I bet this has a whole lot less inaacuracies than the ABC crapu-drama that just aired. Wonder if anybody in town wants to set up a viewing.
I need to keep this link available the next time I bother trying to talk to MB about the idiocy of this war. (I've been tempted to email him and ask if he's heard more from his "friends on the inside; those guys who are still in the business"... but I can't keep myself from making snarky comments, and besides, if in the last conversation all he could respond with is that I didn't know enough to converse with him about the topic, then fuck him. That still makes me angry.)
Hey, those of you who own a TiVO or DVR or whatnot? Please consider this as a great way to give feedback to ABC if you're as cranky as I am. This list is a little more complicated, but still has some things that the uber-busy mensch can fit into their day of trying not to fall under the wheels.
Saw this quote today from an older article:
... the national-security choice for ordinary Americans in the post-September 11th era is... "Who's going to keep me from getting blown up by terrorists?" And that's the question Dubya makes sure to answer clearly (... "defeat the terrorists abroad so we don't have to face them here at home").
Yes, it's bullshit, but at least he's answering the core question in a way that phrases like "liberal internationalism" never will.
So, my advice to my fellow Democrats is this: Stop trying to articulate a progressive foreign policy vision. Instead, tell Americans why Dubya's foreign policy is going to get them blown up, and what we need to do to prevent that.That still does seem to be the issue. Trying to explain nuances of international policy and the psychology of human beings to some people seems to be a lot like teaching a pig to sing.
1 comment:
The article about Lowry is interesting.
Item 1- Lots more troops at the time of the invasion would have allowed us to do some classic counter-insurgency/occupation stuff. Like, say, keeping people from running totally amok and looting. Or perhaps closing the borders to dry up the flow of arms into the country. Basically it would have given us the capacity to provide basic stability for a while and allow a political process to occur, and to allow proper reconstruction.
As for the Churchillian thing, I've been thinking a bit about that recently. Churchill is getting invoked a lot by the right lately, and it bugs me because Churchill's rhetoric would have been basically empty had we not stepped in to save his bacon. He and his often misguided military commanders had managed to squander massive amount of materiel in North Africa trying to squash Rommel (whose forces represented a rather insginificant investment on the part of the Germans) while basically ignoring the Japanese. The Japanese might very well have been able to invade India and totally disrupt the British state has the Japanese not been suddenly occupied with the U.S.. So basically, Churchill's rhetoric was only valuable because there was a powerful ally gearing up in the wings. We have no such ally.
Anyway, I ramble and have chores to do. Good links.
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