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By Callimachus | Related entries in Blogging, Smart Things Said By Smart People, The War On TerrorismOnce again, leave it to Jeff Goldstein to spell out, in bulleted, plain English, what the Administration seems to be trying to say:
Clearly, the important administration arguments are beginning to coalesce: 1) Criticism of the war is not by itself unpatriotic 2) Similarly, answering anti-war critics is not challenging their patriotism 3) But opportunistic and cynical anti-war critics who are trying to walk back their own votes and level spurious charges at the Administration (they lied to take is into war) are themselves lying 4) These lies are hurting the country and the troops. 5) The burden of proof, in a post 911 world, was on Saddam Hussein to prove he’d disarmed; we could not wait for the threat to become imminent before acting 6) The cause the troops are fighting for is just and right 7) Iraq is moving toward freedom; and things on the ground are improving daily, regardless of what the MSM and prominent Dems would have us believe.
These points, taken together, form an easy, concise, and�most importantly�a factually correct counter-narrative to the Dem / MSM narrative that has preached confusion, failure, quagmire, American criminality (torture, WP), and the relentlessness of an insurgency whose battleground savvy and knowledge of the Arab world are thwarting the plans of our confused military leaders and civilian war commanders.
Agree or argue, but it’s nice to see a case made clearly and directly, without being garbled by the messenger or the media. Ah, the power of a blog. I just hope he’s right and that’s what the administration, in fact, believes.
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November 21st, 2005 at 11:59 pm
The problem comes with who gets to catagorize dissenters into group #1 or group #3. Similarly, what sensitivity meter are we using when we #2 the dissenter. #4 implies an anti-patriotic outcome — in fact, treason. The only question is malice, which at this point in the debate would have to be implied. #6 is silly, because the world is inifinitely filled with “just and right” fights. Cuba. I’ll go with #7, I don’t know first hand…I wonder if Mr. Goldstean does, first hand.
Callimachus, why do you care what the administration “believes”? The administration could believe that Aliens have body-snatched Putin — I don’t care, as long as, we don’t invade Russia.
The Republicans are masters of using the stupidest Democrats to their advantage and framing the argument to pummel the Democrats. Goldstein’s comments are simply a “case” being “made clearly and directly.” It is framing the argument. Like this:
1) Bush promoted a pre-emptive military strike based on flawed intelligence.
2) Bush showed absolute confidence in the quality of intelligence coming from his branch of government.
3) The burden of proof was on Iraq post 9-11, because it is an Arab country with Arab people in it and because we were already in quazi-war with Iraq — not because of any clear connection to 9-11 or Al Queda.
4) Bush had personal reasons to want to remove Sadam Hussein, namely, the assassination attempt on GHWB and the unfinished business of the First Gulf War started by his father.
5) Post 9-11 sentiment was ripe to go to war with some Arab country, after Afganistan.
6) Bush used this political climate and flawed intelligence to build support for a war with Iraq.
7) Many people are dying in Iraq, including U.S soldiers.
8) There is no forseeable exit or exit plan.
9) We may well be there for 20 years and sink trillions of dollars into this war.
November 22nd, 2005 at 4:09 pm
DosPeros,
Are you being ‘deliberately obtuse’? Is this a joke?
“1) Bush promoted a pre-emptive military strike based on flawed intelligence.”
As far as we know, this is true.
“2) Bush showed absolute confidence in the quality of intelligence coming from his branch of government.”
Tenet told him that it was a ’slam dunk’ that we would find WMD’s in Iraq.
“3) The burden of proof was on Iraq post 9-11, because it is an Arab country with Arab people in it and because we were already in quazi-war with Iraq â€â€? not because of any clear connection to 9-11 or Al Queda.”
It was up to Iraq to provide proof that he had dismantled and destroyed his weapons - per the UN Resolution and the Cease Fire from the Gulf War… he never did.
“4) Bush had personal reasons to want to remove Sadam Hussein, namely, the assassination attempt on GHWB and the unfinished business of the First Gulf War started by his father.”
Liberal asshattery!!! You know…. there is medication available to help you with this problem…
“5) Post 9-11 sentiment was ripe to go to war with some Arab country, after Afganistan.”
Would you prefer that we went to war with somebody like France????
“6) Bush used this political climate and flawed intelligence to build support for a war with Iraq.”
After 9/11 happened, we changed the way that we viewed intelligence. I would say that is completely normal behavior, if you were the victim of a theft then you begin to be pro-active in preventing any further thefts.
“7) Many people are dying in Iraq, including U.S soldiers.”
Yes, many people are dying in Iraq… we are fighting Al Queida in Iraq and just in case you have forgotten, we lost more civilian people in one morning on 9/11 than we have lost soldiers in this war so far, and that is after 2 1/2 years of fighting.
“8) There is no forseeable exit or exit plan.”
Yes there is, we are training their people to handle their security. It takes time to train them but more and more of them are becoming ready to take over.
“9) We may well be there for 20 years and sink trillions of dollars into this war. ”
We may end up building a base over there, just like we did in Germany, but we won’t be there in the same capacity as we are now. I think that it would probably be a good idea to have a base in the area because of the instability of the Middle East right now. This is an area that is going to require constant supervision for a quite a while.
“3) But opportunistic and cynical anti-war critics who are trying to walk back their own votes and level spurious charges at the Administration (they lied to take is into war) are themselves lying 4) These lies are hurting the country and the troops. ”
Are you saying that you don’t see any opportunistic and cynical anti-war critics in your party that are trying to walk back their own votes and claim that ‘Bush Lied’, and in view of several seperate reports and investigations that show that this administration did not ‘massage intelligence’, they didn’t ‘intimidate anybody into specific claims’….
Are you saying that this type of ‘lie’ from our elected leadership wouldn’t have any consequences or effect on our troops and the war in general?
You are aware that nothing takes place in a vaccuum, everthing that we do and say have consequences.
November 22nd, 2005 at 11:15 pm
First off, Debsay, I’m not a Democrat or a Republican and yes, obviously, there are political opportunists.
My point here was that Republicans have been successful in “framing” the pro-war argument and that the Democrats have not.
You proved my point by defensively arguing the implications of the facts that I set out — not the facts themselves. One frames an argument by cherry-picking facts and values which bolster their policy preference.
I will now remove the ass from my head, get in line, and join the struggle to spread democracy — so that foreign countries can elect governments that hate us and that we have to remove later. Yeepy!
“You are aware that nothing takes place in a vaccuum, everthing that we do and say have consequences.”
I’m vaguely familiar with this concept, but probably not as much as the families of dead soldiers.
“Are you saying that this type of ‘lie’ from our elected leadership wouldn’t have any consequences or effect on our troops and the war in general?”
I don’t know, what kind of effect do you think it has? I don’t believe that our soldiers really need or want to be protected from the rough and tumble world of politics. They aren’t idiots. They can think and analyze and do all those things that all us armchair blogosphere generals can do. If your worried about the soldiers welfare, I’d suggest getting them the armor they need to survive roadside bombs –not their tender emotional state after the Howard Dean calls Bush a liar.
November 23rd, 2005 at 2:43 am
Hey DosPeros, you can use the
November 23rd, 2005 at 9:45 am
Justin — I’m within several points of being functionally retarded. Ask Debsay. How do I do that? Is there a special button on this magic machine?
August 7th, 2006 at 10:43 pm
Good job.