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.

 

My response to Clarke's Op Ed

Richard Clarke presented three major points in his New York Times Op Ed today. I want to respond with my views mostly on his first point, that there is a major war of ideas going on in Islam today.

Clarke makes the point that the true war in the middle east is a civil war within Islam between moderate and radical extremist Muslims. They have to decide how Islam will develop and the moderates will win. In their desperation the radical extremists are trying to stop all movement into the future through terrorism leading to Islamic states.

The West is involved because it is at least to some extent the conflict between Islam and the progressive ideas of democracy and free trade that has led to the civil war within Islam. As the moderates move towards adopting some of the better aspects of Western ideas and practices into Islamic societies, the extremists are attempting to make such adoptions extremely expensive.

The bombs and bullets and, yes, terrorism, are only the tools in the real battle of ideas that is going on. The Bush administration is reacting only to the bombs and bullets, with more bullets and bombs. They are ignoring the war of ideas and are losing it rapidly.

If I make the conflict within Islam sound like a battle between conservatives and progressives, I think that is an accurate description of it. It is a war of ideas, conducted in societies which for the most part do not have democratic traditions of government. Each side believes that they will win if they control government, but control will change only through civil war. Fear of change and control of the government are the only tools available to the conservatives. Any adaptation to the changes caused by moving into the future is a loss to them.

Does it sound like I am describing the Islamic extremists as being much like our American social conservatives? It should. I think the motivation is the same. The difference is that we have a tradition of change in our government through means other then violent revolution.

The similarity is that our extremists also are people who do not work well with ideas. Bush was ready to start a war to change the world as soon as he was elected, but has no respect for the ideas held in the rest of the world.

He proved it by abrogating the Kyoto treaty and the ABM treaty immediately upon taking office, and by ignoring the views of the rest of the world when he invaded Iraq. He deals with the ideas of others by ignoring them, by personally attacking the individuals or nations who have differing ideas, by attempting to bribe them to accept his ideas, and by suppressing their speech by things like removal of funding or even getting laws or regulations prohibiting the communication of certain ideas as he has done in the abortion arena.

I am not surprised that Richard Clarke views the current problems of terrorism from the middle east as a result of a civil war between extremists and progressives there. I see much the same conflict going on here in the United States, with the social conservatives in both places using many of the same extreme weapons.
In both societies the people who do not adapt well to change are attempting to fight a war against social movement into the inexorable future. They fight with simplistic slogans and memorized catechisms since real analysis rarely provides the certainty they demand. When the slogans are not enough, they use police and armies where they can, and terrorists like the KKK where they can't.

Since modern government requires highly sophisticated analysis to function, it is no surprise that the Bush administration was not ready for 9/11. Clarke, having spent 30 years at the highest levels of our federal government effectively getting things done, is a master of analysis and converting that analysis into action. The Bush administration is a political operation which is staffed primarily by individuals who disdain such analysis and instead search for simply answers. Such people will revert to the military very quickly, and will perform poorly in an environment requiring Intelligence collection, analysis, and conversion to action. I think that is the real message that Clarke conveyed to us with his book, his testimony before the 9/11 Commission and his recent Op Ed piece.

Those are my reactions to the first of the three points Clarke presented in his Op Ed piece. His other two points were:
2. The changes needed in the CIA and FBI and the dangers of focusing on structural changes, and
3. The need for civil discourse between those in charge of fighting the two wars we now have (one against terrorism and the other in Iraq) and their critics and opponents.

I can't add to what he said about number 2.

As for number 3. I would refer you to my argument above about how extremist social conservatives have to battle their opponents. I don't see any civility returning to our political discourse until the conservatives are totally discredited.

posted by Richard at 11:33 PM