Politics: A new beginning

[Not Me]

Originally posted by sgtclub
Did anybody catch the Howard Dean interview on Hardball the other day. He repeatedly referred to Russia as the Soviet Union. Seems to me this is on par with potatoe and Bush not being able to name certain foriegn leaders, but that's just me.

Agreed.

BTW - Why is Dean so angry? NTTAWWT. He has had such an easy, nice life. There seems to be no reason.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by bilmore
It's ludicrous for anyone who knows this to buy into it. Tet was a made-up loss, specifically made-up to serve the desires of the writers, and those writers succeeded, because they turned public opinion around with their mischaracterizations and lost the war for us. It's like you're saying that we're not really having any real problems, but the press wants us to think that we're having real problems, so, yeah, we're having real problems, even though we're not having any real problems except for the press telling us we're having real problems . . .

Are you one of those people who thinks we would have won in Vietnam if only the press hadn't caused so much trouble? How interesting!

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by bilmore
It's ludicrous for anyone who knows this to buy into it. Tet was a made-up loss, specifically made-up to serve the desires of the writers, and those writers succeeded, because they turned public opinion around with their mischaracterizations and lost the war for us. It's like you're saying that we're not really having any real problems, but the press wants us to think that we're having real problems, so, yeah, we're having real problems, even though we're not having any real problems except for the press telling us we're having real problems . . .

Well, OK. Frankly, I remember little about the Tet offensive, so I'll leave this to you and Ty to sort out.

I will observe, though, that the blog you cited is (a) encouraging as a recap of abysmal Ba'athist military strategy, but (b) light on its assessment of effectiveness as a guerilla campaign. As Ty has stated, it is a different kind of war, and even if it sucks ass as a tactical matter, it might not, um, matter if the populace loses faith in the proposition that the Americans will restore order.

As to how that's going, it seems to me that noone really knows (yet). They're all staring at different parts of the elephant, and the conservatives are focusing on the tusks, while the liberals find themselves facing the tail. We're still struggling for a sense of perspective on it.

Meantime, Jim Hoagland of WaPo observes that this isn't really a nationalist struggle, or one (at the moment) engaged in by a significant swath of the ethnic populations. It's about the Ba'athists who reeeeeealy want the power back, and it's about the money.

Gatti(a tractor trailer full of cash and gold bars? Jesus. Three Kings redux)gap

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Are you one of those people who thinks we would have won in Vietnam if only the press hadn't caused so much trouble? How interesting!

Actually, to a great degree, yes. (But, count in "pacifist pols", too.)

I was one of those rabidly-anti-war types - SDS, etc. - whose massed millions eventually caused us to limit our involvement to unwinnable levels, and then pull out. (A great regret of my life, as I now see that I was completely on the wrong side of that.) We didn't lose that war - we simply allowed ourselves to be led in dishonest and untruthful ways into a great national consensus that was flat-out wrong. We were sheep, led by the PC of those times and an oversimplistic, and, I think now, racist, view of life. I fear the same fate for our fight in Iraq. We could easily win this, but, if we get convinced by more lies, we won't - we'll underman a battle while concentrating on placards and banners that don't reflect reality.

There was a great article/op-ed in the (gasp!) LA Times a few weeks back that set out a position mirroring my own, quite nicely. I'll try to find it. It says this all better than I can.

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Gattigap
It's about the Ba'athists who reeeeeealy want the power back

Is using the word "reeeeeeeally" the same as using "really, really, really" or is it more like using just "really, really"?

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Gattigap
As Ty has stated, it is a different kind of war, and even if it sucks ass as a tactical matter, it might not, um, matter if the populace loses faith in the proposition that the Americans will restore order.

But you end up pushing a tautology with that view. The populace will lose faith if the "we're losing, and we suck" myth keeps getting repeated, and the mantra here is to repeat it, because it might effect public opinion, and so it might end up being true . . .

This just strikes me as the least self-aware, most self-damning argument I have ever encountered. Not yours in particular - I mean the whole idea that it might be going bad, someone says it might be going bad, it's really not but it's being repeated, so it's going bad . . We're the ones who would have to be convinced, and it seems like a complete abdication of independent thought to buy into this.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by bilmore
Actually, to a great degree, yes. (But, count in "pacifist pols", too.)

I was one of those rabidly-anti-war types - SDS, etc. - whose massed millions eventually caused us to limit our involvement to unwinnable levels, and then pull out. (A great regret of my life, as I now see that I was completely on the wrong side of that.) We didn't lose that war - we simply allowed ourselves to be led in dishonest and untruthful ways into a great national consensus that was flat-out wrong. We were sheep, led by the PC of those times and an oversimplistic, and, I think now, racist, view of life. I fear the same fate for our fight in Iraq. We could easily win this, but, if we get convinced by more lies, we won't - we'll underman a battle while concentrating on placards and banners that don't reflect reality.

This is all much too big a question to hash out here. Suffice it to say that it seems to me that whether we could prevail in Vietnam was also a question of what was actually happening in Vietnam, and it seems telling to me that your post has more to say about "the PC of those times"* on the home front than it does about the conduct of the war. As for recent op-ed pieces, this one strikes me as a good response to the preening from that blog.

* Sebby won't care, but those must have been some pretty cutting-edge folks to be so far in front on the PC thing.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by bilmore
But you end up pushing a tautology with that view. The populace will lose faith if the "we're losing, and we suck" myth keeps getting repeated, and the mantra here is to repeat it, because it might effect public opinion, and so it might end up being true . . .

This just strikes me as the least self-aware, most self-damning argument I have ever encountered. Not yours in particular - I mean the whole idea that it might be going bad, someone says it might be going bad, it's really not but it's being repeated, so it's going bad . . We're the ones who would have to be convinced, and it seems like a complete abdication of independent thought to buy into this.

So the conservative response is to say, the war is going great because it is, and anyone who says otherwise is a victim of false thinking. You, of course, are a free thinker, but if someone disagrees with you, they are simply "repeating" a "mantra." (E.g., PC cant.) Please.

If and when the war loses public support, it's going to be because the situation is flawed and our policy is a mess, not because the media let the military down.

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by bilmore
But you end up pushing a tautology with that view. The populace will lose faith if the "we're losing, and we suck" myth keeps getting repeated, and the mantra here is to repeat it, because it might effect public opinion, and so it might end up being true . . .

This just strikes me as the least self-aware, most self-damning argument I have ever encountered. Not yours in particular - I mean the whole idea that it might be going bad, someone says it might be going bad, it's really not but it's being repeated, so it's going bad . . We're the ones who would have to be convinced, and it seems like a complete abdication of independent thought to buy into this.

No, no -- I meant the Iraqi populace.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Gattigap
No, no -- I meant the Iraqi populace.

Well, why would you let me rant on that long without interrupting me to tell me that? That's just rude.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
So the conservative response is to say, the war is going great because it is, and anyone who says otherwise is a victim of false thinking

No, the correct response is to deal with facts. As many facts as possible, from many sources. Accurately reported facts. (Shorthand here would be, not NYT facts, I guess.)

[The Larry Davis Experience]

Originally posted by bilmore
Larry wants to "analyze" this. Uh huh. How's this analysis - they fucked that one up. I suspect that that statement is what Larry will call "analysis". What he terms "analysis, I call repetition of points that you want to make. It's a valid criticism - but, really, you want to "analyze" it? Right.

I think you're missing me, since I was responding to Hank's comment that "Here again, Saddam's guys made some choices that complicate getting Iraq going again, but I don't see how bitching about our not "predicting or preparing" for those choices makes much sense."

Perhaps "analysis" was a poor choice of words. I just wanted to differentiate "bitching" from actually thinking about whether what we're doing the right thing over there with my dollar and in my country's name. Unlike Hank's comment, I think the examination of our preparation and execution of the reconstruction does make sense.

But maybe you don't. If you see me as repetitive, I suggest you skip over the rest of my posts, since I plan to continue to hold these views.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by The Larry Davis Experience
I think you're missing me, since I was responding to Hank's comment that "Here again, Saddam's guys made some choices that complicate getting Iraq going again, but I don't see how bitching about our not "predicting or preparing" for those choices makes much sense."

Quite possible, as I was attempting to go back and collect and respond to the "facts" and "arguments" that SAM keeps claiming I was ignoring. I ended up reading snippets, so it's likely that I misunderstood your point.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

bilmore, what have you read recently that gives you hope for the way the fighting in and reconstruction of Iraq are going lately?

[The Larry Davis Experience]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
As to the money, in context of the overall military budget, its not that much percent of a single year's spending. As to presenting the question, or facts, to the american people, he repeatedly said it will be tough, long and expensive. We were basically defying a large percentage of the world. You thought it would be cheap?

Uh, my point is that the manner in which we defied the rest of the world made it more expensive for us. I did not think it would be cheap. By the way, I think your "it's that much percent" argument is fairly misplaced in this discussion, and not just because $87 billion represents more than 20% of the FY03 military budget.

I think it's fair to say that there were some mixed messages sent about the cost of this enterprise, and that Bush clearly stated at some point or other that this would not be easy. However, you choose to ignore the other messages that were sent that the sacrifices would be minimal. I found Replaced Texan's post about his/her (not a big fan of the "em" thing) grandmother kind of interesting in this regard. She's waiting for the oil revenues to pay for it all, just like it seemed a majority of the country thought Saddam had a hand in 9/11 up until very recently. I don't think that's because they all were hanging out with Fluffer down at the rehab clinic.

I find it interesting that despite Bush's rhetoric the only sacrifices that are being made are by those who are in our military and the future taxpayers who will have to pay off this deficit spending.

I'm was using France, as shorthand. Please do feel free to underestimate me, though.

I guess I read a certain sneer into all admin supporters references to France, after the whole freedom fries debacle. My apologies. I fully estimate you.

Iraq was allowing sham inspections because the US had massed hundreds of thousands of troops on its border. That costs, both in dollars and the soldiers lives being disrupted. We had been "inspecting" for 10 years. France/Germany/Russia were not changing their position with any amount of time.

You are smarter than this. If Bush timed this for the election, it would happen next June or so.
You do recognize that the heat posed a closing window, that did make waiting a few months impossible. A decision to wait a few months would be a decision to wait a year. We had soldiers there. We knew they'd be there for awhile if we went in when we did. Is it fair to add a year to how long they'd be there?

My point was only that the timing factors that forced us to go in when we did were predicated on the fact that we had deployed troops to Kuwait long prior to that time. The decision on when to deploy was made by the same people who cry that "we had no time to wait." If you think that makes the deadline an inevitability, that's your prerogative.

I believe there were political and military alternatives that could have been explored, and your conclusory statements about what France/Germany/Russia were going to do don't really do much to change that. This probably means you will find my views to be unrealistic. I can accept that.

On an unrelated note, I miss the headdress. I think it'd be cool if you started working in some other hats, maybe a fez or a cowboy hat or one of those cool kaiser-era helmets with the spike on top. (Please note that no political statements were intended in my choice of examples.)


edited to fix tags, and you're not alone in reading the sneer factor into references to France -- T.S.