Have We Lost The Rhetoric War?

Are there similarities in how we fight wars less effectively today and how we discuss them, similarities that might ultimately undermine the war effort itself?

If someone didn't whole-heartedly support America's cause in World War II, odds are they would have been called a traitor, a coward, or at least a weakling, etc. Today, just as we see collateral damage as an argument for not fighting a war, as opposed to an unfortunate by product of one, the conventional wisdom is that we shouldn't be too hard on war critics, less we run the risk of looking like unhinged war mongers.

Recently the term disproportion has been in the news as regards fighting a war. Think about proportionality as regards the current debate of the Iraq War. Young men and women, good young American men and women are off in a foreign land fighting for what America defined as her cause when she went to war. They are fighting, being severely and often permanently injured and even dying everyday.

Yet, as purveyors of what some might call pro-war rhetoric, how do we respond to the people we see daily undermining the very effort required to fight that war and adequately support our troops?

Isn't the tendency to go soft on them? To not actually say what we believe to be true in our hearts - that, ultimately, their short-sighted reasoning, or lack of resolve weakens America's prospects in what is an increasingly dangerous world as a result of the rise of radical Islam?

Isn't it disproportionate to give anti-war folks like that a pass when they sit safe and protected pumping out un-war-supportive prose, while better men and women than all of us fight and die?  I'm starting to think that it is.

What I do know is that, if we are to defeat Islamofascism, many more innocents will die. And even more innocents will die if we don't defeat it. With stakes that high, is it really such a crime to call certain individuals cowards, or traitors, or somehow un-American, or dangerously misguided Americans, at best?

If America and perhaps now Israel find themselves in a position where they can no longer effectively let slip the dogs of war for just cause, isn't it, at least in part, because the rhetoric of war has been ceded to those who will always oppose it, no matter how right the cause?

Q: What did you do in the war Daddy?

A: Well, I tried to be as polite and careful as I could be when arguing about it.

Given the consequences, does that sound so noble? Perhaps not.

Here's the latest war news: Pajamas Media, or read a few regional blogs. I like to check the JP headlines, as well.

Comments

[xxx]

And why oh why do the Iranians hate America oh student of history. Does the Shah of Iran ring any bells? Big U.S. allie, neat guy, very capable secret police force, lotsa torture. That is why, specifically, the Iranians hate us.

What has happened in Iraq? We started with a few 'foreign terrorists' and ended up with an insurgency, do you think that is a positive step in the war for hearts and minds?

The bottom line is, what Israel is doing now is destructive to itself. The Europeans have had it with Israel. Who do you think is going to pay for rebuilding Lebanon..WE ARE. The United States and if we don't pay, it won't get rebuilt.

It is obvious that Dan and his cadre don't care about dead arab children since you either blame the dead children [they were probably dupes and carrying bombs], blame their parents for not getting out since the nice Israelis sent them flyers, except that they also bombed out the roads and kept up firing, or, better yet, blame Hezbollah for killing them and then have the pure insanity to claim that its really on one set of dead children that are just in the Hezbollah deep freeze and being carried around a war zone for multiple photo opps.

There is nothing that needs to be done about people who think you are evil and want you dead as long as they stay in their own country and mind their own business...going out of your way to further alienate and enrage people who already think you are evil and want you dead could be considered high risk behavior.

Do you really think Iran would be this belligerant if we weren't bogged down in Iraq? They know we aren't going to touch them, the MOST we can do is try to bomb out their nucleur facilities on some more trumped up evidence a la WMD.

[xxx]

There is a world of difference between thinking that teenagers shouldn't have sex and forcing teenage girls to have children they don't want as punishment for having sex.

Yes, I know there are a lot of right wing nut jobs in this country and they ALL vote, my point was that the religious zealots are not a tiny minority, but a large minority who have done an excellent job of moving us ever closer to a theocracy.

No ONE will ever convince me that a non implanted, fertilized egg is an innocent life or an unborn baby. It is a fertilized egg that hasn't implanted in the uterus, of which nearly half don't ever implant in the uterus, are these spontaneous abortions? miscarriages?

Ugh.

[wjo]

"x":

Really, is not praying for our national death by people not yet born in 1979 rather absurd. Is there no statute of limitations on such grievances? The world has turned and is vastly different. Are you arguing that American interests and policy in 1979 are the same as in 2006? Perhaps you are in accord with Bin Laden that the Reconquista needs to be avenged.

Another quote for you:

"Today, it is clear for everyone that the aggression against Lebanon was a pre-meditated U.S.-Zionist action as a key step in the path of dominating the Middle East and the Islamic world." I'll withhold the speaker's name, but tell me how you disagree with his assertion? Hint: he's an actual theocrat and wishes to own atomic weapons.

Regarding the "insurgents" in Iraq, who do you think is supplying them with the bombs that murder and maim? Who among the local population do they draw their "fighters"? Look East and West for your answers.

With regard to evil people who want you dead staying at home, if only they would. Trouble is they just don't want to stop murdering Americans. They have even taken to crashing jetliners into buildings.

As for the abortion issue, it is unsoluable because of its moral underpinnings. Your moral compass may say something vastly different than mine, but why is it yours always has to be the one followed?

Please explain what this theocracy in America you fear looks like. I am most curious what the precipice looks like to you.

[Flying Rodent]

What, am I speaking Welsh here?

Okay, how about this one?

Daddy, What did you do in the war?

Well, son, I trawled the internet looking for news articles and blog posts to back up my views on child-murder, so I could provoke my fear-crazed acolytes to back my agenda of absolute hatred. It's amazing how many people were willing provide detailed justifications for my utter lack of humanity.

It makes your daddy's heart swell with pride to remember his stints on FOX News, telling America that them dead kids were nothing to worry about. Why, it feels just like yesterday I was askin' people who objected to the cold-blooded murder of children, "Is it really such a crime to call certain individuals cowards, or traitors, or somehow un-American?".

I know a lot of valiant Americans fell in the field of combat, but I just feel I done my part - without me, the American public would never have held their nerve while watching the blasted corpses of those kids being hauled out of the rubble.

I believe that tradition dictates that is the bit where you call me an anti-semite.

[wjo]

Flying Rodent:

It should read thus:

Daddy, what did you do in the War?

What war? You mean Bush's war cooked up in Texas to profit his Enron-Halliburton-Neo-Con buddies and to distract us from saving the planet from the internal combustion engine, WalMart and daily hygiene regimens?

Why I went to Daily Kos, CNN,ABC, BBC, CBC, CBS, MSNBC, NBC, and NPR every day to hear of the insidious activities of the FBI and CIA and the "Department of Heimat Security" to erode my civil liberties just because those misunderstood foreigners tried to get our attention. I'm glad those foreigners gave those fat-assed Rotarians and stooges what they had coming to them for raping the planet and oppressing all brown-skinned peoples.

Why it swells my heart with pride every time I remember going to a Code Pink rally where I went on a 20 minute hunger strike in solidarity with my oppressed jihadi brothers and sisters. Good times. Good times.

I knew a lot of baby killers escaped their war crimes after dropping cluster bombs on kindergartens and phospherous shells on orphanages, but I support the feckless naifs who were conned into their mission. Everyone knows soldiering is a job for dumb bunnies who can't cut it in the real world. Had I been a toothless Goober from West Virginia, I too might have fallen into the codeword clutches of the neocon warmongers. However, I continue to write to Louise Arbour to prosecute everyone who ever thought badly of brave and humane resistance fighters using weapons in homes, schools and houses of worship.

Without me all those scary hard right Christian Conservatives with their damn "love your neighbor as yourself" crap dogma would have prevailed.

Daddy wanted so much to save the planet and abort you, but his vices got the better of him and daddy had to live with the shame of bringing you into this horrible world. If I had more compassion in me, I would have spared you growing up in this hell that is Amerikkka. Please forgive Daddy.

I especially recall going to counter-protest all those theo-con pro-war rallies where they chanted "Death to Islam", "Death to the Arabs", "Death to Persians" and exhultantly held up pictures of dead brown children and rejoiced that they had been martyred for their faith. While they burned Palestinian, Iranian and Syrian flags, I held up a sign saying: "I'm ashamed to be the son of an Imperialist Crusader who once listened to country music and drove an SUV".

Without my bravery, those nice mullahs in Iran would never have obtained atomic weaponry in order to stick it to the man. Without me those inhumane Zionist oppressors would never have had their comeuppence.

Glory days son, glory days.

[Phoenix]

"Daddy, What did you do in the war?"

Flying Rodent,

Which war are you talking about? The Iraq War? The one in Rwanda? The one in Ghana? The one in Uganda? Somalia? The one rumbling among the peasantry of China against the new-elites? The one over Kashmir? Afghanistan? Israel/Lebanon/Iran/Syria? The one rumbling to overthrow Musharraf in Pakistan? The quiet sublimation of Tibet by China? Chechnya? The War of Hope now uprising in Cuba? The War of Intent in Venezuela? The Latest But Greatest Internet Blog War? Or The Relentless Name-Calling War Between the Multi-Political Parties in America? The War Between Fundamentalists and Free-Thinkers? The Bloods and Crips/ M13? Mothers Against Drunk Drivers? <--- Drunk drivers kill over 50% of the total 43,000 highway deaths every year. The War Between Microsoft and Apple? Whatever conflict.....

Just pick one. That way we might be better able to determine what 'tradition' you speak of that should dictate our next response of virulent name-calling.

[Rick]

Damn, I just wonder where you crybabies have been when it was Israeli children being killed? Where were you when they were Russian? Philipino? Surely you cried over the African children? Right, come on, please dont say that it is only Lebanese children dying who upset you so. Truly, I feel sorry for you people who hate your own nation, parents, family so much that you will only cry for the children of Lebanon........tragic

[rwilymz]

"And why oh why do the Iranians hate America oh student of history."

You really should know better by now, 'x'. Others know history much much much better than you.

"Does the Shah of Iran ring any bells?"

Yep. Does anything aBOUT the Shah rings any of *your* bells? Of is just invoking the name enough?

"Big U.S. allie, neat guy,"

Yep. Implemented the first semi-republic under a monarchy in that part of the world in the 50s. For the first time in 1,500 years ... make that 2,300 years, since Alexander, the people of Persia -- even though under a monarchy -- got civil liberties.

"very capable secret police force, lotsa torture."

You're getting wa-a-a-ay ahead of yourself. The Shah didn't get installed and immediately implement secret police and torture squads. For the first 15 or so years he was fine and most people loved it. Then some religious nutjob -- you might have heard of him -- Ayatollah somethingorother ... Khomeini! that was it! he decided that, well, Iran, with it's freedom of religion where all religions are equal and there's no dhimitude for infidels, well, that was just unacceptable. So he gethered together those who thought like he did and started a revolution.

It didn't get very far since religious nutjobs tend to be poor military people. The good Ayatollah was kicked out of the country [he went to live in Paris under French protection, by the way...], and his followers started having secret meetings and killing random officials.

THAT is why the secret police etc.

And then in the 70s the moral equivalencing came in, "if there's religious freedom, why is the Ayatollah kicked out of the coutry...?" You can be muslim in Iran, you just can't start revolutions. But dimbulbs in the 70s Iran are no brighter than dimbulbs in 21st century US, so they just don't get the significant differences.

Plus, then, others who thought it would simply be cool to be in a revolution decided to join in, and voila! storm the embassy gates.

"That is why, specifically, the Iranians hate us."

That is why **some** of the Iranians hate us. The ones who like the theocratic repressions that were disallowed under the Shah.

There is a substantial portion of their population which has had a taste of the western style society, and they like it. They mouth the pro-revolution lines just to keep themselves out of the new secret police prisons, but they have their secret meetings under the Ayatollah ... the same as others had under the Shah.

...and why is it that the secret police and torture used by anti-US regimes is so much more tolerable to the "enlightened" navel-gazers than the secret police and torture used by our friends?

"There is nothing that needs to be done about people who think you are evil and want you dead as long as they stay in their own country and mind their own business"

This doesn't become more true the more frequently you say it.

It simply makes you facile more often.

1] staying in our own country means that we will slowly revert to becoming an agrarian society, with a subsistence economy, a third-world standard of living and short life expectancy; it is a policy of the arch-"neocon" isolationist Pat Buchanan.
2] even the most rudimentary trade with other parts of the world run the risk of attack by pan-islamists. we were originally attacked by Barbary pirates in 1784 because we da-a-a-ared to buy salt from Spain;
3] if you listen to the man behind the curtain he will tell you that it is our *existence* that he is fighting. It is not even enough that we mind our own business.

"going out of your way to further alienate and enrage people who already think you are evil and want you dead could be considered high risk behavior"

So is buying salt from spain.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Might as well make money.

"Do you really think Iran would be this belligerant if we weren't bogged down in Iraq?"

Yes. They've been belligerent to the US since '79.

[Phoenix]

rwilymz,

You could save a lot of key-punching by dropping the historical pedantry - which is meaningless to Triple X - and go back to the "Ultimate Source" you spoke of a few posts ago. You could just say that the biggest fallacy in the world today is that all religions are true. That cannot be. There can only be one. IF there IS a true religion, in fact.

I believe vehemently in the study and application of history, but progress is a continuum that moves apace despite our beliefs and desires, and those of us in the western world have managed to hang on for the ride and adapt accordingly. Others intent on defying the change that progress brings want us dead. Those people are gunning and running on religious beliefs.

It's that simple. Triple X just can't grasp who's right and who's wrong.

[Rick]

Geeze Phoenix, you sure used a lot of words to say "You're wasting your time and talent on that idiot."

[Phoenix]

Otay!, Rick.

You're right. ha ha. But, dang, I sure didn't waste Dan's bandwidth for 50-60 comments worth of useless explanations.

('Useless' in that they were wasted on Triple X.)

[Rick]

Point taken. Do we still like each other?

[wjo]

Rick and Phoenix, didn't you get the memo that anyone who disagrees with X is a rabid conservative dumba**. Stop acting with civility and courtesy or you'll ruin the caricature.

[harry near indy]

mr riehl,

i congratulate you for not deleting my comments. many times, conservative posts will often delete comments that don't agree with the post.

i still stand with what i wrote, and i still disagree with your original post.

[Rick]

wio: I only let the monster loose on those that deserve it. Took me a while but I realize that xxx is a kid and victim of leftist ideology. He's berated by it everyday from his heroes, tv shows, MSM, teachers, maybe even parents. I kind of envy him/her! Imagine being totally devoid of years of living in the world, knowing only what those who should know better have told you about the mid east and everything else. Regurgitate the info, erroniuos or not and get good grades. I really wish the kid would tell us his/her age.Guess that requires too much courage.

[Phoenix]

Rick, - I've always liked you. I don't get all huffy if someone takes me on or is sarcastic about something I write as long as I respect their attitude; and you have a great attitude.

wjo, - Yeah, I thought about messing up the 'rabid' stuff, but I did allude to it in a short quip, so I get to carry your lunch. :)

harry, - Dan never deletes comments unless they have filthy language in them. He deleted one of mine once, but I deserved it for losing my cool really badly. He puts up with some ugly personal attacks. I don't know how he does it, but he has my respect. Yes, many conservative bloggers will delete comments and ban you. I'm banned from a few conservative blogs, and I have actually had one good (polite) comment edited during a debate to make me look bad just before I was banned. That engraged me. Wow. Just thinking about it.....Talk about cheap, chickenshit fighting. Anyway, I always end up back here because Dan doesn't let his ego run his blog, and he is fair no matter what.

(Dan, that will be ten dollars. :)

[Dan Riehl]

i congratulate you for not deleting my comments

No need, Harry - debate is fine. As for phoenix:

(Dan, that will be ten dollars. :)

Good to see you dropped your prices, used to be $25! ; ))

[Phoenix]

Oooops.... It is $25. I just forgot to add the part about you being really hot.

:)

[Dan Riehl]

really hot.

Then it should be $10 - or maybe we are thinking of two entirely different things!!! LOL

'Night!

[Phoenix]

I know you have air-conditioning so it was the other 'hot'. ha ha ha.....

Hey. I'll give YOU ten dollars.... Twenty? ......

hahahahaha..... :)