Here is a difficult question for you: “Who has become more predictable regarding their reactions to President Bush? Al-jazeera and the Arab Press or the American Left?”
The American Left
Count me as one who thinks that Bush’s little trip is, on balance, a “good thing.” I mean, it’s better than him not doing it. But, what’s with the press acting like, as Hesiod says, Bush grabbed a machine gun and personally stormed a building filled with armed insurgents?
He didn’t meet with any locals. He didn’t meet with the governing council. He flew into a heavily fortified military base and then flew out again.
President Bush is a chickenshit.
I’m surprised they didn’t ship that yellow-bellied coward to Iraq in a submarine.
Once the shock value of this stunt wears off, people will realize that everything the Bush administration has been telling us about Iraq is a 100% lie.
Why is it so inherently unsafe for Bush that he has to fly in under darkness without anyone except a handful of top aides and Secret Service and military personnel in the know, then hide out at the airport for a couple of hours with 600 troops, but Hillary Clinton and Jack Reed can drive around the city and meet with American troops, international officials and Iraqi leaders?
I would be a lot more impressed if Bush spent the night in Iraq. Perhaps visited one of those famous schools that have allegedly opened since the war. But fact is that Iraq is nowhere near as calm and safe as the administration would have us believe. The country really is a mess, thanks to the US invasion and inept occupation.
Instead, the President had to sneak in and out of Iraq for a quick and dirty photo op, clearly in fear of his life if the news of his visit had leaked. He did not even get time to eat a meal with the troops. He was there for two hours. He did not dare meet with ordinary Iraqis, with the people he had conquered (liberated).
Offstage, the real Iraq carried on. Guerrillas attacked a military convoy on the main highway to the west of Baghdad, near Abu Ghraib. The wire services said, that an AP cameraman filmed “two abandoned military trucks with their cabs burning fiercely as dozens of townspeople looted tires and other vehicle parts.” Guerrillas in Mosul shot an Iraqi police sergeant to death.
Bush– he has to visit the country like a thief in the night. Essentially, this trip was an announcement that Iraq is in such bad shape that the military could not protect the life of the President without such deceit.
Al Jazeera and the Arab Press
The Al Jazeera English Website:
US President George Bush’s stealthy visit to Iraq has been greeted with derision in the Arab world and Iraq’s neighbour Iran.
A section of the Arab media termed it a stunt which showed his determination to win both the war in Iraq and re-election next year.
In Iraq itself, many people termed it a cowardly swift stopover for fear of resistance fighters. Some said they would have preferred Bush to have had the courage to visit the country more openly and meet ordinary people.
I watched it all on Al-Jazeera later, and as usual, they described it as a cheap attempt by Bush & Co. to boost American public opinion in his favour for the upcoming election campaign. You could easily detect the anguish in their anaylsis to the fact that Bush didn’t go down to the streets or meet everyday Iraqis, or that Air Force 1 wasn’t hit by an anti-aircraft missile fired by Iraqi militants. They were really frustrated. Their news have become so predictable. My father was peculiarly furious with one of these ‘analysts’, he almost kicked the tv. The guy was saying that this visit would practically achieve nothing, or to be more accurate “would trick nobody”. He also said that it would have no effect whatsoever on morals of American troops…etc.
“I came, I saw nothing, but I will conquer.”
You decide…
Darth Cirrocu
“Why is it so inherently unsafe for Bush that he has to fly in under darkness without anyone except a handful of top aides and Secret Service and military personnel in the know, then hide out at the airport for a couple of hours with 600 troops, but Hillary Clinton and Jack Reed can drive around the city and meet with American troops, international officials and Iraqi leaders?”
Ooh! Ooh! I know! I know!
Is it because they know that the Sadaam loyalists consider them allies? :-P
Arash
John, I read you everyday, nice commentary and all. Lately, it’s been ad hominem.
Why don’t you simply address all of these people instead of labeling them worse than Arab media? Here’s how I see it: Clinton went to Kosovo and was welcomed by huge crowds of Muslims. The same thing happened a few months ago when he visited Srebrenica.
Steve Malynn
Arash, you simply confirm Darth’s comment above. For crying out loud, Clinton carried Arafat’s water for eight years, campained on reversing Bush 1 policy in Bosnia and actually carried through four years too late.
I’m going to stop now, for the sake of keeping my post clear of the profanity building up, with the observation that for all of Clinton’s kissing arab ass it never helped the US.
Tman
Wow, excellent post John, a good laugh indeed.
It’s really sad, the blog/left world and Al-jazeera together in one happy sneer.
Let’s get them a room, shall we?
Tim
CPTHAM
I have a unique vantage point in this debate since I am currently stationed in Iraq. The moral boost to the troops is tremendous. The difference between this visit and the War Hero’s to kosovo is incalculable. I cannot convey the utter disdain I feel for the moronic left. On a different subject, has anyone else noticed how damn near impossible it is to post on Dem-Left blog sites? Just a thought.
CPT M Hamilton
Balad, Iraq
Francis W. Porretto
I would call the comments from the Left clear symptoms of “running scared.” However, there will be consequences for GOP officeholders below the White House. The milquetoast behavior of Republican legislators in the face of Democratic obstructionism and slander will compare poorly to the courage demonstrated by the president, and the voters are bound to notice. Many will have to shape up and get with Dubya’s program if they don’t want to have to find honest work after November 2004.
cameron
All this is is Carrier Landing Redux. Nothing more, nothing less.
As you have the crazies on the left saying Bush is chicken, you have the crazies on the right thinking this is the most heroic thing since superman.
Neither is correct.
Andrew Lazarus
CPTHAM, maybe they’re filtering your access. Atrios, Hesiod, Howard Dean, and Daily Kos all have comment sections.
Were you in Kosovo when Clinton visited? The photos seem to show enthusiastic American soldiers. Maybe that’s because they were no longer under hostile fire.
Be careful out there.
cameron
Did I say Carrier Landing Redux?
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1520&e=3&u=/afp/20031128/pl_afp/us_iraq_bush_rice_031128222956
JS in TN
Heya Cole — look to the log in your own eye. Not only was the right predictably celebratory, but their sneers at the left’s reaction were predictably snarky.
Jon H
The stealth visit doesn’t exactly meet the standard of bravado set by Bush’s “Bring em on” comment.
Jadegold
Given Shrubby’s Big Iraqi Adventure is rapidly turning into a quagmire, I’d expect the rightwing to be concentrating on the myth of “bush hating/loathing” more and more.
The fact is the T-Day trip to Baghdad was a PR stunt. It was also a nice thing to do. One fact does not cancel out the other.
Of course, Shrubby could have taken a number of other actions, such as serving up dinner to the wounded at Walter Reed or dining with the families who lost loved ones in Iraq, etc. But that wouldn’t have put Mr. HappyFace on this debacle.
Andrew Lazarus
Two excellent posts excerpted.
Mea culpa from Yglesias:
Piling on at Atrios:
Harry
These websites are so unreasoned there is no really reason to read them. That is unless you are like me and revel in their angst and bitterness. I would call them “dirtbags” but to borrow a phrase from Dennis Miller, that would be an insult to bags filled with dirt.
triticale
Could someone go thru the historical records for me, and dig up the newspaper headlines announcing that Roosevelt was to fly to Malta to meet with Churchill and Stalin?
SDN
“Were you in Kosovo when Clinton visited? The photos seem to show enthusiastic American soldiers. Maybe that’s because they were no longer under hostile fire.”
Probably because they were ordered to.
Full disclosure: I’m a software consultant who has been working on an active duty AF base for 12 years for various companies. I’ve been living in the town with those bases for 33 years.
During the Clinton years, there were actually general orders put out about once a year that Clinton bashing was off limits. It wasn’t particularly enforced unless someone was egregious, but it was there.
The Democratic Party lost about 90% of the military community in 2000 when Gore’s team tried to get the military absentee ballots tossed. I expect to hear A1Cs and 2nd Lts making the occasional comments like “Gore might have to hire his own flight crew for Air Force One, ’cause WE won’t fly him anywhere!” and “If he gets elected by throwing out our votes, shouldn’t that trigger the clause in our oath about defending the country from enemies foreign and domestic?”; they’re young and stupid. What I don’t expect is to hear comments like that from 20-year Master Sgts and Lt Cols, who are supposed to be telling their subordinates to shut up and soldier.
Democrats, especially Bill and the Hildebeeste, are about as popular as Black Plague among the military and ex military I’m around every day.
Andrew Lazarus
You know, that military ballots tossed thing is a great urban legend. It covered up the way Bush got, or at least tried to get, military votes cast AFTER the election (much less the deadline) into the mix. They even accepted ballots sent by FAX (most definitely not allowed by FL election law). The best defense is indeed a good offense!
The media don’t seem to have trouble finding military families souring on Bush for interviews.
Jadegold
Exactly, Andrew.
The rightwing likes to pretend the military, as a whole, is this big homogenous bloc that votes GOP.
It’s a myth propagated largely by those whose only exposure to the military is owning the Saving PVT Ryan DVD.
While the military tends conservative overall, the military tends to vote on the same issues as everyone else–the economy, schools, healthcare, the environment, etc. The pocketbook issues.
There’s also a not insignificant amount of hostility from career officers above the O-6 level for Rumsfeld and his crew at the Pentagon.
SDN
Sorry, Andy, but personal experience trumps bullshit every time. I KNOW people this happened to.
“The media don’t seem to have trouble finding military families souring on Bush for interviews.”
And if we can’t find them, Mr. Jayson Blair, we’ll just make them up. Actually, I have no doubt there are people with military connections who will spew to the papers. I did use the 90% figure, after all. However, one man’s experience (guess who’s) says that he has a hell of a lot more support than Clinton ever did.
And, JG, the blind pig does find the occasional acorn. Yep, they are unhappy. They realize that the Clinton policies on Political Correctness and “phony peace” dividend gutted the military. Most of their unhappiness stems from the fact that President Bush and his administration, instead of opening up the archives and showing what went down, damn the squeals from the Demorats, are actually trying to focus on winning this thing overseas.
Hell, if I was Bush, I’d be running a commercial every single day: “Wonder where our troops are? well, Al Gore fired them all while reinventing government! Yep, non-military hiring went up, so the net reduction in the size of government came straight from the military! I’m sure Al Qaeda was happy! (close on about 30 seconds of bodies dropping from the Towers on one side of the screen, and a shot of Gore taking credit for reinventing government on the other)”
But the President is a much nicer guy than I am.
Jadegold
SDN: Your comments bear no resemblance to reality. Carry on smoking dope or whatever it is you conservatives ingest these days.
Steve Malynn
Jadegold, the entirety of reduced manpower in the federal government touted by Gore as “reinventing governmant” was spending the “peace dividend” on the backs of the DOD. Truth as lived by all in the DOD. SDN spoke of his 33 years on DOD payroll, My 25 years experience is exactly the same.
JadeGold
Steve: Perhaps if you’d performed a bit more ACDUTRA, as opposed to reading William Kristol, you’d be better informed.
I’d ask that you seek better information from more informed sources.
capt joe
Colombian Gold, to borrow a phrase from Reagan, “there you go again”.
Everything you say is God’s (well not in your case probably) truth and everyone else is lying. Spinning facts to where conclusions. You must look like a moebius strip with all those contortions of logic.
Just a bit of Gore fun. I knew one of the guys on Gore’s secret service detail. He didn’t have much respect for him. He said that Gore would chow down on any buffet within range like a starved free range pig and then spend the rest of the flight farting up a storm. He said Saddam’s WMD had mnothing on a GoreFartFest. He was glad whe the campaign ended for more reasosn than his sense of smell.
Is it just me or the sounds of the left trying to say they give a crap about the military come up pretty hypocritical.
JadeGold
CAPT Joe: Don’t sea stories usually begin with ‘this is no shit, but I knew a guy who…’?
True story: Secret Service agent tells me Shrubby gets real pouty and testy when he has to work past 1600. And that Shrub rarely gets to work before 0900 and spends 2 hours a day in the gym and at lunch.
Paul
Jadegold: Try this one on for size.
I knew Al Gore. He has a Southern Plantation Owner attitude to anyone he doesn’t consider to be his equal, which would be just about everyone. He considered us to be his “house slaves,” while you stupid mooks in the public lapped up the slop he ladled out to you and begged for more. Of course, no Democrat ever lost by underestimating the intelligence of his constituency.
He is verbally abusive and short-tempered. He once kicked one of us when we were trying to repair a control panel in the passenger cabin so His Majesty could have a fully functional entertainment system. The aircrews and stewards that flew him were forced to do so, instead of being a regular crew that regularly flew him (as was the case with every other DV). On the day of Bush’s inauguration, he decided to waste the taxpayers’ money one last time by taking two planes to Colorado for a ski trip with Tipper, damaging both for a cost of $15,000, in addition to expenses incurred for fuel and other sundries.
In short, he was an intolerable man with an inconceivable contempt for humanity.
Of course, these things don’t matter to you JadeGold, because you’re merely doing a virtual version of putting your hands over your ears and shouting for all you’re worth.
SDN
No, Jade, they bear no resemblance to your reality. This is a good thing. And since all DoD contractors have to pee in a cup every so often to keep our jobs, I’ll have to decline to join you at the bong…..
And Steve, I just have 12 years in the contractor lotto. The 33 years is how long I’ve lived in a military town, knowing actual military. Unlike Jade, who’s never been any closer to the military than a Memorial Day protest….
Dr. Weevil
SDN: I think you’re right about JG, who (2 posts down) claims to have attended the Naval Academy and brags about having a DD-214, but wants to be paid a substantial sum of money to prove either ‘fact’. Not that either would be easy for a common troll to prove, of course, even if it were true, since even the most genuine Annapolis diploma or DD-214 isn’t likely to have the name JadeGold on it. So far, I haven’t even gotten an answer to the question why a USNA alum would keep calling Bush “your president” instead of “our president”.
HH
“You know, that military ballots tossed thing is a great urban legend.”
Except, of course, for the “it’s all true” part.