No one seems to be writing opinion pieces quite the way I would, so I decided to do it myself.

The name? Taverns are places where one goes to discuss the interesting events and things in the world, so this is my tavern.

I will offer my views on politics, economics, and whatever else strikes my fancy.
I will occasionally publish the entire article from another journal for purposes of causing discussion.

The Effect of a Paranoid foreign Policy

Since the tragedy of 9-11 which understandably shook and outraged everyone in this country, we have increasingly embraced at the highest official level what I think fairly can be called a paranoiac view of the world. Summarized in a phrase repeatedly used at the highest level, "he who is not with us is against us." I say repeatedly because actually some months ago I did a computer check to see how often it's been used at the very highest level in public statements.

The count then quite literally was ninety-nine. So it's a phrase which obviously reflects a deeply felt perception. I strongly suspect the person who uses that phrase doesn't know its historical or intellectual origins. It is a phrase popularized by Lenin (Applause) when he attacked the social democrats on the grounds that they were anti-Bolshevik and therefore he who is not with us is against us and can be handled accordingly.

Further on Mr. Brzezinski makes a point which I think dovetails with and helps to explain the Intelligence problems which I have been documenting.

The second condition, troubling condition, which contributes in my view to the crisis of credibility and to the state of isolation in which the United States finds itself today is due in part because that skewed view of the world is intensified by a fear that periodically verges on panic that is in itself blind. By this I mean the absence of a clearly, sharply defined perception of what is transpiring abroad regarding particularly such critically important security issues as the existence or the spread or the availability or the readiness in alien hands of weapons of mass destruction.

We have actually experienced in recent months a dramatic demonstration of an unprecedented intelligence failure, perhaps the most significant intelligence failure in the history of the United States. That failure was contributed to and was compensated for by extremist demagogy which emphasizes the worst case scenarios which stimulates fear, which induces a very simple dichotomic view of world reality.

Let me hare off into my own thoughts here.

I have long believed that Conservatives build their policies around a reaction to fear. As individuals they are afraid of what they do not understand. One thing they do not understand is the world outside the United States. Not only is it strange and incomprehensible [all those people speaking other languages and praying to strange Gods.] it is very dangerous. 9/11 was graphic proof of how that strange outside world can reach out and destroy people and things which are American, familiar, and otherwise safe.

A second major threat to many conservatives is people who work to change our American society itself. The familiar is comfortable, and any effort to change the familiar threatens that comfort and increases that fear.

One way of dealing with those threats is to try to understand them. The major institution we have in society for studying and attempting to understand the things we do not is Universities and schools. A lot of people spend great effort to understand the world outside the US and the changes that are occurring in society, and gain a measure of comfort in their mastery of those things. Another institution which is more accessible to everyone is the Press generally.

But Universities themselves are special places, open to only a select few. Many people do not feel accepted in such environments, and find them as puzzling and as threatening as the world outside the US with its strange languages and cultures. In addition to that, many changes in society can be directly attributed to people in universities. For many outsiders, Universities are more likely to be viewed as sources of threat than of comfort.

Two other social ways of dealing with the frightening threats are to try to control them by force (military and law enforcement) or to find an environment with a clear, concise and unambiguous set of guidelines.

The first would lead to heavy investment (both financial and emotional) in an extremely strong military or in clear unambiguous demands for rigid law enforcement, and the second can lead to search for a social institution that bases itself on clear, unchanging and universal guidelines. Fundamentalist religion is often found as such a social institution.

It is difficult to find comfort in complex, nuanced ideas. When a person is afraid, he doesn't think well. So he is likely to search for clear and specific alternatives.

Enter the demagogue. The demagogue specializes in offering clear, black and white alternatives that do not require that a person make nuanced judgments.

Today in America we have an institutional source of such demogoguery in the right wing press and the related set of conservative institutes such as the American Heritage Society and the American Enterprise Institute. Much of it is based on the financing provided by Richard Mellon Scaife and by Rupert Murdoch. The conservatives in the Republican Party have built on this by creating a centrally controlled method of determining the current message to publish and an extremely disciplined method of keeping everyone on the same message. The result is a clear, black-and-white well-financed and unnuanced message from the media and from the politicians that is hard to get away from. It is especially attractive to people who want certainty in their lives and are afraid when they don't have it.

Part of the message is what to fear. That includes outsiders, foreigners, intellectuals and university professors, anti-Americans, and anyone who contradicts the message or policy they are currently pushing. All of these are threats that the population they are preaching to, which makes it more imperative that those people accept their message as The Answer to such threats.

Part of the message is who Not to listen to. This is the source of political attacks on individuals who hold different views such as those performed by Bill O'Reilly and Rush Limbaugh. David Brock's book is an excellent description of how this right-wing propaganda machine works. A lesson that conservatives learn from this is that anyone who disagrees with them is an enemy with a contrary agenda. This is why the people in the Bush administration have been "Stovepiping" raw Intelligence data to the decision makers and ignoring the analysis by the CIA, DIA, and State Department as described by Seymour Hersh's recent New Yorker article.

Another clear part of the message is to distrust the Press. They label it the "Liberal-biased" Press. The effect of this label is that a Conservative can discount any information the Press offers that disagrees with the Conservative message because it comes from a source with an agenda to attack conservatives. Any disagreement with the Conservative message proves the bias of the Press.

It's not that there isn't a lot of things out there to threaten people. 9/11 proves that. The problem is when our government takes a paranoid attitude and attempts to simply destroy every threat by force. America has a superb military, but a military force is primarily useful against the military force of another nation. It is a lot less useful against terrorist organizations which are not nation-based.

Since we don't have a large powerful anti-terrorist force, the problem of 9/11 had to be converted by Conservatives to one that could be attacked by out military. The attack on Afghanistan to get the al Queda did that, so the Bush administration then attacked Iraq. Saddam was a festering problem that could be reframed as an attack by our strong military on "terrorism".

It was also a very paranoid move. It makes very little sense to outsiders and non-Americans and in fact is very likely to create more dangers from terrorism than it could possibly solve. It is the violent reaction of a group of people who refuse to try to understand what threats really exist and how to deal with them because that is not a clear, black-and-white action that builds on the clear strengths of America.

I think is also comes from a recognition by Conservatives that America is probably past its peak as the dominate nation on Earth.

In short, I really think that Brzezinski is on to something fundamental in America today when he describes the actions of the Bush administration as paranoid.