I’ll be on the radio tomorrow with Jeff Goldstein and crew:
When: Thursday, 3 PM EST
Where: Rightalk Radio
Guests: John Cole, from balloon-juice.com, Michele Catalano, from a small victory.
Topics: The state of political discourse; social cons vs. traditional conservatives; privacy rights vs. government regulatory functions; Atheist Americans; lose women.
Toll-free Call-in number: 1-866-884-8255 (866-884-TALK)
Disclaimer: WE REFUSE TO BE SILENCED!
Offer: If you have any questions you
CaseyL
“[He’]s the current poster boy for
John Cole
I can handle myself.
Jeff G
Yes, Casey. You have us PEGGED!
protein wisdom: fundie capital of the blogosphere!
Juliette
Casey,
As a charter member of the religious right, I’d hardly call Bill and Jeff a couple of raging fundamentalists.
And they say we religious types are overly excitable.
Sheesh.
Mr Furious
My question to you:
“How the hell can you still be voting Republican?”
Mikey
“How the hell can you still be voting Republican?”
Well, in my case the idea of turning over the defense of the nation to the Democrats gives me the same kind of feeling as turning over whiskey and car keys to teenage boys does.
(Thank you Mr. O’Rourke)
MT
So, Mikey, let me get this straight. Turning the “defense” of the nation over to Democrats will result in similar damage that whiskey and car keys in the hands of teenage boys would? You mean that there would be reckless speed and abuse of power (those car engines can go pretty fast when one is “drunk”), destruction of the environment (pity the poor trees), lying and coverups (after all, where have they been all night?) and indiscriminate killing (running that red light can cause accidents!).
Your (and Mr. O’Rourke’s) analogy is inaccurate on so many levels. It would seem to me that the current administration, drunk on their own power, has caused a huge pile up with respect to their “defense of the nation.” (And the Iraq war IS about defense, right? After all, Iraq DID have WMDs and WERE involved in 9/11…right?)
The comparison to teenage boys, however, does seem to fit Bush and Co. The maturity level seems about the same…
norbizness
I think that falls under the category of “semi-known, partially knowable unknowns” in the Rumsfeldian epistemology.
Mark
I would simply ask John why he roots for such an evil team like the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Bad, bad man.
JG
There is no issue concerning dems and defense of the nation. The problem is that dems wouldn’t put us on the offense like the repubs do. Gore would’ve invaded Afghanistan, there’s no other way to respond to what happened to us. The difference is Gore wouldn’t have invaded Iraq. President Bush said knowing then what he knows now about the state of Iraqs weapons programs he still would’ve invaded. That measns it was policy, we were going anyway. Thats going on the offense. I doubt dems would do that. Too many domestic uses for the billions I guess, bunch of pansies.
Mikey
MT: The history of the last thirty years of the Twentieth Century is all the proof needed for me to distrust the Democratic Party with national defense.
Lee
“Gore would’ve invaded Iraq”…. that was a good one. He’d of been biding his time in the WH inventing the iPod waiting for the UN to come to our defense….
Kimmitt
Gore would’ve invaded Iraq
Um, dude, that’s not what he said.
LEE
I was never good at setting up to deliver a punchline. Meant “Afghanistan”. I’m done w/humor.
timekeeper
Unless losing the election caused Gore to undergo a radical metamorphosis, rather than simply allowed him to express his true beliefs, I wonder if he would have invaded Afghanistan in the wake of 9/11. I have no doubt that CLINTON would have done so, but he was not part of the equation in 2001. But Gore was not (and is not) Clinton redux, as some of his statements since he left Washington had made quite clear.
JG
I think the fact that every democrat in congress backed Bushs move to invade Afghanistan backs my claim that Gore would’ve invaded. And since he wouldn’t have pulled resources from there to ramp up the Iraq invasion we might even have captured bin Laden, Zwahiri and Mullah Omar. Remember them?. Good to see that the marginalized second rate dictator and his insane children are gone but they didn’t attack us, the ones who did are still free to plan.
BumperStickerist
John’s from West Virginia –
which begs the question:
What’s more fun to shoot at – a water heater on the side of the road or a washin’ machine in a backyard.
:)
Mr Furious
“the history of the last thirty years of the Twentieth Century is all the proof needed for me to distrust the Democratic Party with national defense.”
You mean the Republican revisionist version of history over the last thirty years? Because I don’t recall the country getting invaded and taken over during the nineties…
Bush is doing a nice job killing people around the globe, but as far as actually defending the country, I’d say his record is not looking good. If the weapons he claims were in Iraq actually existed, his brilliant plan for the War accomplished exactly what it was supposed to prevent–proliferation into the hands of terrorists. He has done nothing on Iran and North Korea, or actual security here except on airplanes. Our biggest threat? Loose nukes in Russia. Nothing there either.
A fucking bang-up job.
Hubris
What’s more fun to shoot at – a water heater on the side of the road or a washin’ machine in a backyard.
Hey, I was born and raised in West Virginia too, so watch your mouth.
By the way, what’s a water heater?
Kimmitt
I wonder if he would have invaded Afghanistan in the wake of 9/11.
I don’t. Gore had his flaws, but unwillingness to respond to a provocation of that magnitude was not among them.
Richard Bennett
President Gore would have responded to 9/11 with a national year of guilt on the theme of “why do they hate us?” and then it would have been all about hybrid cars.
If there were a god, I’d pray to him every day for saving us from a Gore presidency.
JPS
Kimmitt:
“Gore had his flaws, but unwillingness to respond to a provocation of that magnitude was not among them.”
I for one don’t doubt he would have responded. Of course he would have, But I wonder–and I swear I am not being partisan, I honestly wonder–whether he would have pursued a war until the fall of the Taliban government.
I happen to think a large-scale conventional invasion would have been a disaster, and air strikes alone wouldn’t have done the trick.
What do you think Gore would have said to an advisor who said, “OK, boss, how about this. We send in a few hundred guys from Special Forces. They’ll scope the place out and do recon beforehand. Then they can organize these fractious Afghan tribes who’ve been getting their asses kicked into the far corners of the country by the Taliban for the last six years, coordinate air strikes, and lead them to victory.”
More to the point, what would the chances have been that he would have had such an advisor in a position of any influence? He would have been surrounded by the kind of advisors who knew you don’t just conquer Afghanistan; it’s been tried. and if we do it’ll start up a guerilla war like the Russians suffered for ten years.
I think if Gore were president, we would have delivered a great deal of punishment to Afghanistan and the Taliban government. Lots of air strikes, lots of cruise missiles, until we brought that government to its knees. We might even have got them to turn over Mullah Omar, and cease their overt support for al Qaeda.
I seriously doubt, however, that we’d have gone for anything as radical as regime change. I don’t think Gore and company would have believed we could pull it off. We’d have left them in place, and regretted it in the long run.
And incidentally, I am surrounded at work by a lot of very smart Democrats, and most of them were convinced in week five of the Afghan campaign that we’d blown it.
Kimmitt
I seriously doubt, however, that we’d have gone for anything as radical as regime change. I don’t think Gore and company would have believed we could pull it off. We’d have left them in place, and regretted it in the long run.
I just cannot agree with this. The difference between Gore and Bush would have been that unless Gore happened to have someone who shared Rumsfeld’s vision for a lighter Army, we would have had a lot more American soldiers in Afghanistan than we did. But there is just. No. Way. That Gore would not have swiftly deposed the Taliban in response to 9/11. Anyone who says otherwise is profoundly wrong about the character of Al Gore and of the Democratic Party in general.
most of them were convinced in week five of the Afghan campaign that we’d blown it.
Precisely my point — the Democrats you were working with were committed to the invasion and concerned that it might not work.
JPS
Thanks for your response, Kimmitt.
“unless Gore happened to have someone who shared Rumsfeld’s vision for a lighter Army, we would have had a lot more American soldiers in Afghanistan than we did.”
Well, that’s the deal-breaker, isn’t it? I believe that if the principal military advisor to President Whoever had not had Rumsfeld’s faith in Special Forces, we would have gone for a massive conventional invasion–with the same happy results that have attended other countries’ efforts–or just pummeled the crap out of the place from afar until they cried uncle.
Look at the way we fought in Kosovo. Look at our cruise missile attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq in December ’98. This is how the Clinton National Security folks thought–why do you believe our response would have been radically different if the same (or similar-thinking) people had been in charge?
Or let me put it another way. While we were still threatening the Taliban with war and regime change unless they played ball, Colin Powell speculated that a new government might be a coalition including “moderate Taliban.” Powell, the cautious and levelheaded adult of the Bush administration, would have been the hawk in a Gore cabinet.
“Precisely my point — the Democrats you were working with were committed to the invasion and concerned that it might not work.”
No. You misunderstood me. Most of them were convinced from the start that invading was folly, and around about week five, when we hadn’t won yet, they were sure they’d been proven right.
Kimmitt
why do you believe our response would have been radically different if the same (or similar-thinking) people had been in charge?
Because 9/11 was different from what came before? It’s not like Bush 43 was a paragon of decisive interventionism before 9/11.
we would have gone for a massive conventional invasion–with the same happy results that have attended other countries’ efforts–
I really don’t know the answer to this. The situation on the ground really did cry for us to intervene on the side of the Northen Alliance; the question was going to be how we went about doing it. The Taliban was militarily very weak. There’s no particular reason to think that we would have done things completely differently, while there are plenty of reasons to think that we would have done them somewhat differently.
Most of them were convinced from the start that invading was folly,
It may have been folly, but it was absolutely and utterly necessary. I hate to ask, but did your friends have a lot invested in the Kucinich primary? I’m pretty deep in the Party out here, and the only time I’ve heard any actual opposition to the invasion of Afghanistan — as versus discussion of tactics and failures to finish the job — was in a room full of Kucinich backers that I was trying to get to back Dean instead.
JPS
“I hate to ask, but did your friends have a lot invested in the Kucinich primary?”
Gee whiz, Kimmitt, how’d ya guess!
Sorry. Yes, generally they did. Although some preferred Dean because they thought he was a bit more effective in his opposition to Bush than Kucinich was, and that Kerry was too mainstream for them. (From the dark side, I would have to agree with them.)
All satire aside, Dean was a little too conservative for most of the academics I know.
We’ll have to agree to disagree on the rest. If I had your faith in the Dems’ ultimate soundness on national security, I wouldn’t much care who wins elections. To me, domestic policy is important but secondary. (Meaning no offense to you–you’re an economist, right?) And if we agree that doing what we did in Afghanistan was absolutely and utterly necessary, then believe it or not we’re more or less on the same page.
P.S.: One big Kucinich fan I know, who opposed war with Afghanistan, I asked (nicely), “What would you do?” The answer: “Freeze his [bin Laden’s] bank accounts.” And there you have it, my objection to the Kucinich foreign policy: Preferable to reality, but without a prayer of actually working.
Kimmitt
Sure, but pasting Kucinich’s views onto Al Gore is like pasting Buchanan’s views onto Bush 41. If your argument is, “Some Kucinich crunchies (who probably voted for Bradley in the 2000 primary anyways) were against something, therefore Al Gore would have acted the same way,” I’m not sure I’m thrilled with agreeing to disagree.
Meaning no offense to you–you’re an economist, right?)
None taken; it’s kind of you to remember.
And if we agree that doing what we did in Afghanistan was absolutely and utterly necessary, then believe it or not we’re more or less on the same page.
Yeah, that’s kind of my point. I’m on the Left side of the Party, too (just not the far Left). The Democratic Party was overwhelmingly in favor of invading Afghanistan, and there’s just no reason to think that any of its leaders would not have implemented the national consensus policy on that issue.
JPS
Kimmitt:
“pasting Kucinich’s views onto Al Gore is like pasting Buchanan’s views onto Bush 41.”
Oh, granted. I didn’t mean to do that at all. And I didn’t mean to suggest that because some colleagues of mine were against the Afghan campaign, Gore would have been too.
I know Kucinich wouldn’t have invaded, and I believe I wrote I have no doubt Gore would have taken us to war.
“If your argument is [Gore ~= Kucinich], I’m not sure I’m thrilled with agreeing to disagree.”
Heh, as they say. No. I meant, on the question of whether a Gore administration would have seen it through to regime change. You seem sure they would have; I’m not even sure they’d have considered that an attainable goal, so I suspect they’d have punished Afghanistan until we were satisfied they wouldn’t overtly support al Qaeda anymore, maybe until they turned over Mullah Omar, then called it victory.
I give the mainstream Democrats a lot of credit for supporting our overall policy there, but I’m just not at all convinced they’d have originated it.
Kimmitt
I give the mainstream Democrats a lot of credit for supporting our overall policy there, but I’m just not at all convinced they’d have originated it.
I wish I knew what it’d take to convince you. Apparently 90% approval isn’t enough. :)