Quote:
Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
We are war with people that want us wiped out. We ignored the threat for years. We can no longer. Your analogy is an insult really to the 3000 people who died on 9/11.
|
This argument is crap and it has always been crap.
The first sentence is true. The rest of the sentences are false. The second sentence is either a lie or willfully ignorant.
Bob's analogy is not bad -- because it focuses on incompetence -- which is the major complaint at this point.
We are at war with people who want us wiped out, and by invading Iraq we attacked mostly an entirely different bunch of people. No significant link between Iraq and anti-U.S. terrorism, al-Qaeda, etc. existed before the invasion [eta -- except for the attempted assassination of Bush I] and no serious argument can now be made to the contrary.
Your use of 9/11 as justification for the Iraq war suggests that you have drunk the Kool-Aid. That tragedy did not make it a good idea for us to go around and start killing everyone who we think needed killing. Even if we're right, its a bad policy sometimes. The consequences could be worse than having left it alone.
As to Bush -- yeah, I just want him out, period. End of story. I'm really happy that it presently looks like the 2006 elections will be tough for the GOP on a national level. I like Cindy Sheehan because she hurts Bush. Period.
You essentially said -- "Bush's policy may be incompetent, but fuck-ups are better than doing nothing." It ain't necessarily so.
I watched Russert's show last Sunday -- where he had four retired Generals on to analyze the Iraq situation. They came from various political perspectives (Downing, Clark, Meigs, and another). I found it striking how their opinions of the situation in Iraq and the way it will likely look in a year differed largely by degree. e.g. They all said there will be an active insugency in the Sunni areas, and that the "Iraqi-ization" of the conflict will have to bear the burden -- but that the Iraqis are nowhere close to ready.
I was also struck by how Meigs was quietly scathing about the justifications used for the war and the way it was conducted (more so than Clark) -- if you read between the senior military double-speak. [Paraphrase -- "I think we as citizens are all frustrated by the way in which the justifications used to lead us into this war turned out to be incorrect -- and I think that the historians will tear them to shreds when the proper documents are declassified in 10, 20 or 30 years. "] It may just have been the format of the show, but not even Downing disagreed.
S_A_M
P.S. Thanks for sponsoring the Board.
