No Sir!—Reality Makes a Comeback
Six weeks ago, I posted a story about diplomat Alberto Fernandez who suggested on television that the Bush Administration had been "arrogant and stupid" in Iraq. A spokesman suggested that Mr. Fernandez had been "misinterpreted," and after counseling, he did come forward and said that he didn’t mean to say what he said, which was what everyone paying attention knew from the marrow of their bones out: Iraq was a bungle of biblical proportions that will go down in history as one of the worst mistakes ever made by any nation in human history.It is, indeed, THAT BAD.
This blog has already discussed the Project for the New American Century (great Wikipedia entry, by the way) and linked to its 90 page Rebuilding America’s Defenses Report as well as Wesley Clark’s pre-election speech revealing plans to invade Iraq as part of a five year seven country invasion to establish US hegemony in the middle-east.
Well, how’s your hegemony this morning? I am not a professional historian, but I’ve read a little and paid some attention, and everything on my meter says that this fiasco has put the US, and certainly the Bush Administration, at the top of the shit list of the entire Islamic world. This is hegemony?
Well, two months after the publication of Bob Woodward’s State of Denial, six weeks after the Fernandez remark regarding arrogance and stupidity, two days after The New York Times published Rumsfeld’s 11/6 memo saying in different words that things were all F’d up, and one day before the official release of the recommendations of Jim Baker’s Iraq Study Group, when Sen. Carl Levin, D-Michigan and incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, asked Rumsfeld’s imminent replacement Robert Gates if the U.S. was winning the war, Gates replied, "No sir."
Really? Levin thanked Gates for what he called a "refreshing breath of reality."
After years of hysterical denial, I will speculate that the democratic controlled Congress will put us on a collision course with reality, and although I understand what Levin meant, "refreshing" is not the word that comes to mind.
Just 3 days ago I posted statistics on the 3137 coalition casualties in Iraq. Since that post, the carnage has climbed to 3154. The number of injured nears 22,000, and we are not talking about nicks and scratches.
Have we rebuilt America’s defenses yet?
History will determine whether my meters are faulty or accurate, but they tell me that this will ultimately have the opposite effect of everything PNAC wanted to accomplish. The United States will be weaker, not stronger, have less influence, not more, and it will have bled unconscionable quantities of lives and dollars, and when it is all over, when this horrible fiasco is finally complete (whatever that means), matters will be worse.
The Republican Congress actually tried to impeach Bill Clinton. Remember? They really did.
For what?!
posted by x4mr at 12:06 PM
2 Comments:
Great post, x4mr.
One way to look at it is that there are 300,000,000 million of us and 6 billion of them. When all is said and done, the rest of the world will not tolerate American hegemony. Despite military superiority, the US cannot rule the world, not even the Mideast. We have shown our willingness to use our weapons and occupy a country that was of no threat to us, but realistically, how many times can we do this? The cost is prohibitive, and the American people do not want Empire. They want jobs, security, health care, education, and a leadership role in the world that they can be proud of.
In 2008, George Bush will take his rightful place alongside the worst presidents in US history as well as the worst of the world's leaders. The next administration will be tasked with repairing the damage, most of which cannot be repaired, because people cannot come back to life.
The next two years are unpredictable. I just don't see a strong opposition to the Iraq War among the Democratic congressional representatives and senators.
And, of course, there's the oil.
Not quite sure how to interpret your post, Sirocco. If what you are saying is get the hell out immediately, I agree with you.
After thinking about this for quite some time, I've reached the conclusion that it is absolutely terrible no matter what we do, but what is less terrible is pulling out, letting whatever happens happen, and while it is, we prepare to deal with it.
If a massive meat grinder ends up producing a Syrianiqkeyabia, so be it. I think any of those scenarios are better than the notion in your post of "The Great War" with our sending a million people over there, which I think would lead to even worse scenarios.
I've got an original post brewing about this Glenn Beck fearmonger notion of an evil empire of unified Islamic folk who want to annihilate the rest of the planet. I don't buy it.
I do think that our bullying and invading fuels such flames, but perhaps out of self defense. Maybe they think we're out to kill all of them. Given how Bush and Cheney have lied, violated the constitution, set up secret camps, er, prisons, suspended habeas corpus, etc., etc.. can you blame them?
This is just all terrible.
I'd like to see us pull back, lick our wounds, and rebuild to face what is real.
China is preparing.
The sooner Cheney is gone the better. I have a post brewing about him as well, but I'm afraid to publish it. Men in black might barge into my home and next thing I know I'm naked in eastern Europe with electrodes attached.
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