Really? Seriously?

Just finished watching Governor Sarah Palin's speech in Dayton, OH. Hmm. Take a gander:



Seriously, she looks and sounds like a soccer mom giving a campaign speech! We are really supposed to buy into the idea that she can step into the presidency at a moments notice?

David Schraub's post at The Moderate Voice while watching:

So far, this is not going well. She looks star-struck up there. My girlfriend says she’s rambling. I think she sounds hokey (sometimes that’s a good thing, but I don’t think here). Her diction is not strong — she sounds halting to me. And it’s thematically disjointed.

The part about mentioning Geraldine Ferraro and Hillary Clinton was a forced nod. The fact that she had the gall to bring up Hillary's 18 million cracks! OMG! If Hillary wasn't invested in Obama before, she sure as hell will be now! Hillary will work overtime to make sure that ceiling holds for at least four more years.

I think that the 18 million cracks reference was a serious tatical mistake by the McCain campaign. Did they vet the speech? Did they think Hillary would take that sitting down?

I think Hillary will volunteer herself for attacking this one personally now. She may not have been a willing attack dog before but look out now. No half term governor, former mayor of a city of less than 9,000 people is going to hijack what she started, after all the time and effort she put into this, especially if she will not benefit from it.

Does the McCain campaign seriously want Hillary to be Obama's active attack dog along with Biden?

Speaking of Biden. What is McCain going to do about the debate. Can you imagine the woman at that podium in a debate with Joe Biden? Are they going to lock Sarah Palin in an intensive debate immersion room for the next few weeks?

I assume the woman is intelligent. Even with that assumption, what is the strategy? That she will appear so overmatched against Biden that people will equate Biden with the hunter that killed Bambi's mom? Why would you try that strategy?

They've got an incredible amount of work to do in the next several weeks. They get a pass for the convention, maybe, but then all bets are off.

I think that either:

1. John McCain had a defining lapse in judgement that even exceeds the lapses in judgement that Ronald Reagan, and, later, Ronald Reagan's lapse in judgement, George H. W. Bush came to regret. Or....
   
2. John McCain is about to learn, quite painfully, that your advisors can be complete idiots even when they are getting paid obscene amounts of money.

Which it is depends entirely on who made the call here. Either way, I am not seeing this ending well.

I said it earlier, and I still believe, John McCain had few, if any, good choices. I didn't envy him his decision. I still don't.

Comments welcome,

Pat McGovern

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Saakashvili Does Sign

I am baffled by the fact that regardless of when I decide to resume making post on current events, the events of the day inevitably draw me to post multiple times, and incessantly, on one given topic.

This occured last year with the Walter Reed scandal and the original Wandering Donkey. Sad to say, I have lost those posts. You may be able to ressurect them on archive.org but I don't have time to.

Now onward to the fact that I am posting at least once a day on the Georgia-Russia crisis. (You may indeed read into the order of the nations in my title.)

In my previous post I asked why Mikhail Saakashvili might be expected to sign a peace agreement with the terms outlined. I responded with, what I thought, to be a well reasoned argument that he should not.

However, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili has done exactly that.



The fact that the Georgians have signed a Cease Fire agreement is somewhat significant.

First, I give a number of reasons why this should NOT have been done on my previous post.

Second, and a point I did not consider earlier, is that Russia has not yet agreed to these conditions! WTF was French President Nicolas Sarkozy doing in Moscow? Apparently he was putting together a peace deal that was up to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice to shove down the throats of the combatants. I personally thought the Russian side was covered. I guess this was wrong. (I hope you enjoyed your visit to the Kremlin, Nick. I'd love to get such a deal!)

Apparently, the Russians now have to sign this. This is not a big thing if it gives what was told before. This would include the ability of Russian troops to move into proper Georgian territory if it's citizens, troops or integrity were threatened.

Hell, I'd be all over signing that. I don't necessarily think that is the same thing they thought they would be signing two days ago though.

I have a feeling that some sort of switch has taken place.

Time, and the various news agencies will tell.

In the meantime, given the past knowns and rhetoric, Mikhail Saakashvili made a mistake today.

Given that he went to Columbia; I think there is a different interpretation that will come to light.

Russia, cannot win this, despite their overconfident attitude. They lose. The west and Georgia win. Does Medvedev lose credibility? Absolutely! Does it mean change? Probably not.

Comments welcome,

Pat McGovern

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Why would Saakashvili sign?

Slowly, but surely, more and more stuff comes out in this whole Georgian invasion that just makes you wonder. It is now clear, to a great extent, why the Russians have not removed themselves from Georgian territory.

Why?

They don't think they have to! Indeed, they apparently don't have to according to the peace plan that U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice is now trying to get Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili to sign.

The plan gives the Russians the right to patrol in Georgian territory. Not just South Ossetia, not just Abkhazia but in what is actual, undisputed Georgian territory.

Here is where I should make a politically incorrect joke about how it must have been a Frenchman who negotiated this deal. Unfortunately, this isn't a situation to which humor, in bad or good taste, should be applied.



Comparisons and analogies abound here folks.

The Russians are saying that they are doing nothing different that the United States and Europe did in Kosovo (which was, notably, done against Russian wishes.)

Saakashvili is making comparisons to the Munich Agreement in 1938.

Both sides are leveling charges of genocide.

Meanwhile civilians and reporters are being caught in the crossfire. The video above has footage of a reporter being hit by a sniper as she is going on the air.

I cannot imagine that President Saakashvili will sign the agreement as it is presently constructed. It does not even have any provision for outside oversight or any type of sanctions against Russia if it fails to abide by it's terms.

It is not clear who started this. It is clear who needs the protecting here. I do not say that Georgia is innocent in this. But they, being that their army is already all but destroyed, need to have someone defending their right to exist here. At the very least, the Bush administration seems to be doing their best to achieve that.

That said, their is a lot of blame to go around on why this is happening.

-You can start with Kosovo. But that was still what nearly all in the west would consider a justified action by the United States and Western Europe. Nevertheless, Russian President Dmitri Medvedev and his Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov are using that as their template here. Ironic really, since we cut into their sphere of influence with that action and this action is, and least partly, about reestablishing their sphere of influence.

-Iraq. To some extent, Afghanistan also. But mostly, Iraq. Unilateral action on a grand scale. This is what really cuts the Bush Administration off at the knees. No matter what they say, the Russians will come back at them with some excuse that they say makes this situation more justifiable that the United States violating Iraqi sovereignty.
I am sure the right wing in the country will have all sorts of arguments on this. The left does not.
Internationally, as we try to mend the burned bridges of said Iraqi campaign, the Bush administration will also find it hard to defend this attack as well.

-Our foreign policy in Eastern Europe in general for the last seven plus years. We have spent the last seven years building our foreign policy in Eastern Europe on a "great personal relationship" with former Russian President and current Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

That said, Russia itself hasn't felt the relationship has been 'good' or even 'okay' for at least three years. We have done nothing but play nice with countries such as Georgia or Ukraine both of which the Russians consider thorns in their side. Meanwhile NATO and the EU creep ever closer to the Russian border.

Unfortunately, we also have given the Russians no reason to think that we would be reacting as we are right now to such an action as they have taken. They thought we would say something, sure, but they did not beleive we would be so righteous in our rhetoric.

(Take a step back, and think about our governments actions for the last seven years. Objectively, would you think we would have the balls to present such a loud protest about the violation of sovereignty of a country that the other country considered a 'threat to their national security'? That's a WOW in most of the world's eyes.)

All of this leads us to where we are. With a Secretary of State trying to convince the president of a small embattled republic to let the troops of a big, allegedly democratic republic, have free reign on his peoples territory.

Would you sign that agreement? Would you expect the democratically elected leader of another country to?

I wouldn't.

Comments welcome,

Pat McGovern

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Russians Sticking Around

Increasingly, it is starting to look like the Bush administration is on the right side, even instinctively, for once. They are still standing with Georgia against Russia in South Ossetia. They are still not blindly accepting the claims of Russia about atrocities by Georgia against the Ossetians.

Meanwhile, Russia is not helping it's cause. They have not withdrawn, which they may or may not have interpreted as one of the terms of the ceasefire. They have also advanced which cannot possibly be interpreted as being allowed under the terms of the ceasefire.



I would really like to know, now that the Russian Army has all but destroyed the Georgian Army exactly how much of a threat does it present to them or the Ossetians?

In addition organizations such as Human Rights Watch are both casting some doubt on Russian claims of Georgia atrocities, such as the alleged 2000 Ossetians massacred:

A doctor at Tskhinvali Regional Hospital who was on duty from the afternoon of August 7 told Human Rights Watch that between August 6 to12 the hospital treated 273 wounded, both military and civilians. She said her hospital was the only clinic treating the wounded in Tskhinvali. The doctor said there were more military personnel than civilians among the wounded and added that all of the wounded were later transferred to the Russian Ministry of Emergencies mobile hospitals in South and North Ossetia. As of August 13, there were no wounded left in the Tskhinvali hospital.

The doctor also said that 44 bodies had been brought to the hospital since the fighting began, of both military and civilians. The figure reflects only those killed in the city of Tskhinvali. But the doctor was adamant that the majority of people killed in the city had been brought to the hospital before being buried, because the city morgue was not functioning due to the lack of electricity in the city.

and shedding light on ongoing abuses clearly caused by, if not directly effected by, the Russian invasion:

On August 13, Russian forces seemed to be taking measures to prevent the looting of Georgian villages; the road south from the town of Java to Tskhinvali was closed to members of South Ossetian paramilitary groups. Russian officers at the checkpoint told Human Rights Watch that the road closure was due to the massive looting taking place in Georgian villages along the road.

However, moving back from Tskhinvali to Java on the evening of August 13, Human Rights Watch researchers saw, for the second day running, houses that were ablaze in several Georgian villages. They had clearly just been torched. One counterintelligence officer of the South Ossetian forces claimed to Human Rights Watch that: “We burned these houses. We want to make sure that they [the Georgians] can’t come back, because if they do come back, this will be a Georgian enclave again and this should not happen.”

The officer went on to describe events during the fighting, including the execution of a Georgian armed man: “The day before yesterday [August 11, 2008], the Georgians killed two of my soldiers in the village of Tamarasheni. We had been conducting a sweep operation there. We detained three of them. Two of them didn’t do anything to us so we just let them go – we couldn't take them anywhere as I had to take care of my own men first. The third one seemed to be high on something – a normal person would have surrendered, and this one was shooting at us instead. We questioned him and then executed him.”

He expressed concern about the ongoing pillaging: “There are looters everywhere in these villages. ... The looters are now moving to Gori (I went there this morning). The fighting there is over, and now the looters are looting there to profit from this war. Someone has to do something about it.”

Russia continues to come out in this badly. Maybe their orignal intention was to act in a peacekeeping role. Regardless, they are now being seen, and will continue to be seen as aggressors. They need to step back.

The rest of eastern Europe as well as most of the rest of the world will not idly sit by while Russia seems to impose it's will on it's neighbors. We did that in the 50's and 60's. We weren't happy with the consequences of sitting on our hands then. We shall not do so this time.

---

That being said, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili's 'interesting' assumptions need to come to an end. He is doing a great deal of damage with his rhetoric. Hopefully, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice essentially tells him to 'shut up' and let everyone else speak. Or at least encourages him to get his facts straight before he actually says anything.

I know the man likes President George W. Bush, but come on, you don't have to be as cowboyish in your rhetoric as he has been. Even George W. Bush has learned moderation, especially when speaking on international issues.

We, the United States, as I said in a previous post, don't have either the moral authority we once did, nor do we have the physical authority to affect this situation. Thanks to our actions in Iraq we have been deprived of both. This may be the reason Russian President Dmitri Medvedev seems so comfortable doing as he wishes.

I think, given the fact that nearly all of western and eastern Europe is now united in oppostion to Russia's actions, that may prove the decisive factor. This is not the communist Soviet Union. Russia may not need the United States, but it does need the west.

That is why I am hopeful that eventually this conflict will be resolved. Preferably sooner, rather than later.

Comments welcome,

Pat McGovern

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