Republicans & Conservatives: Archives

I guess I’m a little fuzzy on this: how is it the terrorists win if we leave Iraq? Sure, the Iraqi people lose. And we lose some world respect. But I’m not making the connection that “the terrorists” will have won. Do you mind filling in the gap?
Thanks.

Ummmm… Dustin? Hello? Are you listening? Dean has ben quite consistent that he opposed the war, but now that the mistake was made, we have to live up to our commitment.

He has offerd a solution. It includes world participation with being hampered by the need to send billions of unchallenged monies to companies of Beltway insiders and Bush “Pioneers.”

I am glad Dean has you concerned. I think it is a great sign that next President will be a former Governor from Vermont. Go Howard, go!

Jonesy, I think it will be a struggle for the Fmr. Governor to get through the Primary season. They haven’t even started yet and you are claiming victory for him already? Marshall and many others who have gone to Iraq say the picture isn’t as bleak as the press paints it. Dr. Dean can restate whatever he recently read in the NY Times but if the truth of the matter is that things are going better in Iraq than the press is making it out to be, it could be a long road ahead for any anti-war Democratic candidate.

Jonsey, you’ve done a great job of twisting my words. I never said Dean wants our troops to come home. I’ve merely said that voices like his would “rather point fingers than offer a solution of their own.” What he has done is accuse Bush of lying.

However, any solution that only involves the practice of yelling “liar, liar” is no solution at all.

Additionally, how is “world participation” different from the U.S. shouldering most of it? If the act is right in itself, we do not need the rest of the world to give us a pat on the back. We do it because it’s right, not because others think so.

You should also brush up on why companies such as Haliburton received the contracts. In Haliburton’s case, it is one of the few American companies even with the capabilities to do what needs to be done. Furthermore, the company already has resources in the Middle East.

As a Repub, I applaud Dean, and i hope that he is the guy. If i cannot have Dennis K, then Dean is the next best guy. Actually Dean/Clark is my ultimate tag team. The more liberal the party goes, the smaller it gets, in a Reed poll, commissioned by the DNC, only 36% of Americans identify themselves as a Dem, thats the lowest ever. 45% identify themselves as Repubs, which has grown since 1996. In the South and Midwest Dean gets to go to rural white democrat areas, and explain gay marriage and his quote where he would “veto the partial birth abortion ban”. That would not play real well in historically democrat but conservative white rural areas.

My filter on this is apparently a little different than yours. Thirty-five years ago I was dodging bullets while we engaged in the Great Southeast Asia Wargames (1968 - first tour). At that time, five years before we finally pulled our combat troops out completely, anyone who carried a rifle knew what the finish was going to look like.

Two years later, when I went back, everyone still knew what the end was going to look like. But during that time the argument by those not serving — by the politicians and other strap-hangers, was exactly the same as you’re making now. So my filter is that wall in Washington with those 58,000 names on it.

If our so-called leaders could have realized the simple truth that we can’t make the world over in our image, well over 20,000 of the names on that wall wouldn’t be there today.

I think that if we’re honest with ourselves, we can see what’s going to happen in Iraq and the rest of the Middle East already. There will be no flowering of democracy in the rest of the Middle East. If anything, the populations (and perhaps the governments) of surrounding countries will become more radicalized and anti-American, if that is possible.

As for Iraq, even if we suppress the terrorists for a while, as soon as we start pulling out everybody will dig up their AK-47s and start going at each other — Sunnis against Kurds and Shiits, Shiits against Sunnis and each other. It’ll look like Lebanon without the fundamental orderliness of that civil war — there will be no “Green Lines” this time around.

In the meantime a currently unknown number of young Americans will come home in flag-draped coffins and an even larger number will come home hideously maimed in body and mind. And also in the meantime our politicians, both those like George Bush, and the Republicans and Democrats who voted with him to get us into this war and those who come after him, as well as the boot-lickers and cheerleaders in their respective political parties and in the media — none of whom will do any of the bleeding or any of the dying, and none of whose children will do any of the bleeding or any of the dying (and, by the way, none of whom are fit to even shine the boots of the men and women on the battlefield) — will continue to say, as you do “the idea that we must not concede to terrorists has been lost on [insert description of [deleted] person who would prefer to not spend lives, blood and treasure] who would rather point fingers than offer a solution of their own.”

Fundamentally Mr. Bush’s argument, and yours, is an appeal to hubris: we can’t leave because we can’t embarrass ourselves; but it’s a false argument. We will leave sometime — next year, five years from now or ten years from now — and no matter when we leave we will set the terms under which we do so, so it’s just a question of weather we do it sooner or later. I, for one, would prefer sooner. This isn’t complicated. It doesn’t take a gigantic policy statement. It doesn’t require the participation of the West Wing Drum and Kazoo Marching Band or the Congressional Tabernacle Choir.

When we were in The Land of Bad Things we used to say “let’s just declare victory and go home.” It took a long time, but ultimately that’s what we did and that’s what we ought to do here. The first candidate who says something like this is the one who will get my vote.

Well that’s a very bleak outlook on life Paul. Why not turn your face to the wall and die while you’re at it? You think that service in the military should always be rosey and clean? People die whether you are fighting the Civil War against slavery or the Gulf/Iraqi Freedom War against terrorism. Who says which is worth fighting for and which is not? I say impose Democracy now, not later when it is needed sorely, and accept the loss. Everyone who joins the military understands that they may die at any time and they accept that fact. If you can’t handle that, don’t sign up. Huzzah!

Dustin,

You missed my point (and I apologize for my typos).

You are insisting that all Dean says is “liar, liar.” You are wrong. That was the gist of my post.

Dean has presented ideas to deal with post-Bush Iraq.

DO they get as much juice flowing as “liar, liar?” Well, no. Read Doonesbury yesterday, the “really, really, really…” bit is how so many of us feel, that Dean’s fire is what draws us in.

But, if you look past the fire to the message, I think you will see why many of us believe Dean is the next president.

Jonsey