Make the Election About Iraq

[DOGS THAT BARK]

Tell em Charles

Make the Election About Iraq

By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, June 13, 2008; Page A23

In his St. Paul victory speech, Barack Obama pledged again to pull out of Iraq. Rather than "continue a policy in Iraq that asks everything of our brave men and women in uniform and nothing of Iraqi politicians, . . . t's time for Iraqis to take responsibility for their future."

We know Obama hasn't been to Iraq in more than two years, but does he not read the papers? Does he not know anything about developments on the ground? Here is the "nothing" that Iraqis have been doing in the past few months:

1. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki sent the Iraqi army into Basra. It achieved in a few weeks what the British had failed to do in four years: take the city, drive out the Mahdi Army and seize the ports from Iranian-backed militias.

2. When Mahdi fighters rose up in support of their Basra brethren, the Iraqi army at Maliki's direction confronted them and prevailed in every town -- Najaf, Karbala, Hilla, Kut, Nasiriyah and Diwaniyah -- from Basra to Baghdad.


3. Without any American ground forces, the Iraqi army entered and occupied Sadr City, the Mahdi Army stronghold.

4. Maliki flew to Mosul, directing a joint Iraqi-U.S. offensive against the last redoubt of al-Qaeda, which had already been driven out of Anbar, Baghdad and Diyala provinces.

5. The Iraqi parliament enacted a de-Baathification law, a major Democratic benchmark for political reconciliation.

6. Parliament also passed the other reconciliation benchmarks -- a pension law, an amnesty law, and a provincial elections and powers law. Oil revenue is being distributed to the provinces through the annual budget.

7. With Maliki having demonstrated that he would fight not just Sunni insurgents (e.g., in Mosul) but Shiite militias (e.g., the Mahdi Army), the Sunni parliamentary bloc began negotiations to join the Shiite-led government. (The final sticking point is a squabble over a sixth cabinet position.)

The disconnect between what Democrats are saying about Iraq and what is actually happening there has reached grotesque proportions. Democrats won an exhilarating electoral victory in 2006 pledging withdrawal at a time when conditions in Iraq were dire and we were indeed losing the war. Two years later, when everything is changed, they continue to reflexively repeat their "narrative of defeat and retreat" (as Joe Lieberman so memorably called it) as if nothing has changed.

It is a position so utterly untenable that John McCain must seize the opportunity and, contrary to conventional wisdom, make the Iraq war the central winning plank of his campaign. Yes, Americans are war-weary. Yes, most think we should not have engaged in the first place. Yes, Obama will keep pulling out his 2002 speech opposing the war.

But McCain's case is simple. Is not Obama's central mantra that this election is about the future, not the past? It is about 2009, not 2002. Obama promises that upon his inauguration, he will order the Joint Chiefs to bring him a plan for withdrawal from Iraq within 16 months. McCain says that upon his inauguration, he'll ask the Joint Chiefs for a plan for continued and ultimate success.

The choice could not be more clearly drawn. The Democrats' one objective in Iraq is withdrawal. McCain's one objective is victory.

McCain's case is not hard to make. Iraq is a three-front war -- against Sunni al-Qaeda, against Shiite militias and against Iranian hegemony -- and we are winning on every front:


? We did not go into Iraq to fight al-Qaeda. The war had other purposes. But al-Qaeda chose to turn it into the central front in its war against America. That choice turned into an al-Qaeda fiasco: Al-Qaeda in Iraq is now on the run and in the midst of stunning and humiliating defeat.


? As for the Shiite extremists, the Mahdi Army is isolated and at its weakest point in years.


? Its sponsor, Iran, has suffered major setbacks, not just in Basra, but in Iraqi public opinion, which has rallied to the Maliki government and against Iranian interference through its

Sadrist proxy.

Even the most expansive American objective -- establishing a representative government that is an ally against jihadists, both Sunni and Shiite -- is within sight.


Obama and the Democrats would forfeit every one of these successes to a declared policy of fixed and unconditional withdrawal. If McCain cannot take to the American people the case for the folly of that policy, he will not be president. Nor should he be.

Give the speech, senator. Give it now.

 

[djv]

I agree make it one of the election discussions. However With over 70% of Americans wanting out of Iraq. If I was Reb I would not want that. You just can't suger coated it enough.

 

[rusty]

So if this is true why the troop levels stay,if not increase slightly.Sounds like were ready to downsize now.How come we havent.

Protect the greenzone sounds like a plan.Will just leave the rest to them.

 

[StevieD]

Why would we possibly listen to the guys who have been consistantly wrong about Iraq from day one? This is the Neocons new war cry. Let's not talk about why we are there, let's talk about how we claim to have success. Look let's talk about how much money and lives this has cost and how much it will continue to cost. Let's talk about those who were wrong about why we were there. Let's talk about those who said the war will pay for itself. Let's talk about those who said it would last 6 months tops. Let's talk about those who said we would be welcomed as liberators. Yes, lets talk about them let us not let them dictate to us their feelings about the future.

 

[Skulnik]

StevieD, let's not change history. TIA.

:nono: :nono: :nono: :nono: :nono: :nono:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7CsH_5UTkw&feature=related

 

[Skulnik]

Democrats are funny. JMO

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDwODbl3muE&NR=1

:mj07: :mj07: :mj07: :mj07: :mj07: :mj07:

 

[rusty]

N0 one said the dems wernt for the invasion of Iraq.But once its discovered thats BS,and its more to do with Bushes dad(not finishing the job).

Lets finally admit we went into Iraq with hidden agenda(s),not the reason(s)WMD,that were supposdely told to us in 2003.

Lets MAN UP!! here!

 

[Tapir Caper]

Bush Behind Bars?

by Dan Spielberg

In his new book, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder (Vanguard Press, 2008), Vincent Bugliosi, the man who successfully prosecuted Charles Manson for murder, argues convincingly that President George W. Bush's conduct in taking the U.S. military to war against Iraq under false pretenses in March of 2003 qualifies him to be prosecuted for murder in any state in the nation. The victims in the case would be all the soldiers from that state that were killed in the war against Iraq. He lays out his case in a devastatingly logical and methodical manner, weaving together all the relevant facts to paint the definitive portrait of just how reckless and criminal was the behavior of President Bush in his push for war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Famous for his true crime books, such as the book about Charles Manson that launched his literary career, Helter Skelter, Bugliosi shows us that he is still in fine form.

The legal definition of murder, as Bugliosi tells us, is "the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought." Under the law, for there to be a true crime committed the two elements of a prohibited act (actus reus) and criminal intent (mens rea) must coexist in time. According to Bugliosi's legal argument, Bush's act in this case would be his sending U.S. troops to Iraq, resulting in the death of some 4,000 of them. The criminal intent that would need to be shown, malice aforethought, could be proven by demonstrating that Bush took them to war with "reckless and wanton disregard for the consequences and indifference to human life." The only legal defense that could be mounted against charges like this would be that Bush acted in defense of the nation. In order to prove that Bush did not act in defense of the nation in starting the war, knowing all too well that Saddam Hussein was no threat to this country, and had no role in the attacks of 9/11, Bugliosi takes us on a painful walk down memory lane.

He points out that one of the first references to Iraq made by the Bush administration after 9/11 was made on October 15, 2001, by then Secretary of State Colin Powell when he told the press "Iraq is Iraq, a wasted society for 10 years. They're sad. They're contained..." If that were the case, how were they supposed to be a threat to the world's strongest military power?

Bugliosi calls our attention to the fact that after Bush had started talking about the possibility of war with Iraq he said that his decision will be based on the "latest intelligence." What he never said, of course, is that on October 1, 2002, the classified 2002 National Intelligence Estimate issued by the CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies said that Saddam Hussein was NOT an imminent threat to the U.S. Not long after that, on the afternoon of October 7, 2002, then CIA director George Tenet delivered a letter to Senator Bob Graham (D-Florida), Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, saying "Baghdad for now appears to be drawing a line short of conducting terrorist attacks with conventional or CBW (chemical or biological weapons) against the United States." That evening Bush delivers a speech to the nation at the Museum Center in Cincinnati, Ohio in which he called Saddam Hussein a "great danger to our nation."

Then there is the infamous reference to Saddam Hussein's supposed quest for uranium in Africa in the President's 2003 State of the Union speech, which was based on documents which were believed to be forgeries by U. S. intelligence agencies. In October of 2002 George Tenet told Deputy National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley that the president "should not be a fact witness on this issue" and the reporting on it was "weak."

However, for many, the conclusive evidence that Bush knew Saddam Hussein was no threat to this country, therefore an attack on Iraq was unjustified, will be the memo which has come to be known simply as the "Downing Street Memo." This was written by Matthew Rycroft, a foreign policy aide to British Prime Minister Tony Blair, on July 23, 2002, about high-level meetings he had with Bush Administration officials. This memo contained the statement that "Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and the facts were being fixed around the policy."

In addition to providing us with the legal rationale and possible jurisdiction for such a prosecution of the President, Bugliosi also provides examples of how monstrously callous Bush has been since the war began in March of 2003. He provides several pages of photographs of scenes of carnage from Iraq juxtaposed with pictures of a grinning, clowning President Bush, having the time of his life. He also provides several quotes from President Bush made during a variety of stages in the war showing that the President was more concerned about going running, fishing or to a ball game than about the thousands killed in the war that he started. As Bush said in a press conference on December 4, 2007 he's been feeling "pretty good about life."

In the Acknowledgments section of the book Bugliosi provides a valuable insight into the world of book publishing when he claims that many people at the largest publishing houses in the country told him that although they agreed with the conclusions in the book, and thought that the book would make money, they wanted to have nothing to do with it out of fear. It was, they said, "too hot to handle." In fact two liberal law professors of his acquaintance were scared to even look at the book! Bugliosi claims that this is all due to the climate of fear created by the current right wing in America, which brands anyone who believes George Bush's actions to be criminal as a "pro-terrorist," "anti-American" sufferer of "Bush Derangement Syndrome." One is hard-pressed to disagree with him.

In a political environment where impeachment of President Bush is "off the table," those who wish to bring the man to justice may have to look to the courts, but the question is, of course, who would step up and prosecute him? There are not too many prosecutors today who posses Vincent Bugliosi's passion for justice rather than a passion for high conviction rates and career advancement. Even if no charges are ever actually filed against Bush, at least The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder stands as an historical record of one more American President's mendacity on the issues of war and peace.

June 23, 2008

 

[The Sponge]

Why would we possibly listen to the guys who have been consistantly wrong about Iraq from day one? This is the Neocons new war cry. Let's not talk about why we are there, let's talk about how we claim to have success. Look let's talk about how much money and lives this has cost and how much it will continue to cost. Let's talk about those who were wrong about why we were there. Let's talk about those who said the war will pay for itself. Let's talk about those who said it would last 6 months tops. Let's talk about those who said we would be welcomed as liberators. Yes, lets talk about them let us not let them dictate to us their feelings about the future.

Doesn't it want to make you puke Stevie that the last of the George Bush lugnuts will try to find anything they can grasp on, in a place we shouldn't be in to begin with? Let me know when we are getting our three trillion back, free oil, and over 4000 thousand kids lives back as well as the tens of thousands scarred, and then i will find a reason for some hope.:thumb:

 

[kosar]

Don't think prosecuting that idiot for murder has any shot, but along with his Manson book, Bugliosi had another very good one called 'And the Sea Will Tell.'

Very good read.

 

[Hard Times]

I don't think that the real power will ever let the puppets in D.C. ever have a court hearing.They are some that love to posture and try to make points back home,but to hang one of there own,thats not happing.Vote all of the SOB out but thats not happing either.The only shot we got is to take a shot if you know my meaning.

 

[kosar]

The only shot we got is to take a shot if you know my meaning.

Yep- assassination is the answer. If you know my meaning.

 

[Hard Times]

Kosar,lets take a shot at voting them out,I don't need homeland security knocking on my door.

 

[kosar]

Kosar,lets take a shot at voting them out,I don't need homeland security knocking on my door.

Yep- I'm worried about 'homeland security' knocking on my door as well. Could be any minute, actually.

 

[Hard Times]

Assassination without a permit,why wouldn't they:nono:

 

[kosar]

Assassination without a permit,why wouldn't they:nono:

Exactly. No Permit. F*cking permits always screw things up and I just checked my locks, not that it will help.

 

[djv]

Would it be alright for me to say. Incoming? :SIB

 

[The Sponge]

Exactly. No Permit. F*cking permits always screw things up and I just checked my locks, not that it will help.

If being a miserable prick becomes a crime you better start getting worried. You could be the first hit on the list. You probably won't feel a thing tho. Probably get shot between snores

 

[kosar]

If being a miserable prick becomes a crime you better start getting worried. You could be the first hit on the list. You probably won't feel a thing tho. Probably get shot between snores

You seem more bitter and more grouchy than usual, Spongy. Everything ok?

 

[DOGS THAT BARK]

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/06/was_iraq_worth_it.html

June 25, 2008
Was Iraq Worth It?
By Tony Blankley

It has been fashionable -- indeed, de rigueur in political and media circles -- to view contemptuously President Bush's assertion that we are fighting the terrorists in Iraq so we wouldn't have to fight them here. Even conservative commentators have tended to tiptoe around the proposition. We are all far too sophisticated to believe such simplicities. Nor will any self-respecting public chatterer even raise the little matter of America not being hit by terrorism on our soil for the almost seven years since Sept. 11.

And yet the undeniable facts certainly would justify a debate -- if not yet a consensus of agreement -- on President Bush's assertions. Regarding killing Islamist terrorists in Iraq rather than New York City, consider the numbers: According to USA Today in September 2007, more than 19,000 insurgents had been killed by coalition forces since 2003. The number obviously has gone up in the nine months since then (these were midsurge numbers), but I don't have reliable updated numbers.

Of course, most of those 19,000 killed insurgents were not foreign terrorists, but local Iraqis moved to action by our occupation. However, according to studies by the Center for Strategic and International Studies and by the Defense Intelligence Agency, foreign-born jihadists in Iraq are believed to number between 4 and10 percent of the total insurgent strength. So it is reasonable to assume that we have killed -- as of nine months ago -- between 800 and 1,900 non-Iraqi terrorists who otherwise would have been plying their trade elsewhere. It only took a couple of dozen to commit the atrocities of Sept. 11.

Moreover, we know specifically that Al-Qaida in Iraq has been decimated recently. According to the British newspaper The Times in February: "Al-Qaeda in Iraq faces an 'extraordinary crisis'. ... The terrorist group's security structure suffered 'total collapse'."

And last month, Strategy Page reported: "Al Qaeda web sites are making a lot of noise about 'why we (al-Qaida) lost in Iraq'. Western intelligence agencies are fascinated by the statistics being posted in several Arab language sites. Not the kind of stuff you read about in the Western media. According to al Qaeda, their collapse in Iraq was steep and catastrophic. ... If you can read Arabic, you can easily find these pro-terrorism sites, and see for yourself how al Qaeda is trying to explain its own destruction (in Iraq) to its remaining supporters."

Now, it is doubtlessly true that our invasion of Iraq (and Afghanistan) helped al-Qaida's recruitment. I have been told that by U.S. government experts I trust. But that is an old fact. What Osama bin Laden famously said about recruitment is also true: People follow the strong horse. And the new fact is that as we are winning in Iraq, as we are killing al-Qaida fighters and other Islamist terrorists there by the truckload (along with other insurgent opponents of the Iraqi government we support with our blood and wealth), we are proving to be the strong horse after all and can expect to see a reduced attraction for young men to join the Islamist terrorist ranks.

Fighting and winning always impress. Even merely fighting and persisting impress. Shortly after the fall of Soviet Communism, I had dinner with a then-recently former senior Red army general. He told me that the Soviets were astounded and impressed by the fact that we were prepared to fight and lose 50,000 men in Vietnam, when the Soviets never thought we even had a strategic interest there. They thus calculated that they'd better be careful with the United States. What might we do, they thought, if our interests really were threatened?

The full effects of the vigorous martial response of President Bush to the attacks of Sept. 11 will not be known for decades. But if history is any indicator, military courage, persistence and a capacity to kill the enemy in large numbers usually work to the benefit of such nations.

On Sept. 10, 2001, many Islamists thought America and the West were decadent, cowardly and ripe for the pickings. (Hitler thought the same thing about us.) On the basis of President Bush's political courage -- and supremely on the physical courage, moral strength and heartbreaking sacrifice of all our fighting uniformed men and women (and un-uniformed intelligence operatives) -- America's willingness and capacity to fight to protect ourselves cannot be doubted around the world. This may prove to be the most important global political fact of the first decade of the 21st century -- with implications even beyond our struggle with radical Islam.

It is time to reconsider whether President Bush or Barack Obama was right on whether to fight. Obama has had a good political run on the early and inconclusive evidence. As victory starts to emerge in Iraq, more persuasive data begin to fall on President Bush's side of the argument. This is a debate worth having before November.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
By JIM KUHNHENN, Associated Press Writer
24 minutes ago



WASHINGTON - John McCain's stance on the war is unambiguous: He voted for it, supports the current enhanced U.S. troop presence in Iraq and vigorously opposes any timetable to withdraw.



The public's stance on the war is as equivocal as McCain's is not: A strong majority of Americans oppose it and believe it was wrong in the first place, but more find McCain better suited to handle Iraq than his Democratic presidential rival, Barack Obama.

"He's more experienced militarily," said Ann Burkes, a registered Democrat and retired third-grade teacher from Broken Arrow, Okla. "And I don't know if I agree with stay-the-course (policy), but I think the good probably outweighs the bad with him, experience-wise."

Burkes illustrates the conflicted voter, one who is as likely to be influenced by McCain's policy positions as by his personal biography as a former Navy pilot who spent more than five years in a North Vietnamese prison.

For McCain, there is a major complication. Not all those voters who perceive him as stronger on Iraq say they will vote for him for president.

Unlike the 2004 presidential contest, this is not shaping up as a national security election. Neither the war nor terrorism is foremost in the public's mind. The economy and energy prices are the pre-eminent issues of the day. And on those, Obama has the edge.

Still, this hate-the-war, love-the-warrior strain runs through the American electorate. In a new Associated Press-Yahoo News poll, more than one out of five of the respondents who said they opposed the war also said they support McCain for president. The sentiment does not discriminate by gender or by age. Most significantly, it splits independent voters in favor of McCain.

Respondents said McCain would do a better job in Iraq than Obama by a margin of 39 percent to 33 percent. Undergirding that response is a strong sentiment that McCain would be a better leader of the military than Obama. One out of three respondents said that description matched McCain "very well," whereas only one out of 10 said the same of Obama, who did not serve in the armed forces.

The Iraq findings track McCain's advantage on the issue of terrorism. Of those surveyed, more than twice as many believe McCain can better handle terrorism than Obama. As such, McCain is emerging clearly as a candidate of national security, a conventional role for a Republican.

The public's views about Iraq are especially notable because many voters appear to separate McCain's past record of support for the war from their perception of his performance as a military leader. What's more, it points to a potential Obama vulnerability.

Only 6 percent of those who say they will vote for Obama say McCain would do a better job on Iraq. But among "weak" Obama supporters, that figure rises to 15 percent. Moreover, among undecided voters, McCain is preferred 25 percent to 15 percent over Obama on Iraq.

Leeann Ormsbee, a registered Democrat from Waterford, Pa., believes the United States rushed to war, but now does not believe troops should simply withdraw. The 29-year-old self-employed house cleaner says she has never voted for a Republican. She might this time.

"I do believe that he will do better in Iraq," she said of McCain. "Because he's served in the military and he has said we can't just pull out. ... I think we're just kind of stuck with it now and we have to finish."

Republican pollster Neil Newhouse calls these voters "nose-holders."

"They don't like the fact that we're over there, they don't think the decision was the right one, but they understand that if we simply withdraw our troops it would leave things worse off," he said.

Aware that national security is one of McCain's strongest features, Democrats and their allies have tried to portray his Iraq stance as a mere continuation of President Bush's policy. They have seized on his comments earlier this year when he speculated that U.S. troops could remain in Iraq for 100 years. Though he was talking about a presence of non-combat troops akin to those in South Korea, the remark has been used against him in television commercials.

Earlier this month, McCain kicked off his general election advertising campaign with an ad that featured his and his family's military service and his years in captivity but cast him as a man with a distaste for war.

"Only a fool or a fraud talks tough or romantically about war," he says in the ad.

McCain supported the resolution in 2002 that allowed Bush to use force in Iraq. He later criticized then-Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld for his management of the war and went on to become one of the Senate's leading advocates of last year's buildup of troops. He has said he could envision troops withdrawing around 2013 but has refused to fix a date.

"We were losing in Iraq; now we're winning," he has said.

The troop expansion, which is about to end, has left Iraq safer and given Iraqi forces greater responsibility for security. But Pentagon and congressional reports issued this week also warned that the gains are delicate and could be reversed.

McCain's Iraq advantage could evaporate if violence and chaos resurface and U.S. casualties mount. Conversely, even greater successes in the country could make withdrawing troops more palatable.

Obama has argued that the troop buildup has not helped resolve Iraq's political problems. He wants to remove all combat brigades from Iraq within 16 months of becoming president. But he has said that if al-Qaida builds bases in Iraq, he would keep troops in the country or in the region to carry out "targeted strikes."

"As the American people get to know Obama and McCain better, they will see that the difference is Obama's desire to fundamentally change American policy in Iraq and John McCain wants to continue George Bush's policy," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said.

Democratic pollster Anna Greenberg said the evidence of improvements this year presents a double-edged sword for McCain and Obama.

"Obviously, people don't like the war in Iraq; they want it to be over and they don't like all the money we're spending there," she said. "On the other hand, people also don't want to retreat or lose. ... In 2006, (the public's view of the war) was much more clearly a net positive for Democrats. I think the landscape has changed."

At the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, which has also polled on Iraq and the presidential candidates, associate director Michael Dimock said the public has a perception that McCain "is not completely on board with Bush."

What's more, he said, Obama faces lingering concerns about his experience, about not being tested and about not having foreign policy experience ? themes Hillary Rodham Clinton pushed during their prolonged primary contest.

"What you see is that Americans themselves are conflicted about Iraq," he added. "They are very hesitant to say that we need to get out now. They understand the complexity of this situation."