It’s the policies, stupid!

More moaning and handwringing in Washington this week over the everywhere evident lack of success of the US government’s campaign to “sell” the US to the hearts and minds of Muslims around the world. Condi Rice gave a major speech at the US Institute of Peace Thursday on this theme. The next day, the WaPo‘s Robin Wright had a front-page article joining and amplifying the general bemoaning.
“Oh, if only some well-conceived p.r. campaign could come along and just unlock the magic door that would enable the always well-intentioned US government to explain its good intentions to the world’s Muslim masses” …That seems to be the theme.
People like Rice and Wright who harp on it so much either forget completely, or seek to minimize to near-zero, one simply fact:
It’s not the “values” or the “image” of the US that Muslims around the world “hate”.
It’s the policies, stupid!
So one more p.r. push–in a series that is already, let’s face it, very long and thus far completely unsuccessful– just ain’t going to succeed. Here’s my advice to Condi and her minions, and Robin Wright (who should know better) and all her colleagues in the major US media:
Why don’t you quit sitting around agonizing over whether “Radio Sawa” or some slick little new US-funded news magazine in Urdu will finally “do the trick”. And then start looking instead at the policies, the policies, the policies.
If US citizens and our appointed leaders really listen to what the grievances that other people around the world have about the content of the US government’s policies; if we/they engage in serious dialogue about those grievances, and then actually change the policies that are seen–in many cases, rightly–as bullying, imperial, abusive, and just plain unfair… If all that happened, then no slick p.r. campaign would even be needed to “sell” America to the 1.3 billion Muslims and the several billions of other, non-Muslim critics that the US has around the world.
Policies like what, you may ask?


Well, policies like the whole current US policy on the Palestine issue, which has given almost uncritical backing to Sharon’s continued campaign to implant Israeli settlers in the completely illegal settlements that Israel has been building in the occupied Palestinian West Bank.
Today, the NYT cites Israeli and American officials as saying that:

    the [Bush] administration now supports construction of new apartments in areas already built up in some settlements, as long as the expansion does not extend outward to undeveloped parts of the West Bank…
    The new policy has not been enunciated publicly. It came to light this week when Mr. Sharon’s government announced that 1,001 new bids for construction would be issued for subsidized apartments for settlers in the occupied territories.
    For the last three years, American policy has called for a freeze of “all settlement activity,” including “natural growth” brought about by an increase in the birthrate and other factors. As a result, when settlement expansions have been announced, American officials have called them violations.
    After the latest Israeli announcement, however, administration spokesmen said they were withholding judgment.
    “What we have asked of the Israeli government is to let us know what it is that they are doing,” Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser, said Thursday in answer to a question at the United States Institute of Peace.

An un-named administration official–presumably, Elliot Abrams, who is cited by name later in the article–was quoted as “amplifying Ms. Rice’s comment” by saying:

    a decision had been made this week not to compound Mr. Sharon’s political troubles at a time when he was battling hard-liners in his Likud coalition who were revolting against his proposal to pull all settlements out of the occupied Gaza Strip.

Oh, how lovely for Mr. Sharon. Too bad for the Palestinians who get yet more of their land stolen, though?
The article even says that a “technical team” from ther State Dept is due to travel to Israel next month to “examine the boundary lines of construction sites in settlements”.
If the administration does that… Plus, it still sticks to Bush’s disastrous April 14 announcement that “in light of the facts on the ground” Israel can now plan on keeping some of the large settlement blocs in the West Bank… Plus, it continues to shovel US taxpayers’ money into Israel’s coffers with no conditionality at all attached that links that aid to Israel’s settler-implantation policies…
Well, I can understand why billions of people around the world would see the US as actively complicit in Israel’s colonial-expansion policies in the West Bank, can’t you?
Or, the whole policy on Iraq…
Or, the continuing failings in Afghanistan…
Or, the flagrant abuses enacted at Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, and other outposts of Washington’s global (anti-Muslim) gulag…
Anyway, almost wherever you look, there are policies that are wrong in themselves, and that for that reason seriously undermine the ability of the US to win friends around the world.
It is those policies that need to be changed. They need to be changed for our own, quite “American” reasons– simply because of their flawed, coercive, and abusive content. We who are US voters need to change them for that reason– not because anyone anywhere else in the world may support or oppose them.
But I can guarantee that once those deeply flawed policies are corrected, the view of the US held by just about all of that 96% of the world’s people who are not US citizens will certainly change, as well.

24 thoughts on “It’s the policies, stupid!”

  1. OR, the policy of financial assistance for AIDs in Africa, — i.e. only if abstinance is promoted. This puritanical outlook is pretty puzzling in the rest of the world.

  2. I agree with your views, as far as they go, but it also strikes me that this wide-spread belief in the effectiveness of propaganda says a whole lot about your establishment, and exposes their contempt for the intelligence and shrewdness of people in the rest of the world. Now how did they arrive a these views? Maybe because propaganda works so well within the USA?
    In fact, it also used to work pretty well in much of the rest of the world until Bush. However, now that such wide-spread disenchantment has set in, all the PR campaigns in the world will not get the US its reputation and honor back. Not until – as you say – the policies change fundamentally. Unfortunately that does not seem to be on the cards under Kerry either.
    It only takes a very short time, and a small number of corrupt morons, to wreck the work of generations of better men and women.

  3. What never stops amazing me is that the Americans never get over thinking that all they need to do to succeed is to apply even more of what is already not succeeding. The Israelis are afflicted with the same thing, now that I think of it.
    When I was quite young I had a horse trainer who gave me one of the best bits of advice I have ever received. After watching me struggle for some time with my horse, and seeing me becoming more and more frustrated, he said to me “Don’t keep doing the same thing and expecting different results. If you are not getting the results you want, you need to do something different.” Duhhhhhhh! But the Americans just can’t seem to get that concept, can they? If P.R. isn’t working, then pile on more P.R. If massive destruction and killing aren’t working, destroy more and kill more. If invading and taking over one country doesn’t bring stability,peace and prosperity to a region, invade and take over more countries.
    The other thing that amazes me about the Americans is their almost religious belief that if they only can find the right way to package a pound of **** people will actually believe it is a pound of gold.
    So, they try putting it in a fancy box tied with a nice ribbon. When that doesn’t work, they put pretty paper around the box, and more ribbon. When that doesn’t work they put more paper and more ribbon. They seem convinced that if only they can wrap it in enough of the right fancy paper and put enough of the right kind of ribbon around it, then it will become appealing. They never stop to consider that no matter what they do people will still know that what is in the package is not gold, but ****.
    And you know, I agree with Messenger that believing packaging is more important than contents is part of American culture. You see it all the time in many aspects of American behaviors and perceptions.

  4. When you have the right policies, then it’s only natural to want to sell them. Why is it so surprising that the people in charge of America believe in their rightness? That’s normal human behavior; it’s very rare to question yourself.
    The leftish critique of the USA falls down on one point: there are times when the USA, if it is advocating the right policy, is better off cutting off debate and simply saying “this is what we’re going to do”. Certainly that’s what is going to have to happen between the USA and Israel.
    The USA has operated for a while by simply telling the world what to do. Yes, that has to change. But if you look at the major party candidates in the USA, you will see that there isn’t a political consensus yet to support that. Both Kerry and Bush believe that the vital element is simply “projecting power” and don’t pay much attention to what is being projected. The leftish critique of Bush still contains the exact same actions, only the lefties expect them to be done in the name of liberal goals. Isn’t that more PR?

  5. You failed to mention the $8 billion dollars that has just recently been uncovered by a U.S. audit. This is the amount of $’s that was misappropriated by the Bremmer CPA administration. In part the audit revealed that millions of dollars for example, were allocated for thousands of workers that never existed. The audit is due out in the near future.
    Or what about the $86 million that was earmarked for cleaning up Iraq’s water supply, but has now been reappropriated to be spent on the new American embassy in Baghdad (HARPER’S index, September, 2004 edition, Page-9). So while the Iraqi citizens watch a new American embassy being built on their land, polluted water including raw sewage, continues to flow through the streets of Baghdad, and the citizens continue to be without an adequate supply of safe drinking water. And probably sometime in the not too distant future we will be sitting in front of our TV sets watching news stories about Iraqi freedom fighters lobbing multiple mortar rounds in the direction of the new building. And Americans everywhere will openly ask, “Why would they want to destroy our embassy?” And probably the usual often-asked question will also be asked, “Why do they hate us so?”……and the quagmire of Mr bush’s war of choice becomes murkier and murkier.
    So be it!

  6. Czechmate,
    Make that nearly $9 billion – 8.8 to be more precise – and that is only what has been uncovered so far.
    Speaking of Iraq and money, it hasn’t been reported very prominently, but it seems that millions of dollars of Iraqi money – not American money allocated for “rebuilding”, but money that is the property of the Iraqi people – was given by the American Occupation Authority (aka the CPA) to the American occupying forces to hand out to Iraqis as bribes and incentives to get them to help the occupation efforts against the resistance. I don’t know whether that was part of the 8.8 billion or not.

  7. Or maybe the money’s getting paid out to various militias, tribal leaders, factions, etc., just to keep them from turning on us…

  8. I for one would not identify leftist critiques in the US with Kerry’s policies.
    What Helena is saying is certainly leftist but definitely not the same as Kerry.
    And I certainly agree that the US administrations always seem to think that turning to PR is the way to “sell” a policy that isn’t working. I’ve seen this again and again under different presidents from both sides of the aisle. (It goes something like: “We have to get our message out better.”)
    But let’s at least get our “leftists” straight here and not conflate one with another. Kerry may be a better alternative to Bush, but I would not really equate him with “leftists.” He is positioning himself to win an election, not to win a policy debate. (I’m with the “leftists” on this one, not with Kerry.)
    I applaud all those, like Helena, and many writers here as well, who stand up for principles and are not pandering to the approved PR positions.
    It is my view that it takes a great deal of time and energy to read and think through the issues. Most people just want “canned” PR-type sound bites, so the saddest commentary is that apathy is our greatest enemy.
    The world has every reason to be mad. And so do we – who are spending so much time educating ourselves into solidarity with them.
    I’m sure I will have annoyed someone with this post, but so be it!

  10. Mary Ann, I agree, though I was trying to say that the leftist critique of both Kerry and Bush is flawed.
    The leftists say the US ought not to tell the world what to do. But the world does want help doing the right thing. There might be a time, as with Vietnam, when the US program is so hopelessly tangled that the leftist critique is appropriate and we’re better off just leaving. I think that’s true of Iraq, I’m just saying the country isn’t ready to admit that yet.

  11. I was trying to say that the leftist critique of both Kerry and Bush is flawed…. The leftists say the US ought not to tell the world what to do. But the world does want help doing the right thing.
    I think this argument is a bit flawed for a number of reasons. There is a difference between telling the world what to do, and helping the world do the right thing, to use the above terminology. Also, our country may not be ready to leave Iraq yet, but whether that would be the better policy for the country is another question which deserves to be debated on its own. And it sure wasn’t the world that came to our door begging us to invade Iraq.
    I would also suggest that the “leftist critique” re the Viet Nam War did not suddenly become appropriate because we became so entangled. There certainly was a whole chain of duplicity and deception which characterized our involvement in that war that became increasingly hard to hide as time progressed. However, one might perhaps say that in this case the leftist critique was quite appropriate from the beginning, but unfortunately, it was only after the body count reached saturation level that its appropriateness was recognized.

  12. I don’t disagree with any of that. I think if the US had the proper policies towards Vietnam then, and the middle east today, it could have won these wars, or got by without having wars at all. There is an ability though, for the powerful nation to take the initiative in promoting good in the world.

  13. I would not at all disagree with what you say here either. The problem as I see it is that the U.S. has been exerting its power (and in a self-aggrandizing way) rather than exerting leadership. That’s not all that unusual for a country in a hegemonic position, but I’m not sure its necessarily inevitable, and I think it is counterproductive to our own and the world’s well being .
    Real leadership by the U.S., imho, could have been shown in terms of the Kyoto protocol, the international criminal court, the biological warfare and abm treaties, and the Israel-Palestine situation, by helping to make, coordinate and back up international efforts and institutions in the attempt to resolve the various problems which confront all of the world. If the first response to the 9/11 attack on us, as the most powerful country in the world, was to go through formal, legal channels, I think that the precedent which we might have set could well have been truly awesome.
    Instead, however, rather than exerting leadership, I think we’ve basically gone off on our own, largely shooting from the hip and often undercutting efforts to establish common grounds from which resolve real world problems. And these policies seem to be to be turning us into the proverbial 800 lb gorilla of whom everyone must take into account, but no one really can or even wants to deal with, (unless of course they can be properly bought off). And they create impacts and precedents which seem likely to negatively effect our future security and well being.

  14. …. this wide-spread belief in the effectiveness of propaganda…Maybe because propaganda works so well within the USA?
    Yes, I’m afraid so (and I am an American, BTW, so I know all too well). Take a sniff of the current campaign for president.
    Sorry for the ad hominem, but Ms Beers’ grotesquely tight, plastic-surgery’d-to-death face is, unfortunately, an almost perfect metaphor for the US propaganda effort in the Arab world.

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