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PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS ON HOW THE 'FREE TRADE' CASE FOR OFFSHORING AMERICA'S JOBS HAS COME UNGLUED Roberts on the sensational exposure of the faked "gains" and phantom stats of the free traders. Who was America's most anti-imperialist president? Try Grover Cleveland! JoAnn Wypijewski on the unlikely hero of Hawai'i's restoration movement. Alexander Cockburn reports on evangelical Christians in crisis amid fresh onslaughts by forces of darkness. The Warbler's Parable: Rosa Miriam Elizalde on the black-masked visitors to Cuba defying the US economic blockade.
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Today's Stories June 27, 2007 Marjorie
Cohn June 26, 2007 Jonathan
Cook Ralph
Nader Corporate
Crime Reporter Ron
Jacobs Martha
Rosenberg John
Chuckman Denny
Haldeman Anthony
DiMaggio Stephen
Fleischman William
S. Lind Website
of the Day
Paul
Craig Roberts Jennifer
Loewenstein Bob
Anderson Robert
Pollin Patrick
Cockburn Eva
Liddell Dan
Bacher Larry
Atkins Mark
Brenner James
Rothenberg Website
of the Day June 23 / 24, 2007 Alexander
Cockburn Jeff
Taylor Oren
Ben-Dor Gary
Leupp Robert
Fisk David
Rosen Russell
Mokhiber Alison
Weir Robert
Fantina D.
K. Wilson Nicole
Colson Stephen
Soldz, Steven Reisner and Brad Olson Dave
Lindorff Benjamin
Dangl Michael
Dickinson Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
June 22, 2007 Andy
Worthington Sherwood
Ross Eliana
Monteforte Robert
Weissman Richard
Rhames Christopher
Brauchli Ramzy
Baroud Ehud
Krinis, David Shulman and Neve Gordon David
Michael Green Kathryn
Webber Website
of the Day
June 21, 2007 Peter
Linebaugh Natsu
Saito Ron
Jacobs Saree
Makdisi John
Stauber Scott
Liebertz Tom
Clifford Robert
Jensen Michael
J. Smith Jeb
Sprague Website
of the Day
Omar
Barghouti Andy
Worthington Margaret
Kimberley Robert
Weissman Russell
D. Hoffman Rannie
Amiri Stephen
Lendman Dave
Lindorff David
Swanson Anne
Dachel Website
of the Day
June 19, 2007 Ralph
Nader Dr.
Shepherd Bliss Bill
and Kathleen Christison Jeff
Leys Dave
Zirin Chris
Floyd Ben
Terrall Anthony
Papa VIPS Linda Flores Website
of the Day
John
Ross Paul
Craig Roberts Martha
Rosenberg Norman
Solomon Don
Santina Isabella
Kenfield James
Brooks Eva
Liddell Sam
Husseini Akiva
Eldar Website
of the Day
Alexander
Cockburn John
Halle Robert
Fisk Andy
Worthington Uri
Avnery Fred
Gardner Saul
Landau P.
Sainath Missy
Comley Beattie Alan
Gregory Walter
Brasch Website
of the Weekend
June 15, 2007 Alan
Farago Andy
Worthington Michael
Simmons Franklin
Lamb Gary
Leupp John
Ross Website
of the Day
June 14, 2007 Michael
Donnelly
Faisal
Kutty Harry
Browne Charles
Jonkel Steven
Higgs Bruce
Dixon Bruce
K. Gagnon
Website
of the Day June 13, 2007 Glen Ford Marjorie Cohn Bill Christison Charles Jonkel Silvia Cattori Richard Gott Firmin DeBrabander William S. Lind Keith Rosenthal Website of the Day June 12, 2007 Jeffrey St.
Clair Paul Craig
Roberts P. Sainath Ralph Nader Omar Waraich Dave Lindorff Harvey Wasserman Malini Johar
Schueller Ramzy Baroud Website of
the Day
June 11, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Paul Craig
Roberts Uri Avnery Norman Solomon Eva Liddell Rannie Amiri Rachel Voss Christopher
Brauchli D. K. Wilson Website of
the Day
Alexander Cockburn George Ciccariello-Maher Saul Landau Robert Fisk Brian Cloughley Ron Jacobs Ward Boston Conn Hallinan Leonard Peltier Lawrence Davidson John Ross Kate Allan Fred Gardner Stephen Fleischman Monica Benderman Geoff Bailey Missy Beattie Patrick Dyer Tim Lengerich James Irani
Gary Leupp Michael Tillery Michael Simmons Poets' Basement Website of the Weekend
June 8, 2007 Serge Halimi Patrick Cockburn Jeffrey St. Clair
Paul Craig Roberts William Blum Joshua Frank Lance Selfa Dave Lindorff Lawrence Ferlinghetti Website of the Day
Marjorie Cohn Soldz, Reisner
and Olson: Soldz, Reisner
Paul Craig Roberts Bill Quigley Silvia Cattori Carl G. Estabrook Ellen Taylor Corporate Crime
Reporter Brenda Norrell D. K. Wilson Kevin Zeese Website of
the Day
Alain Gresh Gary Leupp Steven Sherman Bruce Dixon Corporate Crime Reporter Brian M. Downing Ron Jacobs George Bisharat Nicole Colson Bruce K. Gagnon Website of the Day
June 5, 2007 Michael Neumann Jonathan Cook David Vest Robert Fantina Hoffman, Parsneau and Chowdhury John V. Walsh Richard Cretan Adam Engel William S. Lind Myles Hoenig Jim Minick Website of
the Day
Nizar Latif Diana Johnstone Gregory Wilpert Paul Watson Susan Rosenthal,
MD Richard Ward Eva Liddell Zahi Khouri Evelyn Pringle China Hand Karyn Strickler Website of the Day
June 2 / 3, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Marc Levy Martin Smith Diana Johnstone John Ross Uri Avnery Sunsara Taylor Richard Neville P. Sainath Missy Comley
Beattie Nisrine Abiad Rannie Amiri Margot Pepper Eric Stewart Ralph Nader Dan Bacher Shaun Harkin Richard Rhames Frederick Hudson Poets' Basement Website of the Weekend
Dave Marsh Saul Landau David Phinney Robert Jensen Stanley Heller Yifat Susskind Robert Weissman Paul Buchheit William S.
Lind Sherwood Ross Stephen Lendman Website of the Day
Robert Bryce Patrick Cockburn Gary Leupp Kathy Kelly Marjorie Cohn Chris Kutalik
Corporate Crime Reporter Dave Lindorff Website of the Day
May 30, 2007 James Ridgeway Franklin Lamb Terrence E. Paupp Uri Avnery Alan Maass Rock and Rap
Confidential Ralph Nader Nirmal Ghosh Jean Daniels Tom Barry Website of the Day
Stephen Soldz Eliza Ernshire Ron Jacobs Dave Lindorff Evelyn Pringle Mike Whitney David Swanson John Holt Cynthia McKinney Martha Rosenberg Website of the Day
Bill Quigley Col. Dan Smith Cindy Sheehan Dr. Susan Block Jeeni Criscenzo Douglas Valentine Website of the Day 
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June 27, 2007 The Myth of Democratic PacifismThe Footprints of DemocraciesBy PAUL BUCHHEIT America's cooperation with other countries in the name of promoting peace has been marked by a push toward democratization. As President Bush said, "democracies don't go to war with each other." The modern view of this thesis was formalized by philosopher Immanuel Kant, whose 1795 essay "Perpetual Peace" suggested that democracies would never vote to go to war, except in self defense, and therefore war would not exist if all nations became democracies. But the idea has always been controversial. American founding father Alexander Hamilton disputed "the paradox of perpetual peace" in his Federalist Papers: "Have republics in practice been less addicted to war than monarchies? Are not the former administered by MEN as well as the latter?...Is not the love of wealth as domineering and enterprising a passion as that of power or glory?" It is generally true that democracies do not fight each other. But democracies do not necessarily react peaceably to other forms of government. A comprehensive study by political scientists Jack Snyder and Edward Mansfield showed that over the past 200 years developing democracies went to war much more frequently than stable autocracies or established democracies." Other studies recommend against installing democracies in countries with a large ethnic divide. Based on these conclusions, it would seem unwise to try to force democratization on a nation in any hurried way. There are many historical examples that challenge the validity of 'democratic pacifism.' Historians Thomas Schwartz and Kiron K. Skinner refute the notion with examples such as the U.S. against Mexico in 1848, the American Civil War, the U.S. against Spain in 1898, England against the Boer Republic in South Africa, and even World War 1, in which Britain and France and their opponent Germany were largely democratic. In recent times, democratization spawned authoritarian leaders in Zimbabwe (Mugabe), Serbia (Milosevic), and Rwanda (Hutus). Yugoslavia and Indonesia were more tolerant as dictatorships than as democracies, and indeed Indonesia's GDP has decreased almost 50 percent since embracing democracy. Hong Kong and Singapore have fared well without democracies. Relatively well-governed African countries such as Ghana, Malawi, Mali, and Senegal did not experience the type of economic growth realized by countries perceived as corrupt, such as Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, and Pakistan. The Pakistani people generally rejected attempts to form a democratic state, and President Musharraf has pursued social and economic reform unencumbered by the burden of democratic compromise. This appears to be true for Chavez in Venezuela also. Perhaps most significantly, China has seen a burgeoning economy without the need, at least so far, for a democratic government. While democracies don't necessarily lead to peace, peace and prosperity may promote democracy. A 1997 study found that rich countries are far more likely to sustain a democracy than poor countries. Certainly the absence of peace can provoke oppressive behavior in otherwise democratic-minded leaders, such as Lincoln in the Civil War, Wilson in World War 1, Churchill in World War 2, and the Bush Administration in the current Iraq War. In order to better understand the economic differences between democracies and non-democracies, world data tables were merged from three sources: (1) The Economist's Democracy Index, which divides the world's countries into
(2) The Global Footprint Network, which determines for each of the world's countries,
(3) The CIA World Factbook (worldwide Gross National Income figures from nationmaster.com) The composite table is available at http://www.fightingpoverty.org/2007NationalData.xls. A summary of the data follows:
The following observations were derived from the data: (1) Democracies tend to be wealthy; or perhaps more accurately, wealthy societies tend to be democracies.
(2) The average person in a democratic country uses four times as much land and resources as a person living under a non-democracy. If everyone in the world consumed the same amount as those living in democracies (6.71 hectares), we would need four planet earths to sustain us.
Note: Biocapacity usage percentages add up to over 100 because the earth has a global ecological deficit (overshoot) of 0.25 Earths. According to the Global Footprint Network, "such overshoot leads to a depletion of Earth's life supporting natural capital and a build up of waste." (3) The resource usage in (2) is mitigated by the fact that biocapacities in democratic countries tend to be greater than in other countries (that is, democracies tend to exist in the most resource- rich areas). As a result,
What conclusions can be drawn from this data? First of all, it's understandable that democracies wouldn't attack democracies if they're all so prosperous. It would seem more likely that democracies would be fearful of the 5 billion people living in non-democracies who have much smaller biocapacities and consumption rates than the rich world. This is especially true if, as noted above, developing democracies go to war much more frequently than other political systems. Secondly, it's unrealistic for a government to promote democracy in the name of improving the lives of others if a single earth cannot support the democratic lifestyle. If it's true that democracies are correlated with wealth and prosperity, the expansion of democracy will place a greater ecological demand on our earth unless overall consumption is reduced. The welcome peace dividend of a democratic world may depend on the willingness of current democracies to share the wealth. Paul Buchheit is a Professor, Harold Washington
College in Chicago. He can be reached at: pbuchheit@ccc.edu
References: "Federalist No. 6: Concerning Dangers from Dissensions Between the States," by Alexander Hamilton, for the Independent Journal, 1787 Jack Snyder and Edward Mansfield, "Democratization and the Danger of War," International Security 20, no. 1 (Summer 1995) Donald Horowitz, "Democracy in Divided Societies," in Larry Diamond and Mark F. Plattner, eds., "Nationalism, Ethnic Conflict, and Democracy (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994) Alvin Rabushka and Kenneth Shepsle, "Politics in Plural Societies: A Theory of Democratic Instability" (Charles E. Merill, 1972) "The Myth of Democratic Pacifism," By Thomas Schwartz and Kiron K. Skinner, Hoover Digest, 1999 Amy Chua, "World On Fire" (Anchor Books, 2004) Transparency International, Global Corruption Report 2004 (London: Pluto Press, 2004) World Bank Governance Indicators, 2002 "How to Change Ugly Regimes," Newsweek 06/27/05 Fareed Zakaria, "The Future of Freedom" (W W Norton & Co, 2004) Adam Przeworski and Fernando Limongi, "Modernization: Theories and Facts," World Politics, 49, No 2, January 1997 "Economist Intelligence Unit: Democracy Index 2006" Global Footprint Network (http://footprintnetwork.org) Gross National Income, per capita, by country (www.nationmaster.com, from CIA World Factbook) {missing data filled in from following 3 sources} World Bank Data & Statistics, 2004 Internet World Stats, Usage and Population Statistics (www.internetworldstats.com) Information by Country, UNICEF
(www.unicef.org/infobycountry)
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CounterPunch Books of the Crossroads: HOW THE IRISH INVENTED SLANG By Daniel Cassidy  Click Here to Buy! How the Press Failed The Gang's All Here: Judy Miller, Bob Woodward, Rupert Murdoch, Bill O'Reilly...End Times Leaves No Reputation Unstained!  Buy End Times Now! CounterPunch Books! Saul Landau's Bush and Botox World with a Foreword by Gore Vidal  Click Here to Order!  Michael Neumann's Devastating Rebuttal of Alan Dershowitz Grand Theft Pentagon: Tales of Greed and Profiteering in the War on Terror by Jeffrey St. Clair           The Occupation by Patrick Cockburn   Humanitarian Imperialism By Jean Bricmont               CITY BEAUTIFUL By Tennessee Reed        Bruce Springsteen On Tour By Dave Marsh                   |
