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From: tan@ihlpg.UUCP (Bill Tanenbaum)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: In the Name of God
Message-ID: <1712@ihlpg.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 17-Mar-86 17:04:35 EST
Article-I.D.: ihlpg.1712
Posted: Mon Mar 17 17:04:35 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 20-Mar-86 18:03:35 EST
References: <1680@ihlpg.UUCP> <707@mtuxn.UUCP>, <356@gargoyle.UUCP> <725@mtuxn.UUCP> <79@gilbbs.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 52

> [Tom Keller, in response to Guy Ferraiolo]
> ...  Further, should we not in fact protest human rights violations
> committed by the U.S. ***MUCH*** more vociferously than those committed by the
> "evil communists" precisely *BECAUSE* America is supposedly above such 
> atrocities?
------
No.  Human rights abuses should be protested in proportion to their severity.
By your backwards logic, you would punish the more humane societies for
abuses you wouldn't even notice in the less humane societies.  Why protest
Hitler or Pol Pot at all?  After all, everyone expects atrocities from them.
Can you say "double standard", Tom.
-----
>    Indeed, this newsgroup does appear, at present, to be dominated by postings
> deploring current U.S. policies.  What better use for it?  As I have stated
> repeatedly, by making *MUCH* noise about policies we consider harmful oor
> wrong, we have the opportunity to affect changes in those policies.  As each
> of us, as citizens, are partially responsible for the results of these 
> policies, this is incumbent upon us.  Not being responsible for the results
> of the policies of any other nation, and not having the power or privilege
> of affecting changes in their policies, I choose not to expend much effort in
> discussing them here.  Criticism is intended to improve the situation.  My
> criticism of the U.S. *might* affect an improvement...my criticism of the
> "evil commiunists" will not.
-----
Wrong again.  Ask any Soviet dissident about the importance of Western
support for them.  The Soviets are not totally impervious to Western 
public opinion.  On the contrary, they make great efforts to influence it.
------
> The frequency and manner in which we
> interfere in the internal affairs of other nations, the assisnations our
> C.I.A. has engineered, the puppet govenrments we have forced upon several
> nations all speak of a nation willing to do anything it feels necessary to
> further its goals.  Remember, Mr. Ferraiolo, it was the United States which
> dropped the only two nuclear weapons ever used against human beings, to
> further its own goals.
------
Yeah, like ending World War II.  What a horrible goal.
If the Allies had had those weapons in 1941 and dropped them, how
many tens of millions of lives would have been saved?   Of course,
you would have opposed such a drop, with your mindset.
Unfortunately, if the (relatively) bad guys interfere in the internal
affairs of other countries, and the (relatively) good guys do not, the
(relatively) bad guys will end up calling the shots.  This is the unfortunate
reality of the world we live in.  The problem is always one of choosing
the lesser evil.  Complete non-interventionism is the road to disaster.
The world would be a far better place if the Western Powers had intervened
in Germany in 1933 or 1936, or even 1938.  The problem is to pick the
right interventions and avoid the wrong ones.  It's a very difficult
problem indeed.  We can do without your simplicities, just as we can
do without the simplicities of the Right.
-- 
Bill Tanenbaum - AT&T Bell Labs - Naperville IL  ihnp4!ihlpg!tan