Jimmy Carter's "Alternative To War"

[barbara100 at jps.net]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Eddie Bettano" <eddiebettano at yahoo.com>

Carter:
> > > Atlanta...Despite marshalling powerful armed
> > forces in the Persian Gulf region and a virtual
> declaration of war in the State of the Union message,
> our government has not made a case for a preemptive
> military strike against Iraq, either at home or in
> Europe.> > Recent vituperative attacks on U.S. policy
> by famous
> > > and respected men like Nelson Mandela and John Le
> > > Carré, although excessive, are echoed in a Web
> > site poll conducted by the European edition of TIME
> > > magazine. The question was "Which country poses
> > the greatest danger to world peace in 2003?" With
> > several hundred thousand votes cast, the responses
> were: North Korea, 7 percent; Iraq, 8 percent; the
> United States, 84 percent. This is a gross distortion
> of our nation's character, and America is not inclined
> to let foreign> voices answer the preeminent question
> that President Bush is presenting to the world, but it
> is sobering to realize how much doubt and
> consternation has been raised about our motives for
> war in the absence of convincing proof of a genuine
> threat from Iraq.
>
> _________________
Eddie:
> This is a very strange way to float an alternative.
> Isn't it? I mean, why does President Carter even
> bother to mention that Nelson Mandela and John Le
> Carré are giving voice to excessive attacks on the
> United States and its policies? Does doing so add
> anything to his "alternative"? No, of course it
> doesn't. Why include a poll? An internet poll? The
> only thing sobering about President Carter's
> alternative thus far is that it sounds like yahooed
> google.

And you sound like a flippant asshole. Sorry, but you've been provoking us
for weeks. I can't stand it anymore. But more to the subject--and it's a
good subject, pynchon or not--Maybe Carter's intention isn't to lend a
step-by-step alternate plan but to sway public opinion in the hopes public
opinion will sway the Bush administration; and maybe he wants to reassure
us, be calm, cool and collected, "chill"; maybe he wants us to listen closer
so we might hear the fakery in our government's rhetoric; maybe he's trying
to make amends; maybe he's trying to show us it's a big world out there and
most of it sees us as a big bad bully.


> > > In Washington, there is no longer any mention of
> > Osama> bin Laden, and the concentration of public
> > statements> on his international terrorist network
> is mostly limited to still-unproven allegations about its
> > > connection with Iraq. The worldwide commitment and
> > top> priority of fighting terrorism that was
> generated after September 11th has been attenuated as
> Iraq> has become the preeminent obsession of political
> > leaders and the general public.

> This is not true. And, what has it got to do with a
> peace alternative to the UN policy? Nothing.

Flippant. And it is true!  All of it. We don't hear about Osama anymore;
there's no evidence of a terror link with Saddam; and our political leaders
need figures for the public to obsess over. Even Pynchon says this last one
if you believe that Playboy Japan article.