| Friday,
April 1, 2011 What
is Legitimacy
There is more going on in the world than Libya and the Fukushima Daiichi
reactor complex, but there's so much about those -- much of it nonsense --
that it drowns out everything else.
Case in point: in today's Wall Street Journal, Senator Joe Lieberman and
Senator John McCain, both of whom aspire to national leadership, say "In
Libya, Regime Change Should Be the Goal" (link).
They say explicitly that the US ought to recognize the Libyan rebels as the
legitimate government of Libya. They do not precisely say why. Here is one
rationale:
If Gadhafi is allowed to hang onto power through the
use of indiscriminate violence, it will send a message to dictators
throughout the region and beyond that the way to respond, when people rise
up peacefully and demand their rights, is through repression and
slaughter—and that the rest of the world, including the U.S., won't stand in
the way.
That sounds good -- but I do not think they have considered the
implications. Suppose, for instance, that a large faction in the United
States rises up to barricade the streets, occupy a state Capitol building,
disrupt commerce and stop food deliveries, prevent people from getting to
work and otherwise get in the way of people trying to get on with their
lives. Eventually the police are called in to take these people away. Some
are chained together. Some wreck police cars and set fires. When asked why
they are doing this, they say they are rising up peacefully to demand their
rights -- and the pigs are repressing them.
Actually, I do not have to suppose any of this, because it has happened
at several times and and many places in the United States. The oppressed
groups rising up to demand their rights have included teachers in Wisconsin,
Latinos in Los Angeles (several times), blacks in Los Angeles who burned
down part of the Wilshire Miracle Mile and looted Korean stores, hoodlums in
Los Angeles exuberant over some basketball results -- and in every case
there were many who came forward to condemn the police repression and
brutality against people rising up peacefully to demand their rights.
Fortunately the Mexican Armed Forces did not launch cruise missiles against
the Los Angeles City Hall or the Police Headquarters; but perhaps the
reasons for that lie more with the United States Air Force than with lack of
sympathy for those who took to the barricades.
Is any group large enough to barricade a city and disrupt everyone's life
a legitimate government?
In the days ahead, it is imperative that we maintain
and if necessary expand our air strikes against Gadhafi's ground forces,
which pose a threat to civilians wherever they are. In doing so, we can
pave the way for the Libyan opposition to reverse Gadhafi's offensive and
to resume their quest to end his rule.
The battlefield reversals suffered by the opposition
this week, when weather conditions hampered coalition air strikes,
underscore the need for a more robust and coherent package of aid to the
rebel ground forces.
The U.S. should also expand engagement with the
Libyan opposition, led by the interim Transitional National Council
currently based in Benghazi. We have been encouraged by the Obama
administration's growing rhetorical support for the opposition, but we
hope to see more tangible manifestations of it in the days ahead.
Apparently the legitimate government of Libya hasn't got a chance without
US intervention. The US must break things and kill people in order to put
the opposition into power.
Another immediate priority should be getting
humanitarian assistance into eastern Libya and restoring telecommunications
access there, where Gadhafi has cut off land lines, mobile networks and the
Internet. While top opposition leaders have satellite phones, we have both
humanitarian and strategic interests in restoring the ability of people in
liberated parts of Libya to communicate with each other and the rest of the
world. We should also take steps to get Gadhafi's satellite, television,
and radio broadcasts off the air, while helping the opposition air its
broadcasting. [emphasis added]
In other words, the legitimate government -- the rebels --
cannot govern. They need help. They need us to provide the basics of actual
government. They also need us to suppress the broadcasts of what was, until
a few weeks ago, was the universally recognized government of Libya.
Apparently we can't even be sure that the people rising up against the
regime and whom we ought to recognize as the legitimate government can win
even a propaganda war: we have to help them get their message out while
suppressing any opposition to them. Or at least any opposition from what
used to be the legitimate government. I doubt we would be asked to suppress
the views of, say, fundamentalist monotheists who advocate the ruthless
application of Sharia law for Libya. I presume there are some among the
rebels. There usually are when people rise up to demand their rights in that
part of the world. It was, after all, the Muslim Brotherhood who led the
abortive rebellion -- rising up to demand their rights -- in
Hama in Syria back in
1982.
But that won't be. Lieberman and McCain know better. How,
precisely, I do not know.
Some critics still argue that we should
be cautious about helping the Libyan opposition, warning that we do not know
enough about them or that their victory could pave the way for an al Qaeda
takeover. Both arguments are hollow. By all accounts, the Transitional
National Council is led by moderates who have declared their vision for (as
their website puts it) Libya becoming "a constitutional democratic civil
state based on the rule of law, respect for human rights and the guarantee
of equal rights and opportunities for all its citizens."
Ah. They say they are for a constitutional democratic state. Of course
the government of Bangladesh insists that it is a democratic state.
A 16-year-old girl who was raped in
Bangladesh has been given 101 lashes for conceiving during the
assault.
By Dean Nelson, South
Asia Editor 4:30PM GMT 25 Jan
2010
The girl's father was also fined and warned
the family would be branded outcasts from their village if he
did not pay.
The girl died of the injuries from 101 lashes. The government of
Bangladesh says this should not have happened, but the incident is not the
only case of such practices; and of course if the government tries to
prevent this application of Sharia the people of the village, all of whom
stood by and watched the administration of the 1o1 lashes to a 14 year old
girl, would likely rise up to demand their rights. Should the US then bomb
the government of Bangladesh for attempting to stop this sort of thing? And
do not think I am playing games here: much of the flame of Islam has arisen
among the desert people of North Africa. The Berbers and Tuareg sometimes
take their religion seriously. What happens when the rebels led by moderates
cannot govern? Senators McCain and Lieberman say:
In particular, we and our allies should be providing
the council with the communications equipment, logistical support, training,
tactical intelligence and weapons necessary to consolidate rule over the
territory they have liberated and to continue tilting the balance of power
against Gadhafi. We do not need to put U.S. forces on the ground precisely
because the Libyans themselves are fighting for their freedom. But they need
our help, and quickly, to succeed.
I have no brief for Qadhafi, or for Bashar of Syria, or for Mubarak of
Egypt. I will say I have not heard stories of 14 year old girls being lashed
to death in public during their watch in their regimes, but that is not a
great deal to be said to their credit. Or is it? In some parts of the world
it is assumed that 14 year old rape victims will not be beaten to death in
public, but there are places where that is demanded by the law, and is it
bad form to point out that this is barbarism.
Liberty, as a principle, has no
application to any state of things anterior to the time when mankind have
become capable of being improved by free and equal discussion. Until then,
there is nothing for them but implicit obedience to an Akbar or a
Charlemagne, if they are so fortunate as to find one. But as soon as mankind
have attained the capacity of being guided to their own improvement by
conviction or persuasion (a period long since reached in all nations with
whom we need here concern ourselves), compulsion, either in the direct form
or in that of pains and penalties for non-compliance, is no longer
admissible as a means to their own good, and justifiable only for the
security of others.
John Stuart Mill, On Liberty
At one time the "solution" to these matters would have been League of
Nations mandates over countries that can't rule themselves and continue to
disturb the international order. That form of imperialism is no longer
fashionable. Two senators of the United States now pronounce legitimate a
group that apparently can't keep its followers from firing all its
ammunition into the air in celebration of victory before being routed in the
counterattack they didn't expect after their victory. Let's hope that if
they win they have better control than that.
Hope springs eternal.
=================
The news from Japan is about the same: the situation in Fukushima Daiichi
remains serious, but no one off the plant site has been injured. There are
detectable emissions from the plant found outside the perimeter including as
far away as California, but none of those remains dangerous.
The reactors are pretty well a total loss and have become economic "bads"
in that owning them is an unwanted expense. The effects on the nuclear
industry are such that probably more people will die as more energy is
produced by non-nuclear means that have a higher lifecost/kw than nuclear.
Those who oppose nuclear power will rejoice.
From the MIT report site (
http://mitnse.com/ )
Air monitoring data for the region can be
found at
http://www.mext.go.jp/english/
radioactivity_level/detail/1303986.htm .
An isolated location outside the boundary of
the evacuation zone displayed high levels of deposition of Iodine-131. The
IAEA has announced that these levels, found in the village of Iitate,
exceed their guidelines for evacuation. Local officials are assessing the
situation.
Testing of various food products from the
prefectures surrounding the damaged reactors show that all of the food
product samples from outside Fukushima prefecture display either no
radioactivity or levels below regulatory limits. However, 25 samples from
the Fukushima prefecture did exceed Japanese regulatory limits.
Radiation levels in seawater immediately
adjacent to the plant’s discharge canal rose yesterday (http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/
press/corp-com/release/11033109-e.html) . The cause of this increase
is still not known.
====================
Mote in God's Eye
A large number of your books are available in Kindle
compatible format from Baen. I prefer to buy my books from when I can.
http://www.webscription.net/s-83-jerry-pournelle.aspx
Brian
They are indeed, and it explains how they can be
set up to be readable by Kindle devices and Kindle apps on iPads; but the
process isn't automatic like clicking on a book and having it appear on
your Kindle, and the result is far far fewer sales. Amazon sales are huge;
all the rest added together are still pretty small. Baen ought to market
through Kindle, but they don't.
But those who want some of my books as eBooks
need to look at Baen. Jim was a pioneer in the eBook business.
===============
This is technically mail, but I will put it here:
Outies Now Available in Trade Paperback
1. Outies is now available in trade paperback from
multiple outlets.
Please encourage purchase from :
https://www.createspace.com/3536693 because that gives us
maximum royalties.
The difference is significant: at the same price
point, we get $7.11 from createspace, but only $3.92 from Amazon, and only
$.73 from anywhere else.
2. And now, we are in the news for NSF:
http://www.nsf.gov/news/
news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=
119138&org=NSF&from=news
Dr. Jennifer R. Pournelle, Ph.D.
The NSF news (point 2) covers her discovery and new theory of
civilization from Iraq. It's worth your attention.
I do not do April Fool jokes. What, never? No, never. What, never? Well,
hardly ever..."
===========
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