Letters to the Editor
ondelette
Published Letters: 1984 Editor's Choice: 19
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No, he's sending up a trial balloon
[Read the article: Krauthammer's plan to deny Palestinians gas and electricity]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Krauthammer’s “If that fails to concentrate the mind” sounds like some bad dialogue from an old WWII Nazi movie.
get real
No get real. It is a very recognizable part of a quote "Nothing so concentrates the mind as an execution in the morning." (which is actually a paraphrase).
Krauthammer is showing that he is less reckless than John Podheretz. Everyone knows the Samuel Johnson quote and its variations, everyone knows what he is advocating, if cutting off electricity doesn't concentrate the mind.
Like Podheretz, he ought to be dragged before the ICJ to answer charges of advocating genocide.
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This time, shooter has a point
[Read the article: Everyone we fight in Iraq is now "al-Qaida"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Hate to do this, but...
The target of this propaganda is the Iraqis not us. Moktada al Sadr has lost control of his militia, although he is quite willing to have them not fight if that is what it takes to get the Americans to leave. His on-the-street commanders, though, are not listening to him, they are doing a blood feud with the Sunnis. Also, some of the Sunni sheiks had said they would be willing to go after al Qaeda with the U.S.
So they are trying to make it look like the enemy is somebody that both the Sunnis and the Shi'a can go after with impunity, and that it is okay not to kill each other.
We aren't the target of the propaganda, but they know the Iraqis can get information anywhere.
As for whether or not this is a good strategy, and the moral implications of having a united U.S. press tell lies to the Americans to make it work, that's totally debatable. And as for whether Rove&Co. will milk it in the U.S. for all its political worth, that's a given.
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Notice: I'm moving...
[Read the article: Everyone we fight in Iraq is now "al-Qaida"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]On a previous thread, given what was labeled what, I asked to be put in the Fringe. Apparently, I was mistaken:
Fact: Even the extreme left media like NBC, NYT and WaPo...
PoliticalRealityOnline
Please be advised, I am taking up residence in the Oort cloud, I guess.
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I had the same problem during Vietnam
[Read the article: McClatchy reports on shift in Iraq propaganda]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I guess it is always the case that both sides of a debate have some of their facts a little...underinformed. I'm not having any problem with the premise that the Al Qaeda ramp up from our administration is propaganda directed at getting public support in this country. I'm not having any problem with the push to get us out of someplace we should never have been, or the push to call a spade a spade and talk about insurgencies and civil war, even failed states, about Sunni and Shi'a militias and domestic outweighing foreign fighters 19:1.
But like gadgiiberibimba and Pandyora and others, I am having a lot of trouble dismissing all the details, like discerning general Sunni insurgents from Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, ignoring indigenous strategies by Sunni leaders and by Shiite leaders like al Sadr that have as their aim removing the stated reasons why the Americans are still there so they will leave (naive, considering the awfully permanent looking bases, but really a strategy by al Sadr right now), dismissing everything from any military spokesperson above the rank of Specialist (below which we, what, wholeheartedly support the troops, right?), in order to present a very idealized picture of totally seamless mendacity and deceit by an extremely well knit Bush-Cheney-MSM complex.
Just as the blogosphere isn't simple, it's complex, and the left isn't simple, it's complex, and the Muslim world isn't simple it's complex, and...Why is it so hard for us to understand that the war and its supporters are complex as well?
This reminds me of the Vietnam war, when all the anti-war protesters and opinion makers used the line that "Vietnam was traditionally one country." Except that it wasn't true, it had only been united for about 50 years or so before the French took over, the north had traditionally been a tributary of China, the south...not so much. Didn't have any bearing on whether or not the U.S. should have been there, but it wasn't the truth, and weakened the argument, IMHO.
Perhaps at the end of the day, since the end I would like to see to this war coincides fairly well with the end Glenn and others would like to see, I should ignore this kind of stuff. But Tom Ricks was on Terry Gross last week saying that Petraeus will be bringing a set of scenarios, their cost, and their consequences, to the Congress in the fall, and is expecting the Congress to make a decision between them (and yes, they include withdrawal), because the military believes the Bush people to be out of the process since they have little time left. I trust Ricks like I trust Steve Coll and Ahmed Rashid -- they dig first before they present the archaeology.
When that happens, it would be a good idea if those who have opposed this war all along have a very clear eyed view of what is happening, what has happened, and what will happen, together with our obligations and interests, so that decision can be made in a much better fashion than those made by "The Decider". I don't see how that happens if we continue demonizing everyone who doesn't agree with us 100%.
Come and cave the sky in on me if you must, but please explain how a seamless pure evil that isn't quite true is easier to combat than one that is true, but isn't so seamless and pure.