Dear Democrats,
A really good way to be perceived as playing with national security for purely selfish political reasons is to actually have your former losing Presidential candidate write snide and condescending editorials in the NY Times presuming to tell the President what to say in his speech. To make matters worse, you could repeatedly call him a liar, prescribe no real solutions, and throw around phrases that read like a grad school education training class (‘establish a truly inclusive political process’).
It probably isn’t a good idea, the week after Rove unfairly painted you all as weak on security and the war on terror, to have the man who in many ways is still the symbolic head of the Democratic party demanding timelines and deadlines for withdrawal (as well as renouncing any future military bases- isn’t that a military decision, not political? Didn’t we have bases in Germany for, well, now?).
Also, you could avoid suggesting things that are already being done- like using ethnic tribal militias- you did get the memo, right? At any rate, this may have made Kerry feel good, and it may have given you a chance to vent your spleen, but this was not a very good idea.
Some might look at this piece in the op-ed pages of the left-leaning NY Times and think you are playing political games.
But enough of my advice. Go read Greg Djerejian. More here from Von:
No. Setting a deadline for withdrawal is sheer lunacy. It throws a lifeline to terrorists, undercuts the nascent Iraqi regime, and discourages Iraqi moderates. A firm deadline virtually guarantees that withdrawal will occur too soon. It’s idiotic, counterproductive, and will ultimately cost more American lives…
Simply put, Iraqis have always needed more support from the U.S. More troops to restore basic services and keep the civil order in the aftermath of the war. More trainers to prepare a new Iraqi army. More and better ways to channel rebuilding funds to the ground level. More assurances that we will stand beside the Iraqi government until it has been fixed. The strategic sins of the Bush Administration have been of omission, not commission.
Kerry’s Op Ed notes this, of course. But noting in passing that the aftermath of the Iraq war (and here I use Djerejian’s phrase) was “something of a pretty significant cluster-f*&k” ain’t enough. Using it to score a political point ain’t enough. You gotta act on it. You gotta fix it. You gotta offer something other than cut and run.
Pretty much. Offering a sensible plan for winning is not only the appropriate thing to do, but it is what the public wants:
As President Bush prepares to address the nation about Iraq tonight, a new Washington Post-ABC News poll finds that most Americans do not believe the administration’s claims that impressive gains are being made against the insurgency, but a clear majority is willing to keep U.S. forces there for an extended time to stabilize the country.
The survey found that only one in eight Americans currently favors an immediate pullout of U.S. forces, while a solid majority continues to agree with Bush that the United States must remain in Iraq until civil order is restored — a goal that most of those surveyed acknowledge is, at best, several years away.
Do the right thing, and quit whining and sniping for political points. You have a chance to provide an alternative plan, rather than just whinging incessantly about the DSM and illegal war for oil nonsense, which just turns people off.
jami
how does it “hurt” national security to tell bush to outline a more specific plan to get out of iraq? (i hope that’s what kerry’s letter said).
jami
you’re the one being snotty here, mister. AND you’re the one threatening other americans. why aren’t you in iraq? are your kids in iraq?
John Cole
A.) You could try reading the damned letter before reacting here.
B.) Because Senators are supposed to do this thing privately, not run out and place snotty editorials in the NY Times before a speech.
C.) I am not in Iraq because I am too old, too out of shape, and I am a veteran. What is your excuse?
Jimmy Jazz
Huh? Bush is going to invite JFK for tea and scones, and Georgie’s going to listen with furrowed brow while John waves his arms alot and expresses his views on the Iraq occupation?
I agree that the content leaves a little to be desired (but really, what good solutions are there in Iraq?) but I’m really missing how doing some preemptive criticism of an increasingly unpopular president and an increasingly unpopular war is so “out of form” or “uncalled for” as you apparently think it is.
bg
Hey, I didn’t have squat to do with that.
But isn’t this remarkably similar to the game conservatives play all the time where they offer Dems advice?
Don
Personally I’d just as soon someone stuck Kerry and Lieberman in a rocket and blasted them off to some other planet, preferably one we aren’t worried about alienating by dumping our worst trash on. I don’t see, however, how his bloated polysylabic essay saying “Look, can we stop pissing away American lives on this bullshit boondoggle ASAP?” could in the remotest sense qualify as weak on security.
Yes, it should be shorter on thesarus and dictionary and specifics. I’d have prefered if he’s focused on demanding some timelines and deadlines and countering this idiotic parroted nonsense about how setting a deadline means the insurgency will sabotague it. Are we supposed to believe that absent some specific goals the terrorists there are just going to sit on their hands and NOT disrupt things? Yeah, goals and deadlines make things harder. That’s what they are FOR, to set targets that you commit to running after and reaching.
The problem with goals and timelines is that if you really slip them you have to ask “does this mean we should rethink how we’re doing this?” For grown up organizations and people this is valuable, and it’s the right thing to do for your “customers.” Cable companies setting schedules “between 8a and 2p” is a stereotypical joke, but we think “whenever” is acceptable for the end of hostilities? Timelines and goals force an organization to be accountable and confront reality as well as prepare for costs. Else you end up doing things like, oh, spending 300B+ rather than 60B and calling something “Accomplished” and then losing just as many lives in the subsequent 12 months.
John Cole
It makes you look like you are playing political games, and demanding artificial timelines rather than setting appropriate goals is a non-starter.
At any rate, none of this should be in the NY Times before the speech- it is a rather petty and transparent political ploy.
Jimmy Jazz
Heh. Like “muzzle Howard Dean, he’ll kill your chances!”
Yeah, because HoHo’s comments have succeeded in driving Bush and the Republicans’ numbers back up from cellar levels.
Oh wait, they haven’t.
Don
Oh c’mon John, don’t fall into that “artificial timelines” nonsense. All timelines are ‘artificial,’ they are projections that are based on the best possible information (unless they are set based on need) that you WORK towards meeting, and considering the very real cost to us in lives and economy there’s every reason to have one that’s agressive rather than open-ended.
I cannot believe that any true conservative doesn’t believe in the basic idea that governments behave like a gas in that they expand to fill every available crevace of opportunity to spend and exert power. How is a policy enabling Forever War any different?
As far as political games and the timing of this, why does the President get some carte blance right to set the timing of appealing to the public? What provides him absolute right to first at-bat and requires the opposition party to wait and merely respond?
Jimmy Jazz
Exactly! =)
Seriously, though, will Kerry’s comments not resonate with the 60% of Americans that want to get the hell out of Iraq?
Bush’s speech will do absolutely nothing, and is intended to do absolutely nothing other than to drive his numbers up a few points before the next round of car bombs and likely revelations on the Plame case. Kerry’s little missive has the same political intent.
John Cole
As far as political games and the timing of this, why does the President get some carte blance right to set the timing of appealing to the public? What provides him absolute right to first at-bat and requires the opposition party to wait and merely respond?
I think the words I am searching for are “Commander-in-Chief.”
akaoni
The lack of a deadline is just what the administration is hoping for. One only has to read the PNAC policy papers regarding Iraq to see that a permanent presence is just what they desire. But of course we are missing the forest for the trees. The whole dialogue around the war has been flawed because we aren’t talking about the true goals of the occupation of Iraq. This is not about terrorism, it’s not about freedom, it’s not even about WMD. All of these issues are related but not central. What it’s truly about is the preservation of the United States’ ability to exert force on a uniquely important part of the world, and by extension the preservation of the United States’ role as the dominant force in global affairs. Now we can debate the merits of these goals, but until we start addressing these issues, any discussion of US policy in Iraq will be missing the boat entirely.
Don
No, that gets him the right to have HIS stumping appear in prime time on all the networks rather than back pages of one city’s newspaper. It’s not a four-year entitlement to first serve on every volley.
Jon H
John wrote: “At any rate, none of this should be in the NY Times before the speech- it is a rather petty and transparent political ploy.”
I wouldn’t be surprised if the Times solicited an editorial from him, for the day of Bush’s TV spot.
And what Senatorial ego could resist that?
Darrell
Kerry’s exit plan from Iraq: everyone get 3 purple hearts for boo-boo scratches and go home
I wonder when he’ll start accusing our troops of being a bunch of baby killers to be compared with Genghis Khan
Darrell
“The reality is that the Bush administration’s choices have made Iraq into what it wasn’t before the war – a breeding ground for jihadists.”
yeah that’s just what the country needs ketchup boy, unsubstantiated doom and gloom proclamations like that. Iraq is not “breeding” jihadists, it is smoking them out you jackass.
“refused to recognize the urgency of training Iraqi security forces”
yes, how stupid of us not to train the Iraqi security forces before we invaded
“and the specter of quagmire staring us in the face”
Oh my, a “Quagmire”. What a piece of sh*t Kerry truly is. I find it disturbing that 48% of the country voted for him
Mike S
Don
yeah that’s just what the country needs ketchup boy, unsubstantiated doom and gloom proclamations like that.
Well, not everything can be the gloried and well-reasoned rhetoric that is Kerry’s exit plan from Iraq: everyone get 3 purple hearts for boo-boo scratches and go home
Mike S
yeah that’s just what the country needs ketchup boy, unsubstantiated doom and gloom proclamations like that.
What this country needs is happy talk. “Last Throes,” “Turning the corner,” “light at the end of the tunnel.” Happy talk is what will win this war.
gratefulcub
Darrel
unsubstantiated doom and gloom proclamations like that. Iraq is not “breeding” jihadists, it is smoking them out you jackass.
I believe he, and everyone else that makes this statement, is referring to a new CIA report saying ‘Iraq is a better training ground for jihadists than Afghanistan of the 80’s’. The liberal, communist loving, terrorist infiltrated CIA?
Darrell
I believe he, and everyone else that makes this statement, is referring to a new CIA report saying ‘Iraq is a better training ground for jihadists than Afghanistan of the 80’s’.
I read the same reports. Unfortunately grateful, you dishonestly omit the context on WHY Iraq is in someways a “better” training ground than Afghanistan in the Taliban salad days. It’s only because unlike in a THEORETICAL training camp without enemies shooting at you, in Iraq, surviving terrorist headchoppers are learning how to avoid capture while carrying out their car bombings and assinations. Only in that context of real world combat experience against our military, is the training ground “better”.
They certainly can’t operate out in the open as they did in Afghanistan under Taliban control without getting their heads blown off.
Your dishonesty in omitting this important context underscores the doom and gloom whinings of most of the left. You really want us to lose. Otherwise, your criticisms would have balance and context.. and honesty
gratefulcub
I didn’t omit anything, in fact I agree wholeheartedly with your explanation. Live training is better than theoretical training. They are learning how to fight a guerilla war against us, or another occupying force.
Why would I want us to lose? i really don’t understand that logic. Why would I want to leave Iraq in a state of civil war, turning into a failed state that would destabilze the region? Who wants that? There is a difference between wanting us to lose, and wanting us to face the reality of the situation and adjust.
Can we possibly believe that this war isn’t creating terrorists? Every war or occupation of Arab and Muslim lands in this century has created terrorists. Algeria, Afghanistan, Palestine……. There are many in the Arab/Muslim world that are fence sitters. They despise the terrorists’ tactics, but they do support their cause. When they see infidel tanks in the streets outside their windows, or have family members killed by occupation forces…..some of them tend to sympathize more with the resistence than they did before. some of them will join the terrorists, enthusiastically or reluctantly. (I am in no way saying they should, I am just saying that some will). We had to know we would create terrorists, and terrorists sympathizers. I am not saying that is a reason not to go to Iraq, but it is an obvious result, and we need to stop acting like it isn’t true so that we can honestly asess the situation and move forward.
Please don’t respond by telling me yet again that I want american soldiers to die so that we can lose because I hate bush so much.
Mike S
You really want us to lose.
The scribblings of a jackass. Go Cheney yourself Darrell.
Darrell
Why would I want us to lose? i really don’t understand that logic. Why would I want to leave Iraq in a state of civil war, turning into a failed state that would destabilze the region? Who wants that?
There are many, many who hate George Bush so very much that they would rather see us lose, even if it means Iraq turns into an oppressive dictatorial terrorist black hole..rather than see Bush (and America) succeed. Usually, their criticisms are dishonest and not at all constructive. Thank you for your clarification. I will not place you in that category, although I disagree strongly with your analogies of Algeria (fighting brutal French colonial oppression) or Afghanistan, where terrorists were basically welcomed and invited to that country under Taliban rule
Do you hold open the possibility that many fence sitting former terrorist sympathizers have now switched sides now that they have seen that the terrorists are trying to tear apart their country while Americans are rebuilding it? Iraqi public opinion polls indicate a big swing against the terrorists
Sojourner
Why do you hate the troops, Darrell?
gratefulcub
Again, I agree with almost everything you said. There is no exact analogy for the US occupation, Algeria, Palestine, Afghanistan
Geek, Esq.
There’s a continuum of thought, with one pole being “stay no matter what the cost” (usually held by people who think we should have killed a few million more people in Vietnam) and “turn tail and run like brave Sir Robin” at the other.
The public wants something in the middle, which they are right to. The question is whether the Dems or the Reps are going to be able to formulate it better.
Darrell
gratefulcub, your last post most definitely falls into the category of thoughtful concern/criticism. I would agree that ‘some’ insurgents, especially in the early days, may have been wanting to rid their homeland of foreign occupiers. I think now that today’s insurgency is almost entirely terrorists, along with a number of Sunni Baathists who refuse to give up their former priveleged status and power, still trying to hold their jackboots over the Shia and Kurds
I agree with you entirely that we can’t leave Iraq until it is more stable and able to defend itself. But what other option is there but to ‘stay the course’? Stay the course, keep winning hearts and minds through rebuilding efforts, until the Iraqi armed forces are political systems gain experience and independence. Staying the course is exactly what we need to continue doing, even if it’s not popular here politically.. it’s the right thing to do
Jon H
Darrell writes:”They certainly can’t operate out in the open as they did in Afghanistan under Taliban control without getting their heads blown off.”
Well, that’s kind of the point. They couldn’t operate in Iraq before we invaded. (Well, apart from Zarqawi’s base in the no-fly zone which we allowed to exist.)
We took Afghanistan away from them. But then we handed them Iraq, which is a far superior base of operations for a terrorist group interested in the Middle East and Europe, than a landlocked country in the middle of nowhere in Central Asia.
Not only can they operate from Iraq, but they are training against us, improving their skills, tactics, and techniques, learning how to defeat our high tech equipment. (For example, when we started using RF jammers to prevent IEDs from being set off, they apparently started using infrared lasers, which aren’t blocked by jammers.)
Eventually, the people who have been training in Iraq will rotate out, and will be able to spread havoc elsewhere.
If the insurgents gave up the fight tomorrow, and just went underground, Bush would probably declare victory. But there would still be hundreds or thousands of new, trained terrorists out there.
If we had just kicked them out of Afghanistan, and left them hanging, they’d have nowhere to use as a base right now, except maybe the Northwest Frontier Province of our good buddy Pakistan.
Jon H
Darrell writes: “I agree with you entirely that we can’t leave Iraq until it is more stable and able to defend itself.”
The problem is, it’ll be far easier for a nascent independent Iraq to collude, or at least agree not to intefere, with the terrorists, than to fight them.
gratefulcub
My problem with
Jon H
The least he could do is announce he is going to seize, by eminent domain, the intellectual property held by the company which is “up-armoring” the humvees, so that it can be transferred to other companies willing to do the upgrade on the hummvee manufacturing line, rather than as a slower retrofit.
The company’s unwilling to license it, and is trying to maximize their own profit and hold onto the production, even though they can’t keep up with demand.
Mike S
Jon H
Do you have a link for that? I have never heard that claim before.
Jon H
Link
The Defense Department continues to rely on just one small company in Ohio to armor Humvees. And the company, O’Gara-Hess & Eisenhardt, has waged an aggressive campaign to hold onto its exclusive deal even as soaring rush orders from Iraq have been plagued by delays. The Marine Corps, for example, is still awaiting the 498 armored Humvees it sought last fall, officials told The Times.
In January, when military officials tried to speed production by buying the legal rights to the armor design so they could enlist other venders to help, O’Gara demurred, calling the move a threat to its “current and future competitive position,” according to e-mail records obtained from the Army.
…
What the Defense Department thought would be the easiest option turned out otherwise.
The Humvee chassis is rapidly made on a vast assembly line near South Bend, Ind., by AM General. But before its vehicles can be rushed to Iraq, they are trucked four and a half hours to O’Gara’s shop in Fairfield, in southern Ohio – which had 94 people armoring one Humvee a day when the war began. There, the Humvees are partly dismantled so the armor can be added.
“Clearly, if you could have started from scratch you wouldn’t be doing it that way,” Mr. Brownlee said in a recent interview.
In February 2004, Mr. Brownlee visited the O’Gara plant and asked the company to increase production, gradually pushing its monthly output to 450 from 220 vehicles. The Defense Department also wanted to contract with other companies to make armor.
Determined to hold onto its exclusive contract, O’Gara began lobbying Capitol Hill. Among those it drew to its side was Brian T. Hart, an outspoken father of a soldier who was killed in October 2003 while riding in a Humvee. Early last year, as a guest on a national radio show, Mr. Hart urged the Pentagon to involve more armor makers. Two weeks later a lobbyist for O’Gara approached him.
“He informed me that the company had more than enough capacity,” Mr. Hart says. “There was no need to second-source.”
Mr. Hart then redirected his efforts to help the company push Congress into forcing the Pentagon to buy more armored Humvees. With support from both parties, the company has received more than $1 billion in the past 18 months in military armoring contracts.
Meanwhile, the Army did not give up on trying to speed production by involving more armor makers. Brig. Gen. Patrick O’Reilly said several armor companies were eager to be part of a plan to produce armored Humvees entirely on AM General’s assembly line.
In January, when it asked O’Gara to name its price for the design rights for the armor, the company balked and suggested instead that the rights be placed in escrow for the Army to grab should the company ever fail to perform.
“Let’s try this again,” an Army major replied to the company in an e-mail message. “The question concerned the cost, not a request for an opinion.”
The Army has dropped the matter for now, General O’Reilly said, adding that he hoped to have other companies making armor by next April.
Mike S
Damn man. This country sure has changed since WWII.
Kimmitt
John —
Senator Kerry is trying to set himself up for a Presidential run in ’08. This is part of that. Nobody has the authority to tell him to stop making an ass of himself; he has no chance in the primary and refuses to acknowledge it.
Darrell
The longer we stay, the worse this situation gets. And, regardless if what we did was torture or not, regardless if it is policy or not
John Cole
Jon H- Please start embedding your links using the buttons.
Sojourner
Can you provide evidence for this?
Darrell
Can you provide evidence for this?
Not off hand, I read it on a couple of Iraqi blogs and I think I read an article on it, but I have no citation, I’m going off memory. I’m not aware of any formal survey of the Iraqi people on this topic, one way or another. But given what the Iraqi people have been through under Saddam, it makes perfect sense that they would roll their eyes over the relatively mild reports coming out of Abu Ghraib vs the horrifying systematic atrocities under Saddam
gratefulcub
I mock the president going on tv and telling us to stay the course using his same tired rhetoric, the sound and the fury signifying nothing. I want him to tell us the real situation and some real responses to it, not the same campaign stump speech from november about staying the course. Staying the course means absolutely nothing. And I never said I thought we should stay the course, in fact I pointed out the reasons I believe we need to adjust our plan.
We are at war, these are important times. His job tonight is to sit in the Oval Office, and somberly tell us the truth about the situation. Something along the lines of
gratefulcub
Newsweek lied, people died.
Abu Ghraib was western media hype.
My head is spinning……..
Darrell
I never said Iraq had all the electricity it could use (it does not), I was merely pointing out that you were mistaken in your assertion that there is less electricity now, than pre-war. I am not sure that is a disputable point, as EVERYTHING I have read says there is more electricity generated now than pre-war. My point being that the average Iraqi can definitely see improvement in electricity and water compared to what life was like under Saddam. Having said that, yes, reconstruction is going slower than anticipated because of terrorist attacks
Sojourner
So you don’t think the Iraqis care about their fellow men, women, and children who are being raped, tortured, and killed by the Americans who came to free them? I don’t think you give them enough credit.
gratefulcub
Of course I am bitter. I am a liberal, living in kentucky, in a country being run by conservatives. I fight it, but bitterness sneaks into my words on occasion. I truly try to lose the rhetoric and snarkiness, maybe I should proof read BEFORE I post.
And here comes that bitterness and snark
ppgaz
Any proposal of a “plan” or strategy for moving forward will become bogged down, and probably fail, if it is attached in any way to any complaint about actions already taken. I would think that this is Organizational Politics, 101. You don’t make your plan look better by gratuitously bashing the previous one. A plan will stand on its own merits — or fall on them — only if given a chance to do so. Blending it with complaints about the past is generally a sure way to deflect from the purpose, and the value, of the new proposal. It also gives the impression that the bash is as important as the need to move forward. It isn’t.
The bashing has its place, but using it as an ornament on a suggested new course of action is not that place. It’s absolutely the wrong place.
gratefulcub
I wasn
George Turner
Gratefulclub,
It’s the soldiers in Iraq who tell us everything is going well. I would think they would know.
However, every Islamic militant nutcase keeps showing up and blowing up, but how do you think the press would react if New York City was having three car bombings a day, or three a year?
Would they call for a retreat to Iowa, or continued policing?
George Turner
Gratefulclub,
It’s the soldiers in Iraq who tell us everything is going well. I would think they would know.
However, every Islamic militant nutcase keeps showing up and blowing up, but how do you think the press would react if New York City was having three car bombings a day, or three a year?
Would they call for a retreat to Iowa, or continued policing?
Stormy70
Source, please.
Jimmy Jazz
John: that’s a fucked up thing to say. PNAC isn’t some whacked out liberal conspiracy theory. It’s a group that includes very senior administration officials, has been very vocal about its goals, and apparently it is those same officials who cherry picked the intelligence that was used to justify this war. Problem: every bit of it has been discredited. That leaves two alternatives: 1) they were lying or 2) our intelligence system completely failed us. Since Bush has resisted any call for an independent investigation of #2, I’m going to have to go for #1. I think they did believe Saddam had some rump chem and/or biological capability that would “justify” the war. Actually, I did too. But I don’t think they believed Saddam was a threat.
There are two issues: 1) the concerted propaganda campaign that got us into Iraq and
2) what do we do now
I wholeheartedly agree that the Dems need to be part of the solution on #2 in a serious way. Not because I think Bush gives 2 shits for what they’ll say, but simply to raise our credibility and provide a valid alternative.
To dismiss the valid, evidentiary concerns over what I believe as the greatest single act of deception ever perpetuated on America as “whinging” is, well, fucked.
Our government has zero credibility with: 1) the world, 2) half of America. I don’t know about you, I think that’s a problem as we try to confront the real threats facing this country.
Jimmy Jazz
Sorry, “perpetrated” not “perpetuated”.
George Turner
Gee JimmyJazz,
Since the UN, the Europeans, the Russians, and the intelligence agencies in the Middle East ALSO thought Saddam had some WMD capabilities, I guess it proves Rove controls the whole world.
Oh, and Bush said we must remove Saddam before he becomes a threat. You must’ve not been paying attention.
Jimmy Jazz
You intentionally ignored the part where I said I thought he had some capability too. Not the point. Plenty of countries have and/or want WMD. We apparently invaded the only country in the Middle East completely free of them.
The point is:
No, we could easily have wiped Saddam out if he caused any monkeybusiness. What Bush said is that we needed to take Saddam out before he gave the weapons he didn’t have to terrorists he didn’t deal with, because said terrorists would gladly have used those weapons on him.
I’ll wait for you to drag out the Atta met an Iraqi in Prague fable that was discredited by the FBI, the CIA, and the President of Czechoslovakia.
Jimmy Jazz
The dramatic collapse of public support for Iraq doesn’t change the facts, but it pops the balloon of revisionist history quite nicely. You and I both know what Bush, Cheney, Condi and the rest said.
Sojourner
You’re asking for a source for a question?
wtf?
JoeJ
Saddam was harboring Abu Nidal, paying money to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers, shooting at American and British aircraft that were monitoring the UN created No Fly Zone (created due to his invasion of Kuwait) which apparently passed the Global Test, circumvented the Oil for Food program while paying off French and Russian politicians to ensure their veto in the Security Council, and oh yeah, murdering and terrorizing the Iraqi people on a daily basis. But oh, none of that means that Saddam was a bad guy or a destabilizing threat to the region. Does anyone seriously believe the man would not have resurrected his WMD programs as soon as the UN sanctions were lifted? Talk about gullible…
We did the right thing by removing that piece of filth from power like the French and Brits should have done with Hitler before he became a real threat.
Dave
Jimmy Jazz, did you really use the work monkeybusiness in context to Saddam? Gassing villages, cutting out tongues and tossing men off roofs, torturing children in front of their parents, raping wives and daughters in front of husbands and fathers is monkey business to you? I’m at a loss for words… and so are you.
Jimmy Jazz
::sob:: you’ve convinced me, after reading stories like this.
Oooooops, that’s Uzbekistan, our valiant ally in the War on Terra. Forget I said anything.
Darrell
Comparisons of Uzbekistan human rights abuse to the scale of mass murdering atrocities in Iraq under Saddam is like comparing US military prisoner abuse to the genocidal Khmer Rouge. Both detached from reality.
If Jimmy Jazz and his ideological brothers gave a rat’s ass about human rights, they would have supported the toppling of Saddam on a Human Rights basis ALONE… the left used to tell us how very much they cared about human rights abuses. But when the US toppled the bloodiest living mass murderer on the planet, they scream that Bush is acting like Hitler. Our actions in Iraq have exposed the left for the lying, hypocritical scumb that they have always been. Decent former leftists like M.Totten, Dean Esmay and others have seen this phenomena and split the sheets with the left, a left which is showing their true colors
Sojourner
Darrell:
You’re ignoring the fact that Hussein was at his worst during the’80’s and early ’90’s when, at the same time, he had friend of U.S. status. So cut the shit. Why wasn’t the U.S. irate about it back then?
Jimmy Jazz
Sojourner, once again thanks for getting my back.
Darrell: I’m not one of those “leftists” who are always begging for humanitarian intervention, especially when it involves a military “solution”. There are a vocal minority who are, but far more Americans of all persuasions who feel that is a misapplication of military power, unless there is a lot of international and regional cooperation and other circumstances exist.
If any “hypocrisy” is revealed, it’s from those on the right left shamefully hiding behind the “Saddam was a bad man” excuse as all other justifications have crumbled.
As Sojourner says, the worst of the abuses occured with our tacit approval back in the days when Rummy was shaking hands with Saddam, and far more Iraqi civilians have died in the war and post war than in the last few years of Saddam’s reign. Some “humanitarian mission”.
Paul Wolfowitz, from the same infamous “bureacratic reasons” interview:
“the criminal treatment of the Iraqi people…by itself, as I think I said earlier, is a reason to help the Iraqis but it’s not a reason to put American kids’ lives at risk, certainly not on the scale we did it.”
Link