/16/opinion/16SUN2.html

" New documents provide disturbing new details of the F.B.I.'s abuse of power in the 1960's, and they are a cautionary tale for today."

The same simple techniques for "pulling a plug" that worked to take down the President of the University of California worked EASILY to take down the AEA Oppenheimer financing - - and to do a LOT of other things behind the scenes that people ought to come to understand. Enron is NOT nearly as exceptional as one would wish. Financing of militarily classified research and military function is subject to NO really effective accounting at all, nor has it been since Eisenhower's time.

At the same time, there DO have to be exceptions to "rules" for sufficient reasons, some of the time -- and pre-emption against weapons of mass destruction does make sense. But it is NOT sufficient to say "we have an exception because George Bush says so." Not unless he can and does explain himself to the whole world.

I'm taking care, and working as best I can in the national interest.

Almarst has good reasons to distrust the Bush administration - they may try to do some things well, but to say that they "bear checking" is putting the matter mildly.

I've got some matters to deal with - I intend to become "completely unshackled," as agreed to by a CIA official in our last conversation, unless the government talks to me about other restrictions, and gives me reasonable reasons.

lchic - 07:34am Jun 17, 2002 EST (#2570 of 2592)

sluicegate post-watergate ;)

lchic - 07:50am Jun 17, 2002 EST (#2571 of 2592)

" ... These accounts of the F.B.I.'s malfeasance are a powerful reminder of how easily intelligence organizations deployed to protect freedom can become its worst enemy ... ""

The FBI had become : http://www.ebooks3.com/ebooks/an_enemy_of_the_people.html

lchic - 07:56am Jun 17, 2002 EST (#2572 of 2592)

'''"India's victory without war has its own significance. Not just America, but other nations, mainly Britain, Russia and France, put intense pressure on Pakistan that cross-border terrorism must end and Pakistan must follow the path of peace." http://www.guardian.co.uk/kashmir/Story/0,2763,739066,00.html

lchic - 08:05am Jun 17, 2002 EST (#2573 of 2592)

Australia : ASIO

'' ... It seems to me that you've got to give someone a right of appeal system to get out of that circumstance. (Otherwise) the person (is) locked in a room and someone's got the key and no one knows you're there."

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/05/01/1019441390253.html http://www.uplink.com.au/lawlibrary/Documents/Docs/Doc106.html http://www.asio.gov.au/About/Content/account.htm

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