Jeff Goldstein reviews a segment of last night’s Hardball:
From last evening’s “Hardball w/ Chris Matthews” comes this bizarre bit: Shortly after New York Times columnist Bob Herbert condemned the US for forcing democracy on Iraqis “at the point of a gun,” Democratic strategist Hillary Rosen had this to say: “There’s another word for ‘insurgents’ in Iraq, and that’s ‘residents.’”
Not to be outdone, Matthews himself (channeling Brian Williams) then added: “‘Insurgents’ are what the British called us in the Revolutionary War. It’s true”—an observation which, if I didn’t know better, might lead me to conclude Chris was trying to draw some sort of parallel or something.
I saw that too, sort of- I was doing something else and the time and wasn’t sure what I had heard, so I was waiting for the transcript.
Sojourner
Um, isn’t that exactly what we did? I don’t recall the Iraqi people coming to us with the request to help them become a democracy. If they did, please cite a link with evidence.
Aren’t Iraqi citizens members of the insurgency or are they entirely imports from other countries? I can’t believe someone is arguing there is no Iraqi insurgency.
Of course America was begun by insurgents. Are we now going to re-write history and claim that our founding fathers politely asked the Brits to allow us to become a separate country and the Brits readily agreed?
Somebody please explain exactly what is incorrect about the statements made other than the usual semantic nonsense.
Mr Furious
Matthews may be correct as a point of fact, but the analogy he draws is no longer even close to the truth. The “insurgents” in Iraq stopped functioning as “revolutionaries” the moment they stopped attacking occupying trooops and started slaughtering innocent Iraqi citizens.
And Rosen, STFU, and clean out your fucking desk. That bone-headed comment is not part of any Dem “strategy” I want to see trotted out. Many of these insurgents are not “residents,” they are foreign, and NONE of them are sympathetic actors anymore.
Mr Furious
Sojourner-
I wrote my comment before reading yours, but I think I answered you (somewhat).
Basically, if the insurgency was still primarily targeting occupation troops and legit military targets (perhaps even some logistical Iraqi targets), they could claim to be operating a resistance more on par with the American (or other) Revolution. Suicide bombs in markets, and blowing up scores of children negate any legitimacy to me. And should give pause to ANY serious politician (or strategist) to appear supportive.
Nobody around here is more opposed to the War than I am, and I have no problem with harsh crtiques or condemnation of the War, but don’t align youself with what the Iraqi insurgency has become and expect anything but scorn.
Sojourner
Yes, Matthews was, for once, correct factually. I think the point he was trying to make is that invading a country is likely to produce a reaction amongst at least some of the locals whose nationalistic tendencies will likely produce a violent reaction. This is factually correct but denied by the Bush administration prior to the invasion in their claims that it would be all flowers and chocolates.
I don’t understand your problem with Rosen’s statement, which is basically the same as Matthews. I watched the segment and she did not portray the insurgents as sympathetic. Once again, these are factual statements. The reality that they can be twisted into all sorts of contortions doesn’t make them any less factual. And their factual inevitability should have been directly addressed in Bush’s war planning.
Sojourner
I agree with everything in your second post. And given the political climate, these statements may give ammunition to the pro-war types. I am simply trying to analyze their factual content. To deny their validity is to encourage the same mind set that drove this war.
Mr Furious
Yeah, factually correct. Politically fucking retarded.
ppGaz
You know, the cable airwaves are chock full of the most inane and idiotic bullshit 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
While the subject remarks border on laughable, they aren’t going to have any effect on anything, they aren’t even in the ballpark of the level of lunacy and stupidity that one can find on the “other side” of this issue, and I can say that with confidence even if you ignore 50% of the verbal and printed horrors catalogued at mediamatters.
This kind of thread is basically a “shocked, shocked that we have found foolishness in the public square” sort of thing. We don’t need the thought police monitoring cable tv, or its cousin, talk radio, looking for gaffes that can be used to get the folks at the trailer park all riled up.
We could use some decent journalism, though.
Steve
Estimates from our own people are that less than 5% of the insurgency, and maybe a lot less, consists of foreigners to Iraq. So the “foreign fighters” thing has a mythical component to it.
What most people don’t want to acknowledge, because thinking is hard work, is that the “insurgency” is not some unitary fighting force. There are a lot of insurgent groups with a lot of different goals, some of whom are anti-US, some of whom are anti-Shia government, some of whom are God knows what. I realize you can’t even make a vanilla comment like this in today’s super-patriotic climate, but just because some insurgents are killing civilians, I don’t agree that you can label every insurgent in Iraq as a soulless terrorist.
danelectro
hillary rosen? that’s great, just great.
Mr Furious
“I don’t agree that you can label every insurgent in Iraq as a soulless terrorist.”
I don’t either, but when the news (again today–25 dead) is filled with stories of attacks on other Iraqis, clearly designed to intimidate the population, terrorist becomes, more and more, the proper term.
Those in office here, or charged with representing or strategizing for a Party (Rosen, or even Dean) would be wise to keep it in mind.
Hebert and Matthews can say whatever the hell they want, but i don’t need my Party shooting themselves in the foot with this shit.
Steve
Well, I don’t deny that spokesmen sometimes have to play to the lowest common denominator, but between us smart people, I’d like to think we can agree that the “insurgency” is not some unitary group that provides membership cards.
Mr Furious
Look, early in the War, Bush called everyone who raised a finger to the troops in Iraq a “terrorist.” I called bullshit on that, because it wasn’t true. Resistance to occupation should be expected (at least by leadership with a fucking brain and a plan). And in an asymmetrical battle situation, guerrila techniques will be employed. Fine. They were insurgents
We’re long past that point now.
Mr Furious
At the end of the first ‘graph above, I meant to say…
Fine. Theywere insurgents mounting a predictable and perhaps defensible resistance.
The Ace
Um, No we didn’t “force” Democracy on them, not at all. I must have missed the Iraqi resistance to Democracy. “Forcing” them would entail us fighting a war against the citizenry e.g. US Revolutionary War, not removing an unelected dictator.
Second, the British referred to us as “insurgents”? —If they did, please cite a link with evidence.
Finally, to call terrorists “residents” is grossly trivializing what they are doing. Matthews is doing the same, I mean, what is the point to somehow equate the blowing up of schools, children, mosques, hospitals with shooting red coats to form your own country? What’s funny about this is, those on the left commenting about this read it line by line and note its “factually” correct (it is not) but if President Bush mentions 9/11 and Iraq in the same speech, he is, according to them, trying to tie them together or “make us believe” Saddam was behind it, etc.
Pathetic.
OHNOES
I’m pro-Iraq War, terror war, etc… and to meet someone who opposes the war yet condemns the terrorist “insurgency” restores my faith in humanity.
Though, I still take issue with the “democracy at gunpoint” statement, especially considering the fascism at gunpoint they had beforehand.
Sure, the British called our good old Revolutionary War people “insurgents,” but you won’t believe how many people have called Bush and his comrades “Nazis.” Truthful, yes? But the analogy they’re trying to draw? Little more than a drug-induced hallucination.
OHNOES
Note that calling Bush a nazi isn’t truthful, but the fact that people called him a nazi is truthful.
Steve
Look, there’s not a lot of Iraqis longing for the return of Saddam (although their daily lives may have been easier in those days), but that doesn’t mean everyone is thrilled about the blessings of democracy. If you’re a Sunni, you used to live under a secular government where the people in power are basically Sunnis themselves, and now you’re being ruled over by a Shia majority. It matters not that the Shia government is democratically elected; the fact is, since you’re part of a permanent minority, you don’t exactly see what’s so great about democracy.
None of that excuses violence against civilians; but if we’re talking about resistance to US troops, or resistance to the new Iraqi government, it’s simply a fact to be expected. We would have loved the insurgents if they had rebelled against Saddam, but we condemn them for rebelling against the new government, because it’s a democracy and they should accept it. The point is that from their perspective, they’re being oppressed in either scenario.
jg
He’s nazi-like though.
Tongueboy
“Bob Herbert condemned the US for forcing democracy on Iraqis “at the point of a gun,””
Sojourner reacts:
Um, isn’t that exactly what we did? I don’t recall the Iraqi people coming to us with the request to help them become a democracy. If they did, please cite a link with evidence.
How about 8 million ink-stained fingers? You might want to rethink your statement unless you are willing to argue that Coalition forces were used by the Bush and Blair Administrations to intimidate Iraqi citizens into trotting out to the polls quite unwillingly. If so, please cite link with evidence.
“Democratic strategist Hillary Rosen had this to say: “There’s another word for ‘insurgents’ in Iraq, and that’s ‘residents.
Sojourner continues:
Aren’t Iraqi citizens members of the insurgency or are they entirely imports from other countries? I can’t believe someone is arguing there is no Iraqi insurgency.
Rosen’s statement calculatedly attempts to substitute a neutral label for a negative label placed by most reasonable people on a bunch of hooligans who are indeed doing negative things. Ya know, like murdering unarmed civilians and such. Not a huge deal but perhaps a bit of a stretch for the average person with a moral compass.
Sojourner
Okay, but it’s certainly taken a whole lot of GUNS to get to this point, now hasn’t it? And this is after Bush declared the war to be over so let’s not blame it all on Hussein.
Also keep in mind that democracy means a whole lot more than voting. And Iraq is far from there. Which explains why American GUNS remain in Iraq.
See the argument previously made that not all of the insurgents are attacking civilians.
From dictionary.com:
Insurgent: Rising in revolt against established authority, especially a government.
Note that it says NOTHING about killing innocent civilians.
Tongueboy
Okay, but it’s certainly taken a whole lot of GUNS to get to this point, now hasn’t it? And this is after Bush declared the war to be over so let’s not blame it all on Hussein.
Also keep in mind that democracy means a whole lot more than voting. And Iraq is far from there. Which explains why American GUNS remain in Iraq.
Sounds about right to me. Comparing the Iraqi reconstruction experience to that of Germany and Japan, it is truly astounding how far the Iraqi people have come in such a short time in developing a civil society, with the help of the Coalition of course. There is still a long ways to go and a key to finishing the reconstruction task is to wipe out the bad guys. Hence, the guns.
Sojourner
Well, at least we agree on the guns part so my original statement still stands.
Stormy70
I think what some people forget is that Saddam emptied the prisons before the invasion. He let loose around 100,000 criminals. Surely, a healthy percentage of the 100,000 are hardened thugs and criminals. Some of these may be running kidnapping rings and contributing to the overall insurgency.
Sojourner
Yeh, hardened thugs and criminals are known for their car bombers. There’s serious money in blowing up cars.
Callimachus
I’m still waiting for someone to rise to Ace’s challenge and produce a Revolutionary War-era quote from some British type, calling the American rebels “insurgents.” I’ve checked the OED: The noun was in use from about 1765 with the same sense it has now. So theoretically it’s possible. But no one’s got a quote? Or is CM just blowing smoke?
[Even if there is such a quote, of course, it doesn’t mean he knew about it when he spoke. He could be both right AND blowing smoke.]
OHNOES
Sojourner demonstrates his acute knowledge of the criminal mind.
Yes, from the minority’s point of view, they are being oppressed, but, dangit, they need to suck it up. The Democratic minority (As well as several much more minorityish ethnic minorities) has been determining public for years. The Sunnis need to realize that they are the minority and that they can work through the Democratic process to keep their voices heard. It doesn’t have to fall to the same tired, old, moronic, suicide bombing that the terrorist morons seem to think is a great idea.
Granted, I’d rather not stake my reputation on that statement without doing a lot more reading as to what exactly divides the groups.
Knemon
“Yeh, hardened thugs and criminals are known for their car bombers. There’s serious money in blowing up cars.”
Yeh, there is – when you’ve got the kind of sugar daddies they do. Saddam was dealing out 25 large (which goes quite a ways in the ME) for suicide bombers’ families in Isratine. What are these guys getting?
The link between international terrorism and garden-variety bank-robbing, kidnapping and murder-for-hire was there 100 years ago (Stalin, e.g.), and it’s there now.
Somewhere in Iraq, there may be a pure & noble insurgency, attacking only military targets and Speaking Truth to Power (call it A).
There’s also an unprecedentedly nihilistic and bloody campaign of terrorist bombings. We’ll call that B.
Right now, B is the problem. B *might* be parasitic on A, and you *could* argue that if you somehow got A to the bargaining table, B would be unable to function.
Is that the argument y’all are making?
Buck Smith
It seems to me that the closest analogy to the “insurgents” in Iraq is not the American Revolutionaries 1776, but the Ku Klux Klan of 1876. Interesting that the sole (former) member of the KKK in the senate is roughly allied with the insurgents.
Sojourner
So you’re claiming that the insurgents were criminals locked up in Hussein’s prison? Do you seriously think that if prisoners were suddenly released from American prisons, they would execute political crimes? Not likely. So why would you assume that Iraqi prisoners would?
Knemon
“Do you seriously think that if prisoners were suddenly released from American prisons, they would execute political crimes?”
If the price were right? Yes.
I’m not saying all the released criminals are now “insurgents,” that all the insurgents were released by Saddam, or anything of the sort … just that there’s gotta be a little overlap there.
“Political crimes” is a bit euphemistic for me. I know that you want to find a noble insurgency to support, but it just ain’t there.
Jaibones
Hilarious string. Time and this war have proved only that Bush and his administration were 99% correct all along. As to tactics, I have no criticism and no expertise.
As for “insurgents”, “residents” and “terrorists” our troops have reported from the very beginning that the enemies that they captured included Iraq Baathists, Syrians, lots of Saudis, Iranians, Pakistanis, and Jordanians. They were led by the military and political leaders of Hussein, and later by known members of Al Qaeda, who have been killed and captured by the thousands.
This was never an insurgency in the context that critics of Bush — which is the real point, isn’t it? — have suggested. These were never citizen Iraqis nationalistically opposed to intervention by America’s alliance. Bushites were right: the opposition has been Hussein/Syrian Baathists and various and sundry anti-West terrorists with a window of opportunity to shoot at Americans without paying air fare. And after we killed enough of them to make that hard to sell, they focused on killing Iraqis, who had lined up with us from the very beginning.
Sojourner’s suggestion that 8 million Iraqis voted, at risk of assassination, because we forced them to at gunpoint is just silly. Time has only proven that they were right.
Are there other very difficult political and religious issues? You bet. Have we figured them out? Nope. But you Dems need to admit the profound truths of what we have done. It is historical-momentous, and cable nitwits like Matthews are just having a tough time swallowing it.
Sojourner
Agree. I don’t agree that the former prisoners are the cause of the problem.
No way am I claiming there’s a noble insurgency. But to me a political cause is different than a criminal cause, although obviously a political one can, and has, become a criminal one.