q -- just like Bush predicted. It good to know that Democracy consists of holding an election in an ethnically cleansed country where only a few dozen people are killed and while occupied by a foreign invader. How much more democratic must Venezuela be then, or Cuba or Iran? Bush predicted that? He also predicted mobile chemical weapons factories, Qaeda training camps, stores of WMD's and a nuclear weapons facility -- that it would all be on the cheap and take only a few weeks. I do hope there's a tongue deeply embedded in some editor's cheek.And now Maliki is suggesting that election returns have been tampered with and there have been hundreds of accusations of fraud. But never mind, it's mission accomplished and Nixon wasn't a crook.
Yeah, and the Iraqis are back up to the eyeballs in corruption. Just like back in the Saddam days. Their level of corruption makes our Congress look squeaky clean.
ReplyDeleteNothing says a Bush democracy like rampant corruption!!
Huzzah.
ReplyDeleteNow can we bring the troops home and stop sinking billions of $$ in that black hole?
Bullets over Bagdad!
ReplyDeleteDemocracy in Bloom!
Having been there, I pray these people can pull together some semblance of nationhood. I don't care who takes credit.
ReplyDeleteThis is where I really criticize partisans. You're wishing failure on Iraq just so you can hang it on Bush? Not smart.
He's already paid the price anyway. Even conservatives like me are tired of him. I wouldn't give two cents to his presidential library, and I hope we've all learned a lesson about jumping into wars without thinking it through and with only half the country supporting it.
I also hope the dem politicians have learned to grow a pair and vote their convictions.
I hope Iraq succeeds because I never want to go back there and I hope to hell none of my kids, or anybody's kids, ever have to go there unless its for the olympics or some friendly cultural exchange.
You can be four-square against the war and still hope and pray for a good outcome, if nothing else than for the Iraqi people. I don't understand why smirking Bush haters can't see that...
Silverfiddle - "You're wishing failure on Iraq just so you can hang it on Bush? Not smart"
ReplyDeleteI don't want our troops back there either. My oldest daughter, a commissioned officer in the U.S. Army, has been to Iraq 3 times ... plenty of hand-wringing worry and family sacrifices during her 3 deployments there. Why would I want Iraq to become a failed state? You shouldn't make those kinds of assumptions about 'libruls' ... unless your intent is to say something very hurtful.
"News"week seems to have become the official hagiography organ of the Reign of Error.
ReplyDeleteThey've put out some real gems lately in an effort to wipe their monkey's ass. I can hardly wait for the next installment.
Octo: Fair enough, but look at the article again and look at the first two comments.
ReplyDeleteAnd notice I never said "libruls" or "liberals, for that matter. I said partisans, because I apply the same to some Conservatives who are now suddenly anti-war and looking to hang an Afghanistan failure on Obama.
"You're wishing failure on Iraq just so you can hang it on Bush?"
ReplyDeleteI'm just telling the truth and the truth is that there has been no victory, there is no self sustaining democracy and as I said it sounds like a put-on when Newsweek tells us that this is some kind of vindication of the ever shifting reasons for having invaded Iraq.
It's a bit of a stretch to say I'm hoping for failure when I'm only saying it's a cruel joke on us and them to declare victory. It's almost offensive to tell us that this possible corrupt election of a candidate selected and supported by a foreign occupier, actually reflects a successful, stable, democratic government and it is offensive to say that it justifies the destruction of that country and the death of many tens of thousands and the exile of millions.
George Bush brought about this war. He went to great and I think criminal extremes to prosecute it and although I agree in wanting it just to be over, I don't agree with forgetting who started it and why. I don't agree that the necessity of the war has been demonstrated or that it has been successful in stabilizing the region or the planet. Lastly, even though this post was about Newsweek and not about Bush, I don't dislike him because I'm partisan, I'm partisan because I think he is a dishonest man, contemptuous of democracy and the law, who got people killed and destabilized the world for reasons having nothing to do with improving it or protecting us.
Oh, but our Iraq invasion adventure story keeps getting better:
ReplyDeleteIn February, General Ray Odierno, U.S. commander in Iraq, said that Ahmed Chalabi, once the Iraqi-exile darling of the Bush White House, was "clearly influenced by Iran" as a political power broker in the run-up to Iraq's parliamentary elections early this month. "We have direct intelligence that tells us that," the General said, accusing Chalabi of having several meetings in Iran, including ones with a man who is on a reported U.S. terror watch list.
At first glance, it might seem like an unimaginable reversal. This is the man who sat behind First Lady Laura Bush during the 2004 State of the Union address, the indefatigable source of propaganda and "intelligence" for White House hawks seeking legitimacy in their zealous quest to invade Iraq. And now he's accused by a top General (earlier, by the CIA) of perhaps aiding the nation declared by his former patrons to be part of the so-called "Axis of Evil."
Read more from Janine Wedel.
Careful, you don't want to be a "Bush basher"
ReplyDeleteLOL! Too late for that.
ReplyDeleteSilverfiddle - “Fair enough, but look at the article again and look at the first two comments.
ReplyDeleteI still don’t see a link between stating a fact versus engaging in wish fulfillment. On May 1, 2003, the date former President Bush declared ‘Mission Accomplished,’ there were 139 U.S. troops killed and 542 wounded. Since that declaration, fatality figures climbed to 4,385 dead and 31,616 wounded ... and the number of Iraqi casualties are in the hundreds of thousands and millions respectively ... at least as much blood as the deposed dictator ever shed.
‘Mission Accomplished’ may have signaled the end of combat operations but the beginning of a bloodbath. The arrogance and ironies are beyond comprehension. For a snapshot in gross incompetence, take this stroll down Memory Lane.
Well, I was the first commentor and I don't see anything wrong with what I wrote. Is it not true that Iraq is extremely corrupt?
ReplyDeleteThat's not my idea of a successful state or mission. Just because I don't see Iraq succeeding on its own very well doesn't necessarily mean I don't want it to get better.
Of course I do but what I'm not going to do is paper over the reality of a still far from stable country. It's not partisan to look at a highly corrupt government and think that such a result is much of a success.
Unfortunately for some conservatives the legacy of the Iraq war doesn't just end when the fighting dwindles to sporadic violence. The ripples effects of the long-term stability of Iraq are just as important (if not more so) than the war itself.
Anyone can go in and blow up a country and topple a weak government but putting it back together to where it is functioning is the hard part.
Corruption means a barely functioning government and certainly not one that's "free." So, that's why we are so harsh--Bush left Iraq just as broken as he found it.
We're looking at the after-effects of the war and not seeing much to celebrate or see as progress. History is judged on a long term scale and the ripples of the Iraq war are still effecting that country and until it gets better I won't give Bush much credit.
It wouldn't be logical to do so. We can't just pretend that it's all going swimmingly now that it's not in the news all the time.
Silver, you said:
ReplyDelete(Bush)'s already paid the price anyway.
Really? What price is that? The shame some conservatives feel, deservedly so, after the Bush years is no punishment for the man. Neither is the fact that his presidential "library" will remain, um, underutilized. If we were an honest, democratic people, we would make sure Bush and his cronies paid for their criminal (yes) actions. But, as a nation -- and that includes our current president, we prefer to "forgive and forget" -- or at least the former. (Thankfully, not all agree with this generous approach.) This, btw, only makes it probable for the same "mistakes" to be repeated again.
There has been no accountability for the Bush era crimes, domestic and international, perhaps because uncovering the depths of deception and disease that were behind that administration's workings would spoil a good thing America's ruling elite has going for itself here and abroad.
(And, yes, for the record, I am an unabashed Bush basher -- for the same reasons Captain stated above.)
Can't stand the truth? just call it biased and people will think there's another side of equal probability to the story.
ReplyDeleteHey, but at least this guy's polite. That counts for a lot with me and I'm tired of defending Obama from charges of cannibalism, witchcraft and worse.
I agree Captain--politeness goes a long way. I know it looks like we're piling on Silver Fiddle but I appreciate you engaging in this discussion with some civility.
ReplyDeleteI never accused anyone of "saying anything wrong." In fact, I find the posts here, and the commenters generally polite and articulate.
ReplyDeleteI can stand the truth, and I have not argued with you over the validity of the war, nor the correctness of Bush's actions.
I just get my back up when I detect gleeful dancing over perceived US failures.
Iraq will never be a Middle East United States. If we're lucky they may achieve the creaky stability of Egypt without the stalinist police state. They're holding elections and putting a government and society together. At least they are trying.
I also don't expect anyone to "forgive and forget" Bush's actions or the war. I just think that is a separate (but valid) issue from wrapping it up the best we can and praying this comes to a good end, for us and most importantly for the Iraqi people (you know, the ones you shed tears over because of all the things we've done to them?)
I take no offense at anything anyone's said. I am conservative visiting a liberal site so I expect "feedback." Plus, I spent over 20 years in the military, so I've grown some pretty thick skin.
"Democracy" in Iraq is why Bush was forced to sign a Status Of Forces Agreement (SOFA) that guaranteed the complete exit of American forces.
ReplyDeleteIncidentally, there is no native word for "democracy" in Arabic. There is a native word for "socialism" but not for "free market."
Silverfiddle,
ReplyDeleteCynicism is often subject to misinterpretation. Two policy debacles such as Vietnam and Iraq in one lifetime maketh a person of my generation cynical in the extreme. When past policy failures leave us impoverished and traumatized, it is difficult to find grounds for optimism. Criticism does not necessarily signal a wish for continued failure. Quite the contrary: I would prefer to be proved wrong for a change … and get no satisfaction in being proved right.
As you may have observed, there is as much diversity of opinion among liberals as among conservatives. For instance, not all liberals agree with the current Afghan surge, and there is little ground for an optimistic outcome in Afghanistan when an ex-con is put in charge of Marjah, recently liberated from the Taliban. This is the opinion not of a liberal but of conservative commentator Andrew Bacevich, whose opinions I read and admire (and often agree with).
I visited your blog and found your profile which states:
“I am convinced both parties are branches of the same criminal gang looting our country and trashing our constitution. Partisan politics is nothing but a distraction so the looting can continue.”
I agree, and if our reception here has been cautious, hesitant, and less than welcoming, it is unfortunate but understandable since we are often trolled by ‘partisans.’ This too is a sad commentary on our times: It takes time to establish dialogue based on trust.
Nevertheless, we do welcome conservative opinion in this forum; and it is certainly in our best interests when all stakeholders of democracy are constructively engaged.
Silverfiddle, with respect to the future of Iraq, there was an analysis recently put forth by Fareed Zakaria.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking hypothetically, Zakaria believes Iraq has the potential to surpass Iran as a regional power if Iraq’s fledgling democracy can move beyond sectarian conflict and develop its oil resources. The key word is ‘hypothetical.’
Let us wish the Iraqis success … so we don’t have to go back there.
Octo, I read Zakaria's piece,and I agree that success is far from assured.
ReplyDeleteAs for my welcome, no apologies necessary. You oughta see how Grung_e_Gene treats me over at his place!
I am a conservative, so I naturally favor the Republicans, but they lost their way. I find the current trend encouraging, which would naturally put me at odds with most of you, who wish they would come to the middle.
Conservatives wish the Dems would moderate. That's why I generally don't engage in purely political argument of dems vs. republicans, this politician against that one. I do believe that is a game to distract us.
I do enjoy discussing issues such as this one. It is interesting because it contains questions like, "even thought I think the invasion was wrong, can I still hope for a good outcome?"
Conservatives should be learning a lesson about trusting politicians. We gave Bush a free pass and did not intellectually evaluate what he was doing. We should also learn that you can't hammer an ideological round peg into a societal square hole.
People in the Middle East are the way they are for a reason, and certain concepts like "democracy" are foreign, as Matt says. Our cultures are very different and making them change at the point of a gun is a fools errand.
Iraq can be a success, but it will be an Arab/Muslim success, complete with religious bigotry and other mayhem familiar to that part of the world.
I can assure you that I feel no glee over the corruption of my country's ideals, the replacement of those ideals by an "every man for himself" ideology and the loud assertion that we don't owe our country or our countrymen a damned thing much less a wooden nickel.
ReplyDeleteI think of myself as a conservative too, but now that a middle of the road, let's respect the constitution, let's not get dragged into a war to make KBR rich, "I like Ike" attitude is openly portrayed as revolutionary Trotzkyism, I've simply abandoned that entire right/left scale as a pile of stinking marketing hype. I've lost absolutely all traces of respect for the GOP, few of which survived Nixon and I'm convinced down to the bottom of my soul that their economic policies are not only wrong, but fraudulent, not only fraudulent but sustained by attacks against justice and freedom.
I don't think it's the Democrats who have made it impossible to discuss the real costs of various health care reform proposals by screaming about Communism and I don't think the people who insist that Adam Smith was a Marxist have America's best interests at heart or any respect for democracy or truth. Need I mention that they're Republicans for the most part?
I thought the invasion was very wrong, but I believed the obvious lies about WMD because I trusted Powell, one of the first victims of Bush's fraudulent crusade -- but yes, once we went there, I thought we needed to succeed for our own good instead of our usual bomb and abandon policy. None the less, I hate the continual and ever shifting stream of lies and misrepresentations and most of all the unrelenting personal attacks on any kind of critics no matter how true and accurate -- critics are just traitors, the President is never wrong and "Liberals" are the problem. As though opposing a war is a "liberal" thing instead of being definitively conservative.
If I ever feel anything akin to glee, it's at the thought that formerly blind supporters of the movement masquerading as conservatism might just be forced to wake up and stop blaming everyone but themselves for their own deeds: bankrupting the country, cheating us out of our birthright, setting us against one another, abridging civil rights, driving the middle class into poverty and making a very few people stinking rich in the process.
"Let us wish the Iraqis success"
ReplyDeleteOf course, but not a phony success, a cardboard democracy ready to topple as soon as we stop propping it up. This war started as a fraud and it won't go away with a fraudulent victory -- and that, if anyone has forgotten, was what my post was about.
Yeah, Eisenhower with his warning against the military industrial complex would be lambasted as a socialist. As would Teddy Roosevelt who believed in CONSERVING the environment.
ReplyDeleteThis is getting a little off bit, and I apologize to the Cap for this but, I never understood how conserving our natural resources isn't a CONSERVATIVE issue!! Isn't conservatism all about conserving things as they have always been?
Such as keeping our forests, etc in their pristine state where possible. Not that I'm accusing Silver Fiddle of that at all. I don't know where he stands on nature. I'm just talking about the conservatives who don't care about conserving our environment.
Warning! A rant ahead!
ReplyDeleteThis war started as a fraud and it won't go away with a fraudulent victory
Indeed. What on Earth makes some people think that they can bomb another nation into democracy?
I never bought into the WMD scaremongering. It made absolutely no sense, from any conceivable angle.
First, Bush and Co. were tying it to 9/11 -- and there was no connection.
Second, international inspectors on the ground in Iraq insisted that there was no evidence of WMD.
Third, even if Iraq had WMD, how would they be a threat to the US (remember, Bush insisted Iraq WMD posed an imminent danger to us)? In what ways would Saddam manage to unleash them on the US (assuming that he would be so reckless and stupid -- and Saddam was many things, but not that)?
The WMD rationale stank to high heaven from the get-go, but it fit very nicely with the neocons' Project for the New American Century -- in fact, invading Iraq was part of their blueprint for the US military domination of the world. And the Bush's administration was populated with neocons -- in him, they found a perfect tool to execute their plans. (Watch for Palin to take on this role now.)
So those are more or less logical reasons that should have made anyone suspicious of the WMD rationale.
But then there were the claims about overthrowing tyranny and instituting democracy in Iraq. Which, of course, made even less sense. We would invade a sovereign nation, bomb its cities, destroy its infrastructure, and torture and kill its citizens in order to liberate them from a tyranny of a leader, who although he was no Gandhi, kept their country together and maintained a semblance of a civil society in it (desperately missing now)? And we expected its citizens to greet us with flowers and candy, as Richard Perle, Thomas Friedman, and yes, Fareed Zakaria himself, predicted?
In what universe do things work out this way? Certainly not that of human affairs. Here, btw, we could see another glaring failure of empathy -- because if we and our leaders were able and willing to put ourselves in the Iraqis' shoes, we would immediately understand how foolish these plans were. Would we want to be liberated (and we do need liberation) this way by another, more powerful nation -- say, China? I didn't think so. But hey, empathy is not our strong suit.
I remember the days leading to the Iraq invasion and afterwards as full of rage and disbelief on my part. Our country's actions were so blatantly unjust, illogical, harmful and yes, criminal, that they defied everything I believed in. I watched the pundits on TV and read their glowing endorsements of the invasion with a sick feeling in my stomach and will forever remember their names and faces (yes, Friedman and Zakaria). I will continue to have nothing but disdain and contempt for anyone who in any way endorsed or supported this criminal and deadly enterprise.
But our collective memories are short -- the pundits, as usual, keep blathering on and raking big paychecks, unencumbered by their complicity in mayhem and murder. Why, these days Friedman says, with his trademark cheerful face, It's Up to Iraqis Now. Good Luck. Good luck?! Makes me want to puke.
And since we are on the subject of the "democratic victory" in Iraq: during the Saddam era, Iraq had one of the most progressive societies in the Middle East, with women having a full access to education, health care (for all, btw), employment, choice of spouses and other forms of personal freedom. Now Iraqi women are afraid to leave their homes -- because when they do, they are fair game for religious zealots. I guess this too falls under Rumsfeld's infamous "democracy is messy" declaration, issued, with an astonishing indifference, when confronted with looting of Iraq's museums after our "democratizing" invasion.
So is this victory or progress? For whom?
@Elizabeth...The other problem with the whole "we need to overthrow tyranny" argument is that there are tyrants all over the world!!
ReplyDeleteI have a degree in African history and I can tell you that most of Africa is run by dictators. As well as much of South and Central America.
Not to mention the rest of the Middle-East, Burma and on and on. If we had to invade Iraq because of tyranny then doesn't that argument call for invading all countries led by dictators?
Otherwise, aren't we just playing favorites? Not that I ever bought the argument in the first place but still....
I don't know if any of you listen to Bill Bennett in the Morning, but he talks about approaching a debate with intelligence, candor and goodwill. I find all three here.
ReplyDeleteI respect what you are saying, and I certainly am not questioning anyone's sincerity or patriotism.
I don't troll to be provocative, I do it because I want to hear what people with different opinions than mine are saying.
As for conservatives and the environment, conservation can take many forms. I love the rocky mountains. I ski, hunt, fish, camp and hike there. It's where the tasty animals live!
I don't want to see it destroyed, which is why I am adamantly opposed to any effort to bring the winter olympics to Colorado. Corporations win, we lose.
Germany has beautiful forests tended by forest meisters, and it is illegal to cut down a tree without permission. Those forests are criss crossed with logging roads and punctuated with quarries and other industrial operations with small footprints. It does not detract from their beauty.
They selectively and smartly keep them thinned out resulting in a healthy forest for hikers and bikers.
A bigger danger than conservatism is statism, or corporatism. It knows no ideology or party.
I know the GOP is supposed to be the party of the rich and of big business, but so are the Democrats. Any politician can be bought.
The real wall of separation needs to be between big business and the state.
One good rant deserves another, eh Elizabeth?!
Handsome, of course we (dis)like some dictators more than others. Seems that as long as they comply with American interests, they are OK -- good, nice dictators. That burning desire of ours to bring democracy to their nations becomes rather less important then, even as the tyrants decimate their populace.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy shmemocracy. If we should already learn one thing it is that whenever our leaders start talking about bringing democracy to some other part of the world, they mean something quite the contrary.
Silver, you said:
The real wall of separation needs to be between big business and the state.
Now that's a rant I could fully support -- and even join myself.