Monday, February 25, 2013

The Republicans part 2

This part 2 about the Republicans will focus more of what the Republicans foreign policy was and how their polices did not work. This is another aspect Cuomo talks about in his speech, in order for the American public to side with the Democrats.

Cuomo mentions a lot about the nuclear arms race, in which he says the the Republicans "believe we can pile missiles so high that they will pierce the clouds and the sight of them will frighten our enemies into submission."
He is referring to Reagan Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) that was proposed in 1983, which was mentioned in the blog before this, and how it increased the national debt.  Now looking at the foreign policy side to it, this initiative was used to protect the US from the Soviet Union. So basically this era was still the Cold War Era. It is said that before Reagan became president, he referred the USSR as an "Evil Empire". 
"He believed the United States could ill afford to sit passively while communism expanded aggressively". Therefore Reagan passed the Reagan Doctrine(1980), which pledged that America would support the "freedom fighters" who were opposing communism in other countries. 

Little background history of what was happening during this time of the Cold War. Communism was spreading all over the world. The Soviets invaded Afghanistan, Nicaragua was under a Sandinstia government which was backed up by the Soviets, El Salvador was being threatened by communist guerilla, and Cuba had an insurgency on Angola. 

So a lot was happening in the communist world, and Reagan felt that the US was going to be threatened by the Soviets/Communist if the US did not make itself superior in the arms race. 

"We give money to Latin American governments that murder nuns, and then we lie about it." 
What happened in Latin America?
Reagan supplied aid and CIA training to El Salvador because of the Reagan Doctrine, which played a factor in the rising debt. There were four US nuns that were brutally murdered and raped by the guerilla armies of El Salvador. Reagan and his cabinet basically stated that the death of the nuns were their own fault. Reagan briefly lifted all aid to El Salvador, but eventually gave back the aid because he said that they were progressing in human rights. However, this was not the truth because the "Salvadoran military was engaged in a widespread campaign of terror and torture.”


The four US nuns that were killed in El Salvador
"279 young Americans in Lebanon in pursuit of a plan and a policy that no one can find or describe." 
So then what happened in Lebanon?
In October 1983, 279 Americans were killed by a suicide bomber in Lebanon in their barracks stationed in Beirut. Syria, Iran, and Libia were supposedly training terrorist groups on their own soil. The marines "were part of a contingent of 1,800 Marines that had been sent to Lebanon as part of a multinational force to help separate the warring Lebanese factions." Cuomo didn't mention other terrorist bombing that also occurred in Lebanon, and they even occurred after this speech was given. Cuomo mentions these 279 Americans killed twice in his speech, probably to put an emphasis on what happened.

"We have been less than zealous in support of our only real friend -- it seems to me, in the Middle East -- the one democracy there, our flesh and blood ally, the state of Israel."
Cuomo point about Israel was that, they were a great ally to the United States during the 80s. However, Reagan made strikes against them because they were building nuclear weapons that could threaten the US, even though they were an ally, all because Reagan wanted to be ahead of the arm's race. 


"Now our allies are as confused as our enemies. Now we have no real commitment to our friends or to our ideals -- not to human rights, not to the refuseniks, not to Sakharov, not to Bishop Tutu and the others struggling for freedom in South Africa."
Who are these people that Cuomo mentions? 
The refuseniks were soviet jews who were denied permission to emigrate. 
Sakharov was a Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1975. He was a nuclear physicist and human rights activist. During the 1980s, "after he had denounced the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, he was exiled to Gorky". He was an ally to the US ans supported ending the communist regime and the nuclear arms race.
Bishop Tutu, was also a Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1984. He was an human rights activist.
I think Cuomo mentioning these people was to show how unclear the Republicans are about the foreign policy and wanting peace around the world. It is important to defend our country, but also important to make sure that when the US helps other countries, it is to benefit the country who needs help and not to benefit the US to get ahead of the game.

One last thing that Cuomo mentions is the person, Ann Gorsuch Burford. She was an Enviromental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator. Reagan was accused of saying that trees pollute more than cars, so his focus on the environment wasn't a large focus. In fact Ann Burford, tried to dismantle the agency and cut its budget by 22%. Enforcement cases on the environment fell by 79% in her first year under Reagan. She tried to get rid of the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts and lower pollution standards, but Congress refused. 

So yeah, Cuomo mentioned a lot of things that Reagan failed at, two full blogs of history. It was just to further prove his point that the Democrats are the party to vote for during the 1984 election.


References:
http://www.ushistory.org/us/59c.asp

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/target/etc/cron.html

http://morallowground.com/2010/12/02/on-this-day-1980-american-nuns-kidnapped-raped-murdered-by-american-trained-salvadoran-death-squad/

http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/west-of-eden/if-obama-treated-israel-like-reagan-did-he-d-be-impeached-1.400542

http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1975/sakharov-autobio.html

http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1984/tutu-bio.html

http://grist.org/article/epa24/

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