Someone Tell the President the War is Over

[mirror]

Someone Tell the President the War Is Over

The president's cable cadre is in disarray as well. At Fox News Bill O'Reilly is trashing Donald Rumsfeld for his incompetence, and Ann Coulter is chiding Mr. O'Reilly for being a defeatist. In an emblematic gesture akin to waving a white flag, Robert Novak walked off a CNN set and possibly out of a job rather than answer questions about his role in smearing the man who helped expose the administration's prewar inflation of Saddam W.M.D.'s. (On this sinking ship, it's hard to know which rat to root for.)

As if the right-wing pundit crackup isn't unsettling enough, Mr. Bush's top war strategists, starting with Mr. Rumsfeld and Gen. Richard Myers, have of late tried to rebrand the war in Iraq as what the defense secretary calls "a global struggle against violent extremism." A struggle is what you have with your landlord. When the war's über-managers start using euphemisms for a conflict this lethal, it's a clear sign that the battle to keep the Iraq war afloat with the American public is lost.

That battle crashed past the tipping point this month in Ohio. There's historical symmetry in that. It was in Cincinnati on Oct. 7, 2002, that Mr. Bush gave the fateful address that sped Congressional ratification of the war just days later. The speech was a miasma of self-delusion, half-truths and hype. The president said that "we know that Iraq and Al Qaeda have had high-level contacts that go back a decade," an exaggeration based on evidence that the Senate Intelligence Committee would later find far from conclusive. He said that Saddam "could have a nuclear weapon in less than a year" were he able to secure "an amount of highly enriched uranium a little larger than a single softball." Our own National Intelligence Estimate of Oct. 1 quoted State Department findings that claims of Iraqi pursuit of uranium in Africa were "highly dubious."

It was on these false premises - that Iraq was both a collaborator on 9/11 and about to inflict mushroom clouds on America - that honorable and brave young Americans were sent off to fight. Among them were the 19 marine reservists from a single suburban Cleveland battalion slaughtered in just three days at the start of this month. As they perished, another Ohio marine reservist who had served in Iraq came close to winning a Congressional election in southern Ohio. Paul Hackett, a Democrat who called the president a "chicken hawk," received 48 percent of the vote in exactly the kind of bedrock conservative Ohio district that decided the 2004 election for Mr. Bush.

These are the tea leaves that all Republicans, not just Chuck Hagel, are reading now. Newt Gingrich called the Hackett near-victory "a wake-up call." The resolutely pro-war New York Post editorial page begged Mr. Bush (to no avail) to "show some leadership" by showing up in Ohio to salute the fallen and their families. A Bush loyalist, Senator George Allen of Virginia, instructed the president to meet with Cindy Sheehan, the mother camping out in Crawford, as "a matter of courtesy and decency." Or, to translate his Washingtonese, as a matter of politics. Only someone as adrift from reality as Mr. Bush would need to be told that a vacationing president can't win a standoff with a grief-stricken parent commandeering TV cameras and the blogosphere 24/7.

Such political imperatives are rapidly bringing about the war's end. That's inevitable for a war of choice, not necessity, that was conceived in politics from the start. Iraq was a Bush administration idée fixe before there was a 9/11. Within hours of that horrible trauma, according to Richard Clarke's "Against All Enemies," Mr. Rumsfeld was proposing Iraq as a battlefield, not because the enemy that attacked America was there, but because it offered "better targets" than the shadowy terrorist redoubts of Afghanistan. It was easier to take out Saddam - and burnish Mr. Bush's credentials as a slam-dunk "war president," suitable for a "Top Gun" victory jig - than to shut down Al Qaeda and smoke out its leader "dead or alive."

But just as politics are a bad motive for choosing a war, so they can be a doomed engine for running a war. In an interview with Tim Russert early last year, Mr. Bush said, "The thing about the Vietnam War that troubles me, as I look back, was it was a political war," adding that the "essential" lesson he learned from Vietnam was to not have "politicians making military decisions." But by then Mr. Bush had disastrously ignored that very lesson; he had let Mr. Rumsfeld publicly rebuke the Army's chief of staff, Eric Shinseki, after the general dared tell the truth: that several hundred thousand troops would be required to secure Iraq. To this day it's our failure to provide that security that has turned the country into the terrorist haven it hadn't been before 9/11 - "the central front in the war on terror," as Mr. Bush keeps reminding us, as if that might make us forget he's the one who recklessly created it.

The endgame for American involvement in Iraq will be of a piece with the rest of this sorry history. "It makes no sense for the commander in chief to put out a timetable" for withdrawal, Mr. Bush declared on the same day that 14 of those Ohio troops were killed by a roadside bomb in Haditha. But even as he spoke, the war's actual commander, Gen. George Casey, had already publicly set a timetable for "some fairly substantial reductions" to start next spring. Officially this calendar is tied to the next round of Iraqi elections, but it's quite another election this administration has in mind. The priority now is less to save Jessica Lynch (or Iraqi democracy) than to save Rick Santorum and every other endangered Republican facing voters in November 2006.

Nothing that happens on the ground in Iraq can turn around the fate of this war in America: not a shotgun constitution rushed to meet an arbitrary deadline, not another Iraqi election, not higher terrorist body counts, not another battle for Falluja (where insurgents may again regroup, The Los Angeles Times reported last week). A citizenry that was asked to accept tax cuts, not sacrifice, at the war's inception is hardly in the mood to start sacrificing now. There will be neither the volunteers nor the money required to field the wholesale additional American troops that might bolster the security situation in Iraq.

WHAT lies ahead now in Iraq instead is not victory, which Mr. Bush has never clearly defined anyway, but an exit (or triage) strategy that may echo Johnson's March 1968 plan for retreat from Vietnam: some kind of negotiations (in this case, with Sunni elements of the insurgency), followed by more inflated claims about the readiness of the local troops-in-training, whom we'll then throw to the wolves. Such an outcome may lead to even greater disaster, but this administration long ago squandered the credibility needed to make the difficult case that more human and financial resources might prevent Iraq from continuing its descent into civil war and its devolution into jihad central.

Thus the president's claim on Thursday that "no decision has been made yet" about withdrawing troops from Iraq can be taken exactly as seriously as the vice president's preceding fantasy that the insurgency is in its "last throes." The country has already made the decision for Mr. Bush. We're outta there. Now comes the hard task of identifying the leaders who can pick up the pieces of the fiasco that has made us more vulnerable, not less, to the terrorists who struck us four years ago next month.

Bush's credibility is so low that Republicians in their desperation fabicated a story and circulated it about Cindy Sheehan making some comments about Isreal. I wonder if Karl Rove was behind that as well! Don't these morons ever learn!

[newbie]

What's really sad mirror is, regardless of how you rationalize it, those poor marines, soldiers and civilians died for nothing. What a great legacy Dubya will leave.

[mirror]

What's even sadder is that the Democrats would probably have done the same thing, don'tcha think?

[crazymf]

A worse mistake than the ones made already would be to pull out prematurely. This story is far from over and to start using recent history to judge events as they unfold is undoubtedly shortsighted. I have no doubt that there won't be a clear outcome to this.

What would make this conflict worse than it is is if they started drafting soldiers to fight. The public opinion of the war would plummet to lows resembling Vietnam.

However:

Canada's support of our neighbors in a time of need is despicable. Our government is full of gutless wonders like Martin and the former, Cretien. While we do not have a military much larger than Portuguls, at least they could have garnered political support for the Americans and at least sent someone to help, even support troops or staff.

Instead, the bleeding heart liberals sit on their butts and complain about the right wing doing everything wrong. I have never felt so low being Canadian as I have since 911 with our governments decisions to abandon our friends to the south when they need us.

Another decision the west doesn't get to participate in. Shame on us.

[mirror]

Such political imperatives are rapidly bringing about the war's end. That's inevitable for a war of choice, not necessity, that was conceived in politics from the start. Iraq was a Bush administration idée fixe before there was a 9/11. Within hours of that horrible trauma, according to Richard Clarke's "Against All Enemies," Mr. Rumsfeld was proposing Iraq as a battlefield, not because the enemy that attacked America was there, but because it offered "better targets" than the shadowy terrorist redoubts of Afghanistan. It was easier to take out Saddam - and burnish Mr. Bush's credentials as a slam-dunk "war president," suitable for a "Top Gun" victory jig - than to shut down Al Qaeda and smoke out its leader "dead or alive."

Canadians would have been there in a flash if the US has persued a legitimate ememy, but instead it was all about BIG OIL and nothing to do with capturing bin Laden or WMD. What a sick sick society we have to the South of us. Thank goodness for people like Jean Chretien and Cindy Sheehan who are the real heroes in this tragic war, because they have contributed to ended it sooner rather than later. And that is why the war monger Harper will never ever get his hands on the levers of power in Canada, no matter how badly the Liberals screw up.

[Shakeyhands]

A worse mistake than the ones made already would be to pull out prematurely. This story is far from over and to start using recent history to judge events as they unfold is undoubtedly shortsighted. I have no doubt that there won't be a clear outcome to this.

What would make this conflict worse than it is is if they started drafting soldiers to fight. The public opinion of the war would plummet to lows resembling Vietnam.

However:

Canada's support of our neighbors in a time of need is despicable. Our government is full of gutless wonders like Martin and the former, Cretien. While we do not have a military much larger than Portuguls, at least they could have garnered political support for the Americans and at least sent someone to help, even support troops or staff.

Instead, the bleeding heart liberals sit on their butts and complain about the right wing doing everything wrong. I have never felt so low being Canadian as I have since 911 with our governments decisions to abandon our friends to the south when they need us.

Another decision the west doesn't get to participate in. Shame on us.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

perhaps based on your post I am glad that the "west" didn't get to make the call on this one... to what end our involvment in Iraq? to be mired in the quagmire as well running up our own deficet just to placate whatever it is that you feel that we owe to the Americans? its an unjust war carried out in the face of International condemnation and based on lies. Give me a break

[newbie]

Canada's support of our neighbors in a time of need is despicable.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

A time of need?? The only need here was the President's selfish desire to invade a country that exhibited no immediate threat. Most of the world saw through that and refused to support that initiative. Our former PM at least did something right by signing off on the bogus campaign.

[newbie]

What's even sadder is that the Democrats would probably have done the same thing, don'tcha think?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Jury is out on that one mirror, but I don't think someone like Clinton would have carpet bombed Baghdad.

[crazymf]

Well, I knew I'd take flack on this, but think slightly more global than just Iraq for instance. It's just a speck. If it wasn't for the USA and the SAC, we'd probably be speaking either Russian or Chinese by now. And if something bigger ever breaks out I'm sure there won't be all the whining and complaining when we jump straight into bed with uncle sam against whoever it is. I heard just today that the Russians and Chinese were conducting joint military exercises.

I gotta say, I still remember the nuclear threat and having to listen to the air raid tests right here in Edmonton. It's not that long ago. You guys are saying that Bush is pissing away all the good will the USA has built up in the past. Maybe so, but aside from Bush's shortcomings and a few warmongering twits like Wolfowitz, the USA is our friend.

The true Canadian way is to talk problems to death and then do nothing in the end. At least the Americans do something, right or wrong, they do something. They may not always be a world dominating power. What then? You think Canada, with all it's gay married people and imminent free dope laws is going to stop anybody from taking us at will?

You guys better hope I'm wrong if you're going to keep bashing our neighbors. This country is turning into a bunch of pansies.

[mirror]

I have some nice pansies in my garden. That's what you meant isn't it.

Of couse we are good neighbours with the US but when they bully us it is important for Canada to stand up to them, and also if we really are their good friend, we need to tell them when they are wrong like what we did about invading Iraq.

Things though are slowing changing in the US even although perhaps the President doesn't yet grasp it.

Get Real

[newbie]

You guys better hope I'm wrong if you're going to keep bashing our neighbors. This country is turning into a bunch of pansies.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I don't bash all Americans, just this particular administration. I was totally on board when we went into Afghanistan. That's where the roots of Al Queda seemed to be. But Mr. President had his own agenda going into Iraq. I still maintain we did the right thing to stay out of it.

[crazymf]

I have some nice pansies in my garden. That's what you meant isn't it.

Of couse we are good neighbours with the US but when they bully us it is important for Canada to stand up to them, and also if we really are their good friend, we need to tell them when they are wrong like what we did about invading Iraq.

Things though are slowing changing in the US even though perhaps the President doesn't yet grasp it.

Get Real

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, as I stated, it's too early for me to pass judgement on the Iraq war. Don't forget, it's not long ago that they just figured out what happened in Vietnam and what it's total impact was.

The article is a nice chronology interspersed with fairly apolitical chidings. I enjoyed reading it. I'd love to see how Canada was reacting in the same context as that.

I guess from where I stand, I feel more in common with the USA than Ottawa, Quebec, or southern Ontario. I don't think I'm alone in that around here either.

I like to simplify things. I still think that old Bush has had his sights on Iraq since the gulf war, and he convinced young Bush to focus on it. I was frankly confused a bit how fast gw switched the target to Iraq, but on the other hand, there has been a feeling of unfinished business for 10 years or so after the gulf. I don't see how the world could have expected any different. The USA was justifiably riled up after 911. It's just a matter of opinion how much is too much payback.

Every time there is a leader who pushes really hard, there gets to be a strong opposition who pushes hard back. That's a check and a balance imo.

Bush is a guy like that. I'm a meat and potatoes guy having worked a trade for 20 years and can appreciate a leader who gets things done. I'm oriented toward people who are in your face and frank. That's why I like GW and Ralph.

It's just the way I am and it doesn't make me a bad person.

[mirror]

I agree. It doesn't make you a bad person.

[theloniusfleabag]

Dear crazymf,

You guys are saying that Bush is pissing away all the good will the USA has built up in the past. Maybe so, but aside from Bush's shortcomings and a few warmongering twits like Wolfowitz, the USA is our friend.

The USA was, once upon a time, to be admired. I miss that old USA. I grew up in the 70's (graduated in early 80's) and that USA is nothing like the one today.

I have never felt so low being Canadian as I have since 911 with our governments decisions to abandon our friends to the south when they need us.

Canada was right there, serving with distinction, against the Taliban after 9/11. Some US troops handed over their weapons to Canadian snipers because they respected their abilities so much. However, the Iraqi invasion was seen by most of the world as a 'war of choice' by the US, and clearly the evidence shows that the US was acting solely with their own agenda (nation building or otherwise, they weren't truthful), and not, as they claim, against 'terrorism'. They have done their credibility tremendous harm, which is a shame. If someone is to stand up for freedom, democracy and fairness in the world, it is now going to be harder for the US to make allies for action, because fewer people trust them than ever before.

[crazymf]

I guess what I'm trying to say is I'm not ready to jump on any bandwagon dissing the USA just yet. They're self centered hard headed people, sometimes as ignorant as all get out, maybe even usually. However, they run us one way or another and all we can do is fight it. I find that counterproductive. The sooner North America has a common currency like Europe and less borders, the better off we'll all be.

Fleabag, I graduated in 76 when one of our dollars was worth 1.20 us. That was a year after Vietnam ended and it's coming again. The dollar is a changing.

I did a music tour through the USA in 77 and in Philidelphia had a screwed up veteran hold a shotgun to my head after buying some dope from him. That was fun...

Watch and wait before passing judgement on our brothers....

[mirror]

Shades of Vietnam?

Here come the protests:

It never ceases to amaze me how a few dedicated people can change the course of history by initially displaying some courage. But then again that is the only way change usually takes place.

Anti-war rally downtown

[newbie]

I did a music tour through the USA in 77

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Hey, a musician in our midst? Well, you can't be all that bad then.

[crazymf]

Yeah, some of us have lived a bit before we got here and got called western separatist anti-gay rednecks.

[Black Dog]

Well, I knew I'd take flack on this, but think slightly more global than just Iraq for instance. It's just a speck. If it wasn't for the USA and the SAC, we'd probably be speaking either Russian or Chinese by now. And if something bigger ever breaks out I'm sure there won't be all the whining and complaining when we jump straight into bed with uncle sam against whoever it is. I heard just today that the Russians and Chinese were conducting joint military exercises.

I gotta say, I still remember the nuclear threat and having to listen to the air raid tests right here in Edmonton. It's not that long ago. You guys are saying that Bush is pissing away all the good will the USA has built up in the past. Maybe so, but aside from Bush's shortcomings and a few warmongering twits like Wolfowitz, the USA is our friend.

The true Canadian way is to talk problems to death and then do nothing in the end. At least the Americans do something, right or wrong, they do something. They may not always be a world dominating power. What then? You think Canada, with all it's gay married people and imminent free dope laws is going to stop anybody from taking us at will?

You guys better hope I'm wrong if you're going to keep bashing our neighbors. This country is turning into a bunch of pansies.

Um...there's only one nation that poses a viable threat to Canada's terrotory, and that's the U.S.A. Three oceans and thousands of kilometers of empty tundra make us immue to invasion by anyone else.

Otherwise, I really don't see the point here. That Canada should simply toe the Yankee line because "the U.S. is our friend"? That close relationship is a an albatross around our neck. We've become over reliant on the U.S. economically, which severely impairs our ability to act as a soverign nation. Also, should teh U.S. econmomy ever bottom out, then they'll drag us down with it. I think our energies would be best devoted to diversifying our economic partners (anyone know Mandarin?).

[crazymf]

BD, you're showing your naive colors. Like your post about rules of conquest on the other thread, you seem to want to live by rules and regulations. That's all great providing everybody plays by those rules. Outside of our borders are many more sets of rules and regulations.

Saying we are immune to invasion from the north is mere isolationism or more naivity.

Working against the states is like the mouse crawling up the elephants leg only to get pissed off. You're right on one account, if they go down we get dragged down too. My opinion is that we need to work closer with them to become a more similar society. Acting as the defiant little brother all the time only hurts us, not them.

Diplomacy and rules only work until the bombs come out. Then it's natures rules, survival of the fittest.

One more thing. No matter what you come back with on this, and I'm sure it will be something, if we no longer serve the US's interest being self governing, we will become state immediately. If by some whacko election, for instance, a communist government took power in Canada, the states would invade immediately and take over. There would be NOTHING for us to do about it either. It would be over in days if not hours. The only reason we are still soveriegn is because they want us to be.

[Black Dog]

Saying we are immune to invasion from the north is mere isolationism or more naivity.

No, it's realism. Who is in a position to take on such a logistical nightmare?

Working against the states is like the mouse crawling up the elephants leg only to get pissed off. You're right on one account, if they go down we get dragged down too. My opinion is that we need to work closer with them to become a more similar society. Acting as the defiant little brother all the time only hurts us, not them.

How can you, on one hand, acknowledge the danger of a closer relatonship with the U.S. and, on the other, call for an even closer one? You're contradicting yourself.

Diplomacy and rules only work until the bombs come out. Then it's natures rules, survival of the fittest.

So the September 11, 2001 attacks on the WTC were justifiable! Hitler should be celebrated!

One more thing. No matter what you come back with on this, and I'm sure it will be something, if we no longer serve the US's interest being self governing, we will become state immediately. If by some whacko election, for instance, a communist government took power in Canada, the states would invade immediately and take over. There would be NOTHING for us to do about it either. It would be over in days if not hours. The only reason we are still soveriegn is because they want us to be.

One giant blue state.

[crazymf]

BD, I think you totally don't even understand what I'm saying to you so I'll try to be clearer.

No, it's realism. Who is in a position to take on such a logistical nightmare?

Anybody with a motive and airplanes. ie. Russia? China?

How can you, on one hand, acknowledge the danger of a closer relatonship with the U.S. and, on the other, call for an even closer one? You're contradicting yourself.

No contradiction at all. You put words in my mouth to suit yourself. I state that our economy is tied to theirs, so why fight to be different when we can strengthen our similarities instead.

So the September 11, 2001 attacks on the WTC were justifiable! Hitler should be celebrated!

Twisted statement there BD. Sarcasm doesn't do well with you.

The attacks were no doubt justifiable to the extremist twits who did them, not to us. That's why retaliation is justifiable to us for those attacks though. If you want to celebrate Hitler, go ahead. I don't see how the two are related.

One giant blue state.

Again. You seem naive to me. Talking apples to my oranges. Blue, red, whatever. I can tell you'll be confused if it ever happens.

[Black Dog]

Anybody with a motive and airplanes. ie. Russia? China?

Methinks you've watched "Red Dawn" one too many times. Sure, I suppose a theoretical airborn invasion could be undertaken. of course such an invasion would require an enormous force and a tremendous amount of supplies, as the invaders would be a long ways away from their home base. Then there's the small matter of holding onto such a vast amount of territory. Even a small military like Canada's could mount an effective resistance against such an invasion.

I state that our economy is tied to theirs, so why fight to be different when we can strengthen our similarities instead.

Because if they go down, we go down wih it? And because we're not really all that similar.

The attacks were no doubt justifiable to the extremist twits who did them, not to us. That's why retaliation is justifiable to us for those attacks though. If you want to celebrate Hitler, go ahead. I don't see how the two are related.

Not twisted, just applying your logic.

When you take away any rule of law or moral guideline and adhere to such "survival of the fittest" thinking, you surrender the right to make moral judgements, simply becuase the law of the jungle precludes morality.

If survival of the fittest is the only rule, then Hitler's invasion and occupation of other weaker countries was justifiable, as was his attempted genocide (after all if the Jews et al were too weak to resist, then that's the way of the "law of the jungle.")

Again. You seem naive to me. Talking apples to my oranges. Blue, red, whatever. I can tell you'll be confused if it ever happens.

Naive? Nope. Consistent? Yup. Can you say the same?

[crazymf]

Anybody with a motive and airplanes. ie. Russia? China?

Methinks you've watched "Red Dawn" one too many times. Sure, I suppose a theoretical airborn invasion could be undertaken. of course such an invasion would require an enormous force and a tremendous amount of supplies, as the invaders would be a long ways away from their home base. Then there's the small matter of holding onto such a vast amount of territory. Even a small military like Canada's could mount an effective resistance against such an invasion.

I state that our economy is tied to theirs, so why fight to be different when we can strengthen our similarities instead.

Because if they go down, we go down wih it? And because we're not really all that similar.

The attacks were no doubt justifiable to the extremist twits who did them, not to us. That's why retaliation is justifiable to us for those attacks though. If you want to celebrate Hitler, go ahead. I don't see how the two are related.

Not twisted, just applying your logic.

When you take away any rule of law or moral guideline and adhere to such "survival of the fittest" thinking, you surrender the right to make moral judgements, simply becuase the law of the jungle precludes morality.

If survival of the fittest is the only rule, then Hitler's invasion and occupation of other weaker countries was justifiable, as was his attempted genocide (after all if the Jews et al were too weak to resist, then that's the way of the "law of the jungle.")

Again. You seem naive to me. Talking apples to my oranges. Blue, red, whatever. I can tell you'll be confused if it ever happens.

Naive? Nope. Consistent? Yup. Can you say the same?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Seeing as how you still don't understand what I'm saying:

If someone slapped you upside the head, I think you would tell him that was against the rules. If there was nobody there to help you enforce your rules, and you got slapped upside the other side of your head, you'd be screwed. Talking wouldn't help much at that point. Do you get it yet???

Conquest is like that.

I suppose you're in favor of the gun laws too? Of course you are.

[Black Dog]

Seeing as how you still don't understand what I'm saying:

If someone slapped you upside the head, I think you would tell him that was against the rules. If there was nobody there to help you enforce your rules, and you got slapped upside the other side of your head, you'd be screwed. Talking wouldn't help much at that point. Do you get it yet???

Conquest is like that.

So Hitler was wrong not because he invaded countries and killed millions of people, but because there was someone to enforce the rules?

And this contradicts me...how?

I suppose you're in favor of the gun laws too? Of course you are.

Since I don't own guns, I don't really care. I don't understand the near sexual fetishization of firearms by some segments of the population, but hey: whatever floats yer boats.