Cute:
The National Republican Congressional Committee is urging Gen. Stanley McCrystal to put House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “in her place” for weighing in on Afghanistan — prompting one female Pelosi ally to blast the House GOP as “80 percent male,” “100 percent white” — and completely out of touch.
On Monday night, Pelosi told Charlie Rose “should go up the line of command” instead of publicly opining on strategy — prompting a swift, sneering reaction from the GOP committee.
Mocking the first female speaker as “General Pelosi,” an NRCC spokesman wrote, “If Nancy Pelosi’s failed economic policies are any indicator of the effect she may have on Afghanistan, taxpayers can only hope McCrystal is able to put her in her place.”
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.), who is close to Pelosi, could barely contain her anger.
Pelosi is, of course, 100% correct. I kind of happen to think that McCrystal was kind of screwed anyway you looked at it when he was in London, because his report had been leaked and people knew what he thought already- he had no choice but to answer the way he did to that question. On the larger point, though, Pelosi is completely correct. He should be going through the chain of command with his opinions and plans. No one who has ever spent more than a few hours in the military would dispute this.
calipygian
That’s why so many GOOPers do.
burnspbesq
I’ve never quite been able to figure out why so many progressives harbor such scorn and anger for Pelosi. To my way of thinking, she is doing a difficult job, and doing it pretty damned well. And as you correctly point out, on this particular issue she is dead on.
In other news, Rush Dimbulb is part of a group that is negotiating to buy a majority stake in the St. Louis Rams. Hard to imagine a better reason to hate a sports team.
Makewi
So, you’d rather just distract everyone from remembering that under the Bush regime it was Pelosi saying that the administration should be listening to the generals. Perfect opportunity to wave the red flags of sexism, classism or misogyny.
McCrystal is just playing the time honored game of CYA, knowing that Obama is going to dither and then look for a scapegoat. Hey, wasn’t this Obama’s hand picked commander for the “real war”?
calipygian
What is McChrystal talking directly to the President for anyway? Isn’t that why we have a Theater Commander (Petraeus) and a SecDef (Gates)?
What happened to the chain of command? Last time I checked, Patton didn’t have audiences with FDR.
Derelict
No one who has ever spent more than a few ours in the military would dispute this.
Which tells you exactly why the RNC is disputing it.
DougJ
So, you’d rather just distract everyone from remembering that under the Bush regime it was Pelosi saying that the administration should be listening to the generals. Perfect opportunity to wave the red flags of sexism, classism or misogyny.
I realize you’re a spoof, but it’s worth remembering — the idea of generals putting civilian leaders “in their place” is completely contrary to the set-up of our democracy here. I would never, ever have dreamed of saying that Shinseki should put Bush — or Hastert — in his place.
KG
call me crazy, but I’m thinking if someone is two heartbeats away from being commander-in-chief, then their opinion should carry a not insignificant amount of weight.
@Makewi: um, there really isn’t any inconsistency here. President talks to generals, generals talk to president, two way street. Military strategy isn’t exactly something that should be developed in the public arena.
KG
@KG: oh, and what DougJ said.
Skippy
Well he could at least be specific about the place Pelosi belongs. Does he mean the home, the kitchen, or in a compromising position with a GOP elected official?
Fixed (I hope that’s turned out the way I wanted it to).
calipygian
@DougJ:
Actually, Shinseki isn’t the operative example here. The operative example is Petraeus when he was in overall command in Iraq and he DID put Bush in his place…indirectly, through proxies.
Which the nut-bags on the Weakly Standard right roundly applauded.
Sirkowski
The military should put the government “in its place”???
burnspbesq
@Makewi:
Are you actually this dense, or is it for effect?
There is no inconsistency — none whatsoever — between saying that an Administration should be listening to the generals and saying that generals should be speaking to the Administration through normal channels, rather than allowing (or worse, participating in) leaks that have the apparent objective of tying NCA’s hands.
And if you don’t think that the House Republican caucus is a nest of sexism, classism, and misogyny, you really aren’t paying attention.
WyldPiratd
If Obama didn’t have a Come to Jeebus meeting with McChrystal on the tarmac in Copenhagen, then we have problems in the White House.
The fucking military are trying to roll Obama liked the rolled Clinton. These general officers with the big mouths need to shut their yaps to the press when it comes to policy.
Personally, I would shit-canned McChrystal for running his mouth.
New Yorker
Of course the wignuts think generals should put civilian leaders in their place. I mean, haven’t you ever read what these “freedom lovers” say about Augusto Pinochet? They want to have his children.
Skippy
Yay it did. I really wish there was a preview option here though.
Sirkowski
Listening ≠ Obey
Makewi
@DougJ:
BS. You all were fine and dandy with military commanders giving Bush advice you agreed with, but now that the shoe is on the other foot is suddenly inexcusable. Worse, you just can’t help yourselves but to make every disagreement into some larger proof of the evil racist, sexist, classist heart of the republicans.
It is what it is. The arguments are the same, only the justifications and the names have changed.
gwangung
Effect. Makewi’s always admitted that she’s thrown up shit against the wall, relying on the quantity over quality strategy. Probably hoping that everyone else is dumber than she is—and it’s painfully clear she’s never had any command time….
Betsy
@New Yorker:
Given that these are the ones cheering on the Honduran coup, I would tend to agree with you.
The fact that she’s a woman just makes her authority all the more unbearable for them. Ha. WATBs, the lot of them.
matoko_chan
and 100% christian/mormon/evangelical.
can a religious political party survive in the 21st century?
Or will the GOP devolve into a noxious hive of fascists like the European Christian Democrat Party?
gwangung
Nah, it isn’t. We’re all too smart to swallow that; kinda insulting that you think we’re that dumb.
kommrade reproductive vigor
Gosh. Republicans playing You and Him Should Fight.
Never seen that before.
And the dick scabs will start whining about mean nasty racist DemoncRATs in 5…4…3…
calipygian
I actually wish it weren’t a woman. I wish it were an openly gay man. For the lulz.
Warren Terra
Um, I’m not the world expert on the GOP house caucus, but I do remember the existence of Joseph Cao. He may be a total fluke, only elected because of Dollar Bill Jefferson (and, sadly, I’ve seen no evidence that Cao is seizing this opportunity to behave as a genuine centrist, which would make him interesting) – but he’s not white.
Makewi
@burnspbesq:
Oh there is some denseness around here, that is for sure. Perhaps you can show me the Democrats calling for the generals criticizing Bush’s war effort in the press to go through proper channels?
gwangung
@Warren Terra: Us Asians are considered honorary whites for most racial purposes….
gwangung
@Warren Terra: Us Asians are considered honorary whites for most racial purposes….
calipygian
Personally, I would never have appointed that shit bag because of his role in the Pat Tillman coverup.
Somehow, he thought it was right and honorable to lie on Tillman’s Silver Star citation about how he was cut down by devastating enemy fire, but a few days later sent a secret “personal for” up the chain saying he was killed by friendly fire.
If that doesn’t indict the man’s honor and basic honesty, I don’t know what does.
Makewi
@gwangung:
Actually, my problem is in thinking that you can look at any subject with even a hint of objectivity.
Omnes Omnibus
If I have the command structure right, McCrystal reports to Petraeus who reports to the Army Chief of Staff who reports to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs who reports to the SecDef who reports to the President. Obama can reach down and talk to anyone, but things go up through the chain. Unless the Army has changed since I left in ’92.
Moreover, listening to the generals does not mean obeying the generals. It should not be that hard to understand.
Ignorant fucksticks.
Warren Terra
Hm. Not sure how to respond to that. Then again, as a Jew I was raised not to consider myself White, even though Jews are treated as White nowadays (well, outside of some parts of the South) – perhaps because in my parents’ youth, pre-Vatican II, Jews were still not really treated as White, with restricted housing, employment, and school admission still being commonplace.
Omnes Omnibus
@Makewi: You mean the retired generals, right? Different animal.
Skippy
The only Republican woman in the House I can think of is Michele Bachmann. So I’m guessing being batshit crazy is a requirement the GOP have for their female representatives, which makes sense seeing a woman would have to be insane to be a member of a party which hates her and wants total control over her body and mind.
Omnes Omnibus
@Skippy: Jean Schmidt, also.
On edit: There is the crazy death panel lady from SC, I forget her name, as well. But, like you said, crazy.
gwangung
@Makewi: Nah. Your problem is that some of us know a tad more about the military and how the command structure is set up than what your arguments are implying. All the BS in the world can’t cover that up.
DougJ
You all were fine and dandy with military commanders giving Bush advice you agreed with, but now that the shoe is on the other foot is suddenly inexcusable.
It’s their fucking job to give him advice, you idiot. The same it’s their job to give Obama advice. (Some may quibble it be done thru Sec Def or whatever, but you know what I mean.)
Come on, better spoofing.
gwangung
With the usual snark on snark repartee.
DougJ
Oh, do you mean the retired generals, Makewi?
Skippy
@Omnes Omnibus: Ah yes. And yep, Schmidt fits the crazy bill as she’s a seekrit Birfer, IIRC.
Actually, I’m being unfair to the GOP. Insanity is a requirement for ALL members, not just women. Now that’s equal opportunity you can believe in.
curious
i gasped reading the phrase “put her in her place.” how disgusting. why is this childish, petty, bullying language even remotely acceptable from public officials?
i listened to bit of cspan’s washington journal this morning and was pleasantly surprised to hear near unanimity among the callers on the importance of the chain of command. perhaps this attack won’t go over as well as the nrcc hopes, at least among people who actually have any familiarity with the military. or non-junta forms of government.
Omnes Omnibus
@Skippy: … and good news for John McCain.
jayackroyd
I actually am with dday here <a href=”http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2009/10/like-poison-to-discourse-by-dday-robert.html” digby
I think the problem is not with military officials expressing their opinions, and, frankly, broadening public discussion, but with the media adopting an authoritarian line that whatever the military says we must do.
This is especially bad because the military tends to see military solutions as the best ones. Think Curtis LeMay during the Cuban missile crisis. Batshit crazy proposals from the military should be aired publicly, as should more measured ones, as should Noam Chomsky’s positions.
Skippy
@curious:
Because we have the worst free media in the world who don’t call them out on this shit, and 9 times out of 10 the Dems don’t have the backbone to call these pigs the racists/misogynists/liars that they are, so it gets overlooked by America At Large.
Makewi
@DougJ:
First, it isn’t their job to give him advice in the press. Second, Pelosi deserves to be called out for her two faced approach on Afghanistan. It’s funny to watch you all twist this into something sexist though. When the only tool you have is a hammer….
aimai
Makewi isn’t a woman, is she? Because I don’t object to the twisted politics and the incoherent posts so much as I do to the sheer stupidty of all its positions and I really don’t want to believe that she’s batting on my team. I mean, come on! Please let Makewi be a man. She’s making all of us look bad.
aimai
Skippy
@Makewi:
I suppose we were twisting Lynn Westmoreland’s words into racism, too.
There are certain phrases which have such obvious sexist/racist connotations that there’s simply no other way to interpret them. This crap about ‘putting Pelosi (a woman) in her place’ is a prime example of this.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
@Makewi:
Please provide a source for when “Pelosi (was) saying that the administration should be listening to the generals” during the Bush administration.
Which active duty generals criticized Bush’s war effort outside the proper channels? Please provide a source.
Ash Can
That’s OK, the GOP will always have Phyllis Schlafly as its token female. I understand she hates women.
Napoleon
@Skippy:
Virginia Fox is another of their female crazies.
LD50
@Makewi: I’m sure Gwangung is just crushed not to have your approval.
DougJ
First, it isn’t their job to give him advice in the press.
I don’t recall any active duty generals giving Bush advice in the press.
Tonal Crow
OT: (Via The Great Orange Satan):
Among other things, they say:
Gwangung
@LD50: Whimper, whimper.
ericblair
@Makewi: Perhaps you can show me the Democrats calling for the generals criticizing Bush’s war effort in the press to go through proper channels?
Mind pointing out where an active-duty general officer did this? And if you mean Shinseki, he gave his troop estimate in a session of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
This is bad because it completely screws up any objective analysis of the situation by the operational chain of command, because now everything is politicized into either a public smackdown of McChrystal or Obama. Plus, the Afganistan order of battle is complicated since NATO is technically the lead, and if McChrystal is mouthing off without the rest of ISAF leadership, CENTCOM, and Joint Staff leadership on board he’s way out of bounds.
Tonal Crow
McChrystal is out of line here. He’s active duty, and knows damned well to communicate up the chain of command, which is there to ensure that civilians control the military, and not the converse. Obama should slap the guy silly, if not can his ass. And no, there’s no parallel to the many *retired* generals who criticized Dubya’s Excellent Misadventures, nor to Shinseki, who was called before Congress to testify.
sidereal
Actually, I mocked up the entire scenario in a sandbox at 1:30 scale and it proved beyond a doubt that it was impossible for McCrystal to go up the chain of command there and that Pelosi should go back into the kitchen and make him some pie.
Ash
I read the profile of McChrystal in Time (or it may have been Newsweek) and I watched him on 60 minutes, and since I have no clue how the military actually operates, my only contribution to this discussion is that he seems kind of strange.
burnspbesq
@Makewi:
If you can show me an active- duty officer slagging NCA in the media, I will supply the matches, the kindling, and the stake. IIRC, the generals who went public with criticism of Bush were all retired. Small but meaningful difference.
Tsulagi
@calipygian: Exactly.
Not sure why McChrystal was in London. His job is in AF-PAK. If he is not there, it should be because he is conferring with senior military/political leadership elsewhere at their request. His job is not holding press conferences or 60 Minutes interviews discussing his preferences in impending policy decisions unless directed to do so by the SecDef or President. I’m guessing that’s not the situation this time as Gates when asked about McChrystal’s London musings said the general should speak and give his opinions candidly to the President, but privately.
calipygian
And not only was Shinseki shit canned because of his testimony soon after, that classless piece of shit Rumsfeld didn’t even have the common decency to attend the guy’s retirement ceremony.
Are all Bushies classless pieces of shit?
Mike in NC
Affirmative!
slag
The funny thing about @Makewi‘s infinite supply of moran-ness here is that John Cole didn’t say anything about sexism. He just said Pelosi’s right. It was Politico (that liberal rag) that brought up the totally unsubtle sexism in the comment. If you’ve never heard about “a woman’s place”, then you live under a rock. There’s no code there. Sexism straight out. And the only tool one needs in order to realize it is a brain. But apparently, some of us in this world have neither hammers nor brains.
kay
I suspect Republicans are just frustrated because they can’t attack Gates, and Gates said it first, and they already took a side, so that’s a real conundrum for them.
“Gates or the General? Hmmmm. Who to laud and who to denigrate? I know, we’ll go after Pelosi!”
You have to think “playground” to get the basic feel.
Turgid jacobian
Actually think Shinseki wanted him to? When gates canned the last 4 star in Af he discretely asked if he would be welcome at the retirement party, I hear. Imagine there was a “duck no!” in reply
ksmiami
“Generals and majors always seem so unhappy unless they’ve got a war”
Generals always want more men; more arms. We need to declare victory in Afghanistan and get out before it wrecks us.
XTC forever man
Litlebritdifrnt
This entire thing reminds me of a caller to Limbaugh’s show the other day. She was homeschooling her 11 children (yes you read that right ELEVEN!) She was commenting on women today not being “happy” she said it is obvious that the reason they are not happy is because they have “strayed from their god given role” (presumably pushing out 11 sprogs and then homeschooling them while making sure your husband’s dinner is on the table and his slippers are warmed when he gets home). I thought for a while that she was a spoof, but the more she spoke the more I realized she was the real deal. I wonder if she wore a “housedress” an apron and pearls?
JMC in the ATL
@Makewi:
Naw, BJ has a whole swiss army knife full of tools. You, BoB, etc.
Ash Can
@Litlebritdifrnt: I have to wonder…
1) How many women listened to that and thought, “This broad’s on crack;”
2) How many men listened to that, said to their wives/girlfriends, “Why can’t you be more like that?” and ended up with “Farberware” engraved backwards across their faces.
mike
c’mon here folks. obama and the dems have been pnk’d by mcchrystal and the neocons. mcchrystal assembled a group of neocons and other pro-war “foreign policy experts” to assess the situation in Afghanistan…..and surprise! – the conclusion is that we need to send in more troops and kill more people. After this stacking of the deck, someone on the inside leaked the “report”, which was no more than a compilation of neo-con talking points. there is no hope of anything resembling a “victory” in Afghanistan anymore than there is in Iraq. I guess if we stay there long enough and do as much damage as we’ve done in Iraq and pretty much depleted our national wealth, then we can claim to have achieved some sort of hollow victory. I’d rather just get out now.
Comrade Doctor General Michael Brown
Thank you, Callipygian:
The man is a snotrag. He has no business in decent company, let alone honorable company.
SiubhanDuinne
Michele Bachman . . . Jean Schmidt . . . Virginia Foxx . . . and the gentlelady from Tennessee, Marsha Blackburn!
Mickey
Marsha Blackburn Voted FOR:
Omnibus Appropriations, Special Education, Global AIDS Initiative, Job Training, Unemployment Benefits, Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations, Agriculture Appropriations, U.S.-Singapore Trade, U.S.-Chile Trade, Supplemental Spending for Iraq & Afghanistan, Prescription Drug Benefit, Child Nutrition Programs, Surface Transportation, Job Training and Worker Services, Agriculture Appropriations, Foreign Aid, Vocational/Technical Training, Supplemental Appropriations, UN “Reforms.” Patriot Act Reauthorization, CAFTA, Katrina Hurricane-relief Appropriations, Head Start Funding, Line-item Rescission, Oman Trade Agreement, Military Tribunals, Electronic Surveillance, Head Start Funding, COPS Funding, Funding the REAL ID Act (National ID), Foreign Intelligence Surveillance, Thought Crimes “Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act, Peru Free Trade Agreement, Economic Stimulus, Farm Bill (Veto Override), Warrantless Searches, Employee Verification Program, Body Imaging Screening.
Marsha Blackburn Voted AGAINST:
Ban on UN Contributions, eliminate Millennium Challenge Account, WTO Withdrawal, UN Dues Decrease, Defunding the NAIS, Iran Military Operations defunding Iraq Troop Withdrawal, congress authorization of Iran Military Operations.
Marsha Blackburn is my Congressman.
See her unconstitutional votes at :
http://tinyurl.com/qhayna
Mickey
bartkid
> “80 percent male,” “100 percent white”—and completely out of touch.
And, 98% chickenhawk.
Again, I fully support any war in which Bill Kristol joins the army and serves on the front lines.
bago
Make wi. I guess that’s one way to take the piss out.
joe from Lowell
Debbie Wasserman-Schultz is going to be the first woman president, and the first Jewish president.
That woman could make Dick Cheney wet himself.
kormgar
“he had no choice but to answer the way he did to that question”
I believe the traditional response is either “no comment” or “I can neither confirm nor deny that”
He made his choice.