Prominent Japanese philosopher Iwao Hirose spoke on “Primary Health Care and the Market Mechanism” at the University of Maine on Thursday March 29, 2007. Iwao Hirose discussed the privatization of health care in Chile following the the 1973 coup and the possible lessons this experience holds. He described the US health care system as comparatively expensive and ineffective.
Monthly Archive for March, 2007
This podcast features Professor Doug Allen of the University of Maine discussing Lessons Four Years After the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq. The program was given at the University of Maine on March 22, 2007.
On February 10, 2003, Doug published an oped entitled Going to War in the Bangor Daily News. It has been available HERE at the original Deep Blade Journal website ever since.
As it turns out, the salient points in Doug’s 2003 piece have become all too real as the US invasion, conquest, occupation, and pacification program in Iraq has dragged on for now over four years. Doug wrote in 2003:
The long-range consequences of war for the people of Maine and the U.S., as well as for Iraqis and people of the region, are unpredictable and very threatening: the likely destabilization and possible overthrow of many governments in the region; the likely increase in terrorism at home and abroad; the likely escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; the volatile destabilization of Iraq with Shia uprisings in the South (possibly linked with Islamic militants in Iran), Kurdish uprisings in the North (possibly linked with Kurds in Turkey and demands for a separate Kurdistan), and the permanent stationing of many thousands of U.S. troops in Iraq and the expenditure of many billions of dollars trying to impose foreign order on the chaos; and the devastating economic consequences for our already fragile local, state, and national economies.
For all of these reasons, it makes sense to oppose preemptive and largely U.S. unilateral moves toward war. We must work with others to explore alternatives for resolving the serious crisis with Iraq.
The audio program here runs just over one hour. It delves into the history of the conflict and analyzes aspects of policy that have driven the US into a corner in Iraq, making it very difficult for it to get its military out of the country. The war thus continues despite daily death and destruction following the utter failure of the application of US military might to solve anything. Every day the US stays in Iraq, the conflicts and humanitarian disasters only grow worse.
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