Holy Shiite!
posted by BohemianLikeYOU at 2/27/2006 01:31:00 PM
Monday, February 27, 2006
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Holy Shiite Indeed!
Feb. 28th, CBS Poll:
Mr. Bush's overall job rating has fallen to 34 percent, down from 42 percent last month. Fifty-nine percent disapprove of the job the president is doing.
For the first time in this poll, most Americans say the president does not care much about people like themselves. Fifty-one percent now think he doesn't care, compared to 47 percent last fall.
Just 30 percent approve of how Mr. Bush is handling the Iraq war, another all-time low.
By two to one, the poll finds Americans think U.S. efforts to bring stability to Iraq are going badly – the worst assessment yet of progress in Iraq.
It Didn’t Work
By William F. Buckley, Jr.
Feb. 24, 2006
"I can tell you the main reason behind all our woes — it is America." The New York Times reporter is quoting the complaint of a clothing merchant in a Sunni stronghold in Iraq. "Everything that is going on between Sunni and Shiites, the troublemaker in the middle is America."
One can't doubt that the American objective in Iraq has failed. The same edition of the paper quotes a fellow of the American Enterprise Institute. Mr. Reuel Marc Gerecht backed the American intervention. He now speaks of the bombing of the especially sacred Shiite mosque in Samara and what that has precipitated in the way of revenge. He concludes that “The bombing has completely demolished” what was being attempted — to bring Sunnis into the defense and interior ministries.
Our mission has failed because Iraqi animosities have proved uncontainable by an invading army of 130,000 Americans. The great human reserves that call for civil life haven't proved strong enough. No doubt they are latently there, but they have not been able to contend against the ice men who move about in the shadows with bombs and grenades and pistols.
The Iraqis we hear about are first indignant, and then infuriated, that Americans aren't on the scene to protect them and to punish the aggressors. And so they join the clothing merchant who says that everything is the fault of the Americans.
The Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, elucidates on the complaint against Americans. It is not only that the invaders are American, it is that they are "Zionists." It would not be surprising to learn from an anonymously cited American soldier that he can understand why Saddam Hussein was needed to keep the Sunnis and the Shiites from each others' throats.
A problem for American policymakers — for President Bush, ultimately — is to cope with the postulates and decide how to proceed.
One of these postulates, from the beginning, was that the Iraqi people, whatever their tribal differences, would suspend internal divisions in order to get on with life in a political structure that guaranteed them religious freedom.
The accompanying postulate was that the invading American army would succeed in training Iraqi soldiers and policymkers to cope with insurgents bent on violence.
This last did not happen. And the administration has, now, to cope with failure. It can defend itself historically, standing by the inherent reasonableness of the postulates. After all, they govern our policies in Latin America, in Africa, and in much of Asia. The failure in Iraq does not force us to generalize that violence and antidemocratic movements always prevail. It does call on us to adjust to the question, What do we do when we see that the postulates do not prevail — in the absence of interventionist measures (we used these against Hirohito and Hitler) which we simply are not prepared to take? It is healthier for the disillusioned American to concede that in one theater in the Mideast, the postulates didn't work. The alternative would be to abandon the postulates. To do that would be to register a kind of philosophical despair. The killer insurgents are not entitled to blow up the shrine of American idealism.
Mr. Bush has a very difficult internal problem here because to make the kind of concession that is strategically appropriate requires a mitigation of policies he has several times affirmed in high-flown pronouncements. His challenge is to persuade himself that he can submit to a historical reality without forswearing basic commitments in foreign policy.
He will certainly face the current development as military leaders are expected to do: They are called upon to acknowledge a tactical setback, but to insist on the survival of strategic policies.
Yes, but within their own counsels, different plans have to be made. And the kernel here is the acknowledgment of defeat.
============
What say you?
Let's hear it for the moonbats...
As for the polls, my Laughing Friend, they are not surprising. I too have been disappointed by Bush in his handling of Iraq, but I defy anyone to have done better. Please tell me, Hysterical, what would you have done were you in the White House?
Oh, I know... You would have never gone to war. Nevermind the evidence of Saddam's chemical weapons and genocidal activities.
Oh wait, I forgot... Bush actually lied to us all. The intelligence didn't REALLY say all those things, we were all just duped by the stupid warmongering cowboy. Somehow he's too stupid to earn the Left's respect, but too smart for them to catch him when he's "lying."
So what if you had gone to war? Surely you would have handled it better than the President, right? But how do you propose you would have done that?
Now as for that Buckley article,
I would like to see the statistics from the region, not quotes from a clothes merchant and the Iranian President, before I make a decision about the "acknowledgement of defeat."
So have we lost Iraq? At this point, I'd say we lost it when we decided to allow this country a form of self-government, and our defeat was clinched when they made allowances for "Islamic Law" in their constitution. Neither of these are Bush's fault, however, as he could not (and should not) have subjugated the nation without first having evidence that they are capable of self government. Then, had he found sufficient evidence proving their inability, he would have undoubtedly faced opposition from every bleeding heart and intellectual moonbat in the world.
That same opposition would have come if he had attempted to meddle with the Iraqi Constitution, or root out terrorists more vigorously. He couldn't take the most effective courses of action because if he had, his approval ratings would probably be lower than they are now.
So am I a Bush fan? Not particularly. But he was better than the alternatives in 2000 and 2004, and I will continue to support him.
Neither of these are Bush's fault, however, as he could not (and should not) have subjugated the nation without first having evidence that they are capable of self government.
Sorry, that should read "Without first having evidence that they are INCAPABLE of self government."
Go on, keep supporting George Bush who last week said: "Our strategy in Iraq is that the Iraqis stand up, we'll stand down."
That is a cousin of the "Vietnamization" policy of Nixon in the early 1970s that was gonna keep South Vietnam from becoming, simply, Vietnam. It didn't work. The North Vietnamize won.
With event going the way they are, it doesn't look like we'll even get close to a "Iraqization" of Iraq. Maybe we should hire the old soldiers from North Vientman to take over in Iraq? They won war one, maybe they could win this one.
http://img.timeinc.net/time/magazine/archive/covers/1975/1101750512_400.jpg
Things that sucketh:
Signs The Matrix Sky Radio Big Fish Miracle No Time for Sergeants The Passion of the Christ Nicholas Nickleby To End All Wars Master and Commander Elf I Robot Hitch
and especially:
O.C. Supertones Relient K Hawk Nelson MxPx Roper Casting Crowns Krystal Meyers MAE Eli Chris Rice Newsboys DCTalk Big Daddy Weave Todd Agnew Switchfoot Olivia the Band Barlowgirl Spoken Matthew West TobyMac
Killing is wrong.
Your mama said...
"Things that sucketh:
Signs The Matrix Sky Radio Big Fish Miracle No Time for Sergeants The Passion of the Christ Nicholas Nickleby To End All Wars Master and Commander Elf I Robot Hitch
and especially:
O.C. Supertones Relient K Hawk Nelson MxPx Roper Casting Crowns Krystal Meyers MAE Eli Chris Rice Newsboys DCTalk Big Daddy Weave Todd Agnew Switchfoot Olivia the Band Barlowgirl Spoken Matthew West TobyMac"
Hey, I object!!! Some of those bands are pretty hot! Although, I will agree that with the exception of "The Passion of the Christ" most of those movies are not that good overall. That and other than apparently going Christian bashing with an obviously childish overtone there is no point to your comment.
To actually comment on the issues at hand. If we have failed in Iraq, no one bears the responsibility more heavily than the citizens of Iraq. There are a lot of factors at work, but lets face it. If they can't rise up as a nation, create a constitution, and survive against those who would seek to oppress them WITH the help of the mightiest military on the planet then they more than anyone bear the responsibility if their nation crumbles. This is particularly true if they then blame those trying to help them (the US and only the US) and instead look for salvation from those trying to oppress them (apparently almost everyone else).
Heh heh -- Yes....
Arrogant Bush Incompetently Liberates 50 Million
We'll continue "blundering" our way through more liberations in the Middle East just like we bufoonishly liberated Europe 60 years ago.
What we really need is more hand wringing from politicians, late night talk show hosts, and songwriters? Where *Have* You Gone, Sheryl Crow?
To those suffering under the boot of oppression everywhere, we boldy offer you *concern* and U.N. beauracracy.
"Arrogant Bush Incompetently Liberates 50 Million"
not quite yet...
mick jones said...
"'Arrogant Bush Incompetently Liberates 50 Million'
not quite yet... "
So, does this mean that he has completely liberated 50 million people? Because I thought it was incomplete as the original quote stated. What say you?
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