One imperative need for better foreign policies and a more peaceful world leverages today with the removal of the Bush administration. It was already bad to have a foreign policy based on the principles of deterrence and containment and now we have reached the slippery slope of the hegemonic and unbound Bush’s policies of “you are either with us or against us.”

I find painful to realise that our supposed democracies are sustained by the fallacy of the Free Market, therefore I felt disappointed when I learnt that the fall of the stock market could have played a major role in Sonia Gandhi’s decision not to become the prime minister of India. Our world is becoming more dangerous, Amnesty International has condemned the bulldozing of Palestinian homes by Israel, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has unfolded another plot to overthrow his democratically elected government, Chechnya President Akhmad Kadyrov has been assassinated, killings seems an endemic neglected problem in many parts of Africa.

Whenever I think of Bush’s policies of pre-emptive never ending wars to make peace so I think he is the real axis of evil. We need to bound our problems and look for the leveraging of effective public policies to solve these problems. We cannot continue to have public policies based on opinion polls and we cannot have public policies by re-writing history. The American public was supportive of the war against Iraq and now that this war has become ugly, expensive and unwinnable, the American public is having second thoughts about it. This Iraq war was not needed, it was a war of choice, and it was an illegal war. Bush is re-writing history. First Bush waged the war because Saddam Hussein had Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), then when no WMD were found the excuse for this war became Saddam Hussein’s intention to produce WMD in the future, then the excuse became one of regime change, then the excuse became one of exporting democracy and the Free Market. And what do we have to day in Iraq? The unintended consequences of the Free Market: private prisons, private justice, private government, and a private occupying American military. Is anything left to privatise in Iraq? Oh yes, I forgot its oil!

Pertinent articles published in Ensign

1. .. Traynor, Ian The privatisation of war: $30bn goes to private military December 10, 2003 http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1103566,00.html

2. . Thornton, Philip and Andrew Gumbel America Puts Iraq Up for Sale September 22, 2003 the Independent/UK, http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0922-01.htm

3. Hurst, Lynda The privatization of Abu Ghraib. Civilians named in abuse scandal can't be charged. Iraq war ramps up Pentagon's use of private contractors (pdf) May 16, 2004 Toronto Star

4. . Gutman, Huck Privatization of warfare May 1, 2004 Axis of Logic, http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/article_7101.shtml