The Unraveling.
No, not quite a metaphor for the Obama campaign.
By Moe Lane Posted in Al Qaeda | Barack Obama | Iraq | Pakistan | War — Comments (12) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Yet. But the Senator's going to have to address the details of this TNR piece (via Glenn Reynolds) on the way that Al Qaeda's name is rapidly taking on the characteristics of mud among the very groups and cultures that they were hoping to impress with 9/11. Particularly since, as a member of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Senator Obama is theoretically in a perfect position to either confirm or deny the arguments made by TNR. Although that doesn't explain why he hasn't talked about it before now: well, one more thing for him to clear up.
Senator Obama is welcome to take his time, of course. Every day that he sticks to his current narrative that the war is lost, and we must flee is one more day where he becomes ever more inextricably attached to that narrative - for good, or for ill. Probably ill, in his case... given that reality is showing a distressing tendency to not care about Senator Obama's election prospects. None the less, he can still get out of this.
All Senator Obama has to do is go on the air and admit that he was wrong.
Deadly bombings in India have "hallmarks of an al Qaeda operation" — Comments (4) »
The Unraveling. 12 Comments (0 topical, 12 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
Polls do show that a majority of American citizens now believe the Iraq War wasn't worth the effort we have put into it.
But there's NO EVIDENCE that a majority of American citizens would prefer a U.S. defeat at this juncture.
There's no inconsistency between saying "I wish we hadn't done things this way in the first place" and "But now that we're stuck with it, let's not make things even worse by defeat."
That's my view, in fact; and McCain is comfortable asking for the votes of folks like me. He just wants to make sure that there's a decent outcome to the war in Iraq--and let future historians sort out how and why we got involved there in the first place. And so do I.
And he has to go that way. If McCain only gets the votes of Americans who think the Iraq War was a great thing, he will lose. He has to appeal to some of the war's critics, like myself, who nevertheless quote Charlie Brown when Lucy kicked the ball away:
Winning isn't everything.
But losing isn't anything.
I really, really do.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2...
That same Rasmussen survey found:
"Most Americans—52%--say bringing the troops home within four years is a higher priority than winning the War."
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2...
That sentiment will remain a problem for McCain.
and let the Dems run with a factitious MSM campaign against the war virtually unanswered. Then McCain finally got the Oval Office to do the surge, which was brave enough, but Rumsfeld had already ruined recovery with his strange Bremer Pro-Consul appointment. Now finally, things are falling into place and Al Qaeda is recognized as the franchise-chain facade with a cave-dwelll]ing Wizard of Oz who is now completely discredited.
But it's '08 now and Obama has made ONE trip to Iraq and none since '06. Yet this dude is going to finish the war off? What a joke. Obama's dishonesty is starting to ooze from every pore.
Switched over to Hannity during a Celtics game commercial & saw a looming massive Buddhissimo of wisdom noting that it's better to see Jimmy Carter stabbing Hillary in the back rather than the country!!! Hip hip hooray!
Of course, Jimmy is still smarting from Teddy taking it to the Convention in '80 & wrecking his chances for a second term [actually, by that time, JC had wrecked his own chances!] And of course, the Superdelegates actually have to VOTE at the Convention---some sort of declaration doesn't cut it. So let's just glide into Denver & let the pledged & the supers decide it there. And as a Floridian who wanted to vote for Hillary, I want to see FL get at least half-representation.
The irony of FL again being in the center of a voting controversy, this time non-bogus, is so rich---thank God Janet R evicted Elian Gonzalez or things would have been much much worse.
But since you insist on rehashing the history of the war, AGAIN, then I am compelled to point out that the turning point came around January 2004. That was when David Kay testified before Congress that he couldn't find any Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) in Iraq.
Let me begin by saying, we were almost all wrong, and I certainly include myself here.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/01/28/kay.transcript/
Bush's approval rating took an immediate 12 point hit (at least), and started going downhill on a trajectory from which it never recovered.
The neo-conservatives who made up Bush's brain trust had a variety of arguments to support the need to remove Saddam from power. But Bush chose to make Saddam's alleged arsenal of WMD the main rationale to the American people, and to the U.N. Security Council. When those WMD failed to materialize in Iraq, Bush's credibility with the public and the world community was irreparably damaged.
If he had his heart set on removing Saddam, he should have made a more balanced case to the public that didn't rest so heavily on the WMD argument. The war resolution passed by Congress in October 2002 had a more balanced preamble; but that wasn't the way Bush, Powell, Cheney and Rice pitched the war to the American people. It was all WMD, all the time.
Let's face it; he lied, they lied, everyone lied! Check out Scotty's memoir. just lookin for the truth
Sorry again Moe, but they're just too obvious today for me to call in the regulars.
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"If we want to take this party back, and I think we can someday, let’s get to work." – Barry Goldwater
"Noman Benotman, bin Laden's Libyan former companion-in-arms, assesses that Al Qaeda's recent resurgence, which he says has been fueled by the Iraq war..."
"Most of these clerics and former militants, of course, have not suddenly switched to particularly progressive forms of Islam or fallen in love with the United States (all those we talked to saw the Iraqi insurgency as a defensive jihad)...
You seem to (?) approve of the article's conclusions--that these (anti-American) muslims are in the best position to pull the rug from under Al Quaeda.
But you're not interested in their conclusions about Iraq--that the war is pretty much single-handedly responsible for Al Quaeda's resurgence?
You see, step one is to...
Actually, step one is to keep natsec chowderheads like Obama and his supporters out of any sort of oversight over American foreign policy. Or maybe that's step one-A. Step one-B is to eliminate the possibility that AQ can act as a catalyst that would transform the entire region into a war zone not seen since the Taiping Rebellion. If the groups most likely to join up are coming up with their own reasons to avoid doing so, I'll let 'em get on with that.
Moe
PS: You're new, so you get a free warning. You may disagree with conclusions, but if you are incapable of assuming a good faith effort on any Contributor's part then please go elsewhere.
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC. I've been usurped!
...why Moe links to the article--apparently approvingly--when the article directly contradicts the point that he seems to want to make.
Or not.
The Fuzzy Puppy of the VRWC. I've been usurped!
We have an incompetant President who was wonderful at promoting the message that we were winning when we probably weren't, and who, since his re-election, has basically given up defending himself and has allowed the message that we're losing to set in at the time things are improving. The more Senator McCain gets across the (correct) message that things are getting much, much better in Iraq, the more he is going to run into public opinion such as this: http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/29741/iraq_war_not_worth_fighting_f...
Maddening. But reality, at least for now.