Liberals only, no debate.
Due to the recent events, the pro/anti war kettle has been stirred again.
Please give me your best argument in favor of the thing you feel strongest about regarding the war in Iraq.
(Cites are appreciated but not necessary.)
Why did we invade this country at this time?
The fact that Hussein is a bad person does not warrant a unilateral regime change.
Again a link to whuckfistle’s complementary poll for conservatives:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=229397
What? No thread for the left of center moderates? Real Moderates? Fringes? 
Um… the rat bastard lied to the entire freakin’ planet in order to generate a war largely for political and economic purposes, and due to rotten planning and having no real clue about Iraq (or, for that matter, what an army is supposed to be for), has violently screwed things up over there and gotten a lot of Americans killed?
Dunno if I can put it any better than that.
And I ain’t a liberal. But I don’t like Bush, either.
I’ll give it a go, but it’s a shame that we can’t debate.
Saddam has been captured. This is, of course, a good thing. Regardless of where one stands on the war, I’m sure most people recognise that Saddam was a pretty nasty chap and right now we’re better off with him in a cell rather than hiding in a hole in the desert.
The big question I see is, what to do with him? He did some bad stuff, and I believe that if last year Bush had appealed to the UN to pass a resolution demanding the removal of Saddam on the basis of his human rights violations, we’d have seen a war supported by the world-community with a much better post-conflict period, both for the Iraqis and occupying soldiers. The smartest thing to do would be to allow the Iraqis to try him. Saddam should not set foot in Guantanamo; it would look like, and would be, the Americans getting rid of their enemy, not the Iraqis trying theirs.
As to the rest of the war, I don’t believe the capture will change much. There will continue to be attacks on American troops, and there’ll continue to be a lot of them. Saddam has been hiding in a hole. He hasn’t been masterminding a resistance effort. Right now, Bush should be looking to rebuild the country as effectively as possible, allowing the transition of power to the Iraqi people as quickly and as smoothly as possible, and getting American troops home as quickly as he can without compromising the other two goals.
For all of these things, he needs UN involvement. Restricting the rebuilding contracts to countries in the coalition of the willing is not only mindblowingly childish, it’s a bad diplomatic move, and a bad move for the future of Iraq. I thought a conservative President would understand how markets work, even if he couldn’t understand why it was a bad idea to piss off people that you’re trying to convince to help you out. If a company from Canada or Germany can held rebuild Iraq better and cheaper than a company from the UK or the US can, they should get the contract. It results in the US taxpayer paying less and the Iraqi people getting a better deal.
The US should also hand over the rebuilding of Iraq to the UN. The UN knows how to do it. It will be a sign of reconciliation with the world and may convince other countries to be more forthcoming with badly-needed assistance in terms of money and troops. And while it won’t convince all Iraqis, at least some will see it as a big step in the transition to self-government.
And lastly, the U.S needs to stay involved, both financially and militarily. Sure, the UN will be telling the U.S. what to do a bit, but remember that the U.S. has quite a lot of power in the UN. They made the mess, it’s their responsibility to clean it up. And come next November, they need to get rid of Bush and vote in a president who won’t be stupid enough to get them in such a damn fool situation again.
Any questions?
What I feel strongest about ? The callous disregard for the UN and diplomacy. It was so plain silly. Most countries might have agreed on banishing Saddam or getting rid of him… it was a matter of time and better diplomacy.
Flaming, card-carrying, yellow-dog liberal Democrat checking in with my “take.”
The Bush Administration has strained diplomatic relations with a number of our key allies, brought back a unilateralist approach to foreign policy that, had it been proclaimed by any other nation, we would have howled about to no end, and shown a Keystone Kops approach to planning. I’m glad that Saddam Hussein is no longer in power, and I support the men and women who are in Iraq trying to make the most out of a terrible situation, but I have no confidence in the present Administration.
A few election cycles ago the rhetorical question “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” was floated about pretty heavily. No, I don’t feel as if I’m better off than I was four years ago. I feel no safer, I feel as that government’s reach has grown (particularly in areas of civil liberties), and I’m poorer by many thousands of dollars through a faultering economy. I didn’t vote for Bush the first time, and nothing he’s done so far tells me I made the wrong choice.
Just a note;
I actually would like to be able to make an honest comparison of the black and white that seperates the two mindsets.
If you would like to post but don`t know where, then either start your own thread or look for the numerous others that are out there already.
Sorry, I should have been more clear.
I want the threads to be a display of feelings without the need to debate or defend.
Thanks, Tamerlane, much appreciated.
Personally, I feel best keeping it as simple as possible.
Do not allow focusing on whatever ends were accomplished to distract from the means used and costs incurred.
Weren’t the stated reasons for invading Iraq supposedly related in some way to terrorism?
To what extent were those accusations borne out?
To what extent have our efforts reduced terrorism?
How much $ and lives did we spend in this effort?
Was it worth it?
Why?
Is the US going to go after another “bad person” now?
However bad Hussein was, how was he a threat to the US or its vital interests?
In Vietnam, we had a proxy army and a viable puppet government. In Iraq we have neither. 300 of the first 700 members of the new Iraqi army have deserted. In Vietnam, a decent percentage of the population (but not enough) were at least a little favorable to the US. In Iraq, virtually no one is. Iraq is not Vietnam. It’s worse. There is no light at the end of the tunnel.
We have no military objectives in Iraq. No “to do list” of “go here, attack these people, take control of this.” Armies work by attacking, not by standing around waiting to get shot. The Iraqi’s goal is to get us to leave. They aren’t going anywhere, they can take decades if they choose. This is pretty much a worse case scenario, militarily.
It was all built on lies based on a horribly conceived decades old plan to bring democracy to the Middle East. There were no WMDs, Saddam and Osama hate each other, etc. They thought they could start pumping revenue generating oil in days. It’s going to be a year and then only small income. Iraq will be unable to pay off it’s current debt, let alone pay back the US cost of the war, for many years to come. Idiots with spreadsheets are still idiots. It was going to take 3 months, 6 tops, to get a new government going. They have now “accelerated” the transition to next June, July at the least. Right.
Remember those press conferences before the war where reporters questioned Rummy about “exit strategy” and he refused to talk about it. They still haven’t got one going.
If you don’t have a good exit strategy, don’t go in. If you don’t have one at all, think of something else to do.
It has taken considerable resources away from going after Bin Laden and trying to keep Afghanistan from going downhill again.
So, the war in Iraq has greatly harmed our domestic security.
Every article I have read about the implications of Saddam’s capture makes repeated stupid, non-factual errors. There are several Iraqi groups fighting the US. They are jockeying for position to take over Iraq once the US gets kicked out. None of them like Saddam in the least. (He’s a has-been rival.) Saddam’s capture makes most Iraqi’s happy, but not for the reason the media is reporting. He’s one less threat to the “insurgents”.
The American people are being kept deliberately uninformed about what is going on in Iraq. The US has ordered the cessation of civilian casualty counts. There is no democracy being introduced into Iraq.
All this money spent, all those American lives lost, all that international goodwill spilled, just so George could pursue a vendetta for his Pappy. :rolleyes:
Imagine what we could do if we spent all that energy towards capturing real terrorist masterminds…
I’m not sure if that’s possible.
The conservative/pro-war side of this issue is based on simplistic, black and white terms. “Saddam is a dictator!” “Iraq is part of the Axis of evil!” “We must fight terrorism!”
The liberal/anti-war side of this issue is based on subtle nuances and the application of reality. “Saddam has no ties to al Qaeda.” “This war is increasing terrorist activities in the region.” “Resources for capturing Osama bin Laden are being diverted.”
Getting the two sides together for comparitive purposes is like having a four-year-old debate with an adult. Except this time, the four-year-old is in the White House.
There’s lots of reasons, but if I had to put one at the top of the list, it’s the documented history that clearly shows, contrary to the disavowals from the White House during the leadup to the effect of “we’re not planning for war yet,” how the cadre advising Dubya (Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz, et al.) had been agitating for this attack since 1998 if not before.
The cynical and blatant trick of misdirection by which they exploited the legitimate tragedy of 9/11 to get their completely unrelated war against Hussein is simply breathtaking. One is naturally led to wonder how they would have attempted to secure their war if 9/11 hadn’t happened. And one wonders, with a shudder, if they’d have succeeded.
That’s tops on the list. Second, of course, is the daily demonstration that they simply have no idea what the fuck they’re doing.
Quoting Bill Hicks, from over a decade ago:
“Saddam? Terrible weapons. Just terrible weapons.”
“Well, how do you know?”
“Urrrrrmrmmmmm we looked at the receipt”
There are many countries in the world that have weapons of mass destruction. China is one example. Shrub shows no interest in invading China or any other such country.
There are many countries that support terrorism. Saudi Arabia is one example. Shrub shows no interest in invading Saudi Arabia.
There are many countries in the world that abuse human rights. Zimbabwe is one example. Shrub has no interest in invading Zimbabwe.
There are many countries in the world that have WMDs, support terrorism, and abuse human rights. Pakistan is one example. Shrub shows no interest in invading Pakistan.
There is one country in the world that has a large amount of oil which they aren’t willing to share with American oil companies. That country is Iraq. Shrub invaded Iraq.
If Shrub believed that it was wrong for Saddam Hussien to slaughter his own people, he would no have chosen a vice presidential candidate who made millions by selling weapons to Saddam Hussein. Ergo, Shrub does not have any real moral problem with Saddam Hussein. That much is plain enough.
Now, what should we do with this lovely country that we “control”? Well, we could just pull all our troops out tomorrow. The only real objection is that leaving Iraq in anarchy would disgrace the united States. Well, it’s a bit late for that; the United States has already been disgraced. Public opinion of us in Jordan and other countries can’t get any worse.
However, there is one better choice. Iraq has three large ethnic groups: Kurds, Sunnis Shi’ites. Sunnis hate us. Kurds are indifferent to us. Opinion of us varies among Shi’ites, but it’s generally negative. The big problem is that all three groups hate each other, and they don’t want to live under the same government. What we should do is create three new countries, one for each group. Then, except for an occasional minor border skirmish, they wouldn’t have any need to communicate with each other. After that, we take our troops out and hope nothing bad happens.
The reason why Shrub won’t consider this possibility is that Turkey hates the Kurds, and doesn’t want a Kurd nation. My response would be to say screw Turkey. They can hate the Kurds all they want, but since their President isn’t named “Bush”, they wouldn’t attack this new country without a just reason.
My most liberal take on the war:
ALL of the reasons given for invading Iraq apply equally well to
two countries: the USA and Israel.
Reason: They possess weapons of mass destruction
Reason: They have expressed willingness to use them
Reason: They have a history of aggressive behaviour to their neighbours
Reason: They have defied UN resolutions trying to control their aggressive behaviour
Reason: They have launched attacks on their own citizens (ok, for the US, assume Saddams relation to the Kurds = US relations with minor neighbours and protectorates)
Reason: They support terrorism
So why is it right for the USA to attack Iraq? Only because no one
had the power and the will to stop them.
Bush has spent all this time focusing resources and time on Iraq when the economy at home has rather sucked. “Lalala, I can’t hear you!”
Lies, all lies! “Um, they have WMD. Yeah.” A few months later . . . “Where are the WMD?” “Ummmmmm . . . they’re well hidden? Yeah, tat sounds good.”
There are a bunch of Evil Dictators. Why did we pick this one? Cause he tried to hurt my daddy. Doubya Doubya Two.
After bitching about how Saddam ignored UN Resolutions, guess what! We go and IGNORE SOME UN RESOLUTIONS.
5.Just a personal pinion of mine, but who are WE to tell others what WMD they can and cannot have? We have more WMD than anyone else, and no other country in the world has used them as often or with as high a body count as we have. We’re the only country that’s used atomic bombs against another country. TWICE. Once we get rid of ours, then we can start playing Cops. Or something.