editorial

That messy divorce between George W. Bush and reality

George W. Bush's announcement that he's escalating the war in Iraq was an exercise in denial and delusion. These are not rare symptoms for a politician in trouble, but the extraordinary circumstances in which they have manifested themselves make this situation particularly dangerous for the United States and the world.

Wounded politicians in denial tend to make arguments that weave strands of truth with threads of fantasy, and that's what Bush did in his speech. It's true that the United States can't afford to lose the Iraq War --- but it has lost that war. It's true that Iraq can become a breeding ground for jihadis disposed to attack the United States wherever there's an opportunity --- but it has become that, as the result of the US-led invasion. It's true that without US forces on the scene, Iraq is likely to fall into an atrocious civil war engulfing Shiites and Sunnis, and maybe even the Kurds --- but that civil war has been underway for some time now.

That 20,000 or 30,000 more troops would be sufficient to pacify a Baghdad whose citizens are determined to kill one another is totally unrealistic. That the United States can do anything of consequence to resolve the Iraqi civil war while talking to neither Iran nor Syria is another delusion.

The Iraq War has broken the US government's budget and will be looked back upon in historical hindsight as a major milestone in the decline of American industrial and economic power. The United States should have been investing its wealth in improved education, renovated infrastructure and cutting edge industries, but instead the politicians in Washington have frittered it away on an unnecessary war.

The US oil companies that gave us the Bush administration in the first place have not grabbed and will not acquire the prize they had hoped this war would bring them, control of Iraq's vast oil resources. The American people were assured that the proceeds of Iraqi oil would pay for this military intervention and that was an appeal to base larcenous instincts in its inception and an undeliverable promise in the end.  

George W. Bush, his neocon advisors and his oil company backers got us into this mess, but now the American middle class is stuck with most of the bill. It has been a terrible financial defeat for the American people and the losses can only be cut, never reversed.

The most dangerous part of George W. Bush's Iraq delusion is the likelihood that he'll expand the war to Iran or Syria in a vain attempt to redeem what he has already lost. That would be true madness, but it appears to be the direction in which he's headed.

America's best military officers have spoken against the mistakes that were made on the way into this mess and have been sacked, branded cowards or even traitors, and replaced. The most intelligent of American politicians, Democrat and Republican, have seen the writing on the wall and are distancing themselves from George W. Bush's fantasy world. The American voters manifested their disillusionment with the Iraq War at the polls this past November, only to be slapped on the face with this latest escalation.

And thus the time has come for Americans to escalate the anti-war pressure: in the streets, in the halls of Congress, in the political parties, in the labor movement and professional organizations, in the clubs and civic groups, in the religious congregations and even in the Armed Forces. It has become a matter of national security for the American people to do whatever can be done to restrain this mad escalation of a lost war.

Not just for the sake

of Panama's name

Playa Ensenada in San Carlos will soon make the change from fishing village to tourist resort. At least the people who have squatters' rights there are being bought out rather than just kicked out.

The fishing off San Carlos, and all along the Gulf of Panama shoreline, has been declining for years. Despite laws prohibiting it, the fishermen at Playa Ensenda have been finning sharks but even so the sharks that they can catch these days are almost always pitifully small. So maybe the fishermen will actually be able to make better livings mowing foreign retirees' lawns, carrying golfers' clubs or finding jobs in the city.

But “Panama” means “abundance of fish,” fishing is probably this country’s most ancient industry and our ability to feed ourselves, whatever the free trade advocates may say to the contrary, is the foundation of our nation's or any other nation's security. So where is the government's effort to rebuild the degraded Gulf of Panama fishery?

At the end of the legislative year the National Assembly was thinking in terms of allowing Asian commercial fishing interests into the underwater national park off of Coiba Island, but they mercifully held off on that bad idea. The National Maritime Authority seems far more interested in placing its offices in the high-rent premises of Partido Popular contributors than in doing anything for the nation's fisheries. The president's economic development strategy, to the extent that there is one, is to dam all of Panama's rivers, even though they are necessary to the spawning of many marine species, and to remove fishing villages and replace them with tourist resorts. Fish farming, something that's privately owned and when not properly regulated pollutes public waters, is the only seafood production sector in which the current administration seems to show much interest.

Let us not make too much of a partisan issue of this, however, because previous administrations of various political hues have also neglected the nation's fisheries.

It's sad, because so much is now known about how to build and conserve a fishery. You use junk vehicles, derelict ships and other structures to create artificial reefs and oyster beds offshore. You establish hatcheries for certain species. You allow important rivers to flow freely to the sea. You create sewage treatment systems whose last filters are artificial wetlands in which life abounds. You control the production, use and disposal of trash, particularly plastics, with packaging regulations and laws requiring deposits on beverage bottles and cans. You create a series of protected zones where marine life can thrive and then spread to replenish the adjacent fishing waters. You ban the industrial trawlers that sweep up every living thing and scrape the sea bottom into an underwater parking lot. You use the proceeds from the sale of fishing licenses to hire people to enforce the rules and to build new infrastructure.

Panama needs to take its fishing culture and economy more seriously. The people who go out in their boats every morning to catch a living for themselves and their families should be treated as honored members of society, not as obstacles to remove in order to make way for more profitable developments. It's not just a matter of defending Panama's good name, but also about protecting a valuable legacy that among other things is one of the cornerstones of the tourism industry that the government is trying to promote. What’s a visit to Panama, after all, without a fresh corvina dinner?

Bear in mind…

Our chances of building a good future may be poor, but they vanish altogether if we keep facing in the wrong direction.

Bruce Catton

Wise men say it isn’t art! But what of it, if it is children and love in paint?

Georgia O’Keeffe

American and European concepts of conservation, especially preservation of wildlife, are not relevant to African farmers already living above the carrying capacity of their land.

Dian Fossey