An important and long-overlooked point about the depravity, corruption and truly un-American impulses which define so many Bush followers is revealed by a comparison of these two statements:
Howard Dean, December 5, 2005
Saying the "idea that we're going to win the war in Iraq is an idea which is just plain wrong," Democratic National Chairman Howard Dean predicted today that the Democratic Party will come together on a proposal to withdraw National Guard and Reserve troops immediately, and all US forces within two years. . . .
"I've seen this before in my life. This is the same situation we had in Vietnam. Everybody then kept saying, 'just another year, just stay the course, we'll have a victory.' Well, we didn't have a victory, and this policy cost the lives of an additional 25,000 troops because we were too stubborn to recognize what was happening."
William F. Buckley, Jr. in The National Review, yesterday
One can't doubt that the American objective in Iraq has failed. . . .
Our mission has failed because Iraqi animosities have proved uncontainable by an invading army of 130,000 Americans. . . . .
[Bush] will certainly face the current development as military leaders are expected to do: They are called upon to acknowledge a tactical setback, but to insist on the survival of strategic policies. Yes, but within their own counsels, different plans have to be made. And the kernel here is the acknowledgment of defeat. . . .
These statements, made within a little over two months of each other, are almost identical. If anything, Buckley's statements are a much more emphatic declaration of defeat.
When Dean stated two months ago that we were not winning in Iraq and could not win, Bush followers trotted out their common but literally deranged rhetoric of accusing anyone who opposes the war in Iraq (or Bush terrorism policies) of being a coward, of committing treason, and being a traitor to their country. Indeed, since 2002, Bush followers have been regularly accusing their political opponents who oppose that war of subversion and treason, even as a majority Americans have come to oppose the war in Iraq.
In light of Buckley’s comments, let’s review some of the reaction among Bush followers to Dean’s identical comments about Iraq just two short months ago:
Jim Geraghty, writing in Bill Buckley’s own National Review:
The unified message from the President and GOP surrogates is, "Victory! Elections! They stand up, we stand down!" The message from at least the Dean wing of the Democratic party is, "Withdraw! Defeat! Withdraw! Defeat!"
I think any statement from a national leader that sounds like, "we have been defeated in Iraq" is political nitroglycerin. Families of the troops will be livid at the suggestion that their sons and daughters have failed to achieve their mission.
Should families of the troops be "livid" at Bill Buckley?
Michelle Malkin, the day after Dean's comments:
"Howard the Coward"
The Jawa Report, the day after Dean's comments:
Howard Dean Traitor and Ally to Zaqueery
OK Mr. Traitor, Howie says Mr. Bush is not our enemy. Drop me a line when you wake up to who the actual enemy is. Once again the Left attacks America and
gives terror a free pass.
Ben Shapiro, in an essay bearing the all-American title: "Should we prosecute sedition?" (h/t Hume's Ghost)
Much of the language of the "loyal opposition" has been anything but loyal. . .
Howard Dean, the head of the DNC, averred in December that the "idea that we're going to win the war in Iraq is an idea which is just plain wrong."
At some point, opposition must be considered disloyal. At some point, the American people must say "enough." At some point, Republicans in Congress must stop delicately tiptoeing with regard to sedition and must pass legislation to prosecute such sedition.
And then here was Michael Reagan-- who just happened to appear as guest host on Hannity & Colmes last night, appropriately sitting in for Sean Hannity -- issuing this death sentence for Howard Dean due to Dean's observation (now echoed by Bill Buckley) that we are not winning in Iraq:
Michael Reagan, son of the late President Ronald Reagan, is blasting Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean for declaring that the U.S. won't be able to win the war in Iraq, saying Dean ought to be "hung for treason."
"Howard Dean should be arrested and hung for treason or put in a hole until the end of the Iraq war!" Reagan told his Radio America audience on Monday. Reagan was reacting to Dean's comments earlier in the day, when the top Democrat said that the "idea that we're going to win the war in Iraq is an idea which is just plain wrong."
All of these declarations of treason and calls for criminal prosecution against Dean were based exclusively on his statement that we were not winning in Iraq -- exactly the same statement Buckley made yesterday.
This grotesque exploitation for domestic political gain of patriotism, loyalty and bravery is the single most frequently used rhetorical tactic of Bush followers over the last five years. During this same time, we have been hearing all sorts of complaints about the "Angry Left." Similarly, that the "lefty blogosphere" is composed of enraged, epithet-spewing cretins has become the newly unveiled conventional wisdom among the status-threatened establishment media. And yet, it has become so common as to be routine for Bush followers to stridently accuse their domestic political opponents of being cowards, subversives and traitors, and, increasingly, to call for their imprisonment and/or execution.
While Michael Reagan’s statement about Dean surely was -- in one sense -- one of the single most despicable comments from any political figure in the last decade (and was condemned by virtually nobody), in another sense his comment was not really all that notable. Bush followers have made it a regular staple of our political dialogue for critics of the war in Iraq and/or Bush’s terrorism policies to be accused of subversion and treason.
This is a real question: by the standards which have become commonplace among Bush followers, isn’t Bill Buckley clearly a traitor? We are (of course) in the middle of a war. That war (in Iraq) is the central front in another war we're fighting (the War on Terror, a/k/a the War of Civilizations, World War III, World War IV, the Long War). To surrender in Iraq is -- to use the White House's formulation -- to "surrender to the terrorists." Bill Buckley is clearly on the other side - the side of terrorists. And what a coward he is.
Worse, there are American troops in harm’s way and here is Bill Buckley declaring that Bush has lost the war and should acknowledge America's defeat. Doesn’t Buckley owe the troops an apology? He should be spat on by the families of those troops.
This really is the lowly point to which Bush followers have dragged this country. To oppose the American war in Iraq -- a war that is turning out to be the greatest and most disastrous strategic mistake this country has ever made – has long been sufficient for one to be branded a coward and a subversive. To question the President’s policies on terrorism has resulted in even more severe accusations.
Bill Buckley has now unmasked himself as a cowardly, anti-American ally of Al Qaeda. He wants to wave the white flag to terrorists, and has sabatoged the Commander-in-Chief’s war effort by declaring it a failure. Shouldn’t we bring criminal charges against Buckley, along with demands that he be hanged? On what ground can any of the Bush followers who have long equated opposition to the war with subversion and treason -- and who branded Howard Dean a traitor for a statement identical to the one Buckley made -- oppose those efforts?
The great patriot and American hero Ben Shapiro can prepare Buckley’s noose while that brave American warrior Michael Reagan places the hood over his head and those lovers of American values Michelle Malkin and John Hinderaker lead the throngs as they yell "traitor" and "coward" at Buckley while his neck snaps. That’s the horrendous image which has come to represent the sad, almost-psychotic state of political dialogue which Bush followers have imposed on our country. And that’s just one of the comparatively small harms which the Bush movement has inflicted on America which is going to take quite some time to repair.
UPDATE: As much as they want to, Bush followers can't revoke Buckley's credentials as a conservative since . . . well, he sort of invented conservatism. So, instead, they are now declaring that conservativsm is different than the Bush movement -- something I've been arguing (to the dismay of Bush followers) for quite some time.
Here is Bush lover Captian Ed -- explaining away Bill Buckley -- in the Captain's revealingly entitled post "The Difference Between Bush and Conservatives":
Today's opinion piece by William F. Buckley, the father of American conservatism, highlights the difference between traditional conservatives and the Bush Administration's efforts in foreign policy, along with a host of other arenas.
Bush 43 is not a conservative in foreign policy, at least since 9/11 taught him that genocidal tyrannies in Southwest Asia could produce immediate and existential threats to the American homeland. He has been much closer to Woodrow Wilson than his father or even Ronald Reagan in his reaction to the world.
Bush, of course, is not a "conservative" in domestic policy either, as his record deficit spending, including discretionary non-security-related spending, rather conclusively demonstrates.
As this confession from the Captain reflects, when forced to choose between conservative principles or loyalty to Bush, Bush followers will expressly toss conservativsm overboard and disclaim an association with its principles. I'm pretty sure that was the central theme of an argument I made a week or so ago (entitled "Do Bush Followers Have a Political Ideology?") upon which Bush followers heaped such enraged scorn. It seems that they're coming around to this view, all in a week's time.
That's what will happen when the Father of the political ideology to which they have deceitfully proclaimed allegiance publicly proclaims the crown jewel of the Bush movement to be an abject failure. "It doesn't matter that Buckley says that, because we're not conservatives; we're Bushites." Exactly.
UPDATE II: I have a post up today at Crooks and Liars examining the question of whose judgment was more accurate and wise with regard to Iraq -- Howard Dean's or George Bush's? As their pre-war predictions reveal, it's not exactly a closely contested competition. This matters greatly because we have a serious crisis on our hands in Iraq and Americans must decide whose judgment they believe is entitled to respect with regard to what we ought to do now.
Glenn - sorry to post this twice - but it will help the ones who requested a bit of HTML help.
ReplyDeleteFor Tech-no-Dweebs (and I come as a Highly Certified Tech-no Dweeb as any you find on the Internets!! *wink* Oh and I am the QUEEN of TYPOS)
Easy to use HTML TAGS:
These things inside brackets *< and >* - are called *tags* and must be in pairs. The first TAG turns the feature *ON* the last tage turns if *OFF* (And OFF is represented by a * / * in front of the symbol inside the brackets for the ON tag.
Tags are placed in a *NESTING* order as you type them - such that IF you BOLD, then ITALICS the closing tags will be put in the reverse order: ITALICS, then BOLD to turn them OFF.
As you can read on the top of the "Leave your Comment" space are three TAGS listed - but only in the ON form. (You type the ON Tag first and then complete with the OFF tag at the end of the commentby adding / to the tag.)
NOW, Blogger will not let me type the actual TAGS and leave them visible for you to see. But they are just like you see on the top of the "Leave a Comment" section above.
b = BOLD
i = ITALICS
a = For making a URL link - the full ON part of a URL link starts as --
a bracket facing like this: <
Then type this: a href="
Then you put the complete URL Link - i.e. -
http://nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories/2006/0223n
Then add a *quote* (") and bracket ( > ) (facing the the direction shown.)
After this * > * bracket symbol you must write a name for what the link goes to (and this will become the highlighted and underlined LINK) - Give it a name - Like "National Journal Article"
Then finish the TAG with the OFF symbol for this *a* tag: Type a bracket facing this way < then / and then the letter *a* and followed by a bracket facing this way > .
IT will come out like this:
National Journal Article.
Two tricks - (1) commas which are slanted sometimes dont work properly. (2) and , if you type this tag backwards as in * / * then * a *-- this will underline everything which comes after!! (A typical typo of mine. *smile*)
Other useful tags - But not in allowed in BLOGGER - can be these:
blockquote = BLOCKQUOTE
u = UNDERLINE
strike = STRIKE-THROUGH
and here is page for some simple HTML basics.
So give this a TRY!! and hope to see some nice and easy links to your next URL references!
Ooops I meant -- if you type this a tag backwards as in * a * then * / * -- this will underline everything which comes after!!
ReplyDeleteSorry.
Damn hypocrites.
ReplyDeleteRight now we're hearing the insurgency is just too strong, but how long do you think it will be before the meme starts circulating that we lost Iraq because of the press and "liberals"?
Now for a real comment.
ReplyDeleteIt will be most interesting to see how much *wriggle* room these staunch sedition prosecutors will allow for One of Their Own as they provide cover and excuses and waffle (Can anyone say "Flip-Flop, Flip-Flop") over this point.
Let's see the deafening SILENCE from the Righie-Bloggisphere on this one.
;-)
Let's try that karen-
ReplyDeleteBush Rats
Don't hold your breath, the wingnuts will find a way out of this. They have spent the last 5 years (or more) carefully honing their skills of denial and supression of cognitive dissonance.
ReplyDeleteThey will figure something out, but I do eagerly await the repsonse of the corner (although the cowardly Jonah Goldberg will probably just ignore it).
For whatever it's worth: I've been maintaining a list of links to key news stories, essays, even a photoessay, explaining in general terms how we were misled into the war, why it's going badly, THAT it's going badly, what it's costing us, etc. My intention is that people can give the link to conservatives who are starting to second-guess the war and need to be convinced. They can read it at leisure, none of it's shrill, and hopefully it's persuasive, or at least demonstrates that we liberals (you know, Glenn, Dean, Buckley) aren't just stupid.
ReplyDeleteUse if it it's helpful. Links Resource: The Mishandling of Iraq
Sometime in the future, perhaps not for many years, historians will once again read what was written by those who opposed Iraq and Bush's preemptive war doctrine and see it objectively for what it was. Much of what was said and written was clear thinking and clear headed. Those who avoided the emotional fervor fueled by revenge for 9/11 could see the folly of the path being pursued - the simplemindedness, the unrealistic nature of it.
ReplyDeleteWe are like a herd that was being stampeded over the hill - to a valley of danger. At first, a few in the herd see the danger - but the herd pushes them forward. We are at a tipping point, most of the herd now realizes that we've made a mistake. Those at the back are still urging us on.
Wow. That was beautiful. I'm glad you're on our side, Glenn.
ReplyDeleteWell, I’m afraid that the right and Rove’s response to Buckley (and other Republicans who disagree) will simply be to ignore them, and continue to pretend that is only lefty Democratic “moonbats” who oppose Bush.
ReplyDeleteThey did that on the NSA issue pretending that only Democrats opposed warrantless wiretapping, and they’ll do it on the war in Iraq as well.
What other response can they have? They can’t really acknowledge that Buckley is a traitor, so we must just throw this back at them time again like Glenn did today.
I’d love to hear this question raised on Sunday Morning talk shows and other cable shows, but I’m not holding my breath. There’s a double standard for rhetoric of Bush supporters and Bush opponents. It’s been going on a long time, and it’s time to end it.
Oh, and let’s not forget that Buckley is not only a traitor, but a “smelly hippie” too. The “hippies smell” to describe all Bush opponents is big-selling theme on “conservative” t-shirts. Silly, but true.
They were wrong on Civil Rights.
ReplyDeleteThey were wrong on Viet Nam.
They were wrong on Watergate.
They were wrong on Iran-contra.
They were wrong the first Gulf War.
They were wrong on universal health insurance.
They were wrong on Whitewater.
They were wrong on the Clinton impeachment.
They were wrong on the 2000 election.
They were wrong on the Iraq invasion.
They were wrong on Abu Ghraib.
They were wrong on the swiftboat vets.
They were wrong on Terri Shiavo.
They were wrong on New Orleans.
They are wrong on Plamegate.
They are wrong on the FISA law.
They are wrong on the "war on terra."
They have been wrong on essentially every issue for the past 50 years, and they have retained power through fear, slander, and demonization, and through outright preversion of language and the destruction of decent public discourse. No wonder their world view is so deranged and perverted.
Much of what was said and written was clear thinking and clear headed. Those who avoided the emotional fervor fueled by revenge for 9/11 could see the folly of the path being pursued - the simplemindedness, the unrealistic nature of it.
ReplyDeleteMary - This is so true. I am actually working on a post right now on this topic which will be posted a little later at C&L. If you read Howard Dean's pre-war speeches as to why invading Iraq was so misguided and counter-productive, it is genuinely staggering how prescient he was and how accurate his predictions turned out to be.
Of course, Howard Dean was dismissed and caricatured as some sort of pacifist freak, even though nothing could be further from the truth. He emphatically advocated the need to fight wars when doing so is necessary to defend a country's vital interest, but argued that, for many reasons - all of which turned out to be exactly right - the invasion of Iraq was not in our interest.
But that debate could not even be had, precisely because of the tactics that I describe in this post. To raise questions about the Leader's war made you a traitor and a coward, and that was the end of that.
It is worth remembering who was right about their predictions concerning the war - and who was very, very wrong about pretty much everything - not because it's the time for recriminations or because of the satisfaction that comes from some sort of "I-told-you-so" moment, but because we are in a very serious and troublesome situation there still and the country has to decide whose judgment it trust from this point forward.
Guess it really all depends on how you define "winning" in Iraq. If the chimperor wanted to destablilize the region, create civil unrest, destroy the country, build permanent bases, promote a civil war, extend our military presence there indefinitely, destroy the countries infrastructure and refining capacity and create a reason to move into Iran nextto exten our "perpetual war", then Iraq has been a smashing success.
ReplyDeleteIf the purpose was feed the military-industrial complex that the bush family has been involved with for generations, Iraq is going exceptionally well.
Bush family fortune did not come from oil (anther lie), it came from financing the nazis in WWII.
The oil industry (major piece of the military-industrial complex) is making record profits -- war was an outstanding success for them too.
Wish we would move past the "competency" debates -- some are making profits beyond avarice on chimpy's policies. He may be a etulent, idiot child; but he is doing someone else's dirty work exactly as planned.
let's not sink into the same sewer the Bush Administration and its servants have. I urge caution in tone, if not action.
ReplyDeleteGlenn’s post is clearly a rhetorical flourish used to expose the hypocrisy of Bush supporters, and unlike Shapiro and company (who are serious), I don’t anyone will seriously believe that Glenn is calling for Buckley to be executed.
I’m not worried about this “tone” at all, deriding Bushites for their strident tone is most welcome, and this is simply the most effective way to do it.
karen, mcl -- why not just provide links to websites that clearly explain and illustrate this. I have seen "sandbox" sites that even let you practice.
ReplyDeleteDo we really need to turn this into an HTML 101 when there are GREAT resources online that will answer all of these questions and even provide a grounds to test them?
Just my opinion -- feel free to disagree
how long do you think it will be before the meme starts circulating that we lost Iraq because of the press and "liberals"?
ReplyDeleteWell they have been working on it all along -- was subtly used against kerry in 2004. They could not directly hammer us with it, however, cuz it was more important to proclaim "mission accomplished" and that things were going GRRRRRRRRREAT!
When it becomes impossible to maintain that lie, they have been laying the groundwork to blame the war's oppontents.
After all, people that steal elections really were never concerned about "accountability" in the first place.
Bill Buckley's a liberal. Given that, to say he's a traitor and deserves to be hung is just redundant.
ReplyDeleteI agree with much of what David Shaughnessy said. The decision to invade Iraq was calamitous. Now, the consequences of either staying or leaving Iraq are both potentially dire. It's hard to argue with the sentiment "No blood for oil," but the economic dislocations that would result from the U.S. and the West being cut off from supplies of cheap oil would be massive. (See James Kunstler's Clusterfuck Nation chronicles at www.kunstler.com.)
ReplyDeleteI'm not arguing that we should stay, or even that staying in Iraq would necessarily preserve our (temporary) supplies of cheap oil. It's not clear to me what the right course of action is here (other than prosecuting the idiots who got us into this mess).
Glenn, I think your scorn for the wingnuts of blogosphere has been well-earned. But I think the real culprits are the MSM, who feign "balance" while forcing neocon memes down the throats of the average American (like 'Abramoff = bipartisan scandal', 'Ann Coulter = Michael Moore', 'Gore = liar', 'Kerry & Bush campaigns = both exaggerate' etc. etc.).
(BTW, thanks, karen mcl, for that useful note about tags!)
Creepiness Factors Surrounding the Bush Clan
ReplyDeleteor
Tricky Dick Was Bush-League Compared to Chimpy
I am sure it will offend some, just one interpretation of history. Let’s just look at the “creepiness factors” here.
The Bush family fortune did not come from oil -- it came from financing the Nazis in WW I. There was an investigation (official record) and I believe some assets were frozen and even seized.
In fact, some say the Prescotts and other powerful elites were actually behind Hitler's rise to power in Germany. Think about this – it is a fact that the propaganda techniques had their roots in America. Was Hitler an evil genius or a stupid puppet -- anyone else see some scary possibilities here.
George Bush I namesake and maternal grandfather, George Herbert 'Bert' Walker, was a native of St. Louis, who founded the banking and investment firm of G. H. Walker and Company in 1900. Herbert "Bert" Walker controlled Smith and Wesson. The brownshirts in the streets of 1920s Germany were armed with Smith and Wesson revolvers, which they got for free from Fritz Thyssen (of Thyssen/Krupp), who got them wholesale from Walker.
George’s grandfather, Prescott is responsible for bringing Richard Nixon into politics, set him up, and provided direction and support.
George I was involved with the CIA many years before being its director under Gerald Ford. He was involved with the Bay of Pigs. Some believe he has connections, direct or indirect, with JFK assassination. If you do not accept the Warren Commission, and most Americans don’t, then the murder of an elected president was nothing less than a coup d’etat. It is a verified fact, that the rest of the world accepts though it was never given the press it deserved, that chimpy did not win in 2000 – another coup d’tat?
If you think the JFK case is convoluted and full of lies – check of the RFK murder! Most certainly this paved the way for tricky dick to get into the Whitehouse (remember, this is Prescott’s main man). Isn’t this, in many ways, a coup too? While we’re at it – Martin Luther King’s murder was the result of a conspiracy – at least that is what a judge and jury decided when they heard the evidence. How come the rest of America never heard the evidence?
Nixon could not have possibly resigned over the Watergate burglary -- this is minor league stuff, especially by today's standards. What possibly could have been on that 18-minute gap that cannot be recovered with today's technology? You know that you cannot actually erase your hard-drive this clean. A secretary certainly did not erase these tapes in this matter by herself. No -- this is not a direct Bush thing, unless there was direct, indirect involvement with JFK murder. Any other speculation as to what was on that tape?
The Reagan assassination attempt was done by the son of a close bush family friend -- while Ronald ran as an aggressive, "reform" type in 1980, he became a passive "hands-off" delegate after the assassination attempt. Coincidence -- Nancy Reagan could not stand the Bushes.
If you can accept that there was Bush involvement with the CIA and perhaps even the Reagan assassination attempt, then please look at this link:
http://www.mackwhite.com/lennon.html
Neil Bush was a major player in the Savings and Loan scandal -- cost us billions. He told congress that he received million dollar loans that were "forgiven" and that this "happens all the time." Does anyone else think this makes chimpy's Social Security con more reprehensible?
Bush Sr. was having breakfast with Bakr bin Laden, brother of Osama, the morning of 9/11, at a Carlyle Group shareholders meeting.
The Bush administration was specifically warned about planes being used as weapons and that “Bin Ladin Determined to Attack US” yet they claimed “who could have known?”
The Bush administration was specifically warned about the need to rebuild NOLA levees and was specifically warned about Hurricane Katrina, yet they claimed “who could have known?”
Iraq, a war that Bush I refused to continue fighting in after Desert Storm, was allowed to progress into what is now being more widely accepted as “the gates of hell” and a civil war. This after the American public was told “we would be greeted as liberators” and “mission accomplished. The oil industry, however, is making record profits that are astonishingly high and the military-industrial complex is making BILLIONS in profits – much of the federal money they receive (hundreds of billions) cannot be accounted for. Outrageous billings for services and supplies are the order of the day – but billions are just “disappearing” into the war machine’s deep pockets.
Is it possible that the Bush family has connections to some of the most disturbing events in the past 100 years?
I humbly present this for discussion only, not as fact – “Gemstone” files style, seeking to promote dialog. Much of this would never be verifiable if true – run these topics through your favorite “search engine,” see what you find, decide for your self, and share your ideas.
Bush Was Right
ReplyDeleteWritten by: Frank Highland
Freedom in Afghanistan, say goodbye Taliban
Free elections in Iraq, Saddam Hussein locked up
Osama’s staying underground, Al Qaida now is finding out
America won’t turn and run once the fighting has begun
Libya turns over nukes, Lebanese want freedom, too
Syria is forced to leave, don’t you know that all this means
Chorus
Bush was right!
Bush was right!
Bush was right!
Democracy is on the way, hitting like a tidal wave
All over the middle east, dictators walk with shaky knees
Don’t know what they’re gonna do,
their worst nightmare is coming true
They fear the domino effect, they’re all wondering who’s next
Repeat Chorus
Ted Kennedy – wrong!
Cindy Sheehan – wrong!
France – wrong!
Zell Miller – right!
glenn writes:
ReplyDeleteBush followers have made it a regular staple of our political dialogue for critics of the war in Iraq and/or Bush’s terrorism policies to be accused of subversion and treason.
So true, but let's not forget that the fish rots from the head:
"So I ask all Americans to hold their elected leaders to account and demand a debate that brings credit to our democracy, not comfort to our adversaries."- GWB
Article Three of the U.S. Constitution:
Section 3: Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.
"Irresponsible" debate = comforted enemies = treason
So sayeth Dear Leader
So true, but let's not forget that the fish rots from the head:
ReplyDeleteYou're absolutely right. I've written a lot about Bush's increasing tendency to use the language of treason when describing his domestic political opponents.
This is what the White House said (in the CNN link I included in my post) about Jack Murtha when he called for a strategic deployment of our troops based on the Buckley Theory - that we aren't winning:
But McClellan added, "The eve of an historic democratic election in Iraq is not the time to surrender to the terrorists."
Opposing the war on Iraq = surrender to terrorists.
Someone needs to shut down National Review and quick. They're like Al-Jazeera now.
Mary Robinson said:
ReplyDelete"Sometime in the future, perhaps not for many years, historians will once again read what was written by those who opposed Iraq and Bush's preemptive war doctrine and see it objectively for what it was."
You know, Mary, that most of the world right now sees it and has seen it for what it objectively is. It's America that has to wake up out of its slumber and start comparing its view of the world with objective reality. That you think that any serious historian or even any informed citizen (outside of the USA) is now or has been fooled by this disaster merely underlines how bad things are in the USA.
Reading the comments section for Jeff Goldstein's discussion of Buckley's article, it seems the consensus is that WFB is in his dotage; old and irrelevant; he should shut up and go away. Hmmm, well, Bill Buckley has seen this kind of clamoring against "traitors" before, and knows his own sins in having abetted that, and that it can negatively impact political judgments.
ReplyDeleteIt seems not to occur to anyone -- at least in Goldstein's comments -- that with age comes wisdom (well, sometimes). Bill Buckley was once a young up-and-comer in the conservative movement, like Mr. Shapiro -- Shapiro who wants to prosecute opponents of the Iraq war for sedition.
When the young Buckley was founding National Review, he wanted -- so badly he would have died for it -- to bring Whittaker Chambers on board as senior editor. The aging and sickly Chambers was revered by the right for all the reasons he was reviled by the left of that era: Chambers' having left the Communist Party and revealed the domestic spy network he had run, brought down Alger Hiss. And, for a decade from the pages of Time magazine, and in his masterful book Witness, Chambers had galvanized the nation and brought into high relief the threat of Joseph Stalin and the Communists among us who toiled in that tyrant's service. No wonder, then, that Buckley wanted Chambers, with whom he had become close friends.
But Chambers could not and did not join the editorial board of NR. And he didn't do it because he could not embrace NR's defense of Joseph McCarthy. On the founding NR staff were analogs to young Mr. Shapiro, and Chambers was appalled by them. Nor did he endorse the view that Dwight Eisenhower should be driven out of the conservative movement for being too moderate, which was part of NR's founding mission. So, while Chambers did eventually submit some essays to NR, he would not have his name on the masthead.
Buckley has mellowed over the years, and come to understand that his good friend Whittaker Chambers in his dotage was a voice of calm and reason. Now, Buckley has assumed the role of honored elder among conservatives, and they would do well to listen to the wisdom age and experience bring.
No one is more acutly aware than William F.Buckley that rhetoric about treason can obscure reality, and in this instance it has been doing so about the state of affairs in Iraq.
<test&gr;
ReplyDeleteThere is a fundamental difference between Howard Dean and Bill Buckley.
ReplyDeleteHoward Dean is personally and politically invested in seeing the United States militarily defeated in Iraq.
In contrast, Bill Buckley supports the idea of bringing freedom to people. However, he saw the violence on the streets after al Qaeda desecrated the Shia holy shrine and despaired that the Iraqis would be able to govern themselves democratically like the rest of the world in the face of this kind of violence.
In sum, Dean tries to spread defeatism while Bill Buckley is personally defeated.
It is a tragedy that Mr. Buckley could not have waited another day or two before voicing his despair...
He would have seen the Iraqi Shia and Sunni political leaders join together in calls for peace and the Sunni say that they would come back to help form a unity government the day after the withdrew in fear.
He would have seen the leading Iraqi Shia and Sunni religious leaders join together in calls for peace from mixed religious services.
He would have seen Iraqi citizens heed the call of their leaders and stop the rioting just one day after it started.
He would have seen the US military step aside and the Iraqi military establish security in all the affected areas and stop the rioting. Buried in all this drama is the just released Pentagon report that Iraqi military battalions running their own operations in their own territory has grown from 36 to over 50 in the past few months. That increase over the past few months is alone as large as the entire insurgency.
Of course, you won't hear most of this from our major media outlets outside of Fox News. To find out details of what is really happening in Iraq, you have to go to the blogosphere and read the translations of Iraqi media reporting all of this or to the military blogs from Iraq.
Make no mistake about it, this is an enormous challenge for the Iraqis. The desecration of the Shia mosque is the equivalent of the Irish protestants blowing up St Peters Basilica at the height of the Irish troubles in the 70s.
However, while you are celebrating the despair of an old lion of the conservative movement, the Iraqis are so far turning perhaps the greatest challenge yet to their fledgling democracy into a victory for unity.
Instead of praying for the political demise of a President who cannot run for reelection, why don't you take a deep breath and instead pray for the Iraqis to succeed in preserving their democracy and for our troops to succeed in their mission.
Is that really too much to ask or are you folks too far gone in your political hatred???
This will be an interesting test of Glenn's theory that opposing a single Nero Jr. policy makes one a "lib'rul".
ReplyDeleteIntellectual honesty is emphatically not a trait of the Reactionary Right, so there will be no condemnation of Buckley equivalent to what Dean received from them.
How interesting. I had a completely different take on Buckley's article. I don't think he will be repudiated by right-wing. He just gave them their much-needed exit strategy.
ReplyDeleteNote where the article places blame for the failure. He doesn't say "This was absolute folly from the start." He doesn't say, "The Bush Administration screwed this up."
Instead, he says, "Our mission has failed because Iraqi animosities have proved uncontainable by an invading army of 130,000 Americans." Basically he is saying, "This is the correct policy. It's worked in Latin America. It just did work here because those Muslims are just too backward."
I see the beginnings of a new meme: "We tried. We really did. We gave the Iraqis their best hope for freedom, but they just blew it. They're just animals and there is nothing we could have done to help them."
If the Corner bloggers start having a "serious intellectual discussion" on Buckley's essay, then you can bet this is where we're headed.
thanks for putting in the time to look up these quotes and but them in a single post.
ReplyDeleteposts like this a extremely valuable as an easy-to-grasp illustration of republican propaganda.
but they are also valuable because they illustrate what can anger many people who are not otherwise concerned about political matters
unfairness.
to jump on dean but not on buckley would, i think, be viewed as unfair by many.
furthermore,
let's began using the words "propoganda" and "propoganist" to describe efforts by the white house and the national republican party to distort public discourse,
to mislead and
to misinform
in a coldly calculating way.
it's the calculation
as well as the content
that is important to
identify and speak out on.
malkin, coulter, bennett, limbaugh, will, tierney, et al
are not just engaging in spontaneous commentary;
they are engaging in calculated efforts to mislead and misinform and inflame.
that's propaganda.
Sorry. In the above post, it should have been, "...it just DIDN'T work here..."
ReplyDeleteHume's Ghost asks:
ReplyDeleteRight now we're hearing the insurgency is just too strong, but how long do you think it will be before the meme starts circulating that we lost Iraq because of the press and "liberals"?
Like this?
The kids at the corner seem oddly silent at the pronouncement of failure by their old grandpa.
ReplyDeleteHow long can they ignore it?
Once again, Dean was ahead of the curve, jst as he was during the 2004 campaign, just as he was when he said that capturing Saddam would change nothing, just as he was in countless other situations. But can we ever get anyone in the media to ever go back and say "hey, this guy's called every single one of these developments two months earlier than any other prominent political name?" Not a chance in hell.
ReplyDeleteBuckley will be dismissed as old, addled, irrelevant -- unequal to the rigors of the Long War.
ReplyDeleteThe King may be from time to time ill-served by corrupt, incompetent, or venal Ministers; the King-in-His-Person may occasionaly be in error, say, in choosing which cravat complements His shirt; but the King-In-His-Majesty cannot err.
Throw away those Federalist Papers and get a good translation of Bossuet.
And WRT Brian above, Howard Dean is perfect proof that the only bigger sin in politics than being wrong, is eing right too soon.
bart, that same Pentagon report says that no Iraqi battalions can fight independently. It also says that Sunni attacks have not produced sectarian violence, cough. So 50 battalions can fight with US aid now? Sounds to me an awful lot like the last report. "Iraq military drowning in quicksand" is more like it.
ReplyDeleteI know that you think Fox News reports the real story, and you know that I think Fox News viewers believe more untruths about the world than viewers of any other news outlet (there are studies to that effect). It would be nice if we could agree on some neutral source.
Here's yesterday's LA Times:
Meanwhile, the largest Sunni political bloc pulled out of delicate talks over the shape of Iraq's new government, pushing a faltering process to the edge of collapse. Sunni leaders were furious because dozens of their sect's mosques had come under attack in retribution for Wednesday's bombing of the Shiites' Golden Mosque in Samarra, about 60 miles north of the capital.
"No matter how much the [religious leadership] or the government will attempt to control the situation, it will stay as a negative milestone in Iraq," said Jaber Habeeb, a member of the recently elected parliament. "Things may be chaotic."
The waves of vengeance have left the majority Shiite and the minority Sunni communities feeling victimized and deeply angry with each other. Both are also resentful of the United States, which has been working to ease the animosity and coax Iraq's various ethnic and religious groups into a cooperative government.
"The Americans also abandoned us extremely. They could have put some of their vehicles to protect the mosques — they have the forces to do that," Khalaf Ulayyan, general secretary of the Sunni Iraqi National Dialogue Council, said at a news conference. "How does a civil war start? It starts like this."
Your statement that "the Iraqi military establish security in all the affected areas and stop the rioting" is highly misleading. In fact, it is the sectarian militias that are out on the streets. Shiite militiamen (read: the Iraqi military) killed Sunnis as reprisals for the shrine bombing. Now the Sunnis want their own militias, big surprise. There will be a religious civil war in Iraq, or there already is, whichever.
Iraq is doing a death spiral and you are still polishing the turd. It's not triumphalism like ours but blindness like yours that made the Iraq war unwinnable.
Instead, he says, "Our mission has failed because Iraqi animosities have proved uncontainable by an invading army of 130,000 Americans." Basically he is saying, "This is the correct policy. It's worked in Latin America. It just did work here because those Muslims are just too backward."
ReplyDeleteExactly. He doesn't oppose the ideology of the invasion. He is just declaring the strategy a failure. It is shocking to me that people are making so much of his statement.
Exactly. He doesn't oppose the ideology of the invasion. He is just declaring the strategy a failure. It is shocking to me that people are making so much of his statement.
ReplyDeleteHe used the word "defeat" three times in the same article and said George Bush should ACKNOWLEDGE DEFEAT in our war.
This is the same claim that Democrats like Dean have been making for awhile now.
If you can't understand the significance of a towering conservative figure like Buckley announcing that WE LOST THE WAR IN IRAQ, I wonder what you can understand?
ReplyDeleteHoward Dean is personally and politically invested in seeing the United States militarily defeated in Iraq.
Then why is he still permitted to walk the streets?
Such a high-profile figure maintaining such a defeatist position surely gives aid and comefort to our enemies abroad?
Why should he not simply be Padilla'd?
Wow, nobody. This is the most clean and direct comment I've read on Republicans in a while. What a breath of fresh air. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteLet's say it again...
"They were wrong on Civil Rights.
They were wrong on Viet Nam.
They were wrong on Watergate.
They were wrong on Iran-contra.
They were wrong the first Gulf War.
They were wrong on universal health insurance.
They were wrong on Whitewater.
They were wrong on the Clinton impeachment.
They were wrong on the 2000 election.
They were wrong on the Iraq invasion.
They were wrong on Abu Ghraib.
They were wrong on the swiftboat vets.
They were wrong on Terri Shiavo.
They were wrong on New Orleans.
They are wrong on Plamegate.
They are wrong on the FISA law.
They are wrong on the "war on terra."
They have been wrong on essentially every issue for the past 50 years, and they have retained power through fear, slander, and demonization, and through outright preversion of language and the destruction of decent public discourse. No wonder their world view is so deranged and perverted."
Yes. Their world view is deranged.
Howard Dean and Jimmy Carter get a "score" of 0. John Murtha gets a score of 2227. Bills Buckley and O'Reilly get scores of 2492.
ReplyDeleteWhat is the scale used in computing these "scores"? The cumulative number of "coalition" fatalities from the start of the war, until the moment the person realizes the war was a mistake.
People of conscience get lower scores; craven fearmongers get higher scores.
Bush and Cheney, if they get their way, will have scores off the charts.
I encourage everyone to think of public figures in terms of their scores.
2 Points - Facts, evidence, reason and logic talk right past right-wing truthiness. It doesn't matter if rationality and sanity are on your side. Our world is increasingly ruled by irrational psychopathologies.
ReplyDelete2nd point. Conservatives were also wrong on the American revolution (against it), slavery (wanted to keep it), women's suffrage (didn't want it), child labor (wanted it), etc. After fighting so many losing battles for so long is it any wonder they're acting a little bit deranged?
P.S. You can use this link to find your favorite public figure's score.
ReplyDeleteI think much credit should go to Steve Gilliard who has not only been constantly right about Iraq but whose laser-sharp analyses have proven completely accurate, right from the start. Billmon and his barflies, too, deserves much credit for what they foresaw in the days that preceded the war.
ReplyDeleteHoward Dean is personally and politically invested in seeing the United States militarily defeated in Iraq.
ReplyDeleteIn How to Think Straight Antony flew wrote about how one of the most common argumentative errors is to make a grounds/motive shift and then to act as if the two are the same.
That's what we see here. Bart shifts to Dean's motives, without addressing the grounds for his claims that we should leave Iraq. Grounds that were correct. This is the same thing that the pundits who accused him of treason did.
Actually, its one of the main weapons of Bush defenders.
Their world view is deranged
ReplyDeleteDepends of which side of the checkbook you are one...
Their "core" supporters, the "super-rich" that own the military industrial complex and benefit from the endless parade of tax cuts are doing fine.
Liberalism in the US was strong and powerful when we would talk about economic issues -- now it is the "white elephant" in the room.
I agree with most of the setiments here, but do believe that many are overlooking the real problem...
Chimpy, rove, and cheney are not really calling theses shots and the decisions are not being made for the "average" American.
When is that discussion going to happen. In my opinion, we have our hands tied until we talk about REAL issues and not the distractions or that puppets that get paraded before us.
Course, I could be wrong...
erinm writes: He used the word "defeat" three times in the same article and said George Bush should ACKNOWLEDGE DEFEAT in our war.
ReplyDeleteThis is the same claim that Democrats like Dean have been making for awhile now.
If you can't understand the significance of a towering conservative figure like Buckley announcing that WE LOST THE WAR IN IRAQ, I wonder what you can understand?
No kidding, and well said.
I didn't oppose the war in Iraq, and still think it was the right thing to do, provided there were not practical reasons militating against it -- and there may have been. It seems that Bush ignored -- even caused to be fired -- all analysts who warned that sectarian warfare in the aftermath would be an issue. Quite clearly, no plans were made for this reality.
For me, there is a distinction between, on the one hand, whether the war was a folly at the outset, and on the other, whether it could have succeeded if undertaken competently. We'll never really know, but what is clear is that, as Buckley says repeatedly, we have been defeated. George Bush does virtually nothing competently. Nothing.
Glenn: -- a war that is turning out to be the greatest and most disastrous strategic mistake this country has ever made –-
ReplyDeleteMaybe not yet, but the current and future blowback should give King George the edge and allow him to unify the titles Worst Presidency and Worst Presidential Decision.
Dan Lewis said...
ReplyDeletebart, that same Pentagon report says that no Iraqi battalions can fight independently.
This represents a shift in US strategy, not Iraqi capability.
The construct of the military rating system the Pentagon came up with has three levels - 1) Currently operating without any US assistance whatsoever, 2) Currently operating with some US assistance, 3) Currently operating along side US troops.
The Iraqis in our Category Two construct control their own space, command their own troops, make their own plans and do their own fighting.
We provide an advisory team at the command level which can call in air power and coordinate logistics.
The Iraqi Army logistics and air power was awful before the war and we are building this area from scratch.
This advisory team technique will enable us to keep helping the Iraqis professionalize while we pull US combat troops out of the country over the next two years to a level like what we have in Afghanistan.
We have been pushing hard to train Iraqi battalions so that they can operate in their own space without US combat troops fighting with them - moving from Category 3 to Category 2. The fifty some battalions in Category alone 2 outnumber the insurgency about 2-3 to 1.
These category 2 battalions provided the security for the elections and are providing the security in the areas affected by the recent rioting.
There are another 60 - 70 Category 3 battalions which are in the fight partnered with our units. Under the present timetable, most of these should be Category 2 by the end of this year.
I know that you think Fox News reports the real story, and you know that I think Fox News viewers believe more untruths about the world than viewers of any other news outlet (there are studies to that effect). It would be nice if we could agree on some neutral source.
Despite the press' protestations to the contrary, they all have biases and should all be viewed with a BS detector.
Fox is a right center news outlet. The Wash Times is right. The WSJ has a right editorial page and a left news page. These sources tend to be GOP oriented.
The remaining television news ranges from Left center at CNN to left at CBS. These are Dem oriented.
The papers runs the full gamut of partisanship, but in general tend to be oriented towards the coasts, the cities and liberal politics because that is where their personnel come from.
I try to read everything and cut out all the news-itorials.
Fox does plenty of its own news-itorials, but they also do a lot of stories at the ground level with our and the Iraqi soldiers and they pay more attention to actual Iraqi politics than most of the media except maybe the WP.
DXM said...
ReplyDeleteHoward Dean is personally and politically invested in seeing the United States militarily defeated in Iraq.
Then why is he still permitted to walk the streets?
Because he is blessed to live in America where he can freely slander his country and its military without fear of being thrown in jail.
However, we Elephants are blessed to have him running the opposition party. Those slanders make wonderful campaign commercials.
Such a high-profile figure maintaining such a defeatist position surely gives aid and comefort to our enemies abroad?
It would appear so if you listen to the taped speeches of bin Laden and Zawahiri over the past year.
The question is how Dems can elect and support such a person to be the voice of their party.
Bluememe and Anonymous, yeah. I should have qualified that. The meme has been around that "liberals" were the reason we hadn't won Iraq, yet.
ReplyDeleteActually, I had it suggested to me by my own friends that I was a terrorist sympathizer and anti-American because I said that we should not have invaded Iraq. ONe of them even flat out said that if it wasn't for people like me we would have already won in Iraq.
Morford has a great column this week
ReplyDeleteHume's Ghost said...
ReplyDeleteBart: Howard Dean is personally and politically invested in seeing the United States militarily defeated in Iraq.
Bart shifts to Dean's motives, without addressing the grounds for his claims that we should leave Iraq. Grounds that were correct.
No, they were completely incorrect.
Dean subscribes to the Murtha myth that the US Army is somehow broken after taking 2000 KIA over three years. There is no current or historical proof for this slander. The reenlistment rate for soldiers who actually served in Iraq and see the progress first hand is at historic highs. Historically, our casualty rates are amazingly low in Iraq. The Army took that many KIA in the first hour of D-Day and somehow won WWII.
Dean also subscribes to the myth that the insurgents are undefeatable. However, the insurgents have failed in every one of their goals. They could not stop the elections, they could not stop the Sunni from joining the government, they could not stop the formation of an Iraqi military which now far outnumbers them, and they appear to have failed to cause a civil religious war with even the most heinous provocations.
Ooops I meant -- if you type this a tag backwards as in * a * then * / * -- this will underline everything which comes after!!
ReplyDeleteDoes this really work?
karen mcl you are a genius.
I was too embarrassed to ask anyone about this
Bart spews:
ReplyDeleteBecause [Dean] is blessed to live in America where he can freely slander his country and its military without fear of being thrown in jail.
However, we Elephants are blessed to have him running the opposition party. Those slanders make wonderful campaign commercials.
And I've about had it with you Elephants, tho I voted for you in the past election. Little could be more clear than that George Bush did not plan for the sectarian and tribal animosities in Iraq, a reality which many experts about that part of the world had warned would be a very big problem in the aftermath of toppling Saddam.
Maybe there was no way to effectively prepare for that, and if so, then invading Iraq was a mistake. I don't know at this point.
But whatever else is true, Dean wasn't wrong that Bush could not and would not win there. Saying that does not constitute "slander," any more than does Buckley's candid admission that we have been defeated. Buckley's article makes me sick, not for his having said it, but for his being correct.
I paid almost no attention to the Dean candidacy, and haven't liked some of what I've read him saying that Glenn has posted or linked to in the last few months. I await Glenn's further discussion of what Dean predicted and whether he has been entirely vindicated.
If Dean was right, however, then he just was. And no Coulter-esque blathering about slander and treason will change that.
I want some of whatever drugs Bart's on.
ReplyDeleteWow. I haven't had hallucinations like that since the Dead stopped touring.
Hyapatia: Have you heard of or read George Packer's Assasins' Gate?
ReplyDeleteIts considered an authoritative account of how the war in Iraq was planned. The book covers how the lack of planning for post war Iraq was deliberate.
From Salon's review:
Perhaps the most morally shocking revelation in "The Assassins' Gate" is that the real reason the Bush administration did not plan for the aftermath of the war was that such planning might have prevented the war from taking place. One example of this was the administration's rejection of an offer of help from a coalition of heavyweight bipartisan policy groups. Leslie Gelb, president of the bipartisan Council on Foreign Relations, had offered to assist the administration in its postwar planning: He proposed that his group and two other respected think tanks, the Heritage Foundation and the Center for Strategic and International Studies, prepare a study. "'This is just what we need," Rice said. 'We'll be too busy to do it ourselves.' But she didn't want the involvement of Heritage, which had been critical of the idea of an Iraq war. 'Do AEI instead.'"
Representatives of the think tanks duly met with National Security Council head Condoleezza Rice and her deputy Stephen Hadley. "John Hamre of CSIS went in expecting to pitch the idea to Rice, but the meeting was odd from the start: Rice seemed attentive only to [AEI president Chris] DeMuth, and it was as if the White House was trying to sell something to the American Enterprise Institute rather than the other way around. When Gelb, on speakerphone from New York, began to describe his concept, DeMuth cut him off. 'Wait a minute. What's all this planning and thinking about postwar Iraq?' He turned to Rice. 'This is nation building, and you said you were against that. In the campaign you said it, the president has said it. Does he know you're doing this? Does Karl Rove know?' "
Without AEI, Rice couldn't sign on. Two weeks later, Hadley called Gelb to tell him what Gelb already knew: 'We're not going to go ahead with it.' Gelb later explained, 'They thought all those things would get in the way of going to war.'"
In effect, the far-right AEI was running the White House's Iraq policy -- and the AEI's war-at-all-costs imperatives drove the Pentagon, too. "'The senior leadership of the Pentagon was very worried about the realities of the postconflict phase being known,' a Defense official said, 'because if you are Feith or you are Wolfowitz, your primary concern is to achieve the war.'"
In the normal sense of the word "moderate", the closest I came to moderation in the blogosphere were "lefty" blogs such as Glenn's.
ReplyDeleteMost people seem to assume Glenn is a "lefty" but I've been reading him for longer than most people and I'm not sure. One thing I've noticed is that Glenn has revealed very few of his political views on most issues. What he has done is attacked the Bush Administration, which is what causes people to assume he is a "leftist." Lots of people on the right hate the Bush Administration, too, because they ain't conservative. So the fact that someone is a Bush critic isn't, to me anyway ,proof of anything ideological.
Bart, it isn't just liberals who see that Bush's vision has been totally misguided. If he really thought that mere democracy was somehow magically going to be enough to bring peace and stability to Iraq -- and that there was thus no need to plan for a very rocky aftermath in a tribal culture with almost no experience of civil society under the rule of law -- then he is a fool, and has, as non-leftist Julian Sanchez puts it, adopted the worst errors of the left.
ReplyDeleteOne of the greatest things about Glenn's posts is how quickly the sort of people he writes about leap into the comments section to prove exactly his point.
ReplyDeletebart is a wonderful example of this. Dean, bart says, is a twisted evil man who wants to Defeat America. The evidence for this? The motives bart discerns behind his statements. However, Buckley is a good and kind man who wants only peace and liberty for the Iraqis. The evidence for this? The motives bart discerns behind his nearly identical statements. And the hilarious thing is that had Glenn uncharacteristically made a mistake and accidentally attributed the Buckley to Dean and vice versa, bart would be saying the exact same thing
Glenn has very convincingly outlined a decsription of the current political discussion in our country where, amongst one group, tribalism trumps all; belonging to the right team means all can be forgiven, where as belonging to the wrong tribe means you must be scorned and, if possible, destroyed. The team you are signed up for -- or more properly, that people assign you to on the basis of your questioning of Team Republican's choices -- is all that matters. Questions of whether a decision was right or wrong, or what its real-world consequences are, is utterly irrelevant. After all, what matters the temporal world when eternity, and the Judgement of Right and Wrong beckons? People like bart can see straight into your soul; the window is whether or not you agree with his team leader.
Glenn describes this world, and then people like bart flood to the comment section to exactly validate Glenn's points.
The beautiful part is that bart claims “Dean is personally and politically invested in seeing the United States militarily defeated in Iraq” that “Dean also subscribes to the myth that the insurgents are undefeatable” that people who dare question the adminstrations decisions are “praying for the political demise of a President... instead [of praying] for the Iraqis to succeed in preserving their mission”, and then signs off by asking rhetorically “Is that really too much to ask or are you folks too far gone in your political hatred???”
It's a beautiful example of a completely unaware self-parody.
Here's a clue for Bill Buckley:
ReplyDeleteIf your goal is to transform a dictatorship into a liberal democracy, it's probably a bad idea to put a gang of reactionary kleptomaniacs in charge.
What the Bush regime has done to our country and our military is criminal. Open borders, unsecure ports, illegal wars, un-Constitutional behavior ... the list goes on and on. At this stage it's clear y'all are just eating your own. Attacking Bill Buckley? Ha! You neocons are simply embarrassing.
ReplyDelete...the postulates didn't work.
ReplyDeleteQuite an understatement by herr Buckley. Maybe that's because the postulates are horribly flawed to begin with?
Rove will deal with Buckley easily: rantings from a cranky old man.
Bush & Co, have succeeded in the hobgoblinization of democracy.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Bill.
Bart and other bush cult members,
ReplyDeletePointing out failures of the bush administration is not equil to defeatism. Disagreing even strongly with what this administration does is not treason. It is the best and most important part of being American. People have died so that we may disagree. Please move you and your wingnut friends to China or North Corea if you want to march lockstep with your leader. If you think lefties are wrong, fine. Tell us how. Mention Trator, defeatist and you expose yourself as to what we have already seen you to be. A Things are going great, bush can do no wrong appologist. You people are like the general in Iraq who said, "We are winning!!" while his forces crumbled around him.
bart, the Fox news apologia is misguided, as it always has been.
ReplyDeleteSo let's trot out this classic and I'll just have to leave it at that. If you have some evidence that the state of misinformation at Fox has changed since, feel free to link it. Garbage in, garbage out.
I wouldn't trust my BS detector in such heavily contaminated areas, if I were you. In fact, if I could do you any service, I would lift that detector to your ear, shake it, and let you listen for the little rattle.
My fault for getting sucked into a debate on the relative categories of Iraqi battalions, bart. Sorry. Let's try and get back to the main point, neatly unexplored by your factoids, which is that category or no category, the Iraqi army we have trained and armed is populated by Shiite militiamen. They have been killing Sunnis and desecrating their shrines in response to the destruction of one of their most holy shrines. Now the Sunnis want their own militias, no wonder. That's not the Iraqi military re-establishing security, as you put it so sunnily.
this is the way the civil war begins
this is the way the civil war begins
this is the way the civil war begins
with a bang
But hey, more Category II battalions? The overall readiness of the Iraqi army has increased by twinky-twunk percent? Pentagon strategy standing firm on paper? Man do I regret my seditious doubts now.
I know what the wingnuts will say, and what have said. Of more interest to me is what the Blue Dog Dems, the DLC, and other Dem enablers will say.
ReplyDeleteOf more interest to me is what the Blue Dog Dems, the DLC, and other Dem enablers will say.
ReplyDeleteThe DLC will continue to support the war even if Iraq literally combusts into a gigantic fireball and immolates all 150,000 American troops, even if Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz begin speaking out against it, even if their own children get drafted and sent off there to die, even if Bush's ratings drop to 7%. Because to suggest otherwise would be to "look weak on national security".
Other, saner Democrats are either already there (Dean, Feingold, Murtha) or are getting there but still too worried about protecting their ever-triangulating hides (most Dem Senators).
I blame a political culture that has somehow made it "unacceptable" to publicly oppose a war, even a war as ill-conceived and resource-sapping as this one. And that is the most damaging legacy of an administration with no shortage of damaging legacies.
erinm said: If you can't understand the significance of a towering conservative figure like Buckley announcing that WE LOST THE WAR IN IRAQ, I wonder what you can understand?
ReplyDeleteI guess I'm just not as smart as you. However, I've watched people declare such utterances -- Murth's for example -- as momentous and all that happens is that they get demonized.
Buckley will be (accurately) called an old coot whose conservatism is out of style or some such. Or he'll just be ignored OR people like you will be advised to read Buckley's full post, which addresses strategy, not ideology.
This is more of the usual waiting around for the Bushies to undo themselves.
I'm delighted Buckley says the war is lost. But I bet you it's not going to make one bit of difference to anyone but Dems looking for a magic bullet. The average American will say, "Bill who?" And Republicans in power (both in media and politics) will, as I said, pat the old coot on the noggin.
If only bart and his ilk knew how puerile and predictable their method is.
ReplyDeleteStep 1: Identify some slightly unusual yet irrelevant and innocuous act by a political enemy.
Step 2: Label said political enemy crazy, unhinged, shrill, French, etc.
Step 3: Identify a truthful yet controversial statement by said political enemy and use it make accusations of treason, shrillness, and/or mental illness.
Step 4: Attribute alleged treasonous, shrill, or deranged comment to a vested interest in the failure of Bush and/or irrational hatred of Bush. Similarly attribute all opposition to Bush to irrational hatred of Bush.
Step 5: Express pleasure that said allegedly deranged political enemy is a Democrat since that guarantees the Dems will never win again.
Rinse and repeat.
Damn, Glenn, the more of your blog I read, the more I'm enjoying politics. I haven't had such laughs in years (of course, we haven't had that much to laugh about either, but when the chickens come home to roost, you can't help but laugh at the absurdity of it all).
ReplyDeleteThank you, thank you, thank you for helping all us "Libruls" point out the glaring truths that these Bushites refuse to see.
I'm becoming a regular reader over here, and have linked you in my sidebar.
Peace.
shargash, you might try The Moderate Voice.
ReplyDeleteI haven't read it much, but your post brought it to mind.
Hypatia said...
ReplyDeleteBart, it isn't just liberals who see that Bush's vision has been totally misguided. If he really thought that mere democracy was somehow magically going to be enough to bring peace and stability to Iraq -- and that there was thus no need to plan for a very rocky aftermath in a tribal culture with almost no experience of civil society under the rule of law -- then he is a fool...
To start, Mr. Bush never said that Democracy was going to bring "peace and stability" to Iraq. Iraq already had the stability of the police state and the peace of the mass grave under Saddam.
The theory behind bringing democracy to Iraq is that democracies do not attack one another the way Saddam attacked his neighbors and warred against us.
Indeed, Bush never premised the war at all on bringing "peace and stability" to Iraq.
We have achieved each and every goal we set out to perform...
Iraq is no longer a threat to us or its neighbors.
Iraq is now out of the WMD business.
Iraq no longer supports international terrorism.
Iraq is no longer a safe haven for al Qaeda and the larger Islamic Fascist movement. Rather, it is the battleground where we are engaging that last sizable group of al Qaeda.
Iraq now has a fledgling constitutional democracy.
The enemy has been helpless in preventing any of our objectives or accomplishing any of their own.
Terrorism is not an end unto itself, it is a war crime designed to achieve goals.
You are absolutely correct that Mr. Bush did not predict or plan for the premeditated terror campaign Saddam planned for and launched after we defeated his military.
There is a saying amongst us combat arms folks in the Army - "Your battle plans do not survive first contact with the enemy." This is because you never really know what the enemy will do. You simply make your best guess and stay flexible to meet the new circumstances.
The military decisively won the conventional war for which they planned at remarkable speed and with next to no loss. However, they had to make a time consuming and painful transition to engage the enemy with an effective counterinsurgency strategy. They only started to get it right about a year ago.
Folks, retreat and defeat is never ever an option once you pay the blood price of war. This country always had a policy of unconditional victory until Korea and Vietnam. There is no other policy which keeps faith with the men and women in the military who are paying the price in blood, trauma and sweat.
ReplyDeleteThe DLC will continue to support the war even if Iraq literally combusts into a gigantic fireball and immolates all 150,000 American troops...
Exactly. It amazes me how constantly and comprehensively wrong the DLC and their crack team of brilliant consultants are.
If I were hungry, I wouldn't even trust their strategists to recommend something off the lunch menu for me; they'd tell me to eat worms and cockroaches becaues ``Fear Factor'' polls well.
I have a confession to make: I am a born and bred Southerner and I am a lawyer. Southerners know a thing or two about a "lost cause". We've been recovering from one for more than one hundred years. Lawyers know a thing or two about a famous axiom in the legal profession: You cannot prove a negative.
ReplyDeleteMany of us sensed/knew there were no WMD in Iraq. The reason was pretty evident: Saddam was asked by BushCo to "prove" he "did not have WMD". Can't do it. (And by the way, Iran "can't" prove it will not make "nukular" weapons either.) WMD was a myth. It was the causi belli around which we could be led into war. There are other myths we accept today that are equally dangerous. Two are listed below:
Myth
Someone needs to shut down National Review and quick. They're like Al-Jazeera now. Glenn, that was from you. Were you being sarcastic or do you buy into the notion that in Al Jazeera there is danger. Our whole problem in this country is that we lack any global perspective. I link to Al Jazeera regularly and find that they have a tremendous amount of information. Unlike American media, they cover the streets of the Arab world. No outlet does that over here.
Myth
We cannot leave Iraq or chaos will result or words to that effect. In truth, the US presence in Iraq is the problem. We continue to prop up a puppet government in Iraq peppered with a bunch of corrupt and incompent Iraqi exiles straight out of the CIA or neocon think tanks. In December, Chalabi got less than one percent of the vote. He's still in charge of the Ministry of Oil.
The Iraqis aren't buying this bunch of scallawags (or carpetbaggers if you prefer). They know better.
When my husband was in Viet Nam (1968-69), a favorite line from the favorite song in country went: "We gotta get out of this place, if it's the last thing we ever do....". The troops back then knew it. They knew it was a lost cause. Don't think today's troops in Iraq don't know a lost cause when they see it too. They are the face of American corruption and incompetence in Iraq and as such they are the enemy of Shia, Sunni, and Kurd.
We gotta get out of Iraq and let those folks begin the long process of reconstruction. War's over, Iran won. We gotta get out of that place.
What's telling, Glenn, is that the loudest dissent, that over the Dubai purchase of 21 of our ports (not six, as the adminisatration would like us to think), is coming not from the grassroots but from within the inner circle of the party. You cannot tell me that there aren't at least a handful of dissaffected people within the WH who are too terrified to speak out. Where do you think a lot of these leaks are coming from?
ReplyDeleteThey may have chosen Bush over classical conservative ideology but the one thing that trumps both is personal, political survival and we've been seeing for decades that Republicans, as with Democrats (witness the Monica scandal of '98) will eat their own.
The Virgin Ben Shapiro has always written with profound rage.
ReplyDeletePerhaps with maturity, he will better channel his anger.
Failed love, is not the worse that life will deliver, virginal Ben.
Jonathan Dursi said...
ReplyDeleteOne of the greatest things about Glenn's posts is how quickly the sort of people he writes about leap into the comments section to prove exactly his point. bart is a wonderful example of this.
Dean, bart says, is a twisted evil man who wants to Defeat America. The evidence for this? The motives bart discerns behind his statements.
Actually, I laid out Mr. Dean's slanders and why they are lies for which there is no basis. Truth is the only defense for slandering your country and he fails this test.
However, Buckley is a good and kind man who wants only peace and liberty for the Iraqis. The evidence for this? The motives bart discerns behind his nearly identical statements.
No, I took Mr. Buckley's own words at face value...
One of these postulates, from the beginning, was that the Iraqi people, whatever their tribal differences, would suspend internal divisions in order to get on with life in a political structure that guaranteed them religious freedom. The accompanying postulate was that the invading American army would succeed in training Iraqi soldiers and policymakers to cope with insurgents bent on violence.
This last did not happen. And the administration has, now, to cope with failure. It can defend itself historically, standing by the inherent reasonableness of the postulates. After all, they govern our policies in Latin America, in Africa and in much of Asia. The failure in Iraq does not force us to generalize that violence and anti-democratic movements always prevail. It does call on us to adjust to the question, What do we do when we see that the postulates do not prevail -- in the absence of interventionist measures (we used these against Hirohito and Hitler) that we simply are not prepared to take?
It is healthier for the disillusioned American to concede that in one theater in the Mideast, the postulates didn't work. The alternative would be to abandon the postulates. To do that would be to register a kind of philosophical despair. The killer insurgents are not entitled to blow up the shrine of American idealism.
Mr. Buckley is arguing that the Reagan and Bush Doctrines premised on spreading democracy around the world to defeat enemies worked in every part of the world but Iraq.
In contrast, Mr. Dean and the Democrats have opposed this doctrine from its inception under Reagan.
Brilliant post, Glenn.
ReplyDeleteHey, what about Howard Dean for President? I always liked the guy, even when I viewed myself as a Republican. Who engineered that Democratic backlash against him for having a temper, or whatever it was that made them turn against him?
How could the Democrats have chosen a non-entity like Kerry when they could have had a spitfire like Dean?
No, bart, you didn't `lay out Deans slanders'; you didn't even quote *once* from Dean. That should have been your first clue. You're more interested in attacking some completely phantasmal Other, made up almost entirely in your own head, than actually approaching the reality of the problem.
ReplyDeleteThere is no dichotomy between agressively promoting liberty and democracy in the world and not invading Iraq. If, as Buckley apparently believes, the attempt has failed utterly in Iraq, then this becomes even clearer. The same thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars could have been spent promoting democracy a thousand other ways.
bart at 5:32pm continues to strengthen Glenn's arguments at every turn. Please don't ever stop posting, bart.
ReplyDeleteMr. Buckley is arguing that the Reagan and Bush Doctrines premised on spreading democracy around the world to defeat enemies worked in every part of the world but Iraq.
What matters to bart is that the motives and team-alliance of Buckley, or Bush, in and around the war were Correct. This is much more important to bart than whether or not the policies were successful. Believing in the Leader is more important than actually achieving the stated goals of the Leader.
In bart's world, it is more important to go along with the words of the Leader than to actually achieve goals. Rooting for a failed policy is more righteous than actually achieving the policy's goals. It's astonishing. Bart's going to make a great psychology case study some day.
At least Bart keeps us updated to the latest GOP talking points. As usual, his above posts reflect the desire among Bush Followers to simply make it so by saying it. Bart's list of things Buckley "would have seen" had he waited a few days reads like a litany recited by a True Believer--that bated breath, chant-like repetition of glorious happenings--in this case though the list is at best simply wishful thinking, at worst another attempt at keeping people in the dark about what's really going on. I'll give Bart the benefit of the doubt and assume he really believes this fantasy. The guy who came up with the talking points is another story.
ReplyDeleteBart's need to question the motives of those he disagrees with is telling. Most of us accept that we all want the best outcome. I never for a minute think that Republicans are secretly hoping to bring the country down, even though the policies of this administration make it easy to build that case.
No, I assume we all want things to work out well. Some of us are just confused about how to do that. Bart though, wants to believe he's not just dealing with people who disagree with Bush's policies, he's dealing with people who are actually evil. Dean wants us to fail. He wants our troops to die. He wants us to lose the war. I assume it's because he wants so badly to win elections he'll stoop to anything, including rejoicing at American deaths in Iraq so he can say "I told you so" and get Dems elected. If he had to he'd pull the trigger himself though. Is that it Bart?
I think what we're seeing here is projection. Partisans like Bart assume their opponents work the same way they do. The Coulters/Limbaughs/Hannitys of the world are loyal to their party in a way we just don't see from the other side. Liberals just don't have the kind of blind loyalty to their leaders we see among Bush faithful. But the Bushies don't know this. They assume their opponents are as rabid in support of Dems as the Bushies are of Republicans. That's why when the discussion turns to failings of Republicans, (especially on the internet) the Bushies often start yelling about Monica, like this is supposed to leave us devastated at the memory of what Clinton did. Assuming we had the kind of relationship with Clinton that they have with Bush, shouting "Monica" probably would be devastating. Instead though, it's usually just a non-sequitor that disrupts the discussion.
Bart doesn't comprehend the kind of relationship with your party where you trust it as far as you can throw it, and if it screws up, you shake your head but aren't shocked. I was disappointed that Clinton wasn't able to keep his private life private. I do give him some room due to his having had to put up with a witchhunt that forced him to talk about his private life under oath, which never should have happened, but still. The guy was so brilliant at policy and so dumb at personal decisions. If he hadn't balanced the budget, had the economy humming like a machine, job growth at all-time highs, budget surpluses for our children to use, and a world that respected him so much as President of the United States in its role as the sole superpower that they actually claimed to feel safer knowing the US was out there keeping the world safe, I'd have supported his impeachment. I don't have the kind of loyalty it takes to defend a guy I voted for from attacks by his opponents for obvious mistakes on his part. Bush loyalists are different. Attacks on their Fearless Leader can only spring from evil motives--regardless of how deserving he might be of the complaints. Bush has tanked the economy, busted the budget, the world thinks we're insane, we're in war based on lies that's becoming the biggest mistake in our history, and on and on and on. But if Dean claims it's time to accept reality and start to clean up the mess, he's got some evil motives. Bushies aren't even willing to engage Dean on the merits. It's easier to dodge the discussion by calling the guy a traitor.
You have to feel sorry for Bart right now. To have that kind of loyalty betrayed must hurt. No wonder he clings so tightly to the illusions he hears from FOX/Rove. The alternative is just too painful to contemplate. I'm tempted to say it will soon be impossible to ignore the failure of this war, but if they can still maintain the fantasy now, Im not sure they'll ever accept reality. Bart will tell us Bush was betrayed by liberals, and if we'd just kept fighting we'd have eventually won.
You can't argue with logic like that.
experimenting:
ReplyDeletehere
KAREN! I did it! I can't believe it! If you are not a teacher, you must immediately switch professions. Maybe you should be President of Harvard? Either that or you have to work for a company that publishes VCR programming instruction booklets, which I never did learn how to figure out:)
You are the BEST teacher in the world!
THANK YOU SO MUCH.
What was confusing me about the italic and bold stuff above the "Leave your comment" is that the closing side doesn't have that "/" in it.
So shouldn't Glenn correct that to cater to dummies like me and write those with that "/" included on the right side of the "b" and "i" symbols above?
Also, the only thing which was not immediately and easily clear in your intructions was whether when you wrote "National Journal Article", just like that, it meant to include the quotation marks around what you name the URL. I didn't know at first whether to put "here" or here.
Jonathan Dursi said...
ReplyDeleteNo, bart, you didn't `lay out Deans slanders'; you didn't even quote *once* from Dean. That should have been your first clue. You're more interested in attacking some completely phantasmal Other, made up almost entirely in your own head, than actually approaching the reality of the problem.
:::sigh:::
As soon as anyone actually addresses my arguments here, I might take your exceptions seriously. I notice that you did not offer any quotes of your own and there is a good reason for that...
Murtha: "My experience in a guerrilla war says that until you find out where they are, until the public is willing to tell you where the insurgent is, you're not going to win this war...In Vietnam it was the same way."
Dean: "The idea that we're going to win this war is an idea that unfortunately is just plain wrong. I've seen this before in my life and it cost us 25,000 brave American soldiers and I don't want to go down that road again."
There is no dichotomy between agressively promoting liberty and democracy in the world and not invading Iraq. If, as Buckley apparently believes, the attempt has failed utterly in Iraq, then this becomes even clearer. The same thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars could have been spent promoting democracy a thousand other ways.
OK, I would enjoy hearing all of the ways short of military intervention we could have removed ther Taliban and Saddam Hussein from power and replaced them with the democracies in place right now.
Hey, what about Howard Dean for President? I always liked the guy, even when I viewed myself as a Republican. Who engineered that Democratic backlash against him for having a temper, or whatever it was that made them turn against him?
ReplyDeleteThe short answer: Dean was a threat to the beltway-insider cocktail-party circuit.
Democrats were (and are) terrified to think ouside the box and try something DIFFERENT. They failed to learn from the 2002 midterm bloodbath that Republican-lite is a losing electoral strategy. Dean was one of the first Democratic leaders to come around to this realization, and he parlayed it into a movement.
Dean would have gotten the grassroots riffraff a place at the table in our government. Few things are more threatening to the insider power structure (which cuts across party lines).
He had to be dealt with.
If the Dems had been as tough on Bush as they were on Dean, well, the nation and the world would likely look a lot better today...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeletei actually strolled through the comments because i was going to note that Captain Ed, quoted by Glenn in an update, continues to live in a fantasy world, but then along comes Bart who seems to have invented a fantasy world.
ReplyDeletein this fantasy world, for instance, we can now tie together the invasion of iraq and the invasion of aghanistan, even though the standard liberal line prior to the war in iraq was that we had unfinished business in afghanistan (as we still do).
in this fantasy world, we've achieved all of our goals in iraq, especially putting iraq out of the wmd business, even though the duelfur report makes crystal clear that iraq was no longer in the wmd business and hadn't been for years (basically, since clinton ended their efforts - imagine that!).
in this fantasy world, there's some relationship between reagan's approach to the world and bush II's approach to the world, even though reagan's choice, in lebanon, was to leave after a terrorist attack.
in this fantasy world, dean is opposed to all wars, when, in fact, he merely pointed out the obvious: we're not going to win "this" war.
and so on.
nothing causes me greater concern for the american educational system than the moronic piffle produced by the likes of bart (and my original target, captain ed). how do they learn to think this stupidly? even soviet apparatchiks knew better....
"However, he saw the violence on the streets after al Qaeda desecrated the Shia holy shrine and despaired that the Iraqis would be able to govern themselves democratically."
ReplyDeleteIf only he would have taken the trouble to study a little history. He would have found out that shortly after The Great War, when Winston Churchill et al were scribbling arbitrary boundaries over the remains of the Ottoman Empire; the founder of the House of Saud expressed the opinion that the region now known as Iraq could only be governed effectively by a ruthless dictator, due to the ancient and deep-rooted conflicts between the factions there.
My "take" on this is that the Bush followers are not even going to give much attention to Buckley and O'Reilly, who also called for an immediate withdrawal having now decided that Iraqis are "insane". That got one day's press notice, but led to no big uproar.
ReplyDeleteThe Bush followers never really wanted this war in Iraq, I don't think, at least the ones I know. They just blindly supported the President once he decided to go in. Once people realized there were no WMD, they lost interest in that venture.
However, the hard core Bushco following (one of my best friends belongs to that group) still thinks there are WMD there. She keeps emailing me articles proving there are. I'll try and find one and post it here, to show what they are being fed.
And Bush has no plans to withdraw, so we'll be there until the next President takes office, and maybe forever, depending on who that President is.
Didn't someone write that we are still in Korea? Is this a good thing, or bad thing? I don't know much about politics. If we "stayed" in Iraq the way we have in Korea, would that be okay, or still a bad thing?
Congratulations, bart, you've now shown two quotes where both Murtha and Dean point out how difficult, if not impossible, it is to win this war currently. Could you remind me again how that shows that “Dean is personally and politically invested in seeing the United States militarily defeated in Iraq”; or that “Dean also subscribes to the myth that the insurgents are undefeatable”or that people who dare question the adminstrations decisions are “praying for the political demise of a President... instead [of praying] for the Iraqis to succeed in preserving their mission”? Because you said you were just taking those `slanders' and drawing the logical conclusions, but I must have missed a step between what they said and what you think they said.
ReplyDeleteAs for promoting democracy, I'll point out that the vast majority of successful democracies today did not begin their political lives imposed by physical force from the outside. The bad news is that promoting liberty and democracy takes time, and sometimes requires more subtlety than all-out-war. Would it be nice if a batallion or two could instantly replcae despotic regimes with fully functioning democracies in North Korea or Zimbabwe or the Congo or Pakistan or Saudi Arabia or
Uzbekistan or Burma or Iraq? Yes, sure.
As for the Taliban, military action worked fairly well initially in Afghanistan and sustained action there might well have worked out fairly well. On the other hand, diverting attention and resources away from ObL and Afghanistan to Iraq resulted in a policy where both countries are moving towards warlordism and chaos, rather than democracy.
The key here is that achieving an important goal (like promoting freedom and democracy) actually takes some careful thought about what actions are most likely to work, taking into account the reality of local conditions and capability.
If you are so keen on using war to promote freedom and reduce terrorism, bart, why aren't you screaming at the bush administration about not declaring war on Saudi Arabia, where the same number of people are living in a non-free society, and indeed a partial theocracy where much policy is set by an extremist strain of Islam? And where the national government really does have ties to terrorism? Why do you hate freedom and democracy so much, bart? Why are you objectively pro-saudi-monarchy?
There are always policy choices, bart. The war in Iraq was a bad policy choice, which did a horrendously bad job of promoting democracy and freedom. Those who were opposed to the war -- and those who weren't, but think we're losing the Iraq war now -- aren't anti-freedom or anti-democracy; they just see more clearly than you that this was a stupid way to go about promoting those things.
David Shaughnessy, I respectfully disagree with your post.
ReplyDeleteTwo of your points...1)What matters 'most' is that we're in Iraq, not how we got here; maybe that is summing it up too simply, but we should most DEFINITELY continually question HOW we got into it in the first place, because we must hammer into the American conscience of the dangerousness of blindly accepting leadership. How do you think this whole crazy, ridiculous, 'religious war' and tamping down of American dissent has lasted? BECAUSE THEY CONTINUALLY HAMMER "you're a traitor" "either with us or against us" etc into the American public.
2)"Bush is the only President we have" Again, with respectful dissent, I say that is a load of crap. If you think for one moment that to continue with your line of reasoning simply makes progressives "above the fray," you need to consider that there will BE no fray unless we fight fire with fire. Upholding virtuous behavior in all manner in governing is a great and lofty ideal, but *current* reality demands other routes of correcting this horrendous situation.
Thanks
(GLENN GREENWALD, is a new hero of mine)
Mr. Buckley is arguing that the Reagan and Bush Doctrines premised on spreading democracy around the world to defeat enemies worked in every part of the world but Iraq.
ReplyDeleteHmm, was that the Reagan Doctrine that spread freedom in the form of providing material support to Saddam Hussein? Or was it the part when freedom was spread by training Osama bin Laden? I know! It was the widespread support of "freedom squads" in Honduras and elsewhere in Latin America! At least the elder Mr. Bush took a slightly different tack and spread democracy by reinstalling the dictatorship in Kuwait. Both Mr. Reagan and the Presidents Bush have shown such a hard line toward China, too. It's also great to see the current administration continuing to prop up the military dictator of Pakistan, who overthrew a democratically elected government. There's our good buddy in the War on Terra, President "Boil 'em Alive" Karimov of Uzbekistan. And we're spreading democracy in Dubai by giving a lucrative port contract to its slave-trading absolute rulers.
But I'm being too hard on this administration. At least Hamid Karzai is the elected mayor of Kabul (and the threatening of electoral opponents was just taking a page from Egypt). After all, it was much more important to invade Iraq than it was to finish the job of nation-building in Afghanistan. Let freedom reign [sic]!
Sorry, meant to say that the largest beneficiary is Iran and the Islamists. (not 'benefactor ;-)
ReplyDeleteThe presence of bart and gedaliya makes Glenn's blog an extremely efficient one-stop-shop for the current political weather report. From Glenn, we get a superb sense of what is possible in the war to restore our country to sanity, and I include a functioning Republican party actively promoting conservative ideals as an important front in that war. From bart and gedaliya I get a redundant proxy for the current game of the politically insane who happen to be ruling us. You two are very very good, please keep posting.
ReplyDeleteI confess I also get a bit of a thrill seeing those two shamelessly crap out such prodigious amounts of bullshit. Thanks to the crew that bart and gedaliya shill for, I have never before so viscerally appreciated the constrained view of governmental power. Trust us, they trill, we're the government and we're here to help you. The cognitive dissonance of "Republican" Bushites pushing this theme is delicious.
I demand that David Shaunessy run for President.
ReplyDeletebecause there is nothing that ranks higher on the scale of presidential "high crimes" than bringing a country to war under false pretenses. Nothing.
Imagine this: You are a woman whose right arm has been blown off, along with half of your face.
Every morning when you wake up, to face a day of unspeakable emptiness and sorrow, the first thing you remember is that your three children are dead, having been blown up by a fire bomb, along with your husband.
WHY? WHY?
How did such a horrible thing come to be? Nobody is immune from the types of devastation that result from Acts of Nature or the random acts of violent individuals or groups who decide to use force to transgress against others.
But what kind of insane Government POLICY is this which turns a blind eye to such a horrific cost in terms of human life and happiness for NO VALID REASON?
How exactly does Laura Bush sleep nights?
Let's give the real name to the practice of initiating a pre-emptive war under false pretences to further the secret agenda of a group of treacherous men: Murder.
We each have one life. Murder takes away that life. That's the simple reality.
Bush and the group behind him who decided it was okay to waste the lives and limbs of tens of thousands of people to promote their insane, secret agenda are simply murderers.
They should be made to answer for their crimes, and I say that not with malice, but because unless a society is willing to identify and punish those who commit crimes against humanity, that society will implode from within.
What exactly is Bill Clinton doing hanging out with the Bushes, his new big buddies?
Why is Rudy Guiliani such a fan of "The Sopranos"?
Those who hang out with thugs and murderers, failing to call them on their crimes, who glorify and admire a pack of murderers, are little better in my book than the murderers themselves.
I put Nazi enablers, Mafia wives, people who "golf with" murderers, people who live next door to a family where the children are being viciously beaten and abused but say nothing, in the same big pile:
depraved subhumans who have lost the capacity to be outraged by human acts of evil, and who turn the other way because to strike out against it would jeopardize their own little niche.
"THE DRUDGE REPORT has obtained an email sent Monday evening by Democratic National Committee (DNC) research director Devorah Adler that contains ten opposition research packets on potential 2008 GOP presidential contenders.
ReplyDeleteIn one packet titled “Newt Gingrich: 08 Watch February 2006” a picture of the former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (R-GA) appears with --- him holding two full plates of food!
The quote underneath the Gingrich photo reads “In His Own Words: Gingrich’s Solution To Childhood Obesity: ‘Turn off the TV, cut the fatty diet and get exercise.’ [AP, 2/8/06]”
The ten Republicans picked by the Democrat Party include: Sen. George Allen (R-VA), Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS), Sen. Bill Frist (R-TN), Gingrich, Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R-NY), Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-AR), Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), Gov. George Pataki (R-NY) and Gov. Mitt Romney (R-MA)."
There's only one party stupider than the Republicans: The Democrats.
They intend to discredit potential Republicans with such hefty arguments as being fat?
Unless the Democrats mount a campaign against the POLICIES of Bushco which have threatened this country with its own destruction, they provide no solution to the current dilemma.
Seems like a third party will have to be formed, with extremely attractive, prinicpled candidates from both parties, and that's the party we will all have to support.
They intend to discredit potential Republicans with such hefty arguments as being fat?
ReplyDeleteUmmm....having Drudge as a source is like having no source at all.
Relax.
To start, Mr. Bush never said that Democracy was going to bring "peace and stability" to Iraq. Iraq already had the stability of the police state and the peace of the mass grave under Saddam.
ReplyDeleteThe theory behind bringing democracy to Iraq is that democracies do not attack one another the way Saddam attacked his neighbors and warred against us.
Indeed, Bush never premised the war at all on bringing "peace and stability" to Iraq.
We have achieved each and every goal we set out to perform...
1.Iraq is no longer a threat to us or its neighbors.
2.Iraq is now out of the WMD business.
3.Iraq no longer supports international terrorism.
4.Iraq is no longer a safe haven for al Qaeda and the larger Islamic Fascist movement. Rather, it is the battleground where we are engaging that last sizable group of al Qaeda.
5.Iraq now has a fledgling constitutional democracy.
6.The enemy has been helpless in preventing any of our objectives or accomplishing any of their own.
Terrorism is not an end unto itself, it is a war crime designed to achieve goals.
7.You are absolutely correct that Mr. Bush did not predict or plan for the premeditated terror campaign Saddam planned for and launched after we defeated his military.
8.There is a saying amongst us combat arms folks in the Army - "Your battle plans do not survive first contact with the enemy." This is because you never really know what the enemy will do. You simply make your best guess and stay flexible to meet the new circumstances.
9.The military decisively won the conventional war for which they planned at remarkable speed and with next to no loss. However, they had to make a time consuming and painful transition to engage the enemy with an effective counterinsurgency strategy. They only started to get it right about a year ago.
10.Folks, retreat and defeat is never ever an option once you pay the blood price of war. This country always had a policy of unconditional victory until Korea and Vietnam. There is no other policy which keeps faith with the men and women in the military who are paying the price in blood, trauma and sweat.
Wow. Where to start. Hard to imagine anybody could believe such things. I'm tempted to assume you know whats wrong with all of this and that you get a paycheck for catapulting it. Any other possibilty leaves me worried for you. On the outside chance you're sincere, I've numbered things to make it easier.
1. It's become clear the inspectors had it right. Iraq was not a threat to us, and all that talk about mushroom clouds was the administration's method for getting Americans to back the war they'd planned from the moment they took office. The prood would take too long but i'll just mention Paul O'Neill as a witness whose credibilty is beyond question. If you claim he's a liberal you lose. If you claim he's dishonest, again, you lose. paul O'Neill is the kind of conservative i have always enjoyed being able to agree to diagree with. i may not agree with him, but his honesty and integrity are beyond question. That's why he din't fit in. I won't go into many details here but he said he was shocked in the first few meetings to learn policy discussions would be non-existent in this administration. Policy decisions would be made by political flaks. Rove's continuing presence in the Bush Whitehouse would be like Clinton having had carville stay on after the election to run things. I was o'Neill who blew the whistle on the fact that the Iraq war was a foregone conclusion, before 9/11 or any other excuse that's been trotted out. When the light of history shines, this will be the traitorous action that will separate Bush from every other POTUS in history. He'll have the singular distinction of sending American troops to their deaths out of choice, for reasons we still don't really know.
Historically, if a man comes into your town and says the guys on the other side of the hill are coming to kill you and yours, unless you arm up and go kill them first, you would look him in the eye and demand that he swear this to be true before you'd send your own people to die. If it turned out he lied, you'd make sure he paid the highest price you could dole out, assuming you were still around afterwards to do so. This is, in effect, what Bush did. He swore to us that he had certain knowledge the enemy had weapons of mass destruction and aimed to use them on us. No other reason can suffice to start a war. Not nation-building, not removing a dictator, not spreading democracy, or any of the other reasons they've trotted out since it became clear the WMD story was a lie. Oh, wait, it was just a mistake, not a lie. This doesn't wash. As President, you don't get to weasel out by blaming others for a decision like this. You don't allow yourself to be in a position where you might be mistaken in such a case. You are either certain, or you are not. No in between is allowed in decisions to go to war without having first been attacked. Clinton never would have made such a mistake. Nor, I believe, would any other POTUS in history. I might be wrong and there might be another apple this rotten in the bunch, but I'm not aware of them.
2.Iraq has been out of the WMD business since the First Gulf War. Any pitiful attempts to start things up were taken care of by Clinton. This is another area where the MSM has failed to properly inform us of stories that have come to light in the last few years.
3. Brent Scowcroft came out a few months back to tell his side of the story. I won't rehash it here but it's now clear that though Saddam was a bad man, at least he kept Iraq from becoming part of the Worldwide Islamic Revolution. It meant keeping his country under lockdown, so nobody he didn't like could get in, but at least it played into our desire to keep a lid on the spread of Islamic fundamentalism. The notiom that Al Quaida or any other group had a foothold in Iraq is just nonsense. And you know it. If you need proof I'll be glad to hunt some down for you.
4.Just the opposite is true. whereas iraq wasn't a haven for AlQuaida before we invaded, it now supports Al Quaida and any other America-hating group that wants to kill Americans. All we've accomplished is to give those who want to kill us a place to come do so. Yopu might give me the 'it's better to fight them there than here" theory, which is just the sacrificial lamb theory. we need our young people to go take a risk of being killed to keep the enemy diverted from us here at home. What moral cowardice. I'd suggest we could start spending the money we've wasted giving our enemy a chance to kill our kids in Iraq on actual security at home. The kind that would require even Bush's corporate buddies to sacrifice. If you'd rather our kids sacrifice, you convince me why our kids are less precious than the stockholders.
5. Fledgling. Cute word. Yeah that's what it is. Fledgling.
6. Probably your most absurd point. We want the various factions to get along, they do not. So they blow up the Golden Dome and get their way and make it harder for us. We want oil to flow, (to pay for the war among other things). Our enemy does not. So they disrupt oil production to the point where Iraq actually has to import enough to run their cars. 30-love. I could go on and on. Open the paper each day and I'll show you an example of our enemy doing something to accomplish its objective and impeding ours. This is one of those where i wonder if you're serious.
7. I knew what we'd be facing after the bombing stopped. So did many others. If they worked for Bush, they got fired. Bush didn't want to hear anything that might get in the way of his plan. This is another traitorous refusal to listen to those who knew what they were talking about. Had he listened, 2000= kids might not be dead. Or would you rather just think bush is that stupid. either way, it doesn't look good for you.
8. You plan for a host of contingencies. the insurgency is one of many that were warned about. The war college had its own assessment that predicted exactly whats happened. Your excuse for why bush missed it is not a winning point for your argument, its another damning bit of evidence against the guys who forced us into this nightmare.
9. Started to get it right about a year ago did they? Even with all the people who told them ahead of time that this is exactly what they'd run into, they only started to get it right a year ago. And even that's debatable. The news of late hasn't been good.
10. We're in this mess precisely because we decided to ignore the lessons of Viet-Nam. And the Powell Doctrine had worked so well in the First Gulf War. To forget it so soon is a criminal betrayal of our troops. You don't stay in a no-win situation because you've already started to bleed. That's insanity. But there you go.
"The play's the thing, wherein we'll find the conscience of the King." -"Hamlet"
ReplyDeleteConsider this. The Homeland Security Department had reservations about this deal.
WASHINGTON - The Homeland Security Department objected at first to a United Arab Emirates company's taking over significant operations at six U.S. ports. It was the lone protest among members of the government committee that eventually approved the deal without dissent.
They apparently were arm twisted into going along with it by the insertion in the deal of some (read them yourself) meaningless additional guarantees from Dubai that speak nothing to the real potential threats that have been aired on the Internet in the last few days. But the point is that the agency responsible for our national security was itself wary of this deal.
Now read this:
On Saturday, congressional leaders, the company and Bush administration officials appeared to move closer to a compromise intended to derail plans by Republicans and Democrats for legislation next week that would force a new investigation of security issues relating to the deal. Discussions underway Saturday were to continue through the weekend.
Here you have it. Even those voices on both sides that cried out in outrage about this deal are being wined and dined and armtwisted into going along with it.
I intend to look very carefully at whomever continues to speak out against this deal. The others, who apparently are willing to go along if, during this delay,the government is able to brainwash the American people into going along with the deal to provide these politicans with political cover, are people I will view as just part of the big DC cocktail party, power grab, business as usual crowd, who have no real convictions and are concerned only about perpetuating the power machine which enables them to line their pockets.
If Hillary Clinton and Chuck Schumer, those sell-out snakes, do not introduce legislation to block this deal as they said they would, I would vote for Bush before I would vote for HC. At least he's the known enemy, while she operates by lurking about in the polluted tall grass, talking out of both sides of her mouth and hoping that in so doing she is disguising the fact that she is morally bankrupt.
I am opposed to this deal 100%. Let's get real. Nobody needs 45 hours or 45 days or 45 years to know it doesn't pass the smell test. No ports should be potentially compromised by being controlled by any foreign nation.
Period. These spineless Democrats apparently want to appear "reasonable." The are too brain dead to know that being "reasonable" includes having at least some shred of common sense.
And if the President is able to sell this deal to the 64% of Americans who are now so vehemently against it, I have little hope that anything much is going to change in our government, and we should all save our time and admit defeat.
Keep in mind: this deal is slated to go through on March 2, a few days from now. There are no plans to change that, unless legislation is introduced. The offer on the part of the UAE is merely to hold back "taking control" of the operation of the ports. Big concession. If the deal goes through on March 2, it's a fait accompli and soon this company will be operating our ports. Everyone should know enough about business, and life, to know that.
And finally, those pathetic British, who are supposed to be our friends and allies, should be leaning on P&O to keep them from selling our ports to the UAE.
But then, Bush, Blair, the corrupt UAE (human traffickers and drug profiteers) rulers, et al are all part of the same corrupt group of thugs. Why am I not suprised they all pat each other on the back, while the other hand is in the pockets of the citizens of their respective countries?
Bart,
ReplyDeleteI'm so relieved that things worked out so well in Iraq, and the neocons have been able to create a stable democracy there.
I just feel bad that these 60, at least, won't be around to participate in the ticker tape parade celebrating that victory:
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Bombs and gunfire killed about 60 people as another daytime curfew Saturday failed to halt violence that has claimed nearly 200 lives since the destruction of a Shiite shrine set off a wave of retribution against Sunnis and pushed Iraq toward civil war.
Can you imagine what might happen when they have to life the curfew? What next? Martial law?
'an angry old broad' (from GA) said at the end of the last thread:
ReplyDelete"...The bonus was my son learned a lesson in standing up for what he believes in. He was silent (which for him is a big deal, lol) through this whole thing until we got to the car. "Mom, it's hard sometimes to stand up to mean people isn't it?" I said yes, it is. He then said "but if you don't it's pretty much the same as saying it's ok to be nasty to other people, right?" I said yep, and sometimes it might even get you into trouble, but you still should try..."
BRAVA, angry Georgia broad!
THAT is taking our country back, face to face, and one on one! It is also a microcosm of the same technique that Glenn is using his blog to potently implement, by taking on the same people and their nationally-broadcast words head on. And it is also precisely how you nip racist comments spoken by people in your presence, in the bud.
It also happens to be what Howard Dean has done his best to practice, within the limits of the constraints the "powers that be" (the insiders) force on him in his current role. The truth about Howard is that he is optimistic and cheerful, almost to a fault. Quite the opposite of the vicious character trait smears of "angry" and "out of control" that his critics like to fabricate and spread around.
Three "Democratic" examples of such attackers of Dean, who emerged in direct response to, and in the immediate aftermath of Dean's 'Iraq is unwinnable' quote Glenn highlights here:
Rep. Earl Pomeroy of ND said to the media that Dean should "shut up."
Rep. Jim Marshall of GA said to the media words to the effect of 'what else would you expect from the Dean Screamer.'
Rep. Ellen Tauscher of CA said to the media "Dean doesn't speak for me."
Thereby getting on record for the national media their heartfelt opinions of their own Party's National Chair. [To be fair, I believe Rep. Pomeroy later apologized, privately, to Dean.]
And thus today, two months on, apparently such "Democrats" are to the right of William F. Buckley, Jr. on the political spectrum, eh?
I submit that Paul Hackett is now being subjected to the same sort of treatment by those who, for whatever reason, also feel threatened by the truth he speaks. The people who dished out the dirty tricks think the person who calls them on their tricks is a "crybaby"? And that if someone has a "progressive" voting record that person also, by definition, has character and integrity, despite clear evidence to the contrary?
I prefer character and integrity in those who hold a public trust to represent our best interests in Congress. Jack Murtha is someone trying very, very hard to make amends for his vote to permit the Iraq invasion. Clearly his conscience is in play, not just his logic. I will stand up for and defend anyone displaying such character and integrity, never mind what particular bills they may or may not have voted for in the past. Character and integrity will help you weather the unpredictable storms to come, far, far better then some politically-calculated scorecard of votes.
And if citizens wish to serve in our federal legislature, and somehow find the funds to buy their way in to the closed club, with or without the help of the DSCC and the DCCC, I don't give a damn if they have yet to make up their minds on certain policy issues. IF, that is, their good character, and unimpeachable integrity, are in evidence. That was, and is, my reason for strongly supporting Paul Hackett, not simply his position on any singular issue - although the Iraq invasion looms large for me, as it does for him.
[To be realistic, IF Hackett had decided on his own to enter the Senate race without the support and urging of the DSCC, I doubt that he would have dropped out at their urging. But he figured he was doing the 'chain of command' a favor, I think, in an 'honor and duty' sort of way. Once those 'superior officers' turned on him, he was out -- disgusted by the process and those processing it, and because he was not really in it on his own initiative from the get-go. But after his service in Iraq, I absolutely can not blame him for that decision. And I want the truth about the tactics used against him to come out -- just as I wanted the truth out about the Democratic tactics viciously used against Howard Dean in Iowa. 'master jack' in this thread has it mastered on this score:
"...Dean would have gotten the grassroots riffraff a place at the table in our government. Few things are more threatening to the insider power structure (which cuts across party lines).
He had to be dealt with.
If the Dems had been as tough on Bush as they were on Dean, well, the nation and the world would likely look a lot better today..."]
I think an important reality too many people wish to, and willingly, ignore is that resisting "mean people" IS NOT PLEASANT, but MUST nevertheless be done. Those who say they would rather advocate for "positive change" and stop engaging with the negative, are simply abandoning the battle and the battlefield and leaving it to others to fight. Glenn and 'an angry old broad' are so right: it takes it out of us, it's not fun, it's hard work, and not very rewarding, but IT IS VITAL to challenge the hate-spewers and the liars, to their faces. THAT is the lesson of character and integrity that the Democratic Party has yet to learn.
Taking Spying to Higher Level, Agencies Look for More Ways to Mine Data
ReplyDeleteBy JOHN MARKOFF
Published: February 25, 2006
PALO ALTO, Calif., Feb. 23 — A small group of National Security Agency officials slipped into Silicon Valley on one of the agency's periodic technology shopping expeditions this month.
Skip to next paragraph
Software for Spies
A Technique for Spotting Connections On the wish list, according to several venture capitalists who met with the officials, were an array of technologies that underlie the fierce debate over the Bush administration's anti-terrorist eavesdropping program: computerized systems that reveal connections between seemingly innocuous and unrelated pieces of information.
The tools they were looking for are new, but their application would fall under the well-established practice of data mining: using mathematical and statistical techniques to scan for hidden relationships in streams of digital data or large databases.
Supercomputer companies looking for commercial markets have used the practice for decades. Now intelligence agencies, hardly newcomers to data mining, are using new technologies to take the practice to another level.
But by fundamentally changing the nature of surveillance, high-tech data mining raises privacy concerns that are only beginning to be debated widely. That is because to find illicit activities it is necessary to turn loose software sentinels to examine all digital behavior whether it is innocent or not.
"The theory is that the automated tool that is conducting the search is not violating the law," said Mark D. Rasch, the former head of computer-crime investigations for the Justice Department and now the senior vice president of Solutionary, a computer security company. But "anytime a tool or a human is looking at the content of your communication, it invades your privacy."
When asked for comment about the meetings in Silicon Valley, Jane Hudgins, a National Security Agency spokeswoman, said, "We have no information to provide."
"An important and long-overlooked point about the depravity, corruption and truly un-American impulses which define so many Bush followers"
ReplyDeleteLong-overlooked?!? By whom?
Hi Glenn dear, I'm back. Lovely Saturday evening here.
Trust me when I say not one of the depraved, corrupt, murderous scams, cons, bilking, lies, lies, power grabs, law breaking, constitution shredding "impulses" of this illigitimate, pseudo administration has been overlooked for five years by many of us.
And if I were you I wouldn't waste time reading much less quoting those rabid right wing people(?). There's really no point to it and it hurts the mind.
" Howard Dean's or George Bush's? As their pre-war predictions reveal, it's not exactly a closely contested competition. This matters greatly because we have a serious crisis on our hands in Iraq and Americans must decide whose judgment they believe is entitled to respect with regard to what we ought to do now."
I believe the poll numbers are showing the people distrust the bushists and I think just recently a poll showed a majority trusting Dems more on something can't remember. I realize they've tried to brainwash us into ignoring polls but I say look at the numbers and rejoice. All the Deomcrats should be screaming for impeachment everyday. They'll immediately have us who've wanted it for five years and I think many other people who are longing for accountability and a functioning government. I know the republicons own everything (and can't run anything) but as we get closer to the elections wouldn't some them want to join the law abiding bunch? Maybe?
Their war on the Dems and even more vicious war on liberals may backfire on them. There's still only us as opposed to republicon, conservatives, neocons, something called a moderate, the rabid right wing, the rabid religious right, whatever. When one of them stands up for our country and not the Bushist regime I'll call that person a Republican. Right now they're all cons. Right now we the people have a huge advantage over them. We still cherish truth, honor, integrity and we want change. Again, the numbers.
And American blinkers aside, they're not just destroying America, murdering hundreds of thousands of people!, they're killing the planet!
Anyway, just more words.
Take care, Jan
Midniteride (a ride to pain, agony, torture, and death):
ReplyDelete"The people who dished out the dirty tricks think the person who calls them on their tricks is a "crybaby"? And that if someone has a "progressive" voting record that person also, by definition, has character and integrity, despite clear evidence to the contrary?"
I wrote the "crybaby" post. I am not one of the "people" who dish out anything. I never heard of Hackett before a few days ago, but I read things on the Internet that turned me against him.
Those things may have been inaccurate. If they were, then I have no position.
Certainly if you have proof Rep. Brown circulated lies about Hackett, then I agree heartily with you that he should be condemned, and I would never support him. But DO you have proof? And if you don't, isn't it you who are circulating falsehoods about another?
Now, I would like to hold YOU to your words. You say you want people of integrity, people of character, people who are not mean, right?
Do you really think that's true of you?
If so, I would think that a moral monster like Murtha would be the last person you would support.
He is a "paid for patsy" of the huge industry in this country which abuses, tortures, maims, terrorizes, hunts for sport, kills, dismembers and otherwise subjects innocent animals to UNSPEAKABLE HORROR, let me repeat that, UNSPEAKABLE HORROR. He consistently votes against any legislation that would at least institute more humane practices when we torture and kill those billions of unfortunate sensient beings without the ability to defend themselves from such atrocities, but who unfortunately do have the ability to feel pain.
I hate him and despise him with a passion that far exceeds the passion of people who hate the Bush cabal.
Why are we where we are, really?
You don't like people being "nasty and mean" to each other?
Take a look at what goes on in slaughterhouses in this country, if you can stand it. I'll post a link tomorrow.
First one becomes desensitized to the torture of animals, and then one doesn't give a sh*t how many innocents are tortured in enemy detention camps, and then one doesn't give a damn about how many civilians become collateral damage, and so it goes.
Nastiness doesn't cause terror, pain, suffering and death.
If he's your hero, you're my enemy.
The only person I can think of off hand who is more depraved than Murtha and his ilk is Bill Frist, cat torturer and cat killer.
Did it ever occur to anyone that this whole misbegotten Middle Eastern nightmare is being done on purpose to inflame the dumbasses in the Middle East to draw them into further conflict?
ReplyDeleteTaken as a whole, "our" policies have been nothing short of cartoonish. Along with this, we have recently witnessed the wholesale corruption of our entire "National Value System" that included a healthy respect for our revered traditions of individual liberty. which includes the supposition of privacy.
There is a historical pattern at work here...
...and it's not about "liberals" and "conservatives". That stuff is for assholes.
dduuuuhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
ReplyDeleteWTF
so does the bold make some people feel more important? mighty? correct?
Grow up...
How exactly does Laura Bush sleep nights?
ReplyDeleteHear she drinks a lot -- an awful lot. That's why they call her "pickles"
That story about chimpy being told to "choose her or the bottle" is slightly wrong.
She actually told him to keep his fuckin' hands off HER booze
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteWhat should the United States do now?
ReplyDeleteWhat the United States should do now is put a gun in the hands of every neocon that led us into this position and send them to the front lines, with the same inadequate equipment that has been issued to everyone else, and bid them good luck.
Quick, before it goes away. Go to Google. Type the word "failure" in the search engine, then press "search."
ReplyDeleteMark N said...
ReplyDeleteWhat should the United States do now?
What the United States should do now is put a gun in the hands of every neocon that led us into this position and send them to the front lines, with the same inadequate equipment that has been issued to everyone else, and bid them good luck.
Mark N, all I can say about this post of yours is you are one hell of a brilliant strategist. Best idea I've heard in a long time. Make them wear yellow uniforms, also, for the cowards they are.
I want to congratulate this blog. A few "people" like gedaliya and bart show up, and they are quickly exposed for what they are, and read only to get a preview of the latest lame propoganda put forth by Bushco.
ReplyDeleteGo to VC and read the endless drivel, the post after post after post after post from the same sorry quarters.* And they're even dumber than Bartaliya.
I guess "they" send their more articulate trolls to the smarter blogs.
Why has VC become a blog that attracts the lowest of the low?
Well, since it's a good lesson to be learned in terms of how we go forward as a country, the answer is simple: lack of moral leadership at the top.
* There are three or four intelligent, contrarian thinkers on that site, so I don't include each and every poster.
Did it ever occur to anyone that this whole misbegotten Middle Eastern nightmare is being done on purpose to inflame the dumbasses in the Middle East to draw them into further conflict?
ReplyDeleteYes.
Taken as a whole, "our" policies have been nothing short of cartoonish. Along with this, we have recently witnessed the wholesale corruption of our entire "National Value System" that included a healthy respect for our revered traditions of individual liberty. which includes the supposition of privacy.
There is a historical pattern at work here...
...and it's not about "liberals" and "conservatives". That stuff is for assholes.
But it's the "pattern" about which none dare speak its name.
It has been proposed that "What matters 'most' is that we're in Iraq, not how we got here."
ReplyDeleteWrong! It matters a gigantic fucking lot how -- and why -- we got there. As far as I'm concerned it is and has always been a lost cause and should be ended as expeditiously as possible with a minimum of further death and mayhem. But how and why it started are crucial questions that this country cannot avoid, if it is ever to regain its honor. And there must be atonement. Period.
bart--
ReplyDeleteYou're missing the point of Glenn's OP. It might be easy to get sidetracked into discussing our success or failure in Iraq, but all Glenn was asking was, why was it ok to castigate Dean for defeatist comments, but when William Buckley makes them he gets treated with the kid gloves? Why do Dean's comments make him a traitor and serve as grounds for new sedition laws, but if William Buckley says it, it's just a chance for an interesting and trivial discussion about how nice it is that we all can have different opinions?
You can have a fine discussion of the history of Dean's rhetoric if you want, but that isn't the point. The point is, both Buckley and Dean said same thing, but they get treated with a double standard. Why is this ok? You can claim it's about context, but the original criticism of Dean didn't seem to be about the context. It seemed to be about his particular choice of words. So why should Buckley get a double standard when he uses more or less those very same words? Again, it can't be because he's coming from a different direction, because again, the problem Dean's critics seemed to have was with his language. They might have had a problem with the direction he was coming from, too, but that's a different problem.
i don't understand the point of view that because you disagree and are vocal about it, it equals sedition. is this not america where dissent is a founding principal of democratic values?
ReplyDeleteand to say that a person who disagrees has a personal involvement in seeing american kids killed is absurd, is that like someone who gives a job to thier best friend/crony in order to make them rich at the expense of american lives.
make no mistake, the world is changing and the cabal in washington will be tried for its crimes against humanity.
so does the bold make some people feel more important? mighty? correct?
ReplyDeleteWell, it could be worse. At least it's not ALL CAPS.
By the way, bart, on a purely personal note, has anyone ever mentioned that your habit of always posting your rantings in bold type makes you appear insecure?
ReplyDeleteIf you really believed what you were saying, you wouldn't need to constantly shout it.
From American Spectator (FWIW):
ReplyDeleteHOWIE AND HARRY
It appears that the Democrat Party is closer to imploding than the Republican. How else to explain the ongoing attempts by Democrat Party Chairman Howard Dean to destroy Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid?
According to knowledgeable DNC sources, Dean about ten days ago was shown opposition research documents generated by the Republican National Committee more than three years ago, which laid out facts regarding Reid and his family's lobbying and ethical conflicts.
Dean, according to the sources, was fascinated by the details, and asked that his staff research and independently confirm everything on the documents. "Basically he oppo'd a member of his own party," says a DNC source loyal to Dean.
"Basically, we were looking at three- or four-page documents that made Jack Abramoff's lobbying work look like that of a rank amateur," says the DNC source. "Between the minority leader's past in Nevada and here in Washington, and the activities of his sons and son-in-law, there probably isn't anyone in this town with more conflicts. The Reid family is the symbol of what's wrong with Washington; it's their behavior that enabled the culture that spawned people like Abramoff."
Dean then went public over the weekend, saying that Democrats with an Abramoff problem would be in trouble, not only with voters, but with the Democrat Party. But why attack a senior member of his own party?
According to Democrat Party watchers and DNC staff, Dean has grown increasingly frustrated at how he is treated by the likes of Reid, Sen. Dick Durbin, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and Rep. Rahm Emanuel, who leads the House Democrat candidate recruitment effort. "They treat him like a lackey, not as an equal," says another DNC employee. "Just last week, they were all badmouthing his fundraising activities, when clearly he's done a good job. What this comes down to a fight for the soul of our party, and if the chairman has to draw a long knife on a few of his colleagues, he's more than willing to do so."
Can this really be true? A Democrat who actually cares more about principles than party loyalty? I don't know much about Dean, but he is starting to sound more and more interesting. Could this guy be an actual hero? Would be a "netroots" candidate?
Response to David Shaugnessy:
ReplyDeleteOne concrete real-world example is the action 'an angry old broad' took in her local supermarket, as she described in the last thread.
I'm talking about what "speaking truth to power" is generally understood to mean. I mean the battlefield that Senator Russ Feingold has NOT quit, unlike almost all of his colleagues, as he "resists," "engages," "fights," and "challenges" the corrupt powers in the Congress in an attempt to safeguard the Constitutional liberties of every American, by filibustering and offering amendments to the P.A.T.R.I.O.T. Act.
I mean all the things that the Democratic Party does not, will not, do every day to challenge and confront at every opportunity the crimes being perpetuated on our country by the Bush Regime. It is a "battle" familiar to everyone who has experienced the modern American high school: having the courage to speak out and do the right thing for the right thing's sake DESPITE the "popular mood." Russ Feingold is defying his own Party bosses, and the media's "popular" conventional wisdom, in order to honor his oath of office to the COUNTRY and its CONSTITUTION. That is difficult, that is painful, you can hear the stress in his voice. But dammit, he's doing it, and every one of us ought to be grateful, and be willing to do our own share of the work that needs doing, as 'an angry old broad' in Georgia just bravely did, whenever we can. "Virtue is its own reward" -- and thus no politician dares practice it, fearing an election loss? I beg to differ with that interpretation of serving the public.
How many of you are aware of Iraq the Model's blogspot? I recently discovered it, and do not know enough about him to assess him yet, but he sounds like a really intelligent, measured, terrific person. He lives in Iraq and has been reporting what's going on there. I would urge all to check out his site and make your own assessment:
ReplyDeleteHere's an excerpt from a recent report:
A couple of joint press releases were made after the meetings in which the two parties made calls for unity among Iraqis and condemned all kinds of attacks on mosques and civilians.
In both cases the US and Iraqi authorities were blamed for the escalating situation.
Ironically, these are the very two factions believed responsible for the greatest deal of the violence in the past few days!
Glenn, that was just brilliant. You articulate so well what many of us feel. Thanks
ReplyDelete<a href="URL">label</a>
ReplyDeleteResponse to anonymous at 10:03:
ReplyDeleteI'm curious about what made you so hostile toward Paul Hackett, with so little exposure to him? But your feelings about Jack Murtha's history perhaps explain it. I assume that Hackett appears to pose a threat to strongly-held values of yours which you believe, or know, that Sherrod Brown shares? I've seen other reactions of this sort ("crybaby," "quitter," etc.) expressed about Paul Hackett, who appears to me to be "the victim" in this situation. [And I was certainly not accusing you of being the one practicing dirty tricks -- that was aimed at the Brown camp.] After all, Brown got what he wanted: an uncontested primary on his way to take on Senator DeWine. And, yes, the follow-up from the Brown camp to accusations of dirty tricks is often: "Do you have proof Brown did this swiftboating?" Not yet, I don't. I expect the truth to emerge, however. [And I don't believe I said I had proof, nor said that Brown himself participated in that part of the pressure on Hackett.]
But does the fact that I don't yet know whether Senator DeWine, Karl Rove, Sherrod Brown, or Joe SixPack started the OBVIOUS whisper campaign against Hackett's Iraq service mean it didn't happen? When multiple county party chairs in Ohio heard the whispers? When Sherrod Brown himself admits hearing them from his own campaign manager? When Harry Reid, the Senate Minority Leader personally called Paul Hackett to accuse him of being photographed in Iraq committing war crimes? [Resulting in a trip to D.C. by Paul to fully rebut the rumors.] And then when insiders and Brown pals like Rep. Waxman admit calling Hackett funders in CA on Brown's behalf to stop the flow of money to Hackett. And when a New York fundraiser for Hackett admits being called for the same reason by party insiders, and considers it an uncalled for and objectionable move. All these "insiders" who are calling of course have the implicit backing of the funding committees and leadership of the Democratic Party when they make such a call. What are those called supposed to think?
I am, in fact, very grateful for the statements that Paul Hackett has had the courage to make publicly to date, about and since his withdrawal, though risking the namecalling and disdain that has followed, because otherwise the proof I DO have, just listed above, I would not have. And if and when more details and "proof" emerge about the swiftboating which Hackett himself says occurred, I know that the person or persons who reveal it will likewise be smeared and called names for "rocking the boat" and "harming" Brown, etc. Good mob silencing techniques, all the way around, in other words.
I respect your strong feelings about Jack Murtha's career votes. In this case, I know far less than you. And I know next to nothing about votes of his related to slaughterhouse practices. I watched him in a town hall meeting recently, which made it absolutely clear to me that his conscience is bothering him. He regularly goes over to Walter Reed and confronts the results of his action on the Iraq vote, face to face, when meeting with the wounded veterans there. I cannot ignore his change of heart. I do retain skepticism about his future votes, knowing his past record. But - because he has stepped forward in time, and with the best of intentions, to prevent more human bloodshed in Iraq should others support his position, I do give him my full support for his present actions, and respect the courage and integrity of his present stance. Other than that, we will probably have to agree to disagree about Jack Murtha.
Ok, so Blogger is stupid and translates text to HTML twice if you use preview, but it only took one test to establish that. Any real "Highly Certified Tech-no Dweeb" would have figured that out, instead writing everything out and talking to people as if they were five-year-olds.
ReplyDeleteAnd what the hell are " commas which are slanted"? And how would they work only "sometimes"? HTML is a deterministic language. And how is a (incomprehensible) warning a "trick"?
And of course <a/> does not "underline everything which comes after"; Blogger rejects it, saying "Tag is not closed".
A Face-saving Dubai Deal in the Works?
ReplyDeleteBy TIMOTHY J. BURGER, MIKE ALLEN AND MATTHEW COOPER/WASHINGTON
SUBSCRIBE TO TIMEPRINTE-MAILMORE BY AUTHOR
Posted Saturday, Feb. 25, 2006
Moving toward a deal that could allow President Bush and congressional GOP leaders to save face and avert a prolonged confrontation, GOP officials said today that they were discussing the idea of having Dubai Ports World seek a new review of its acquisition of a British company's operation that runs several key U.S. ports.
House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Peter King, confirmed in a phone interview early Saturday afternoon to TIME that officials were close to a deal involving the Congressional leadership, the White House and the Dubai company. The agreement would call for a 45-day “CFIUS-plus investigation,” King said, referring to the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, a Treasury Department-run interagency panel that probes proposed acquisitions in the U.S.
Although the Dubai deal had already been approved by CFIUS, "the rationale for reopening it is, once DP carved out the American ports from the rest of the contract it changed the nature of the agreement so it had to be reviewed again," says King, who had been among the leading GOP voices opposing the deal as first approved without the extra 45-day review process or briefing of Congress. King says will await final details before formally backing any such deal. King added "if we are going to hold back on legislation, I think there has to be continuous congressional review throughout the new CFIUS review.”
If approved by all parties, the new deal would allow Bush to avert a GOP-driven bill to overturn the Dubai deal with enough votes to override Bush's threat of his first veto. Republican sources tell TIME that Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee proposed the basic terms of a deal designed to give the White House a graceful way out, while also allaying the concerns of the many lawmakers in both parties who have said the deal could be a threat to our security. Under the Frist plan, the deal could stand a good chance of ultimately going through after the extended review. Frist aides apparently proposed the terms to representatives of the company and the White House late Friday. Neither has formally responded but both seemed interested in the idea, according to a Senate Republican aide. "This avoids a direct clash," the aide said. "It solves everyone's problem. The President doesn't have to cancel the deal or veto anything."
Under Frist's plan, the company would voluntarily separate U.S. ports from the rest of the deal for 45 days, allowing them to continue to operate as they do while the deal is re-vetted. That would allow a new review through the administration's Committee on Foreign Investments in the U.S. (CFIUS). Administration officials remain adamant that their first review was thorough and proper, so the face-saving element was crucial, according to one Capitol Hill negotiator. Frist is proposing that this time, CFIUS do the extra 45-day review that the law calls for in transactions where there are national security concerns. That provision was not triggered last time because administration officials had no remaining concerns at the end of the first review. This approach would eliminate the need for new legislation now, the Republican sources said.
Are the Democrats insane? Are the Democrats insane? Are the Democrats insane?
They have an issue which has energized my Repulican friends like none I have ever seen, and it's energized them AGAINST Bush, and now the Democrats want to make nice, work out a few phony restrictions, and enable the deal to go through?
This is what we are dealing with. I want to hear what Howard Dean says about this. I read that the Democrats are not really "enthused" about this deal, and are looking for a face saving way to go along with it. Sure, they know which side their bread is buttered on. All that money from corporate America..... They're not about to let a little thing like national security stand in the way of the gravy train.
They're all a bunch of pigs. I am about two days away from dropping out of politics completely, and going back to living my life. Might as well enjoy myself before the big curtain starts coming down.
Let the Demoidiotcrats fight BushCo by themselves. Who cares? They all look alike in the dark anyway.
Some intellectually dishonest slimebucket called midnightride wrote:
ReplyDeleteBut does the fact that I don't yet know whether Senator DeWine, Karl Rove, Sherrod Brown, or Joe SixPack started the OBVIOUS whisper campaign against Hackett's Iraq service mean it didn't happen?
Does the fact that I don't yet know whether you fuck goats mean you don't?
Any real "Highly Certified Tech-no Dweeb" would have figured that out, instead writing everything out and talking to people as if they were five-year-olds.
ReplyDeleteListen you distasteful person, call me stupid, but I have looked at all those sites and could never figure out how to post URL links because I have zero training in computers and only recently started using one.
If it weren't for Karen, I probably never would have figured it out. Her posts were enormously instructive and helpful.
But YOU want to criticize her. Did it ever occur to you that people who come together to accomplish an important goal have a bond which unites them, and are interested in helping others with that same goal?
Since you are so sophisticated, why don't you exercise the SCROLL feature and just go by those posts?
Or do you only want people to post items that YOU want to read?
And no, I haven't noticed that pressing the Preview feature makes anything appear twice. Maybe you need to get a little more instruction from people like Karen to learn how to use a computer.
I tried not to giggle when I read truth machine's post. But I couldn't help myself :)
ReplyDeleteHow many of you are aware of Iraq the Model's blogspot?
ReplyDeleteIt's strongly pro-war and a favorite of wingnuts. Just what do you think "Iraq the Model" means?
I tried not to giggle when I read truth machine's post. But I couldn't help myself :)
ReplyDeleteActually, I wasn't fair. I should have written:
Does the fact that I don't yet know whether you fuck goats, or sheep, mean that you've never fucked quadrupeds?
Oops -- that was me.
ReplyDeleteAnd no, I haven't noticed that pressing the Preview feature makes anything appear twice.
ReplyDeleteI didn't say that pressing the Preview feather makes anything appear twice. You're even more inept than karen mcl.
Personally, I don't believe in making accusations, even vague ones, against anyone unless my own eyeballs have seen the evidence and know it's real.
ReplyDeletes/feather/feature/
ReplyDelete"Ok, so Blogger is stupid and translates text to HTML twice if you use preview, but it only took one test to establish that."
ReplyDeleteThat's what you said. I have no idea what you mean.
I said at the start I was stupid with computers. Karen is anything but.
What did you say the name of the charm school you went to is?
"It's strongly pro-war and a favorite of wingnuts. Just what do you think "Iraq the Model" means?"
ReplyDeleteI don't know. What does it mean?
Sorry if I suggested going to a pro-war site. I should have read it more extensively to see where the man was coming from. I thought maybe he was an impartial observer on the scene, but if he's pro-war, that's the last site I will ever go to again.
Thanks for pointing that out.
That's what you said. I have no idea what you mean.
ReplyDeleteRight, because you're no expert, and know it, unlike karen mcl. But since you have no idea what I mean, you shouldn't say that I mean that something appears twice, should you? Cretin.
OK. I'm a cretin.
ReplyDeleteHappy now?
Peace.
And just to educate your whiny little brain:
ReplyDeleteBlogger translates <i> to <i> when you click preview; if you then click "publish this comment", it re-translates, treating that as a tag, rather than posting the text you actually entered.
Peace.
That's funny, sicne you chose to pick a fight with me, with your ignorant defense of poser-as-expert "karen mcl".
ReplyDeleteSorry if I suggested going to a pro-war site. I should have read it more extensively to see where the man was coming from. I thought maybe he was an impartial observer on the scene, but if he's pro-war, that's the last site I will ever go to again.
Do not ever go there again. Don't read it, or even mention it. What is the matter with you? -- that site is on the Index of Forbidden Blogs.
I don't know. What does it mean?
ReplyDeleteIt means that the invasion of Iraq was a model for turning non-democratic regimes into democratic ones; it's pure neoconnery. See http://www.antiwar.com/blog/comments.php?id=P1653_0_1_0
Do not ever go there again. Don't read it, or even mention it. What is the matter with you? -- that site is on the Index of Forbidden Blogs.
ReplyDeleteYeah, Hypatia, belittle the poster for not wanting to waste time at pro-war sites. In your faux-libertarian conception, it's not that we have the freedom to read something, we have a requirement to read it.
To sum up: The poster asked about the site. I noted that it's a pro-war site -- I did not say not to read it or mention it. The poster then volunteered that, if it's a pro-war site, it's not the site the poster wishes to visit. Hypatia then demonstrated, once again, that she's a jackass.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteP.S. Since we're giving computer lessons:
ReplyDeleteIf you want to click on the link cited above, be sure to get the whole thing, since it is wider than the text column and may be partially hidden (depending upon your browser and other factors). To make it easier, I'll encode it as a link:
"Iraq the Model" -- or the Bad Example?
Glenn: By stark contrast, when one reviews the pre-war arguments made by Howard Dean as to why the war was ill-advised, it is glaringly self-evident just how right he was -- at a time when few others recognized it -- about virtually everything.
ReplyDeleteOK, let's take a gander...
I believe it is my patriotic duty to urge a different path to protecting America's security: To focus on al Qaeda, which is an imminent threat...
This was not a valid reason for avoiding intervention in Iraq. Iraq was sheltering at least 1,500 al Qaeda at a base near the Iranian border and a number of cells in the Sunni Triangle. Read the chapter about Operation Viking in the book Masters of Chaos by Linda Robinson. The SF combined with the Kurdish Peshmerga and engaged the al Qaeda camp in about a week long battle. When they took the camp, they found travel and identification documents for al Qaeda fighters who fled to Iraq after we routed them out of Afghanistan. They also found a workshop with chemical weapon precursors, chemical weapon manuals in arabic, chemical protective suits and atropine nerve gas antidote. The captured al Qeada told the SF the name of their Iraqi intelligence coordinator.
Recent documents indicate that Saddam trained roughly 8000 terrorist over the four years leading up to the war.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/006/550kmbzd.asp
Other released Iraqi intelligence documents show that Saddam was supporting al Qaeda allied groups back at the time of the original WTC attacks:
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id=5267
...and to use our resources to improve and strengthen the security and safety of our home front
There was no reason that both could not be funded.
while working with the other nations of the world to contain Saddam Hussein. . .
You mean working with the nations and the UN personnel which were taking millions in protection money from Saddam's Oil for Food program while he starved his own people?
The Administration has not explained how a lasting peace, and lasting security, will be achieved in Iraq once Saddam Hussein is toppled.
This was never our goal.
Iraq is a divided country, with Sunni, Shia and Kurdish factions that share both bitter rivalries and access to large quantities of arms.
Wrong. There never was a civil war between these groups. There was a preplanned terror campaign described by the Iraqi intelligence documents in the WS article linked above. Neither the supporters or the opponents knew about this at the time.
And last week's tape by Osama bin Laden tells us that our enemies will seek relentlessly to transform a war into a tool for inspiring and recruiting more terrorists.
I keep hearing this claim, yet where are all these terrorists? The al Qaeda in Iraq have about the same 1500 they had before the war. However, our troops are telling us that the suicide bombers today are handcuffed to their steering wheels or are teenage boys.
In Iraq, I would be prepared to go ahead without further Security Council backing if it were clear the threat posed to us by Saddam Hussein was imminent, and could neither be contained nor deterred. However, that case has not been made, and I believe we should continue the hard work of diplomacy and inspection. . .
This is particularly humorous given the recently released audio tapes of Saddam's command meetings with his lieutenants which were recently featured on ABC's Nightline and were released in full detail at the Intelligence Summit last weekend.
Mr. Duelfer assured us, without any physical or documentary evidence, that Saddam had destroyed his WMD in 1991 and 1992 immediately after the war.
However, during this tape recorded meeting with Saddam, we learned that Mr. Duelfer had been lied to...
At one point Hussein Kamel, Saddam's son-in-law and the man who was in charge of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction efforts can be heard on the tapes, speaking openly about hiding information from the U.N.
"We did not reveal all that we have," Kamel says in the meeting. "Not the type of weapons, not the volume of the materials we imported, not the volume of the production we told them about, not the volume of use. None of this was correct."
http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/Investigation/story?id=1616996
http://www.intelligencesummit.org/
We still cannot account for the WMD which Kamal described. However, evidence is growing that some or all of these WMD were moved to Syria along with the WMD manufacturing equipment and the WMD scientists which Duelfer confirmed had been moved to Syria in convoys just before the war.
Kay and Duelfer could not rule out this possibility:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/01/25/wirq25.xml
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20050427-121915-1667r.htm
The Israelis have publicly announced that they believe the WMD were moved to Syria:
http://www.nysun.com/article/24480
http://www.meforum.org/article/755
The second in command of the Iraqi AF claims that two pilots told him that they flew WMD containers to Syria:
http://www.nysun.com/article/26514
"But does the fact that I don't yet know whether Senator DeWine, Karl Rove, Sherrod Brown, or Joe SixPack started the OBVIOUS whisper campaign against Hackett's Iraq service mean it didn't happen?"
ReplyDeleteThis sentence of mine apparently needs to be translated for the (intentionally-misreading?) 'truth machine'. What that sentence says is:
Point 1: An ugly whisper campaign about Hackett's Iraq service happened. Period. [I state that because I believe Sherrod Brown when he says he heard it, and I believe Paul Hackett when he says he heard it, and I believe multiple county party chairs who told multiple people that they heard it, and I believe Sherrod Brown's campaign manager when he told Sherrod Brown and others that he heard it.]
AND
Point 2: The SOURCE and ORIGIN of this irrefutable whisper campaign are yet UNKNOWN. [I trust and hope that its source and origin will be revealed. Until that time, however, only the whisper campaign's EFFECTS are known, and not its original perpetrator(s) (who could be DeWine, Rove, Brown, and/or SixPack).]
I see nothing intellectually dishonest about these points, whatsoever. My sympathies for Paul Hackett, however, just increased.
Glenn, I was thinking in terms of a theme that you had talked about a couple of posts back. About Digby's assertion that being bi-partisan is being foolish and the rhetorical questions you were asking about whether we progressives use the same tactics as do the republicans use now....
ReplyDeleteAnyway, in terms of this post and that previous post. One thing I've been thinking for awhile is that progressives, democratic leaders, etc. Do not react strongly enough to the rhetoric they are accosted with when they are talking to the various talking head shows.
One particular example would be the recent Hannity and Colmes show where Arianna was being subjected to Hannity's bullshit and she did well by pointing out that Coulter was sitting next to him, but...anyway.
What I think needs to happen is that when the rhetoric of "TRAITOR" is used (e.g. you're hurting the troops, your giving aid and comfort, you're happy to see our troops harmed, democrats celibrate at bad news in Iraq, ad infinitum) that the reaction from the Net Roots, the democratic leadership, everyone concerned about the use of this language. We should loudly, REPEATEDLY, denounce those who say these things, demonize them for using language that EVER suggests we are traitors, the drumbeat against the use of this language needs to be intransigent and stubborn and louder than it is now.
Anytime the net roots is being intervied and someone, whether its a Hannity type or worse a talking head that parrots the "conventional wisdom" that suggests the progressives are aiding the enemy. That needs to be shouted down IMMEDIATELY...
We cannot accept being tagged with that anymore.
I think that should be a high priority as we take the debate into the 06 election cycle. And, to help us through the implosion of this administration.
Stop the world. I want to get off.
ReplyDeleteHowever, David Rivkin, a former White House legal adviser, said the numbers had to be put in perspective.
"If 10 people were tortured to death out of over 100,000 detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan" that was "a better rate" than in both world wars and "most civilian penal systems".
Report: Nearly 100 dead in US custody
Nearly 100 prisoners have died in US custody in Iraq and Afghanistan since August 2002, the Human Rights First organisation has said ahead of publication of a new report.
At least 98 deaths occurred, with at least 34 of them suspected or confirmed murder and manslaughter (deliberate or reckless killing), the group of US lawyers told BBC television on Tuesday.
Their dossier claims that 11 more deaths are deemed suspicious and that between eight and 12 prisoners were tortured to death.
However, charges are rare and sentences are light, the report said.
The report comes a week after new photographs of alleged prisoner abuse at Baghdad's US-run Abu Ghraib prison emerged.
Murders
The report alleged that one person was made to jump off a bridge into the Tigris river in Iraq and another forced inside a sleeping bag and suffocated.
The number of deaths in custody discounts those due to fighting, mortar attacks or violence between detainees. They were directly attributable to their detention or interrogation in American custody, the BBC's Newsnight programme said.
The report's editor Deborah Pearlstein told Newsnight: "We're extremely comfortable with the veracity and the reliability of the facts here.
"These are documents based on army investigative reports, documents that we've obtained from the government or that have come out through freedom of information act requests in the United States"
Deborah Pearlstein,
Human Rights First organisation
"These are documents based on army investigative reports, documents that we've obtained from the government or that have come out through freedom of information act requests in the United States."
Newsnight was told by the US Pentagon: "We haven't seen the report yet. Where we find allegations of maltreatment we take them very seriously and prosecute."
Zalmay Khalilzad, the US ambassador to Iraq, told the BBC: "There are thousands of prisoners that have been held by the coalition during the past more than two years.
"Some have died of natural causes and there have been charges of abuse. Of course, we always investigate and determine what happened and appropriate punishment is given if the judgment is made that illegal actions took place.
"If those reports are true, of course they would be terrible abuses and they would be illegal things. Those who are responsible for them would be investigated and they will be punished."
However, David Rivkin, a former White House legal adviser, said the numbers had to be put in perspective.
"[If] 10 people were tortured to death out of over 100,000 detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan" that was "a better rate" than in both world wars and "most civilian penal systems".
"It is not a scandal. Bad things happen in detention. A lot of them died for reasons that have nothing to do with it."
Amnesty International UK demanded an investigation into the deaths.
A spokesman said: "We want to see the US and its allies allowing a full independent and impartial investigation into these deaths, as well as mounting incidents of alleged torture and other mistreatment.
"We've also raised with the Americans the question of overly lenient sentences for those found guilty of torturing prisoners to death in Afghanistan."
Thanks for the link about Iraq the Model. It's really not a site I choose to go to again.
ReplyDeleteOne thing I did notice when reading that article was that the Washington Post seems to have a callous disregard for the saftey of others.
I think it's despicable that the White House leaked the news about meeting with the two brothers to its apologist, the Washington Post, and they printed the story.
As the third brother pointed out, that jeopardized his family's lives.
Business as usual in the Propaganda Highway, I guess.
Poltically lost, you would react with outrage because you feel outraged, as do I.
Unfortunately, most people have lost the capacity to feel outrage.
The Death of Outrage probably says as much about our current situation as any one other casualty.
But I'll keep feeling outraged at injustice until my last breath, not that it does much good.
However, David Rivkin, a former White House legal adviser, said the numbers had to be put in perspective.
ReplyDelete"If 10 people were tortured to death out of over 100,000 detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan" that was "a better rate" than in both world wars and "most civilian penal systems".
Ah, the "I killed fewer people than Hitler" defense.
I'm quite sure this isn't a particularly valuable exercise, but putting that aside for the moment...
ReplyDeleteTo start, Mr. Bush never said that Democracy was going to bring "peace and stability" to Iraq.
Very true. Mr. Bush said that Iraq needed to be invaded because it provided a national security threat to the United States, a claim which was quickly proven to be entirely false. In any event, it would be difficult in the extreme to argue that removing peace and stability from a country is a positive action.
The theory behind bringing democracy to Iraq is that democracies do not attack one another the way Saddam attacked his neighbors and warred against us.
It's difficult to come to grips with the sheer stupidity of this assertion. For starters, democracies absolutely do attack one another. Hell, you don't need to go outside the hemisphere to mark the war between the democratic government of the United States of America and the democratic government of the Confederate States of America. Once you start adding up the states that have retained figurative monarchies but are guided by parliamentary bodies, this statement falls apart.
But the kicker is that even if it didn't fall apart, it would be an irrelevant point. The underlying premise is that it is preferable to have democracies because they will not wage aggressive war. But democracies have shown themselves perfectly willing to engage in acts of unprovoked aggression against sovereign nations. There is no better example of this than the invasion of Iraq, a war that was launched with no provocation against a country that had no chance of defending its territorial integrity. If a democratic country can break international law and conduct unprovoked war that results in the deaths of tens of thousands of people, then what exactly is the point of the objective, anyway?
Iraq is no longer a threat to us or its neighbors.
The invasion provided spectacular proof that Iraq never was a threat to us or its neighbors. They might as well have been fighting with Dixie cups.
Iraq is now out of the WMD business.
They were out of the WMD business before the invasion. Maybe you missed the newsflash.
Terrorism is not an end unto itself, it is a war crime designed to achieve goals...Folks, retreat and defeat is never ever an option once you pay the blood price of war. This country always had a policy of unconditional victory until Korea and Vietnam. There is no other policy which keeps faith with the men and women in the military who are paying the price in blood, trauma and sweat.
No form of warfare is an end to itself, whether the fighting is irregular warfare being conducted by guerrilas or conventional warfare fought by the United States military. The military is an instrument to enforce policy, nothing less and nothing more. The fact that servicemen and women have died in the conflict is deeply saddening, but it's also completely irrelevant to the worth of the policy objectives. That's why "Support the Troops" is such a moronic slogan- it's the functional equivalent of going to your mechanic and saying, "Support the drill!" even if he's using the drill to punch holes in your car. The troops are not a policy, they are a means to an end. And there has been nothing about this invasion that has justified their use.
Thanks to most of the commenters. I've got a link for HTML help; grounds/motive shift has been named, explained, and demonstrated;, I've been shown an interesting new way to score pundits and politicians; and thanks to HTML education, a lot of interesting links have popped up.
ReplyDeleteBut I do so miss the sophistication of Usenet browsers; can anyone suggest a Blogger substitute for the KILL FILE? Not only was it an individual convenience, it was an effective and democratic tool for enforcing the local ethic. Those who were consistently provoking instead of provocative, got flamed for a few days, and then found no one was responding to them since they had become invisible. And then they left.
about bart.
ReplyDeleteman has a courage to come here and discuss his ideas with political oponents. btw, how much of you guys (readers of this blog) go to right wing based blogs to read and discuss - not many i would think (no, no balls there).
amazingly, seems noone here recognize that bart actualy is trying to bridge the differences between the sides, trough arguments and discussion. that's always positive sign.
and what you people do. you spit on the guy, proving that you're just an other side of the same coin..
phew..
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteWilliam F. Buckley's disagreement with Iraq war = "a consistent critic of our Iraq policy and a consistent skeptic of our aims there"
ReplyDeleteany other criticism = product of the "hate-Bush left"
For the last couple of days this Blog has been infected with an unbridled glee, brought about when William F. Buckley published his February 24, 2006 column declaring our defeat in Iraq. Their utter joy is not surprising given the passionate hatred most blog commentators have for George Bush.
ReplyDeleteHowever, what is surprising is that no one here, not even their leader Glenn Greenwald, has failed to mention one salient and critical point regarding WFB’s stance regarding the war:
William F. Buckley has always been skeptical of this war, and the latest article is one of a series in which he has been critical of our aims and policies in Iraq. What he wrote is nothing new.
Here are some examples:
Was Iraq Worth It
Exiting Iraq
Algeria and Iraq
Who Are We Fighting>
The Cost of War
Skepticism Regarding Nation Building
WMD
Skepticism Regarding Nation Building
The above WFB columns are not a complete compendium of Buckley’s views on Iraq, but they are sufficient to demonstration that WFB has been a consistent critic of our Iraq policy and a consistent skeptic of our aims there. Buckley is not a neo-conservative and distrusts the president’s Wilsonian impulses. As such, his latest article came as no surprise to those of us who have been reading his thoughts on Iraq over the years.
William F. Buckley is the founder of the modern conservative movement and a great man. He is one of my personal heroes. He has mentored three generations of conservative activists and thinkers. He has had a profound effect on our movement. Even so, he has not always been correct on the issues, and in this case I believe he’s wrong. In the coming days many of WFB’s protégés who support our Iraq policy will be speaking out. Ramesh Ponnuru, for instance, has taken the first step in the National Review blog The Corner. More will follow.
I expected the hate-Bush left to react as it did when WFB’s dissent on Iraq was published. Over-reaction and frenzy is, after all, par for the course with this crowd. But as usual, in the end, all that unbridled joy will be followed by a crash of disappointment and dissolution. This development does not signal the end of the Bush presidency; it will not presage a mass exodus of conservative support for the president; it will not dominate the news. All that will come of this is...nothing.
WFB’s dissent isn’t a new development. It doesn’t signal a sea-change. It merely follows a consistent pattern of thought. For the hate-Bush left to assume otherwise simply demonstrates, once again, the depth of their ignorance and cynicism.
Aw. c'mon Glenn, everyone knows this is Bill Clinton's fault. If only he hadn't prosecuted the war in Kosovo so efficiently there would have been no need for Little Shrub to have to try to prove that he has bigger balls.
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to argue with the sentiment "No blood for oil," but the economic dislocations that would result from the U.S. and the West being cut off from supplies of cheap oil would be massive.
ReplyDeleteThis is from way upthread, but it needs to be dealt with whenever it shows up.
The US and the west will not be cut off from oil (cheap oil is a thing of the past) under any circumstances. The only thing a country can do with its oil is sell it onto world markets. Oil is completely fungible and doesn't bear a content stamp. A country may, like Venezuela to Cuba, sell oil at concessionary prices. But the effect of doing so is to lower the overall world price, because the recipient country doesn't make purchases or even sells the product onto world markets.
Another interpretation of those who oppose our increasingly disasterous intervention in Iraq is that they are the courageous ones, the true patriots. It takes a lot of guts for high-visibility politicians like Dean to speak out against Bush and the war. The level of brownshirt rhetoric seems to get ratcheted up a notch every day, seemingly matching the increasing violence in Iraq, and I have to wonder when the dam is really going to burst. A truly objective reading of Dean's statements--unlike the pathetic attempts by Bart to spin this in a crude fashion--shows that he is speaking in the best interest of America, and that he does so at his peril. No one at that level of public identification usually wants to bring general condemnation down upon themselves, including calls of being psychopathic or worse.
ReplyDeleteI find it fascinating--and troubling--that the U.S., which won its independence, grew into an industrial colossus, won two world wars, and put its flag on the moon six times, now seems to choose fantasy and denial over the clear truth. It would be so easy for our country to recover its role as world leader ethically, morally, and even financially, by choosing to develop environmentally sustainable energy sources, by providing health care to all its citizens, by offering serious aid to those countries who don't even have the basics, etc., but instead we're spending wildly to go into astronomical levels of debt to finance a military empire, turn our backs on the rest of the world, and to ship virtually every decent job offshore. This is truly psychopathic behavior on a national scale.
From the UK Sunday Times:
ReplyDeleteFYI: Khalilzad is the US Amb. to Iraq.
"Much depends on the negotiating skills of Khalilzad, a Muslim born and raised in Afghanistan who first moved to America as an exchange student in secondary school. As a neoconservative who called for regime change in Iraq, Khalilzad has risen to the challenge.
"“He’s the one irreplaceable American,” said Krepinevich. “A lot of people are hoping he will pull a rabbit out of a hat.”
"Khalilzad’s strongest card is that the Americans have the money and the military boots on the ground. “Behind closed doors, he can say that if there is a civil war, because of our military power we can decide who comes out on top — and leave it open as to who might emerge the victor,” Krepinevich said.
"It is, he added, a warning to all sides that “we can make life really miserable for you”."
So, if the Iraqis start killing each other under a civil war (as opposed to killing each other in the previously-styled 'insurgency'), the US Amb. is threatening a neocon variation of Mutually Assured Destruction.
Interesting use of the phrase “we can make life really miserable for you”. I would already be inclined to grant Pres. Bush a "mission-accomplished" for making the Iraqis' lives miserable.
Rick
Sean said...
ReplyDeleteBart: To start, Mr. Bush never said that Democracy was going to bring "peace and stability" to Iraq.
Very true. Mr. Bush said that Iraq needed to be invaded because it provided a national security threat to the United States, a claim which was quickly proven to be entirely false. In any event, it would be difficult in the extreme to argue that removing peace and stability from a country is a positive action.
1) The links I posted above in response the the Dean speech discuss the Iraqi intelligence documents proving Iraq's lies about destroying its WMD, its training and sheltering of thousands of terrorists and the fact that we found an al Qaeda chemical weapons lab in their primary Iraq base.
2) If you take the time to check out the polls from Iraq, the heavy majority of the people would not go back to the "peace and security" of Saddam's police state, even when facing Baathist and al Qaeda terrorism.
Bart: The theory behind bringing democracy to Iraq is that democracies do not attack one another the way Saddam attacked his neighbors and warred against us.
It's difficult to come to grips with the sheer stupidity of this assertion. For starters, democracies absolutely do attack one another. Hell, you don't need to go outside the hemisphere to mark the war between the democratic government of the United States of America and the democratic government of the Confederate States of America. Once you start adding up the states that have retained figurative monarchies but are guided by parliamentary bodies, this statement falls apart.
The Civil War was not one democracy attacking another, it was a civil war within a democracy. Moreover, monarchies are not democracies. I am not aware of any wars between parliamentary democracies which had reduced their monarchies to pure figureheads.
But the kicker is that even if it didn't fall apart, it would be an irrelevant point. The underlying premise is that it is preferable to have democracies because they will not wage aggressive war. But democracies have shown themselves perfectly willing to engage in acts of unprovoked aggression against sovereign nations.
What part of "democracies do not attack one another" did you not understand?
Democracy does not turn countries into pacifist societies. Actually, Victor Davis Hanson in his book Culture and Carnage made a very good good case that societies which provide individual rights tend to create the most ruthless and effective militaries.
As for Iraq, if you believe that a government is not sovereign unless it rules with the approval of the people, then the Baathists dictatorship in Iraq, which took power through a coup and then maninained its rule through mass murder, torture and terror, cannot be considered sovereign.
Buckley's declaration of defeat is one thing, but this from Bill Kristol is just amazing, even astounding, on so many levels.
ReplyDeleteA) If you can't spell, don't post - you look like an idiot.
ReplyDeleteB) Use the shift key - it's not that tough, and you'll be easier to read.
/flame on - I won't be watching.
//Glenn - great post!
gedaliya--
ReplyDeleteYou seem to be missing the point of Glenn's OP, too. The issue isn't whether or not William F. Buckley is a great man. The issue is, why does this give him a pass when he says essentially the same things that Howard Dean says? Why does he get to be just "wrong", but when leftists say the same things, words like "treason" and "sedition" get thrown around? Doesn't this suggest that nobody needs to take such charges seriously, and that they're just politically motivated epithets? (As though that should come as a surprise.) All such people are really saying is "I think Howard Dean is a dope." To which you would add "And William F. Buckley is a great man." Alright, fair enough. But this just means that anyone can legitimately criticize the war, and even declare defeat. And they don't deserve to be called traitors for it (because, as you yourself would agree, William F. Buckley doesn't deserve it.) So claims to the contrary would seem to be revealed as naked political posturing. If the right isn't willing to admit this, why should we take them seriously the next time they cry "wolf" when a leftist says bad things about the war?
Some Guy said...
ReplyDeletegedaliya--
You seem to be missing the point of Glenn's OP, too. The issue isn't whether or not William F. Buckley is a great man. The issue is, why does this give him a pass when he says essentially the same things that Howard Dean says?
Buckley is not saying the same things as Dean.
Buckley supports the concept of using force to spread democracy which was part and parcel of both the Reagan and Bush Doctrines. He recognizes that this approach worked in every other area of the world.
Dean and the Dem leftwing never believed that people in the Middle East can govern themselves like in the rest of the world.
The purpose of Dem defeatism is to convince the country to withdraw their support for the war effort and then cut and run.
Well, those defeatists now have a major league conservative scalp. Buckley has given up.
As I posted before, Dean preaches defeatism, while Buckley has been personally defeated.
That doesn't excuse Buckley for making unfounded findings of defeat when our troops are in the field, but his concession of defeat is a tragedy when one remembers how Buckley carried the anti-communist banner through the lonely years of appeasement during the 60s and 70s. That may be why some are giving him a pass.
BTW, has anyone picked up on the disconnect between Glenn's earlier piece condemning conservatives for attacking other conservatives as being liberal whenever they deviate from the so called "Bush Cult" and this piece where Glenn is peeved that the Conservatives are not condemning Buckley.
You seem to be missing the point of Glenn's OP, too.
ReplyDeleteWell, the title of the thread implies otherwise, but I'll address the Dean question.
Yes, Glenn wonders why Howard Dean received disapprobation from our side while Buckley's similar remarks provoke only silence. He attributes this disparity to a sinister, venal hypocrisy, another example of the evil Republicans showing their true colors as power-mad moral cretins.
I suspect the reasons are more subtle than that. I'll offer one of many possible explanations that don't require the angry assumptions made by Glenn.
For instance, let's look at Howard Dean's public stature. In comparison to WFB's it is, well, less impressive. The firebreathing liberal dynamo doesn't quite measure up to Buckley, an important historical figure. Dean, who fervently hopes gain for himself a place in history, is seen as ambitious and opportunistic, whose views on the war are carefully shaped in order to strengthen his constituency in the left wing of the party. Buckley, whose hawkish and anti-communist creditions are legendary, is playing to no constituency. He is a revered figure. He is treated with respect despite deep divisions between WFB and many of his admirers and supporters on this issue.
Dean, for good reasons, is simply not respected as much as Buckley is. If Dean was respected as much as is Buckley, his pronouncements would have provoked less acrimony. Perhaps someday he may. But now he is not.
When Buckley was around Dean's age, he ran for Mayor of New York. It was in 1965, and his opponents were John Lindsey and Abe Beam. Buckley was young, brash, and radical, and managed to garner around 15% of the vote...in New York City! Many of the young people who worked on that campaign went on to become conservative leaders in Congress, the press, and academia. Those were the days when Buckley almost single-handedly built the modern conservative movement from scratch.
Does Glenn really believe that our reaction to Buckley's Iraq war remarks should be the same as it is to similar remarks made by one of our most important political adversaries? I don't think he does. Furthermore, don't you think its puerile for Glenn to scold us for behavior he well knows he himself would display if put into a similar situation?
If Dean is successful building his movement, perhaps someday he'll gain some of the stature enjoyed today by Bill Buckley. Until he does, don't expect us to offer him same consideration in the public square that is currently given William F. Buckley. And geez, don't expect us to greet his statements with silence while at the same time he is grappling with us on the battlefield of American electoral politics.
Bart blathers: Well, those defeatists now have a major league conservative scalp. Buckley has given up.
ReplyDeleteAs I posted before, Dean preaches defeatism, while Buckley has been personally defeated.
Well, Bill O'Reilly has been "personally defeated" then, too.
On his Feb 20 radio show, he said the U.S. needed to "hand over everything to the Iraqis as fast as humanly possible... there are so many nuts in the country -- so many crazies -- that we can't control them." O'Reilly said the "big mistake" was "the crazy-people underestimation."
And this morning while discussing the situation in Iraq on ABC's This Week, this is what George Will had to say:
STEPHANOPOULOS: What does civil war look like?
WILL: This. This is a civil war.
And Bill Kristol (I linked to this a few posts above)conceded the fact of civil war on Fox this a.m., but insanely insists that happened because we have not been "serious" in fighting the war in Iraq:
BILL KRISTOL: There would not be civil war if Zarqawi had not spent the last 2 1/2 years – had ex-Saddamists with him, very skillfully going on the offensive slaughtering Shia in Karbala, now blowing up the mosque.
CHRIS WALLACE: They’re there. There are going to be more mosques to blow up. What do you do about the terrorists?
KRISTOL: Kill them. Defeat them.
CHRIS WALLACE: We’ve been trying.
KRISTOL: We’ve been trying, and our soldiers are doing terrifically, but we have not had a serious three-year effort to fight a war in Iraq as opposed to laying the preconditions for getting out.
CICI CONNELLY: I think that really begs the question then: what have we been doing over there for three-plus years? You say there hasn’t been a serious effort to rid that region of the terrorists. I just wonder what secretary Rumsfeld would say in response to that or all the U.S. soldiers who have been over there all this time.
So, lookie Bart, at all the other "conservative scalps" who have "given up" and admitted that there is civil war in Iraq, that we cannot fix things there, and that we should get out. Are they all traitors now, too?
Howard Dean was right. For myself, I feel deeply chagrined that I paid almost no attention to his candidacy, because I trusted George Bush to competently manage the war in Iraq. I was wrong, so were you, Bart, and so were a lot of others.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteHypatia, out of breath, wonders:
ReplyDeleteSo, lookie Bart, at all the other "conservative scalps" who have "given up" and admitted that there is civil war in Iraq, that we cannot fix things there, and that we should get out. Are they all traitors now, too?
Once again, Hypatia prevaricates with half-truths. Although both were concerned about civil war, neither George Will nor Bill Kristol said "we cannot fix things there." Moreover, no conservative supporter of the Iraq war policy has abandoned their support for the war effort except for perhaps Jack Murtha. All other current opponents of the Bush policy were either against it from the beginning or expressed grave reservations about it early on (such as WFB). They comprise a only small minority of Bush's core constituency.
As much as you and other members of the hate-Bush left would love to see WFB's declaration and the recent setbacks in Iraq result in the defeat of the United States, that is not going to happen. Moreover, since not a single Democrat has offered an alternative course of action to our present policy, the public, despite its misgivings and fear about the future, are not about to entrust the prosecution of this war to what they perceive the Democrats to be: either a bunch of pansy hand-wringers or arrogant backseat drivers with 20-20 hindsight.
We would be completely delighted if the Democrats nominate Howard Dean for president. At that moment the hate-Bush left would achieve its desperately hoped for political apotheosis, fulfilling its dream of seizing control of the Democratic Party and making it its own. What will happen? Unfortunately for the HBL, the result would be a complete and utter defeat and repudiation, certainly as bad as or even worse than that suffered by George McGovern in 1972.
So...our attitude is: Go for it Deaniacs!. Let's go toe-to-toe...and may the best man win.
gedaliya said:
ReplyDeleteDean, who fervently hopes gain (sic) for himself a place in history,...
Did he tell you this?
The links I posted above in response the the Dean speech discuss the Iraqi intelligence documents proving Iraq's lies about destroying its WMD, its training and sheltering of thousands of terrorists and the fact that we found an al Qaeda chemical weapons lab in their primary Iraq base.
ReplyDeleteNo, we found nothing of any relevance, and the only reason this keeps getting floated around is because WMD is a term with no clear definition. To justify an invasion of another country and the deaths of tens (or hundreds) of thousands of people, there needs to be clear and incontrovertible evidence that the country in question had a significant capability of causing harm to the United States, that it had both weaponry and delivery apparatus, and that it had an intention to do so. The only even quasi-legal defense of preemptive warfare is that it was conducted against countries that were clearly in the process of mobilizing for war themselves. (Think Israel in 1967.) That doesn’t apply here, and the very ease with which the invasion was carried out fundamentally contradicts any notion that Iraq was any threat whatsoever.
2) If you take the time to check out the polls from Iraq, the heavy majority of the people would not go back to the "peace and security" of Saddam's police state, even when facing Baathist and al Qaeda terrorism._
The people of Canada might like it if we deposed their government and replaced it with the rule of polar bears. That doesn’t change the fact that it is an illegal act to invade and occupy a country without just cause. You can argue that humanitarian issues can trump international law, making invasions to put a stop genocide, a la the North Vietnamese decision to invade Cambodia or the NATO decision to intervene in the Kosovo War, morally justifiable. But Saddam did his major killing a long time ago, and the most pressing humanitarian issue in Iraq in 2003 was the devastating effect of the UN sanctions, not anything that Saddam was doing.
The Civil War was not one democracy attacking another, it was a civil war within a democracy. Moreover, monarchies are not democracies. I am not aware of any wars between parliamentary democracies which had reduced their monarchies to pure figureheads.
That’s absurd. The Confederate States of America fit absolutely every criteria of a functioning democratic state. They had a Constitution, they had an elected government that was responsive to the will of its constituents, they had their own currency and their own military forces. The CSA was, in fact, a virtual mirror of the USA. If that isn’t a democratic state, then what is?
As for the rest, you can only arrive at that conclusion by whittling down the definition of liberal democracy until it fits your argument. To quote from Cecil Adams:
Proponents of this idea argue that a war between democracies has never occurred. One arrives at this comforting conclusion chiefly by setting up the rules to exclude all the non-conforming cases. The most egregious omission is civil wars, which account for a high percentage of the world's violent conflicts--159 of 575 wars between 1816 and 1980, by one count. The spectacle of the American Civil War, in which two popularly elected governments engaged in four years of the most brutal slaughter, refutes the bald notion that citizens will not vote for politicians who send them off to be killed. Clearly they will if they think the stakes are high enough.__OK, you say, but at least democracies won't get into wars with one another for purposes of foreign aggrandizement. Here we get into the issue of what constitutes a democracy. The U.S. and Britain fought in the War of 1812; Britain at the time had a parliament and a prime minister. So did imperial Germany prior to World War I. Advocates of the peaceful-democracy school account for these cases by saying that neither Britain in 1812 nor Germany in 1914 were liberal democracies. The definition of liberal varies with the teller, but the simplest formulation, proposed by Dean Babst, who first advanced the peaceful-democracies idea in 1972, is that "if a hereditary ruler, such as a king, can choose the prime minister of president, then the country is not considered to have an elective government." This takes both Britain and Germany out of the picture for the period in question. That's fair enough in the case of Germany, where responsibility for the war can be laid pretty clearly at the feet of Kaiser Bill and the Junkers. But the War of 1812 was largely the work of the War Hawks in the democratically elected U.S. Congress.__The more basic objection to excluding all but liberal democracies is that throughout most of history the number of such democracies has been small. According to political scientist Michael Doyle, there were only 13 liberal democracies prior to 1900, and just 29 between 1900 and 1945--and many of those did not endure. Doyle counts 49 liberal democracies as of 1983; setting aside the confusing instance of Israel vs. Lebanon, none has fought another since 1945. But it may be argued that this merely reflected the postwar Pax Americana.__One would like to believe democracy = peace, but if we look at the big picture we find little to persuade us that it's a sure thing. Nazi Germany was not a democracy after 1933, but Hitler had been freely elected and the Nazis dominated the democratically chosen Reichstag. The United States and France conducted wars of great savagery in Vietnam and Algeria. The U.S. helped topple the elected Allende regime in Chile, with murderous consequences for the Chilean people.
What part of "democracies do not attack one another" did you not understand?__Democracy does not turn countries into pacifist societies.
Okay, but then you have to pin down the argument that you are actually trying to make. Your first point is that democracies don’t attack other democracies. The implication is that this is a good thing. Why is it a good thing? Because it means no war. But, if democracies continue to wage war against non-democracies, then what exactly is the point? As applied to Iraq in particular, your argument states that the United States had to invade Iraq and install a democratic government because democratic governments don’t attack each other. In effect, the USA had to invade Iraq now so they don’t have to invade Iraq some other time. Isn’t that the logical equivalent of saying “we had to burn this village in order to save it?”
As for Iraq, if you believe that a government is not sovereign unless it rules with the approval of the people, then the Baathists dictatorship in Iraq, which took power through a coup and then maninained its rule through mass murder, torture and terror, cannot be considered sovereign.
Right, only the definition of sovereign state is not up for debate.
Main Entry: sov·er·eign·ty
Variant(s): also sov·ran·ty /-tE/
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -ties
Etymology: Middle English soverainte, from Middle French soveraineté, from Old French, from soverain
1 obsolete : supreme excellence or an example of it
2 a : supreme power especially over a body politic b : freedom from external control : AUTONOMY c : controlling influence
3 : one that is sovereign; especially : an autonomous state
We don’t get to decide who is and who isn’t a sovereign state- according to your definition, half the countries on earth aren’t sovereign states and, presumably, we have the right to invade any of them at our pleasure. This is just another example of Bush supporters being willing to subvert language, the law, or whatever else to justify what are patently illegal actions.
In addition to Bill O'Reilly calling for us to get out and admit we can't fix things in Iraq, and Will and Kristol's conceding that civil war has broken out, Bush supporter Dale Franks over at QandO is discussing Buckley's column and angrily admitting defeat. (I have clarified with Jon Henke that Dale is the one of the QandO trio who voted for Bush; the other two did not vote for either candidate of the two major parties.)
ReplyDeleteI am not sure, btw, that just "getting out" is now either a moral or practical option. But I do know the people to manage the mess are not the ones who got us into it.
Bush came close to losing in '04; he was vulnerable, and it was only because the Democrats ran the worst candidate I can imagine against him, that he eked it out. He is much more than vulnerable now, and I pray that either the GOP purges itself of the Bush neocon-populists, or that the Dems send up someone really good in '08. Best if both things happened, and we had a meaningful choice between two competent and clear-headed candidates.
This is just another example of Bush supporters being willing to subvert language, the law, or whatever else to justify what are patently illegal actions.
ReplyDeleteThe hate-Bush left is so impotent politically that the only avenue left open to it is the quixotic attempt to criminalize their opponents' policy positions. The HBL can't win elections, so their opponents must be criminals.
How pathetic and tiresome.
hypatia writes:
ReplyDeleteIn addition to Bill O'Reilly calling for us to get out and admit we can't fix things in Iraq...
Bill O'Reilly's support of the war was predicated on one issue, the existence or non-existence of WMDs. He said early on that if they weren't there he would withdraw his support. He's never been a strong supporter of the war.
Bush supporter Dale Franks over at QandO is discussing Buckley's column and angrily admitting defeat.
Who is Dale Franks? I'm sure you can find hundreds of obscure self-described Republicans admitting defeat. What you won't find are policy-influencing Republicans in Congress, the press or academia who have abandoned the policy who were not against it from the beginning (or shortly thereafter), not except, as I said before, Jack Murtha.
Bush came close to losing in '04...
Oh? He got more popular votes and more electoral votes than he did in 2000. Your remark is simply silly.
He is much more than vulnerable now...
Vulnerable to what? Losing another election?
...or that the Dems send up someone really good in '08...
Like who? Dean? Feingold? Clinton? Whose your ideal candidate?
As much as you and other members of the hate-Bush left
ReplyDeleteAre there any people that hate Bush that aren't on the "left", or are all Bush "haters" on the "left" by definition?
I'd be interested to know, considering that a casual perusal of Stormfront.org (if one can stomach it) will find plenty of examples of people opposed to the war in Iraq for anything but left-wing reasons.
Are there any people that hate Bush that aren't on the "left", or are all Bush "haters" on the "left" by definition?
ReplyDeleteDo Nazi's hate Bush? I don't know. There are so few of them that I don't suppose it even matters.
I think it's safe to say that the vast majority of Bush-haters are on the the left, and those who aren't are irrelevant.
Hume's Ghost writes: Are there any people that hate Bush that aren't on the "left", or are all Bush "haters" on the "left" by definition?
ReplyDeleteOpposing Bush does not mean one hates him. And what is "left" in the mind of those who think virtually anyone who opposes Bush is that?
George Bush is a populist, as are many of his supporters. Populism is regarded by many as a species of the left, or at least a mutation of it.
But these labels are silly in the context of this discussion. Here in the heartland, in the red county in which I live, many, many average people are very disgusted with George Bush, including a lot who voted for him. I think even a crazy like Michael Moore could defeat Bush at this moment.
Hyapatia:
ReplyDeleteThanks, that was my point. I meant to put hate in quotes like I did with left and haters.
The hate-Bush left is so impotent politically that the only avenue left open to it is the quixotic attempt to criminalize their opponents' policy positions. The HBL can't win elections, so their opponents must be criminals.
ReplyDeletePolitical impotence has nothing to do with the issue, and it's disingenious to attempt to conflate the two. The fact of the matter is that the act of invading Iraq preemptively (and preemptive of nothing, it must be added) does not have any legal basis in international law. To quote from the Global Policy Forum:
Shortly before the outbreak of hostilities, UN Secretary General stated that the use of force without Council endorsement would "not be in conformity with the Charter" and many legal experts now describe the US-UK attack as an act of aggression, violating international law. Experts also point to illegalities in the US conduct of the war and violations of the Geneva Conventions by the US-UK of their responsibilities as an occupying power.
Who the American voting public choose to support or not support is completely beside the point. But you must know that already.
Here in the heartland, in the red county in which I live, many, many average people are very disgusted with George Bush, including a lot who voted for him.
ReplyDeleteDo they hate him the way people on this blog hate him?....with a passion so intense it is pathological? I don't think so.
And even if they are upset with some of his policies, do you really believe they'll vote for a Democrat this year? I don't think so, although of course only time will tell.
Ever time Michael Moore opens his mouth we benefit. I only hope he campaigns for Democrats this year.
BTW, what red county do you live in? I am in a very blue county (Suffolk, on Long Island), and even here Bush would easily beat Michael Moore.
Do they hate him the way people on this blog hate him?....with a passion so intense it is pathological? I don't think so.
ReplyDeleteAnd even if they are upset with some of his policies, do you really believe they'll vote for a Democrat this year? I don't think so, although of course only time will tell.
Ever time Michael Moore opens his mouth we benefit. I only hope he campaigns for Democrats this year.
BTW, what red county do you live in? I am in a very blue county (Suffolk, on Long Island), and even here Bush would easily beat Michael Moore.
Pathological suggests that those who oppose Bush do so for abnormal reasons. But of course they do not. They oppose him for very normal reasons- they find his policies unethical. But it does require having a set of ethics to begin with to recognize unethical behavor in others.
And what does Michael Moore have to do with anything?
"Does Glenn really believe that our reaction to Buckley's Iraq war remarks should be the same as it is to similar remarks made by one of our most important political adversaries?"
ReplyDeleteYes. It's a matter of considering the argument, instead of the person making it. Otherwise known as refraining from ad hominem arguments.
Gedaliya, your answer to why conservatives aren't ripping Buckley for making the exact same argument as Dean boils down to, "Well, it's 'cause we like Buckley better."
Here's you, basically saying it:
"Dean, for good reasons, is simply not respected as much as Buckley is. If Dean was respected as much as is Buckley, his pronouncements would have provoked less acrimony."
Okay, well that's called hypocrisy. Accepting an argument from Person #1 that, coming out of the mouth of Person #2 you called treason, solely because you happen to like Person #1 better... that's hypocrisy. Stop rationalizing it and just admit it.
"don't you think its puerile for Glenn to scold us for behavior he well knows he himself would display if put into a similar situation?"
I can't speak for Glenn, but as for me, I call b*llsh*t. Not everyone has your crass, craven gift for rationalization and hypocrisy, Gedaliya. I *left* the Democratic Party when it no longer stood for what I stand for. I stopped reading/listening to Carville when I decided his values aren't the same as mine.
You, by contrast, continue to pledge unthinking allegiance to your precious leaders, no matter how often you're lied to and betrayed. How wonderfully obedient of you.
Patrick Meighan
Venice, CA
bart--
ReplyDelete"Buckley is not saying the same things as Dean."
This is kind of silly. We're only talking about the sense in which both have, in fact, said that we have essentially been defeated. They might be coming from different directions on it (and I would never directly compare the two men, obviously), but it still amounts to the same statement.
"That doesn't excuse Buckley for making unfounded findings of defeat when our troops are in the field"
I'm genuinely glad to see that you, at least, are consistent in your criticism of both. That's all that's being asking for here--consistency.
"his concession of defeat is a tragedy when one remembers how Buckley carried the anti-communist banner through the lonely years of appeasement during the 60s and 70s. That may be why some are giving him a pass."
But shouldn't this suggest that his opinion is in fact an acceptable position? Again, if you're going to call Dean an idiot, fine--but do it in a way that's consistent. We now see that cries of treason and sedition don't accomplish this.
"BTW, has anyone picked up on the disconnect between Glenn's earlier piece condemning conservatives for attacking other conservatives as being liberal whenever they deviate from the so called "Bush Cult" and this piece where Glenn is peeved that the Conservatives are not condemning Buckley."
Again, the only point here is consistency. I can't speak for Mr. Greenwald, and it isn't my job to, but it seems to me he's just peeved about the obvious double standard that's being applied here--especially considering the seriousness of the charges that are being carelessly tossed around.
Look, I'd agree that this is mostly a blogosphere spat. But serious-minded people are out here blogging, so it seems to me it does matter at least a little bit.
gedaliya--
ReplyDelete"Dean, who fervently hopes gain for himself a place in history, is seen as ambitious and opportunistic, whose views on the war are carefully shaped in order to strengthen his constituency in the left wing of the party. Buckley, whose hawkish and anti-communist creditions are legendary, is playing to no constituency. He is a revered figure. He is treated with respect despite deep divisions between WFB and many of his admirers and supporters on this issue."
Ok, so...we see that it is just about personality, and not about substance. As long as you admit it, fine.
"Does Glenn really believe that our reaction to Buckley's Iraq war remarks should be the same as it is to similar remarks made by one of our most important political adversaries? I don't think he does."
Ok, but taking it to the level of charges of sedition and treason is the point at which you need to start putting your money where your mouth is. I would never, ever dare accuse William F. Buckley of being a traitor--so why on earth should I consider Howard Dean one when the very same comments come from his mouth? Why on earth should we take such charges seriously at all? (Answer: we shouldn't.) Again, this is mostly a blogosphere spat, but that doesn't mean we need to ignore it.
"Furthermore, don't you think its puerile for Glenn to scold us for behavior he well knows he himself would display if put into a similar situation?"
I have no idea if he would or not. I'm not here to defend Mr. Greenwald.
anonymous wrote at 8:40am:
ReplyDelete"how much of you guys (readers of this blog) go to right wing based blogs to read and discuss - not many i would think (no, no balls there)."
I do.
You can check some of recent my posts over at the Will Malven's Houston Conservative blog (formerly named- I kid you not- "The Tin Ear.")
I've also posted on various other conservative blogs, as well as occasionally on various major media Internet discussion forums.
Additionally, in political forums, as a general rule I use my Blogger ID, or my full name, Robert D. Reed.
Just a heads-up on that.
Just a heads-up on that.
ReplyDeleteoic
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ReplyDeleteDoes Glenn really believe that our reaction to Buckley's Iraq war remarks should be the same as it is to similar remarks made by one of our most important political adversaries?
ReplyDeleteIt depends on whether he realizes you're a maggot who calls people traitors just because they are "political adversaries". He seems to naively cling to the notion that you folks have some allegiance to truth like real human beings. He and the rest of America, especially the Dem leadership, need to wake up to the sseverity of the infestation.
I guess the truth hurts. One problem with our "war" in Iraq is that it isn't a "war" its a "warcrime", and thoes are much harder to win because the enemy becomes embolden to the righteousness of their cause and the purpetrators of the warcrime desire to be the bad guys less and less. I know Bush wants to hold reality on trial for treason, but can we really leave reality in prison forever or will it eventually escape to bite us.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that has interested me in the "debate" is how successfully positions have been falsely stereotyped to corrospond to places on the spectrum.
ReplyDeleteA large number of conservatives, retired officers and others questioned or opposed this war. Even Kristyol and the Wekly Standard have been critical of it's management for years, arguing for more troops etc.
Sen Clinton was derided for the same positions. Ironically those who believed in it and wanted it to succeed rather than not really believing Iraq existed and thinking it all a domestic partisan game (eg. Limpbowel) were ignored.
The public doesn't know of these people's positions or existence. Opposition has been associated with Jane Fonda aka Howard Dean.
Neocons are like abused wives
ReplyDeletewho watch the partner they once loved assault their kids, insult the neighbors, attack her family and drive away sensible friends.
Left isolated, frozen in fear and silence afraid to admit the truth and never ever to speak truth to him again.
Abused wives are like neocons who apologize when shot in the face.
Wifebeaters are like neocons who shoot their 78 year old partner in the face and act like they did nothing wrong at all. yeah they "shot the gun", but they did nothing wrong.
They have lost the morals to care if theyre right.
they have lost the sense to know it matters.
they have lost the courage to face reality.
Do any neocons read mid east expert Juan Cole?
http://juancole.com/
Do any read the young Iraqi woman in Baghdad who blogs? http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/
No, probly not.
Iraqi citizens and the children of wifebeaters need more than the bootcamp from Hell they need a leader who knows enough to care whether they die and cares enough to know what the hell going on.
Now Neocons old friend Buckley has
summoned the nerve to state
what is obvious, that the Bush strategy is driving Iraq over a cliff and still Bush refuses to acknowledge he's lost nor ask for directions from the countless experts who know a better way.
Thicketed
Whoops--"sdpwmlg" is me.
ReplyDeleteI'd forgotten about Captain Ed. Thanks, I guess, for reminding me of him. His response to your bit about him is hilarious, as are the comments by his gang. Nope, I don't think he reads before he types. And, nope, I don't think he's smart enough to know how far gone he is. You are absolutely right about him, of course, he's a Bushie, not a conservative, a propogandist, not a blogger.
ReplyDeleteWhew, a while back, I tried looking around for a conservative blog what was, well, not completely retarded. I was spending all my time on lefty blogs and I thought, hmmm, maybe, just maybe there's a blog or two with different arguments but a sense of perspective. I dunno why I thought Capt. Ed might be kinda okay, maybe it was because he's one of the few Right blogs that have commnents. Anyway, my bad.
I spent a week or so asking questions and then trying to interact by, say, carefully and politely pointing to various government documents and Republicans and conservative news sources that undercut Capt. Ed's belief in Bush. I tried to play fair. I didn't ever link to crazy lefty sources like the NYT or WaPo. I didn't call anyone names. I agreed with what I could.
In the end, Capt. Ed came out of no where and posted two long, vicious, posts saying, in short, "You bastard. You don't respect _me_, Capt. Ed! You may have read government documents and done your research but _I_ Capt. Ed helped start this war against terror and _I_ know what's what because _I_ was there." He went on to quote a bunch of Team Bush people who might have said something nice about his blog and he said he'd even met some of the _real_ players in the GWOT so there. It. Was. Stupid. And. Nasty.
So, I thought, whew, okay, that was a waste of time and I quit reading and commenting on CQ. There are, a few, reasonable conservative blogs out there but, as Capt. Ed proved once again, he's not one of them.
Oddly, the conservative blogs I respect tend to be sites where religion is treated as a serious topic. I'm not religious at all but I try to respect other people's basic beliefs (within resonable unreasonableness, of course.) It makes me wonder if perhaps the firewall around relgious belief, in the current political enviroment, actually helps dialogue by limiting _discussion_ to politics. Nothing to do with Capt. Ed but an interesting puzzle nonetheless.
For about a year now, I've been wearing a big button that says "Howard Dean is Right." It's all-purpose, and frequently very timely, as now.
ReplyDeleteThe link to WFB's article no longer takes the reader to the right place. The correct URL is http://www.nationalreview.com/buckley/buckley200602241451.asp
ReplyDeleteThought you should know.
themaiden
Good point on the hypocrisy. Thanks for the write up efforts.
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