Here are some comments by that erudite scholar, Thomas Gangale, author of the innovative approach to Presidential primary campaigns originally known as the "California Plan."
Tom will comment more on this after this post, so go to the comment section and check in.
Let the Green Dog know what you think.
Dotty
Here's Tom's post on our very own Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey:
Woolsey's Sound Bites for Peace
Copyright 2005 by Thomas Gangale
In reading Chris Coursey's "Opposing War in Five-Minute Increments," which
appeared in the "Santa Rosa Press Democrat" on March 28, 2005, I gained an
increased admiration for Rep. Lynn Woolsey. Her lonely evening vigil in the
nearly-deserted House chamber, where she bears witness to the folly and
evil of war, may seem quixotic on the surface. On the contrary, her
campaign against the Iraq War is exactly the sort that one should wage
against an opponent of superior force: small, incremental victories that
wear down that opponent over time. It is the strategy of Fabius over
Hannibal, Washington over Cornwallis, Giap over Abrams.
Nearly 2200 years ago, Marcus Porcius Cato the Censor invented the sound
bite by ending every speech in the Roman Senate, regardless of its subject,
with the words "Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam" -- "In
conclusion, I believe that Carthage must be destroyed." One can imagine
that Cato's colleagues thought him quixotic, and some may have laughed at
him in secret when he brandished a branch of figs, allegedly of
Carthaginian origin, as "proof" of Carthage's resurgence as a Mediterranean
power and a mortal threat to Rome. Yet armed with this flimsy evidence,
much as Colin Powell played tape recordings to the UN Security Council two
years ago, Cato eventually won the day. Carthage was destroyed.
But Cato could not have foreseen the consequences of victory. Whereas many
of his contemporaries were only too glad to believe that Rome's pre-emptive
war against Carthage was an act of self-defense, history has judged
otherwise. Rome paid dearly for its hubris; in the course of the next
century its republic was battered down by its own imperialism. Rome was
destroyed.
Quo vadis, America?
It is a historical fact that the persistent drumbeat of oratory can drive a
great nation down the road to war. Perhaps our generation can answer this
question: can the patient vigil of one person of conscience move a great
nation down the road to peace?
In conclusion, I believe that Lynn Woolsey must be reelected.
-----
Thomas Gangale is an aerospace engineer and a former Air Force officer. He
is currently the executive director at OPS-Alaska, a think tank based in
Petaluma, California, and an international relations scholar at San
Francisco State University. He is the author of the California Plan to
reform the presidential nomination process.
