<p>Some Democrats buy into the moronic, sanctimonious philosophy of Howard Dean more than others - i.e., “it’s a battle of good versus evil and we’re the good.” The really ironic thing is that usually in the same paragraph they will throw in some words about how the divisiveness needs to stop - of course only meaning the divisiveness of those evil Republicans.</p>
<p>TheDad:</p>
<p>One of D’s professors makes essentially the same argument in blogging about his full support of “the surge”:</p>
<p>“Laissez-Surge”</p>
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</p>
<p><a href=“Laissez-Surge | Easily Distracted”>Laissez-Surge | Easily Distracted;
<p>If you are referring to the WMD issue as a Bush lie, there is much evidence that says otherwise.</p>
<p>First off, the Kurds did not just drop dead from nothing?</p>
<p>But even that is not imporant. To lie means to intentionally tell a falsehood. Bush did not intentionally tell a falsehood about WMD’s. The whole world believed Saddam had them. In fact, looking at the facts, it defies all logic that WMD’s were not found, unless ofcourse if you believe they were moved elsewhere. Those who disageed with the Iraq war prior to its start did not disagee over WMDs, rather over if all diplomatic efforts had been exhausted. It is no coincidence that the French, Russians, Israelis, British, Egyptians, Saudis, Germans, and even the United Nations, for God’s sake, all said that Saddam had WMD. You would have to be a nutjob to think otherwise. Even Clinton, from the previous administration, thought that Saddam had WMDs.</p>
<p>So either Clinton, Bush, many Repubs and Dems, the Brits, Israelis, Frenchies, Germans, Rusks, and Egyptians all sat down at a big table at the UN and decided along with UN orginizations to make up lies about WMD’s or Bush did not lie. </p>
<p>There is no other option that I can see.</p>
<p>It sounds like that Swathmore proffessor wants America to lose this war.</p>
<p>Define “victory” in terms of something that’s attainable. I would say stable, democratic, pro-American. At one time, I thought we could get two out of three. At this point, <em>maybe</em> one. The dead-enders shouldn’t blather pious platitudes, they should look at the political situation in Iraq, who has support, who doesn’t, and the Iraqi political consequences in response to any move we make. </p>
<p>There is no war left to “win.” It’s a delusion. We’re reduced to looking for a least-worst scenario. Bleah. Thank you Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Feith, and company.</p>
<p>There is no war to win. There will be no victory (except that Bush claimed victory three years ago). This WILL end with the US leaving. Question is: how many more people will die before we go?</p>
<p>There is no war left to “win.” It’s a delusion. We’re reduced to looking for a least-worst scenario. Bleah. Thank you Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Feith, and company</p>
<p>I disagree. There is a war to win. It will be long, ardous, and bloody battle, but over time with many different courses being utilized victor will prevail. There is no reason to let ourselves fail in Iraq. There is no reason to fail, and withdrawal is what it is, failure. </p>
<p>Why is that when something is hard and victory is not right around the corner, the course must be abandoned?</p>
<p>If Israel had given up its fight in 1948, there would have been no Israel. They fought, however, even though failure was much more evident to them in 1948 then it is to American in 2007. America should not have to settle for failure.</p>
<p>Prior to the invasions of Afghaniston and Iraq there were four contigious state sponsors of terror in the Middle East: Syria, Iraq, Iran, and Afghanistan. Now two of the state sponsors have been taken out. So there now exist the non contigious Syria and Iran. </p>
<p>America should not have to abandon Iraq, and leave it to the terrorists so they can plug the hole back in. It is in America’s best interest to continue the fight.</p>
<p>Settle for failure? We already have failed.</p>
<p>The Israel analogy doesn’t work, sorry…Mr. Familiar voice. There is no existential threat to the US, no matter how the fear mongers paint the situation.</p>
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<p>I agree. The President, as far as I can tell, can no longer even define what “winning” would be.</p>
<p>As for Prof. Burke, he addresses that issue in his later blog comments, especially as it relates to the loss of additional American life in pursuing an escalation in Iraq. His conclusion is that Bush will pursue his course of action no matter what efforts are made to convince him otherwise. For example, he has already replaced his military commanders who recommended NOT increasing troop levels. Thus, in his view, changing the course of action in Iraq is not an option.</p>
<p>BTW, in addition to Libertarian Burke’s view, Swarthmore’s most noted conservative professor, James Kurth, also favors “losing the war” in Iraq at this point. He argues in favor of pulling out and allowing sectarian warfare to not only consume Iraq, but spread throughout the region as Saudi Arabia and Iran pour resources into a broader Sunni versus Shia conflict.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.amconmag.com/2005/2005_09_26/cover.html[/url]”>http://www.amconmag.com/2005/2005_09_26/cover.html</a></p>
<p>There may be no existential threat, but failure is something both countries did not and should not settle for.</p>
<p>We have not already failed. We will fail only if we withdraw all soldiers. That is failure. Right now, it can be said America is losing, and even so that is not completely true. With every area in Iraq stabilized except for Baghdad and Anbar Province, why leave with the job not finished. Things arent going good so we surrender to the terrorists? So that they can hold mass rallies crying how easy it was to beat the weak-kneed Americans?</p>
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<p>So, paint me a picture of what Iraq looks like after the United States “wins” the war? What does “winning” mean?</p>
<p>BTW, if you guys want to watch an fantastic hour on Iraq, go this website and watch the Charlie Rose interview this week with returning NYTIMES war correspondent John Burns. Burns presents a tremendous understanding of the situation on the ground in Iraq and where this thing is headed. He touches on many of the themes Prof. Kurth addresses…for example, that it is unlikely an Arab Shia Iraq would subjegate itself to a Persian Shia Iran.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.charlierose.com/[/url]”>http://www.charlierose.com/</a></p>
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<p>You forgot Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.</p>
<p>Robert McNamara from “The Fog of War”.</p>
<p>We blew it again. We are never going to be accepted in Iraq. We are not even fighting for the same thing as the Iraqis.</p>
<p>“In the Cuban missile crisis, at the end, I
think we did put ourselves in the skin of
the Soviets. In the case of Vietnam, we
didn’t know them well enough to
empathize. And there was total
misunderstanding as a result. They
believed that we had simply replaced the
French as a colonial power, and we were
seeking to subject South and North
Vietnam to our colonial interests, which
was absolutely absurd. And we, we saw
Vietnam as an element of the Cold War.
Not as they saw it: a civil war.”</p>
<p>[Yrotciv</a> in Iraq!!!](<a href=“http://www.slate.com/id/2150162/]Yrotciv”>Bush's backpedaling on the war in Iraq.)</p>
<p>Iraq is like victory except in reverse.</p>
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<p>Are you kidding? The only region of Iraq that could be considered stable is the largely autonomous Kurdish region in the north. The southern parts of Iraq are battlegrounds between competing Shia factions and militias. To the extent that there is stability in a specific region, it’s because a “warlord” (for lack of better term) has imposed militia control, usually through brutal force.</p>
<p>Electricy production in Iraq is at the same level as January 2004, shortly after the invasion and down 7% from 2005 levels.</p>
<p>Oil production has been declining and is still well below pre war levels and below January 2004.</p>
<p>In other words, the situation is deteriorating.</p>
<p>A year ago, the State Department saw a net inflow into Iraq as Iraqi ex-pats returned home. That reversed itself early last year. Since then more than 1 million Iraqis have been displaced from their homes, largely due to ethnic cleansing of mixed Shia/Sunni neighborhoods. The refugee problem right now is catastrophic. It’s getting worse.</p>
<p>"WASHINGTON, DC: In a leak from the Iranian Foreign Ministry today, it was learned that the Iranian government has given permission to its nationals to kill U.S. military operatives working in Iraq.</p>
<p>“They are clearly a destabilizing force in the entire region,” the memo read, “bent on wreaking havoc on the Iraqi people, while threatening our territorial integrity.”</p>
<p>The memo noted that chemical weapons had been used against Iran by its neighbors under the auspices of the U.S. government during the 1981-1989 War, in which 550,000 Iranians, including 100,000 children, lost their lives. “We can’t afford to allow that to happen again,” the memo concluded.</p>
<p>Iranian government officials, while not confirming the existence of the memo, noted that the U.S. has recently moved battleship carriers, with nuclear capabilities, just outside Iranian territorial waters, and is dispatching an additional 21,500 troops to be stationed less than a hundred miles from its border, on the west, and 3,200 additional troops to the east, bringing the total of aggressive, hostile troops to almost 200,000. Iranian leaders were quick to point out that no action would be taken against foreign terrorists without at least the tacit consent of the current Iraqi government of Nuri Al-Maliki.</p>
<p>Iranian officials also noted its good relations with Sunni Muslims in Kurdistan, including the existence of joint diplomatic missions and trade associations going back more than a decade, following the use of poison gas against the Kurds under conditions of what is known in the region as the “Rumsfeld Handshake”. Some 140,000 Kurdish Sunnis were killed, but U.S. operatives in Iraq arranged for the execution of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein before the truth of the association could be revealed in open court. </p>
<p>“Our cemeteries are already filled with victims of U.S.-funded and trained torture, with victims of poison gas under American auspices, and we won’t get fooled again,” stated a woman selling fruit in a market in Qom, who had lost a husband and five sons to U.S.-backed aggression."</p>
<p>Then there should be no reason to complain about US soldiers killing or arresting those Iranian nationals suspected of doing what Iran legally allows.</p>
<p>FF & Zoosermom: You’re both wrong about the legal course of the Jones case. “The judge” agreed that Jones could not prove any damages, and threw the case out. On appeal, after oral argument two of the three appellate justices seemed to be receptive to the idea that she might be able to prove some kind of damage at trial, and should be allowed to go to trial to try to do so. The standard of proof on appeal wasn’t “who’s right?” but “Is there any chance at all that she can prove any amount of damages - even $1?” Winning the appeal wouldn’t have meant she won the case - only that she should have the opportunity to take it to trial and try to prove it. (And wouldn’t that have been great?) At that point somebody (not Clinton) threw cash at Jones to make her go away without an admission of wrongdoing by Clinton - not because of the merits of her case (which I’m inclined to believe the trial judge assessed correctly) but because of the same political factors which caused the case to exist in the first place.</p>
<p>Kluge, again, I’ve never said anything about the merits so that post didn’t really apply to me. The deposition was duly noticed, Mr. Clinton was placed under oath, and he lied. He then faced the consequences of those actions like a man. What part of that do you disagree with?</p>