- The criticized American policy and agenda embodied in
President Bush's National Security Strategy is one aimed at not only regime
change but also culture change in the Middle East, which little-emphasized
dynamic answers those scratching their heads in Washington why many throughout
the world are opposed to the U.S.'s "war against terrorism."
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- What is also overlooked is that President Bush's attitude
toward regime and culture change was in place as a matter of covert U.S.
policy since the presidential term of his father, George H.W. Bush ("Bush
41"). It was witnessed when the United States stood back when a coup
in Russia uprooted Mikhail Gorbachev, Time Magazine's Man of the Century,
from office. While Mr. Gorbachev was instrumental during the Reagan years
in the dissolution of the Soviet Union and removing the former Soviet Empire
as a global threat, he was seen by the Bush 41 administration as soft on
eviscerating all remaining threatening elements of Communism, having his
own political roots therein, and a more compliant Boris Yeltsin replaced
him in the manner recorded by history.
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- The current President Bush ("Bush 43") deployed
a similar modus operandi in the spring of 2002 when a coup took place in
Venezuela to uproot Hugo Chávez from power. Industrial and oil
powers within Venezuela, with ties to U.S. interests, initiated a military
coup, which not only failed but also resulted in the type of criticism
applicable to President Bush's drive to bring democracy to the Middle East.
The wide criticism spewed forth by the entire spectrum of Latin and South
American leaders put a black eye onto Bush administration tactics and hypocrisy.
When the Bush administration's preferred oil industry aligned replacement,
Pedro Carmona, immediately dissolved Venezuela's National Assembly and
Supreme Court, thereby assuming dictatorial powers, these actions were
opposed across the board by Latin American democracies. When 48 hours later
Chávez regained power, Bush National Security Advisor Condoleezza
Rice publicly warned Chávez to "respect constitutional processes,"
further undermining U.S. credibility in the entire region. Since the invasion
of Iraq, it has become crystal clear to the world that democracy and open
and free elections are part of the Bush administration's noble agenda and
goals in Venezuela, Iraq and soon elsewhere (according to Bush 43 rhetoric
against Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Egypt), as long as the candidates,
and certainly the winning candidate, meet its approval.
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- Israelis should consider whether they have been subject
to regime and culture change under policies that arose under the Bush 41
administration, post the success in seeing Gorbachev replaced by Yeltsin.
Ariel Sharon ultimately was elected to reflect Israeli dissatisfaction
with the policies of Shimon Peres and Ehud Barak. Within hours of his election,
Ariel Sharon offered Barak the position of Minister of Defense and Shimon
Peres the position of Foreign Minister. This all reflected US foreign policy
first carved for the Bush 41 agenda by Jim Baker, preemptively intervening
in foreign states and promoting democratic principles as long as election
results allow the continuation of covert approved policies for that foreign
state and nation.
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- Now, the State of Israel, as a natural result of Bush
41 preemptive policies put into place, finds itself supporting Bush 43
policies that have effectuated culture change within the U.S. itself, allowing
the U.S. to put aside, under the cover of 9-11, its own Constitution to
promote the Patriot Act and a continuing string of laws abrogating basic
freedoms and protections, allowing a foreign policy where anyone can be
assassinated or invaded under an executive level perception that a person
or foreign state represents a current or future threat to U.S. interests;
changes in culture that openly promote and allow corruption and cronyism,
thus lending support to a de facto attitude of benign authoritarianism.
Has Israel allowed itself to become a willing victim of Bush policy of
both regime and culture change, thereby serving, as an invaluable needed
ally to legitimize globally recognized wrongs and wrongdoings in the Middle
East?
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- The Arab/Islamic nations want to be free from U.S. intervention
as to what serves the best interests of their own populations, and preclude
regime and culture change promoted under the banner of bringing both technological
advancement and democracy to those nations. The Arab/Islamic nations have
the right to honor, protect and live under their own heritage and culture
without outside intervention. Israel has to understand the consequences
of culture change for it, especially in terms of how it views and acts
toward its Arab/Islamic neighbors.
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- The biblical and religious heritage of Israel attests
that Israel never had enemies when the Jewish people occupied the holy
land. Those that did historically arise, the Assyrians, Babylonians and
the Romans, were all the creation of the reality that the Jewish people
accepted a change to its culture. The Jewish people remember their mistake
in accepting inappropriate culture change through memorializing it through
a day of mourning each year ("Tish'aB'Av"). The Jewish people
thus should understand that accepting culture change, one arguably with
a strong nexus to Bush 41's covert policy for regime and culture change
for Israel, precludes their continuation in Israel, when submission to
it, especially under the current Bush administration's painted picture
for the new Middle East, would operate to defile God's gift and name.
Thus, the Jewish people recognize that biblical and religious history attests
that they were cast out of Israel not because of enemies but because enemies
arose to effectuate the required consequence of their own failings in accepting
culture change.
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- Similarly, it is important for the U.S., founded on Judeo-Christian
precepts and principles, to recognize that it is accepting culture change,
reflected best when a mainstream media outlet, America-on-Line, posits,
on its opening page, whether Americans any longer find God and religion
relevant. The implications of this culture change are onerous when one
sees Tommy Franks, former chief of the Central Command, who led the war
against Iraq, who like the President grew up in Midland, Texas and attended
high school with Laura Bush, stating that in the event of a WMD attack,
"our form of government would go out the window. The Western world,
the free world, loses what it cherishes most, and that is freedom and liberty
we've seen for a couple of hundred years in this grand experiment that
we call democracy. (Emphasis added)"
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- This type of talk is massaging the public to expect the
installation of a military government and control in the United States
(especially under unabated Cheney rhetoric that one has been imminent since
9-11) and compels the American people to think long and hard whether current
policies of this presidential administration were in place way before the
Project for the New American Century and even far before Bush 41 assumed
the presidency in 1988 or before he nearly assumed the presidency in 1981:
for the Bush family was aligned with one world government a long time ago,
as noted by the Dallas Morning News, many years back, when it connected
Senator Prescott Bush to H. Neil Mallon and the Dallas Council on World
Affairs. The Dallas Morning News wrote:
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- "In fact, the one-world views of Mr. Mallon, close
friend of U.S. Sen. Prescott Bush of Connecticut and financial patron of
Mr. Bush's son George's entry into the Midland oil industry, even became
suspect as Dresser's sales leaped the Iron Curtain and the McCarthy era
found fertile soil in Big D."
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- There were very good reasons the founding fathers created
documents finding policies in pursuit of regime and culture change anathema
to what this country represented. It is time to protect and find the Constitution
of the United States of America again relevant, to unmask policies of regime
and culture change as treacherous to the fundamental defining principles
and ideals of this nation.
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- Joseph B. Ehrlich
- Hewlett Harbor, New York
- December 9, 2003
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- Permission for republication and rebroadcast given exclusively
to Rense.com.
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