On a sane planet, someone who was so massively, tragically, irredeemably, irretrievably and self-evidently W-R-O-N-G about the clusterfuck that is Iraq would self-censor further utterances on the topic. By cramming a pair of sweaty gym socks down his own gullet, if necessary. Alas, we do not live on that planet; William Kristol and Fred Kagan on Iraq:
It’s widely agreed that the collapse of Iraq would be a disaster for American interests and security in the Middle East and around the world. It also seems to be widely assumed either that there’s nothing we can now do to avert that disaster, or that our best bet is supporting Iran against al Qaeda. Both assumptions are wrong. It would be irresponsible to embrace a premature fatalism with respect to Iraq. And it would be damaging and counterproductive to accept a transformation of our alliances and relationships in the Middle East to the benefit of the regime in Tehran. There is a third alternative.
That alternative is to act boldly and decisively to help stop the advance of the forces of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS)—without empowering Iran. This would mean pursuing a strategy in Iraq (and in Syria) that works to empower moderate Sunni and Shi’a without taking sectarian sides. This would mean aiming at the expulsion of foreign fighters, both al Qaeda terrorists and Iranian and Lebanese Hezbollah regular and special forces, from Iraq.
This would require a willingness to send American forces back to Iraq. It would mean not merely conducting U.S. air strikes, but also accompanying those strikes with special operators, and perhaps regular U.S. military units, on the ground.
[snip]Now is not the time to re-litigate either the decision to invade Iraq in 2003 or the decision to withdraw from it in 2011. The crisis is urgent, and it would be useful to focus on a path ahead rather than indulge in recriminations. All paths are now fraught with difficulties, including the path we recommend. But the alternatives of permitting a victory for al Qaeda and/or strengthening Iran would be disastrous.
Jesus God, they must require a wheelbarrow apiece to haul their massive balls around. They should be clapped in irons, marinated in livestock offal and dropped into the nearest crocodile tank.
CONGRATULATIONS!
Oh, I disagree. Profoundly.
kindness
I think the proper response to these MSM Einsteins is any time any one of us sees one on the street, walk up and give them a swift kick in the nuts. That would work for me.
piratedan
the statute of limitations for war crimes, how do those work? Can’t somebody arrest these fuckers for yelling FIRE in a crowded movie theatre or something?
jayboat
Hate them. All of them. Forever and ever. Amen.
BGinCHI
This is what you get from a class of people who don’t know very much, have never worked a hard job a day in their lives, and have nothing but time and privilege.
These are the same people who act like assholes in restaurants because they cannot imagine that someone has to MAKE the stuff that comes out on a plate.
Just like war, it is not magic. It has to be labored over. What these two disgusting human being want are results without consequences or the hard work, risk, and death that other people will expend.
BG rating: 100% worse than Hitler.
John O
Bloodthirsty maniacs, the both of them, unless they actually have to fight the fucking wars they seem to get off on. It’s totes (did I say that right, kids?) surreal that these fucks still warrant a legitimate and good blog post.
Balls, maybe, even big ones, but balls at least one observer would like to kick hard.
dmsilev
“No, please! This is supposed to be a happy occasion! Let’s not bicker and argue about who killed who.”
Corner Stone
HAHAHAHAHAHA!
Now is not the time. Tomorrow probably will not be the time. And the day after that? Certainly not the time.
Protip: We would not be in a position to litigate the decision to withdraw from Iraq – if you fucking goatholes hadn’t stuck our collective dick into the punchbowl there.
Corner Stone
And as usual, the suggestions are smarmy bullshit, with no possibility of being measurable or implementable.
Empower moderates on both sides of a sectarian struggle to the death? Check.
Expel foreign fighters? How the heck do you think you’re going to accomplish that?
Oh.
Gravenstone
I say we air drop them over some random Iraqi city. Parachute optional. Might be instructive to see who elects the high speed dirt nap over being treated by the natives as they so richly deserve.
BGinCHI
Neo-con version of the White Queen’s logic:
War tomorrow, war yesterday, but never a convincing argument today.
ulee
Even Pat Robertson recognizes that Bush Inc. are a bunch of incompetant liars. Can David Gregory catch up?
dmsilev
@Corner Stone: Yesterday, it was “too soon; let’s wait until emotions cool down”. Tomorrow, it will be “let’s not reopen that old and settled debate”. I believe there’s a window approximately 3 milliseconds wide in which it is in fact appropriate to discuss the issue.
(applies to Iraq, gun control, climate change, taxes, etc. etc. etc.)
SRW1
There never has been and there nerver will be a time to litigate any neo-conservative fuck up.
Jewish Steel
I do love this. I know I can safely ignore whatever follows.
Patrick
Yes, it is.
First of all, anybody who was wrong about the war in 2003 should shut the hell up.
Second of all, if our leaders and their followers hadn’t been so arrogantly stupid back in 2003, Iraq wouldn’t be in this mess. It is not our country. Let them fight it out. It is their part of the world.
Or is this about the oil again, just like it was in 2003???
Corner Stone
Since these boy geniuses don’t seem to get how this works, I’m happy to help them out.
Guys, when you kill ISIS members you are killing fairly competent fighters who happen to be Sunni. Less effective Sunni forces = opportunities for Shia victories in the sectarian warfare being waged there. Shia victories = empowering the Shia nation state bordering Iraq. Which just so happens to be called Iran.
Mustang Bobby
That’s the same line we hear from the NRA after a mass shooting in a school, which means it is now the time to remind these bloodsucking ghouls of the 4,000+ American lives that were sacrificed on the altar of their miserable little war boners. F*uck you with a garden rake.
rk
It’s never the right time to think about anything, just as there’s never a right time to talk about gun control. However, it’s always the time for failed pundits to give their opinions. For that we have all the time in the world.
Suffern ACE
Yeah. That ISIS is pretty much the remants of the “moderate” militias we formed to fight AQ during the surge. They may be the moderates.
What we need are more radically moderate moderates.
Villago Delenda Est
Another person whose advice the President should ignore….BoBo, who, as usual, is as wrong as these two neocon war criminals.
Villago Delenda Est
I agree.
Fuck this litigation shit. Summary executions of all the war criminal filth that got us into this mess in the first place.
Very much to include Kristol and Kagan. Both need to swing like Keitel, Jodl, and Tojo.
johnny aquitard
Jesus. These two? “What to do in Iraq“?
The real issue isn’t that these morons have no shame. It’s that someone is even more foolish and shameless to give them a venue to catapult the propaganda from. Again.
Then again it’s the Weekly Standard. It’s morans all the way down.
WereBear
Since wrong is both their essence and their default, I guess they don’t see anything wrong with their rules for discussing it. Anything else would just get confusing!
gnomedad
Fool me … you can’t get fooled again.
Villago Delenda Est
@Patrick:
Ultimately, that’s what it’s about. Without the oil under the ground being fought over, we could not care any more about this conflict than we care about what’s happening in Sudan or the Congo. Add in the fact it’s near the Zionist state, and these guys get deeply concerned that some other people’s kids need to get into uniform and go spill their guts on the sands.
Corner Stone
@Villago Delenda Est:
That’s a little harsh, don’t you think? I mean, besides showing his wang off in that one movie, what the heck has Harvey Keitel done to deserve swinging?
Villago Delenda Est
@Corner Stone: Wrong Keitel; This one.
Although The Bad Lieutenant did push the envelope, admittedly.
Kropadope
I, for one, welcome an independent Kurdistan and whatever they call the two or three other regions Iraq splits into.
LAC
@dmsilev: lol! “All this will be yours someday, son”. “What, the curtains?”
Quaker in a Basement
Mr. Kristol, I believe you are expected at Mr. Boggioni’s for dinner.
Long Tooth
“..they must require a wheelbarrow apiece to haul their massive balls around”.
“Balls”?
My definition of ‘balls’ encompasses courage incarnate. Guys like Kristol don’t have a clue.
rikyrah
@jayboat:
I feel ya.
Rosalita
yeah, and you fuckers can personally lead the ground assault
Cpl Cam
I assure you their balls are shriveled and atrophied little things, otherwise they wouldn’t require other men to lay down their lives in order to make them feel slightly less inadequate…
Mike in NC
Kagan and Kristol need to boldly and decisively go fuck themselves.
Suffern ACE
O.K. this is one of those “Cold Hard Strategic Thinking” thoughts that our foreign policy neocons are supposed to be good at. Why would we think that by not doing anything we are helping Iran. I mean, not doing anything at all. No “funding moderate guerillas.” No tacitly funneling arms to the Sunnis or anyone else. Why would we think that the Iranians would be any more effective at stopping Sunni insurgents in a civil war than we were? Since they share a border they don’t have the expense that we have shipping everything 1/2 way around the world. But why wouldn’t we want Iran to go for the same glory we have? Wouldn’t that mire them in for a few years until they decided to make nice with their own insurgents?
D58826
and what did the crocodile ever do to deserve such an unwelcomed guest
Roxy
Now is the time to throw a gunny sack over the both of their heads, throw them on a plane, make them guess where they are going, toss their butts in the middle of Iraq and let them preach how right Bush was.
If this was put on pay for view I would pay to watch.
Gawd I really hate these two.
Corner Stone
@Suffern ACE:
In my opinion, Iran would have a much better chance at rolling up the ISIS/Sunni insurgency in Iraq. They aren’t Assad in Syria, fighting against an actual civil uprising.
OzarkHillbilly
@CONGRATULATIONS!: Oh no nono no. I think he is absolutely right. Now is the time to line the mutha fwckas who started this whole cluster fwck up against the wall and exercise some righteous 2nd Amendment rights on their a$$es.
Suffern ACE
@Corner Stone: I guess. There is an advantage that Iran would have over our intervention where we would be spending our time looking for moderates and pretending that we hadn’t taken a side in the overall Shia/Sunni conflict. However, Iran would encounter the same resistance to reasserting order in the Sunni provinces that our troops did.
Corner Stone
@Suffern ACE:
What Sunni provinces?
OzarkHillbilly
@dmsilev: I built the castle and it fell over.
Citizen_X
“What to Do In Iraq.” How about we drop you two off there, and you give us an on-the-ground report? Kthxfkoff.
GregB
We do have a bunch of armed fanatics traipsing around America doing nothing but scaring women and small children at your nearest Chuck-E-Cheese and Chipotle.
Perhaps it is time they answer the clarion call to arms and head on into the thick of things in Iraq?
Send over the Open Carry Militas stat.
balconesfault
Stuck driving around Texas today, and sometimes Rush is for at least a few moments the most amusing thing on the dial.
Although the real amusement came when a caller tried to get Rush to admit that the decision to invade Iraq was without a doubt a massive mistake for America.
Rush hemmed, and hawed, and finally said there are some things that America may have done wrong like electing Obama, but you can’t take it back, so there’s no point revisiting it and worrying about whether it was right or wrong.
As if Rush hasn’t spent about 5,000 hours over the last 5+ years rehashing all the reasons he believes America shouldn’t have elected Obama?
It seems like even the dittoheads might be getting restless if he keeps trying to defend the s***pile that’s Iraq.
gbear
@Gravenstone:
You airdrop neo-cons with the parachutes you have, not the parachutes you wish you had.
Trollhattan
@D58826:
Hence, to Florida! for the Kristol-Kagan-croc-gator-python battle royale (avec fromage).
JustRuss
We’ve never tried that before, what could possibly go wrong? Hey, let’s call the special operators “advisors”.
J R in WV
As others have said, I think this is a fine time, possibly the most appropriate time so far, to litigate the events of 2002-2004 – the beginning of the war crimes!
Should those who participated in promulgating falsehoods to the citizens of the country be judged as guilty as those who invented the falsehoods? If one could show that they knew, or suspected, or should have known that there was no plan to occupy and rule Iraq, that they knew, or should have known there were no relationships between 9-11 and Iraq, then yes! They would be as guilty as their commanders, Darth Cheney and Shrub W Bush.
I agree that the troops we send to Iraq to deal with ISIS and other troubling events should be comprised of those who fomented the first stage of Iraq II war. They should be deployed from B-52s, and parachutes should be optional, their choice. They could even have side arms or AK-47s, although I think they should have to purchase these on their own funds, as well as their ammo.
D58826
In this time of declining budgets and tax cuts, I think we can dispense with the parachutes. They are such an expensive luxury.
Davis X. Machina
Why isn’t anybody talking about the US re-invasion of Iraq?
Suffern ACE
@JustRuss: @Corner Stone: Anbar. The Iraqi security forces had been driven out of Anbar since January.
Corner Stone
@D58826:
Agreed. Those silk chutes can better be repurposed for tableclothes or even throw away napkins for Sally Quinn cocktail weenie parties.
Corner Stone
@Suffern ACE: No, I didn’t mean “which” Sunni provinces. I meant “what” Sunni Provinces.
Kay
This passage is comical:
Steeplejack
If this is not what we have been trying to do for the last 11 years, then WTF have we been doing?! (Rhetorical question.)
Ruckus
@dmsilev:
Who killed Whom……
danielx
@Patrick:
That would be a large fuckin’ yes. After all (channeling bloodsucking monster Dick Cheney), we didn’t spend all that money taking control of our share of 20% of the world’s light sweet crude supply that those people just happen to live on top of just to have them take it back.
@Villago Delenda Est:
Hey, that’s the whole point of being a Villager neocon warmonger (yes, there’s some redundancy there). You never have to say sorry and never, ever have to admit you were mistaken in your views. Gotta have boots on the ground, as long as they’re not yours or your children’s.
But seriously, folks, sending 150 Marines to the US embassy to help protect and evacuate staffers in the face of a threat from a fast moving insurgent offensive? I think I’ve seen this movie before….now where and when was it again? Oh yeah!
Now I remember.
The moral dilemma, not that Bloody Bill Kristol would recognize or acknowledge a moral dilemma if one bit his balls off, is that these ISIS guys appear to be bloodthirsty bastards to a degree that makes the North Vietnamese of 1975 look like paragons of correct military behavior.
SatanicPanic
@Villago Delenda Est: Well you cut right through that Gordian Knot. I say you win the thread
Ruckus
Parachuting them into Iraq?
First you’d have to put them in orange jumpsuits, next, what did Iraq ever do to us to deserve dropping those two on them? I realize the Iraqis may enjoy debriefing them with zeal but still, haven’t we inflicted enough horror on Iraq over the last decade+?
jl
Thanks. Hilarious piece. Good for some grim laughs.
They say that US troops coming in and, what?, helping out Malki would go really swell with Iraqi Sunni Arabs, and everyone else allied with the uprising.
Or, do they propose to just go in and tell Maliki to thank us and then STF up, while the wise Americans set things right as they see fit.
They must be on drugs.
Edit: and they promise that we will ‘create bargaining chips’ (FREE MONEY!?) that we can use to influence the Iranians.
‘Credibility’ does not appear in their article. Is that odd, or not?
SiubhanDuinne
@GregB:
No lie. Someone on FB put up a photo of a bunch of angry-looking rifle-toting men, and put the question : “ISIS, or a Target parking lot in Texas?”
I honestly didn’t know which.
jl
7 Myths about the Radical Sunni Advance in Iraq
By Juan Cole | Jun. 16, 2014
http://www.juancole.com/2014/06/myths-radical-advance.html
And, commenter raven will gripe, but if you do look around, some informative posts at Pat Lang’s sic semper tyrannis blog on the situation, particularly details of what indigenous Iraqi elements have been cooperating with ISIS.
srv
You people need to let go of all the baggage you’re carrying from the oughts. You’re letting your rage get in the way of objectively looking at the issue.
These guys aren’t going to stop. They’ve been at it for 3 years in Syria and they’re ready to wreak havoc in Iraq. Next up, Saudi Arabia. They’re not the clown-car AQ, they’re the real thing.
You can pay the Kagan’s now, or you can pay them later, as we will be putting boots on the ground in KSA. And it will be a lot more boots and a lot more messy if we have to go there.
muddy
@balconesfault: Teenagers like that one too. “It’s in the past, why do you have to bring that into it?”
“Well sweetheart, it was only day before yesterday and it was the same line of bullshit. You’re grounded.”
jl
@SiubhanDuinne:
“ISIS, or a Target parking lot in Texas?”
Aw, come on. Bad Guys. Good Guys. Nothing could be simpler.
None so blind as those who will not see.
/snark tag if needed.
sm*t cl*de
Iraq needs more foreign fighters to replace the foreign fighters they already have. Oh well, this time there is no talk of recruiting other nations to join in the occupation and maintain a pretense of international legitimacy, so go for it.
FlipYrWhig
So, after a bunch of handwaving, the big plan is to re-fight the war and to win better this time. Pure genius.
Pogonip
Fred Reed has suggested that the children and mistresses of guys like Kristol be strapped to the fronts of the first trucks of the next invasion. I’m with Fred.
muddy
Tweety came on and said “Cheeney and his vessel, George W Bush”, ha! His vessel. Tweety is so annoying but sometimes he is just perfect.
WereBear
@muddy: Things are only in the past when they are settled.
See Faulkner!
SRW1
@Kay:
Actually, that passage is probably as close as these two idiots are ever going to come to admit that ‘standing up’ an Iraqi army after the old one had been dispensed of failed spectacularly. It also indicates that it is slowly dawning on them that the US invasion of Iraq was only ever going to have one strategic winner, namely Iran.
Suffern ACE
@FlipYrWhig: fight it longer. With real leaders who won’t bother with that “opinion poll” nonsense.
Corner Stone
@srv:
Thanks, dog. That was the best laugh I’ve had in a bit.
Kay
@FlipYrWhig:
Kagan and Kristol won the war but Obama failed to win the peace. Now they have to win the war again.
It’s easy. Regain, Stabilize, Demand, Limit, Create and Insist.
FlipYrWhig
@Suffern ACE: Bullwinkle, that trick never works.
Corner Stone
Has anyone spotted Paul Bremer recently? Because that guy is who I want leading the Electric Boogaloo from here on in.
Suffern ACE
@sm*t cl*de: I would ask France, but they are busy ignoring the mess they asked us to make for them in Libya.
PhilbertDesanex
Fuck. Fucking fuck these dumb fuck fucking fuckheads.
SiubhanDuinne
@muddy:
I hate, though, that he is the only person on the fucking PLANET who says “Cheeney,” and at least half the time points out that “that’s the right pronunciation, that’s the way they say it.” Makes me crazy.
FlipYrWhig
@Kay: I remember Clear, Hold, and Build. I had to look up the order, though.
Kay
@SRW1:
It reminds me of children: “and then, and then, and then, and after that…”
That’s when the adult is supposed to say “UNLESS…” :)
Pogonip
The reason I prefer Fred’s idea to Betty’s is that Fred’s idea doesn’t involve polluting the water in a pool full of innocent crocodiles. I know Betty loves animals–and, since she’s in Florida, she probably has crocodile neighbors–so I feel sure she just didn’t have time to think her idea through, and was not actually recommending cruelty to crocodiles. Betty’s not that kind of person.
waspuppet
@CONGRATULATIONS!: Yeah, nice try, fuckos.
Oh shut up shut up shut THE FUCK up.
Corner Stone
@SiubhanDuinne: He acts like some kid on the playground who thinks mispronouncing your name is a devastating victory in the unending levels of elementary school one-upmanship.
Suffern ACE
@waspuppet: decisively look about Iraq for groups of people for whom the answer to the biggest national issue of the day is “why can’t we all get along like the US wants us to?” And trains them to fight to the death for that.
D58826
@srv: .So your saying we have to fight them Iraq or we will have to fight them in Hawaii. Where did I hear that one before?
Wither they are the real deal or not, it seems that the hard core ISIS number about 10k. They have been successful because they have allies of convince in the local Sunni tribes. We are not talking Rommel and the Afrika Corp here. In fact much of their financing is coming from some of our ‘allies’ in the region as the Saudi’s play off against Iran.
The most immediate danger is that western jihadists, with clean passports, will return home and try and conduct Boston Marathon/London subway type attacks.
As far as the baggage from the oughts’ – these guys keep popping up on TV to tell us how to fix the mess that they created without their taking any responsibility for the bad decisions. As far as they are concerned history started on Jan 20, 2009 when the Kenyan usurper moved into the White House
pluege
if you didn’t know that it was their monstrous egos behind it you’d swear they were mocking us to see how stupid Americans really can be to even have them on their spew shows, let alone that some would be so hopeless as to listen to them AGAIN!.
jl
@Corner Stone:
” Has anyone spotted Paul Bremer recently? Because that guy is who I want leading the Electric Boogaloo from here on in. ”
Could try school vouchers, price deregulation, time-varying taxi fees, and tax cuts again. Get them right this time and everything will calm down.
Villago Delenda Est
@muddy: Do you think Tweety might have meant “vassal”?
Corner Stone
@D58826:
That’s an interesting point. Our national intelligence agencies have been scooping up everything. For years and years. But somehow, they didn’t stop the Boston incident, didn’t see Ukraine and didn’t see ISIS.
gogol's wife
@PhilbertDesanex:
Well said.
D58826
@Villago Delenda Est: Probably but I like vessel better – as in sinking ship
Kay
@pluege:
Nah. They have their finger on the pulse of the nation:
Corner Stone
@jl:
Alternatively, they could disband the Iraqi Army again.
That worked so well for all parties last time.
Corner Stone
@Kay: Neocon, Neoliberal. Who’s to say anymore?
D58826
From CNN. I understand the troops to protect the embassy. No need to create Benghazi II but special forces begins to sound like quagmire II
Corner Stone
@D58826: That fucking place couldn’t be adequately defended by 5000 troops. Not in-country and against guys who really don’t like us and have an inline supply chain.
Just stupid. Get them out and tape the keys to the front door.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: I think he’s more of a neoprene. Two wetsuits, one dildo, some assembly required.
srv
@D58826:
I’m trying to be magnanimous and y’all keep helping – how’s a few domestic/embassy ISIL/ISIS bombings going to look for Obama?
They’ve been successful because they’re well equipped and run and we’ve pretty much given them an unmolested run of Syria and now Iraq. They have lots of financial and physical allies back home too. Can’t wait for that welcome home party.
jl
@Corner Stone:
” Alternatively, they could disband the Iraqi Army again. ”
Disgruntled ex-Iraqi Army officers are one of the groups posters at Pat Lang’s blog say are cooperating with ISIS, from reports from contacts, and fact that in Iraq ISIS has shown an ability to maneuver effectively over large distances that they say has not been seen before.
Also: Only person I have found who predicted any trouble that resembles what we see now is Juan Cole. So I check him at Informed Consent every day now for news and analysis. (JUAN) Cole gave a heads up about trouble between Maliki government and Sunnis in middle of May.
srv
@jl:
Didn’t anyone notice Ramadi and Fallujah falling 6 months ago?
D58826
@srv: One more time – Since we don’t own Iraq and we don’t own Syria we really can’t give them the run of the place.
SRW1
@Corner Stone:
Nope, but Doug Feith appears to be available.
jl
@srv: You sound like McCain. Send some troops, they will do something to control something and all the bad things you mention will not happen. What exactly to you propose that US troops do, under whose authority and with whose permission (since Iraq is a sovereign country) and how will that help? I’ll check back later.
Suffern ACE
@srv: ok. How is intervening against them going to prevent those bombings from happening? Wouldn’t that make them more likely?
D58826
The Orangeman is demanding a comprehensive strategy to protect American interest in the middle east. Maybe he should dial up his friends Rummy and Bushie to get the own they prepared. Ah they did prepare one didn’t they???????
jl
@srv: Well go look at the entries over at Pat Lang’s blog and read their argument. If you have some special qualifications or knowledge to say Lang’s posters are wrong, what are they? Tell us.
D58826
On the up-side US 2-1 over Ghana
Corner Stone
@jl:
Well, since they are all starving and disempowered Sunni’s, that makes quite the bit of sense.
And Pat Lang can go fuck himself.
Corner Stone
I wonder if our geniuses in the intelligence directorates have ever considered putting real human assets on paid staff? You know, something like HUMINT?
Instead of wondering which chicken pot pie I’ve been sticking my dick in while I scream at the green cheese moon, how about we spend a few bucks actually asking real deal humans what the fuck is going on?
the Conster
Don’t want to hijack the thread by trashing Corner Stone’s binkie, but Hillary’s excuses are fucking calculating triangulating centrist bullshit.
Cervantes
Notice the implication that we’ve already had “litigation” of — or accounting for — their disasters.
Corner Stone
@the Conster: President Obama has been the very definition of neoliberal centrist triangulating bullshit foreign policies while he’s been in office.
So this should give you comfort that Hillary is the most likely successor to continue and propound the foreign policy of President Obama.
Get your hate on, sweetie. You’re likeable enough, after all.
srv
@jl:
We should just wait until the regime is collapsing before preparing for any invite.
What should they do? Kill ISIS. We have quite a bit of experience exterminating terrorists over the last decade if you didn’t notice. Or was Obama lying when he declared victory over AQ?
Oh, thanks for volunteering me to fisk “War of Northern Aggression” Lang. Let me jump right on that.
@Suffern ACE: Ask D5, he’s the one saying they’re an “immediate” threat.
schrodinger's cat
What do you have against crocodiles?
Arclite
What James Fallows tweeted:
Villago Delenda Est
@Corner Stone: Neofucktards, the lot of them.
Cervantes
@Corner Stone: Bremer? Believe it or not, he is painting New England landscapes and trying to sell them.
His paintings make the perfect gift — for George W. Bush.
Corner Stone
@Arclite: Actually, King James did at one point beat the Spurs to win the championship.
So…not that close of an analogy. I guess.
Villago Delenda Est
@jl: Cole is persona non-grata inside the Beltway for being right far more often than any of the “Vulcans” (I hate that term…they’re more like Romulans) of von Rumsfailed’s DoD.
the Conster
@Corner Stone:
Well, it would be nice if she spent her time as the inevitable candidate of progressives explaining how and why Obama was RIGHT about Iraq – a “dumb” war – and how and why she was WRONG. But, please proceed CS.
BTW, I’m not your sweetie, but please continue mansplainin’ Hillary’s FAIL to me. I enjoy the smell of CS bullshit in the evening.
Corner Stone
@the Conster: Do you have some kind of an issue with President Obama?
Fucking firebagger.
SiubhanDuinne
@Corner Stone: I know. For about the past fourteen years (maybe more, I can’t remember, or have suppressed, when Tweety first appeared on my awareness horizon).
D58826
@srv: I guess I’m d5. I suspect that I should have phrased that differently. The short term potential threat from ISIS is the lone wolf or small groups of westerners returning to their home country and deciding to conduct terrorist attacks. If that happens the most likely such attack would be more like the Boston Marathon than the multi-prong 9/11. Does that mean that ISIS won’t develop the same level of expertise that AQ had on 9/11, I don’t know. It is certainly possible. It is also possible that ISIS will self destruct because of it’s extremist policies. More ‘moderate’ groups that are making common cause with them in Syria and Iraq will turn on them when they are no longer useful. That is what happened before with the Sunni Sons of Iraq in 2007.
What should the US do? Frankly I have no idea. After reading dozens of articles and blog posts over the past few days, I find quantum physics easier to understand. However I am suspicious of any recommendations from the folks that started this mess in 2003. They were disastrously wrong then and now they are in full CYA mode to shift the blame. Our experience with picking out ‘moderates’ is not particularly good but I agree that we can’t just sit around and watch the grass grow. Hopefully whatever we do, and I suspect it will be just things along the margin, it doesn’t make matters worse. A large commitment of US military power, on the ground or in the air, will probably create more enemies than we can kill. Even Rummy worried about that back in 2004. We are not very popular in that part of the world and even our best intentions seem to go wrong.
jl
I will let sev’s responses to my repeated requests for more detailed argument and evidence stand for other readers to judge.
D58826
And for ‘svs’ sake I would also add that there are plenty of other terrorist groups that present a much greater short term threat to the US than ISIS. AQ in Yemen is the group that tried to bomb a half dozen cargo jets using laser printer cartridges. As to the fear that these groups are operating from a remote base area, remember that most of the planning and training for 9/11 occurred in Hamburg Germany and the US flight schools.
Cervantes
@Villago Delenda Est:
One detail: Jodl was exonerated afterwards, at least officially, whereas Kristol and Kagan and company will never be.
Villago Delenda Est
@D58826: Well, there’s every “Open Carry” group in the US, if you want immediate, close to home threats. Them and all the forced birth assholes.
muddy
@SiubhanDuinne: I saw him explain it one time. He was talking to one of the old people in Cheney’s family. A great uncle or some such. The old guy pronounced it Cheeney, thus Tweety says it’s traditional. Then again, the old guy pronounced the breed of his dog as a bagel (beagle). Obvs it’s supposed to be Cheney, as it’s a French name with the S dropped.
A lot of Tweety’s pronunciations amuse me though, Penteegon, atteetude, etc. My dad was from Philadelphia and had these usages as well.
the Conster
@Corner Stone:
LOL. Nothing to say about your binkie’s comments, then. Duly noted.
Villago Delenda Est
@D58826: Germany disassembled Portugal 4-0. I do not expect the US to survive against them.
Corner Stone
@the Conster: LOL! And other things middle school students say! LOL, dog! LOL.
Villago Delenda Est
@muddy: My favorite Tweetyism is about Mitt Romney…”You can land a 737 on his shoulders”. It just epitomizes everything wrong about Tweety. It only begins to touch on everything that’s wrong about Romney.
D58826
latest from Fareed over at cnn – http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2014/06/16/iraq-badlands-might-be-inevitable/?hpt=hp_bn2<a
short version – all our options are aweful.
not sure if that will work
PhoningItIn
I’ve discovered a use for conservalogic. Count the number of logical fallacies introduced in the first paragraph, identify them, and score by the total number of sentences. I think I get 4/6 in the first paragraph, 3 of which are unique.
Betty Cracker
Testing
Svensker
@Corner Stone:
You’ve been doing that? Wow.
muddy
@Villago Delenda Est: I have an item that I really think Tweety would like to buy from me. I’ve been trying to compose a letter to him that hits him in the feels so he gives me way too much money for it. So far I have the personal hooks but am not sure how to do the ask. My writing style does not lend itself to this readily.
muddy
@Svensker: I thought it went without saying.
Corner Stone
Sounds to me like President Obama’s SecState for four years is positioned to carry on his foreign policy.
It kind of makes me sad how so many people seriously question the judgment and decision making ability of our current president. If only they could see what he saw in HRC.
But, sadly, it seems they just don’t trust him or see him as a competent manager making high level personnel decisions.
Sad, really.
Cpl Cam
Jesus. What must’ve their children’s first viewing of Star Wars been like? “No, son, Lord Vader had to destroy Alderaan in order to show Leia the true extent of his power and, also, that he meant business. Plus Alderaan was overrun by rebels and it was the only way to save it.”
Corner Stone
@Svensker: It *IS* made of green cheese, you know.
Svensker
@Corner Stone:
Oh, sure. But whaddya do with the pies when you’re done?
Tehanu
What have those poor crocodiles ever done to deserve that?
Corner Stone
@Svensker: Put them back in the grocery store cooler.
Chicken pot pie has too many calories to actually consume.
Villago Delenda Est
@Betty Cracker: You did not answer in the form of a question. So much for Double Jeopardy.
LAC
@Corner Stone: oh please. The shit you shovel. The president is a naive tool unless it is about Hillary clinton? Then it’s fake head shaking and sad face over how unfair everyone is about him? Well, I guess if you can stick your dick in a pie, then you can write this with a straight face.
Betty Cracker
@Villago Delenda Est: Commenting while using a new device. Wanted to see if FYWP would reject me as an alien.
Corner Stone
@LAC: What do you mean? If Obama can blithely kill people overseas, and HRC is a warmonger who likes to kill people overseas, then why would any Obama supporter have any issue with an HRC continuation of the Obama Presidency?
Why would you doubt his judgment? You have some kind of skill or information that trumps President Obama’s decisions on personnel of his cabinet?
Jay C
@efgoldman:
He wouldn’t have to: we have Iraq and Afghanistan.
Corner Stone
Man, the low class motherfuckers here who know better than President Obama!
Either he knew who HRC was and chose to ask her to be SecState for four years, or he’s a political neophyte who can’t control his cabinet.
Pick one.
Rich Gardner
Erm, what to believe? Kristol thinks we shouldn’t use the Iranians as our infantry this go-round and he’s always wrong. But Sen. Lindsey Graham believes that we should utilize the Iranians and he’s also always wrong! Yike! How to decide between two guys who are both always wrong?!?!?!
Cervantes
@Rich Gardner:
You don’t have to choose either of their answers.
As usual, they’re both asking the wrong question.
the Conster
@Corner Stone:
You’re a drunk, but that’s OK – we all have our weaknesses. Yours is Hillary. I’m an Obot. I’m an Obot because of the “dumb” war comment he made in 2002. That vote on the AUMF was the most important decision for this country in the last 40 years. It cost 4 trillion dollars with no end in sight, and I spent 15 minutes googling “history of Iraq” and realized that I knew more than all the pundits and neocons, yet she, a brilliant hard working Wellesley College grad, champion of women, went along to go along with the neocons because of naked political ambition. Why? Because she’s a neocon. If you think Obama is following Hillz’ lead, when was the last time you heard the name Haim Saban? Exactly.
Ruckus
@Villago Delenda Est:
It might help if someone actually tried to land a 737 on those shoulders.
Suffern ACE
@Rich Gardner: we should put sanctions on Iraq until the people rise up and destroy the sectarians.
Corner Stone
@the Conster: Can I ask you something? When would you imagine the last time I had a drink was?
the Conster
@the Conster:
TRIGGER WARNING: Politico.
r€nato
The only possible, viable solution to the dilemma of either having Shiite Iran or Shiite worse-than-al-Qaeda radicals running Iraq, would be to install a Sunni to run the country.
Of course, he would have to be a rather authoritarian leader – a strongman – in order to hold together the nation based on artificial borders drawn up a century ago in Europe.
If only Iraq had such a leader, it wouldn’t be in the mess that it’s in now.
r€nato
@Rich Gardner: send Kristol and Graham. Accomplish that, and I really don’t care whether it works or not.
r€nato
@Corner Stone: The man who virtually singlehandedly created the Iraqi insurgency by disbanding the army and forbidding them to take part in the new government, recently had an op-ed published in the WSJ about the current Iraq situation.
He and Kagan and Kristol should have all suffered the same fate as Mussolini – shot in the head, then strung up by the balls, then the enraged populace gets to use their corpses as pinatas.
LAC
@Corner Stone: you can knock off the fake Obama support. Your history is quite the opposite. Trust me, if she did everything completely different from Obama and put troops on the ground you would be here yelling down anyone who said boo about it. .
Corner Stone
@LAC: It’s always a little sad when people so straightforwardly state they don’t trust our president to make competent decisions and hire the right people to carry his policies out.
I’m sorry President Obama has failed your test by nominating HRC to be his SecState for four years. Maybe next term he can finally satisfy your demands for purity.
LAC
@Corner Stone: whatever, faker. enjoy your vat of wine and your sad attempt at wit. I am glad that you finally see what many of us have seen for years about Obama and his astute choices.
r€nato
the Kristol/Kagan piece is astounding not just because the fucking balls on these people, but also the utter political tone-deafness of it with respect to the idea of putting significant American troops on the ground in Iraq.
1) Congressional support among Republicans would be weak and would melt away the moment anything bad happened. There would be a tremendous rupture between Obama and most Democratic members of Congress. It would be a sure way to turn Obama into a lame duck and bring certain electoral defeat to Democrats.
2) the military brass would not be happy at all, nor would be servicemen and their families. Kristol and Kagan are loathe to admit this but they fucking broke our army with multiple tours of duty including for national guardsmen who never thought they would be sent off to a foreign land for even one tour of duty when they signed up.
3) and how do we pay for this?
4) and how do we pay for the care of veterans after this new Iraq war is over? We certainly won’t do it by taxing the Kristols and Kagans! Maybe Obama can borrow like a drunken sailor and then Republicans can blame him all over again for the entirety of the deficit.
5) there would be no UN fig leaf this time. We would be truly going it alone, and we would piss away what little credibility Obama has managed to restore to the US in the wake of the Bush/Cheney regime.
6) Putin would step up his aggression against Ukraine and possibly straight-up invade. Re-occupying Iraq would both divert US resources (which K&K appear to believe are infinite) and hand Putin a convenient justification for doing so.
I could go on and on. This is nothing more than neoconservatives doing what they do worst, recommending war as the solution for everything that troubles the US in foreign affairs, as well as Kristol and Kagan looking to redeem their reputations with the blood of others. They’ll be right one of these days!
Corner Stone
@LAC: That he hires people he can trust to carry out his policies, domestic and foreign?
I, for one, am happy to hear you may have started to trust our president to make competent decisions on his cabinet level staff.
It’s a pity you keep doubting him.
Mandalay
@Villago Delenda Est:
Not a Tweetyism, but from Politico’s Roger Simon, who also wrote of Hilary Clinton:
So much for Politico being neutral.
the Conster
@r€nato:
This. every fucking word.
Since no one will be prosecuted for this incomprehensibly awful clusterfuck, I think we need to have a Truth and Reconciliation committee. I would love to see Democrats raising this now, but why aren’t they? Where are the Barney Franks? The Dems need to find their voice, and this new Iraq rerun is it – it’s their time to stand with Obama against IRAQ II! Why aren’t they pushing back? This is the most important thing they can do now, is to unite against this clusterfuck war! It’s not like it’s risky. WTF. Republicans have investigated Benghazi how many fucking times now?
Maybe Hillary could if she had some balls and weren’t so compromised.
Corner Stone
@the Conster:
Why wouldn’t President Obama decide to investigate and potentially prosecute during either of his two terms? No balls?
LAC
@Corner Stone: are you done yet? You are one of those drunk people who thinks that they are funny and beats a joke to death. Your sarcasm is duly noted but sober up, ok?
Groucho48
One thing that really scares me is if our Iraq Embassy falls. The right would be all over it. It would be worse than Benghazi, Fast and Furious, IRS, the birth certificate and all the other scandals rolled into one. No matter that it was the Bushies who constructed a massive Embassy impossible to defend without a Division or two. Ideally, for the right, a bunch of Americans would be killed and a bunch captured. They’d probably have to rehearse before going on all the Sunday talk shows, to make sure they don’t chortle when discussing that situation.
I’m afraid that something like that happening is about the only way Republicans could get the WH in 2016.
Corner Stone
@the Conster: I mean, you realize how stupid you sound, right? You charge HRC with being a coward for not conducting some kind of investigation, if she somehow manages to win elected office with the 2016 nomination and then the general election, after an eight year President Obama administration who did neither.
President Obama will have been the boss for 8 full years before the next inaugurated president. But somehow HRC, if she manages to get in office, lacks “the balls” to take care of the business of investigating and setting up prosecutions.
But Obama doesn’t lack the balls for not doing any of that for 8 years.
Because. Hmmm…because…
Corner Stone
@LAC: So, Conster wouldn’t answer me. So, I’ll ask you. When would you imagine I had my last drink? Think carefully now. One of us knows the actual answer.
the Conster
@Corner Stone:
I’ll grant you that seeking justice for the Bush war crimes was first on my list of things I wanted. Then I came to my senses and realized that Democrats were complicit in every single war crime and nothing would ever be done judicially ever, even if, and especially if, Elizabeth Warren was president. Get real. Also financial armageddon was happening, so it’s not like he was napping.
I am disappointed that more culprits weren’t prosecuted and I’m not naive about the likely reasons why, but I also remember that Bush had eight years of a policy to burrow his acolytes in to every agency, and Obama hasn’t been able to appoint countless judicial nominees. But Obama.
So if Hillary wanted me to get excited about her, this is what I would do if I was her, to keep Obots like me in the fold – she’d do a sincere reckoning mea culpa now on this new Iraq war. I want her to articulate what she’s learned. This is another defining moment for her, and I don’t see her rising to it. At all.
Mandalay
@the Conster:
Because there are plenty of Democrats who supported Dubya’s invasion of Iraq, including Clinton, Biden, Kerry, Pelosi and Feinstein. There’s no way they will support anything that will shine a light on their massive incompetence.
ETA: Barbara Boxer was notable opponent.
the Conster
@Corner Stone:
General Stuck would know. I’m going to hug my plastic unicorn in his memory now.
Mandalay
@Groucho48:
I think you are right, yet a small part of me still kinda hopes that it will happen. Nothing exemplifies the hubris of the Bush Administration more than the construction of that godawful monster, and it would be for the long term benefit of this country, and the world, if it was destroyed. America desperately needs to rethink its worldview. All that said, it is within the Green Zone and not directly accessible, even if ISIS moved in to Bagdhad, and current (American) reports suggest that ain’t gonna happen.
Besides, I think ISIS is far more interested in starting a war with the Shias than wasting a lot of ammunition and energy on destroying a building, and they surely know it would invite massive US retaliation.
Corner Stone
@the Conster: President Stuck, he dead.
Corner Stone
@the Conster: Ok. So HRC can get you hot by promising to do something the actual elected president for the last 8 years (by that time) would have refused to do.
So…a completely irrational and unachievable goal/standard would make you happy?
Except, of course, it would not. If HRC showed “the balls” to prosecute for Iraq, you would no doubt start screeching how she was damaging the party’s agenda moving forward. And how selfish and blah duh blah dublah she was for doing exactly what you demand she do now.
Even though the actually powerful current president actually, in real life, refused to do what you demand a hypothetical HRC administration do.
Groucho48
@Mandalay:
I don’t think it is very likely but in such a fluid and unpredictable situation as we have in Iraq, who knows what could happen? If things start going south, they could go south very quickly.
LAC
@Corner Stone@Corner Stone: let’s see, 15….20 seconds ago? No, that’s fair to you. 30 minutes ago?
Good night
Corner Stone
@the Conster:
So…IOW…she could fuck goats in a dorm room at USC. I mean, that’s the same kind of nonsense as what you’re saying here.
After 8+ years of Obama being the actual elected president who decided to look forward, not backward, HRC could get you engaged by going after people who wanted to do the Iraq War v 3 thing.
“This new Iraq War”.
The one that would have been re-engaged by the actual elected president, President Obama.
Do you even sniff a clue for how stupid you fucking sound? Just hate on her, that’s cool. Just hate on Hillz. We get it.
Corner Stone
@LAC: You sound drunk. Learn to type.
Chris
@Corner Stone:
Ah. You see, the problem there, from what I’ve been told, is that the security clearance process makes it like pulling teeth to hire anyone but a tenth-generation heartland middle-American who’s never been anywhere further than the next state over.
The last such story I heard was from someone in the security studies field at my last university – apparently, there’s at least one intelligence agency out there that not only refuses to hire foreigners (logical), but refuses to hire anyone who has any immediate relatives with foreign passports. Congratulations: you’ve just ruled out every single first-generation immigrant who might actually remember enough of the Old Country to be useful to you (::cue Gust Avrakotos’ rant about real Americans in Charlie Wilson’s War, and that guy wasn’t exactly a liberal bleeding heart even after running him through the Aaron Sorkin filter::)
Heard similar stories from other people, including veterans. A popular one lately was about Afghan interpreters who were supposed to get American citizenship and stay on with the Pentagon to fill badly needed “regional expert” slots, but ended up not getting hired. Security clearance process and all that.
I can’t say if it’s true since I’m not a member of the intelligence community, but from the anecdotes I hear, the bottom line seems to be that the security clearance process will give hell to anyone who’s so much as ordered a kebab ever in his life, and that the higher-ups prefer to rely on nice, clean, safe NSA intercepts than human intelligence. If that’s true – well, fuck.
Chris
@Suffern ACE:
They are? I thought ISIS basically was the AQI, after a makeover/after being disavowed by AQ central. (Which wasn’t the first such disavowal: back when Zarqawi was in charge, he also got a “dude, you’re playing it way over the top, calm the fuck down” memo from AQ central and basically told them to get stuffed).
brantl
If you marinate them in livestock offal, I expect it to take the crocodiles much longer to come around to being willing to eat them. Something to consider.
brantl
@Villago Delenda Est: I think he meant vessel; I can imagine Cheney in a lounge chair, behind Bush’s eyes, closing the top of Bush’s empty brain pan, doing that Eddy Murphy movie, with all the people in the robot….
Cervantes
@Chris:
That was more true ten years ago than it is now. Things started changing around the time of the 2008 presidential election.