Out to Lunch

In this series of interviews, I talk to Summit County residents about how they feel and think about politics.
This week I had coffee at Abbey’s with George Sherman, the chairman of the Democratic Party in Summit County. Sherman said he wasn’t able, by law, to engage in politics during his career as a diplomat, a career that put him in the group of negotiators forming the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty, at Camp David, at the U.S. embassy in Cairo, and New Delhi. Now, he can talk.

Talty: Let's start with local politics: What do you think of the new road proposed from Wildernest to Frisco?

Sherman: Mainly, it’s an idea that the Main Street business people of Frisco have fastened onto as a way to increase their revenue. The routes would take U.S. forestland, and once you take part of the forest, the small parcel that is remaining is attractive to the forest service for trade or selling. My opposition to it is ideological, and for the environment.

Talty: Speaking of the environment, didn’t (Al) Gore and (George) Bush sound like they were going to be closer environmentally? While they were campaigning?

Sherman: Words, words, words. Every action that the Bush administration has taken in the last two years goes away from environmentalism. The most recent episode was really scandalous. The White House took an EPA report that they didn’t agree with, and proceeded to virtually delete all the parts on global warming. In Christie Whitman’s terms, they hadn’t reached any conclusions; therefore they decided just to ignore it.

It was just another demonstration of the special interests that control the White House. All their decisions favor the moneyed interests. The Alaska oil /gas (National Wildlife Refuge) is another example, logging - the people that have a vested interest in making money out of our natural resources. And this is important to Summit County. The environment, if not the major issue, is one of the top three. Preserving the environment. It’s right up there with health care and development, which, of course, is the other side of the environment.

Talty: And at the state level?

Sherman: I suppose in state terms, the major issue now is this fiasco that the Republicans carried out at the end of the session, with re-doing the redistricting.

Completely anti-undemocratic, they didn’t allow the usual process to take place, putting forward amendments, having committee hearings.

It was put through in three days with no prior notice. Joan Fitzgerald - she’s the minority leader in the senate, also our senator - she talked about what happened on the floor and she just couldn’t believe the way they behaved, setting her up, not taking amendments. Andrews just threw the proposed amendments on the floor, and wouldn’t address them. It was a put-up deal. The Republicans had carefully hatched it.

Talty: Where do you think it came from?

Sherman: Directly from the White House - Carl Rowe. Of course, Colorado wasn’t alone. They tried it in Texas, as well. It’s an effort for them to guarantee control of the House next time around. The U.S. House of Representatives is very closely divided between the two parties. In Texas, they were fortunate to have the ability to deny it. Democrats, as the minority party, were able to block passage because they all just left the House, and the state, and went to Oklahoma. Therefore, the Republican wouldn’t have a quorum. In Colorado, that’s not possible because a quorum in the Colorado Legislature is a majority of the total house, and since the Republicans have a one vote majority, and they were all there -- and on board -- they were able to ram the thing through even though the Democrats didn’t participate in the debate.

Talty: Are you saying that if you’re in the minority at that statehouse, you don’t even need to show up?

Sherman: What bothers me is the way the voting public has learned to dismiss this as another political tactic. I don’t sense any indignation, any outrage, about this. This isn’t just a political maneuver, it’s a threat to our basic democratic system because the whole basis of democracy is tolerance -- tolerance that the majority has for the minority opinion. In this case, the minority wasn’t given a chance to do anything. That’s the makings of a totalitarian system. It’s very dangerous.

The number of independents in this county and Colorado in general is also a reflection of voters’ attitude. They don’t feel involved in government. They’re saying, ‘Government is out there, and I prefer to be an independent because that means I don’t have to adhere to any political party that gets involved in government.’ At the same time, they vote and they pay attention to National issues. They just don’t want to be involved at the day-in/day-out level, and they tend to dismiss controversy as just another ploy. This gets back to lack of focus on what the Republicans did at the end of this session.

Talty: Votes don’t follow the lawmaking, so what happens?

Sherman: Just look at this last election. I was amazed that (Sen. Wayne) Allard won. (Democratic candidate, Tom) Strickland would have been so much better as a senator. He’s active, had experience, and is articulate. Allard appeals to Coloradoans … because he comes off as what he is, a small-town veterinarian. Look at the campaign; the person who was most quoted on the Republican side was not Allard, it was his campaign manager, (Dick) Wadams. He was making all the statements; the attack ads were his. He represents the worse kind of politics. He’s right in line with the Carl Rowe approach, which is “winning is everything.”

What I feel is that too many of our citizens consider two or three weeks of an election campaign as their contribution to politics. They don’t pay attention, or react to things that happen between these events, and therefore the politicians are not held accountable. I know from my experience, that people in government do pay attention to what the public thinks and says. Organizations are polling constantly.

Talty: What do you think about poling?

Sherman: It’s part of modern society and I regret it, but I don’t see any way of stopping it. In a sense, if you take a poll that is sober, objective, and shown to be accurate over a period of time, like the Pew Institute -- their polls are well respected -- I think there is a role for those.

When the polls are used to mount propaganda campaigns, then I have reservations. That goes for my own party as well as the Republicans. One of the things I enjoy most about being in Summit County and being involved in politics up here is that it is truly grassroots and we do hear the voice of the people.

In our system now, when you get beyond this level to the state and national level, government is more and more remote. People have a feeling they have no way of controlling what government does at that level. The feeling is helplessness.

I’ll tell you my whole career dealt with high politics. As a journalist, I was reporting on diplomatic formulations, as a Foreign Service officer, I was dealing with foreign relations, and high policy. And in fact, when I became a government servant, I was forbidden by law to be involved in domestic politics. So now that I’m retired and living in Summit County, I have a chance to do what I could never do before. Being retired has a lot to do with it, because I have time.

Talty: Newt Gingrich just attacked the state department, and Colin Powell, why?

Sherman: Well, it’s not new. Gingrich and people like him always -- when things start going wrong or there is some controversy in foreign affairs -- need a scapegoat in the state department. The essence of diplomacy is trying to deal with differences in the world, and trying to reach compromises that are going to be in our national interest. So, it’s constantly dealing with grays. Whereas politicians – people, generally – when looking at issues that are complex, tend to think in black and white terms. You’re either for something or against it. When you get into controversy over what’s black and what’s white, and you have an institution that, by definition, deals with gray, the institution is a convenient scapegoat to turn on. The scapegoats are blocking solutions because, basically, ‘they don’t agree with me.’ I think that’s what the opposition is try to say.

I was in the State Department in public affairs in the Middle East, and my total preoccupation was dealing with the domestic side of foreign policy, trying to explain and convince politicians, ethnic groups and interest groups that what we were doing was okay, and why it was okay. In this case, it was the peace process between Egypt and Israel. In a democracy, particularly our democracy, no foreign policy can be conducted without the support of the public.
In the Middle East we were trying to explain, convince, educate Israeli supporters that we were trying to get a compromise, trying to get peace between Israel and Egypt. There was a good deal of opposition. And when things don’t go well - as they are not now in the Middle East - the institution in the government that is most responsible for conducting American policy, promoting American interests, is the natural target to blame.

Talty: Why do you think things aren’t going well in the Middle East, now?

Sherman: They’re not going well because the extremes on both sides are taking advantage of the divisions among the middle on both sides. Extremists on the Palestinian side who have never accepted the state of Israel and those on the Israeli side who have never accepted the fact that there should be a Palestinian state in that part of Palestine where Israel doesn’t have a claim – a claim in the terms of the International community. Going back to the U.N General Assembly that established the state of Israel and also established a state of Palestine, which at that time the Arabs rejected. and which lead to the first war, and Israel was established defeated the Arab armies. In the next war, in ’56, they extended that, land-wise, and in 67 they took over the whole… anyway, there is a segment of Israeli society that has never accepted a compromise that could have a Palestinian state next door. And there is a segment of Palestinian society - mainly people who have lost their land, or heirs of people who have lost their land - claim that they will not accept the state of Israel. These people are on the same tract, in trying to defeat any sort of compromise, which we represent, although we have now gotten (Mahmoud) Abbas and (Ariel) Sharon to sign onto it.

The pressures on this middle are exacerbated by the extremists who kill on both sides, and so the body politics say 'how can we reach peace with those groups killing our people ?'.

One cause is the Israelis under Sharon, who have systematically undermined the Palestinian Authority that was set up. Their security forces are decimated, they don’t have a government apparatus, which was never great anyway. It was so corrupt.

One of the ironies of the current situation is Sharon coming across as a peacemaker. He’s right wing and an aggressive promoter of the occupation of the West Bank. I dealt with Sharon in the first negotiations. After Camp David.

There was two parts: one was the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty, which was the publicized success, quite rightly. And the second part was the game plan for creating a Palestinian-Israeli settlement over the West Bank and Gaza. That was the most difficult part and had to be implemented. I was part of the group that was charged with getting initial agreement between Israel and the Palestinians on creating some sort of Palestinian Authority. And Sharon was the leader of the group in the Israeli government that was adamantly opposed to any sort of compromise. One of his favorite things was to take us on helicopters flying over the West Bank and Gaza and point out the nahols, the fortified settlements along the Jordan River, and how essential they were to Israeli security. These military settlements he had set up, presumable to bring security to Israel, but really to fortify the occupation on the Jordan River. Jordan was on one side of these settlements, and on the other was occupied territory. It was fruitless to point out to him, as we constantly did, in modern terms, it took exactly seven minutes for a jet to go from Syria to Tel Aviv. These nahols were anachronistic; they didn’t guarantee anything. So now he’s dismantling some of these outposts. Under the pressure of having to make an agreement, he’s moved to the middle, but he doesn’t really have many credentials.

That’s another thing – the lack of trust. Of course, you know how the Israelis feel about Arafat, and I might add, our president feels the same. Whereas, Arafat … I’m not going to defend Arafat because I think he always does the irreducible minimum. The more the violence escalates, you have to decide whether you’re going to follow along, or put down the extremists on your side. Only when it’s obvious, Arafat has moved against the extremes. He’s not a leader. Abbas … how he will perform as prime minister still remains to be seen. Abbas is willing to try to do more against violence, but he doesn’t have any popular support. That’s why the United States is very important.

We should be dedicated to our policy in practical ways. As well as articulating these policies, we should be dedicated to building the security forces of the Palestinians, to helping them rebuild their government so they have something that can be looked at as representing them. In other words, to support and build the middle so it is able to put down the extremes, and give the ordinary Palestinian an alternative to the violence. We also should bring in the so-called moderate Arabs, the Egyptians, the Jordanians, Saudis – to a degree – to get them to support this development among the Palestinians. And at the same time, we’ve got to bring pressure on the Israeli government to control their extremes, and this means reining in the military and their reaction to Palestinian violence. It’s not an easy thing, I mean, when a bomb goes off, like on the bus 10 days ago and kills a number of Israelis, it’s very hard for an Israeli government to say ‘we’re not going to retaliate.’

Talty: Can Bush make peace?

Sherman: Bush is very late off the mark. He used a totally wrong approach at the beginning when he said ‘leave it to the parties involved to solve the thing.’ He just let the whole thing descend into chaos. Our interests are deeply involved in the Middle East, which he refused to acknowledge. Our interests seem only to revolve around oil, but the geographic location of the Middle East is also important because the Suez Canal is an international waterway and the preservation of the democratic state of Israel is in our interest as well. The preservation of our oil interests and the guarding of our security interests in that area of the Suez Canal and the preservation of the state of Israel are an absolute contradiction as long as the Arabs and Israelis are at each other’s throats. So we have a vested interest in trying to create peace or at least a truce between the Arabs and Israel if we’re going to promote all of our national interests. And Bush ignored that.

Talty: And now, the Road Map. Will it be a solution?

Sherman: Once Iraq happened …. and the final chapter has yet to be written on Iraq, and I think that’s going to turn out to be a disaster … One of the reasons he gave for going into Iraq was creation of a democratic regime there and getting rid of one of the chief antagonists of Israel. Remember some years ago, the Israelis bombed a nuclear reactor in Baghdad? Israel has always considered Saddam Hussein one of their leading antagonists on the Arab side. Anyway, once Saddam was heisted, the Palestine-Israeli thing could come front and center. They thought they could take advantage of the momentum that was created by ousting Saddam to get the moderate Arabs on board, behind this roadmap, and to get the Israeli extremists to back down.

But setting up a democratic government in Iraq is proving easier said than done. Anyone who knew anything about the Middle East said, before this war, ‘it’s ridiculous to think that the United States is going to come in and plant a democratic government in a country that is a made-up place, a geographic expression, created after WWI and administered by the British. It was always divided between the Sunnis and the Shiites and the Kurds. It’s just a potpourri, and we’re seeing it now. They’re suspicious of each other.

So back to Palestine, in comes Abbas -- getting someone other than Arafat was our condition for dealing with the Palestinians. Okay, that happened, they have a meeting, and Bush did the whole bit with the Road Map, but now he’s left with having to do follow through. It’s absolutely predictable what happened after the meeting in Jordan. The extremists on both sides are determined that they are not going to have this compromise and they are going to do everything possible to kill this effort. Now Bush is left asking ‘what do I do?’ Whatever he does is going to cause controversy and may not succeed. And this is where Colin Powell comes in. You notice whenever they get to a dead end or they get in trouble, suddenly the Secretary of State becomes the leader.

Talty: So he can be the scapegoat?

Sherman: Exactly. So people like Gingrich won’t attack the president, they can attack Powell and the state department.

Talty: What do they need to be doing, to improve the Middle East situation?

Sherman: As I said, what they have to do, in a systematic way, is promote the center in both political camps. The need is more immediate in the Palestinian side, which is basically a mess.
(Donald) Rumsfeld was on TV every day, twice a day, and we heard everything was going swimmingly in Iraq. You don’t hear so much from Rumsfeld these days. I haven’t heard anything from him these days on the Israeli-Palestinian things. It’s very dangerous. Almost without realizing it, Bush and the people around him: Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, they set us on a foreign policy course which is diametrically opposed to the whole course of our foreign policy course since WWII.

Abroad, they would basically put it as ‘imperialist.’ But I would not use that term, because I don’t think their policy is that well thought out. But its definitely the modern version of ‘America First,’ our policy during the 20s. It was isolationism. Today, it’s not isolationism, it’s bullying internationalism, which cloaks the isolationism. They don’t use diplomacy any more. ‘We’re the most powerful country in the world, and ‘you’re either with us or against us.’ Their rethoric is the black and white equation. Quite frankly, I think it appeals to a streak in the American electorate. And the this appeal is what they’re counting on to get Bush reelected in 2004. He’s seen as the champion of the United States against international terrorism.

I’m not opposed to ‘America First’ when properly defined. Obviously. our national interest should come first, but our national interests should not be antagonistic to all other nations’ interests. And there are places where we compromise, where we can use diplomacy so that we strengthen alliances rather than destroy them. I don’t think this administration, and the American people generally, realize just how the fabric of our alliances are being shattered by this determination to do whatever we consider to be in our national interest regardless of what other might think, or what another country’s interest might be. Those interests are not necessarily opposed to ours. It’s just that they might have a different way of doing things.
France makes it particularly difficult because traditionally they have opposed the United States for the sake of opposition, in many cases. Under deGaulle for instance, they opted out of the military side of NATO.

That’s a good case in point because, at the time, there was a big debate in the foreign policy establishment about how to handle deGaulle. Dean Atchison, who was retired, was all for telling him what’s what and shutting France out. The other side, which was represented by the state department and people who had dealt with foreign policy for the past 15 years, said ‘Do what he wants you to do. Withdraw our forces from France, go to Brussels, Belgium.’ France didn’t want to leave NATO. France didn’t say they wouldn’t cooperate with NATO in case of a Soviet invasion of Eastern Europe, they simply said they didn’t want to be part of the integrated-command structure because that was just a synonym for American controlled command. So, we set up a command structure coordinated with France. Today, France is in NATO, deGaulle is gone and we survived that crisis. That’s the way we should handle this. Instead of trying to take our revenge. Being a Super Power means that we should be big enough to turn the other cheek. And their attitude lacks sophistication. We’ve got to deal with the rest of the world and not look at them in our own image.

Certainly Rowe’s mentality is ‘winning is everything’ and nothing is done in the U.S. government that doesn’t point toward a victory in 2004. Although I’m not aware that he was very much involved in the decisions regarding Iraq. Certainly, where domestic politics is concerned, he’s key. I just read a long article in the New Yorker, May 15 issue, a long article on Carl Rowe. It’s scary. His past is scary, how he looks at things is scary. He’s not a Iago, or a Mephistopheles. Evidently, he comes across in company as a hail fellow, well met, outgoing, jovial. What he says, what he does, and what he means are three different things. I don’t know how people can deal with it.
One thing that this article points out is his unquestioned loyalty to Bush. He’s really dedicated. So, Bush trusts him, and yet he’s not a sycophant. Evidently he says it like it is, in his terms.

Talty: Some say that’s Bush’s strength. Not really listening to opposition?

Sherman: I don’t know whom he listens to with any some sort of liberal tendencies – aside from possibly Colin Powell. Maybe his wife, Laura, I don’t know anything about her. Certainly Cheney, Rumfields, Wolfowitz, Condoleeza Rice, they’re all right down with the doctrine of pre-emptive war and Neo-conservatism.

Talty: What do you think about 2004?

Sherman: It’s still too iffy to predict. The key thing is what happens in Iraq. If American soldiers keep getting killed, we’re going to start hearing shades of Vietnam. Afghanistan next door is equally messed up and things aren’t going well there. Now, there is talk about having to put more troops in both places, which was foreseen by members of the military in the beginning and was knocked down by Rumsfield and Company. Bush can get in over his head in Iraq, and over the Israeli-Palestinian thing, and the isolation from our allies in Europe. The on the home front, the economy is absolutely key. I don’t think it’s clear yet that we’re out of this non-reccession that they refuse to admit exists. Whether or notthe stock market recovers will be decided by the beginning of 2004. His image will be set one way or the other.

Then on the Democrats side, it matters how these nine candidates sort things out whether the party is torn apart. I’m gratified after descending into pot shots at each other and internal warfare this spring, now they seem to be in agreement that they’re not going to attack each other. Obviously they have to criticize each other, but hopefully we’ll come out of this with a candidate who can unite the party and has something to offer that is a genuine alternative to Bush. By 2004 the lines will be drawn and there will be something to attack.

The leadership in Congress has made an effort to get along with the administration over Iraq, and this effort to present national weakened their position. Especially, now in opposing Bush. He comes across as the undisputed leader in the war against terrorism, which encompasses everything we do against violence in the outside world, Afganstan…

Contrary to many Democrats I don’t despair over 2004. I’m not Alice In Wonderland either, the next six months is important in determining whether we have a chance.

I think his foreign policy is undermining our basic national security. National power is based on more than military strength. Yes, military strength is important, but also the power of your alliances, your economy, and how you project your values overseas so that people believe in you and want to follow your lead. All that’s gone by the wayside with this administration. All they focus on is the ability to project military power and to destroy regimes, which they consider a real threat. We might find them to be a real threat, but it would take a more sophisticated approach, to know.

Talty: What was your life like when you started in the Foreign Service?

Sherman: In 52, I got out of college and in France they were talking about the Coke Culture because Coke had taken the world by storm. A government can make any proclamations it wants, but it can’t stop the spread of American culture. But that’s in direct conflict with a world that is becoming so small. Back then, we were just on the verge of the telecommunications revolution and jet airlines flying everywhere.

Globalization is going in two directions. Nations are interdependent versus this mentality that what comes first is preservation of American security. It’s a reaction to the shock of 9/11. Before 9/11, Americans thought all mass violence was something that happened over in the rest of the world. That was a dramatic representation that we’re not protected by the oceans anymore. Bush has reacted strongly, unilaterally, and that’s in accord with the mood in this country. When they come down to face reality, and realize other things that are going on in the world and how dependent, interdependent, we are, then we’re going to say what are we doing wrong. Let’s just hope it isn’t too late.

Talty: Weve shut our eyes to what’s going on?

Sherman: That’s right because we’ve been raced back to Washington’s farewell address to beware of entangling alliances. Do what’s right for American interests. What’s best for the United States is best for the planet.

Talty: Do we know what best for the planet?

Sherman: And in broad terms, like the environment, take a look at one of the issues. We want free trade with Mexico because it currently exports unemployment. Free trade is in the overall American interest because we get cheaper products, but it not best for a community in Mexico that has to deal with environmental degradation.

Talty: We must have international control over the environment, like the Kyoto treaty.

Sherman: When I was in India, there was a big fight over an international agreement to cut down the fluorocarbons, which were creating the hole in the ozone. The United States was willing to go pretty far to limiting production, but India was just getting refrigerators, and resented having to forego something that we’ve had for years, which represented modern life to them. They demanded a large sum of money to create refrigerators that would forgo the fluorocarbons.

Talty: Did we give them the money?

Sherman: No. The reaction in the U.S. was that it was blackmail. The Indians had a valid point. The other thing that came up was International property rights. The Indians were famous for violating American patents and we were after them to respect our patents. The Indian response was ‘the Indian government is committed to treating the illnesses of our people, every government is elected on that, and how we carry that out is by producing cheap medicines. So, do you define American national interests in term of those pharmaceutical companies making huge profits?

Talty: Well, no. But thanks for talking with me, and bringing up these questions.