Cowardice Never Pays
Note to the Democrats: Appeasor nation France is now being targeted by Al Qaeda, despite its strong opposition to the war in Iraq and generally cowardly behavior.
So much for the theory that U.S. policy is the reason why "they hate us."
So much for the theory that U.S. policy is the reason why "they hate us."
posted by LadybugUSA at 9:16 AM
9 Comments:
Cliff, I sat this one out until I read your egregious analogy about what is going on in Iraq. It is most definitely not a carnival shooting gallery. There is no "putt-ding" to it.
My brother thankfully came home safely after his tour there in the National Guard (you know, the guys whose duty is to protect the homefront?), but my cousin did not. He suffered severe facial lacerations and his three year-old daughter has just now warmed up to the sight of him.
They and many of their still-active friends have all told me the same thing: that things are only getting worse, and that they have no clear mission other than to survive their shift each day. Several have told me that they are sick of having to keep their views to themselves publicly and that they respect Murtha more than their official C-I-C.
Also, every last one of those men has told me their equipment shortages are ridiculous. Many still don't have the fully armored Hum-Vees, and two of those guys are in Anbar Province.
I think people like you love to act the part of the tough guy, but if it was your ass sitting in a poorly armored Hum-Vee, apprehensively scrutinizing every pile of gravel and piece of trash and wondering if it contains the instrument of your death, you'd be a quivering mess. Your words sure do have all the bravado of someone who has no idea of what is going on.
In fact, your ballsy bluster coupled with your detachment from reality sound very much like another person who has no idea what is going on or what it's like to wonder if you're going to lose your face today. Unfortunately, that person is the reason we're in all this mess.
And there is something else I want you and others who try so desperately to conflate our criticism of that person with our not supporting our troops (let alone the f__king incendiary accusation that we're rooting for the enemy). Just because our knuckles don't drag the ground doesn't make us elitists. It doesn't make us terrorist-appeasers because know that an important component to winning the real war on terror, equal to the importance of our military, is that we uphold the standards that we helped set over the past century. We don't drink lattes and look down our noses at the people in those flag-draped coffins you hope everyone ignores (while they imagine it all to be a stupid shooting game on the midway). Those men are our men too.
But the smear of the left starts at the top, with Cheney and Rove and that other pansy ass that never wore the uniform, the one sending them to their deaths ill-equipped and undermanned. 'Portray the left as enemies of the state and terrorist cheerleaders and we can keep doing what we want.'
And the blogger has issued more than her share of not-so-subtle innuendo trying to cement this despicable conflation of protest and callous disregard for our troops. When the "tone" from her and others changes, mine will too.
Enough of your implied ownership of the flag, our troops, our freedom, and our collective love of country.
I forgot to add that while you and Carol want to claim our words are injurious to our troops and the war on terror, the real abandonment of them and our cause is the appalling way you and she clamor for tax cuts for the Waltons. They need a few dozen million extra dollars for their heavily guarded mansions in the Ozarks. Meanwhile, you take money from our kids to pay for this boondoggle, and then claim we can't afford to fortify our infrastructure here at home.
Chemical plant security regulations? Naw, the chemical lobby says it's too expensive. What do you want to bet the CEO of Dow doesn't live downwind of the plant?
Pony up the money if you're so committed to the war effort.
"What do you say to that?"
I say we as a country should live up to the example that he and 99.99% of our troops set and conduct ourselves with the utmost restraint and respect on the world stage. If our allies don't respect us, we're seriously f__ked.
No, I am not advocating putting our national security in the hands of others (the way the blogger and her president are all too eager to frame the issue). I'm talking about how the little man in charge has severely diminished our credibility and our stature at a time when we need it the most.
When Colin Powell delivered what I presumed to be solid intel to the UN, I set aside my suspicion that something didn't smell right. It turns out that he had serious misgivings about much of it, as did the CIA. They knew Curveball was a liar. Every single thing that has come to light since then regarding the pre-war, behind-the-scenes strongarming that went on has only validated what my nose told me.
Bush had a personal ax to grind. The neocons had a theory to test out. And Cheney and his war-based and oil-based buddies had some money to make.
But I do not speak for my fellow lefties, many of whom knew it didn't add up. So when you say, "we ALL bought this war," no, we didn't. The momentum of 9/11 whipped up a frenzy of emotions which always snuffs out objectivity, especially when that frenzy is fed cherry-picked intel.
I agree, it is a hopeless situation that your clone in the White House has gotten us into.
I agree, let's move on out of Iraq. Sooner rather than never.
I do not agree, however, that there is no point in arguing about how we got into Iraq. It is an extremely important one. As I've said before, the point will never be moot because of what it should teach us if/when the next attack occurs: that we need to compartmentalize our emotions and our judgment and not shake the two together into one big molotov cocktail.
Furthermore, the best chance we have in regaining any measure of the goodwill we had flowing to us after 9/11 -- goodwill that is essential toward a GLOBAL effort to fight a GLOBAL war -- is to acknowledge to the world that we erred. It is not something that we can cover up. It is on full display.
And the best way of atoning for the seriously botched portrait of democracy the finger-painter has produced is to elect a body or two to reign him in until his time in office mercifully ends. And then elect a statesman, someone who has a working understanding of the complex world we live in and at least a whiff of a plan to navigate our way through it that doesn't rely on dropping daisy cutters wherever, whenever.
But that's just the idealist in me talking, the one who thinks our still-great nation should be represented by a great man who isn't ashamed to admit that he spent his whole life preparing for this moment, instead of stumbling onto it.
for duke,
What I don't buy is that you think you have the insight to think something smelled bad when you listened to Powell. No. I'd lay my money on a more likely scenario, that you wouldn't trust anything out of this admin due to your irrational hatred of Bush. It just sounds better to you to sit there at this time and pretend you knew "the truth" back then. Right.
I also question your line about what "they and many of their still-active friends" have to say, as if you've interviewed hordes of troops. Look, here's a few things to keep in mind. Right off, Cliff countered that with tales of his kid in the service. I have heard quite a few interviews on programs like Laura Ingraham where the troops DO know the mission and support it fully. The point being, that angle of debate goes nowhere. (BTW, despite their feelings, I'm grateful for their service and may God Bless them all.)
Another thing to consider is that there will always be those who believe more and better equipment is needed, no matter how much is there already. And as true as it may be, it's always been the case in every war that some, if not most, had needs they felt or weren't truly being met. You read accounts from as far back as the Revolutionary War, Civil War, or the accounts dramatized in "Band of Brothers", particularly the part about Bastogne. Troops always complain, and they have that right just because of the constant danger, and they always will. And just like on the job, there are troops who feel the boss is an idiot. It will always be thus. It's not a phenomenom unique to this war or the admin.
And another thing, Bush DID wear the uniform. He didn't see action, but he was training as a pilot. Idiots don't get to train as a pilot. And the idea that he's not upholding the standards that we helped set over the past century is assuming more than you could ever know. SOME think he's breaking laws and violating the Constitution and defying the Geneva Convention. Others DON'T. And should there always be enough that do, that doesn't mean they are right. And they aren't right applying standards to a situation for which the standards weren't designed to take into account. You accuse Cliff and myself and Carol of not dealing in reality, yet you've created your own little reality that states that Bush is somehow evil or incompetent, and support it by only listening to those who disagree with the guy. Considering your side has done so much to frustrate the efforts of this admin, leaking info, making false accusations about intentions, etc. shows that it is YOUR side with the wrong idea about fighting the "real" WOT.
Josh,
First, I appreciate the tenor and tone of your arguments. We don't often see it from "the other side". Thanks.
I think the point about France is that it is another example of the uselessness of the appeasement strategy. The feelings of the enemy is irrelevant to the point as appeasement is in one form or another, being put forth by the left. The argument being that there would be fewer or even no attacks if we didn't go into Iraq. Considering how many attacks there were before Iraq, it's a poor argument. But Iraq is often held up as an excuse for jihadist activity by the jihadists themselves. I agree however, that as they are westerners, France should not feel they are safe from attack.
Sadam's offer to Palestinian families of suicide murderers might not have anything to do with AlQueda, but it is, even in it's lame amount, public support of terrorism. The WOT is not just a war against AQ, but against terror, with the focus on Islamofascism. Now, there's always the claim that Hussein and the boys were secular, but his support of the Palestinians puts him in the terroist supporter group. The point is, that ties to AQ are a single issue, but not the only issue that supports the decision to go to Iraq. For example, many whine about WMDs, but we didn't need to find any, Hussein hadn't accounted for them to satisfy UN resolutions. And since he used them, it was reasonable to assume he still had them if he didn't have proof they were destroyed. It was the lack of proof that was a justification, no matter what our flawed intel said about WMDs. He also repeatedly fired on our planes patrolling the no fly zone. And that we didn't war on his ass the moment we learned that he tried to hit Bush 41 shocks the hell out of me. If that's not a reason to go to war, attempts on our president, what is? So he showed over and over that his existence as head of Iraq was a very bad idea for the world, and removing him from power was and remains a very good thing. All the flawed intel shows us is that we need to get back to the time when we had humans gathering itel and not just electronics.
"The invasion of Iraq has brought nothing but suffering and insecurity."
No. That was ongoing. Terrorists were doing that already. Hussein was doing that already. We did not bring it but to those who were causing it all. We only joined the fight rather than trying to stay out of it. But we suffered with both WTC attacks and the attacks on our embassies and military sites, and our security was breeched then. So suffering and insecurity is not alone, but has us finally doing something about it.
No Marshall, I have not interviewed "hordes" of servicemen. Nor has Ingraham, who unlike me, cherry-picked hers, or at least only aired the ones who supported her case.
I was wrong for stating that Bush never wore the uniform. It's just so easy to forget, you know? I see that studied, self-conscious swagger of his on jobsites every day.
I understand how you could arrive at your thesis that I have rearranged my history of feelings to camouflage the "fact" that I have always hated Bush and would never have bought anything he said anyway. I can only tell you that that is not the case. You will probably choose to disbelieve. That is okay.
While it is true that I never voted for the man, I did not hate him until it became evident to me that he had had this shadow policy of invading Iraq all along and that he had used grossly misused my country's resources -- namely, its young men and women -- in such a reckless and thoughtless manner.
I was as enraged as everyone else on 9/11 and was gung ho for going into Afghanistan to find bin Laden. Toby Keith had nothing on me. And I admit it was the lingering adrenalin that, along with "evidence" presented by someone like Powell, whom I regarded as very credible, caused me to not question the timing of this war like I should have. And as for the effectiveness of the war toward fighting the jihadists, Josh enumerated very well the ways in which this is a fool's errand.
Regarding your statement that I have created my "own little reality that states that Bush is somehow evil or incompetent, and support it by only listening to those who disagree with the guy," that actually is not true. You would not know this, but I listen to Rush sometimes. Granted, I'm usually forced because that's what so many in my industry are tuned in to. But I actally listen. And I'm here, aren't I?
And finally, much to everyone's relief, I am calling it a night. And I may not be back for a while. But as you might expect from me, it is not a sign of surrender.
Post a Comment
<< Home