2002 on the Continuum

Part of the problem with New Year assessments is that, for Americans, the old year really ends with Labor Day, and the New Year starts with school. Particularly this year, 1 January didn’t seem like much of a distinction between anything and anything else. So, consider 2002 on the continuum of America’s reassessment of the words and processes that shape political thought and action – ours and other people’s.

Part of the problem with New Year assessments is that, for Americans, the old year really ends with Labor Day, and the New Year starts with school. Particularly this year, 1 January didn’t seem like much of a distinction between anything and anything else. So, consider 2002 on the continuum of America’s reassessment of the words and processes that shape political thought and action – ours and other people’s.

The Kyoto Treaty, the Chemical Weapons Convention, the International Criminal Court, the ABM Treaty and the Biological Weapons Protocol were all multilateral (ABM was bilateral) attempts to circumscribe international behavior with neither enforcement mechanisms nor the ability to punish violators. All relied on goodwill and honesty; all therefore were fundamentally flawed. And the President has disavowed them all.

Palestinian-Israeli negotiations under American auspices were an attempt to make both parties give up deeply held beliefs and positions in the name of an amorphous concept (peace), relying on bribery, cajolery and ultimately goodwill and honesty to circumscribe behavior (process). It was therefore also fundamentally flawed. And the United States has clearly reassessed the political mandate that Israel continue to offer concrete inducements in exchange for Palestinian promises of better behavior.

Perhaps the most jarring and most important reassessment has been with regard to terrorism. Reuters notwithstanding, one man’s terrorist is no longer another man’s freedom fighter. One man’s terrorist is a terrorist. And the way to be rid of terrorists is to hunt them down and kill them (thank you, Secretary Rumsfeld) and to deprive any temporary survivors of refuge.

The common thread here is political confidence – American political confidence – in the ability of the President and the American government to determine plainly what policies will best serve the interests of the American people, and to pursue those policies.

That does worry some people. A Pakistani professor correctly pointed out that, “Of the 48 countries with a full or near Muslim majority, none has yet evolved a stable democratic political system. In fact, all Muslim countries are dominated by self-serving corrupt elites who cynically advance their personal interests and steal resources from their people. None of these countries has a viable educational system or a university of international stature.” His conclusion? “Americans will also have to accept that their triumphalism and disdain for international law are creating enemies everywhere. Therefore, they must become less arrogant and more like other peoples of this world.”

More like “other peoples”? It is not arrogance to think that would be a bad thing. Self-defense and defense of our friends, democracy and rule of law, individual liberties and free markets are what America brings to the table. If 2002 runs along the continuum, “other peoples” will become more like us, and that will be a good thing.