I recently had an e-mail discussion with someone who is a contributor to americanthinker.com, which is almost as bad as townhall in its shrillness. I do not have permission to reprint the correspondance so I will just say that she/he indicated that the media, once again, was ignoring the "good news" from Iraq.
She indicated that she supports the troops but is against a draft, that the establishment of Israel was a "consolation gift" for the Holocaust and that the problem today is due to the simple fact that other Arab nations are somehow responsible for taking in the displaced Palestinians.
Among my responses:
I am not sure that my young nephew, who is a U.S. Marine, would have learned in school that the U.S. was once a supporter of Sadaam Hussein as well as other dictators and even terrorists, when it suited us. He certainly is not old enough to have done anything to contribute to the situation and I find it appalling that the people who did, will not acknowledge it.
Of course, I have no problem with my loved ones - I am also to be married to a Missouri National Guardsman who has served in Iraq - fulfilling their duty. I find the Republicans fervent opposition to a draft to be no different than the war protesters, both past and present, except that the war protesters don't want anyone to go while you people just don't want you to go.
Meanwhile, the Iraq war has diverted much attention and resources from the war in Afghanistan which you acknowledge has gotten worse and with the situation in Pakistan is more dire than ever. I fully supported that war but I am also aware of the continuing problem with women's rights as well as incidents like the recent death sentence for blasphemy of a reporter. "A young journalist in the north of Afghanistan faces the death penalty in what observers say is a well-orchestrated campaign of intimidation against the media."
The expectation of an American-style democracy in both Iraq and Afghanistan may not be entirely realistic. The mission should have been kept to hunting down Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida.
As for my knowledge of history, I am not a scholar, but I have spent much time studying my religon and I have a special interest in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict because, to me, I just find it incredible that anyone could read the Bible and not wonder about all of that outright slaughter. Do you honestly consider a Palestinian life to be as valuable as an American life? An Iraqi?
Honestly, I have found William Dalrymple's comment about simple-minded bigots to be quite appropriate when considering the remarks made on right-wing blogs. I do not judge your comments to be honest or convincing.
----------------
Whatever. You go ahead and believe that you "support the troops." My local paper has reported - War? What war? - that the number of high-quality recruits has continually dropped since the Iraq war started.
The Bush administration is sending "strong signals" that the troop reductions will slow or stop altogether this summer (multiple tours - even longer than 15 months?) because the recent security improvements are "tenuous," and top U.S. commanders predict that the battle for Mosul will be a "grinding campaign" that will require more firepower from both the Pentagon and Iraqi allies.
That's OK, there is no limit to what you will ask of the troops.
--------------
Also, this from TIME:
(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. military isn't ready for a catastrophic attack on the country, and National Guard forces don't have the equipment or training they need for the job, according to a report.
Even fewer Army National Guard units are combat-ready today than were nearly a year ago when the Commission on the National Guard and Reserves determined that 88 percent of the units were not prepared for the fight, the panel says in a new report released Thursday.
The independent commission is charged by Congress to recommend changes in law and policy concerning the Guard and Reserves.
The commission's 400-page report concludes that the nation "does not have sufficient trained, ready forces available" to respond to a chemical, biological or nuclear weapons incident, "an appalling gap that places the nation and its citizens at greater risk."
"Right now we don't have the forces we need, we don't have them trained, we don't have the equipment," commission Chairman Arnold Punaro said in an interview with The Associated Press. "Even though there is a lot going on in this area, we need to do a lot more. ... There's a lot of things in the pipeline, but in the world we live in — you're either ready or you're not."
Showing posts with label al-Qaida. Show all posts
Showing posts with label al-Qaida. Show all posts
Friday, February 1, 2008
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Your Typical Ignorant/Delusional Right-Wing Hick
Some woman, "Goodwin," wrote into my local paper about the resolution condemning Turkey for genocide and the effect it would have on the troops. She said the Democrats should practice the "diplomacy" they are so fond of.
Goodwin is just your typical ignorant/delusional right-wing hick. “Diplomacy” as well as “good governance” and the “Bush administration” has nothing to do with the truth or reality. These kooks think they can just pick and choose the history that suits them - they have no use for it except to inflate their own self-worth or to nurse their own grievances.
It is absurd that ANYONE would even consider electing Republicans. They don’t read the paper, they only see what they want to see, all Iraqis killed are TERRORISTS, it would be irresponsible to pay for this war – better to pass the buck off to the grandchildren, new recruits can get the desert training they need in Iraq – IN COMBAT, troops don’t need body armor – it’s TOO HEAVY (Michelle Malkin - a ridiculous, superstitious and ignorant woman who has been insulting me, a military family member, since this war started), there is no shortage of these brave Republicans willing to fight this war they started, that is why the Army has lowered it’s standards AGAIN, taking violent criminals, and helicopter gunships don’t need guns. Petraeus “wrote the book” on counterinsurgency, which calls for as many troops to occupy Baghdad as are in the entire country, but it would be treasonous to call him on it. The glowing success in Fallujah, it turns out, is due to MARTIAL LAW, the city is under 24-hour lockdown, surrounded by berms and barbed wire, vehicles are banned and residents had to submit to fingerprints and retina scans to get ID cards that let them stay. How long can they keep this up after the troops pull out? Osama bin Laden, meanwhile, is not off in a cave somewhere plotting more attacks; he is “impotent.”
These backwards, backwoods throwbacks can even say with absolute certainly that global warming is a hoax while their own military leaders quietly go about discussing the need for new policies that would “oblige intergovernmental cooperation” by future U.S. administrations, knowing that environmental stresses may severely damage economies, destabilize political systems and upend millions of lives, causing mass migrations across international borders, including our own.
These hicks are a disgrace to this country.
************************
Goodwin is just your typical ignorant/delusional right-wing hick. “Diplomacy” as well as “good governance” and the “Bush administration” has nothing to do with the truth or reality. These kooks think they can just pick and choose the history that suits them - they have no use for it except to inflate their own self-worth or to nurse their own grievances.
It is absurd that ANYONE would even consider electing Republicans. They don’t read the paper, they only see what they want to see, all Iraqis killed are TERRORISTS, it would be irresponsible to pay for this war – better to pass the buck off to the grandchildren, new recruits can get the desert training they need in Iraq – IN COMBAT, troops don’t need body armor – it’s TOO HEAVY (Michelle Malkin - a ridiculous, superstitious and ignorant woman who has been insulting me, a military family member, since this war started), there is no shortage of these brave Republicans willing to fight this war they started, that is why the Army has lowered it’s standards AGAIN, taking violent criminals, and helicopter gunships don’t need guns. Petraeus “wrote the book” on counterinsurgency, which calls for as many troops to occupy Baghdad as are in the entire country, but it would be treasonous to call him on it. The glowing success in Fallujah, it turns out, is due to MARTIAL LAW, the city is under 24-hour lockdown, surrounded by berms and barbed wire, vehicles are banned and residents had to submit to fingerprints and retina scans to get ID cards that let them stay. How long can they keep this up after the troops pull out? Osama bin Laden, meanwhile, is not off in a cave somewhere plotting more attacks; he is “impotent.”
These backwards, backwoods throwbacks can even say with absolute certainly that global warming is a hoax while their own military leaders quietly go about discussing the need for new policies that would “oblige intergovernmental cooperation” by future U.S. administrations, knowing that environmental stresses may severely damage economies, destabilize political systems and upend millions of lives, causing mass migrations across international borders, including our own.
These hicks are a disgrace to this country.
************************
Friday, September 21, 2007
al-Qaida In Iraq
With so many right-wing pundits lauding the alliance between the U.S. and Sunni tribes against al-Qaida in Iraq, I have to wonder just exactly what would their reason be for staying in Iraq if we were no longer there? What purpose would it serve to continue to indiscriminately bomb civilians?
What would their chances be to convert the Iraqi population to their extreme version of Islam? Not long after the war started, an officer commented that the Iraqi people were not psychologically wired to suicide-bombing.
What would their chances be to convert the Iraqi population to their extreme version of Islam? Not long after the war started, an officer commented that the Iraqi people were not psychologically wired to suicide-bombing.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Re-Examine Foreign Policy - John B. Quigley
John B. Quigley, Presidents' Club Professor of Law
Quigley, John B., "Identifying the Origins of Anti-American Terrorism," Florida Law Review, 2006 (56 Fla. L. Rev. 1003)
The current “War on Terrorism” will fail unless the United States changes its policies in the Middle East, an Ohio State University Law Professor argues in the Florida Law Review.
“If terrorism is to be addressed rationally, its origins must be determined,” writes Prof. John Quigley of the Michael E. Moritz College of Law at the Ohio State University, an international human rights activist and an expert in international law. “Just as a physician cannot treat the patient without making a diagnosis, so with negative social phenomena, one must determine their origin before prescribing remedies or identifying appropriate actors to administer the remedies.” The cause of international terrorism, Quigley writes, is the history of heavy handed and self interested Western and, in particular, U.S. intervention in Middle Eastern affairs. The remedy is for the United States to change its policies in the Middle East and toward the Muslim world.
“To turn this situation around, the United States must promote serious negotiations over the Israeli-Palestinian question based on universally recognized principles,” Quigley writes. “More broadly, the United States must cease trying to micro-manage the Middle East to its political and economic advantage. It must promote a collaborative relationship that can be seen to reflect respect for the people of the area...”
"...“But in the Middle East, a perception developed that the United States was out to promote its own interests.” These anti-U.S. perceptions were further solidified by the continued one-sided U.S. backing of Israel and Cold War decisions to support causes like the Islamist revolutionary Mujahideen in Afghanistan, Quigley writes..."
Quigley, John B., "Identifying the Origins of Anti-American Terrorism," Florida Law Review, 2006 (56 Fla. L. Rev. 1003)
The current “War on Terrorism” will fail unless the United States changes its policies in the Middle East, an Ohio State University Law Professor argues in the Florida Law Review.
“If terrorism is to be addressed rationally, its origins must be determined,” writes Prof. John Quigley of the Michael E. Moritz College of Law at the Ohio State University, an international human rights activist and an expert in international law. “Just as a physician cannot treat the patient without making a diagnosis, so with negative social phenomena, one must determine their origin before prescribing remedies or identifying appropriate actors to administer the remedies.” The cause of international terrorism, Quigley writes, is the history of heavy handed and self interested Western and, in particular, U.S. intervention in Middle Eastern affairs. The remedy is for the United States to change its policies in the Middle East and toward the Muslim world.
“To turn this situation around, the United States must promote serious negotiations over the Israeli-Palestinian question based on universally recognized principles,” Quigley writes. “More broadly, the United States must cease trying to micro-manage the Middle East to its political and economic advantage. It must promote a collaborative relationship that can be seen to reflect respect for the people of the area...”
"...“But in the Middle East, a perception developed that the United States was out to promote its own interests.” These anti-U.S. perceptions were further solidified by the continued one-sided U.S. backing of Israel and Cold War decisions to support causes like the Islamist revolutionary Mujahideen in Afghanistan, Quigley writes..."
Sunday, September 16, 2007
America Is Sick
America is sick. Blind patriotism is just another way for these soulless people to take credit for something they didn't do. I have been regularly censored at townhall.com which is full of delusional freaks. They claim to be the defenders of free speech - prayer in school, ten commandments in courthouses, etc., but just you say anything that would cause these hicks cognitive dissonance and you are censored and locked out faster than you can blink an eye. Frauds. You present them with facts and they just write their own reality. They all think they are so cute and clever. Everything is funny, just like the Daily Show. Clowns. Everything is a joke except their foolish pride.
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The Buzz - Osama bin Laden Joke? 9-17-07
Wed, Sep 19, 2007 at 6:44 PM
To the Kansas City Star: You have no class, whatsoever. I can't belive you have the nerve to ask my loved ones to put their lives on the line for you. Osama bin Laden is the man behind the thousands of deaths at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the airliner that crashed in Pennsylvania. He is the reason this country is at war in two foreign lands.
This is sick, whoever finds this funny is sick.
************************************
The Buzz - Osama bin Laden Joke? 9-17-07
Wed, Sep 19, 2007 at 6:44 PM
To the Kansas City Star: You have no class, whatsoever. I can't belive you have the nerve to ask my loved ones to put their lives on the line for you. Osama bin Laden is the man behind the thousands of deaths at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the airliner that crashed in Pennsylvania. He is the reason this country is at war in two foreign lands.
This is sick, whoever finds this funny is sick.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
On The Vietnam War And President Clinton
On The Vietnam War And President Clinton
The war supporters, and Bush himself (the nerve), have tried to paint the Democratic Party as anti-war or "weak" on defense. They frequently cite the Vietnam War as an example, saying that if the Democrats had not withdrawn we would have eventually won the war and the subsequent killing of millions of people in Cambodia would have been avoided and Vietnam would be a democracy. Of course, there are those who dispute that. They say it was the war, itself, that led to the destabilization of Cambodia. Vietnam, although not a democracy, is a prosperous country now.
I was thirteen years old in 1972. To have been old enough to vote during that time would make you over fifty years old now. While many of our representatives have indeed reached that ripe old age, the war supporters are, in effect, discounting the opinions of an entire generation that never actually were involved in the Vietnam war and who have never lived through a war of that magnitude and therefore may have an entirely different perspective on that engagement and on war, itself.
What they are saying is that American can do no wrong, never has, never will. If your president says we should start a war, he must be right. Four and a half years later, in spite of everything, Bush must be right. This is simple-minded and I don't like it.
Many war supporters have likewise smeared President Clinton, relentlessly - he didn't do enough to catch or kill bin Laden after the embassy attacks and the attack on the USS Cole.
It was reported that Clinton testified at the Congressional hearings that he was "obsessed with bin Laden" and had signed an order to have him killed. Unfortunately, there was disagreement with the wording where the CIA, etc. were not comfortable, considering America's dark history, of assassinating him and there never was "actionable" intelligence. Clinton testified that he gave the Bush administration a war plan for al-Qaida but that Bush and Condo Rice was more concerned about China.
Like all cheap tricks, the sword cuts both ways. Here are some differing opinions.
**********
"Clinton became obsessed with capturing and convicting Ramzi Yousef [the mastermind of the attack]." U.S. officials apprehended Yousef in Pakistan in 1995, and he is now serving a 240-year sentence for his crimes -- hardly an abject failure of policy...
However, the manner in which the attack on the USS Cole was handled does more to damage the Bush administration's reputation than it does Clinton's, as his term expired three months after the bombing of the Cole.
In June 2001, five months after Bush had been sworn in, al Qaeda released a videotape claiming responsibility for the Cole operation. If the Bush administration needed a casus belli to destroy al Qaeda, here it was, broadcast around the world. Instead, the response was to do absolutely nothing...
…The American inability to truly comprehend the al Qaeda threat was a systematic failure of many institutions, including the CIA, the Pentagon, the State Department, the FBI and the media, failures that cannot be pinned on any one administration. Beyond all that, you, gentle reader, are also at fault. There was no political will to go to war against al Qaeda because there was no public will to do so. The public had made it very clear during the '90s that even small numbers of U.S. military casualties were unacceptable, whether in Somalia or in the Balkans.
All that changed with Sept. 11. Now two wars later, at the cost of hundreds of American deaths, thousands of Afghan and Iraqi civilian dead and untold billons of U.S. taxpayer money, the Bush administration is still "losing bin Laden" -- two years after Sept. 11...
Peter Bergen is a fellow of the New America Foundation and the author of "Holy War, Inc.: Inside the Secret World of Osama bin Laden." ...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A8174-2003Nov6?language=printer
**********
The Blog From Another Dimension: Further Proof Damning Bush for 9/11 (as if it were really needed)
March 21, 2004
With the recent revelations brought forth by Richard A. Clarke (former counter-terrorism coordinator from both Clinton and Bush 43 administrations), the picture of the Bush administration's malfeasance regarding terrorism has been made more complete.
We already knew that Clinton had put together a solid plan to fight terrorism. Clinton, in fact, had gone after al Qaeda as best he could, and the Republicans had even termed Clinton's attacks on bin Laden as excessive, just an excuse to avoid attention on more important matters, such as whether or not he had gotten sexual favors from an intern. Of course, after the 9/11 attacks, suddenly Clinton was attacked as having been soft on al Qaeda, and the whole mess was his fault. But we found out soon that Clinton, in fact, had a bold plan to hit back at al Qaeda after the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in late 2000, and had presented those plans to Bush.
However, Clinton was perhaps too much more a considerate president leaving office than he should have been. In 1992, Bush Sr. decided to send troops into Somalia while he was a lame duck, essentially sticking Clinton with the check, forcing him to either accept a losing battle in the country or look weak by pulling out the troops. That is one of my greater criticisms of Bush 41, that he played politics with soldiers' lives to give Clinton a black eye as he entered office. Bush never would have engaged in a military action in Somalia had he won reelection.
Clinton, instead of starting a major military offensive at the end of his term and sticking it in turn to Bush Jr., instead gave the new administration his battle plans and let them make the call.
And the Bush people crashed and burned, ignoring the advice and letting their guard slip dangerously. Clinton National Security Adviser Sandy Berger and Richard Clarke briefed Condoleezza Rice on the plans just a few weeks before Bush took office, making their urgency and utility well-known to the Bush White House. And the Bush White House shut them down, cold. Part of the reason for this was that Bush was busy pushing a missile defense shield, and the idea of terrorist attacks played contrary to that. After all, it would be inconsistent to be fighting an active war on terrorism while developing a missile shield which, by nature, was completely ineffective in countering terrorist threats.
And now we hear from Clarke not only a solid confirmation that the Clinton plan was shunted aside, but that further reasons included the fact that Bush & Co. were far too busy planning an attack on Iraq to be bothered with minor-leaguers like al Qaeda. This despite Bush's campaign pledge against nation-building, as he secretly planned for regime change and nation-building in Iraq.
So focused were they on Iraq, that when 9/11 happened and it was clear that the enemy was in Afghanistan, Donald Rumsfeld pushed for attacks on Iraq, suggesting Afghanistan--where bin Laden was--be left alone. Why? Clarke claims that "Rumsfeld was saying that we needed to bomb Iraq, and we all said, 'No, no, al Qaeda is in Afghanistan. We need to bomb Afghanistan.' Rumsfeld said there aren't good targets in Afghanistan, and there are lots of good targets in Iraq."
It strains credulity that more Americans do not hold Bush culpable for the disastrous errors that led up to 9/11, and the obvious prior intent Bush & Co. had to invade Iraq, no matter what evidence they claimed. And this is not just people who worked for Clinton speaking, that includes Bush's own man from the Treasury Department, Paul O'Neill, confirming Bush's intent to invade Iraq pre-9/11.
Add to that the fact that Bush selfishly refused to create a commission to research the security deficits that allowed 9/11 to happen, and then created a hand-picked executive commission (avoiding a congressionally-appointed one) only when his hand was forced--and even still today demonstrates strident unwillingness to assist that very commission.
The answer could not be more clear: Bush screwed up on 9/11, big time, and he knows all too well exactly where the blame lies. Clarke's new disclosures on the matter simply bolster that particular conclusion.
Posted by Luis at March 21, 2004 10:03 PM |
http://www.blogd.com/archives/000518.html
**********
The war supporters, and Bush himself (the nerve), have tried to paint the Democratic Party as anti-war or "weak" on defense. They frequently cite the Vietnam War as an example, saying that if the Democrats had not withdrawn we would have eventually won the war and the subsequent killing of millions of people in Cambodia would have been avoided and Vietnam would be a democracy. Of course, there are those who dispute that. They say it was the war, itself, that led to the destabilization of Cambodia. Vietnam, although not a democracy, is a prosperous country now.
I was thirteen years old in 1972. To have been old enough to vote during that time would make you over fifty years old now. While many of our representatives have indeed reached that ripe old age, the war supporters are, in effect, discounting the opinions of an entire generation that never actually were involved in the Vietnam war and who have never lived through a war of that magnitude and therefore may have an entirely different perspective on that engagement and on war, itself.
What they are saying is that American can do no wrong, never has, never will. If your president says we should start a war, he must be right. Four and a half years later, in spite of everything, Bush must be right. This is simple-minded and I don't like it.
Many war supporters have likewise smeared President Clinton, relentlessly - he didn't do enough to catch or kill bin Laden after the embassy attacks and the attack on the USS Cole.
It was reported that Clinton testified at the Congressional hearings that he was "obsessed with bin Laden" and had signed an order to have him killed. Unfortunately, there was disagreement with the wording where the CIA, etc. were not comfortable, considering America's dark history, of assassinating him and there never was "actionable" intelligence. Clinton testified that he gave the Bush administration a war plan for al-Qaida but that Bush and Condo Rice was more concerned about China.
Like all cheap tricks, the sword cuts both ways. Here are some differing opinions.
**********
"Clinton became obsessed with capturing and convicting Ramzi Yousef [the mastermind of the attack]." U.S. officials apprehended Yousef in Pakistan in 1995, and he is now serving a 240-year sentence for his crimes -- hardly an abject failure of policy...
However, the manner in which the attack on the USS Cole was handled does more to damage the Bush administration's reputation than it does Clinton's, as his term expired three months after the bombing of the Cole.
In June 2001, five months after Bush had been sworn in, al Qaeda released a videotape claiming responsibility for the Cole operation. If the Bush administration needed a casus belli to destroy al Qaeda, here it was, broadcast around the world. Instead, the response was to do absolutely nothing...
…The American inability to truly comprehend the al Qaeda threat was a systematic failure of many institutions, including the CIA, the Pentagon, the State Department, the FBI and the media, failures that cannot be pinned on any one administration. Beyond all that, you, gentle reader, are also at fault. There was no political will to go to war against al Qaeda because there was no public will to do so. The public had made it very clear during the '90s that even small numbers of U.S. military casualties were unacceptable, whether in Somalia or in the Balkans.
All that changed with Sept. 11. Now two wars later, at the cost of hundreds of American deaths, thousands of Afghan and Iraqi civilian dead and untold billons of U.S. taxpayer money, the Bush administration is still "losing bin Laden" -- two years after Sept. 11...
Peter Bergen is a fellow of the New America Foundation and the author of "Holy War, Inc.: Inside the Secret World of Osama bin Laden." ...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A8174-2003Nov6?language=printer
**********
The Blog From Another Dimension: Further Proof Damning Bush for 9/11 (as if it were really needed)
March 21, 2004
With the recent revelations brought forth by Richard A. Clarke (former counter-terrorism coordinator from both Clinton and Bush 43 administrations), the picture of the Bush administration's malfeasance regarding terrorism has been made more complete.
We already knew that Clinton had put together a solid plan to fight terrorism. Clinton, in fact, had gone after al Qaeda as best he could, and the Republicans had even termed Clinton's attacks on bin Laden as excessive, just an excuse to avoid attention on more important matters, such as whether or not he had gotten sexual favors from an intern. Of course, after the 9/11 attacks, suddenly Clinton was attacked as having been soft on al Qaeda, and the whole mess was his fault. But we found out soon that Clinton, in fact, had a bold plan to hit back at al Qaeda after the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in late 2000, and had presented those plans to Bush.
However, Clinton was perhaps too much more a considerate president leaving office than he should have been. In 1992, Bush Sr. decided to send troops into Somalia while he was a lame duck, essentially sticking Clinton with the check, forcing him to either accept a losing battle in the country or look weak by pulling out the troops. That is one of my greater criticisms of Bush 41, that he played politics with soldiers' lives to give Clinton a black eye as he entered office. Bush never would have engaged in a military action in Somalia had he won reelection.
Clinton, instead of starting a major military offensive at the end of his term and sticking it in turn to Bush Jr., instead gave the new administration his battle plans and let them make the call.
And the Bush people crashed and burned, ignoring the advice and letting their guard slip dangerously. Clinton National Security Adviser Sandy Berger and Richard Clarke briefed Condoleezza Rice on the plans just a few weeks before Bush took office, making their urgency and utility well-known to the Bush White House. And the Bush White House shut them down, cold. Part of the reason for this was that Bush was busy pushing a missile defense shield, and the idea of terrorist attacks played contrary to that. After all, it would be inconsistent to be fighting an active war on terrorism while developing a missile shield which, by nature, was completely ineffective in countering terrorist threats.
And now we hear from Clarke not only a solid confirmation that the Clinton plan was shunted aside, but that further reasons included the fact that Bush & Co. were far too busy planning an attack on Iraq to be bothered with minor-leaguers like al Qaeda. This despite Bush's campaign pledge against nation-building, as he secretly planned for regime change and nation-building in Iraq.
So focused were they on Iraq, that when 9/11 happened and it was clear that the enemy was in Afghanistan, Donald Rumsfeld pushed for attacks on Iraq, suggesting Afghanistan--where bin Laden was--be left alone. Why? Clarke claims that "Rumsfeld was saying that we needed to bomb Iraq, and we all said, 'No, no, al Qaeda is in Afghanistan. We need to bomb Afghanistan.' Rumsfeld said there aren't good targets in Afghanistan, and there are lots of good targets in Iraq."
It strains credulity that more Americans do not hold Bush culpable for the disastrous errors that led up to 9/11, and the obvious prior intent Bush & Co. had to invade Iraq, no matter what evidence they claimed. And this is not just people who worked for Clinton speaking, that includes Bush's own man from the Treasury Department, Paul O'Neill, confirming Bush's intent to invade Iraq pre-9/11.
Add to that the fact that Bush selfishly refused to create a commission to research the security deficits that allowed 9/11 to happen, and then created a hand-picked executive commission (avoiding a congressionally-appointed one) only when his hand was forced--and even still today demonstrates strident unwillingness to assist that very commission.
The answer could not be more clear: Bush screwed up on 9/11, big time, and he knows all too well exactly where the blame lies. Clarke's new disclosures on the matter simply bolster that particular conclusion.
Posted by Luis at March 21, 2004 10:03 PM |
http://www.blogd.com/archives/000518.html
**********
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Cowardice Lurking Behind Smoke And Mirrors
Sen. Joe Biden's statement is one of the most intelligent things that I have heard a politician say in quite some time. His and all of the generals' and journalists' comments, however, will likely fall on deaf ears. They are too complex and too "sensitive" and just too damning when this country is being led by a ham-fisted clod whose followers would sell their own souls and their children's futures before they faced reality or admitted they were wrong. Their cowardice is lurking there just behind all of this smoke and mirrors. - karennkc.
**********
“The fact of the matter is that American lives remain in jeopardy and...if every single jihadi in the world was killed tomorrow, we’d still have a major, major war on our hands.” – Sen. Joseph Biden
**********
Speaking at a symposium on terrorist threats at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, retired four-star Gen. Barry McCaffrey said, “U.S. politicians need to act as if the country is at war and ask for sacrifices accordingly.” He also said it would be a mistake to retool the military firepower and strategy too dramatically to meet the threat of insurgencies like that in Iraq and Afghanistan and to do so would leave the U.S. ill-prepared for its next major conflict. “I don’t want to see us spend the next 15 years creating the military that would have been optimized to fight the counter-Sunni civil war campaign in Iraq. I’d rather conclude that we shouldn’t fight that campaign.”
**********
Retired Army Gen. John Abizaid said that beyond attacking the global threat of terrorism with military strength, the United States has done a poor job of applying the economic, political and diplomatic means to fight Islamic extremism. “We need to change that as a matter of national priority.”
**********
This from Warren P. Stroebel, McClatchy Newspapers:
… There was one question that Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker could not, or would not, answer. It was the question that Petraeus posed rhetorically back in 2003 when he led the Army’s 101st Airborne Division into Iraq: “Tell me how this ends.”
Asked whether his proposal for Iraq would make the U.S. safer, Petraeus replied, “Sir, I don’t know, actually.”
Petraeus “is almost certainly the right man for the job in Iraq, but he’s the right person three years too late and 250,000 troops short,” Rep. Ike Skelton, a Missouri Democrat, said Monday.
*********
“It is a measure of how vaporous the ground truths in Iraq have become that George w. Bush had to sneak into the country he conquered. Extra security was needed to proclaim that Iraq was more secure, the surge was working and the country was worth more American blood and treasure...What U.S. strategy could avert the wider bloodshed that looks inevitable in the wake of a smaller force? One small advantage of extending the surge is that it postpones having to find the answer to that question.” – Michael Duffy, TIME 9-17-07.
**********
Crocker is decidedly above party politics. Yet in representing Bush in Iraq, he has inevitably become drawn into the administration's effort to salvage its colossal mistakes. Buying more time may help Bush exit office without experiencing a humiliating withdrawal from Iraq. But it is wrong to ask the troops for more sacrifices without leveling with Americans about what kind of longer-term commitment is really at stake and coming up with a sensible plan to get there. Thus far, the administration has proved either unable or unwilling to get Shiites and Kurds to offer Sunnis a meaningful stake in Iraq's future. And it has done next to nothing toward accepting two of the Baker-Hamilton commission's crucial recommendations about working with Syria and Iran.
Just as with its wishful thinking in invading Iraq four years ago, the White House seems to think that it can eradicate Iran's influence in the region simply by wishing it away. If Bush is sincerely thinking about solving the Iran problem by bombing Iran's nuclear program, then its hard to take seriously its appeal for a little more time to set Iraq on the path of democracy. War with Iran would simply send Petraeus's mission in Iraq into the realm of the unknown. If Americans are being asked to keep armed forces in Iraq, a little more coherence and transparency is in order. - Scott MacLeod
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The nature of military leadership is congenital optimism; officers are trained to complete the mission, to refuse to countenance the possibility of failure. That focus is essential when you go to war, but it lacks perspective. That's why civilian leaders—the Commander in Chief—are there to set the mission, to change or abort it when necessary. The trouble is, George W. Bush's credibility on Iraq is nonexistent. And so he has placed David Petraeus, an excellent soldier, in a position way above his pay grade. He has made Petraeus not just the arbiter of Iraq strategy but also, by default, the man who sets U.S. policy for the entire so-called war on terrorism...
...Crocker also testified that the Iraqi Shi'ites were Arabs who had fought fiercely against the Iranians in the eight-year war and were very unlikely to cede control to their Persian neighbor without a fight. - Joe Klein, TIME.
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“The fact of the matter is that American lives remain in jeopardy and...if every single jihadi in the world was killed tomorrow, we’d still have a major, major war on our hands.” – Sen. Joseph Biden
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Speaking at a symposium on terrorist threats at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, retired four-star Gen. Barry McCaffrey said, “U.S. politicians need to act as if the country is at war and ask for sacrifices accordingly.” He also said it would be a mistake to retool the military firepower and strategy too dramatically to meet the threat of insurgencies like that in Iraq and Afghanistan and to do so would leave the U.S. ill-prepared for its next major conflict. “I don’t want to see us spend the next 15 years creating the military that would have been optimized to fight the counter-Sunni civil war campaign in Iraq. I’d rather conclude that we shouldn’t fight that campaign.”
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Retired Army Gen. John Abizaid said that beyond attacking the global threat of terrorism with military strength, the United States has done a poor job of applying the economic, political and diplomatic means to fight Islamic extremism. “We need to change that as a matter of national priority.”
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This from Warren P. Stroebel, McClatchy Newspapers:
… There was one question that Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker could not, or would not, answer. It was the question that Petraeus posed rhetorically back in 2003 when he led the Army’s 101st Airborne Division into Iraq: “Tell me how this ends.”
Asked whether his proposal for Iraq would make the U.S. safer, Petraeus replied, “Sir, I don’t know, actually.”
Petraeus “is almost certainly the right man for the job in Iraq, but he’s the right person three years too late and 250,000 troops short,” Rep. Ike Skelton, a Missouri Democrat, said Monday.
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“It is a measure of how vaporous the ground truths in Iraq have become that George w. Bush had to sneak into the country he conquered. Extra security was needed to proclaim that Iraq was more secure, the surge was working and the country was worth more American blood and treasure...What U.S. strategy could avert the wider bloodshed that looks inevitable in the wake of a smaller force? One small advantage of extending the surge is that it postpones having to find the answer to that question.” – Michael Duffy, TIME 9-17-07.
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Crocker is decidedly above party politics. Yet in representing Bush in Iraq, he has inevitably become drawn into the administration's effort to salvage its colossal mistakes. Buying more time may help Bush exit office without experiencing a humiliating withdrawal from Iraq. But it is wrong to ask the troops for more sacrifices without leveling with Americans about what kind of longer-term commitment is really at stake and coming up with a sensible plan to get there. Thus far, the administration has proved either unable or unwilling to get Shiites and Kurds to offer Sunnis a meaningful stake in Iraq's future. And it has done next to nothing toward accepting two of the Baker-Hamilton commission's crucial recommendations about working with Syria and Iran.
Just as with its wishful thinking in invading Iraq four years ago, the White House seems to think that it can eradicate Iran's influence in the region simply by wishing it away. If Bush is sincerely thinking about solving the Iran problem by bombing Iran's nuclear program, then its hard to take seriously its appeal for a little more time to set Iraq on the path of democracy. War with Iran would simply send Petraeus's mission in Iraq into the realm of the unknown. If Americans are being asked to keep armed forces in Iraq, a little more coherence and transparency is in order. - Scott MacLeod
**********
The nature of military leadership is congenital optimism; officers are trained to complete the mission, to refuse to countenance the possibility of failure. That focus is essential when you go to war, but it lacks perspective. That's why civilian leaders—the Commander in Chief—are there to set the mission, to change or abort it when necessary. The trouble is, George W. Bush's credibility on Iraq is nonexistent. And so he has placed David Petraeus, an excellent soldier, in a position way above his pay grade. He has made Petraeus not just the arbiter of Iraq strategy but also, by default, the man who sets U.S. policy for the entire so-called war on terrorism...
...Crocker also testified that the Iraqi Shi'ites were Arabs who had fought fiercely against the Iranians in the eight-year war and were very unlikely to cede control to their Persian neighbor without a fight. - Joe Klein, TIME.
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Monday, September 10, 2007
Patriot Day? More Shifting Sands In Iraq
How can Bush's homeland security adviser, Frances Fragos Townsend, say that Osama bin Laden is “virtually impotent,” contrary to top intelligence experts, and when no one even knows where he is or what he has been doing?
The Bush administration would have us believe that Iraq is the “central” front in the global war on terror, and that bin Laden is on some permanent vacation in a cave – no longer a threat? Do these people ever think before they speak? “al-Qaida in Iraq” is only loosely affiliated with al-Qaida and did not even exist before we invaded Iraq. It has been widely reported that al-Qaida is back, in strength, in the lawless Pakistan-Afghanistan border region.
According to some, a debate over the various progress reports from Petraeus, other commanders, government agencies and diplomats is “moot” because Bush has already decided to carry his “new” strategy forward and Democrats lack the votes to stop him.
All I have heard from the war supporters is that the mainstream media is so liberally biased as to be unreliable. Yet, it almost seems forbidden that anybody should ask any hard questions. Why hasn’t Bush taken any steps to alleviate the strain on the military? In a country of 300 million “patriots,” why is it unreasonable to call for a draft? This ill-conceived war in Iraq has put this country in a very precarious position.
The surge was not a number deemed necessary by military experts but rather just a number they were able to scrounge up by extending to fifteen months the tours of the already overtaxed troops. General Petraeus, himself, wrote the army’s new counterinsurgency manual, which calls for as many troops in Baghdad, alone, as are in the entire country. His silence on this point brings into question anything he has to say in regards to the success of the surge or the strategy going forward.
At least it does for me. But, I am just one military family member, a minority, who is not blinded by “patriotism.” I am not willing to sacrifice my loved ones needlessly and recklessly. The military comprises not even 1% of our population and it speaks greatly to the character and honor, or lack thereof, of our “commander-in-chief” and the other 99.99% that the lives and well-being of those brave soldiers who have carried this entire burden does not even rate the slightest consideration.
The Bush administration would have us believe that Iraq is the “central” front in the global war on terror, and that bin Laden is on some permanent vacation in a cave – no longer a threat? Do these people ever think before they speak? “al-Qaida in Iraq” is only loosely affiliated with al-Qaida and did not even exist before we invaded Iraq. It has been widely reported that al-Qaida is back, in strength, in the lawless Pakistan-Afghanistan border region.
According to some, a debate over the various progress reports from Petraeus, other commanders, government agencies and diplomats is “moot” because Bush has already decided to carry his “new” strategy forward and Democrats lack the votes to stop him.
All I have heard from the war supporters is that the mainstream media is so liberally biased as to be unreliable. Yet, it almost seems forbidden that anybody should ask any hard questions. Why hasn’t Bush taken any steps to alleviate the strain on the military? In a country of 300 million “patriots,” why is it unreasonable to call for a draft? This ill-conceived war in Iraq has put this country in a very precarious position.
The surge was not a number deemed necessary by military experts but rather just a number they were able to scrounge up by extending to fifteen months the tours of the already overtaxed troops. General Petraeus, himself, wrote the army’s new counterinsurgency manual, which calls for as many troops in Baghdad, alone, as are in the entire country. His silence on this point brings into question anything he has to say in regards to the success of the surge or the strategy going forward.
At least it does for me. But, I am just one military family member, a minority, who is not blinded by “patriotism.” I am not willing to sacrifice my loved ones needlessly and recklessly. The military comprises not even 1% of our population and it speaks greatly to the character and honor, or lack thereof, of our “commander-in-chief” and the other 99.99% that the lives and well-being of those brave soldiers who have carried this entire burden does not even rate the slightest consideration.
"Bring It On" Again? - Osama bin Laden Deemed "Virtually Impotent"
Seemingly taunting Osama bin Laden, President Bush's homeland security adviser (Frances Fragos Townsend) said Sunday the fugitive al-Qaida leader is "virtually impotent" beyond his ability to hide away and spread anti-American propaganda.
The provocative characterization came just days after bin Laden attracted international attention with the release of a video in which he ridicules President Bush about the Iraq war and reminds the world that he not been captured.
...The consensus of the nation's top intelligence analysts is that bin Laden's terrorist network is anything but impotent.
Terrorism experts say the network is regrouping in the lawless Pakistan-Afghanistan border region. The latest National Intelligence Estimate says al-Qaida is growing in strength, intensifying its efforts to put operatives in the United States and plotting against U.S. targets that will cause massive casualties. The U.S. is in a "heightened threat environment" and al-Qaida is the most serious threat, the analysts found...
..."While he may be physically contained, his influence is not bounded by any physical barriers," said Thomas Sanderson, an authority on terrorism at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"Obviously, in a sense, it does not matter that we've got him trapped in a cave. He has sent forth enough messages to incite violence worldwide against us," he said in an interview Sunday...
...Taunting bin Laden as "virtually impotent" would likely not provoke him to respond, because his strategy of attacks involves lengthy planning that would not be derailed by a single comment, said Sanderson, a senior fellow at CSIS. But such a comment could prove incendiary to like-minded followers of bin Laden who see themselves as a "vanguard of a global assault on the United States," he said.
"A provocation like that," he said, "is not helpful."
The provocative characterization came just days after bin Laden attracted international attention with the release of a video in which he ridicules President Bush about the Iraq war and reminds the world that he not been captured.
...The consensus of the nation's top intelligence analysts is that bin Laden's terrorist network is anything but impotent.
Terrorism experts say the network is regrouping in the lawless Pakistan-Afghanistan border region. The latest National Intelligence Estimate says al-Qaida is growing in strength, intensifying its efforts to put operatives in the United States and plotting against U.S. targets that will cause massive casualties. The U.S. is in a "heightened threat environment" and al-Qaida is the most serious threat, the analysts found...
..."While he may be physically contained, his influence is not bounded by any physical barriers," said Thomas Sanderson, an authority on terrorism at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"Obviously, in a sense, it does not matter that we've got him trapped in a cave. He has sent forth enough messages to incite violence worldwide against us," he said in an interview Sunday...
...Taunting bin Laden as "virtually impotent" would likely not provoke him to respond, because his strategy of attacks involves lengthy planning that would not be derailed by a single comment, said Sanderson, a senior fellow at CSIS. But such a comment could prove incendiary to like-minded followers of bin Laden who see themselves as a "vanguard of a global assault on the United States," he said.
"A provocation like that," he said, "is not helpful."
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