rotten fish

I've been thinking about one of the things bothering me about the Iraq war and the "discussion" of what should happen in Iraq in the american press and realized the same thing bothers me about discussion of Darfur and all sorts of other world flashpoints.

Darfur is a rotten fish. I wonder what those who call for no flight zones or sanctions or troops or whatever think would really happen if anglo-american-etc. intervention actually occurred?
as near as I can tell, the discussing of goings-on in the Sudan in the drawing rooms of London has been one of the world's problems for near 150 years, and is one of the things that needs to stop. Maybe the American do-gooders are more well intentioned than General Chinese Gordon and the classic British Imperialists of yore who met their match in the Mahdist rebellion in the Sudan in the late 19th century, but maybe they're not. This is not some kind of backyard, some annex to the parlor, some terrain diorama under glass or perhaps a really involved version of The Sims or Second Life.

Americans and English need to stop worrying about saving "good" Africans from "bad" Africans and start worrying how to save the rest of the world from the Americans and the English.

Americans and English need to stop worrying about what the "bad" Iraqis might do to the "good" Iraqis when the invasion forces leave, and start trying to prevent the next paroxysm of imperialist violence, and start materially atoning for the too much that has already been done.

US democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards seems decent enough, with some good positions and currently an anti-war stance. But he calls himsef an expert on fighting poverty while charging tens of thousands of dollars to give a speech (on poverty no less), lives in a millions of dollars estate, and can afford to pay hundreds of dollars for a haircut. Beware of rich people talking about poverty, and beware of imperialists talking about helping out in Africa or the middle east.