<p>Half of U.S. still believes Iraq had WMD</p>
<p>[And</a> 36% believe that the US had a hand in 9/11?](<a href=“http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/279827_conspiracy02ww.html?source=mypi]And”>http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/279827_conspiracy02ww.html?source=mypi)</p>
<p>So I guess I am with the 14% that isn’t in either camp</p>
<p>Should we assume these spiffy politico’s are avid CNN viewers? :)</p>
<p>Blue State Update (Zogby poll of NYC):</p>
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<a href=“http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20040830120349841[/url]”>http://www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20040830120349841</a></p>
<p>Damn, gullibility seems pretty evenly dispersed.</p>
<p>EDIT: I wonder what the number was in Connecticut?</p>
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<p>Not at all. If the US military leaders were giving nice, upbeat assessments and they were consistent with reports of peace and brotherhood breaking out all over Iraq, and US soldiers were no longer getting killed, I’d be perfectly willing to believe the generals.</p>
<p>And when the US military leaders are giving somber, depressing assessments that are consistent with reports of car bombs, mass slaughter in mosques, and bodies piling up in the morgues, and US soldiers continue to fly home from Iraq in caskets, I’m perfectly willing to believe the generals in that case too.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, the latter situation is what we’ve got right now.</p>
<p>I happened to catch Chris Matthews’ show the other night. He was absolutely raving about the “civil war” in Iraq and his statements did NOT match what the generals had said. They said Iraq appears to be headed in that direction (which I don’t dispute), but Matthews took it about 4 steps further than that.</p>
<p>The Philadelphia Inquirer’s headline on those generals was to this effect: “Generals see civil war possibility in Iraq.” The much smaller sub-head said “Call prospect unlikely.” It’s hard to know what to believe in this climate.</p>
<p>Driver posted: “It’s hard to know what to believe in this climate.”</p>
<p>It sure is. I was really upset about some of the really awful coverage. Not for partisan reasons, but because I think misinformation inflames the situation.</p>
<p>“It sounds to me like you are willing to accept the military leaders opinions when it corresponds with your world view but disregard it if it contradicts your view.”</p>
<p>No, this is an example of the universal principle – applied in courts of law as well as in the real world–that statements against self-interest are far more reliable than other kinds of statements. </p>
<p>When someone says, “I’m doing a great job, and it’s all sunshine and roses on the path ahead of me,” you should seek independent confirmation, no matter the speaker or the topic.</p>
<p>When someone says, “I’m struggling in my attempt to resolve a terrible mess, and I don’t know whether I can achieve the mission I’ve set out to complete,” you can usually take them at their word.</p>
<p>So Driver, I will pose the same question to you that FF so artfully avoided:</p>
<p>At what point will you consider what is going on currently in Iraq a civil war, since you clearly believe that 100 violent sectarian murders a day doesn’t yet meet your definition.</p>
<p>If 100 or more sectarian murders is not a civil war, what shall we call it?</p>
<p>When a regular army forms that opposes the current iraqi gov’t, until then its just terror being pushed in by iran and syria more so than by the iraqis themselves</p>
<p>“Civil war” has a specific meaning, and it’s not dependent on the number of “violent sectarian murders a day”–or even the non-violent sectarian murders per day, come to think of it. It wasn’t a civil war when Nazis came to power and began wiping out their Jewish fellow citizens, for example. Same thing in the African countries that suffer from tribal genocide. Our own “Civil War” was a war of secession. In a civil war, two sides are at war for control of one government.</p>
<p>The car bombers of Iraq appear to be trying to foment civil war. It won’t happen because we’re not leaving any time soon. In fact the only reason the car bombers haven’t been genocided out of existence by the Shia is that we’re not leaving. It is ironic, but the only thing that keeps them alive is our presence. People who have never been to the Middle East don’t understand the tribal and clan ties that exist beneath any supposed religious or ethnic or national ties. The Tikritis can be better understood if thought of as members of an extended Mafia family. There are a whole lot of disaffected people setting off bombs in Iraq, some related to each other, some not.</p>
<p>Did anyone notice that there were Iranians killed among the Hezbolla fighters in Lebanon today? Interesting. Revolutionary Guard types.</p>
<p>Driver, with the caveat that instead of controlling the government, stopping the government from functioning is one of the goals of some of the combatants in Iraq, Iraq most certainly is in a state of civil war.</p>
<p>However, the picture is clouded by the superimposition of multiple images.</p>
<p>Conditions in Iraq are host to a least five different “sides”, some of whom fluidly cooperate with each other or are proxies for each other and then not.
(I’d probably make it six sides, myself, though I concede that it’s arguable.)</p>
<p>For 20 points, name the five sides:</p>
<p>For 100 bonus points, describe conditions for “victory” that accounts for the status of these five sides and is within the realm of political reality as determined by the Iraqis on the ground.</p>
<p>I’ll judge the results. If any of them are really good, I’ll forward them to our government.</p>
<p>I’ll forgo your bonus points TD…but please do share Juan Cole’s latest neat oversimplification of a country he’s never visited.</p>
<p>Funny, but everybody forgoes the bonus points. Just a dogged blind endorsement of Bush’s lemming-like stay-the-course without any consideration of where the course leads.</p>
<p>I don’t need Juan Cole to do my analysis for me, the situation is pretty clear to any reasonably competent observer. However, he is one of the best aggregator’s of information that doesn’t cut through the noise and chaff to make it into the U.S. press.</p>
<p>The conventional unwisdom holds that there are basically three “sectarian” groups fighting over Iraq. The Kurds, the Shia, and the Sunni. Of course, there are two successful Kurd factions that basically seem to be getting along. There are a couple of “primary” Shia factions that people like to toss around–Sistani, and Mookie, for example. Then there are the Tikriti Mafia, and then the other Sunni. Those are the simplistic six. The situation is far more complicated than that, so it would be great if you would share your far deeper understanding of the region, TD. Just to stop all the lemming-like stuff.</p>
<p>I’m with Post #13. As a 10-year Navy vet, I was not at all worried about our forces finding the WMDs. I ASSUMED they would “plant” them if they couldn’t find any, and am amazed they didn’t. So while you might think W is a fool, at least he’s honest enough to have not taken the easy way out by planting some WMDs.</p>
<p>As to whether or not it’s a “civil war”…I’m from the Detroit area, so to me what’s going on over there looks like a rough weekend or a World Series championship celebration.</p>
<p>You more or less qualify for the 20 points. But that doesn’t stop the lemming stuff. You have to successfully get the 100 bonus points to do that.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Cheney says that Lamont’s victory encourages Al Qaeda. What a bankrupt bit of excrement. I guess they’ll keep waving the voodoo doll. But I think that the majority of the public has caught on.</p>
<p>So Driver…when did you have your last visit to Iraq, since you seem to have such an “Up Close and Personal” view of the region. It appears that you beleive you understand how much more complicated the sectarian situation is than the rest of us, so please…do share… (I’ll add a little LOL, just for fun!)</p>
<p>
I had the opportunity throughout my high school and college years (the 70s, basically) to travel extensively in the Levant, Arabian peninsula, and northern Africa. Not to Iraq, though, and I don’t profess to be an expert. What my experiences have taught me is how much I don’t understand about the Middle East. But that in itself is an educational hurdle light-years ahead of the talking heads we rely on for information, who do believe that they’re experts and have it all figured out. That would apply to people on both sides of the issue.</p>
<p>Iraq is a ****hole, i think we can all agree on that.</p>
<p>But imagine how big of a ****hole it would be if we left tomorrow.</p>
<p>We got ourselves into this mess, and just pulling out tomorrow will only keep us in this mess. We need to stay until the Iraqi forces are capable of doing it themselves, then run to the nearest transport and get the hell out of there</p>