Harper read up on Afghanistan... or so he says.

The best part about watching Fareed Zakaria interview anybody is that you know the following:

1. Zakaria doesn't presume to know the answer to the question he's asking. He lets his guests do the talking after asking direct questions;
2. His big toe can out-think the average politician in under a second;
3. He's done his homework;
4. Because of the above, he makes pure political animals nervous.

This is Zakaria's interview with Stephen Harper. Rather than quote or paraphrase bits of it, it's best if you watch it yourself. If you want to go directly to the Harper interview you'll have to go to about half way through the podcast, though, if you have the time, the whole program is worth watching.



Much is being made on both sides of the political spectrum about the Harper line "We'll never defeat the insurgency in Afghanistan". And, quite rightly, it's being thrown back in the faces of those who smeared anybody and everybody who said exactly the same thing years ago. They were, as usual, wrong.

But, there is a stronger point to be made - maybe more than one.

Harper's admission was qualified with, "Everything I've read on Afghanistan suggests they've had an insurgency in one form or another, probably forever."

Yes. And if Harper had taken the time to do a little research, if he'd been a little more up-front with the population of his own country, we would have heard that from him long ago. The fact that we didn't suggests he didn't understand the chronic condition that is Afghanistan. That is a failure in leadership.

If one is going to make an expenditure of blood and treasure to the degree we have in Afghanistan, one should read the history of the place before making such costly commitments. And if he, up to the time of his admission, ignored the fractured past of Afghanistan, then his qualifying reason is little more than a weak excuse for engaging in an ideological neocon extravagance which is now sticking in the craw of Canadians.

Another point which came out of the interview was the difference with which Harper now apparently views the United States. Gone is the "We're your best and most trusted friend" mantra of the Bush days. There was a time when, if the US president mused over the idea that he needed a nickle, Harper would fall all over himself running around the room taking a collection.

Now, instead of offering anything and everything we pulled out of the dirt to his "bestest buddy" he's talking about resources as "leverage". If the US president were to come to him and ask for an extension in Afghanistan Harper insists he would have to see a plan. An actual plan! When did he ever ask for one of those from Bush?

Fareed Zakaria could have trapped Harper, but it would have served no pupose. When Zakaria brought up the Canadian banking system Harper couldn't say much. It's not something he could take credit for. In fact, if he'd had his way, in the way he would have preferred, the Canadian banking system would have collapsed right along with the rest of the world's financial institutions. The only reason they didn't was because of the regulatory framework built by governments before Harper's time - something he would have dismantled with a majority government.

If Zakaria made one mistake it was this comment leading into a question: "You're an economist."

No. Harper has a degree in economics. He is no economist.

Back to Afghanistan for a moment and the howling over his "We can't defeat the Taliban" line. While many of us already knew that, it triggered a question in my mind which I was going to post. I thought better of it.

I spent a lifetime in uniform in some of the worst places in the world. The kids who came behind me need every chance to believe that, no matter where they're sent, or why, despite the extreme danger, that they will come out of it with their bodies and minds intact. Every single one of them. To ask a question which would only plant a seed of fear in their minds in order to rub Harper's nose in the dirt would be a betrayal of them. They already know what it is anyway; there is no need for me to put it in print.

"We" aren't the problem

During a meeting back in April (Bloggerpalooza Act 1), Laura brought up a point worth considering.

My concern is that Harper and his brand of conservatives will forever change the political atmosphere in this country.

Or words to that effect.

Her point was that, as dirty as politics can get, we've always maintained some modicum of civility.

In the United States, particularly over the last decade, that civility has apparently vanished with the emergence of the conservative movement.

Fareed Zakaria has written an interesting foreign policy essay which suggests it's time for Americans to move beyond the rancid and rotting administration of George W. Bush and look to the future. It's something of a feel-good piece and in it, Zakaria makes a huge mistake.

He fails to acknowledge that allowing the cancerous body which created the situation in the US today, the conservative movement, to survive at all, is not an option. Zakaria writes as though Bush and the criminal enterprise for which he fronts sailed through the past six years with no opposing view. He doesn't acknowledge that an entire segment of American society, a large one, had been predicting the outcome of the Bush administration's devious machinations with alarming accuracy. And while they tried to stop him, instead of being acknowledged as presenting a legitimate dissenting view, they were smeared, marginalized and dismissed by a political machine built to crush any and all opposition. The current conservative movement, both in the United States and Canada does not brook debate in any way, shape or form.

Zakaria missed that completely. But Driftglass didn't.

Fareed attempts to frame the epic tale of the rise, hubristic apotheosis and catastrophic failure of the Modern Conservative Movement on every front and the degenerate freaks who still stand loyal to the criminal junta that runs it…down into a short story about a couple of bad seeds.

The story of Crazy ‘Ol Gee Dubya; sleazy skulker who wrecked the world all by his lonesome firing from the windows of the Textbook-Conservative Depository.

A loner. Disgruntled, with a fetish for guns and violent video games.

A phony-brave dimwit who mumbled a lot about smokin’ ‘em out and bringing ‘em on. Who somehow got his hands on the United States Government and caused a lotta ruckus.

You know the type.

A Lone Gunman whose Magic Bullet managed to take out the courts, maim the electoral process, turn around in midair and kill habeas corpus, wipe out New Orleans, level Iraq, trash our international reputation, set superstition in the Throne of Science, defile genuine Christianity, etc, etc, etc, etc ad nauseum.

That was the tame part. Drifty was just getting warmed up.

Conservatives now flail around like Daffy Duck having a grand mal seizure trying to explain that Dubya was some kind of goofy accident. That they…uh…they….just sneezed too hard and…uh…sorta pooped their pants a little, and there he was.

Just a case of temporary Constitutional Incontinence! So can’t we just forget the whole thing and go back to the Conservative Happy Days of Potsy, Richie, Ralph and President Ronald Wilson Fonzarelli?

Call do-over and go back to hating Negroes and queers, slaughtering the Middle Class blaming Liberals for every-fucking-thing?

No, Fareed. Because without a seething mass of millions of pinheaded, Rush-Drunk, Fox-Blind, Falwell-Gelded imbeciles to play to, Dubya would either be selling mobile homes in Midland or our Ambassador to Paraguay; either way drinking himself blind in the heat, shooting at the neighbors dogs for spite and screaming at his houseboy that his fucking pancakes aren't round enough.

From this point I would urge you to go back and read all of Driftglass's post. For what Zakaria missed and Drifty so neatly pinpointed is that it isn't about one administration. It's about a movement made up of people who would so corrupt the political and democratic landscape of a country as to leave it a wasteland. And they will continue to do what they do now: Blame it on everyone but themselves.

That would be the "we" Zakaria failed to identify.