I don’t think so. The choice of the time when the war was to begin has always been reported to be related to Irak’s climate. They didn’t want to begin it latter in the year and have to face too hot a weather. I believe it’s true, because the time the war was likely to begin was reported long before it actually started.
At least over here, it was widely assumed that the war would be wagged regardless of the circumstances and the findings of the inspectors, and hence that the inspections would be interrupted, whether or not they would have found something.
You, too, seem to have merely skimmed my post, in which I grant that Bush’s and Cheney’s lack of military service are for game as far as their lack of reluctance to go to war. But the prosecution of it is a different matter, unless you’d like to be the first to opine that military service SHOULD be a prerequisite for being POTUS.
I’m impressed with your ability to extract any sense of out Merijeek’s post. Too bad we all don’t have your power to read minds through words that aren’t posted—just think of the time that could be saved typing!
Please see Posts 332 and 333, which caused me to post 334. As far as the “hijack” regarding the support of the troops, I don’t recall how it got started. (You may go back and look for it if it is that important to you.) But it may have dawned on you from time to time that a debate often takes detours to discuss isuues that have been brought up. That’s true of a debate with even just two people, a forum like this is apt to be less single-minded.
Apoloqies for joining this discussion so late; life in the Third World has some disadvantages, like really slow internet service.
I wanted to comment on various of Magellen’s earlier posts about off-topic protestors ar marches. Some of us are old enough to remember the Vietnam protests, when it was common practise for the authorities to disguise cops as especially scruffy hippies, give them signs saying stuff like Support the Viet Kong, and have them infiltrate the marches. The press, of course, would shove all the little old ladies and families and so on out of range and film the fakes, showing the world that only dirty hippies were against the Noble Cause of Our Glorious Leaders. Sometimes, as in the Chicago protests, the cops actually started breaking windows and throwing stuff; it was standard proceedure for march organizers to tell everybody not to let the provacateurs start trouble and not to follow them when they did.
By Magellan’s logic, the authorities’ tactics were highly effective: I wonder if he thinks that the present administration isn’t cynical enough to use the same tactics today?
So it has been a waste of time. No sane person would claim that having served in a war makes you competent to run one.
And as to GW’s lack of Vietnam service in any way connected to his mismanagement of the Iraq adventure. That is because he is just a natural born fuck-up.
Thanks and I did. I belive criticism for his management of the war is independent of his Vietnam servitude or lack thereof. If Bob Dole had screwed up Iraq as badly, I’d be all over him. But Dole would have had much more credibility in starting the war (and probably would not have done so) owing to his brave service record.
Which, if he is, makes his service or lack of service in Vietnam immaterial. Regarding the waste of time you allude to, see posts 332 and 333, which lead me to construct post 334.
The tactics you describe are deplorable and excusable. But they are tools used by both the extreme right and extrem left, although not necessarily having to do with Iraq. The “effectiveness” you mention is not dependent on any way on my logic. It is independent of my logic. If you meant to imply that is was/is in any way justifiable, that notion was created by you, not me. For the record, I do not think it is, regardless of its effectiveness.
I’d also offer that just because an administration acted dishonorably and exaggerated the prevalance of an anti-war/anti American message doesn’t mean that that message in and of itself was 1) valid, 2) invalid, or 3) a true representation of what some actually believed.
Surely you don’t think that Jane Fonda’s actions (justified or not) or the mutterings of der trihs (asinine or not) on these boards was/is the work of the respective administrations. Do you? Or that just because a particular administration may deceptively attempt to use their opposition’s message against them, that that message from the opposition doesn’t actually exist?
No, the “tactics” being described by Mapache were being used by the government of The United States Government!
I’m pretty damn sure Mapache was referring to CoIntelPro.
It is indeed conjecture but from everything I’ve seen of Bob Dole, he isn’t the type to either make snap judgements or exclude devil’s advocates. I can’t imagine him rushing into such a grave decision.
Then we are in complete agreement. I think he would have made a good President, partly for the resons you stated. With all he’s given the country, I wish he had been granted the opportunity for us to find out.
I don’t think so at all. Not one bit. Hell no. Not now, not ever. Wanna know why?
I’ll tell you why. Bush, is the AWOL “hero” from the Air National Guard (daddy got him the slot so he could stay out of Nam). Then he chose to only show up when it suited him. He had the unmitigated gall, the effrontery, the audacity, the hubris, the nerve to (through hints and side remarks, and through Rove and the Swift Shitters for Bull Shit) to smear people who HAD been there. McCain was one, Kerry was the other. Not at the same time though. Meanhwile his pet pundits and lapdogs also managed to smear Max Cleland. Just recently, they tried to smear Murtha.
If you didn’t go to Nam, fine. But don’t pretend you are a mighty hero and then go defaming and lying about those who did go, just to gain a few points in a campaign. Any shit Bush gets for his “war record”, he asked for. Any time he calls someone else a phony, or craven, or soft on terror, or anything at all (unpatritoic anyone?), he should get hammered. He and his cronies talk a lot of shit about other people, so turnaround is fair. He is “fair game”.
No “Waaaahhhhh Mommy! He hit me BACK” crap either.
While I agree with much of what you said, I think the point remains: his service or lack of it has nothing to do with his prosecution of the war (or botching of it, I think we’d agree). To claim otherwise is to support the notion that the POTUS should be required to have military service. As I’ve said, it makes his “eagerness” to send others to war more deserving of scrutiny and a badge of “hypocritical”, but either military service is critical in prosecuting a war and should be required, or it is not and is therefore a moot point.
Regarding Murtha, I don’t see an attempt to smear him. Another ex-marine wished to point out that he thought a certain position was cowardly. In my book he is certainly entitled to that position. Correct or not, it was NOT an attack on Murtha the man, just on a position he held. The two things are very different. Certainly, not everyone who served in Vietnam is going to hold the same opinions, even those that apply to wartime. Some of those positions would be categorized as cowardly, some them might, in fact, be so.
I think Murtha’s record speaks for itself. By every account he was a brave Marine. By every account he as acquited himself in the House with great honor. His stance on the war has changed. Terrific. He may be right now, he may be wrong now. His current position (just like his old one) will be categorized as righteous and brave by some, and wrong-headed and cowardly by others. I think both sides have the right to speak their minds on the subject, particulalry his fellow-marines who served in Vietnam. Wouldn’t you agree?
Magellan said: “The tactics you describe are deplorable and excusable. But they are tools used by both the extreme right and extrem left, although not necessarily having to do with Iraq. The “effectiveness” you mention is not dependent on any way on my logic. It is independent of my logic. If you meant to imply that is was/is in any way justifiable, that notion was created by you, not me. For the record, I do not think it is, regardless of its effectiveness.”
That doesn’t really answer my point, which is:
IF: Disreputable or off-the-point protesters at a demonstration negate or diminish the arguments of the other protestors
AND: We know that the government has used the tactics Crowmanyclouds neatly linked to above in the past
AND: I, at least (don’t know about you) am not really convinced that Bush/Rove/Cheney’s
dedication to honesty and straight dealing is all that much more profound than Nixon/LBJ’s
THEN: Any demonstrations can and probably will be infiltrated by fake protestors, and by Magellan’s thinking are therefore illegitimate.
So what would Magellan suggest as a proper sort of protest? Writing letters-to-the-editor
seems a little underwhelming.
Republican Congresswoman Jean Schmidt called Jack Murtha a coward this afternoon, unworthy of the Marines, on the House floor. Money quote:
The fiery, emotional debate climaxed when Rep. Jean Schmidt, R-Ohio, the most junior member of the House, told of a phone call she received from a Marine colonel. "He asked me to send Congress a message - stay the course. He also asked me to send Congressman Murtha a message - that cowards cut and run, Marines never do," Schmidt said. Also, the "Marine" she was "quoting" was never in Viet Nam. His career was a long string of noncombat, and some would say, cushy jobs. I can't remember his name. but he had no right to make his "coward" comment either. Bubka, Bubkis, something like that.
It would be more helpful if Republicans and conservatives offered positive arguments for how to do better instead of attacking every critic as a wuss, unpatriotic, inconsistent, or worse.
If you put forth an idea, and I responded “that’s what idiots do, smart people don’t,” you’d take it as a critique of your idea and not a personal attack? You’re a very patient man, I guess. I know that kind of response qualifies as a personal insult under the rules of this board, for example.
You lose me at the last part. While it’s probably true that any demonstration “can” be infiltrated by fake protesters, and those protestors “might” be working at the behest (officially or not) of the administration, to conclude that that “probably will” happen seems to me to be a stretch.
It’s not as if we don’t know that there are people who actually hold views that most of us on both sides would consider a sick or extreme. One of them has posted in this very thread. And living in San Francisco I probably have seem more than a fair share of the idiocy.
I’d ask you to look over some of this thread, as much has been discussed on that very issue. I do agree that relying on letters to the editors would never be enough. I would add to that a massive mail/email/fax campaign to our elected representatives and protest marches, with the caveats I mentioned earlier in the thread.
I’ve wrote to a Senator once. I was shocked and amazed when I got a reply, I had expected my letter to get “round filed”. It wasn’t the answer I wanted, but at least someone read it.
