/rant

The ends justify the means, and if the means means letting Saddam torture then so be it.

If it isn’t their families being tortured or if they can’t derive any benefit from it, it doesn’t seem real to them.

Hypocrisy implies an inconsistency between their actions and beliefs, but to me there is no inconsistency between the Absolute Power they want and the means they are willing to get it.

No mention of the enforcement of law; nor of the reality that only humans are enforcing human law on earth. And humans make mistakes.

Abu included criminal abuse, mostly not torture (threats of dogs, not actual dogs killing people. At least one dog bite - each bite was torture.) Gen Karpinski was fired in Jan., 2004; she’s also been demoted.

You are a hypocrite, like most anti-war folk who say they oppose torture. Is torturing 100 people better or worse than torturing 200? or 500? or 1000?

Everybody who’s honestly against torture will say all torture is bad, but less is always better than more.
So how many Iraqis did Saddam kill/ torture in custody in his last 3 years? 500? 1000? 5000?
I really don’t know. I believe it’s in the 1000 - 10 000 range (smaller range than the Lancet’s silly body count).
What do you believe about how many Saddam killed in custody?

Were more Iraqis killed in custody under Saddam, or under the US?

Neo addressed your hypocrisy in earlier posts — you cowardly Anon who wants to “keep his hands clean”.

You prolly voted for Clinton in 1996, after he lied about “no genocide” in Rwanda — but he kept his hands clean. If so, you supported the torturous deaths of some 600 000.

Grackle, the UN exists, but I don’t like it, support it, nor have much faith in it. I think the US should establish a Human Rights Enforcement Group to take military action, in extreme cases, against non-democracies who are excessively violating human rights.

Yes, they thought it through. The political alliance they had was for removing Iraq from Kuwait and even the British were not into toppling Saddam. They also felt that we had weakened him enough that the ensuing civil war would take him out (which, obviously, didn’t happen) or if it didn’t then we had set him back at least ten years. During that time they hoped that sanctions and weapons inspectors would stop him (they didn’t), and,lastly, we still had the option of removing him and time to get allies for that. You seem to be under the impression that nothing other than “Civil war - run run run!” was what they said when it wasn’t even close. This is well documented.

You seem to also forget that Powell, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Pearle, Wolfowitz, and quite a few of the OIF planners were also the main strategic planners for Desert Storm (note strategic, not tactical). They were quite aware of why Bush Sr. did what he did considering they were the ones who helped make the decision.

You can’t praise the people who made the first decision and denegrate the people who made the second as they are the same people.

This is why many people do not give ideas such as that much respect. Your ideas are based on trusting you, that you have fully researched the situation and have given a well thought out idea. When, in fact, you have obviously missed quite a few simple, easily verfiable, and important details. Since your basic thesis is that this type of logic (logic based on incomplete data) is invalid and makes the person making it bad/wrong you shoot yourself - you are doing it just as bad, if not worse, than those you are denigrating. You loose most, if not all, of your credibility doing that to anyone who is not already a believer.

Ignoring Saddam was not an option. People can refuse to acknowledge that reality if the choose, but we were either going to let him do what he wanted, when where and how he wanted or we were going to have to deal with him. That is a fact.

What is happening in Iraq is not a civil war yet, but the truth is if the neo cons are failures..what about those liberals who for years complained about the US not liberating the poor and oppressed and who treated the UN and its edicts like the word of God? Are they now saying that might makes right and only fools really think brown swarthy Muslims can rule themselves?

That sounds like an admission of failure on the part of liberal democracy to me.

To think that at the very moment Churchill said this his government was holding thousands upon thousands of German and Italian detainees in prison camps, none of whom had any prospect of receiving a judgement before his peers. What a hypocrite!

“The Anglo-American tradition going back to the Scottish Enlightenment (and Montesquieu) however holds that you have to let things develop on their own, and interfering just creates an artificial set up.”

Quite aside from the fact that I think this mistates the enlightenment postion, I wonder how the hell things in Iraq were supposed to “develop on their own” when the entire country was crushed under the boot of a heinous dictatorship. Removing that boot was undoubtedly necessary for any sort of natural developments to occur.

The question “what would it take to make you change your mind about neoconservatism” is a very good one, even if it may not have been intended that way. Ultimately the idea underpinning the neo-con agenda is that all people, when given the choice and understanding that choice, will choose to live under something resembling liberal democracy. This hypothesis is very hard to prove or disprove. Is it then an article of faith?

Much I heartily disagree with those who believe that the actions of a dozen crazies in blowing up a mosque prove that Iraqis want to be ruled by a dictator, I think it’s a question that deserves attention. It’s undeniable that at all sorts of points in history large majorities of various populations have opted for the strong man over democracy. I do think that if the US and her allies do in fact make a whole hearted attempt to provide the conditions for Iraqi freedom, over an extended peiod of time, and after all of that the Iraqis elect the next Khomeini, I would have to conclude that the idea is likely worng. But the victory of a minority of fascist thugs or religious fanatics (of whatever party) would prove no such thing.

The best way to get rid of a hornet’s nest is to wait until the hornets are dormant or sleeping. Use poison to kill the hornets, and, when you’re sure there’s no activity in the nest, remove it.

Using a baseball bat is a poor option, but allowing the hornets to take over your house or garden is even worse.

We did nothing about the hornet nest in the first Gulf War. The US let it keep stinging for 13 years in hopes that the Chief Hornet would relent & try to live peacefully. I think 13 years is long enough to “think it through.” My basic tenet is: First, “make sure no harm comes to the US & its allies,” with a corollary of “put American interests first even if the volatile elements of a particular country may opt for civil war.”

From “Jews Without Mercy,” p.viii:

“I am obliged to write it (this book)because I have, except for a few comic moments, always been pleased to be a Jew. The gift deserves to be defended.”
Anti-Semitism?

Even Kamels should know something before Talking.

“It is a common misconception that the phrase primum non nocere, “First, do no harm” is included in the Hippocratic Oath. It is not, but seems to have been derived indirectly from his Epidemics, in which he wrote, “Declare the past, diagnose the present, foretell the future; practice these acts. As to diseases, make a habit of two things—to help, or at least to do no harm.”

It’s particularly pertinent to the discussion of predicting the future.

I saw one of those photos on the cover of the neo-Democrat rag, the New Republic. If that had been a picture of my father or brother, I would have sued the New Republic for every cent they had, every last scrap of their food and for the bedbugs that swarm through their IKEA futons. I hope someone is doing that right now. Those photographs were repulsive, showing a complete lack of respect of the dead.

The fact that you make a crack like this is proves that you are not a nice person trying to see the other side of things.

I don’t entirely agree with the neocon ideals - I believe that we should wage war against the terrorists and the states that sponsor them (Saudi Arabia, Iran, Yemen, the Sudan, Syria) - the goal of this war should be victory - to kill enough of them until they surrender. Then we can talk about a Marshall Plan. I guess I’m just an old-fashioned FDR democrat.

Bush’s neocon policies are kind of a halfway measure, but at least he’s taking a step in the right direction. Bush has failed in some ways, but the appeasement-happy Deaniac Dems and the anti-war activists failed in every way, because they offered no reasonable alternative.

Um, hello, we already were pre-Iraq, and as far as I can tell, the neo-cons are the only ones trying to remedy the situation, drawing on our own experience, by giving those cultures something other than religion to charge them.

If that’s not your thing, whatever, but where does anyone get off sniping at those who are risking their lives to make things better? I just don’t get it.

Like I put forth in another comment, the US cannot stop taking down enemies because their countries might go into civil war. That’s all up to the folks in that country. The US has an obligation afterwards to do its best to leave a stable government but if they are determined to have civil war there is not much the US can do about that. As far as “Iranian orbit” goes: I think we know how to deal with the Iranians if they try running a few Iranian battalions across the border. Likewise the Syrians. As for future heads of Iraq, whatever stripe they may be, they need to know that they are doomed if they try to screw the US like Saddam did.

Read “Jews Without Mercy?” Thanks, but no thanks! If I wanted to read up on Anti-semetism, I’d get a copy of “Mein Kampf”.

The real reason they’re all so angry is, of course, the fact that it’s Marxism that’s died, not conservatism, “Neo-cons”, the United States, etc. Their dream of Utopia is gone. Blame the Neo-con/Jews? Sure, why not? Blaming vulnerable minorities is always the easy way out of a dilemma.

That strawman was easy for assembled “anons” to knock down wasnt it?

Now you can go back and invent another term for those how consider themselves either conservative, or liberals who arent as whacked out as you are.

I have much joy that Saddam was captured in a hole. I fervently desire an Iraq that is, in the President’s words, “a stable democracy that’s our ally”. According to Packer’s “The Assasin’s Gate”, neocons had faith that that a Saddam-free Iraq would become a peaceful, prosperous entity. There was never much post-War analysis done because of their faith in democracy. Sadly, the neocon position was overly optimistic and faith-based. Is Iraq lost? No, there is much to play out. Do we have a handle on it? Hardly. We are at the whim of the vagueries of a religiously-charged culture. Anon 1017 has it about right- “I am afraid we have successfully prepped Iraq to be sucked into the Iranian orbit. Nice move.”

Actually, because the people guilty of crimes concerning Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib have been punished or are in the process of being punished by the American judicial system, I think the war has shown that the US is a country of justice meted out. I also note that no beheadings occurred, which is the justice of choice of the enemy.

Tom has some good points but puts too much faith in the UN for my taste. The US should be in the UN because it is a gathering of nations & the US needs to attend to US interests & goals that such a gathering may consider, so the US can’t afford to totally ignore this discredited & corrupt body. But I would never want my leaders to let the UN run US foreign policy. If the US can get the member nations to go along with what must be done, fine, but a hard & fast 3 resolution rule, given the make-up of the organization, could be used against the US.

America has never been perfect but is way better than those that America is fighting. These bloodthirsty assholes that are trying to murder Americans are constantly defended while Americans are always trashed by the anti-warriors. After awhile one can’t help coming to certain conclusions about anti-warriors in general, namely that they have a deep-seated hatred of America which is subconsciously fueled by a psychologically projected self-hatred. The pathology emerges like snakes slithering from a hole when they think the war is going bad.

I took a look at Iraq the Model & the comments from the anti-warriors are even more vicious(& revealing) than here. Talk about gleeful salivating & rancor!

“The power of the executive to cast a man into prison without formulating any charge known to the law, and particularly denying him the judgment of his peers, is in the highest degree odious, and the foundation of all totalitarian governments, whether Nazi or Communist.”

Winston Churchill, Nov. 21, 1943

On the occasions when the statue of Hussein fell, when the Iraqis braved death and voted for the first time, the second time and the third time, was there ever a moment of joy that something good had happened in Iraq?

For many anti-war people that I’ve been with those were times practically of mourning. As an ex-leftist myself I was surprised and disappointed at this reaction.

You’re doing great, Neo (as always); not cynical like the Lib Avenger says (just look at the salivating anons here!). In Slovakia, I should note that the Czechs did quite a bit of immoral post-war ethnic cleansing of Germans from the Sudentenland — and did NOT allow the Slovaks to cleanse Slovakia of the Hungarians (at about 10% the largest minority, with a center right ethnic coalition that has been part of the gov’t coalition since 1998).

The real issue is this: when are the Muslims going to accept universal human rights of Free Speech (consistently applied; some restrictions on non-offense may be included) and, most importantly, Free Religion?

These are minimums for modern civilizations to achieve relative peace. Lebanon seems close; and Iraqi Kurdistan (see Michael Totten!).

No amount of outside troops can force this tolerance, although quick punishment for every act of intolerance is, barely, imaginable — Leftists with such fantasies perhaps see US campuses as such a “model.”

drllyod has an excellent question: what could make you (or me) give up being a neo-con (?meaning supporting use of military force to create democracy? my meaning, TG)?

I’ve thought long and hard about this, and can’t think of any. If Iran gets a nuke, and uses it on Tel Aviv (or Miami, or Moscow), it will only make me think we didn’t use ENOUGH force, soon enough.

Take another issue, the number of troops. I wanted fewer, because I think the Iraqis have to take on responsibility for themselves, and can’t do so with too many US troops.
If Iraq goes into civil war mode, and more than 100 000 Iraqis are killed by other Iraqis in the next 3 years, I’ll agree I was wrong to want fewer troops rather than more. If it’s less than 20 000 Iraqis killed, and they continue having elections, I’ll say my neo-con actions were successful, and worth it, and fewer troops was correct.

Let’s remember history: I was frustrated like Anon Viet Vet at “not winning” in Vietnam. If I knew, in 72, that either N. Vietnam would stop aggressing (US wins), or else we would leave and let them win, I’d choose the US to win.
If I then learned that the only way for the US to win was to actually let, and make, the S. Vietnamese “win”, and that it would take 18 more years (til 1990), I would still choose that path. — But I didn’t know/ wasn’t sure.

drllyod — how many SE Asians have to be murdered by victorious commies after 1974 (vote of Dems to stop funding) before you think that decision was a mistake? 100 000? 200k? 600k? 2 000 000 (Vietnamese & Cambodian civilians)?

For me, history tells me the US should have continued using force to stop evil commies — but less force per year, over more years, and pushing the S. Vietnamese to do more.

How many folk must be murdered in Rwanda in ‘94 before the US should use force to stop it? (I think 100 000 is a reasonable, arbitrary number as a trigger for US military action)

How many folk must be murdered (& raped) in Darfur before the US, with or without the UN, should take action to stop it? (It’s probably been over 100k already, but it’s not certain.)

Back in Iraq, how many UN SC resolutions should a country violate before they are enforced? I think 3 is enough — after the second, any more UN SC resolutions should specify the legitimacy of the use of force, by any coalition of the willing, to enforce the resolutions.

“Laws” without enforcement are not true laws. Modern civilization, like that started by Hammurabi, requires rule of law.

Well, I can’t say for sure that’s why, but experiance has shown that. Take, for instance, the comments on “Rightwingnews”. I’ve been on and off active there for a few years (same name - strcpy). There are several that change thier name ever so often after they have given some big prophecy that is pretty far left. It’s sorta amusing, they claim to not do that, to be different people, but they must use the auto-login and sometimes forget and use thier old signature or refer to thierselfs under the other name (not to mention the same writing style, quoting style, same talking points, same everything. After you read pages and pages of someone you get to reconise thier writing) - though doing that usually prompts another name change. When it was allowed to post anonymously they did that instead for thier predictions. That’s been pretty common even back in the days Usenet (it’s the only way to “beat” long term archiving of predictions), though this is for the longer term anonymii. There have even been some fairly amusing exchanges where other people make fun of that behavior.

There are, of course, other reasons why they may. I think some of it is just a “jab” - many of our anonymous posters today are that. A single post and no more (though I would still pick a name - I always use strcpy if I can).

Basically I don’t think there is any real difference between this and real life. Usually anonymous stuff is saying something you don’t want traced back to you, a single jab, or not wanting a paper trail (especially when what you are talking about requires trust - I’m sure many politicians wish they could have a magic wand and disassociate thier name with a host of foolish things they have said).

“But for me, there’s usually no mystery as to why they show up in bunches. It usually has to do with certain links. Today, I suspect, most of the anonymii came from a link at the daou report, which is part of salon.com.”

True, it’s usually from a link from someplace else for really large spikes - but that link is generally because of the “bad” stuff. Plus, even when you don’t get that link they still are much higher - almost all the “conservative” (even if only loosly conservative) blog comments are full of this same type of stuff right now. I would highly suspect that there is a similar type thing happens on lefty blogs that aren’t ban/delete heavy.

But for me, there’s usually no mystery as to why they show up in bunches. It usually has to do with certain links. Today, I suspect, most of the anonymii came from a link at the daou report, which is part of salon.com.

You’ll not that it is the same thing everytime. Any peice of news that is bad and they turn up in droves repeating the same thing everytime “We told you so” (with heavy tones of glee) followed by “I’m not gleeful - how dare you!” and lastly declarations of “The (neo)cons have lost!!!”.

We never see them again, when thier doom and gloom doesn’t pan out then they just slink away and wait until something happens that they can declare “Victory is mine!!!!” for all of about a week or so.

Anyone want to bet, once this blows over and all this doom and gloom doesn’t happen, how many of them will just disappear? How many will actually admit to being wrong - I bet one of the reasons for anonymous is so that one can not point out their abysmal track record in predictions - they always claim to have made the correct predictions even when they didn’t. Heck, it’s rare any of the named lefties in comments admit it even when you can go back and give thier exact quotes.

In a week or two we will see who is correct. Given what the Iraqi blogs have been saying they will go back to the road of forging a stable govt, creating an effective police/military force, and killing as many bad guys (see, I threw you guys a bone - I’m a simple neo-con who see the world in terms of “good guys” and “bad guys” so you can safely dismiss me) as they can. Any person who stayed politically heavy during Reagans terms is totally familiar with this - doom and gloom right up until (and some past) the fall of the Soviet Union (it was just a ruse and/or the fall would trigger an all out nuclear war) - and then an attempt to take credit for it (yet to happen, but we are starting to see leaks of it from time to time).

Now that Saddam is jailed it would be nice if Iraq can be brought into the modern world, given a stable government & taste of democracy - a good thing to attempt but not really necessary to achieve what I believe should be the US foreign policy goal: a friendly regime that doesn’t screw around with the US – nothing more, nothing less. It will be truly unfortunate if the situation in Iraq escalates into civil/religious war but the important thing is that Saddam is gone for good.

The administration has made a couple of tactical errors. The main mistake was in letting expectations become too high on the postwar rebuilding, tying success to a stable postwar democracy in Iraq. The necessary action was to depose Saddam – anything else is pure gravy.

Another mistake was made by allowing the one of the barometers of success to hinge on whether the US & its allies could stop the roadside bombs, snipers & suicide bombers. Anyone that has followed the Israeli/Palestinian conflict should be able to realize what a pipe-dream such an expectation really is. Despite all their expertise & experience the Israelis have never been able to stop it. If the assholes are determined they are going to have at least some success.

Whatever type of government Iraq finally achieves is in the end up to the Iraqi people. I hope for the sake of their freedom & future economic prosperity they decide to go a more democratic way but if they don’t that is their loss. What I want my government to do if chaos takes completely over is kick ass if Syria & Iran try to enter the conflict but otherwise wait until the smoke clears & dust settles & let the Iraqi leaders then in charge know that the US will continue to topple anyone who tries becoming a new Saddam-like malignancy - as many times as it takes.

Of course I don’t think everyone who opposed the war is “salivating” now. But some are, and when I composed that sentence, which reads:

The doom-and-gloomers who cried “civil war” at the very outset of any discord in Iraq are now practically salivating with glee…

it clearly was not meant to encompass all those who oppose the war. I thought it should be clear that I was referring to a certain subset of war-opposers, a group that I think I described rather well.

And, unknown blogger–I think perhaps you’ve lost your sense of humor.

What would it take for me to stop believing that, as Churchill said, “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others”? Perhaps nothing, short of seeing another form of governement that is superior, in action. I have yet to see that. What would it take to get me to believe that someone like Saddam shouldn’t have been overthrown? Perhaps nothing, short of a demonstration that leaving him in would have been better (and I can’t quite imagine how that would be demonstrated).

If the neocon agenda were to guide foreign policy for the next couple of decades (highly unlikely, by the way), and if in that time the world erupts in an enormous conflagration of some sort, it will be clear that the neocon agenda did not prevent very very bad things from happening. I always knew that was a distinct possibility. But if I managed to survive such a conflagration, I still would never know what the alternatives might have brought–the same, worse, or better?

All I can do–all anyone can ever do–is evaluate the situation on the basis of my reading, my thoughts, and my observations. I do quite a bit of all three, and I have seen no other policy that seems as though it would have been a better way to have handled the world we have faced during the last four and a half years. I’m not talking about the details–clearly, there’s room for improvement there–but about the big picture.

As for Fukuyama–I never was a fan, and I’m not a fan now. Writing a post about his article in the Times is on my fairly lengthy list of things to do. I hope I get around to it.

They look and sound exactly like those whose leftiness has them believing that the US ought to lose at everything.

If they could figure out a way to differentiate themselves, we might have a better discussion.

The doom-and-gloomers who cried “civil war” at the very outset of any discord in Iraq are now practically salivating with glee (I’m sorry, but that’s how I see it) at being able to say–like the hypochondriac who wrote “I told you so!” on his tombstone–”See, civil war! Here it is, at last!”

this strikes me as disingenuous. the reason for pointing out “i told you so” is not for satisfaction (though, being human, it’s hard to shirk).

“i told you so” is important so that the next time (there’s always a next time):

1) people take the time to educate themselves on the issues

americans, in general, are self-interested and myopic (i should know, being one). being informed is too much work.

2) we allow for a healthy debate before taking action

when one has made up their mind before wieghing all the evidence, debate can be a real drag

their were plenty of intelligent, well-spoken dissenters in both the government and civilian-land. the difference between them - the ones in government lost their jobs…

without admitting any fault, people will continue to hear “i told you so” - until we’re sure they understand what is at stake.

fyi - i am neither democrat nor republican, as i like/dislike parts of both - besides 94% of politicians are self-serving asses.

sorry - kinda rambling…

Heh. It’s like shooting fish in a barrel.

Accomplishment #1: not being a feckless yes-man to shortsighted groupthink by supporting an elective military adventure.

Accomplishment #2: not jumping on the bandwagon of a poorly thought out foreign policy doctrine whose results have been and will continue be the aggravation of existing problems.

For you to assert that the IR strategies which led to the fall of the Soviet Union are the same as those which motivated the war in Iraq is sheer lunacy. The dynamics of the two theatres aren’t remotely comparable and the natures of the conflicts are completely different. If you want to defend neoconservatism and its application to the Middle East on any constituve grounds, please feel free to do so. But don’t compare it to anti-Communism. They’re utterly, utterly different. And you know that.

Of course I think my opinions are superior. That’s the essence of opinion. YOUR IDEOLOGY is A FAILURE. Do you have any points to prove otherwise?

Finally, I’m perpetually amused by the “you only have complaints — offer some suggestions” argument; it’s as if military conflict is something that should be avoided only of something else is proposed.

Freedom’s on the march. Clearly.

Is there an outcome in Iraq that would suffice for this event?

The ME is important because of the oil (that’s why we’re doing nothing about Darfur). But the ME is going to have to pluralist, and then nationalist, and possibly fascist or communist, before it quiets down. The global economy will not interfere with any of that until it starts to effect price of of gas, if/when it does that, you can expect a pretexted invasion involving the US and NATO in the blink of an eye.

Iran will go nuclear too. The US cannot afford to totally alienate Iran and allow China, Russia, or India to step into the void. 1017.

Unfortunately, the anti-war people too often come off as anything but reasonable. As do the anti-Bush people - who, I understand, are not always the same people. I’m sorry, but I don’t take street theater, die-ins, and ugly women shrieking at me from ditches seriously. You can call it shooting the messenger or whatever. The fact is, I do not want these people to have any more influence than they already do. Not in this country.

Let’s face it - we’d take each other’s positions more seriously if we could find a way to divorce ourselves from the Ann Coulters and Michael Moores of this world. This is not the 50s or the 60s. We need serious people, not exhibitionistic geeks.

He also didn’t ditch the Emperor.

I think this is too harsh on Unknown, but I also think Unknown was too harsh on Neo.

I am not really into the blame game however I do think it is OK to demand better from Bush and the people around him. The American people re-elected him, OK, we’re stuck. But that doesn’t mean we cannot demand more.

OTOH, the blame game vis a vis Neoconservatism is something else. Neoconservatism is in fact certifiably crazy, being a species of Lamarckianism such as was popular in Stalinist Russia, the kind of thinking that says that putting wheat in ice water will make it winter wheat, or that the children of amputees will have shorter than normal limbs, or that — in this case — overthrowing a fascist dictatorship in the Middle East will cause a democracy to emerge overnight, because that is the default configuration of mankind.
Neoconservatism is essentially a Marxian model of the world that says, put enough pressure RIGHT HERE, and you can change turn the seas to orangeade, a la Fourier.

The Anglo-American tradition going back to the Scottish Enlightenment (and Montesquieu) however holds that you have to let things develop on their own, and interfering just creates an artificial set up.

No, this isn’t the same as the wars against Germany and Japan. In those cases, they were aggressors, and we had to fight and defeat them. But they also had traditions of democracy and social cohesion of their own. Iraq and most of the Middle East has never had either (although I think Iran does.)

The whole WMD is also something we should save for the Big Recount in the sky, but the fact of the matter is that WE — THE USA — entered into a war of aggression against a sovereign state because (we claimed) we had a right to “defend ourselves” from imminent attack even though that pretext has been thoroughly demolished. There’s nothing we can do about that NOW, but it’s something to keep in mind (a) in 2008, (b) whenever PUTZ, er, POTUS sets forth another strategic pie in the sky, and (c) whenever some Neocon egghead comes up with another Shock ‘n’ Awe spectacular.

Now, we’re in Iraq. The easiest way out is to let the Iraqis settle it themselves, pick one side, give them the guns, and hide. We will still be there for a long time, of course, but at least we might be able to keep our body counts down ……

Reasonable people tend to have solutions to problems. Annoying people tend to have complaints about problems, but no solutions.

And most reasonable people are not against the war, but against how the war is waged.

I think Unknown would benefit from a remedial class in logic, at whatever locations provide it.

Because making fun of snowed in people is not the same as making fun of victims of terroism. People should not make that comparison, especially not in their heads.

People can dislike the President all they want, just because others voted him in rather than you.

Most reasonable people dislike a President not for who he is, but for the policies and things he does. People disliking people just because, is like Islamic Jihad rioting just because they can riot.

While it may be a perogative of people who are anti-military and anti-American to leech off the sacrifices and blood debt paid by American patriots, that doesn’t mean I’m going to do it, now is it.

A lot of things are permissible and free to do in this country. KKK rallies for example. It doesn’t mean I’m going to sign up for one, though.

So you can dislike the President all you want, but that’s no reason for anyone else to agree that that is the right thing to do.

We’d like to wage war successfully, without you guys being in the way. If you can’t get out of the way, if you can’t wait for Bush to die or get out of office, and you don’t want to follow, then you’re a problem. Not the solution.

Anyone that knows about Roosevelt would understand the situation of Roosevelt’s critics. There is far more liberty to criticize Bush in today’s world, than there ever was in 1942.

There are many things Roosevelt did wrong, but that doesn’t mean it is a open field on his mistakes. It isn’t.

Actions have consequences in this world. Unfortunately for many people.

The thing that is hard to understand is not why people like Unknown don’t have intentions to hurt America, the thing that is hard to understand is why people think that their intentions are absolute. Most people don’t tend to believe that a mother intentionally wanted to kill her child when she got into the car accident, however, that didn’t seem to really matter in the end.

A full scale Imperial system could have handled it quite smoothly, but the US hasn’t been in the Empire business since so long ago.

The natural hesitation of the military not to do civilian jobs of police, arrests, and what not has been drilled into them by their training in the states. Sending more people in a place will not counter-act or modify that training.

So I still don’t see that more people on the ground is an answer to the guerrila war, given the problems with the policy. It’s not that I don’t like a bigger hammer,but there is nobody to crush in Iraq that needs 5 armored divisions and 2 infantry mechanized, extra or current. What few organizations and people we do need to eliminate, we can do so with small hit squads, without the requirement for anything larger.

We may end up with additional problems with more troops. I understand that the brass in Iraq thinks that this would be too much of a footprint, that this would make Iraqis not feel motivated to fight for themselves, or something like that. It’s not that I believe them or disbelieve them, it’s just that the risk doesn’t seem to have a lot of rewards to go with the risks.

As for the political conglomeration of 3 guys fighting it out, we can control that easily through threats, rewards, and shows of force. The Kurds do not want to fight us, and are our friends in spirit and heart. The Shia are neutral, at the least. The Sunni are caught between two sides, peace and war.

The only reason why Japan wasn’t a problem was because MacArthur understood the psychology of the japanese and did the right things at the right time. More troops is not going to make Bush understand which actions are the right ones and which are the wrong ones, and without direction from the top, an army is nothing but a disaster waiting to happen in this war.

Speaking of that word, your “anti-intellectual fad” phrase reveals just how full of yourself you are, thinking that your opinion on what’s smart and what’s stupid is better and more important than your opponents. I guess that explains why you, instead of offering an argument, resort to repetition of the word “failure”. It’s called “projection”, baby. Or do you have any personal accomplishments to speak of? Oh, I didn’t think so.

But lately, starting with that chuckling little entry about the poor couple with the snowy driveway complaining “where is FEMA?” (as if the question raised in the wake of Katrina was somehow illegitimate. Do a Google search for pictures of some of the bloated bodies lying for days in New Orleans sewage. If somebody made a crack like that about terrorist victims somewhere you and your peanut gallery would have jumped down their throats) and now this:

…and I know that the goal of those who hate President Bush and the entire Iraqi war is to have it sparked, and to be able to say “We told you so.”

Is my motivation for wanting things to turn out well to be able to say, myself, “I told you so?” I certainly don’t think it is. I want things to turn out well for the sake of–well, for the sake of things turning out well for the Iraqi people, the US, and the world.

you’ve definitely fallen into the crevasse.

Like it or not, reasonable people have plenty of good reasons to be against this war, skeptical of its premise, and uncertain of its outcome. And it’s our prerogative (as citizens of one of those FREE DEMOCRACIES you like to talk so much about) to dislike a President we didn’t vote for and whose policies we disagree with.

None of those things makes us “with the terrorists” or “for the terrorists,” “for” a civil war in Iraq, or “wanting things to turn out badly for the people of Iraq, the US and the World.” Is that really so hard for you to understand?

This sounds an awful lot like saying that Bush was allowed to lie because he couldn’t get what he wanted otherwise.

That’s no excuse for a lack of leadership now.

Split Iraq three ways. Hmm. OK, then we can forecast a war between the Sunnis and the Kurds for the Mosul oilfields. We can forecast a war between Turkey and Kurdistan. We can forecast a Shiite theocracy getting into bed with Iran. Just groovy. “Bring it on!”

Second, civil war, and splitting into three nations, may be a good thing, which rectifies unworkable boundaries drawn by the British. How will we know those boundaries are unworkable? If Iraq splits up into three nations - we will know. And, if the boundaries are unworkable, isn̵