Suggested strategies for bringing democracy to Iraq [View All]

[Tansy_Gold]

I brought this up in another thread and someone suggested I start my own thread on this topic. I'm not much of a thread-starter.

I think most of us agree that we want to bring our troops home, that the whole invasion and subsequent occupation have gone terribly wrong for all parties concerned, and the chimpster's request for eight-seven billion of our dollars to provide Iraq with rebuilt roads, schools, hospitals, electric power grids, water supply systems, etc. while the working population in this country gets nothing is more than a little unreasonable.

But what are the alternatives? While the honchos are wringing their hands, pounding their fists, or extending their palms, let's put our fingers (and brains) to use and come up with some ideas.

I tossed out the notion of allowing the various factions in Iraq to establish their own "states," somewhat on the blueprint of the U.S. in the 1770s and 80s -- semi-independent provinces or "states" with a confederation or republic or some such central overarching government to regulate things like inter-provincial commerce (oil, especially), currency, national defense, and so on. Each province/state could establish its own cultural personality, while -- with help from the U.S., U.N., etc. -- working out a way to tolerate differences. Balkanization, yes, it is, but isn't that to a certain extent what we have here in the U.S., too?

I'm not positive this would work, obviously. But something along those lines worked for the U.S. in bringing the original colonies together despite their differences. And granted, the issue of slavery did eventually erupt into armed conflict, but maybe we and the Iraqis could learn from that experience???

I dunno. It's a thought. Open for discussion.

Peace,

Tansy Gold, who really is going to reread "A Peace to End All Peace"