[quote]JeffR wrote:
I do believe that the U.S. death toll is the lowest in 8 months. [/quote]
This is an idiotic argument - even for JeffR! Who in their right mind would present US dead soldiers figures when trying to show there is progress? Seriously, I’m asking.
The death toll of Iraqis for the past couple of months is of the same level as what they had back in 2003 at the time of the invasion. That is the only thing that matters when speaking about progress in Iraq.
[quote]bigflamer wrote:
Just so you know…
[/quote]
Dude, this isn’t the 90’s. Nobody says warez anymore. Oh wait…my bad.
[quote]Brad61 wrote:
Great rebuttal to the Op-Ed piece here:
"…the authors �?? and the New York Times �?? failed to tell readers the full story about these supposed skeptics: far from grizzled peaceniks, O’Hanlon and Pollack have been longtime cheerleaders for a larger U.S. military occupying force in Iraq.
"The NYT's New Pro-War Propaganda | BaltimoreChronicle.com [/quote]
A great rebuttal if you don’t bother fact-checking it or care about its logic. It essentially is just more ad hominem against the authors.
About Kenneth Pollack: Even though he was one of the earliest and most persuasive boosters of the war, he disowned it almost immediately.
In his book he clearly stated that war in Iraq should only occur after assembling a very large coalition and after there had been progress made on the Israeli/Palestinian front – neither of which occurred.
And after the lack of immediate discovery of caches of WMDs, Pollack said that the lack of WMDs significantly changed his calculations – as the knowledge of no WMDs would have changed everyone’s calculations.
Pollack is a serious man who is an expert on the middle east, and his words should not be dismissed so out of hand - or attributed out of hand to bad motives.
[quote]Brad61 wrote:
There would be no genocide in Iraq if Bush hadn’t stubbornly invaded Iraq against the warnings that it would be a disaster. I’m sure Bush planned ahead and had strategies to cover all the possible scenarios, right? Including a scenario of an unstabilized Iraq, mired in a Civil War… you realize that destabilization is fully Bush’s responsibility, right? And if a half-million dead Iraqi civilians (one estimate) as a result of Bush’s invasion is not “genocide” then what is? I think Bush’s White House puts the number of dead civilians at well over 100,000. That’s not enough dead Iraqi civilians for you, to call it genocide? The cost of genocide was NEVER worth it, which is why half the country and most of the world tried to prevent the invasion in the first place. “We” who were against the war from the beginning have been right about Iraq all along, and “you” who have been for the war have been wrong, from the beginning and you’re still wrong now. The war hasn’t just been badly bungled, it was also a plainly stupid idea that never made any sense.[/quote]
This is an interesting rant, but irrelevant to the point. Much like libertarians talking about open borders immigration being a good thing if we could only roll back the welfare state. And I don’t wish to rehash here why those estimates of Iraqi civilian casualties are grossly exaggerated - it’s actually irrelevant to the question at hand. The fact is that many people agree that the U.S. military in Iraq at this point is preventing genocide from occurring. Do you, or do you not, think it’s worth the cost to use the military to prevent genocide in Iraq?
[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
There are a few left in the old model though – Joe Lieberman, for example. They are not so willfully obtuse as to latch on to the idea that America’s defeat in Iraq would be a problem only for Bush and those pesky neocons.
Brad61 wrote:
Lieberman is an Independant. The Democrats rejected him in Connecticut. Secondly, Bush governed for the last 6 years as if he’s only interested in the people who agree with him about everything, and anybody who doesn’t see things his way can eat shit. That approach was fine with you, when Bush was riding high in the polls. But now that it’s clear that the invasion/occupation is a huge strategic and political disaster, you generously want to include Bush’s detractors- the people who tried to prevent the invasion in the first place- into bearing the same responsibility for the war that Bush and his boot-licking supporters bear. That’s truly pathetic, and it isn’t going to fly.[/quote]
Are you trying to say that you’ve driven them all out of the party already?
[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
Brad and others won’t believe – can’t believe – that anything good is happening. So the ad hominem criticisms of the messenger (see Brad in the thread he started on General Petraeus).
Brad61 wrote:
Petraeus is a Yes Man, and it’s certainly fair to point that out. Bush only surrounds himself with people who agree with him. That’s one of the big reasons his presidency has been a failure. Bush listens to other views, sure… and then he ignores them. Petraeus will be dumped on his ass, as soon as he stops parroting the Bush message, just like previous generals. You want a promotion, you say the things that make the president happy. Otherwise, you’re out of a job. We see the pattern time and time again.[/quote]
More ad hominem and invective from Brad – and no substance. A quick back-handed insult to Gen. Petraeus, and then an irrelevant turn to a Bush insult. Quelle surprise.
[quote]Brad61 wrote:
As far as addressing the editorial and the credentials of the authors, the article I linked does that quite well. Also, I understand Pollack may have backtracked already (?) saying that he meant by the editorial that we are seeing progress against “Al Qaeda Iraq” (a tiny fraction of the insurgency) and that the civil war and conditions on the ground are still as bad as they ever were.
[/quote]
Addressing the editorial? It does no such thing - unless you think “addressing the editorial” means calling the authors neocons and concluding they don’t need to be paid further attention.
As far as it goes, one should note that other contemporary observers are making the same conclusions about the improvement on the ground in Iraq – including some Dem congressmen:
And of course, embed journalists Michael Totten ( http://www.michaeltotten.com/ ) and Michael Yon ( http://michaelyon-online.com/ ) are giving similar reports.
And one more point – even if it’s “just al-Qaeda”, I thought that one of the main goals of the War on Terror was to cripple al-Qaeda? Al-Qaeda chose to make Iraq a battleground. And if the process continues much will be accomplished if al-Qaeda can be defeated in Iraq; their image tarnished beyond repair and their narrative shown to be outrageous lies and propaganda. The NYT article concludes “there is enough good happening on the battlefields of Iraq today that Congress should plan on sustaining the effort at least into 2008.”
If perceptions in the Mid-East can be changed, the effort should be sustained in some form past that point – perhaps as an information war after U.S. forces are withdrawn. Radical Islam needs to be discredited to move the War on Terror forward – and without radical Islam, Iran and Syria fall back to the discredited 3rd-rate powers they should be (at least assuming Iran doesn’t become nuclear-capable).
[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
The party of inclusiveness doesn’t embrace disparate viewpoints (e.g., on abortion).
Even such media outlets as CNN now have to discuss the possibility that the war in Iraq might yet be won.
[/quote]
Hardly could I believe I was reading the first quote.
As to the second quote, the arms merchants must be purchased first to “win” the war.
Is there a Protocols of the Elders of un-Zion?
And JeffR: “enormous”?
[quote]Brad61 wrote:
Great rebuttal to the Op-Ed piece here:
"…the authors �?? and the New York Times �?? failed to tell readers the full story about these supposed skeptics: far from grizzled peaceniks, O’Hanlon and Pollack have been longtime cheerleaders for a larger U.S. military occupying force in Iraq.
"The NYT's New Pro-War Propaganda | BaltimoreChronicle.com
BostonBarrister wrote:
It’s very sad – all the old-line “Scoop Jackson” hawkish Dems from the Cold War have been drummed out of the party by aging hippies and their young followers.
LOL. The Democrats are all Hippies and peaceniks, yeah right. That’s just dumb.
I’m not sure exactly when the phenomenon took hold; as recently as the late 90s, liberals were quick to argue that the military cost of an invasion/occupation was worth it to avoid a genocide {while the Republicans argued that the cost wasn’t worth it, see Bosnia for an example} whereas now the position is seemingly that genocide is an acceptable cost to endure for getting out of Iraq
There would be no genocide in Iraq if Bush hadn’t stubbornly invaded Iraq against the warnings that it would be a disaster. I’m sure Bush planned ahead and had strategies to cover all the possible scenarios, right? Including a scenario of an unstabilized Iraq, mired in a Civil War… you realize that destabilization is fully Bush’s responsibility, right? And if a half-million dead Iraqi civilians (one estimate) as a result of Bush’s invasion is not “genocide” then what is? I think Bush’s White House puts the number of dead civilians at well over 100,000. That’s not enough dead Iraqi civilians for you, to call it genocide? The cost of genocide was NEVER worth it, which is why half the country and most of the world tried to prevent the invasion in the first place. “We” who were against the war from the beginning have been right about Iraq all along, and “you” who have been for the war have been wrong, from the beginning and you’re still wrong now. The war hasn’t just been badly bungled, it was also a plainly stupid idea that never made any sense.
There are a few left in the old model though – Joe Lieberman, for example. They are not so willfully obtuse as to latch on to the idea that America’s defeat in Iraq would be a problem only for Bush and those pesky neocons.
Lieberman is an Independant. The Democrats rejected him in Connecticut. Secondly, Bush governed for the last 6 years as if he’s only interested in the people who agree with him about everything, and anybody who doesn’t see things his way can eat shit. That approach was fine with you, when Bush was riding high in the polls. But now that it’s clear that the invasion/occupation is a huge strategic and political disaster, you generously want to include Bush’s detractors- the people who tried to prevent the invasion in the first place- into bearing the same responsibility for the war that Bush and his boot-licking supporters bear. That’s truly pathetic, and it isn’t going to fly.
Brad and others won’t believe – can’t believe – that anything good is happening. So the ad hominem criticisms of the messenger (see Brad in the thread he started on General Petraeus).
Petraeus is a Yes Man, and it’s certainly fair to point that out. Bush only surrounds himself with people who agree with him. That’s one of the big reasons his presidency has been a failure. Bush listens to other views, sure… and then he ignores them. Petraeus will be dumped on his ass, as soon as he stops parroting the Bush message, just like previous generals. You want a promotion, you say the things that make the president happy. Otherwise, you’re out of a job. We see the pattern time and time again.
As far as addressing the editorial and the credentials of the authors, the article I linked does that quite well. Also, I understand Pollack may have backtracked already (?) saying that he meant by the editorial that we are seeing progress against “Al Qaeda Iraq” (a tiny fraction of the insurgency) and that the civil war and conditions on the ground are still as bad as they ever were.
[/quote]
Due to his training Petraeus doubtless views anti-war Americans as “insurgents”.
[quote]Limbic wrote:
And JeffR: “enormous”?[/quote]
Yes, they are synonyms.
Other than acknowledging my elephantine size, is there anything else you are trying to communicate?
JeffR
[quote]BostonBarrister wrote:
About Kenneth Pollack: Even though he was one of the earliest and most persuasive boosters of the war, he disowned it almost immediately.
In his book he clearly stated that war in Iraq should only occur after assembling a very large coalition and after there had been progress made on the Israeli/Palestinian front – neither of which occurred.[/quote]
No way dude, Bush assembled an international coalition. Ask any Right Winger, they’ll tell you, that was one of the main Right Wing spin points. Oh wait, it’s just a little revisionist history lesson from you.
[quote]
And after the lack of immediate discovery of caches of WMDs, Pollack said that the lack of WMDs significantly changed his calculations – as the knowledge of no WMDs would have changed everyone’s calculations. [/quote]
Jesus fucking Christ, TONS of people said there were NO WMDs in Iraq BEFORE the invasion, including the teams of UN weapons inspectors who were there on the ground, before the war. Dipshits on the Right felt it was more important to smear the weapons inspector’s credibility (and patriotism) than pay heed to their first-hand knowledge. It’s revolting to hear anyone try to claim that “Well, everyone thought there were WMDs in Iraq”. Fuck off, that’s a bald faced lie. Bush wanted to invade and so they looked for bogus intelligence they could use to sell the war.
You’d have to be a naive dork to think that any journalist or politician who gets embedded by the Pentagon, or who goes on a tour of Iraq sponsored by the Pentagon, is going to walk away with an accurate picture of what is actually happening in Iraq.
Iraq is Bush’s war, he owns it and the Right Wing owns it. It would be nice to see the “Party of Responsibility” (sic) show some testicular fortitude and take responsibility for their own staggering failures and mistakes, but it’s clear that is not going to happen. Instead, it’s going to be a long period of pussified “You made us drop the ball!” pass-the-blame. The Right will clearly attempt to blame the media for not covering up Bush’s massive incompetence, and blame the non-complicit Left for not waving our flags hard enough, and asking too many questions. That will be the excuse for the Right’s failures. Blame everyone else, and don’t take any responsibility for yourself, the coward’s way out. It’s already happening, and Republican pass-the-blame will be the official party line after the White House changes hands.
But maybe I’m wrong, maybe we have “turned the corner” in Iraq and Petraeus won’t just be kissing Bush’s ass for the promotion. By my count, that would be the 27th or 28th corner we’ve turned, and we’ve been going in circles for years. The administration has no more credibility (that’s why they need Petraeus as a mouthpiece) and the people who advocated the invasion like Pollack have no credibility. Bush is just stalling for time, so that he can avoid taking responsibility for his own massive blunders, and then he can dump the mess onto the next president. The right is salivating, hoping that it’s a Democrat who gets swamped with Bush’s fuckup. That will lessen the sting of defeat for the Right in 2008, knowing that Bush will pass on almost insurmountable problems that can be blamed on the Democrats.
But please, you knuckleheads on the Right, keep talking about what a great idea the war was, and how great it’s going now. Keep talking about what a great president George Bush is. You’re just insuring your own political marginalization, and I applaud you for that.
Here’s O’Hanlon on Hardball talking about his Op-Ed piece. This is the message which has Jeffy so giddy with optimism:
http://movies.crooksandliars.com/Hardball-OHanlon-Iraq.wmv
I suppose when your expectations are incredibly low, something like this can seem like really good news…
[quote]bigflamer wrote:
JustTheFacts wrote: Just so you know…
[/quote]
heh. Nice.
After reading a bit more about the article, it doesn’t seem so rosy.
Apparently, their visit to Iraq was almost entirely in Sunni areas, where progress has been made. Unfortunately, Iraq is mostly Shiites, not Sunnis. And there’s very little that can be called progress in Shia areas.
And with more deaths, and the Sunni bloc removing itself from the current coalition governement ( http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L01397316.htm ), I’d say stability (yeah, the “sustainable” kind) is still way off over the horizon.
My cautious optimism just got crushed by obvious reality. Snif.
[quote]bradley wrote:
Here’s O’Hanlon on Hardball talking about his Op-Ed piece. This is the message which has Jeffy so giddy with optimism:
http://movies.crooksandliars.com/Hardball-OHanlon-Iraq.wmv
I suppose when your expectations are incredibly low, something like this can seem like really good news…[/quote]
Good evening, bradley.
Would anyone like to bet that members of radical leftist groups have been besieging the Brookings institute and these authors in general since yesterday?
I’m going to highlight EXACTLY what they wrote. They didn’t parse these words to include only al qaeda terrorists in their article.
What they do under probable duress (like your pals having conference calls with reid/pelosi EVERY DAY) doesn’t negate the facts as stated.
JeffR
[quote]pookie wrote:
After reading a bit more about the article, it doesn’t seem so rosy.
Apparently, their visit to Iraq was almost entirely in Sunni areas, where progress has been made. Unfortunately, Iraq is mostly Shiites, not Sunnis. And there’s very little that can be called progress in Shia areas.
And with more deaths, and the Sunni bloc removing itself from the current coalition governement ( http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L01397316.htm ), I’d say stability (yeah, the “sustainable” kind) is still way off over the horizon.
My cautious optimism just got crushed by obvious reality. Snif.
[/quote]
I caught a little bit of Glen Beck last night. The guy that wrote the piece in question flat out said that the situation in Iraq is shockingly better than he had expected. He also said that the extra US troops have worked very successfully toward securing the country.
That has nothing to do with the internal strife that is a huge problem of it’s own.
I guess your reality is relative.
[quote]rainjack wrote:
He also said that the extra US troops have worked very successfully toward securing the country. [/quote]
He can say all he wants, it won’t change the staggering number of dead Iraqis that’s at its highest since the invasion. One wonders what he means by “securing the country”.
[quote]rainjack wrote:
I caught a little bit of Glen Beck last night. The guy that wrote the piece in question flat out said that the situation in Iraq is shockingly better than he had expected. He also said that the extra US troops have worked very successfully toward securing the country.
That has nothing to do with the internal strife that is a huge problem of it’s own.
I guess your reality is relative. [/quote]
The situation in Sunni quarters has readily improved. It’s the Shia parts that aren’t doing so well. And Iraq is about 60% Shiites, so there’s still work to be done.
But if Sunnis are any indication, stability occurs when the people themselves get sick and tired of the chaos and organize themselves to put an end to it. Without that, there is little the US can do to impose order.
As for internal strife being a separate problem, it’s certainly not helping the stability to have political struggles occurring at the same time, especially when these are also occurring along Sunni/Shia rifts.
While our perception of it might differ, reality is what it is.
Without taking a right or left stance, we have to be careful that recent events are not just changing the numbers.
For example, getting local groups to fight it out with al queda doesn’t mean that al queda is not there or that the problems aren’t present.
It may however mean that the numbers are no longer counted – because the US won’t be reporting the losses of local groups.
However, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, if the populace can be recruited to drive out terrorists, then it can open up a lot of opportunities.
It’s also risky though. Creating armed and organized factions (by not doing the alternative of fighting them and hence killing or disarming them) obviously leaves the potential for future civil conflict.
On a different note, I am wondering how many decades it will be before the new proposed arms sales are simply making a future enemy stronger. I don’t suppose anybody has seen this type of thing happen in the past, anywhere?
Keep your eyes open - the same old shit is brewing up once again.
Like any good fight, the winner either strikes first or has the stamina tp last the longest.
Everyone knows Americans can go longer and harder!
[quote]lixy wrote:
rainjack wrote:
He also said that the extra US troops have worked very successfully toward securing the country.
He can say all he wants, it won’t change the staggering number of dead Iraqis that’s at its highest since the invasion. One wonders what he means by “securing the country”.[/quote]
Staggering? Please quantify that figure. 100K? 200K? Another hypocritical post from one the euro-bitchmeister.
[quote]pookie wrote:
rainjack wrote:
I caught a little bit of Glen Beck last night. The guy that wrote the piece in question flat out said that the situation in Iraq is shockingly better than he had expected. He also said that the extra US troops have worked very successfully toward securing the country.
That has nothing to do with the internal strife that is a huge problem of it’s own.
I guess your reality is relative.
The situation in Sunni quarters has readily improved. It’s the Shia parts that aren’t doing so well. And Iraq is about 60% Shiites, so there’s still work to be done.
But if Sunnis are any indication, stability occurs when the people themselves get sick and tired of the chaos and organize themselves to put an end to it. Without that, there is little the US can do to impose order.
As for internal strife being a separate problem, it’s certainly not helping the stability to have political struggles occurring at the same time, especially when these are also occurring along Sunni/Shia rifts.
While our perception of it might differ, reality is what it is.
[/quote]
I think his point was - at least from what he was saying last night - that securing the outside influences will allow for internal issues to be dealt with exclusively.
No one is saying that Iraq is problem free. Hell - the U.S. had a civil war less than 100 years after ratifying the constitution. To think that they will all sit down and color at the same table without fighting is idiocy.
But that is a struggle the Iraqis must deal with on their own. Like you said - there’s not much the U.S. can do about it. But if this is likened to a street football game in busy section of town - the least the U.S. can do is make sure the traffic is routed around the game, and not running over the players.
[quote]vroom wrote:
Within taking a right or left stance, we have to be careful that recent events are not just changing the numbers.
For example, getting local groups to fight it out with al queda doesn’t mean that al queda is not there or that the problems aren’t present.
It may however mean that the numbers are no longer counted – because the US won’t be reporting the losses of local groups.
However, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, if the populace can be recruited to drive our terrorists, then it can open up a lot of opportunities.
It’s also risky though. Creating armed and organized factions (by not doing the alternative of fighting them and hence killing or disarming them) obviously leaves the potential for future civil conflict.
On a different note, I am wondering how many decades it will be before the new proposed arms sales are simply making a future enemy stronger. I don’t suppose anybody has seen this type of thing happen in the past, anywhere?
Keep your eyes open - the same old shit is brewing up once again.[/quote]
One of these days your thinking tree is gonna get sick and die.