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From: jim@ISM780.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Orphaned Response
Message-ID: <37400009@ISM780.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 28-Nov-85 07:25:00 EST
Article-I.D.: ISM780.37400009
Posted: Thu Nov 28 07:25:00 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 30-Nov-85 20:59:34 EST
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Nf-From: ISM780!jim    Nov 28 07:25:00 1985


>Oh *I* get it!  Jan is not intellectually honest if he advocates
>something on the best information he has!  Of COURSE!  Isn't this
>more than a little silly, Jim?  You're accusing someone of intellectual
>dishonesty because he doesn't know information that I doubt you know, but
>holds opinions different from yours.  Jan WOULD be intellectually dishonest
>if he were deliberately ignoring some fact, but not if he fails to dig
>it out (he may have other things to do).

Most of the questions asked pertained directly to support of Jan's position.
Taking such a position without having the facts to support it,
that is taking a position based on unsupported bias, is I think reasonably
labeled intellectually dishonest.  I call on Jan to support his position
*with facts* that we have an *obligation* to support the resistance.

>The interesting thing about aid to the contras is that I think you're
>quite right -- aid to other governments or movements by our GOVERNMENT
>should not be lightly undertaken (actually, I doubt it should *ever*
>be undertaken, but that's another story), but I'll bet there are a LOT
>of things our government does with LESS information (at a guess,
>funding primary education for poor children, or requiring utilities to
>provide service to the destitute) that you ARE in favor of.  Sauce for
>the goose -- sauce for the gander: TAXING people should not be lightly
>undertaken either, but I don't hear you coming out and arguing against
>it when it is for causes that you (with limited information, no doubt)
>like.

How the hell do you know what I am in favor of, or what I know?
Now you are surely being intellectually dishonest, arguing against a strawman.
Why would you want me to argue against taxes when you don't think I have
enough information to argue for them?  From my *values*, not from information,
I favor children being educated, even if it means they grow up to build bombs
to destroy us, I favor the destitute not starving or freezing to death
even if it means increasing the chances of having my throat slit,
and I favor a society with good roads, maintained buildings,
and a healthy environment with preserved natural habitats, even if
it means fewer of the technological toys I love.  I am quite open
to possible ways to achieve these ends.  I am well aware of a
wide range of weaknesses in the ways these things are being done.
I can see what the effects of the current policies are; if
someone offers a different solution, I certainly wouldn't reject
it, but I would ask for analysis before *supporting* it.  I am
familiar with libertarian arguments and am willing to respond to
them.  I refuse to take a position without being willing to
defend it.  And I demand the same of others.

>>Of course, I don't really believe that you have honestly considered these
>>questions or would be willing to honestly examine them.

>Keep calm, but one way to help Jan examine them would be to
>post your own answers to ALL those questions.  Since a great many of them
>dealt with contingencies, I suspect you won't be able to answer all
>of them with anything like authority.  Is it intellectually honest of
>you to require answers of the opposing side that can't be tested?

I require answers that must be available before a claim can be made.  Jan
believes we have an obligation to right our wrongs.  Fine.  But to claim we
sold the Nicaraguans down the river needs substantiation; the claim that we
have an obligation to support the resistance requires evidence that that
would right the wrong, and the claim that we are obligated to continue
supporting the Contras until the previous aid is "matched" needs info about
such aid unless Jan is willing to concede that we may have already matched
it.  My belief is that we have no right to interfere Nicaragua's internals,
without extreme justification.  I read World Press Review, Foreign Affairs,
Newsweek, Time, L.A. Times, N.Y. Times, National Review, Conservative Digest,
The Plain Truth, In These Times, Mother Jones, The Realist, The UTNE Reader,
The Covert Information Bulletin, the academic and popular press, and a lot of
other junk.  Some of this material provides sources and cross-references and
analysis from a variety of perspectives, and some does not.  I have some
evaluation of what is reliable, based on such correlation.  I do not believe
that every Sandinista is a wonderful human being.  I do not believe they are
not without fault.  But I am familiar with the history of the Miskitos, the
Chamorros, the attitude of the Nicaraguans to the U.S. and v.v., Ortega's
public gestures and statements re conciliation with the U.S., , the Honduran
involvement, the international evaluation of the Nic. elections, the history
of the opposition parties and their treatment, the events of the Pope's visit
and politics of the conflict between the papacy and the Nicaraguan
conservative and liberal church, the history of the Samoza family, the
history of Eden Pastora and the Contras in general, the effects of the war on
Nicaragua, the U.S. State Department position on Nicaraguan arms shipments to
El Salvadoran rebels and its basis, the history and degree of suspension of
rights, and a whole lot more.  I would like to know what *evidence* there is
to support the idea that U.S. behavior is *justified*, or even that the
Nicaraguan *people* favor it, since, as much as I have searched, I cannot
find any such evidence in the liturature.  I hear things like "it is an armed
camp, and they censor La Prensa", but my response is, why is that sufficient
justification for supporting violence against them, especially when it is not
for apparently much more violent regimes (elsewhere or the Samozas), and why
isn't that seen as the Nic. government's response to the attack?  It isn't
necessary for it to be a *reasonable* or *justifiable* response.  We attack
them so they go overboard so that *justifies* the original attack as well as
hitting them harder?  What justified our support of the Contras *in the first
place*?  Reagan said we didn't want to overthrow them, just pressure them to
reach agreement with us.  Is that sufficient reason to support guerrilla
aggression?  And it assumes that Nicaragua made no attempt at reconciliation,
*but the record clearly shows otherwise*.  So the State Department said that
was just a show and they weren't serious; is that sufficient to attack?  What
would Nicaragua have had to do to pass our judgement?  "Stop supplying arms
to El Salvadoran rebels".  But did the U.S. provide any means by which such
stoppage could be verified?  Has the State Department offered solid evidence
that such shipments occur?  Many parties have serious substantive, questions
about the validity of documents the State Department offered as evidence that
El Salvador was being supplied.  If you are not willing to *assume* that the
State Department would never dissemble, then the possibility that the U.S.
demanded that the Nicaraguans stop doing something they never did in the
first place becomes very real *in light of the evidence*, and very plausible
in terms of a U.S. foreign policy in opposition to Nicaragua (for whatever
reason).  Are you willing to even *consider* this possibility?  Intellectual
honesty requires that you do.  In any case, is attacking Nicaragua a
reasonable approach?  You have to at the very least make a lot of assumptions
about the war in El Salvador, which is a whole other can of worms.  It is all
predicated on the assumption that who Jeanne Kirkpatrick says are the bad
guys are the bad guys.  But I've read her works, and I know where she is
coming from.  I'll base my opinions on the *facts*.

>>Instead you
>>produce catchy little slogans like the one above, littered with dishonesty,
>>and making no reference to the degradation and death of real human beings
>>that such policies can produce.
>
>I've heard no reference by you to the forced relocation of the aborigines
>in Nicaragua, perhaps I wasn't listening.  Nor, have I heard you mention
>the suspension of civil liberties.  Again, perhaps I didn't notice, and
>again, if you didn't mention these things: Sauce for the goose.....

Mention them as support for *what*?  Have I denied them?  Am I unaware of
them?  Do you hold that they are sufficient reason to support the Contras?
Does that help alleviate the suspension or prevent a recurrence of the
relocation?  How can such support do anything but make it worse, up until
(and not unlikely past) either cessation of the support or overthrow of the
Sandinistas?  Maybe it isn't intellectual dishonesty, maybe it is just an
unfamiliarity the forms of logical connection.  What statement would you have
liked me to make?  That we shouldn't support the Contras because those things
did not happen?  But that isn't my position, is it?  Please answer this!  One
of us is making a rhetorical error somewhere.  It it is me, show me how.  I
am almost certain I understand you position.  It is that the world is black
and white.  Jan is against the Nicaraguans.  I disagree with him, so I must
be for them.  Since I am for them, I must favor everything they have ever
done.  I cannot see how else you could reach your sauce for the goose
statement otherwise.

>The subject WASN'T "degradation and death", so Jan wasn't obligated to
>mention it.  Perhaps there's MORE "degradation and death" under the
>current government than there would be under the Contras.  You have
>some way of knowing that we don't (perhaps you have some way of
>quantifying "degradation")?

The point is the degradation and death at the hands of the Contras *now*.
That *is* the subject; Jan favors support of people who are shooting
and blowing things up.  That means death and degradation.  Some of
such is documented.  Even if you are not familiar with the documentation,
you can reasonably assume that there is *some*, can you not?
What *evidence* of such death at the hands of the Sandinistas can you show?
I understand that people who have a certain view of the Sandinistas
*expect* such, but my whole point is that the *view* is not *substantiated*.
And if there is such killing at the hands of the Sandinistas, it is only on
top of that of the Contras, isn't it?  And there would be more so by the
Sandinistas being under fire, wouldn't there?  And it wouldn't *lessen*
until the Sandinistas were overthrown and Nicaragua was "under the Contras",
would it?  Which implies that overthrow is the goal, doesn't it?
Not just matching aid, or supporting the Contadora process.
And the Sandinistas would fight back all over again, wouldn't they?

Now, what did I say?
  >>and making no reference to the degradation and death of real human beings
  >>that such policies can produce.
		       ^^^
They can, can't they?  Of course I can't see into the crystal ball,
although I might have some suspicions based on the previous behavior
of the national guard who are among the Contras.
But all I said was, if Jan is going to *advocate* such policies, *he* has
an obligation to consider the likely consequences.  It isn't enough to say,
if we don't support the Contras the Sandinistas *might* kill more people
without some sort of analysis that they in fact would, and that there are
not in fact other ways to avoid such a situation, like perhaps
establishing economic and diplomatic relationships and making them a
full-fledged ally.  I have never seen any reason whatsover to think that
the Nicaraguans are so foolish as to think that they would be better off
with the Soviets, and I welcome such evidence.  Simply asserting that
they are Marxists or whatever doesn't cut it.  Ortega's visits to the
U.S. and his public statements requesting an alliance with the U.S.
are part of the public record; *that* is evidence.  It isn't sufficient
evidence; it isn't conclusive; it isn't unbiased; but I suspect it is better
than what you have.

To be honest, while at some level of course it angers me, I thank you and Jan
for challenging me eliciting my responses.  While it may not affect either of
you, I hope that it will lead at least a couple of people to *think* about
the issues more and maybe even *investigate* them further themselves.
Also, hopefully it will lead to new information for me.  If there is
*evidence* to support the contention that supporting the Contras will lead to
desirable ends and that it is justified in terms of U.S. and international
law and/or moral principles that I would be willing to accept, I would be
very interested in hearing about it.

-- Jim Balter (ima!jim)