My friend Lana sent me this. Don't know who Inland is. A blogger I suppose. But I thought it interesting especially since folks have sent me the dry-drunk and brain-disease theories before. Here's a new take on why Bush sounds like an idiot most of the time. Take it for what it's worth.
"Why Bush Can't Talk:
It's not the drugs, and it's not senility.
by Inland
Aug 24, 2006
Bush's press conferences and unscripted remarks are so painfully bad, it spurs the question: what is his PROBLEM?
People have remarked that he wasn't that way when he was the Governor of Texas, and therefore theorize that he has deteriorated due to premature senility or a lifetime of drug use.
I think the reason George Bush stumbles, ends sentences midway through to jump to another thought, rattles off non-sequiturs, and makes up words, is that George Bush is breaking under the strain of lying almost all the time about almost everything.
It's because lying is hard work, and he's trying to hold several different false scenarios in his head while not blurting out what he's really being told behind closed doors.
Bush looks like a person stumbling over the easiest things, but in fact, he's not a person unable to relate simple facts. He's a person trying hard to NOT relate simple facts. He's a person trying to avoid the pitfalls of saying what's on his mind, and trying to keep his stories straight.
As I lawyer, I see people trying to construct false scenarios all the time. But you don't remember lies the way you remember truth. It's easier to remember how fast you were driving than it is to remember the exact lie you told the police officer about how fast you were driving. People who lie have to put a lot of energy into keeping their lies consistent with each other and, well, consistent with undeniable facts.
My grand theory is that Bush's entire presidency, from the beginnings of his campaign until now, is based on his taking public stances that at least obscure goals and positions shared secretly. He and his Roves have always accepted that the majority of the country wouldn't want him if they knew the promises he made to the right-wing Christians and the rich, if they knew the actual effect of his tax cuts, if they knew the evidence behind environmental damage, etc. Now he's hiding the entire foreign policy fiasco: whom he is holding incognito, whom he's spying upon, what he knew before 9/11, and many other secrets.
If you had so much to hide, you too would only use canned speeches, carefully vetted by speechwriters who don't know the real story anyway, to keep it all straight, and you would stumble and hem and haw in all other circumstances.
Which explains why his problem wasn't so evident as Texas Governor. Bush's brand of crony capitalism and piestic christianism went down well in Austin, at least for a governor with no real constitutional authority: Bush only had to repackage himself for the national race, essentially submerge his real persona and his real ideas and his real goals and pretend to a compassionate, not-asshole conservativism.
You know how they tell you, on a date, just to be yourself? And how you think, no, I don't want her to meet that guy just yet? Bush and Rove have been saying that for six years, and Bush has been schizo, trying to send signals and winks and nods to his fundamentalist Christians and send money to his corporate sponsors while slinging a load of bull at the nation. Add to that all the bodies he has to keep buried, and you've got a guy who is in a state of flop sweat every time he has to open his mouth in public.
Bush isn't senile or drug addled. He's a lying asshole. And it's hard work. Only truly gifted and intelligent sociopaths like Rove and Cheney can rattle it off.
Bush can't."
Thursday, August 31, 2006
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Hypocrites
Ted Stevens, that conservative believer in smaller government, also known as the king of pork has been caught with his pants down. Check this out, from Howard Dean:
"Hundreds of billions of tax dollars go to private contractors every year -- a lot of it needless pork barrel spending. There's a bill to create a public database of every federal contract, but a Senator who famously fought for a "bridge to nowhere" won't let it come up for a vote. Demand accountability now and we'll deliver your message to Republican Sen. Ted Stevens.
With your help, we can make real change. Please join me by signing this petition:
http://www.democrats.org/page/petition/publicaccount/fturab
Thanks!"
It's our money, but he doesn't want us to know where it's going. Sounds fair.
"Hundreds of billions of tax dollars go to private contractors every year -- a lot of it needless pork barrel spending. There's a bill to create a public database of every federal contract, but a Senator who famously fought for a "bridge to nowhere" won't let it come up for a vote. Demand accountability now and we'll deliver your message to Republican Sen. Ted Stevens.
With your help, we can make real change. Please join me by signing this petition:
http://www.democrats.org/page/petition/publicaccount/fturab
Thanks!"
It's our money, but he doesn't want us to know where it's going. Sounds fair.
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Pluto and the Open Mind
This post harkens back to and is related in spirit to the Sunday post about the tyranny of moral certainty. Today it was announced that astronomers voted to declare the Sun has 8 planets, an untold number of dwarf planets and an other category, which includes asteroids and comets. Pluto, the object formerly known as a planet, is now a dwarf planet (perhaps it prefers to be called "little planet"). And that is how it should be.
How is this related to the earlier post? It makes my point that new data and evidence lead to new understandings, and that science is not about tradition, history or sentimentality. It is about reason. It has long since made sense to include Pluto with the other planets as it is more and more obvious that it more like the other small icy objects of the Kuiper belt than the 8 main planets. All this declaration (which really changes nothing important) does is recognize that fact and that is why it's significant. Pluto was made a planet because astronomy in 1930 didn't know any better. Now we do, and so astronomers have made the correction, and that should lead to a better understanding of the solar system in the future.
The sentimentality of the original planetary definition (trying to preserve Pluto's place as a planet proper) made little sense and was roundly rejected by the main body of the group. Bravo, and a good object lesson to the general public about scientific integrity.
How is this related to the earlier post? It makes my point that new data and evidence lead to new understandings, and that science is not about tradition, history or sentimentality. It is about reason. It has long since made sense to include Pluto with the other planets as it is more and more obvious that it more like the other small icy objects of the Kuiper belt than the 8 main planets. All this declaration (which really changes nothing important) does is recognize that fact and that is why it's significant. Pluto was made a planet because astronomy in 1930 didn't know any better. Now we do, and so astronomers have made the correction, and that should lead to a better understanding of the solar system in the future.
The sentimentality of the original planetary definition (trying to preserve Pluto's place as a planet proper) made little sense and was roundly rejected by the main body of the group. Bravo, and a good object lesson to the general public about scientific integrity.
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
War on Trial
Army Lt. Ehren Watada refused to deploy to Iraq with his Striker brigade recently, because, he told his superiors, the war is illegal and he had a duty to refuse to serve. He offered to go to Afghanistan, but was refused the compromise. Why? The Army argues that soldiers don't get to make that determination and if they did, Army discipline would unravel. He is going through an Article 32 hearing now, as an Army judge has to decide whether Watada should go to trial in a Court Martial.
If it does go to trial, Watada and his defense intend to put the war itself on trial. Go here for more info.
If it does go to trial, Watada and his defense intend to put the war itself on trial. Go here for more info.
Sunday, August 20, 2006
The Tyranny of Moral Certainty
It is distressing to me that I even have to write this.
The title of this post is self evident. Dogmatic, ideological loyalty must lead to tyranny. Either you are an adherent or an apostate. And the apostate inevitably becomes seen as evil or in league with it.
And yet many Americans have been seduced by the siren song of "moral certainty," as the neo-cons have labeled it. Good vs. Evil. We are good. Our enemies, evil. Everything we do is good, by definition. Everything they do is evil, by definition. That is why we can torture people, or at least hold them indefinitely without charge in maddeningly cruel solitary confinement. We are good and they are evil. We are protecting the good by any means necessary. And if you question this, you are abetting evil and standing against good. By definition.
That's the problem. Contradictory facts from the real world have no place to go if the mind is closed and the question already settled. Reason based on rational synthesis of the facts has no place. Minds cannot change if they are closed. Nor can they even understand the alternative way of thinking. Dogmatists believe in big unchangeable truths and the little truths that every day life reveals therefore have to fall in line to support the big idea already affirmed. The Earth is the center of the universe. Period. Never mind that evidence from new technology (telescopes) and mountains of data from observation required more and more tortured explanations to make the two fit. Some of these were admittedly pretty remarkable in their cleverness. But those who we free from the big truth were able to come up with a much simpler explanation (the Earth and other planets revolve around the Sun). One proponent, Galileo Galilei was called an agent of the devil for this heresy and tortured into recanting.
Even to this day, people reject ideas only because they conflict with a big truth. Public radio quoted a man as saying, "science is about facts, and evolution is only a theory, so it should not be taught as a fact." His mind can't even understand the alternative way of thinking. Science isn't about facts. Science rejects the idea of Dogma and Big Truth. Instead it focuses an open, sometimes called skeptical, mind on the little facts, tries to come up with a explanation that fits the facts best, and then makes predictions that can be tested and either confirmed or denied. Further, these test must be repeatable. So the tester has to reveal his methodology as well as the resultant data so that others can scrutinize it and evaluate it. That way, flaws can be found and corrections suggested. Scientific theories therefore are not written in stone, but are simply the best explanation given what we know at the moment. If new technologies bring about new discoveries and the new data doesn't fit the old explanation, scientists propose new theories that fit both the old and new data. Newtonian physics worked great for it's time, but as astronomy and physics revealed new data about the very large and massive parts of our universe that defied Newtonian predictions, it was clear his mechanics had limitations. Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, superseded Newton because it explained the old AND the new data better than Newton's theory. That doesn't mean Newton was wrong. NASA used Newtonian physics to make all the calculations necessary to send Apollo astronauts to the moon and back. It just didn't work on the truly massive scales we ecountered after Newton's death.
The idea is that nothing in science is the final word. You don't have to believe in science. You can demand and get an explanation for any scientific theory. And you must remain open to new data and be ready to accept new explanations that explain things better. Despite what the dogmatist say, there is no alternative scientific theory to evolution. In fact, the new discoveries in genetics are fully consistent with Darwin's ideas. Intelligent Design is merely dogma dressed in pseudo science. It is merely an untestable assertion and therefore is not science.
This is basic. Every student should understand this. The fact that they don't is an indictment of our educational system. Science is not magic. It is not the proclamation of someone called a scientist. It is simply a system of observation, prediction and repeatable testing. It must convince the open minded. Democracy requires that our political discourse follow those same ideals. Truth needs to come from the bottom up and not from on high. Hitler was morally certain. So was Stalin and Mao and Franco and Mussolini. That is the way of the tyrant. A democrat has to be willing to adapt to the truth as it is revealed to his or her open mind.
So questioning policy rationales cannot be evil. Good rationales must have good evidence behind them and should convince the open mind. Indeed, questioning is exactly how we find the weak rationales and root them out. Moral certainty is an illusion and worse, it can only lead to tryrany, which I would argue to your open mind, is bad.
The title of this post is self evident. Dogmatic, ideological loyalty must lead to tyranny. Either you are an adherent or an apostate. And the apostate inevitably becomes seen as evil or in league with it.
And yet many Americans have been seduced by the siren song of "moral certainty," as the neo-cons have labeled it. Good vs. Evil. We are good. Our enemies, evil. Everything we do is good, by definition. Everything they do is evil, by definition. That is why we can torture people, or at least hold them indefinitely without charge in maddeningly cruel solitary confinement. We are good and they are evil. We are protecting the good by any means necessary. And if you question this, you are abetting evil and standing against good. By definition.
That's the problem. Contradictory facts from the real world have no place to go if the mind is closed and the question already settled. Reason based on rational synthesis of the facts has no place. Minds cannot change if they are closed. Nor can they even understand the alternative way of thinking. Dogmatists believe in big unchangeable truths and the little truths that every day life reveals therefore have to fall in line to support the big idea already affirmed. The Earth is the center of the universe. Period. Never mind that evidence from new technology (telescopes) and mountains of data from observation required more and more tortured explanations to make the two fit. Some of these were admittedly pretty remarkable in their cleverness. But those who we free from the big truth were able to come up with a much simpler explanation (the Earth and other planets revolve around the Sun). One proponent, Galileo Galilei was called an agent of the devil for this heresy and tortured into recanting.
Even to this day, people reject ideas only because they conflict with a big truth. Public radio quoted a man as saying, "science is about facts, and evolution is only a theory, so it should not be taught as a fact." His mind can't even understand the alternative way of thinking. Science isn't about facts. Science rejects the idea of Dogma and Big Truth. Instead it focuses an open, sometimes called skeptical, mind on the little facts, tries to come up with a explanation that fits the facts best, and then makes predictions that can be tested and either confirmed or denied. Further, these test must be repeatable. So the tester has to reveal his methodology as well as the resultant data so that others can scrutinize it and evaluate it. That way, flaws can be found and corrections suggested. Scientific theories therefore are not written in stone, but are simply the best explanation given what we know at the moment. If new technologies bring about new discoveries and the new data doesn't fit the old explanation, scientists propose new theories that fit both the old and new data. Newtonian physics worked great for it's time, but as astronomy and physics revealed new data about the very large and massive parts of our universe that defied Newtonian predictions, it was clear his mechanics had limitations. Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, superseded Newton because it explained the old AND the new data better than Newton's theory. That doesn't mean Newton was wrong. NASA used Newtonian physics to make all the calculations necessary to send Apollo astronauts to the moon and back. It just didn't work on the truly massive scales we ecountered after Newton's death.
The idea is that nothing in science is the final word. You don't have to believe in science. You can demand and get an explanation for any scientific theory. And you must remain open to new data and be ready to accept new explanations that explain things better. Despite what the dogmatist say, there is no alternative scientific theory to evolution. In fact, the new discoveries in genetics are fully consistent with Darwin's ideas. Intelligent Design is merely dogma dressed in pseudo science. It is merely an untestable assertion and therefore is not science.
This is basic. Every student should understand this. The fact that they don't is an indictment of our educational system. Science is not magic. It is not the proclamation of someone called a scientist. It is simply a system of observation, prediction and repeatable testing. It must convince the open minded. Democracy requires that our political discourse follow those same ideals. Truth needs to come from the bottom up and not from on high. Hitler was morally certain. So was Stalin and Mao and Franco and Mussolini. That is the way of the tyrant. A democrat has to be willing to adapt to the truth as it is revealed to his or her open mind.
So questioning policy rationales cannot be evil. Good rationales must have good evidence behind them and should convince the open mind. Indeed, questioning is exactly how we find the weak rationales and root them out. Moral certainty is an illusion and worse, it can only lead to tryrany, which I would argue to your open mind, is bad.
Thursday, August 17, 2006
More Good News from Iraq
Well, the Austin Illiterate Spaceman probably won't print my letter to the editor because it prefers to give space to regurgitated, uninformed drivel like the letters I responded to. At least it's published here, where hundreds, nay, thousands, will never see it.
More good news from Iraq that you won't hear on the mainstream media. The sectarian violence that has wracked that poor country since February has created 180,000 internal refugees. That's people forced from their home inside their own country. 20,000 registered in the last two weeks of July alone. Mixed areas are being homogenized in what one could imagine is the prelude to a partitioning of Iraq. Lucky the Coalition is there to provide stability, huh? We can't leave or there will be chaos, just like what is happening now. Brilliant logic. We are powerless, but we can't admit that. We're like a pathetic semi-functioning addict in that regard.
I want America back! Don't you?
More good news from Iraq that you won't hear on the mainstream media. The sectarian violence that has wracked that poor country since February has created 180,000 internal refugees. That's people forced from their home inside their own country. 20,000 registered in the last two weeks of July alone. Mixed areas are being homogenized in what one could imagine is the prelude to a partitioning of Iraq. Lucky the Coalition is there to provide stability, huh? We can't leave or there will be chaos, just like what is happening now. Brilliant logic. We are powerless, but we can't admit that. We're like a pathetic semi-functioning addict in that regard.
I want America back! Don't you?
Tuesday, August 15, 2006
My letter to the Austin American-Statesman
Here is the text of my letter to the Statesman in response to letters decrying Lieberman's defeat, dissent being unpatriotic, and Cheney claiming Connecticut's decision helped Al Quaeda:
Patriotism is Dissent
Re: Kevin Birdsell's and Rick Hill's letters to the editor, Tuesday, August 15, I thought Dick Cheney's comments about Ned Lamont's defeat of Joe Lieberman ties them together nicely. To paraphrase, Cheney said that by defeating Lieberman, Connecticut voters helped Al Quaeda. It is that kind of outrageous charge that folks who oppose the war object to. It is nonsense and polls show more and more Americans-Democrat, Republican and Independent-are seeing it as such, Mr. Birdsell. (By the way, a fact, by definition, is not arguable.)
Joe Lieberman wasn't rejected by his party because he was strong on defense as Mr. Hill says. He was rejected because he supported a war of adventure against a country that had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks, and continued to support it long after it was irreparably botched. The US military presence has long been irrelevant to how things will turn out in Iraq. The 300 bodies that show up daily in Baghdad morgues aren't victims of insurgents. They are victims of sectarian assassinations our military is powerless to stop. The situation there is in Iraqi hands now and we are pretty much irrelevant.
That's why we want the troops home as soon as possible. They're presence can no longer help matters and only makes them targets. Their absence won't fundamentally change the balance of power there, where militias are acting with impunity even now.
Instead of supporting the Iraqi adventure, Joe should have stood with other Democrats who pointed out we should finish the job in Afghanistan. You know, the place where the actual perpetrators of 9/11 were sheltered. Maybe if we had focus our efforts on wiping out Al Quaeda and the Taliban, Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar would be dead or captured, and then we could have disarmed the warlords and controlled the opium trade. Instead, those criminals are strangling that poor country.
The Iraq war, far from making us safer, is a recruitment poster, swelling the ranks of radicalized young Muslims who want to kill us. Democrats wanted their leaders to be the loyal Opposition. Instead, Joe was a blind follower. That's why he was defeated. That democracy in action. McGovern has nothing to do with it, Republican propaganda aside.
We used to be the nation the world looked to for unbridled, even cockeyed, optimism. This administration and Congress has made us purveyors of the fear and smear propaganda campaign. Patriots should stand in opposition, remove these scoundrels, and get ready for the long hard work necessary to repair the damage they have done.
Here's the text of the letters I responded to:
The Fall of the Democrats
When U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman lost the Connecticut primary, the Democratic Party became the official anti-war party. The last time it wore this mantle, George McGovern was soundly defeated by President Nixon in the 1972 election.
A Democrat who supported a strong defense, Lieberman could stand shoulder-to-shoulder with other great Democrats such as Hubert Humphrey and Ed Muskie. Now after 30 years of public service, Lieberman has been kicked to the curb and the party has been taken over by the MoveOn.org fringe. President Lyndon B. Johnson and Sam Rayburn would roll over in their graves if they could see what has happened to this once-proud party.
RICK HILL
Buda
Free speech goes both ways
I am amazed when I hear on the radio, watch on television and read in the American-Statesman liberals and people who oppose this war using the unpatriotic card.
I did not realize exercising First Amendment rights is a one-way street. Somehow it is OK to call this president a liar, racist, war-monger, etc. But if a Republican dares to question their facts, opinions, etc., well, we must be questioning their patriotism.
If someone wants to question patriotism, they have every right to do that, too.
Quit crying about your patriotism being questioned, because that person has the same rights that you do to call President Bush a liar, racist and war-monger.
KEVIN BIRDSELL
Hutto
Patriotism is Dissent
Re: Kevin Birdsell's and Rick Hill's letters to the editor, Tuesday, August 15, I thought Dick Cheney's comments about Ned Lamont's defeat of Joe Lieberman ties them together nicely. To paraphrase, Cheney said that by defeating Lieberman, Connecticut voters helped Al Quaeda. It is that kind of outrageous charge that folks who oppose the war object to. It is nonsense and polls show more and more Americans-Democrat, Republican and Independent-are seeing it as such, Mr. Birdsell. (By the way, a fact, by definition, is not arguable.)
Joe Lieberman wasn't rejected by his party because he was strong on defense as Mr. Hill says. He was rejected because he supported a war of adventure against a country that had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks, and continued to support it long after it was irreparably botched. The US military presence has long been irrelevant to how things will turn out in Iraq. The 300 bodies that show up daily in Baghdad morgues aren't victims of insurgents. They are victims of sectarian assassinations our military is powerless to stop. The situation there is in Iraqi hands now and we are pretty much irrelevant.
That's why we want the troops home as soon as possible. They're presence can no longer help matters and only makes them targets. Their absence won't fundamentally change the balance of power there, where militias are acting with impunity even now.
Instead of supporting the Iraqi adventure, Joe should have stood with other Democrats who pointed out we should finish the job in Afghanistan. You know, the place where the actual perpetrators of 9/11 were sheltered. Maybe if we had focus our efforts on wiping out Al Quaeda and the Taliban, Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar would be dead or captured, and then we could have disarmed the warlords and controlled the opium trade. Instead, those criminals are strangling that poor country.
The Iraq war, far from making us safer, is a recruitment poster, swelling the ranks of radicalized young Muslims who want to kill us. Democrats wanted their leaders to be the loyal Opposition. Instead, Joe was a blind follower. That's why he was defeated. That democracy in action. McGovern has nothing to do with it, Republican propaganda aside.
We used to be the nation the world looked to for unbridled, even cockeyed, optimism. This administration and Congress has made us purveyors of the fear and smear propaganda campaign. Patriots should stand in opposition, remove these scoundrels, and get ready for the long hard work necessary to repair the damage they have done.
Here's the text of the letters I responded to:
The Fall of the Democrats
When U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman lost the Connecticut primary, the Democratic Party became the official anti-war party. The last time it wore this mantle, George McGovern was soundly defeated by President Nixon in the 1972 election.
A Democrat who supported a strong defense, Lieberman could stand shoulder-to-shoulder with other great Democrats such as Hubert Humphrey and Ed Muskie. Now after 30 years of public service, Lieberman has been kicked to the curb and the party has been taken over by the MoveOn.org fringe. President Lyndon B. Johnson and Sam Rayburn would roll over in their graves if they could see what has happened to this once-proud party.
RICK HILL
Buda
Free speech goes both ways
I am amazed when I hear on the radio, watch on television and read in the American-Statesman liberals and people who oppose this war using the unpatriotic card.
I did not realize exercising First Amendment rights is a one-way street. Somehow it is OK to call this president a liar, racist, war-monger, etc. But if a Republican dares to question their facts, opinions, etc., well, we must be questioning their patriotism.
If someone wants to question patriotism, they have every right to do that, too.
Quit crying about your patriotism being questioned, because that person has the same rights that you do to call President Bush a liar, racist and war-monger.
KEVIN BIRDSELL
Hutto
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
Post Lieberman-Lamont Spin Cycle
Didn't take long for Republican spin (propaganda) machine to get into gear to explain to the mainstream media what the Lieberman primary loss means. The Dems are soft on defense, isolationist, McGovern-like.
Ken "Larry Bud" Mehlman and Senate Majority Leader wannabe Mitch McConnell yapped up as soon as it was clear Lonely Joe lost and will now run in a new party with exactly one candidate-him (yep, they formed a new party called "Connecticut for Joe Lieberman" so that he won't be running as an individual against his former party.) The press, of course, dutifully reported it. Op ed columnist have taken up the talking points too. I read a particularly funny one in the Daily News. "Win for the Whackado Wing." Ha ha. Funny, but nonsensically off base.
How does opposing a war of adventure in Iraq make anyone soft on defense? We weren't acting defensively, as the evidence has shown. This was a nutty neo-con adventure in introducing democracy in the middle east at the point of a gun (or several hundred thousand). McConnell said the Dems have forgotten the lessons of 9/11. Huh? This wasn't about striking back at terrorists. There weren't any in Iraq before the war. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Only evolution/global warming deniers can deny this too. (Why lets facts get in the way of beliefs?)
This was the opposition party punishing an incumbent for not opposing this neo-con nonsense. Why do Hannity, O'Reilly, Limbaugh et al love Lieberman? Because he's moderate? No. Joe Biden is a moderate and they hate him. It's because Joe is onboard with neo-con extremism and double speak. Things are better in Iraq, really and they are getting better. Saddam isn't ethnically cleansing neighborhoods any more. The Iraqis are doing it themselves. Democracy in action. Bahgdad's morgue is a veritable Thor's Goblet of corpses right now. The finish burying yesterday's 300 dead and when they turn around, the morgue is full with the 300 newly murdered from today. And these aren't victims of the insurgency. They are the handiwork of Sunni and Shia death squads--some of whom operate with in the security forces that we are handing control of the country to.
Joe got this terribly, terribly wrong. The people see this. (CNN's new poll shows 61% against the war and over 50% saying we should start getting out.) They voted that way. That's all this election means. Democracy in action. Nothing more.
For those of you who argue that pulling out now is defeatist or will necessarily lead to chaos in Iraq, I say this: We removed Hussein. Mission Accomplished. We never intended to colonize Iraq, so how is leaving admission of defeat? Chaos has already gripped Iraq and we can't stop it. We are irrelevant there. Iraq will stabilize and moderate or devolve into 3 ethnic states whether we are there or not. If we couldn't prevent it up to now, how will staying any longer change that? Hmmm. What we are doing isn't working, so doing it for ten more years will fix it. Curious logic at best. Insanity at worst.
Ken "Larry Bud" Mehlman and Senate Majority Leader wannabe Mitch McConnell yapped up as soon as it was clear Lonely Joe lost and will now run in a new party with exactly one candidate-him (yep, they formed a new party called "Connecticut for Joe Lieberman" so that he won't be running as an individual against his former party.) The press, of course, dutifully reported it. Op ed columnist have taken up the talking points too. I read a particularly funny one in the Daily News. "Win for the Whackado Wing." Ha ha. Funny, but nonsensically off base.
How does opposing a war of adventure in Iraq make anyone soft on defense? We weren't acting defensively, as the evidence has shown. This was a nutty neo-con adventure in introducing democracy in the middle east at the point of a gun (or several hundred thousand). McConnell said the Dems have forgotten the lessons of 9/11. Huh? This wasn't about striking back at terrorists. There weren't any in Iraq before the war. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Only evolution/global warming deniers can deny this too. (Why lets facts get in the way of beliefs?)
This was the opposition party punishing an incumbent for not opposing this neo-con nonsense. Why do Hannity, O'Reilly, Limbaugh et al love Lieberman? Because he's moderate? No. Joe Biden is a moderate and they hate him. It's because Joe is onboard with neo-con extremism and double speak. Things are better in Iraq, really and they are getting better. Saddam isn't ethnically cleansing neighborhoods any more. The Iraqis are doing it themselves. Democracy in action. Bahgdad's morgue is a veritable Thor's Goblet of corpses right now. The finish burying yesterday's 300 dead and when they turn around, the morgue is full with the 300 newly murdered from today. And these aren't victims of the insurgency. They are the handiwork of Sunni and Shia death squads--some of whom operate with in the security forces that we are handing control of the country to.
Joe got this terribly, terribly wrong. The people see this. (CNN's new poll shows 61% against the war and over 50% saying we should start getting out.) They voted that way. That's all this election means. Democracy in action. Nothing more.
For those of you who argue that pulling out now is defeatist or will necessarily lead to chaos in Iraq, I say this: We removed Hussein. Mission Accomplished. We never intended to colonize Iraq, so how is leaving admission of defeat? Chaos has already gripped Iraq and we can't stop it. We are irrelevant there. Iraq will stabilize and moderate or devolve into 3 ethnic states whether we are there or not. If we couldn't prevent it up to now, how will staying any longer change that? Hmmm. What we are doing isn't working, so doing it for ten more years will fix it. Curious logic at best. Insanity at worst.
Friday, August 04, 2006
Liberal Inquisition, or Democracy in Action?
NY Times Conservative Columnist David Brooks, who sometimes makes a lot of sense, wrote a real head scratcher the other day. He called the insurgent campaign of Ned Lamont to unseat Joe Lieberman a "liberal inquisition." Huh?
He whines that liberals in the Democratic party are pillorying Lieberman for one issue alone-the Iraq war-and abandoning an otherwise good democrat. Hmmm. Folks in an opposition party are upset with a member of that party because said member abandoned opposition to the President on THE most important of issues, waging war, and that seems odd to anyone with a brain?
George Will has said the same thing but I've been scratching my head about him for sometime and didn't feel compelled to write. But enough voices have joined this curious chorus, Brooks' straw being the one breaking the camel's back, and I couldn't hold my tongue (or fingers!) any longer. I know they don't get this, but many of us saw this war as trumped up and adventurous. Many felt lied to and manipulated. Many see it as a tragic and stupid blunder. Many expected the leaders of the opposition party to OPPOSE it. Democrats don't have the right to hold a guy in the Democratic party responsible for abandoning them and instead joining and then steadfastly defending the madness?
I think they do, and I think it's called democracy. The people of his party in Connecticut are fed up with him and are saying, "you don't represent me anymore." That is their right. Hell, it's their duty. He may run as a independent when he loses, and he may well win the general election. (That's what the poll gods say.) But he will never represent Democrats again. Democrats are deciding that. It's the democratic way. And there is nothing wrong with that.
He whines that liberals in the Democratic party are pillorying Lieberman for one issue alone-the Iraq war-and abandoning an otherwise good democrat. Hmmm. Folks in an opposition party are upset with a member of that party because said member abandoned opposition to the President on THE most important of issues, waging war, and that seems odd to anyone with a brain?
George Will has said the same thing but I've been scratching my head about him for sometime and didn't feel compelled to write. But enough voices have joined this curious chorus, Brooks' straw being the one breaking the camel's back, and I couldn't hold my tongue (or fingers!) any longer. I know they don't get this, but many of us saw this war as trumped up and adventurous. Many felt lied to and manipulated. Many see it as a tragic and stupid blunder. Many expected the leaders of the opposition party to OPPOSE it. Democrats don't have the right to hold a guy in the Democratic party responsible for abandoning them and instead joining and then steadfastly defending the madness?
I think they do, and I think it's called democracy. The people of his party in Connecticut are fed up with him and are saying, "you don't represent me anymore." That is their right. Hell, it's their duty. He may run as a independent when he loses, and he may well win the general election. (That's what the poll gods say.) But he will never represent Democrats again. Democrats are deciding that. It's the democratic way. And there is nothing wrong with that.
Thursday, August 03, 2006
Jeez, A whole Month?
Yep. Haven't been prolific, have I?
Oh well. After all nothing is happening. Mideast is quiet. Democracy and calm are the rule in Iraq. We are one big happy family at home as rationality and common sense rule over fear and superstition. What do I have to write about?
Oh well. After all nothing is happening. Mideast is quiet. Democracy and calm are the rule in Iraq. We are one big happy family at home as rationality and common sense rule over fear and superstition. What do I have to write about?
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