The Emperors (new) Gulf War clothes.

Great Debates
61

So, elucidator, you just made up a completely unrealistic scenario, railed against it, and said how much it made you sick.

You entertain me.

Duck, I fail to see why Bush couldn’t take it back. So the rest of the world says “no, let us handle it.” Bush then just says, um, no…I’m doing it. And then the rest of the world cries foul and nothing happens. There are no realistic consequences to Bush taking the situation back. There is nothing that the UN could realistically do to STOP Bush from taking back the situation.

Not that I think Bush will suddenly take it back, by the way. I’m not sure that the domestic audience would stand for that sort of waffling on this subject and the Reps could take a big hit.

Latro, what would be the point of returning weapons inspectors? Seriously. They didn’t cooperate the first time, I don’t think they would cooperate the second time either. In fact, the offer for return of inspectors was likely just a delaying tactic. They would barter around for the terms for allowing them in, then once they were back in, the game would start anew. It’s just too bad that the world (including the US at the time) was too craven to force Iraq to obey the terms of the treaty in good faith.

Anyways, I think the real scandal of this thing is how badly Bush has bungled this whole thing. Seriously. He makes one diplomatic blunder and international waffle after another. There are good reasons for attacking Iraq, I can’t figure out why he doesn’t make these arguments, rather than ones that blow up in his face every week. Bah. I didn’t really expect much of George, but wasn’t everyone complimenting on him on his choice of advisors? It seems like they are just as amateurish as he is.

WHY CAN’T ANYONE DO THINGS RIGHT???

62

On the subject of George not being able to risk being seen to '“waffle”, let us also bear in mind that there are elections coming up in about 6 weeks (7 weeks?). I think that if he is planning on taking it away from the UN, he’ll wait until after those elections. Can’t risk screwing it up for the GOP.

Look at all the blue states that are at risk of a Democratic gubernatorial takeover, as of Sept. 12.
http://www.dcpoliticalreport.com/2002/polls02.htm

Now look at Illinois.
http://www.dcpoliticalreport.com/2002/polls02.htm#ILGov

Blagojevich keeps pulling ahead, and barring some colossal screwup on his part, I think Ryan is toast. Even though Jim Ryan is no relation to “the driver’s license scandal guy”, departing Governor George Ryan, people are just getting fed up with the GOP and ready for a change. Bush being seen to waffle on the “Iraq thing” won’t help the voter support he does have in Illinois.

63

Sam, your point is well taken, there does seem to be some rollover going on, toot double sweet.

Russia’s wish list includes back up and legitimacy for its utterly disgusting war on Chechnya, and a bigger slice of the oil pie in Central Asia (the 'Stans).

I’ve heard the suggestion that what China wants is Taiwan. They figure if they go along with the US on the Iraq thing, they earn negotiating points. If negotiations fail, they can simply sieze Taiwan and the US will be too involved with Iraq to do anything about it.

64

Oh, baby, I REAALLY don’t see China “just seizing” Taiwan and the U.S. doing nothing about it. I mean, come on, we’ve been absolutely, totally, 100% on “Their Side” since 1949. We’re almost as compulsively on “Taiwan’s Side” as we’re on “Israel’s Side”. And look at the literally millions of Chinese-Americans who trace their ancestry back to Taiwan, many of whom still have kinfolks there.

I mean, I’m sorry, the mind just boggles. :smiley: (who you been talking to, anyway?) I could see China seizing Nepal and getting away with it before I could see it invading and conquering Taiwan, with America just standing there with its hands in its pockets. If China decided to “take” Taiwan while George was busy with Iraq, it would make your head spin how fast he’d decide that America’s interests lay in Taipei rather than in Baghdad.

China would like to have Taiwan back, no question, but not badly enough to risk a war with Uncle Sam.

Anyway, as of today (although of course it may change from minute to minute, diplomatic protocols and double-speak being what it is), the Chinese are against George sending troops to Iraq without some kind of official UN imprimatur. No glory-hound stuff for W–he has to share with Mauritius and Denmark and Guinea and all the other children… :smiley:

http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/east/09/14/china.iraq/index.html

More here.

65

Good! Though it is still entirely possible that this is an early negotiating ploy. And the Bushistas dont desperately need a “yes” vote from China, what they desperately need is to avoid a veto from them.

Would Our Leader let them get away with grabbing Taiwan. I doubt it, but I dont know. Anyway, its not important what I think, its what China thinks that matters. They might think they can get away with it. Great and bloody wars have been started with just such a miscalculation, as witness Iraq’s belief that the US would shrug off Kuwait. Ooopsy! Come to think of it, most have started that way.

DDG sorry that I masculated you earlier. The graceful and demure femininity of your posts is so obvious, I can’t understand how I missed it.

66

No sweat, I’ve been"masculated" before, and it doesn’t hurt (it’s the “e-masculation” afterwards, when I go back to singin’ soprano…) :smiley:

67

And what am I, then – chopped liver?

Apparently, I’ve been writing my posts in invisible ink. Silly me!

68

No, sorry, we’re not ignoring you, it’s just that it’s more fun to talk about emasculation. :smiley:

Besides, you brought up the “Donald Rumsfeld” thing, and I think everybody here is kind of tired of talking about “Rumsfeld Knew!”, ya know? :smiley:

BTW, left-wing rhetoric polarizes folks, too.

And I don’t think you’re going to persuade many people here that declaring war on Iraq is somehow a good thing for “humanitarian” reasons. We just ain’t buying it, without some kind of proof of Saddam’s Evil Intentions. Photographs, tape recordings, scribbled “to do” lists on Iraqi “Office of the President” letterhead detailing things like “Call Russian Mafia about anthrax shipment–discount for buying in bulk?”… :smiley:

69

Just wanna say, for posterity, that it’s very spooky opening this thread and seeing the discussion cut off short like this–last time I saw it, Monday morning the 16th, it was a thriving, bustling thread, full of excited “imminent war” gossip, but now it looks like we all just gave up on it on Sunday afternoon, due to this week’s “weird server crash” and Jerry the Tech God’s having to roll back to the last backup, which evidently took place in the wee hours Monday morning.

Dang. :frowning:

So, are we having a war, or not? :smiley:
IIRC, when we left, Minty Green had said, “Call me when the Saudis get on board”, and suddenly it looked like the Saudis might actually be getting on board, sort of…

http://www.cnn.com/2002/US/09/15/saudis.iraq/index.html

Now, of course, the whole “will they/won’t they” point is moot, as it seems to me that a lot of the warmongering momentum has been lost as the UN inches its way through its standard procedures, and the rest of the world gets on with its life.

http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/meast/09/19/iraq.weapons.inspections/index.html

Ho-hum.

Iraq, of course, denies having any such thing as big bad Weapons Of Mass Destruction.

http://www.cnn.com/2002/US/09/19/iraq.us/index.html

No! :eek: George wouldn’t do that…

:smiley:

70

Neurotik:

**
Seems to be handling it remarkably well, actually. And seems to be getting the U.N. to come around to his way of thinking on Iraq. Perhaps not on regime change. But make no mistake, the end result of all of this will be a dictator in Iraq, and a potential threat to the U.S. and others, either removed or rendered impotent.

You are going to have continuing difficulty in your case that Bush is wrong - WRONG!, when more and more countries (essentially) agree with him on what needs to be done. Not to mention ranking Congressional Democrats.

**
What you see as a blunder, others see as strong leadership. He’s getting stuff done, and the world’s attention re-focused on the threat potentially posed by Iraq. That’s being effective.

Rather refreshing, as opposed to certain other recent presidencies, when bombings of our embassies and battleships apparently weren’t enough to force decisive action.

And waffle? Show me one waffle Dubya has made on the Iraq issue, and I’ll bring the syrup.

**
I agree. Why does he waste time doing things such as going to the U.N., pointing out the Security Council resolutions that it has made regarding Iraq, pointing out how Iraq has not and is not complying with them, and pointing out that the U.N. is doing nothing about them? So pointless, that is.

71

Yes, indeed, it is a new and more vigorous approach to diplomacy, the diplomacy that says “You’re all a bunch of wussies!” Spit in thier face, step on thier foot and say “Now are you with me?”

And the timing? Anyone a little skeptical as to the timing? Sept. 12th? Well, of course, Dubya might have called up and said “I want to speak to the UN General Assembly”. They checked thier schedule and said “All we gots Sept. 12th” Naturally, Dubya thought “Gee, that would be unfortunate, it would look kind of like I was exploiting the rush of emotion from the Anniverisary. But, Gosh, if that’s all they’ve got, well,…”

Yeah, right. Uh huh.

And then there’s that box of goodies. Like the elephant in the living room that keeps farting when people are trying to hold polite conversation: a big ol’ box of goodies!

A short, victorious war (always a big hit with the home folks). Then the formation of a proper sort of government. We have at hand a list of candidates who are vetted and have our complete confidence that they will show the appropriate gratitude and consideration for the guidance of their Liberators.

Then, of course, comes the arduous process of rebuilding Iraq’s economic base. I have every confidence that such stalwarts of civic duty as Exxon, Haliburton, and British Petroluem will step manfully up to the challenge. Pending the approval of the New! Improved! Iraq government, of course. (Participation of the Russian Gasprom is, as of this moment, still pending. It will likely devolve to a question of whether Russia has the right vision thing. Ought to be simple enough, really. One side of the bread is buttered, one is not.)

Of course, the new fledgling government will need the protection and guidance of its benefactors. It may be neccesary, for thier continued well-being, to keep considerable numbers of troops and airplanes, stationed in Iraq. The convenience of this in terms of maintaining a stern US presence in the Mideast, without having to butter up any locals, is sheer coincidence. We are given to understand.

And finally, the elections! Ah, yes, the elections. Quite overlooked, in Our Leaders haste to protect our interest. They simply haven’t the time to consider such things, as they are utterly absorbed with geopolitical matters. But, yes, now that you mention it, there has been a historical tendency for the public to rally around a wartime administration. Social scurity? Gone. Gross tax cuts for the rich? Poof! Vanished! The economy? Well, kind of tough right now, but a recovery can well be expected, once we have structured New Iraq’s oil business to properly reflect thier interest, balanced with thier blubbering gratitude for thier Liberators.

And the UN? Firmly put in thier place, long a wet dream of the Hard Right (Can’t spell “Communism” without “UN”). From now on, we lead, they follow. Or they go pound burdocks. We don’t care. We don’t have to. We’re the Americans.

Ahh, yes, indeed! A big box of goodies for the Republicans. All quite secondary, of course. Not even looking at it, nosiree Bob. What kind of darkly suspicious mind would even suggest such a thing?

At last, Ronald Reagan’s vision for America is blossoming! The Shining Citadel on the Hill!

I don’t know which hurts worse: that they think we are this stupid or that they are probably right.

72

Of course! The scales fall from my eyes, how could I have been so blind! This is a shift in the paradigm unlike any we have seen for many years!

This war will turn a profit!

Perhaps if we change the stars to 50 Jolly Rodgers…

73

And Iraq bombed which battleships and embassies?

Well, it appears to be pointless to first rattle sabres about how the U.S. will attack Iraq unilaterally, then pound a shoe at the U.N. demanding a resolution and a united front, whilst also all but stating that a resolution doesn’t matter, the U.S. will attack in any case, making the demanded U.N. resolutions all but moot. Talking out of both sides of his bunker, he is. At the least inconsistent, unless this is part of the much-talked-about ‘madman’ strategy.

74

Um, so where’s Osama? Remember him?

I am quite impressed by the ability of the diehard Bush cheerleaders to go along with the rationalization of the week, and in total sincerity. At least he has the excuse of it being political calculation, but what excuse is there for voluntary sheepdom? The enemy of the month routine requires a bit longer attention span to grasp, so there’s a little more understandability there for them.

Just last year, the focus of all the threats and evil in the world was China - remember that P-3 shootdown? But that was last year. Then we had the North Korean missile program, and a breathless insistence on building Saint Ronald’s shield program in defense. But that was last year, too. The discussion about counterrevolutionaries in Russia and their own bombs and virus stores never got all that much traction. But some of you have willingly forgotten all of that.

Then came 9/11, but the perpetrators were inconveniently not in one distant place. So, the villains were conveniently morphed from Al-Qaeda to the Taliban, and they became the enemy for a while. But you sheep couldn’t forget that Osama was still out there, so the old bugbear Saddam had to be the next declared enemy.

And, to justify a predetermined decision, the inherently-dishonest rationalizations have started, and on a very impressively short time scale. From “he’s simply evil, see all those things he did years ago, never mind that it was largely at our instigation?”, to “he has to go”, to “he may be trying to do something that will be dangerous someday”, to “he’s going to bypass the entire region and go straight for us”, to “there might be some Al-Qaeda people there”, to “the UN has to back up its resolutions”, to “we have to be proactive”. But none of those things start with facts, or context, or the principles of nationhood or superpowerdom - they’re all after the fact.

Meanwhile, the ground in which terrorism grows is still fertile, and arguably being fertilized. And Public Enemy Number One is no longer bin Laden.

Some of you ought to be more ashamed of yourselves.

75

And you should study some more recent history, because your perception of the events of the last few years is, uh, a bit ‘off’.

Let’s start with China and the P-3 incident. This was not an attempt by the Bush administration to paint China as anything at all, let alone an enemy. It was simply a bad situation. A P-3 had problems, landed in China, and kicked off a diplomatic incident. An incident which, by the way, was handled exceptionally well by the U.S. AND China. That’s why you don’t hear abut it any more.

And your notion that the war against the Taliban was a proxy war because we couldn’t find al-Qaida is totally revisionist. The Taliban WAS al-Qaida. Bin Laden was supporting them in exchange for free run of the country. Afghanistan was a de-facto al-Qaida state, and was being used to build an army of terrorists. To claim that the Taliban were just a convenient scapegoat is flatly ridiculous.

And the ground with which terrorism grows may still be fertile, but now they have to organize in hiding, and have no place to collect, train, and plan large operations. That’s a significant win.

Iraq is a totally different issue, but to claim that Saddam is a distraction from not getting Osama is also flatly ridiculous. Saddam was on the administration’s radar from the day they took office, and in fact was high on the Clinton administration’s list of serious problems. Lest we forget, the official U.S. policy of ‘regime change’ in Iraq was formed under the Clinton administration, and heavily supported by Tom Daschle.

76

Hmmm? OK, I’ve forgotten – I’d love (ok, dread) a cite on that if you have one handy.

77

I don’t care who’s bad idea it was. Clinton, Reagan, the Easter Bunny.

It’s still an amazingly bad idea.