I’ve run out of outrage lately, XT. Sorry. It’s been that sort of year. I can’t even work up a good mad over the Bush plan to gut Social Security these days. I’m all outraged out.
Also, I was hoping to avoid one more Iraq wrangle, which this discussion, supposedly of what the Dems’ policy on terrorism should be, seems to have inevitably turned into.
I would be outraged if I had the energy, I expect. It’s one thing to recognize the legitimacy of anyone’s right to resist an occupying army, anywhere in the world. It’s another thing entirely to support the killing one’s countrymen by said resistance, even when the occupying army consists of one’s countrymen. That’s a line that shouldn’t be crossed, even in this godforsaken mess. Our men and women in uniform didn’t choose this war; they just have the bad fortune to be the tools of those who did. What I wish for our troops is that they all might make it home safely, with no further loss of limbs or faculties. I’m hoping that once Iraq has its election, the elected assembly insists that we exit the country with all reasonable dispatch, so that this might be true for as many of them as possible.
The Sunni insurgents are thugs, no question about it. They have no compunction about killing their own countrymen as well as killing our troops. They kill Iraqi security forces and government officials, whom they regard as collaborators; and they kill Shi’ites whom they regard as their internal enemies. Judging by what was published last summer about how Fallujah was run then, they seem to want a Taliban-like theocratic state. I regard them as being considerably worse than Saddam, and the likelihood that their sort will have sway over a fairly large chunk of Iraq when all is said and done (I expect the election will merely be the prelude to civil war) is a good argument from the get-go that the citizenry of Iraq would have been better off if we’d stayed the hell out.
(The Shi’ite portions of Iraq ought to do OK as long as Sistani lives. The Shi’ites would probably break up into factions sometime after the election if Sistani weren’t there to mediate, but he won’t live forever. With luck, he may live long enough that a tradition of resolving disputes politically rather than through civil war takes hold in whatever portion of Iraq is governed by the Shi’a majority. If not, thugs like al-Sadr will wind up in control of a big chunk of Shi’ite Iraq.)
Anyhow, I think rfgdxm has said something that should be reacted to with outrage. And if I had any outrage left, I’d use some of it here. But like I said, I’m completely out.
I find the whole topic depressingly cynical. The issue should never be what position should this or this party take in this or this issue to win the election. That whole concept is downright disgusting. The only position shoul dbe the right one, and that leaves only two relevant questions.
What is the right position? This should go in the direction of policy, what action would best protect the interests of both Americans and Iraqis.
How to make sure that the voting public understands this position? This should go in the direction of making the 1st a science that is then translated in clear language understandable by all.
It is, in my view, a complete misperception that the Democrats lost this election because they are considered less capable of dealing with the issue. Impossible to understand for most Europeans, but Bush is regarded by a lot of people as a guy you’d have fun with on a family BBQ and drink a beer with, where Kerry is the wine and cheese guy (probably French too). I think the results might already have looked different if Edwards had won the pre-elections.
If you have a candidate who can come across as one of the people, someone who understands and cares, is accessible and a powerful speaker (not debate class powerful but say Bill Clinton kind of powerful, one of his strongest points), then the Democrats will be a long way towards victory. It is precisely the ‘half of the country are gucks’ mentality that harmed Kerry, even if he never said something like that, he made some feel that way. Clinton did the exact opposite.
Of course, a party can also win by offering the voters what the voters want - easy solutions, quick bucks, etc. Give them bread and play, the Romans said, and the gucks/plebs will be happy. But this is a modern democracy (albeit a relatively ancient one) and gucks no longer exist. People have opinions. People think, whether they vote left or right. People have reasons and for them they are good reasons. You are only going to win their vote if you can convince them you are the leader who might know even better how to deal with the issues that matter, and are able to tell them that in plain language. The bread and play might win you one election, but generally you will lose against whomever gets 1 and 2 above right, not on Iraq, but on all issues that matter.
Humility, charm, affection, wisdom and leadership, those are the qualities of modern leaders, and those are the leaders people can and will vote for.
The fact that your big, bold vision is half fantasy and half lie doesn’t seem to be a political obstacle, I’ll grant you that.
I guess this is the big hang-up with Democrats: we’re too concerned about whether our solutions to the problems actually work, to adopt some grand sweeping vision that’s a pack of foma.
And as long as the GOP thinks it’s more important to beat up on Democrats than to defeat our enemies abroad or to solve our problems at home, the Republicans will increasingly control the placement of the deck chairs as we sink.
As long as the Democrats keep blaming the “mean ol’ Republicans” for their electoral losses, they will remain the oppostion party. A half-way decent Democratic candidate should’ve been able to beat Bush with one hand tied behind his back. Kerry just turned out not to be that candidate. He was the wrong type of campaigner, from the wrong part of the country, recruited out of the wrong branch of the government. It really isn’t any more complicated than that.
Defend it? Well, I suppose I can see how you would see it that way. Myself I see it more as reality…it happened. Its not what I would have wanted, its not what I felt was wise for the US to do, but its in the past now as far as the invasion goes. We are in it up to our eyeballs and are forced now to do what I had hoped America would never have to do again…slog it out in the trenches in an insurgency type situation. We can’t possibly tuck tail and run at this point, which means we are stuck there…so I’m trying to look for any silver lining that exists. And there ARE some good aspects to this fucked up invasion, not the least of which is Saddam and his merry men are gone and the Iraqi’s at least have SOME chance, no matter how slim, to build something that they will find good for themselves out of the ruins of to old regime.
In addition, reguardless of the wisdom of the US’s invasion of Iraq, I don’t see it as an ‘atrocity’ at all…REAL atrocities are just so much worse than anything the US has done as to make this statement vaguely ridiculous IMO. One has only to look at whats going on in the Sudan for instance to see some REAL autrocities. I really do believe that the US did the best it could to keep down civilian casualties and to pursue a strategy to minimize the loss of life on all sides, balancing the risk to our soldiers with the minimization of civilian casualties.
What do you want here…the complete OOB for the US military? Bravado? It is to laugh. You seem to have a vastly uninformed of just how powerful the US military is with reguards to a nation like Iraq.
What could the US have done differently if not restrained by the desire to minimize the loss of life? Well, there is the unrestricted bombing of Iraqi cities, including the use of conventional cruise missiles targetted at any and all military targets reguardless of their proximity to civilian homes or other facilities (hint: In the real world all targets had to be approved, especially those with a close proximity to civilian homes/facilities). What do you suppose the Iraqi’s could have done to prevent us doing that…razing their cities to the ground from the air? Then there are the ROE for ground troops…IF we even decided to commit them before every Iraqi city was a smoldering ruin. We could have sent our troops in with ROE to basically shoot anything that even vaguely looked threatening, to destroy any and all structures that are even suspected of having insurgents or Iraqi troops, etc. We could have targetted all Iraqi infrastructure from power to water to communications…everything gone. There is a lot more we COULD have done had we been the uncivilized barbarians you seem to be painting us…but I think you get the idea.
Fantasy? You are nuts if you think these things and more aren’t EASILY within the capabilities of the US military…especially with reguards to a small nation like Iraq. Its only our own desire to not have massive civilian casualties, and the rightous outrage of our own citizens if such a thing had been done in our names that prevent the US from doing whatever the hell it wants too.
Or, let me put it to you since you think this is all ‘bravado’ talking…exactly who do you suppose could stop us from doing whatever the hell we wanted to do in Iraq? And exactly why do you suppose we couldn’t turn Iraq into a smoking ruin even leaving aside nukes but just using our conventional forces…leaving aside our own restraint as the answer?
100,000? Thats more than I’ve seen in other cites…which list the Iraqi dead at something on the order of 8-12,000. Where are you getting 100,000…that sounds like its including a lot of non-combat related, non-war related deaths.
As to US casualties, honestly, they have been very light compared to past wars of this kind…surprisingly light. Of course, they are ‘light’ to anyone who hasn’t lost a loved one. In the first gulf war the casualties were ‘light’ as well…but not to those few who lost a loved one. Whats the magic number that makes it good or bad? There isn’t one of course. Either its right or its wrong. If its right then no matter how many casualties we have, its still the right thing to do. If its wrong, even if one person dies then its the wrong thing to do. So, I suppose from my perspective its wrong no matter what our losses are…because I don’t feel the US should have gotten involved in Iraq at all. However, if the casualties were thousands in Afghanistan it would still be the right thing for us to do.
I appreciate that. My wife and I hope the same thing as well. And I hope they ALL can come home as soon as possible. Thats why I’m so hopeful that the Iraqi’s can get their shit together, have an election thats at least quasi-representational of the peoples will, and rebuild their army to start shoulding much of the burden. I HOPE this happens, and I suppose thats why I appear to you to ‘defend’ the war…I WANT it to succeed so that we can bring our troops home where they belong.
I put no dollar price on my son’s head…or anyone else’s. Nor do I think that Iraq is about the money (if thats what you were getting at here). As to morally complex…ya, I think its an incredibly complex situation from a moral perspective. Hell, anything the US does intervention wise in the world is morally complex…Bosnia was morally complex. Certainly Vietnam was morally complex, as well as Korea and WWII. There is always the balance between what I’d like (the US to basically stay out of the worlds affairs as much as possible except when our vital national interests are threatened) and direct intervention for things like Bosnia or the Sudan or Somalia…or any other hot spot where people are being savaged, murdered and tortured. Or places like North Korea…or the old Iraq. Its a fine line.
Oh, I certainly will. And I hope to also show some of those $$$ (or Euro’s more likely) that funneled into certain European coffers and may have had an impact on their decision process for or against the US intervention in Iraq. And we can look at how the huge kickbacks to Saddam allowed him to re-arm his military to the extent he was able too…and to create things like his Fedayeen and other para-military operations that are (IMO) the core of much of the present insurgency.
Hopefully we’ll be able to look at ole Kofi Anon and son as well to see how clean THEY are in all this. But right now the time isn’t right…there just isn’t enough data, even for your pal Paul Bremer unfortunately, to make a good thread of it. All of the above is pure speculation until some facts come to light.
Considering the most liberal Democrat in the senate darn near beat Bush, I should think it would require only some minor adjustments. More people voted against this incumbent President than in any election in history. Kerry could have won with very few changes to his campaign, and none to his core values. Despite the all the crowing from the White House about “political capital”, this was still a very close election.
Resent away. But this is the reality; this is the position that exists. Don Quixote had the luxury of seeing the world not as it is, but as it should be. We do not. Your “I won’t choose because I resent the fact a choice must be made,” is pacifist nonsense. There ARE DEATHS NOW. And your willingness to assign moral equivalence to American soldiers and Iraqi bombers says as much as is necessary. I grant you full dominance over the world-as-it-should-be; when we must vote for fantasy world leaders, I will be guided by your wise counsel.
When it comes to making real world choices, I believe your naivete speaks for itself. Certainly your view of moral equity as between Iraqi bombers and American soldiers sends a message to the American electorate from the left that I couldn’t be happier with.
More people voted against the incumbent President because more people voted than ever before numbers wise. Simply put there are more people today in America than ever before.
And what about incumbent Presidents who only had one term because they were booted out? Guys like Carter and Ford certainly, on the surface anyway, seem to have done more poorly that GW.
To turn your statement around though as I’ve done in other threads when this arguement has come up…if the Dems couldn’t be Bush, a wildly unpopular and supposedly stupid moron with Kerry, a popular and articulate candidate, just who the hell CAN you beat? I mean, next election, at least in theory, the Pubs won’t be handycapped by such a loser as Bush…they may actually run a REAL (in Dems eyes) candidate. THEN what will you do?? I’m serious…to my mind at least, if you couldn’t beat Bush with your current platform I really can’t see how you could beat anyone…unless Bush basically drives the nation completely into the dirt and folks are forced to run to the Dems in droves to save them and save the country. As I said earlier in this thread thats kind of like having to hope for someone to lose so you can play…i.e. balls totally in the Republicans court. Its their game to lose, not your game to win.
This has got to be the sickest thing I have ever read here.
Of course, you have been shown that the electorate does not support this course, but why should reality intrude on your wet dream…
I’m not smart enough to understand it??? BTW, isn’t this sort of condescending bullshit the very thing you’ve been advising the left to stop doing? But laugh, Bricker. I also laugh at anyone still foolish enough to take anything you say seriously.
Perhaps you think you’ve got a sufficient “mandate” now so that convincing the stupid and/or unconvinced is no longer necessary.
Let’s see how that works out for you. Keep laughing, in any case. Laugh at needless death and degradation. That is how we will know you…
Actually no…not really. Since I don’t subscribe to most of the current conspiricy theories about election fraud (i.e. I’m sure it happened…it just wasn’t either massive or systematic), I see a fairly comfortable GW win. He basically took all the states the Republican’s figured to take, with a couple of surprises. I expect the same states will be Blue/Red essentially in 2008, though I could be wrong about that and a fundamental shift could be coming.
I think the 2000 election was a ‘narrow victor’ for Bush…VERY narrow. But a 3 million vote margin nationally I would say is relatively comfortable. Was it a landslide? Not by any means. Have other Presidential incumbants done better? Certainly they have.
Narrow or not though, the mere fact that he didn’t lose in a landslide is telling to me. Here we have a president who frankly isn’t the most popular kid on his block. Who got the US into a war in Iraq which most citizens don’t really understand the why’s of…and thats been a fairly steady drain on nation morale for all kinds of reasons. A president under who the economy basically tanked in his first year (not that I blame him necessarily for this, but The People™ take a dimmer view of such things normally), and who hasn’t really focused much on a domestic agenda in his first term to be honest. Certainly there were things on his plus side (his initial handling of the 9/11 crisis was I think very good and scored him points), but overall I really think he was in a very bad position re-election wise.
And yet…the Dems couldn’t beat him. With all that going for them, with the Republicans playing with one hand tied behind their backs, with the high powered stars mostly (and vocally) on their side, with the Michael Moore’s prominently displayed, with internation support for a Kerry presidency pouring in…and with Kerry himself, an east coast liberal, articulate and good looking (though with an oddly large head )…with all that and a lame president to run against, they couldn’t win.
What if the Pubs ran/run a centrist or even liberal candidate (they do have a few in the wings…and I can think of one who probably will run next time), an articulate man/woman with a real vision and with the intellectual horsepower to really convey their message? You can’t count on them always running a GW Bush after all…and if you couldn’t beat him, again, who COULD you beat?
He wasn’t “the most liberal Democrat in the senate”, except in a very skewed analysis. But the next Democrat won’t be running against Bush, so that’s all water under the bridge.
As for the “more people voted…” stuff, well MORE PEOPLE VOTED. BFD. There are more people now than there were in the past, and a larger % voted than usually do. You can spin it to say that Bush got more votes than any other presidential candidate, too. All of those statements are essentially meaningless.
Yeah, it was a close election. OTOH, the Republicans won increases across the board. I personally think “political capital” is in the eye of the beholder. If you think you’ve got it, you probably do. I just see it as a statement of self confidence, nothing more. You can call 'bs" on it, but that won’t stop Bush from spending it.
OK, guys, I’ve been watching this thread and either chill out or take this to the Pit. annaplurabelle, I could really do without speculation on Bricker’s nocturnal emissions, thankyouverymuch.
Dems might consider that, presently, being the “opposition party” may be an enviable position. I’ve said before that Kerry dodged a bullet losing the election, and current events have done nothing to convince me otherwise. Iraq appears to be a growing and unmitigated disaster; stories of abuses of civilians abound and new ones come to light almost daily; Iran is going nuclear, possibly drawing Israel into the fray; Syria harbors “insurgents” with impunity; bombs are going off in the Saudi capital; oil prices have risen again. The battle for “hearts and minds” is all but lost. The Middle East is less stable than before Bush came into office, and the perception of the US abroad couldn’t be lower. That the rest of the world might be correct about our mistakes has not and will not occur to the Republicans, and with a firm grip on the Executive and Legislative branches, they Own the next four years. The Dems. really do not need a strategy, since they have no power to implement it. Rather they should carefully target the most abusive pieces of Republican legislation with little more than a modicum of common sense, offering up the obvious logical alternatives, knowing full well they are forced into the position of “obsructionist” regardless of intent. All they need to be is intelligent, forward-thinking, cogent, and honest. They should gamble a bit by going on record as publically as possible every time another hairbrained bill hits the Congress, makes it throught he House, and must be fillibustered in the Senate. Loss is unfortunate, but again, the Republicans own the consequences, and rather become bitter, simply watch with rueful mindfullness of what mistakes not to make when power inevitably swings across the aisle. Given the Republican track record so far, of victory over reason, that can only be good for the stature of the Democrats in the long run.
As I said, you are hoping that another team loses so you can get that elusive wildcard slot. Balls in the Republicans court with such an attitude.
I wouldn’t count on the fact that things are quite as bleak as you are painting them either. I certainly don’t see things in quite as ‘gloom and doom’ a perspective as you obviously do Loopydude. Now, I conceed that perhaps I’m wrong and things really ARE that bad. I hope that you are still open enough to see though that the converse just MIGHT be true…and things aren’t nearly as bleak as you think they are.
In any event, this is the reality. Only in the Senate can Dem. power be exercised to any significant degree, and only then, really, by use of the filibuster. Since the ball is firmly in the other team’s court, it’s best to try to lay as much claim as possible to their good plays, and be distanced as much as possible from the fumbles. IMO, I see a whole lot of fumbles and not much else. Skyrocketing deficits, piss-poor environmental policy, a tax “reform” plan that is the most blatant attempt at corporate welfare I have ever seen, and will decimate the public coffers just in implementation costs alone, an unjust and essentially illegal war that is costing us hundreds of billions and killing tens of thousands of innocents, the most anti-science approach to any line of research that conflicts with Bush’s ideology I have ever seen in an Executive, even Reagan…please tell me, what is there to like? In my estimation, Nixon was a far better president than Bush could ever hope to be, Watergate and all. This isn’t a time of doom and gloom? When has our leadership been worse?
)…with all that and a lame president to run against, they couldn’t win.