Letters to the Editor
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GENERAL STRIKE - November 6
Please read the Harpers article by Garret Keizer. Please support and help publicize a general strike on November 6.
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I Believe Hiatt Would Respond By Saying...
...that the potential for chaos and genocide after our departure is the justification for our remaining, even in the absence of any Iraqi political progress. This, of course, is as insane as position Glenn attributes to Hiatt. Do we owe an obligation to prevent this disaster that exceeds the obligation of the Iraqi government itself? A government unwilling or unable to take the actions necessary to avert this disaster?
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No short term memory in America
Glenn's article once again shows that what politicians say and do today has no connection to what they said or did in the recent past. Ditto for most of the media, and it's the media that truly disgusts me on this. It's one thing for politicians to blow with the wind, it's what they are expected to do.
But when "journalists" can, with a straight face, write articles or speak on TV and blatantly contraidict and ignore what they were promulgating a month or two ago, the media loses any credibility it has left. It is a mystery to me why so few people are calling them on it. Mr. Greenwald has become one of my favorite reads for this very reason - he's serving as our collective memory.
The latest example of all this is Bush declaring that he is reducing troops in Iraq as a result of the "surge." Gee, send 30,000 troops to Iraq, then bring most of them home and call it a troop reduction. Kind of like running up a budget deficit, then cutting some of it and calling it fiscal responsibility.
Please keep up the good work, Glenn.
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The Iraq War
There is a reason that this "war" in Iraq goes on and it is oil. Until the US companies can control the oil, we are going to have a tough time getting out of the Middle East. I would just as soon cut and run. And as far as Petraeus---Well, Fallon said it best.
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We will never leave.
It's been obvious from the beginning that Bush won't leave. He can't admit his failures; he is too insecure, and he just waits to be rescued. Whether it's Daddy or Daddy's friends or the next Democratic president, someone else always has to clean up after Junior.
So all the people who want the war--Cheney, the neo-cons, the military-industrial complex, the media--will do what they want, and Bush will go along.
(They also want to attack Iran, so that will probably happen too. Look out for them to pull a Dan Rather on this issue. They have a habit of slipping fake stories in the media.)
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Cassia Bella,is the Harper's Article On-line?
If so, do you have a link?
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Since Glenn might have include this, I'll add it
From Paul Krugman, this morning's NYT:
All in all, Mr. Bush’s actions have not been those of a leader seriously trying to win a war. They have, however, been what you’d expect from a man whose plan is to keep up appearances for the next 16 months, never mind the cost in lives and money, then shift the blame for failure onto his successor.
In fact, that’s my interpretation of something that startled many people: Mr. Bush’s decision last month, after spending years denying that the Iraq war had anything in common with Vietnam, to suddenly embrace the parallel.
Here’s how I see it: At this point, Mr. Bush is looking forward to replaying the political aftermath of Vietnam, in which the right wing eventually achieved a rewriting of history that would have made George Orwell proud, convincing millions of Americans that our soldiers had victory in their grasp but were stabbed in the back by the peaceniks back home.
What all this means is that the next president, even as he or she tries to extricate us from Iraq — and prevent the country’s breakup from turning into a regional war — will have to deal with constant sniping from the people who lied us into an unnecessary war, then lost the war they started, but will never, ever, take responsibility for their failures.
'Bout sums it up in a nutshell.
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In fairness
Hiatt's comments aren't as contridictory as Glenn claims.
Hiatt says (as I read it):
1. We shouldn't stay if there isn't Iraqi reconciliation.
2. The Iraqis haven't reconciled.
3. There is _progress_ toward reconciliation, so we should stay.
While you can disagree with this, it is more consistent than Glenn gives it credit.
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Something I wish Glen would look into
There seem to be no standards of journalism at Broadsheet. I wish Glen Greenwald would look into the allegation that Demi Moore had a $200,000 full body makeover and track down the original source for the -pseudo story so we can see whether this is really a credible story or whether feminists are doing to Moore what Bush did to Saddam.
Someone with real journalistic standards needs to take a crack at these allegations.
We criticize the Bush administration for propagating dodgy information that got us into war.
But can the left do any better?
The lifespan of the Demi Moore story suggests that the left is as bad as the right when it comes to propagating questionable information while concealing its dodgy origins.
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ABC News
Go after ABC News again as well. Apparently, Brian Ross's sources were not so good after all.
http://www.attytood.com/2007/09/the_disgraced_abc_consultant_a.html#more
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See this is why Salon needs a Public Editor
There has to be someone whose job it is to tell Salon writers, "There's no actual source for that story so it's wrong to treat these allegations as firmly estabished facts."
Glen is the closest thing I can see to that person, although maybe he'll just stand by his team and insist that all information propagated by Salon is credible, period.
We got into a horrible war because a politically interested party passed us bad information that didn't withstand the test of real journalistic investigation.
If Salon is going to criticize the media for passing that bad information as if it were reliable, then you guys need to apply the same standards of scrutiny to the information being passed by Broadsheet.
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Parsing, parsing...
Sen. Olympia Snowe - May 10, 2007, in Iraq:
Our legislation provides for within 120 days that General Petraeus would come before the Congress and report in terms of whether or not the Iraqi government has met these benchmarks. And if they have not achieved them, then General Petraeus would be required within 14 days, to submit a plan on phased redeployment of the troops associated with the Baghdad security plan, as well as a change in mission for all the other troops, consistent with the stated objectives that were set forth in the Iraq Study Group plan.
Report, check.
Benchmarks not met, check.
Now parse.
Note that the redeployment is "associated with the Baghdad security plan" i.e. the surge itself. No further redeployment needed or called for. Also, Petraeus has shown how it will be "phased" through next summer.
As for the "change in mission for all the other troops", see the final slide of the glorius Petraeus presentation. There, in living color, is just such a "change in mission", and as Bush said last night, it is indeed for "all the other troops".
What we got last night from Bush is just exactly what was called for in the legislation, despite the blathering Glenn points out that surrounded it. I've contacted my Congresscritters this morning to urge action beyond this ridiculous "plan", but I'm not holding my breath.