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Slowtwitch Forums: Lavender Room:
Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster

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MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 8:50

Post #1 of 62 (469 views)

Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster	Can't Post

interesting theory....and I bet Scheunemann wrote that speech Art made love to yesterday.

Georgia war is a neocon election ploy

Is it possible that this time the October surprise was tried in August, and that the garbage issue of brave little Georgia struggling for its survival from the grasp of the Russian bear was stoked to influence the U.S. presidential election?

Before you dismiss that possibility, consider the role of one Randy Scheunemann, for four years a paid lobbyist for the Georgian government, ending his official lobbying connection only in March, months after he became Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain's senior foreign policy adviser.

Previously, Scheunemann was best known as one of the neoconservatives who engineered the war in Iraq when he was a director of the Project for a New American Century. It was Scheunemann who, after working on the McCain 2000 presidential campaign, headed the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, which championed the U.S. Iraq invasion.

There are telltale signs that he played a similar role in the recent Georgia flare-up. How else to explain the folly of his close friend and former employer, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili, in ordering an invasion of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, which clearly was expected to produce a Russian counter-reaction. It is inconceivable that Saakashvili would have triggered this dangerous escalation without some assurance from influential Americans he trusted, like Scheunemann, that the United States would have his back. Scheunemann long guided McCain in these matters, even before he was officially running foreign policy for McCain's presidential campaign.

In 2005, while registered as a paid lobbyist for Georgia, Scheunemann worked with McCain to draft a congressional resolution pushing for Georgia's membership in NATO. A year later, while still on the Georgian payroll, Scheunemann accompanied McCain on a trip to that country, where they met with Saakashvili and supported his bellicose views toward Russia's Vladimir Putin.
Scheunemann is at the center of the neoconservative cabal that has come to dominate the Republican candidate's foreign policy stance in a replay of the run-up to the war against Iraq. These folks are always looking for a foreign enemy on which to base a new Cold War, and with the collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime, it was Putin's Russia that came increasingly to fit the bill.
Yes, it sounds diabolical, but that may be the most accurate way to assess the designs of the McCain campaign in matters of war and peace. There is every indication that the candidate's demonization of Putin is an even grander plan than the previous use of Hussein to fuel American militarism with the fearsome enemy that it desperately needs.

McCain gets to look tough with a new Cold War to fight while Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, scrambling to make sense of a more measured foreign policy posture, will seem weak in comparison. Meanwhile, the dire consequences of the Bush legacy McCain has inherited, from the disaster of Iraq to the economic meltdown, conveniently will be ignored. But it will provide the military-industrial complex, which has helped bankroll the neoconservatives, with an excuse for ramping up a military budget that is already bigger than that of the rest of the world combined.

What is at work here is a neoconservative, self-fulfilling prophecy in which Russia is turned into an enemy that ramps up its largely reduced military, and Putin is cast as the new Joseph Stalin bogeyman, evoking images of the old Soviet Union. McCain has condemned a "revanchist Russia" that should once again be contained. Although Putin has been the enormously popular elected leader of post-Communist Russia, it is assumed that imperialism is always lurking, not only in his DNA but in that of the Russian people.

How convenient to forget that Stalin was a Georgian, and indeed if Russian troops had occupied the threatened Georgian town of Gori, they would have found a museum still honoring their local boy, who made good by seizing control of the Russian revolution. Indeed five Russian bombs were allegedly dropped on Gori's Stalin Square on Tuesday.
It should also be mentioned that the post-Communist Georgians have imperial designs on South Ossetia and Abkhazia. What a stark contradiction that the United States, which championed Kosovo's independence from Serbia, now is ignoring Georgia's invasion of its ethnically rebellious provinces.

For McCain to so fervently embrace Scheunemann's neoconservative line of demonizing Russia in the interest of appearing tough during an election is a reminder that a senator can be old and yet wildly irresponsible.

Robert Scheer is author of a new book, "The Pornography of Power: How Defense Hawks Hijacked 9/11 and Weakened America."
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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

David in FL

Aug 13, 08 9:11

Post #2 of 62 (445 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

For McCain to so fervently embrace Scheunemann's neoconservative line of demonizing Russia in the interest of appearing tough during an election is a reminder that a senator can be old and yet wildly irresponsible.

Opposing the invasion of a sovereign country is now characterized as wildly irresponsible and neoconservative?

"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in a grey twilight that knows not victory nor defeat."

Theodore Roosevelt

MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 9:22

Post #3 of 62 (432 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [David in FL] [In reply to]	Can't Post

David you forget, Georgia started shooting first. The first people to die in this conflict were Russians. Russia response was to remove Georgian troops from South Ossetia and smack them around enough to discourage any further invasion attempts.

Georgia is the invader here, not Russia. Georgia is the country with ambitions on autonomous regions and the country that is using military force against civilians to impose their will.

We love to take sides in conflicts and paint them as good versus evil and black versus white, but in reality the world isn't like that. The Russians probably have more moral justification for their military actions that the Georgians did for theirs'....but we will paint the Russians as the baddies and the Georgians as the poor surrounded homesteader bravely defending his family from the savage hoardes. Nothing could be further from the truth....oh and did I mention the Georgians are Christians??? thats very important too.
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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

vitus979

Aug 13, 08 9:25

Post #4 of 62 (425 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Robert Scheer should loosen up the tinfoil hat.

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

edwinj

Aug 13, 08 9:26

Post #5 of 62 (421 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

And they say that right-wingers are conspiracy nutjobs....

If I was the Euros I would be extremely nervous about the Russians taking control of the Georgian pipeline. They better hope that global warming gives them a nice temperate winter this year....

vitus979

Aug 13, 08 9:29

Post #6 of 62 (417 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

David you forget, Georgia started shooting first.

Not at Russia.

Georgia is the invader here, not Russia. Georgia is the country with ambitions on autonomous regions

No, it isn't. Ossetia is not an autonomous region, it's an internationally recognized province of Georgia. Georgia has no ambitions past that.

Don't be so delusionally anti-Bush that you equate Georgia with Russia, Matt.

The Russians probably have more moral justification for their military actions that the Georgians did for theirs'

No, they don't, and they don't have any moral considerations in mind, either. They have expansion in mind.

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 9:35

Post #7 of 62 (407 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [vitus979] [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To

they most certainly did start shooting at Russia and Russians...unless all the rounds they fired into South Ossetia were aimed at civilians because South Ossetia has no military. Vitus, Russia has had peace keeping troops in South Ossetia for a long time with Georgia's tacit consent. Georgia attcked them first without provocation.

How does this administration support self determination for Kosovo for example and not South Ossetia where 90% of the people identify themselves as Russian and want no part of Georgia??? Oh yeah...the Russians are the bad guys.
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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

parkito

Aug 13, 08 9:40

Post #8 of 62 (397 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

http://www.suntimes.com/...T-EDT-hunt12.article#
McCain, not Obama, was right about Georgia
August 12, 2008 Recommend (272)
STEVE HUNTLEY shuntley.cst@gmail.com

Mention Georgia a few days ago, and most of us would have thought of the state evoked so sweetly in "Georgia on My Mind," the classic tune sung by Ray Charles. Very few of us had heard of the South Ossetia province of Georgia, the nation with the misfortune to have Russia as its neighbor, until war broke out last week.

Like Kosovo, Bosnia, Kuwait and other unfamiliar places before, Ossetia reminds us that a small, remote corner of the globe can explode into an international crisis. One who was up to speed on Georgia and the menace it faced from Russia was veteran Sen. John McCain. He had visited the Caucasian nation three times in a dozen years. When fighting erupted, the presumptive Republican presidential candidate got on the phone to gather details and issued a statement Friday summarizing the situation, tagging Russia as the aggressor and demanding it withdraw its forces from the sovereign territory of Georgia.

It took first-term Sen. Barack Obama three tries to get it right. Headed for a vacation in Hawaii, the presumed Democratic candidate for commander in chief issued an even-handed statement, urging restraint by both sides. Later Friday, he again called for mutual restraint but blamed Russia for the fighting. The next day his language finally caught up with toughness of McCain's.

Making matters worse, Obama's staff focused on a McCain aide who had served as a lobbyist for Georgia, charging it showed McCain was "ensconced in a lobbyist culture." Obama's campaign came off as injecting petty partisan politics into an international crisis. This was not a serious response on behalf a man who aspires to be the leader of the Free World. After all, what's so bad about representing a small former Soviet republic struggling to remake itself as a Western-style democracy?

The comparison between the two candidates served to emphasize the strength McCain's experience would bring to the White House in a dangerous world.

Obama's favored approach to international issues, diplomatic talks, failed to stop Russia's invasion. Vladimir Putin, a KGB bull in the former Soviet Union, wants to restore Russia as the supreme power of Eurasia and, to that end, bully former vassal states like Georgia out of their democratic ways. The fear is that Ukraine will come in his cross hairs next.

However the world's newest war ends, America's leadership must recognize and respond to the underlying dynamic of Russia's resurgent aggressive instincts -- the power bestowed on Moscow by its oil and gas riches.

While we don't get fossil fuels from Russia, Western Europe does, and the Kremlin's energy might is fueled by the worldwide demand for oil. Developing U.S. domestic energy sources and alternatives to oil will only enhance our national security and, by reducing the world's petroleum demand, undermine the economic, political and military advantage vast oil and gas reserves give to unfriendly powers like Russia, Iran and Venezuela.

Obama calls for transforming America's economy in a decade. He's got the right idea -- long term. But short term, this nation must push for energy security on all fronts -- now. That includes new offshore drilling for oil, which Obama loathes, and new nuclear plants, which he views with aversion. We can't just wait for breakthrough technologies for wind, solar and biomass energy.

McCain has got it right in advocating new offshore drilling and a federal push to add 45 nuclear generators over the next two decades. Given the evidence of Russia's energy-fueled aggression, he should abandon his opposition to drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve and to extending subsidies he favors for nuclear energy to include renewables.

As Georgia burns, we need to light a fire under all the talk about energy security and start doing what it takes to make it happen.

Behold the turtle! He makes progess only when he sticks his neck out. (James Bryant Conant)
GET OFF THE F*%KING WALL!!!!!!! (Doug Stern)
Brevity is the soul of wit. (William Shakespeare)

vitus979

Aug 13, 08 9:42

Post #9 of 62 (393 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

they most certainly did start shooting at Russia and Russians...unless all the rounds they fired into South Ossetia

I said "Russia," not "Russia and Russians." In point of fact, they didn't shoot at "Russia and Russians." They shot at Russians in Ossetia, inside their territory. You can buy the "peace keeper" garbage if you want, but it's still garbage. In any event, shooting at Russian "peacekeepers" in your own country is not remotely the same thing as shooting at Russia.

Really, Matt, you might want to reconsider your support for Russia. I swear, it's like the left didn't learn anything after the Cold War. Still apologizing for naked Russian agression and ranting that the West shares some kind of moral equivalence with them.

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 9:42

Post #10 of 62 (390 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [vitus979] [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To

Robert Scheer should loosen up the tinfoil hat.

Yea, dude must be crazy cuz no neocon would ever instigate a war for political purposes!
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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

David in FL

Aug 13, 08 9:44

Post #11 of 62 (389 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

How can you invade yourself? Like it or not, South Ossetia is a province of Georgia, not an independent, sovereign nation.

Russia may not have liked the manner in which Georgia was handling the rebellion within it's own borders, but that's no excuse to invade.....and to characterize those who oppose such an invasion as irresponsible and neoconservative strikes me as........well, irresponsible.

"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in a grey twilight that knows not victory nor defeat."

Theodore Roosevelt

vitus979

Aug 13, 08 9:45

Post #12 of 62 (387 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

No, he should loosen up the tinfoil hat, because he (you, too, I guess) apparently believes that neo-cons have mind control powers, such that they can convince the leader of Georgia to start a war with Russia just so McCain can get elected.

You should be embarrassed. You're not, but you should be.

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 9:51

Post #13 of 62 (375 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [vitus979] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Well Vitus, Scheunemann and his cronies got this country to invade Iraq to prevent Saddam Hussein from using his weapons of mass destruction against us in a repeat 9/11 attack. So I put nothing past him and his ilk.

Scheumemann doesn't need mind control powers, all he has to do is drop a word in his client's ear that we got his back if they decide to roll tanks into South Ossetia. Maybe Shaakasvili didn't need much persuading, just a little push.
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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 10:04

Post #14 of 62 (360 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [David in FL] [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To

David are you familiar with the concept of national self determination? South Ossetia would appear to qualify on all counts...they have their own language, their own distinct culture and history, a distinct ethnic origin, a common fear of Georgia, and a wish to be either independent from Georgia or annexed by Russia. Do you oppose their right to national self determination?

The principle of national self-determination, like all abstract political terms, has in the course of

time undergone changes in meaning and connotation. Its core meaning remains �the belief that each

nation has a right to constitute an independent state and determine its own government.�

This definition begs the question: What exactly is a nation?

A �nation� is a group of people who share a significant number (but by means necessarily all) of the

following attributes: history, language, ethnic origin, religion, political belief, fear of the same

adversaries. In short, a nation may be defined as �a community that is, or wishes to be, a state.�

(The above quotations are from Alfred Cobban, The Nation State and National Self-

Determination, rev. edn. 1969, pp. 39 and 108.)

Frequently the terms �self-determination� and �self-determination of peoples� have been used

synonymously with �national self-determination�. However, these two terms can also have broader

and vaguer meanings, not necessarily associated with separate sovereign statehood for each nation.

B. KEY QUOTATIONS

The Declaration of Independence of the United States (1776) contained a classic expression of

the principle of self-determination: �When in the course of Human Events it becomes necessary for

one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another...�

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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 10:09

Post #15 of 62 (351 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [edwinj] [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To

Another canard. The Russians already control that pipeline....ever check to see where it begins and who puts the fuel into it?
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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

lunchbox

Aug 13, 08 10:11

Post #16 of 62 (350 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

National self determination may be valid here. However, S Ossetia is a part of Georgia; that should be restored, then the S Ossetians can figure out how they want to go. Georgia wanted Russia out of there- maybe they underestimated Russia? If Russia had nothing but altruistic intentions, they would have stopped at the provincial line where S Ossetia ends; instead, they prosecuted a full-out assault.

The missing piece of info for me in all this is: what was S Ossetia's status before the USSR dissolved? How did they come to be a part of Georgia? There may very well be something there, but on the balance Russia is in the wrong.

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If I don't, who will?

vitus979

Aug 13, 08 10:11

Post #17 of 62 (350 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Honestly, get a grip.

Do you think that Russia went to war to protect Ossetian's right to self determination? Do you think that when it's over, Russia will let Ossetia be independent? Do you think that if the Russians are the noble and selfless defenders of Ossetian independence, maybe they don't need to be flattening the rest of Georgia? Do you really believe that Russia gives a damn about Ossetia?

If so, maybe you should have advised the Ossetians to work through the UN to get recognition as a sovereign nation. As it is, the international community recognizes that Ossetia is part of Georgia.

I'm waiting to see how you respond when Russia invades Spain to free the Basques.

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

David in FL

Aug 13, 08 10:18

Post #18 of 62 (345 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Weak, really weak. Reminds me of the episode of Family Guy (God, I love that show!) when Peter Griffin declared his house to be an independent nation........Just sayin' it, doesn't make it so.

Regardless though, it doesn't give Russia the right to invade Georgia, nor does it mean that anyone who opposes Russia's actions are neocons and irresponsible, which was the point of my post. Do you really think that that characterization is accurate?

"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in a grey twilight that knows not victory nor defeat."

Theodore Roosevelt

MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 10:38

Post #19 of 62 (329 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [vitus979] [In reply to]	Can't Post

If the Basque region shared a border with Russia and if 90% of Basques held Russian passports and if the Spanish military rolled in tanks and started killing Basque civilians then I'd respond just the same.
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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

BarryP

Aug 13, 08 10:38

Post #20 of 62 (328 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Matt, I'm trying to keep track here. Help me out. Currently the US has a military base in Saudi Arabia. If the Saudi's "rebelled" and started shooting at US troops,....well, its their country. Right? They can do that. So McCain/Bush would happily respect their sovereignty and pack up and leave with no retaliation. This would play out the same if, for example, we maintained a base in Iraq and one of the cultural factions over there decided they want us out and start firing, right?

I'm soooo confused. I really wish the bad guys would just wear black hats.
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MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 10:45

Post #21 of 62 (323 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [lunchbox] [In reply to]	Can't Post

The Russians have a lot more moral justification for invading South Ossetia than we ever did for invading Iraq. Its a little funny to see the biggest boosters of that invasion jump up and down screaming about "national sovereignty" in Georgia.its even funnier to hear them call Russia "imperialist" because they invade a place that is 90% Russian...but they use no such words to describe our invasion of Iraq.

The South Ossetians have already figured out where they want to go. 90% of them hold Russian passports. They have their own autonomous governing bodies. There are no Georgian police, courts, or governmental bodies in South Ossetia because the people do not want them there. It is Georgian in name only and because someone drew a line on a map that made it so.

On balance Georgia is wrong too. They invaded South Ossetia to impose their governance on a people and a land that did not want it....since when did America support such actions?
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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

(This post was edited by MattinSF on Aug 13, 08 10:52)

vitus979

Aug 13, 08 10:50

Post #22 of 62 (313 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [MattinSF] [In reply to]	Can't Post

If the Basque region shared a border with Russia

In Putin's dreams, it does.

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

sorelian

Aug 13, 08 10:59

Post #23 of 62 (306 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [David in FL] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Weak, really weak. Reminds me of the episode of Family Guy (God, I love that show!) when Peter Griffin declared his house to be an independent nation........Just sayin' it, doesn't make it so.

Then you should also recall that it wasn't until Peter invaded his neighbors pool seizing it in the name of Petoria...that the government had a problem with his sovereignty. (Since he was off the grid originally so to speak, making it possible for his country to exist in the first place.)

Petoria had been allowed to exist up until that point of reckless invasion, Lois even gave tours of Petoria dressed as Jackie O.

In retrospect the more that I think about your example...the less it bolsters your argument.

/just sayin'
//loves family guy

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Pass the weak, hurdle the dead.

(This post was edited by sorelian on Aug 13, 08 11:00)

majorminor

Aug 13, 08 11:00

Post #24 of 62 (304 views)

Post deleted by majorminor [In reply to]

MattinSF

Aug 13, 08 11:03

Post #25 of 62 (265 views)

Re: Robert Scheer gets to the bottom of McCain's Georgia bluster [majorminor] [In reply to]	Can't Post

my eyes!!! my eyes!!! arrrghhh
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HOPE is a plan that worked. CHANGE is a plan that worked. BELIEVE is a plan that worked.

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