Politics: J'accuse!

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
I have plenty of batteries. And why would I particularly care if AG speaks to me? I mean, I have nothing against him and in fact think he's nifty, but if he refuses to speak to me because I went off on you for being a moron, that's kind of his issue.

Seriously, I think there is something mentally wrong with you. Have you papered your entire house and office with the happy pictures? What, do you want to hear "ooooh, everything is juuuuust fine. It's great. Don't you worry your pretty little head, clubby, papa W and uncle Rummy will take care of everything"?

You might want to take those batteries and get to work. Sounds like 45 minutes ought to about do it.

S_A_M

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
Too harsh. Club's implicit point is a valid one -- although tangential. There are hundreds of thousands of coalition personnel in Iraq -- most of them doing good things with good intentions. We as a nation invaded Iraq with noble intentions.

This effort is too important to allow the whole process to break down into partisan squabbling over abuses and incompetence that have moritified all of us, embarassed our nation, and severely harmed our "war effort."

Remember -- we want Iraq to be a stable, productive partner in the Middle East (democracy would be nice) -- AND we want Bush to lose the election. The first is more important than the second (although the scond may be necessary to achieve the first).

S_A_M

The road to hell....

A reason many of us had against going in was that we had no exit strategy and this seemed to be more a geo-political move than a move in the war on terror. As a geo-political move, it ignores what the last 100 years of colonial wars have taught us. It ignores what Conrad realized what he created Kurtz. And so it brings us to the inner station, a little prison in the vicinity of Baghdad.

[The Larry Davis Experience]

Originally posted by Gattigap
While we argue about which set of pictures best represents what's going on in Iraq, David Brooks has a good perspective on why we were, in retrospect, blindly idealistic on what would happen when we invaded, and how we have to be realistic about what'll happen when we leave.

Thanks for posting this.

I agree with Brooks' take going forward, but unsurprisingly I differ with the case he makes for why the admin was so idealistic in forecasting what would happen when we invaded. Brooks pays some lip service to "we were so sure our hearts were pure that we knew everyone would see us that way eventually." And maybe that's got more than a grain of truth in it. But in hindsight, at least to me, it really looks like the admin's forecasts of how the war would proceed are much like their choice of justifications for the war: they went with what would "sell".

We have heard the famous quotes about the WMD rationale being picked as the centerpiece because it was the rationale everyone could agree on. Similarly, I think the idealism Brooks describes was a product of the admin hawks realizing that people wouldn't be so willing sign on for a full-on nation building experience unless there was some indicator that the experience would be easier than other nation building situations, that the Iraqis would scatter rose petals at our feet, that we could draw down our forces to 30,000 in short order after the war because the Iraqis would step up and create an effective security force, that oil revenues would pay most of reconstruction "and soon".

Maybe that's too cynical, but to me this salesmanship would be a rational response by the admin in pursuing an invasion of Iraq that on the surface (and I would argue, even below the surface) bore only a limited relationship to the 9/11 attacks and the war on terror. I just don't buy the claims of others that this admin is "above" politics, that GWB makes choices and statements based on his gut feeling of what's "right".

In other words, I think what we're seeing now is the result of the disconnect between what has happened on the ground and the admin's lack of a conservative bias in its predictions and assessments. Mary Matalin was on Meet the Press this weekend and tried to make the case that by shifting the paradigm of our ME policy and engaging in this new robust military and foreign policy the admin should be expected and allowed to make mistakes. To some extent I can see her point, that it would be unfair to hold them to a standard of perfection. But in light of the fact that the admin did go out on a limb in bringing the case to the people (e.g. certain sketchy stories being proclaimed as evidence of Iraqi WMDs, forecasts of a more welcoming reception than we received, etc) I believe we as citizens are well-justified in holding the admin accountable for those erroneous projections.

Wow, that was wordy. Can you tell I'm procrastinating a little this morning? Sigh. I'd better get started on some real work before I surf over to amihotornot.com or something like that.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Did anyone else find it a bit odd that, rather than letting MG Taguba appear and testify alone, as the Senate Armed Services Committee has requested, the Pentagon _insisted_ that he appear with two superiors (the D_CINC of CENTCOM and Rumsfeld's top civiliam aide) -- and that those two superiors were to provide statements before anyone could ask Taguba questions?

Now, he is only a two-star (which at the Congressional testimony level is only a medium grade), but really . . . .

Nice PR.

S_A_M

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
You might want to take those batteries and get to work. Sounds like 45 minutes ought to about do it.

S_A_M

N/A. I have not been "saving up" a la Less. (I don't really see the point of that.) Whatever it is, it is not a lack of recent orgasms thing.* Nor is it PMS.** I am a weeeensy bit hungover.

*TMI, but you all started it.

**Again, TMI, this time pre-emptive.

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
Remember -- we want Iraq to be a stable, productive partner in the Middle East (democracy would be nice) -- AND we want Bush to lose the election. The first is more important than the second (although the scond may be necessary to achieve the first).

S_A_M

I appreciate this take. Our necessity to succeed in Iraq should be completely separated from who we want to win the election. If Kerry wins, I will be equally supportive of his attempts to succeed in Iraq as well.

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Oh please. While I agree with what you say, club's post was fucking ridiculous.

What was ridiculous about my post?

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by sgtclub
What was ridiculous about my post?

Issue: Murder, rape, torture, violations of Geneva Convention. Your response: Picture of happy people.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Issue: Murder, rape, torture, violations of Geneva Convention. Your response: Picture of happy people.

solution 1- we should all cut our wrists because US soldiers did vile acts.

solution 2- we should punish those who did wrong and get over it.

environmental factor- our enemy says if you capture a female soldier Allah has made her your slave!

Please discuss pros/cons of solution 1 and 2. please also feel free to propose other solutions.

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Issue: Murder, rape, torture, violations of Geneva Convention. Your response: Picture of happy people.

Read the title of my post. It was an attempt to remind us all that things are not quite as dire as they may first appear. Regardless, I don't see how my post offended you to the point of mouth foaming. I've posted far more offensive things countless number of times. Maybe you read too much into this particular post. Or maybe you just assumed what I was thinking. Either way, you've got serious issues.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by sgtclub
Either way, you've got serious issues.

Republicans and Democrats, we can all agree on this, right?

[Sexual Harassment Panda]

Originally posted by sgtclub
Read the title of my post. It was an attempt to remind us all that things are not quite as dire as they may first appear.

The lone picture in that article is all fine and good, but there's no context to judge it by. Where and when was it taken? Is it a recent picture, or is it left over from the first days of the war? Are those Kurdish children?

And trying to judge the overall situation from that picture is just as bad as trying to do so from one featuring Pfc. England. More recent polls suggest that the Iraqis are not as happy as they used to be about us being there:

http://www.tallahassee.com/mld/democ...on/8623441.htm

Most Americans aren't as happy as we used to be about it, either.

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
solution 1- we should all cut our wrists because US soldiers did vile acts.

solution 2- we should punish those who did wrong and get over it.

environmental factor- our enemy says if you capture a female soldier Allah has made her your slave!

Please discuss pros/cons of solution 1 and 2. please also feel free to propose other solutions.

Problem 1: We fought this war for the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people.*

Problem 2: When the Administration wants to take credit for all the good stuff done by individual soldiers in Iraq, and none of the bad stuff, the Iraqi people ain't havin' it, especially when they can point to (1) internal military belief that this resulted from command failures; and (2) historical proof that this sort of thing is endemic to cross-racial colonial occupations, and the Iraqi people are free to assume GWB graduated from high school and did the required reading there.

Problem 3: The perpetrator of a crime is never allowed to "get over it." It's the victim that's supposed to get over it. And any person who suggests that this should happen even a second sooner than the victim feels is appropriate is an asshole.

Cut our wrists? No. Believe that this calls into doubt America's moral authority for unilateral action to overthrow dictatorships? Yes, but I believed we had no such authority before this war, much less these pictures.

*2004 version, for the sake of argument.

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by Sexual Harassment Panda
The lone picture in that article is all fine and good, but there's no context to judge it by. Where and when was it taken? Is it a recent picture, or is it left over from the first days of the war? Are those Kurdish children?

This is certainly a fair critique. I note that you did not attack my motives, but rather, just the substance of the post.

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by sgtclub
This is certainly a fair critique. I note that you did not attack my motives, but rather, just the substance of the post.

Get a room.