Wow
By Callimachus | Related entries in Foreign Policy, General Politics, The War On TerrorismNew Sysiphus is a veteran of the Foreign Service Office, and he’s tapped in to American global policies. He’s more devoutly conservative than I am, but we share an uncompromising believer in the universality of Western freedoms.
On Monday, he published The Breach. It’s one of the most powerful indictments of the Bush Administration I’ve ever seen. Not just for the writing, which is sufficiently potent, but because of the moral authority — if you will — of the writer.
He begins with the President’s own words, in the two key speeches Bush made that form the core of what has come to be called the “Bush Doctrine.” Like New Sisyphus, I fully subscribe to the idealism and high purpose and humanity of that doctrine. New Sisyphus then writes a history of American policies and campaigns in the war on terror that opened on Sept. 11, 2001. And he comes to a conclusion:
Along the way, the President has not advanced the American issue in a direct, forthright way. Instead, his Administration has bumbled along, pretending we are at peace. The very real fact of a very real war is not even discernable among the American population at large. No sacrifices are asked, not even doing without “American Idol.” No mobilization has been ordered. Life goes on as before, creating a severe and hurtful disorientation between those families who have lost sons and those who don’t even know there is a war on.
This is not the War on Terror the President sold us on in 2001. Not even close. We are not serious and everyone knows this, especially our enemies. I look into the eyes of my sons and I know that I would rather die-I would rather die-than let them fight in a war to establish the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan or to hand power over to the crazy Shi’ites of Iraq.
The leading Iraqi political figure, the Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani, has on his website instructions for how to determine what is unclean and what is clean. Among his definitions of “unclean” are things like shit, entrails of animals and, oh yes, the dead bodies of infidel soldiers.
Our policy is to die for a man and a people who literally think the dead bodies of our soldiers are literally shit.
That is our policy.
There are little quibbles I could make with his minor points. But they do not affect the thumping force of his statements. He concludes with:
I cannot support President Bush any longer. Can you?
I agree with N.S. about the infuriation of seeing the same president say the right words in his official addresses, then do all the wrong things when it comes to implementing them. I agree with him that the mound of evidence that this administration doesn’t care, or doesn’t care enough, about the expressed ideals of the Bush Doctrine, is too high to dismiss.
To me, the problem wasn’t that there were too many neo-cons in the administration — as the opposition says — but that there weren’t enough of them. The neo-cons had a vision. But it was left to be implemented by old-school Kissinger-ish realists like Condi Rice and Don Rumsfeld. And Bush? He’s a CEO, not a visionary. The neo-con ideals were like a management model to him; something he could pick and choose from to cobble together his own policies. The rhetoric was useful because it held certain players in place long enough, but I don’t believe any more he feels any commitment to it.
If I ever did. I thought in 2000 he was about the worst major party presidential candidate I’d ever seen. The calculus of the post-9/11 world and the suicidal fixations and lack of better ideas of the anyone-but-Bush faction backed me into voting in 2004 for the same man I held in contempt in 2000. I supported him against the BDS lunacy. But on his own, it’s like rooting for my old college football team. You knew they were going to fumble on every possession. But they were the home team.
But what does it mean to “support” a lame-duck president in his second term? Where are you going to take your support if you withdraw it? My thoughts are, if we can get through to 2008 in one piece, we get another chance to put someone at the top who has an honest foreign policy vision and a commitment to American virtues and a firmness in purpose in advancing them, and a willingness to make the sacrifices that will bring out the spirit of this people.
I don’t support Bush. I don’t oppose him. Mostly I ignore him. And wait for the next chance. Iraq always was, for me, a long-term gamble. I said before it started, “20 years till we know if it’s a good idea.” The outcome will be nothing we intended at the start; unintended consequences will rule, but it seemed to me, and still seems to me, that the chance of those consequences being to the benefit of Iraqis, Americans, and the world in general remain good. In that context, I can wait out George W. Bush’s feeble fading years.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 1st, 2006 and is filed under Foreign Policy, General Politics, The War On Terrorism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
March 1st, 2006 at 6:25 pm
I thought in 2000 he was about the worst major party presidential candidate I’d ever seen. The calculus of the post-9/11 world and the suicidal fixations and lack of better ideas of the anyone-but-Bush faction backed me into voting in 2004 for the same man I held in contempt in 2000.
My experience exactly. Glad to know I wasn’t the only one.
I supported him against the BDS lunacy. But on his own, it’s like rooting for my old college football team. You knew they were going to fumble on every possession. But they were the home team.
Haha ouch. Funny because it’s true.
In my view, the guy has had (for the most part) a more or less fairly steady hand in the war on terror. Any concerns I have regarding imperfections (or even outright apparent contradictions) in the implementation of his high-sounding rhetoric are tempered when I look forward to 2008, and wonder just who’s going to be sitting in the Oval Office, just as we’re likely to be in the thick of the ongoing Iran and (whatever it is that results from the) cartoon jihad debacles.
The man’s certainly not perfect. But I prefer him where he’s at now to the alternative of a Gore or Kerry.
March 1st, 2006 at 6:56 pm
Part of the problem is that Bush will have made it all but impossible for anyone to take a forward-leaning position on foreign policy in the future. He’ll leave us with a whole new Vietnam syndrome. His limp incompetence at carrying out the bold policies he announced will discredit the policies, not just the man. Three years from now anyone suggesting we use pre-emptive force will have Bush’s seeming failure in Iraq thrown in their face. “Do you want another Iraq?” will become as deadly a counter as “Do you want another Vietnam?”
Mr. Bush has been a disaster. I voted against him in 2000, and I voted against him in 2004. I thought in 2000 he was a small man with an unjustified belief in himself. In 2004 I knew that to be true, and although I had no love for Kerry I thought that he, at least, might put forward a better crop of advisers.
Mr. Bush belongs in a class with Jimmy Carter, Richard Nixon and James Buchanan.
March 1st, 2006 at 7:39 pm
Why?
March 1st, 2006 at 7:49 pm
Well … Where do I start ….. I had an innate distrust of Bush in the beginning (mostly because he injected the theology at every opportunity) and have gone downhill on him since.
“The very real fact of a very real war is not even discernable among the American population at large. No sacrifices are asked, not even doing without “American Idol.â€Â? No mobilization has been ordered. Life goes on as before, creating a severe and hurtful disorientation between those families who have lost sons and those who don’t even know there is a war on.”
Why would it be any different? A REAL war? uh-uh … A real war is a war declared by Congress! A real war is a declared operation that utilizes all resources! Anyone remember WW ll ? Anyone remember a tax break during WWll? Anyone remember WWll being administered from the back room by CEO’s?
There is a fundamental lapse of the constitution here that is being lost in contrived pissing contests to keep everyone busy. Speaking of which … like Kerry or not, and I don’t …. but does anyone remember a politician in the 40′ or 50’s debasing and challenging a war veteran for the sake of getting votes? Other vets would have hunted these folks down and beat their collective asses. Real veterans fought for the rights of any American to say anything and those guys shamed themselves for someone who had the balls to fly onto a flatop with a REAL veteran to declare a victory when others sons and daughters were dying and still continue to die to this day. He was on the TV within the last week with a smile on his face saying that we are making progress according to plan.
Make it to 2008 and put someone in that will help the situation? I think we have the chance of a snowball in hell, but there is always hope.
Republican …. Democrat …. Independent or whatever … if we continue to accept the behavior of politicians and power brokers in election bids we will deserve the failures that we acheive in the world.
If we are going to have a war, have a real war. If we are going to plod along and make people rich at the expense of our children and grandchildren then don’t complain. If the WWll soldiers and the wives who worked in factories were around in numbers they would be ashamed of us all. Just some random thoughts and trying to keep it simple :)
March 1st, 2006 at 9:31 pm
Because in the end, when it came to the war on Islamist terrorism, Kerry had essentially the same overall general plan that Bush, by then, had, too. If he had any radical new ideas (and “doing it right” or “getting more allies” doesn’t really count — especially when Chirac and Schroeder right off said “no way, Jack”) we never heard them. If he was less beholden to some special interests, he was more beholden to some others.
Overall, in presidential politics, a tie goes to the incumbent. No point in merely replacing one set of stumblebums with another, in the presence of the enemy, and adding the chaos of transition to the equation.
Add to that picture the whole mass of Michael Moore et al, swirling around declaring that a Kerry victory (they didn’t like him, either) would in fact be not a Kerry victory but A REPUDIATION OF EVERY SINGLE UNJUST AND ILLEGAL MILITARY ACTION UNDERTAKEN BY SHRUBBIE McCHIMPLERBURTON THE DEATH MERCHANT SINCE HE CAUSED 9/11!!!!!
So it became an easy, but still bitter, choice to pull that “R” lever.
Frankly, the best reason to have voted for Kerry was his wife. But them, I write headlines for a living, and four years of her mouth and antics might not have been as appealing to people in another trade.
March 1st, 2006 at 11:21 pm
I’m starting to get the impression that, barring a confrontation with Iran (admittedly a distinct possibility), the rest of Bush’s term will amount to little more than marking time, and of course continuing to spend taxpayers’ money like it’s going out of style.
He’s clearly committed to winning this war, but just as clearly clueless as to how to fight it. The thing is, this Long War is so different from any war the U.S. has fought in the past that I doubt anyone else in Washington now would fare much better. It may even take two or three more presidencies before we get a commander-in-chief who’s finally able to figure it out well enough to produce a truly effective war plan. We can only hope none of our cities get blown away by a nuke in the meantime.
March 2nd, 2006 at 6:21 am
Seems that al-Sistani may have modified his definition of ‘unclean things’
From his website
Sistani
(sorry if I butcher the html)
The following ten things are essentially najis:
1. Urine
2. Faeces
3. Semen
4. Dead body
5. Blood
6. Dog
7. Pig
8. Kafir
9. Alcoholic liquors
10. The sweat of an animal who persistently eats najasat.
“I don’t support Bush. I don’t oppose him. Mostly I ignore him.”
That sums up my feelings nicely.
March 2nd, 2006 at 6:26 am
OK, I take that back…not too bad though
“107. An infidel i.e. a person who does not believe in Allah and His Oneness, is najis. Similarly, Ghulat who believe in any of the holy twelve Imams as God, or that they are incarnations of God, and Khawarij and Nawasib who express enmity towards th e holy Imams, are also najis. And similar is the case of those who deny Prophethood, or any of the necessary laws of Islam, like, namaz and fasting, which are believed by the Muslims as a part of Islam, and which they also know as such.
As regards the people of the Book (i.e. the Jews and the Christians) who do not accept the Prophethood of Prophet Muhammad bin Abdullah (Peace be upon him and his progeny), they are commonly considered najis, but it is not improbable that they are Pak. Ho wever, it is better to avoid them.”
March 2nd, 2006 at 10:47 am
I voted for Bush in 2000. I was even proud of how he handled 9/11 and Afghanistan, but looking backward over his time in office now, I am truly afraid of the damage that can be wrought in the next few years while he’s “marking time” and playing at being President. It’s clear to me that this administration is carefully and not so quietly laying the ground work for a police state and Republicans and Democrats alike are looking the other way and letting it happen. We’re going to wake up one day and find out we’ve given up the very freedoms we claim we want to bring to the rest of the world.
March 2nd, 2006 at 12:51 pm
This man is a crazy hawk. Attack Pakistan after Afganistan, most of the ME countries enabled alQueada. This man vision sounds like a Holy crusade with no use for diplomacy. The attack of 911 do not warrant an unHoly crusade. Bush and Rumsfeld sold the war on the cheap only because that was the only way the public would buy it. A prolonged full scale war to eradicate terror and most of the corrupt ME leaders would never fly.
March 2nd, 2006 at 1:35 pm
I don’t get the idea that everybody should be sacrificing because there’s a war on. Sacrifice for the hell of it has no point. The point of sacrifice during WW2 wasn’t so that we were suffering alongside the families of soldiers - it was (allegedly) so that the soldiers could have everything they needed. Giving up American Idol would do NOTHING for our soldiers. Now maybe we should give up some of the recent tax cuts, but only because we’re disgustingly in the red, and not because sacrifice is good. If it was true that the tax cuts are good for the long term of our economy, then I’d say we should keep them. But the fiscal conservative in me tells me that the debt, deficit, and trade imbalance are going to drive this country into the ground, long term. So I say raise taxes, but not for the sake of sacrifice.
March 2nd, 2006 at 2:28 pm
For me, I think Theodore Roosevelt summed it up nicely:
The Democrats are exactly those ‘cold and timid souls’ in my view. Though it seems Roosevelt was wrong in one respect: the Democrats have come to know defeat very well.
This is a time of great uncertainty. Immovable objects of Western principle are meeting the irresistable force of Islamist belief. Vision, purpose and steady hands are required. The Democrats have none of these. They are beholden for their posts to a sizeable far left constituency that, to me, seems mad.
Some may argue that that’s the role of a minority party: to criticize, debate, and help to shape and refine the national discourse. And they are right, with one slight modification: responsibility.
Responsible criticism. Responsible debate. How odd to find myself nodding along to President Bush as he makes these very same points.
This is what our latter day Democrats seem incapable of. They seem to me the party of angst, fury and irrationality. They are the party of Dean, and of Markos Moulitsas Zúniga. The Democrats on the national stage have given voice to the moveon.org and dailykos crowd; it seems as though the inmates are truly running the asylum.
I’ve been a Democratic voter since 1987, and with the lone exception of 2004, have voted Democratic in every presidential election since. And yet I’ve come to revile the Democrats. When next I register to vote, I will do so as an independent. And until the Democrats come to their senses, they will never again have my vote in a national election.
March 2nd, 2006 at 3:06 pm
Citizen Duck,
I completely agree with the Independent move. Mentioning that wonderous quote from Roosevelt as a foundation of defense for George bush is blaphemic. George Bush doesn’t have the anything like the thoughtful demeanor of Roosevelt. And Roosevelt would never have made the “cheap” moves of Bush while his countrymen were dying in the streets of another country.
George bush is not steadfast …. he is secretive, sneaky and running out of tricks (as evidenced by the video released on Katrina prep) and smiles. He inked a deal in India today that is an A La carte version of the deal everyone else has signed. He will be super conservative with others when he talks.
the real answer to Why? … because we have become a weak and spoiled citizenry, and we don’t remember how to take control of our own lives. We leave that to the marketeers.
March 2nd, 2006 at 4:00 pm
GN,
While we see eye to eye on the independent thing, it does seem we part company there.
I don’t expect perfection from Bush, nor do I think he’s perfect. But I’m far too old and I’ve seen far too much of the world to be shocked by the revelation that politicians are crooked, or that they cater to the interests of themselves and their friends. The way I see it, I have a choice: I can live in the real world, with all its imperfections, and do my best to make my way in it as best I know how, or I can hold everyone to impossible standards of perfection and feel a sense of constant frustration when reality fails to meet my ideals. I simply choose the former over the latter.
In the broad sweep of things, and given the fact that there are realistically two parties for which to vote in this country at the moment, the current crop of Republicans falls more in line for what I feel are the biggest priorities facing us today.
That doesn’t mean I don’t agonize when I go to the polls, or that I didn’t grimace and sigh when I made my mark for Bush/Cheney, but for me it’s simply a matter of choosing the better of two bad choices.
March 2nd, 2006 at 5:38 pm
C. Duck- the quote of the week (or month or year- I can’t decide which) is yours:
“I don’t expect perfection from Bush, nor do I think he’s perfect. But I’m far too old and I’ve seen far too much of the world to be shocked by the revelation that politicians are crooked, or that they cater to the interests of themselves and their friends. The way I see it, I have a choice: I can live in the real world, with all its imperfections, and do my best to make my way in it as best I know how, or I can hold everyone to impossible standards of perfection and feel a sense of constant frustration when reality fails to meet my ideals. I simply choose the former over the latter.�
It’s a pretty damn incisive statement; you’re spot on. Suck it up, deal with reality and get on with living. There’s plenty of folks who need to read this.
March 2nd, 2006 at 8:39 pm
C. Duck,
You are of course right about getting by the best way possible. Perhaps I will reach that conlusive state myself as I age and mature(?) but the frustrations that come from this guy are cause for a good rant now and then. I understand the choice for the least of two distatseful morsels at election time. I also understand that the winners get the spoils. I think these guys hung a really large feedbag.
I guess when you consider the fact that men bet and lost their entire worldly firtunes to make this country happen, it grates when you must watch the rape.
The major issue for me is the incompetence of the the war. I don’t think that our people should be dying because “we had to settle at the polls”. I was not against going to war … I just believe that if we go to war it should be declared by congress and we should all be in it, all sacrificing.
Oh well, this too shall pass ……….. maybe?
March 3rd, 2006 at 3:13 am
Well, as far as Citizen Duck’s view of the current state of the Democratic Party, I think he’s being much too harsh. The Deaniacs, Moorons, and Kossacks have far too much influence in the Party, that’s for sure, but they’re hardly the mainstream. The fact is, the Democrats are in one sense fractured, lacking a consistent and coherent opposition to Bush, and also much too passive. It seems the only ones with real passion now are the moonbats.
I voted for Kerry in 2004, but it was profoundly harder than it should have been. Not under the bondage of BDS, I rejecting the Anybody But Bush mentality. At the end of the day, after weighing all the issues including foreign policy, Kerry won a cautious vote from me. Very cautious.
As for 2008, we need a strong active choice, with a clear plan to fight terror (who is not just a Republican-lite). If they pick Hillary…no they wouldn’t be that stupid.
March 5th, 2006 at 11:31 pm
Sorry, Rafique. We’re talking about the Democrats, here.
They’ll pick Hillary. Your Potemkin Village candidate…
And you thought the Donks were going to produce another George C. Marshall? Well, I’ll eat my hat!
So you’ll be down to one of three Republicans: Condi, Rudy, or McCain.
April 21st, 2007 at 10:16 pm
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