RL May 19 15

Benghazi

• FOX Report Today: Documents Reveal Benghazi Libya Weapons (Provided by U.S. and NATO) Shipped To Syria…
• New docs reveal administration knew about Benghazi 10 days before attack
• JW: Obama Admin Knew About Benghazi Before It Happened

Bush

• Bush Didn’t Lie
• The Bush Years: An Explainer

Freedom Of

• How The Left Uses ‘Racism’ And ‘Sexism’ To Silence The Right
• Barack Obama Tried to Silence Political Speech in 2007
• A Warning To American Christians: You ‘Must Be Made’ To Obey
• Starnes: Radical Group Wants Christian General Court-Martialed for Speaking About God
• Sad, Rabid Puppies and the Front Lash
• Clapping at College is the Newest Sexist Ableist Hate Crime
• Beck Highlights What the Government Is Capable of if Terrorism Is Suspected
• Kerry: Internet 'Needs Rules to Be Able to Flourish and Work Properly' 

Gun Control

• …Backdoor Gun Control with Feds Undermining Sheriffs
• Because Freedom failed, I guess.

The Mess

• Nobody Can Figure Out Why Hillary Clinton Is Running for President
• Cyber Experts: FBI Ignoring Hack Threats to Airplane Wi-Fi
• 1970’s Positive Train Control Still Not “Shovel Ready”
• Fix The GOP Presidential Debates With This One Simple Trick
• A CEO explains why it took him 10 years to build a single plant near San Diego.
• Once Again, Radical Environmentalists Get Egg Thrown In Their Faces
• Stupid-Strategy Sweepstakes: Home Depot vs. Lowe’s
• Amtrak Train Possibly Shot At Before Wreck
• Our attention span is now less than that of a goldfish, Microsoft study finds 

"no solution" middle east really?

   Sent an email to some talking heads in Aug 2013 during a refrain of "we can't nation build" I was try to keep it short and may expand on it later:

Is there a word that describes the act of seeing something done badly and failing then assuming it can't be done?

     Fight the ideological war.

Freedom or democracy do not equal liberty. From the Pres. on down, talk in terms of individual liberty. The moral, practical and economic case as well as the stabilizing effects should be explained in terms of solutions to both small and large problems at all times. Let the Islamist fight a clear declaration of liberty instead of the amorphous democracy and inconsistent freedoms.

    Stop the parliaments.

European models, that's the best we can do? Representatives in parliaments answer to the party. Electing reps individually makes them more accountable. In older governments parties gain influence, it just doesn't hand it to them. 

    Build republics.

First Obama Press Conference

He is who he is. It when well. He is a collectivist hack. We have gone from realizing there are true socialists in our government to socialists idealist.

Stop Helen Thomas. Don't call on Hufpost people. Do you really want to talk baseball when yo say the sky is falling. I am just going to do a few quick hits in this. Just not in the mood to burn straw men all night.

Japans lost decade? Not an economist. 6 Trillion in spending and that didn't fix it? Their are arguments all over on it. My question is do you want to multiply the debt by four and what didn't work

FDR? Your surprised he was wrong. That belief is spreading fast. When was the Great Depression over? After the war?

Not enough credit and its number two. #1 fix it before the stimulus. Fix the problems first and quickly. then massive stimulus. Can it wait for 2? 3? 4? months?

Economist and both sides say we need stimulus? True but not all of them think this package is it.

Tarp 2 as it looks will not work. You have to directly buy up the toxic assets. They can be auctioned off almost immediately. We might lose some money in the deal but it is the source of the problems.

The return to failed policies? wtf? The tax cuts? NO pushing housing? Capitalism? That is the most dishonest statement he has made and he makes it over and over.

The comments on Iran And the rest I am ignoring for the time. The super nova of government is more important.

No earmarks do not mean no pork.

Electronic records of fine. They create some jobs. The saving will not show up for years. They need to be stored offline(thumb drives), updated electronically and protected from government snooping. Not a bad idea but how stimulative is it?

Schools have been state responsibility. With federal money comes Federal strings. I really don't want anyone that believes in over blown social justice any where near schools.

How partisan is it to keep implying that the alternative to this bill is doing nothing. It is not. Very few, if any are saying do nothing.

Bipartisanship? If someone disagrees with you are you sure they are just doing it political reasons or do they know your wrong.

He at time plays at being pragmatic. I don't think he is. Government is the only one that can fix this? They do need to get out of the way. Fix the systemic problems that government made. It is not that capitalism is failed. It is that government that stuck there hand in and played around.

This bill is a massive government expansion. There is no sunset on any of the programs in it. If parts of the bill would not pass on their own, many of them wouldn't, why do we want to let them run on forever.

Bush spun at times he did it more than he should. He was wrong at times. Fine. But Obama, is whistling past the whole argument. Straw men and red herring are not only breeding at an exponential rate they are much bigger than I ever imagined. At some point they blot out the truth. Truth is hard enough to see and usually it takes time to become clear. What he is doing is at least intellectually dishonest. Spinning this much is telling lies. I have made the some argument for people on the other side as well. They make good points at times and at others they lie.

Where did the Hawks Go?

I don't always think in complete little ideas, usually just unfinished chunks of bigger ones. After the Mubai attacks I was more inclined to a hawk type of solution. Trying to get my head around some type of simplified policy to deal with the whole thing i read this quote posted on Ace. Along list of attacks followed by:

'"So enough. No more empty talk. No more idle promises. No more happy ignorance, half measures, or appeasement-minded platitudes. The time for hard-nosed, uncompromising action hasn't merely come – it's been overdue by seven years. The voice of our brothers' blood cries out from the ground.'"

The quote come from World Net Daily: Enough is enough of radical Islam. Not much of a fan of the site after all the birth certificate pieces they have been running. It summed up most of the problems i have with the current foreign policies. Of course it also went way to far.

"Enough with the myths. Not everyone on earth is crying out for freedom. There are plenty of people who are happy in their misery, believing that their suffering is part and parcel of a correct religious system. Those people direct their anger outward, targeting unbelievers. We cannot simply knock off dictators and expect indoctrinated populations to rise to the liberal democratic challenge. The election of Hamas in the Gaza Strip is more a rule than an exception in the Islamic world."

What do we do then? Carpet bomb? No, people can't cry out for freedom if they have no idea what it is. The only exeption i might make is for North Korea. Coexistence between their religion and a free society can't be found if they can't define freedom and are not taught to read even their own religious texts let alone any examination of any real kind of history. That is complete nonsense. The election of Hamas? What where the other choices? Would they even know what one would look like? Compare it to the thoughts of one that has been on the ground In that part of the world.

"Enough with the lies. Stop telling us that Islam is a religion of peace. If it is, prove it through action."

I don't have the intellectual ammo to refute this but I don't believe that to be the whole truth. What I do know that that will make at the least a whole lot of very uncooperative people. It is not that black an white although it should be more clear than it is being portrayed. The piece was a nice ramble but would convince no one of his view. He is preaching to the choir. It is nice from time to time but is absolutely useless to me. I moved on it fell out of the news.

Then today there is this: Some Disparate Dots from Shrink Wrap via Bookworm Room and Watcher’s Council nominations. This is a much better and more useful way to look at the matter.

"The West chose, and President Bush could not or would not take issue with the prevailing wisdom, to treat Islamic terror as distinct from and in conflict with traditional Islam as practiced and supported by states throughout the Muslim world. This was always an argument that had more realpolitik to it than reality and it crucially caused the West to disarm in the intellectual and information aspects of the ideological struggle with Islamic radicalism. Traditional Islam is a target rich environment for an ideological struggle. The traditionalists are completely inept in dealing with ridicule yet they constantly insist on issuing a stream of ridiculous pronouncements."

Then very nicely slides into our side of the problem.

'Compounding our problems, the West has been in an extended ideological slide of its own. It is not just that our elites have become unmoored from the traditional anchors of our ethics and morality (religion, tradition) but they have adopted as their ideological underpinnings a new variant on the Marxist mantra. We have gone from "to each according to his need, from each according to his ability" to a more nuanced and contemporary "to each according to his desires, from each according to his willingness to donate (sometimes under coercion) his time, energy, and money."'

Religion in this case as religious philosophy not of articles of faith from my view. Wrapping it up:

"All these dots may only be related in my imagination yet they suggest that the Obama administration is going to elect not to fight ideologically against the Islamists but will try to manage terror using a policing model (with the more unsavory aspcets of the Bush approach, such as extraordinary rendition, simply being hidden and denied) which is guaranteed to never address the actual causes of Islamic terror."

A much more reasoned approach. It is as well a clear example of how the basic ideology of the in coming administration leads to all kinds of problems. Frankly it is dangerous. I found the Bush administration to walk a tight rope between the anti-war socialistic legalistic approach and a tempered war response. We all seem to ignore all of the Obama philosophy for so much useless minutia on every thing but. Why have we moved so far from the alternative to both takes?

From my hawkish prospective it is about time to ramp up the military, call those causing the problems out and be done with all this. Very over simplified. Yes military action should be the last resort but it should be all but off the table. What has been gained by the endless talking to to Iran? What happened to calling at least for regime change in places like Iran? What is the state of the broadcasts into Iran? What aggressive steps are we taking? What are the consequences for the bad actors on the world stage? None?

Give me a hawk, please! I want this over with. If in the end it takes three or four more Iraqs fine. I think we have a good idea on how to do it right now. I never understood exactly what was the opposition to nation building was. Is it hard? Yes. Can it fail? Yes. Weighing that against a failed state which is less dangerous? If we went down that road again, make threats and backed them up just once I don't know that that much military intervention would be necessary.

Islamic terror is the issue on the table. When we decide to stop sitting on the fence intervene into the internal affairs of countries we should as well fix the mistakes of WWII. Change the borders when needed. Kashmir, Chechnya, Africa and any number of places. Let us all just make the push for a sustainable peace. It gets complicated when you try to enforce your will on to a country. There are basic that can be used and still allow a country retain its own culture. Free speech, some mechanism to express the will of the people, the ability of the people to obtain information (history, news, ect.) and the ability for citizens to leave for another country if they so desire.

Obama and crew with a legalistic approach giving enemies of all stripes room to make gains if not achieve their goals. Bush just trying to hold the line with the Obama types on his back. Maybe just may be we need to take a look at a more hawkish approach and at least get this over with and at best build a lasting peace.

China and Olympic viewing

After all the security bs from them and their unclear long term international goals i wish to give them no support. It is about the games but if no one watches then maybe they won't be awarded to such countries in the future. When the they where awarded the protest should have been then and not the amount of eggshells that are being walked now.

I have heard that this is the first games outside the US the POTUS has attended. That should have been enough for Bush not to go. If not for that fact it was probably the right thing.

I am watching the opening ceremony just to see if there is any protests of any kind. There coverage seems a little soft on the China side. Proud people, big country, old tradition we get it. Just glaze over the horrific cultural reform of the 50's.

Part of the press was held on the runway a couple of days ago for 3 hrs. to such their equipment. I don't think they were smuggling gun?

Om the security side there is China's All Seeing Eye over at Rolling Stone. It is a little over the top but there is a lot of less reported news in there. My interruption is that the Olympics is more a front to finishing their, regaining control after the Tienanmen Square and making sure it doesn't happen again.

I will get into it more. Ping pong to world domination? Planned from the start?

Iran, a Symbol of our Weakness?

In the news more missile tests from Iran. My gut with them is always give them an ultimatum then attack.

I know we can't. One the oil prices, Congress's fault. Two the lack of military for a full scale invasion. The fault here? Bush 41 and Clinton for the cutting of defense and the illusion of the peace dividend. More acutely the slapstick handling of the current war by the administration.

Two questions. Do the rule mean anything? Iran is part of treaties banning the building of nuclear weapons so if they want nuclear power inspections will follow. There is also a ban on the types of missiles they tested. Is the U.N. going to enforce these things?

Why are we still trading with them? Its not just meds and food. Some of it seems to be shady. We sell to foreign company and they sell to Iran.

Europe negotiated with them for three, four years. So according to the U.N. and the pansy hippie wannabes here what do we do now? Sanctions? For how long? Then what? What do we do if they attack Israel, Iraq, or Afghanistan? What if they start blackmailing us? When if ever do we stand up take the the losses? The further down this road we get do we not stand to lose more and more when we take action?

More than two, but it all really gets under my skin. What we can do.

The broad solutions.
Have A coherent PR Front, thee US at all levels looks like a bunch of winy children.
Energy independence, drill you morons! Allow oil shale and coal liquification, again you freak 'n morons! Yes yes may not be a long term solution but is there another short term one?
Get us out of debt, stop spending money, fix social security ect. Bulk up the military.
The broad solution are hard but help solve many problems.

Iran specifics.
Start with a new stricter sanctions. US companies can sell food and medicine to them only. Let them spend all their time farming just to feed themselves. The President should publicly call out all the companies that aren't following the spirit of this and prosecute those not following the letter of the law.

What we should have been all along is a radio free Europe model on steroids. Media Free Middle East. On the radio, 2-3 stations of music from Europe ans US, one talk from Us one from Europe. Over the air tv, BBC news , CNN International, A TV Land type of station, history international and a History type channel focused on modern marvel type shows and middle east recent history. Honestly cover the overthrow of the Shaw, hostages crisis and the terrorist bombings. From what i can tell there is a lot of recent history that the young just have no clue about.

Take good ides where you can find them.

Children of Jihad at Book TV

and a BCC interview




Good Ideas are out there, you just have to look.

V Is for Victory not Peace, you Moron!

As most people i don't pay real close attention to much. So once again TV mutes i look up and see genocide in the closed captioning on vh1. Got my attention, unmuted oh Sheryl Crow "Out of our Heads" A remake? i am Not Going to spend the time. Modern day Peace nick. Fine more power to you. Awe People waving two finger peace sigh. Carter, RFK, Fergi, Michel More, Trump?, Other i recognize their names elude me, Truman, Hendrix, Code pink chick, McCartney,Ring, pres of Iran, Arafat, Bush ( image followed by the blood on your hands line). i omitting some. Nice mixing the old footage with the new. Nice trick link it back to Vietnam.

More signs John Lennon, Santana, Yelson, Elvis, Nixon(is that what he was doing i never got it), Churchill, Churchill Fucking Churchill (half way down).

V For Victory You Flaming Moron!

The whole Propaganda video from MTV unfortunately.

• MTV
• Music Videos
• MTV Shows
• Entertainment News

Truman For that matter to. One distortion of history I will let slide, it's a popular image of Truman i Didn't really catch it fine. Truman and Churchill. You can not distort history in this way. People are uneducated and miss informed enough. This isn't open for interpretation.

1945 WWII V for Victory Not Peace !

Churchill couldn't get elected as a dog catch now. He'd be labeled a warmonger and not just for his stance on Hitler. IT May be that it was hijacked in the 60's and 70's but in 1945 it meant Victory ! Not huge every one( even those dripping in blood) and it will be fine.

No It Meant Kill or capture, take and hold territory, impose marshal law Do What It takes to Achieve VICTORY!

We should take back this symbol then her video will mean something very different. Of course it would distort The meaning of the other people giving the V for peace.

Then Kissinger, They call him a warmonger to, I thing hes just doing a poor job of pointing. Putin Cry? laugh? Oh He's really for peace and love. Fonda?
Miss Crow Was a Teacher thankfully of music, unfortunately not to for from hear. I don't know which is better she did it all on purpose or is just the much of a Flaming Moronic Lemming that doesn't know Any Fucking History!

I like The Music. The video is PROPAGANDA. I guess its nice that MTV networks lifted the band on political advertising.

V FOR VICTORY

GOP to Lose in a Landslide, No Win, No Wait

I as most I suspect are getting very tired of the campaigning. There seems to be this slow walk of broad issues, minor tweaks to positions, personal changes, and VP speculation. Are we waiting til the summer is over so more people are paying attention. Can we get on with it. Just move the election to to August 5.

I hear Dems say over and over the people are behind them and they will win in a landslide. Really? Republicans are starting to do the same thing. Dems point to the special elections. Republicans ran against conservative Dems with very similar views and they tried to link them to Obama. Obama at the time wasn't the head of the party and most of the party wasn't exactly in lock step with him and won't be going forward. Those election just show the stupidity of those local parts of the Republican party. These races have nothing to do with the overall mood of the country or the Presidential race.

My prediction is no prediction now. Some feel that it is Obama's to lose. Ah No. I am in the camp that it's McCain's not to lose, I think. If people come to the conclusion that they are both completely "full of it", lack vision and vote 1st 3rd i don't think anyone can predict ( thats how I'm voting). The more important question is have people really looked at socialism and decided its okay. If thats the case McCain is done, go home now and save yourself the stress.

Now if people haven't looked hard at socialism and realized how socialist at his core Obama is, it's McCain's to not loose. If Obama says that McCain is Bush's 3rd term then call him a socialist or Marxist. It is just as true. Put a big Obama '08 sign an your bus with the hammer and sickle behind it. Explain what that symbol means , explain the philosophies, compare what he had said to Marx, Stalin, and the like. Point to history and what it has lead to. Take the gloves off and hit him.

As a matter of looking at these things you can never underestimate the stupidity of people and the ability to ignore facts in favor of the way they want the world to work, what the people around them think, or just plane charisma.

Who is going to win? It's McCain's to not lose. It really makes little difference. If you want a Second American Revolution sooner vote Obama, a little later McCain, If you want to head it off vote for the 1st 3rd party on the ballot.

Ohio and NAFTA

I can't speak to the facts here but i have no reason not to accept them. The Dems have been making an argument, cheered on by the some people in Ohio that NAFTA is the cause of all their problems. As they always do they have an answer, another useless and ridiculous one. The facts that i accept. the decline in the manufacturing losses in Ohio started in the early 80's, before Bush, before Clinton and before NAFTA. Ohio has the fifth highest tax rate in the US and has gotten there on a pretty steep incline.

Given that, NAFTA is not to blame. It is the fault of the people in Ohio and little can be done on the federal level to change that. The second complaint is the large number of foreclosures. That in the end is on the heads of the individuals. they signed the papers, not the sate or fed. There may have been some hard sell or a little misdirection but little to no illegal acts and in no way wide spread.

The solutions, well i am unclear exactly what they are but we have to include global warming and pollution as part of the fix. What does that have to job and housing loss in Ohio?

So media ( i am really starting to hate that term) have spent how many days on this? Was it a complete waste of time? Candidates for the President of the United States are having an argument over an issue, you have to cover it even if it is completely ridiculous. How many silly little tiffs have there been? The picture. The plagiarism charge.

These things are not only pointless and distracting they are they slowly over time warping our perception of issues, of what's important and, the worst reality.

Our basic Bush problem and the long term fallout.

The man can't make solid decisions. That doesn't mean that they are always wrong. I agree with going into Iraq and some of the philosophy behind it, that is however it on Iraq. Why can't he? Its a mixed bag, exactly what mix, who knows. He isn't the sharpest knife in the shed. Yes, i know. It is hard separate that from management style or political calculation.

Organization, there are all these appointments that have to be made. He put in the person that fit, giving no thought to how those appointments fit together or how they fit into his administration. Factions proliferated much more than had been seen before. And as rarely seen before a mass of rampant activism kept the political divide wide open cutting off most ideas in the middle. One hopes a president has some grace under fire. In this case i suspect it had a much bigger role than it should.

The worst sin is having a leadership style of an absentee father. Delegation is a mark of a good leader, but waking away and not taking at least a passing glance back is not. Appointment of Bremer comes to mind. A leader must listen, build consensus and on a rare occasion take someone out to the wood shed. His leadership is often marked by " this faction is right you are wrong , now go away and get it done". This isn't rare wood shed use.

Our basic problem is his leadership of us, not the administration. We could recover if he just could not run the administration. The president and congress for that matter is meant to lead the people . You make decisions, explain why, listen to concerns and address them. Really the decisions should be made last, I'll take what i can get. Oh there is the wood shed to. Currently it is let someone else make the decisions, give a half explanation if any one has questions. If there are any more questions, restate and take them to the wood shed and beat them with the rolled up statement. Weak, Very Weak.

The US attorneys is one of those issues. Did he really make the decision, or did trust what others told him? Very little competent explanation has been given. Let the beating of rolled up paper begin. Just before the beginning of the war he did better with the people, internally it was an unholy nightmare. They explained, made a decision(rightly in my book), listen to some concerns and tried to address them. Concerns over troop numbers might have been pushed aside if latter mistakes had been avoided. The WMD stuff was a mistake. The rolled up paper was irrelevant. First it was wrong and leaning on the wall, several very nice bats. UN resolutions. Shootings in the no-fly zones. Oil for food. torture. There were even some around the corner we haven't talked about. Mainly Pressing our win in the cold war to stabilize the world and fix past mistakes.

It is idiotic to continue to dodge an issue in the light of facts, stand up, accept them and make a strong argument for your position. The decision may be right but you can't defend an idiot using his arguments. Conservatives tried for far to long not realizing that in this case no one listens to anyone except the idiot. Liberals have, i think, unbeknown to them created a useful idiot. Ask him a question and he starts waving increasingly useless rolled up papers around. Que the rest of the idiots and the power hungry from both sides and all levels. On the left idiots calling for war crimes and the power hungry calling for impeachment and promising the moon. On the right the idiots blaming our problems on gays and defending Bush and the power hungry over playing the fear card, gay marriage and oh some of that moon looks good. What?

In the chaos the argument finally shifted. Is been shifting for some time due to public apathy, continued pointless bickering, less transparency and an increasingly complex government and world. Pointing at the useful idiot in the White House and supposed helpless people being hurt by him the left was able to move the argument. Up until recently they just wanted to help a little more. A little has grown to a lot and is going from helping to taking care of. What do we call that, socialism. Call it what it is. It may not technically be but if the government is signing all the check, close enough. What happened to individualism and some personal responsibility. Massive hand outs didn't get us through WWII, Great Depression, Revolutionary War, the westward expansion and the cold war. Liberalism is fine but socialism is not well American.

Long term. Those that have become at lest somewhat politically aware after the 91 gulf war really started to pay attention after 9/11. What did they see. The idiot on one side the other promising the moon. This is were the last parts of an article from David Frum picks up. Just because he was part of the administration doesn't make him wrong. I will confess it got me thinking about all this. There was a time not that long ago that i could agree with parts of both sides, hopefully i won't be calling it the good old days. What really scares me is most in this group may not know any different and no one is talking core philosophy any more. Their idea of American politics are being set now, it can be changed down the road but it won't be easy. I am sicken by the though of a liberal vs leftist far far more than liberal vs conservative for the next 30 or 50 yrs or longer.

Heathcare and Torture

I am aways looking for new pieces of info and different arguments and ways of looking and explaining issues. i came across two tonight.

First the last half of Anderson Cooper, i just caught the last few minutes. They all seemed to agree that Universal heath care is a must. i can not disagree more, but that's me. The point they make is this: giving everyone heath care is the easy part. the hard part will be keeping and getting prices down. if they aren't it could drive us into an unbelievable debt. Ok the second part is the part every body seems to just overlook. Why can't we get the prices down first and see where we are before giving everyone heath care. You could say that if the government provides all or most health care they could drive prices down(ignoring over head and past track record) or set prices( socialism and loss of research) . get prices under control first please it makes sense.

Second a daily show. Mixed in with a little torture humor a hint of a point. Bush is a weak idiot, not the point. They have dodged issues over and over were they didn't need to and should NOT HAVE. First in light of some history I wasn't aware of as fact, didn't just come from him, we apparently have called water boarding torture after WWII. So it is idiotic to continue to dodge this issue(always has), stand up and say it is. Then make two points. The one that is mentioned in passing by people that are pretty conservative and ignored by the left are the Germans out of uniform spying that were executed during WWII with little fan fair. The second is that these people are not in a uniform and are clearly not civilians. So not covered by Geneva or anything else I can think of. It is the one exception to most if not all the rules. You can argue morals all day long but not legality.

So I will call it torture, all be it the most mild thing i would call torture, but it doesn't matter.

Opinionated Iraq Backstory

Anyone today trying to explain their view of political and social philosophy needs to talk about Iraq. My view may not differ much from a very few pundits out there but as said etc. I am not a fan of beating a dead horses but this is worth the read for some points that are important beyond Iraq even if they aren't new.

First 1991, yes i know been there done that. Two, three points. There were good reasons and more to the point it was sold well and fairly easily accepted world wide. There shouldn't need to be a sales job for these sort of things, it should be pretty apparent. Now yes i except that oil in this region does probable play a role. However Rwanda and Bosnia are not exact parallels to Iraq and its not all oil all the time. The thing that loomed large and are at the root of most of the problems with the use of military in foreign policy then and now, Southeast Asia. The mentality of no civilian or military causalities at, not all costs but at high costs. The push to get it done and get out lead to two failures. We didn't go to Baghdad and put a bullet in Hussein's head, i can under stand the reasons, i just do not agree.
Even with that there was a chance. The Kurds, with the Iraq's army out of the picture i think could have taken over. Now there would have been problems, the reprisals against those in the regime, well not pretty. The other probable fall out would have been with Turkey. The Kurd take over didn't happen. From what i know after the war the short time we were there the Iraqi's asked to use their helicopters to move wounded. We let them and they dropped gas on the Kurds. I at the point the decision was made not to help them with our military i agree, but maybe we shouldn't have encouraged them.
From this it seems that the US has gotten a little gun shy and is under monumental pressure not to hurt civilian and get troops home. I don't want to hurt civilians and want the troops home don't get me wrong. It however leads to mistakes and stupid ones at that. Now may be if Bush 41 has told the generals to do all they to help the Kurd but not to actively engage in the fighting someone would have thought what could helicopter be used for. Not some sort of evil plan pressure and stupidity.
In the interim the Iraqis were playing games. personally after the first weapons lock on our planes, one warning then a bombing campaign then a re-invasion. no games.
The current little war. I had high hopes that it would be a restoration of American power. We had good reasons to use our military, it seemed we were going to be bold about it and do what we thought needed to be done. My thinking is that you take Iraq take over quickly, crush the military and that day tell countries like Iran, Syria and North Korea we will talk but if your going to play game, support terrorist and not allow basic human rights we have a problem and now will do something about it. I know China and others we didn't want to rattle to much would need a little calming for the time but very worth it. Show some teeth and use them when necessary. I had high hopes.
I think there was a push to get things done and create some uber reason to go into Iraq. I didn't think we needed that. They were playing game with the US plane, UN weapons inspectors and there were a couple of UN resolutions. End of Story. So the administration some how let it degenerate into "he lied". How many years will it be before it stops, please someone make it stop, the rabbits the rabbits i can't get away...please .. Sorry couldn't help it. So they couldn't find someone that might have some PR experience or may be Bush should have just stood up and said we were wrong, it happens, there are still good reasons and moved the story forward and back on point. An unbelievable opportunity post cold war to set some order, gone just gone.
In the beginning of the war it seemed that what the administration was telling us made a certain amount of sense. i was very obviously fooled. the screaming of Liar in my ears didn't help and i didn't want to listen to anything else those screaming were saying. It was a useless and misguided charge. If I close my eyes, ask someone to hold up some fingers and tell me how many then my best information is what I'm told if i repeat what they said are you going to scream liar at me forever, sorry rabbits. I Don't know why the administration was saying what they were.
Moving on i hate to say stupidity should be criminal but I am very tempted. The larger point, and it applies to the absolutely disguising, in the I'm going to be sick and in the intellectual sense, 911 truthers. if you are one take a deep breath and think. I had herd this form someone at Reason or Popular Science say something to this effect: NEVER attribute to conspiracy what you can explained by incompetence. I would also say by stupidity, apathy, target fixation and a lesser extent ignorance. think. Like I said I don't think there was some sort of evil plan, call it what you like, but stupidity, criminal, tempting
This is from PBS. I don't trust them much but Nova and Frontline seem to do a good job. I have some very small problems with this, good on the whole.
I could embed it from another source but i would like to do it from the original. Its not as glamorous but here it is.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/yeariniraq/
To be continued in the next post.