Tom Tommorow alleges that TBN is heavily invested in Liberia, a country suspected of giving safe harbor to AL Queda operatives (not to mention being a brutal dictatorship).
It seems like every single cartoon from Tommorow involves such nasty allegations in one form or another, so I don’t know what to think. But how far does moral responsibility go? Does investing in someone or someplace really carry with it the potential for all the future wrongs the company or nation does? Does Tommorow really deserve a place in the lefty canon, publishing in the Village Voice and Salon? Or has he gone too far?
This is not an allegation–it is a fact. Robertson has had a loving relationship with the mass murdering Taylor for years. You see, Christian love is only for the unborn, not for those niggers in Liberia.
By the way, since you say you don’t know what to think about this “allegation,” does your internet provider provide access to internet search engines, like perhaps www.google.com ? One of the uses of the internet, apart from exhibiting your ignorance on internet message boards, is for research. You see, you can actually use it to find out stuff! So, for instance, you could punch up “Robertson Liberia” in google, and probably find some useful information.
Chill, Chump. That’s not just a suggestion, it’s a snide insult. Apos asked a perfectly reasonable question. Last I checked, that was not an acceptable reason for you to blow your nose on the thread.
As I have observed in other threads, it’s an odd but common phenomenon that so-called ultra-left liberals are always the ones who first throw out the n-bomb, as if they are dishonestly making it appear that they are merely echoing their opponents.
Wow, I didn’t need this Liberia information to draw the parallel between Robertson & Al Qaeda, though Taliban might be more descriptive. The only difference between this sort of fundamentalists Christian and terrorist leader is that Robertson can’t seem to put together an army of fanatics to do his bidding for him. Such is the way of American fanatics. They want their way of life to be perpetrated upon the masses, they just aren’t willing to die for it. At least not yet.
He’s not invested in “Africa,” he’s invested in a gold mine in Liberia. Robertson’s “investment” does nothing for Liberians, and Charles Taylor is one of the most ruthless and brutal dictators in the world. Robertson’s alliance with Taylor is at least as helpful to terrorists as the drug trade that Bushies like to grandstand about.
I’m sure South Africans were happy to have the jobs that came from foreign investment, too. The problem with that sort of logic, however, is that you may be making a dime to pay a dollar by being held hostage to the “we have to play by the dictator’s rules or we’ll cost some guy his job” argument. One of the reasons - actually, the main reason - that Liberia is such a shithole is Charles Taylor, and one of the reasons Taylor has lasted this long is that he’s supported by foreign investors. A boycott of Taylor’s regime might cost some Liberians their jobs now, but it might also get rid of Taylor and vastly improve the country’s economy in the long run.
I have enormous contempt for Pat Robertson. It’s a shame that some fallacious arguments have led me to defend this abominable person.
RickJay, was Liberia governed better before the reign of Charles Taylor? Or, is his his miserable governance a continuation of past practices?
My main point is to respond to your boycott idea. Yes, it’s remotely possible that a boycott might lead to a change in government; the only successful boycott I can ever recall was South Africa. However, in the absence of a world-wide boycott, there’s no value at all for a particular organization not to invest in Lliberia. Note that during the heyday of the Cold War, it was liberals who encouraged investment in Communist countries, believing that contact with the West would lead to reform. I think they were right.
As Diogenes rightly points out, “[Robertson’s] not invested in ‘Africa,’ he’s invested in a gold mine in Liberia.” Similarly he’s not invested in Taylor’s government, he’s invested in this one gold mine. Does this gold mine have bad practices? Tom Tomorrow doesn’t bother to make that assertion. He merely uses guilt by association.
It’s bad logic to equate investment in a particular business with support for a bad government.
Liberia was a shithole before, too. Primarily because it’s run by crooks. That doesn’t excuse Taylor; if I rob a bank this week, I can’t say I was just continuing the work of last week’s bank robbers. Liberia WOULD be a better place with a decent leader.
I agree that that’s true, but there’s still an ethical concern here, December, and it’s valid to point out if someone is supporting a brutal dictator. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to come out and say Robertson is personally responsible for deaths in Liberia - his responsibility isn’t that proximate - but let’s not pretend investment decisions are ethically neutral, because they aren’t. I won’t take vacations in Cuba because I refuse to send that much money to Fidel Castro, but I wouldn’t call someone who vacations there a murderer - that’s overdoing it. A little consciousness about this sort of thing is all I ask.
Blaming Pat Robertson for death and chaos in Liberia is extremist and unfair, but then, Tom Tomorrow is an extremist, and he’s unfair, so that’s no surprise. But raising people’s awareness about where their money is going is a valid exercise. I doubt many Canadians knew a Canadian oil company was openly supporting genocide in the Sudan, but when some awareness was raised a public pressure was applied, it got Talisman out of the Sudan. It can and does work.
On top of that, my point was not to suggest Pat Robertson is a murderer, anyway; I simply wanted to point out that it’s fallacious to always trot out the “we can’t stop investing because we’ll cost someone their job” argument. If you found out a business you held stock in was owned by raving Nazis, would you keep your money in it because you didn’t want to hurt the stock price and cost someone their job? Of course you have a right to choose not to invest in that business, and it’s silly to say you’re acting unethically by withdrawing your investment, isn’t it?
You are probably right that boycotts are generally ineffective in promoting reform. However, I challenge you to provide an example where “constructive engagement” has been effective in promoting reform.
There is no evidence that either approach is effective. My own opinion is that if you want to depose a dictator, you go in, kill his army, and string him up. Guess that makes me a “liberal hawk.”
But since that’s not going to happen, either, we must look to other criteria when determining whether or not to invest in a country run by a dictatorial regime. The first is your own personal ethics - does providing at least some jobs and benefits to some subjects of said regime outweigh the support your investment provides that regime? That’s a personal choice, and one I won’t begrudge someone else.
However, in Taylor’s case, there is another factor. Taylor has been supporting insurgencies in neighboring countries, particularly in Sierra Leone. The more money his regime has, the more violence he can export. So here, a boycott may not remove Taylor, but it will certainly help to contain him. So I vote boycott, and think Robertson is a schmuck.
Of course not, but it tends to excuse Robertson. Liberia’s problems go far beyond Taylor. Even if we assume that Robertson’s divestment could help undermine Taylor, getting rid of Taylor wouldn’t solve the real problem.
I think Sua Sponte is probably right. “To depose a dictator, you go in, kill his army, and string him up.” In the case of a country lacking the traditions of democracy and rule of law, it would be well to also make it a colony for several decades, and establish the institutions needed for a successful democracy.
Of course, none of this will be done. Neither investment nor disinvestment will fix Liberia or change its policies. So, the moral questions are theoretical.