I go away for a meeting, and Congress goes and holds a vote about the Iraq War. Like some, I'm disgusted by the outcome, but I think many are blaming the wrong people. To paraphrase Pogo, the enemy is us. Or least part of us.
I'm not referring to the Mouth Breathing wing of the Republican Party (which is currently ascendant). One does not negotiate or convince authoritarians: empathy and abstraction are not their strong suit. The mindless Uruk-Hai will always oppose any thing deemed as 'surrender'--until their leaders point their lizard brains at something else.
No, the group I'm disappointed with (and at times disgusted by) are the 'Friedmans.' They're the ones who want withdrawal in six to twelve months. And many of them probably wanted to withdraw from Iraq in six to twelve months six to twelve months ago.
One Friedman Unit after another Friedman Unit, one massive head trauma after massive head trauma, one dead twenty year old after another dead twenty year old.
These Friedmans are the ones driving the continuation of the war. As long as they are not forced to defend their lethal ninniness, their lethal indecisiveness, anti-war Democrats--and, yes, Pelosi and Reid are anti-war--simply will not have the support to end the war. To conclude that the 2006 election was an overwhelming statement that the war needs to end immediately is false. Most wanted an eventual end, but the plurality wanted 'six to twelve months.' And it still wants 'six to twelve months.' The idea that there is a majority who want to start withdrawing immediately is a pipe dream.
We need to start asking this plurality--the ones who don't want to worry their pretty little heads for six to twelve months--how many more Julio Morenos do we have to lose before we begin to withdraw immediately:
The soldier's girlfriend, who was weeping quietly in the cold rain, had more sense than all her purported betters in this city.
Informed that the mayor of New York had just made a huge and bold move on the White House and asked for citizenship for her dead soldier, who was a Dominican, she said at the wake, "What good is it now? He can't use it."
He sure can't. He was Private Luis Moreno. He was 19 years old. They were loading him in his box into a hearse for the ride to a cemetery forever.
She also had a question: "Why is he dead?"
She is Jessica Corporan and she is 18 and was going to marry him when he got back from Iraq. If you are going to have your heart broken, 18 is not the easiest age to evade pain, and she showed it on Friday.
Mayor Bloomberg was proud that he sent a hand-delivered note to President Bush requesting citizenship posthumously for Private Moreno.
The idea wilted in the noisy steam coming out of the radiators in St. Francis of Assisi church on Shakespeare Avenue in the Bronx.
Along with Bloomberg's request, here was a general of the army giving a bronze star posthumously to Moreno. The general couldn't speak Spanish.
Bloomberg's request was about a 19-year-old who was shot dead in a war in Iraq that was started and continues because of George Bush and no one else. The blood of 525 Americans is on his hands.
Moreno wasn't listed as a citizen of the country, and that is his country's fault. He died for America.
He is so much more than a citizen here. He died a proud member of the aristocracy of the City of New York.
And any letter to the White House from the mayor of this city should not dwell on some cheap technicality. Bloomberg's letter should demand to know why this young man is dead in a box in a cemetery of our city. Why is this young woman in such pain on a wet Bronx street in one of the worst moments in memory?
And why was Julio Moreno in Iraq to begin with?
Until those who are too unwilling, too cowardly to confront the immorality of their fence-sitting are forced to do so, why should we expect the representatives they elected to be any better? We need to hold the little Friedmans accountable: after all, it's their country too.
Related post: As usual, you should read what maha has to say about all of this.
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Well we all know politics are at place here. The reason why the Democrats caved on the war is that A.) they want Bush to endure the blame for anything bad that happens and B.) they know anti-war Democrats have nowhere else to go (party duopoly and all that jazz).
Right now the mid-east is basically a ticking time bomb waiting to blow up in our face. Not only is Iraq ripe for another Khomeini (at least in the Shi'ite regions), but there is the increasing tension between Iran and Israel, the resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan, and the fact that Pakistan is one bullet to Musharraf's brain from a nuclear empowered Wahhabi theocracy. It's no surprise that the Democrats want to let Bush display his bravado and play dummy while it all happens.
We are are terribly frustrated by this. I think we are in a political game of chicken. It the democrats end it, the myth will become -we would have won it "but for the surrender monkeys", and anything bad that happens subsequently will be owned by them. I find this prospect sufficiently scary -if the tactic is successful we could become a very-illiberal country indeed. And even the realist repubulicans (such as may still exist), are waiting for dems to do something that will allow them to transfer ownership of a US defeat to them. So political calculations have left us at an impasse, and we just flail around with noneffectual tactical changes.
Right now the mid-east is basically a ticking time bomb waiting to blow up in our face. Not only is Iraq ripe for another Khomeini (at least in the Shi'ite regions), but there is the increasing tension between Iran and Israel, the resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan, and the fact that Pakistan is one bullet to Musharraf's brain from a nuclear empowered Wahhabi theocracy. It's no surprise that the Democrats want to let Bush display his bravado and play dummy while it all happens.
I'm not referring to the Mouth Breathing wing of the Republican Party (which is currently ascendant). One does not negotiate or convince authoritarians: empathy and abstraction are not their strong suit. The mindless Uruk-Hai will always oppose any thing deemed as 'surrender'--until their leaders point their lizard brains at something else