Baghdad Spinning Out Of Control

Where the hell is Bush? He's had nothing to say about anythiong in days, meanwhile Baghdad is spinning out of control and looking like a full scale civil war.

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Followers of the militant Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr took over state-run television Saturday to denounce the Iraqi government, label Sunnis "terrorists" and issue what appeared to many viewers as a call to arms.

The two-hour broadcast from a community gathering in the heart of the Shiite militia stronghold of Sadr City included three members of al-Sadr's parliamentary bloc, who took questions from outraged residents demanding revenge for a series of car bombings that killed some 200 people Thursday.

With Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki relegated to the sidelines, brazen Sunni-Shiite attacks continue unchecked despite a 24-hour curfew over Baghdad.

Dammit! Bush looks as weak and as incompetent as Maliki. What does he think? That he can just hide out until the Baker Comission comes up with something to bail him out? That isn't going to happen He should at least be issuing a statement.

And obviously Lebanon is on the brink of civil war and no one of any stature in the US government has said much of anything except for the typical BS.

Halting violent sectarian strife in Iraq, especially in Baghdad, will dominate President Bush's summit with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki next week in the Middle East.

Al-Maliki is facing opposition from both sides as he works to halt his nation's slide into an all-out civil war, but the White House said Saturday that despite threats from Shiite and Sunni-Arab leaders, he is not expected to cancel his trip to Amman, Jordan, to meet Bush on Wednesday and Thursday.

Cancel it? He'll be lucky to have a capitol to go back to, if he's even allowed in. Maliki has done nothing with Sadr's militia.

At this point it looks like there is damn little anyone can do, most of all Maliki and Bush. As far as Baghdad goes, they've been bumbling this thing for so long, I'm not sure either one has any credibility on the issue now.

Comments

[kate]

I got attacked on a conservative discussion forum in the spring of 2005 for expressing concern over the Bush's Administration communications strategy. He went silent. His people went silent. He allowed the media to control the narrative and drive his approval rating down and, more importantly, support for the war.

I was a supporter of Bush but the man started to lose me when he threw the Haditha Marines under the bus and now with the shameful way he has fired Rumsfeld.

I used to think he is strong and determined. I will give the man until January to show some leadership some strenght. It may be too late.

There was a paradoy of Bush on SNL right after the election of 2000 with him hiding under the desk saying the job was too hard. He is starting to remind me of that caricature.

I think Condi has been totally captured by the left wing at the State Department and she is influencing Bush, but he looks weaker and weaker.

However, I also find this generation of generals to be decidely unimpressive, they may be great politicians, but they are not warriors.

[Irritated Professor]

The only surprising thing about this is that you're surprised. Bush has always been weak and incompetent, a lot of people were able to see that from the beginning. The question you should be asking is, how come so many people were blind to his faults for so long? And how do you keep from doing that the next time you're tempted to vote for the guy you'd rather have a beer with than the smart guy?

[K]

Exactly what is he supposed to say?

If the elected government won't or can't crack down then our troops aren't going to get it done. Does anyone think there is a magic phone book with the names and addresses of exactly which people to arrest and end the problems?

The problems are multiple: religious fighting, ethnic divisions, some nationalistic insurgents, and some outside factions such as Al Queda and possibly infiltration sponsored by Syria and Iran.

It may now be impossible to bring order to Iraq except by the equivalent of a total police state. The fact that we like democracy, etc. does not mean democracies cannot be destroyed. They usually are destroyed. Whether a different course two or three years ago would have produced a better situation can be debated but not known.

The demographics of the Christian and Muslim populations in Lebanon plus the policies of their neighbors have been eroding the formal government of Lebanon for decades. Now the only question is which Muslim group or groups will take power. And how Syria and Iran will influence them.

Bush has no good options. The best shot is that the formal Iraqi government will get the job done. It appears they will not.

The truth of the Rumsfeld dismissal may be quite different that the reports. Rumsfeld is old, 72 or 73. The new Congress was not going to let him get anything done about military reform. I think it just made sense that he go home. The job is terrible even in peacetime and he took five full years of war conditions.

[Sandy]

To all those people on the right who voted for Bush twice, one word. Duh!

[Rhod]

Irritated Prof:

Just who was the smart guy?

[yyy]

I thought victory was just around the corner?

Gee Dan, you sound like one of those liberal terrorist loving whiners you've been slamming the last three years for telling the TRUTH about the Iraq situation.

The truth unfortunately just gets worse and worse. The insurgents are able to FUND THEMSELVES...in other words they don't need money from Iran or Syria to continue...putting the final nail in the coffin of the Bush fiction that it was all outside agitators who started the trouble.

The truth is, that Iraq was unwinnable from the neocon viewpoint on Day One...what I am actually starting to wonder is whether or not this wasn't the actual purpose from the beginning..its' hard to believe the neocon thinktank is actually this stupid...which leaves us with the idea that their goal was chaos in Iraq in order to precipitate a total breakdown in the ME that we would then go in and clean up.

How else to explain what appears to be one crazy decision after another? Either the people running the war ARE crazy and have been so steeped in denial that they really thought they could PR their way out of a war, OR, this civil war outcome was predicted from the outset..

Though I suppose either way, that makes the neocons crazy, crazy stupid or just crazy crazy.

[jeff]

"anythiong" ?

[Irritated Prof]

Rhod--

Who was the smart guy? Compared to Bush, just about anybody, but that's the easy answer.

[bill]

Given that bush has been a failure at just about everything he has done(except getting elected)since adulthood, is it any surprise he has completely screwed up his "war on terror"? It still amazes me that people ever voted for this boob idiot! Lets see...awol drunk/druggie or war hero with a brain who isn't a good campaigner? Ya gets what ya pays fer. Un fortunately you dicks who voted for bush are directly responsible for where we are now, and it's going to take the Dems years to dig us out of the hole you've put us into.

[yyy]

Let's not forget that if Ralph Nadar had not lost his mind Al Gore would have been president not Bush Light...very possibly Al Gore would have been a two term president and we would NOT have invaded Iraq, not wasted billions , not let the neocon cabal take over foreign policy, not stuck our head in the sand on every other issue out there OTHER than the conservative theocracy's desire to see the personal lives of Americans run the way they want...

[Carol_Herman]

Cheney is in Saudi Arabia. And, last week Bush made a two day visit to Amman, Jordan. Did not stop off in Israel.

While a "peculiar" cease fire is now in effect by the IDF. Abbas, hasn't quite haulted the firing of kassam's. BUT OLMERT'S FORBIDDEN IDF RESPONSES for the time being.

So, "something" is afoot.

What had been on Bush's agenda, in the beginning, was a Sunni alliance in Iraq. (The world's second largest oil reserves country.) 30 different states were showing interest in running these fields. It would be "international" as consortiums go. And, the Southern area where explorations would take place, were divided by Cheney into 9 zones.

Things didn't go according to plan!

The Saudis were given a free hand with terrorism. ANd, the Sunnis in Iraq complied. (If you remember, they boycotted the elections.)

While TERROR is a way of meeting terror; similar to fighting fire with fire. And, iran has been extremely busy! You now know the Tor missiles, russia has supplied to Iran, are going up over all of her nuclear sites.

And, Israel is BATTENING DOWN THE HATCHES.

I'll guess that one of the things to the table, soon, will be UN paper, shaken at Israel, to pull back to old borders.

And, Bush will attempt to go along with this.

Part of his silence? His game plan is broken.

And, Gates, so far as we know, is not "coming to the Hill early" for confirmation. WHy should the deomcrats cooperate now?

Up ahead? It all depends.

Will Gates' appointment meet no resistance at all?

Iraq isn't lost, by the way, it is a free-er country, now. And, not under Bush's thumb. As you can see the Saudis are applying all sorts of pressures.

And, where the fight goes ahead? Nobody knows.

As to being on Bush's bandwagon? I started to get shakey this summer. Watching Condi as "co-president" tap dancing with Chirac; brought out lots of fears.

The other one? I've always noticed a wisdom to American voting habits. And, the sweeping out of the GOP from Congress sure showed me a lot of Americans are very nervous, with the GOP "nellies." Even though the margins in Congress are THIN. Everything seems poised at the 50 yard line.

[sammy small]

Irratated Prof,

Yeah, we should have listened to your "smart guy", John "I Fought in Vietnam" Kerry. Oh, I forgot, he scored lower in all the aptitude tests and GPAs than GWB. So you may want to think of a better adjective.

Maybe he just gives his advisors too much leeway without weighing in more forcefully. Or maybe he fails to adapt or change course when needed. Or maybe he is naive or misunderestimates the Arab street. Or maybe he doesn't kick ass where it needs to be done.

He certainly has some managerial faults. In the business world, project managers are replaced quite often, but are not accused of not being smart. They didn't get to that position by being dumb. They are replaced because they allowed things to get "upside down", not keeping things on a positive curve. This is the case with GWB.

It appears to me he left too much of the war strategy to his staff. Maybe he felt that they were the experts and that he had no better way. Remember that Vietnam was totally screwed up by the politicians. It seems he left this campaign up to the Pentagon. But even the Pentagon didn't do well in post combat operations.

Fallujah was a good example of what worked. It should have been duplicated in all of the major Sunni cities. As they used to say in Vietnam, sometimes you have to destroy a village in order to save it.

But why GWB has failed to act more decisively is a question I can't answer. He certainly wasn't decisive in the beginning. Maybe he got worn down by all the negativity and just backed off too much.

[yyy]

Dubya failed because eventually reality will trump ideology, it may take years, decades or centuries.

Ideology drove the Iraq war and everything else having to do with the 'war on terror'

A pragmatic approach would NEVER have made Iraq the front line, never have let the Israel/Palestinian peace process fail to the point that Hamas beame more popular than Fatah, NEVER NEVER believed the Pakistani's were real allies in the war on terror or the Saudies.

History will show George HW BUsh to have been an honorable and principled man who did the right thing, even though it cost him his second term.

History will show Dubya to be a dumb pawn, too stupid and too arrogant to see how he was being manipulated by the neocon cabal, and certainly as a hugely destructive force both at home and abroad.

They don't call it reality for nuthin.

[dcydell]

"He [GWB] certainly wasn't decisive in the beginning."

Yep. But, what is new in the late great USA?

The horror in Iraq, the new Bush-Pelosi ticket to more hell, is what this country has been deserving, ever since it stopped identifying the enemy, not just post 911, but for decades now.

[warrewarrenbnb]

Dan your a MORON for just figurung out this junk now. Hey Dan, we also LANDED ON THE MOON...Wake up buddyboy and stop sniffin the paint.

[warrewarrenbnb]

Yep this is the President you voted for Dan...

MOOOOORRRRROOONNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[yyy]

Funny, I thought we won the Cold War.

Your problem is you all picked the wrong analogy but you still don't get it.

You try to create a faux parallel between Nazi Germany, a country that was building an awesome war machine right out in the open for all to see, militarizing its country and was the very same country that had started a war of aggression against its neighbors a scant 20 years earlier....and Iraq, a fourth world country that had no war machine and where there was no evidence of any WMD or anything else let alone the idea that Iraq could ever be a military threat against the US

And yet, the actual real parallel between Iraq and Vietnam, where we engaged in a misguided war of choice against in a country whose politics and cultural issues we did not understand trying to fight a guerilla army that ran on ideology not realpolitik and a country that was not in any sense a military threat to the US is roundly denied as left wing terror loving propaganda.

Moonbat does not come close to describing the idiocy of the Bush Administration/neocon position on Iraq and the 'war on terror'

[Purple Avenger]

never have let the Israel/Palestinian peace process fail

How could the US force either side to agree to anything and then have it stick? Please be specific.

[yyy]

If it was not for the United States military and economic aid to Israel, that's ONE FIFTH of our total foreign aid going to one tiny country then Israel would cease to exist, it would have been swallowed up by its neighbors long ago. Period.

Thus, since it is American money and support that keeps Israel afloat the Israelis would have no choice but to make peace if we gave them an ultimatum to do so our lose these billions.

[Former Republican]

Why aren't you mentioning all the good news out of Iraq?

[warrewarrenbnb]

Uh OK...they bombed 200 people yesterday and missed one family standing on the street corner...they didn't get killed so thats good news I guess.

[warrewarrenbnb]

Why the hell would Cheney go to Saudi Arabia nd not Bush? I thought the Bush family had closer ties to the family and that kind of meeting would have made more sense....Maybe Dubya pissed off the Sheiks...look like that to me.

[Dan Riehl]

Why aren't you mentioning all the good news out of Iraq?

There is plenty of good news out of Iraq. But Baghdad is still the key. That's why the various groups are fighting there. This is ultimately a political battle, not a military one, But if you lose the political battle, all the new schools and pipelines, etc, in Iraq are moot.

[Jason Coleman]

Gee, you'd think from the comments here that the situation in Iraq was worse than the situation in Brazil.

You'd also think that we were losing an inordinate amount of soldiers to violence.

Perspective seems to be lost on those who are wishing to merely bash Bush and wring their hands rather than look at what's really happening.

Oh well. Dan, I think you might want to take a step back, survey the entire situation and return to a more reasoned analysis.

I'm sure the commenters here are also trying to figure out a way to pin the hot war that started this weekend in the horn of Africa on Bush as well.

Get some perspective people, this is, has and will continue to be, World War 3 (or 4 depending on how you count them), we're just in the 1937-39 period of the war, before it was popularly defined as a World War. I wonder when it's finally realized by the populace that this is indeed a world war, with multiple players from multiple angles, which side some of these commenters will declare themselves on. Alot of the commentary I see from the left/Bush haters is remarkably similar in tone and argument as the commentary of those who were supportive of Germany prior to America's entry on the Allied side.

We, America (not just Bush), gave in to the mindset of a kinder gentler war, devoid of real serious destruction, we're now reaping that. We have gone about nation building before the threat was extinguished, we've been trying to localize and contain conflicts in an attempt to deny the global scope of the conflict itself. That was a wrong approach and has been the wrong approach for some time (a time that preceeds Bush).

We've not yet seen the full blown warfare that is certainly coming, and the events to come won't be managable through partisan infighting on our part. The failure of the large majority of people to see what's coming is a commonly repeated historical mistake, and things will get much more painful before they get any better.

--Jason

[yyy]

This is ultimately a political battle, not a military one,
---------------------------------------------------

Ya don't say?

Really?

You mean the mightiest army in the history of the world can't WIN by just killing all the bad guys, or silencing it's critics or controling 'negative' media coverage about Iraq by bombing Al Jazeera or suing the NYTimes et al, or nuking Iran and Syria?????

Funny, us liberal moonbats have been saying that for 3+years.

[Layer Seven]

How strange; democrats take over congress, Iraq EXPLODES, and it's Bush's problem?

The Iraqis read the tea leaves, at least.

[Steel]

Whoa, the Cartoon Network must be showing reruns, as I see all the children are here.

Dan, Bush almost acts like he's ill, his hair is getting white real fast and he seems ... physically weak.

Maybe it's that time of a two term POTUS.

Iraq?

We don't have the will. The entire Middle East is in a roil from the results of our elections.

I do think things are going to get very ugly very soon.

And there's little we can do about it.

[yyy]

No, Jason, this is not WWIII or WWIV, not even close and it never will be.

There is no power in the Islamic world that can rival pre-39 Germany, no power in the Islamic world that poses any kind of legitimate military threat to the United States or Europe...and crying about how if they nukes they're going to nuke us will not make it true.

What we are reaping now is a replay of what has happened over and over again when an ARMY is confronted with a guerilla insurgency force that has the backing of large swaths of the population.

Islam does not want to take over the world, Iran does not want to take over the world, they want to take over the MIDDLE EAST...those are two very different aims.

Hysterical ranting about crazy muslims who want to kill us all, Islam and the West engaged in some kind of crazy deathmatch of civilizations is PURE NONSENSE, made up propaganda that will soon, hopefully be completely discredited. There is no global scale of the conflict.

Even Bin Laden said he would leave the West alone if the West left the Middle East alone and he is a NUT.

[yyy]

How strange; democrats take over congress, Iraq EXPLODES, and it's Bush's problem?
------------

Yes, it is 100% Bush's problem and it will ALWAYS be Bush's problem, the blood of our dead and their dead will ALWAYS be on Bush's hands.

PS..the one thing the Shia and the Sunnis in Iraq DO agree on is a desire for the US troops to leave ASAP...

Iraq has been exploding for a long time, NO ONE, not even the great unwashed masses of idiots in red America are going to blame the Democrats for anything that is going on or will go on in Iraq.

Get over it.

[yyy]

PS,

Even if I believed the wrongheaded idea of an Islam vs. the West deathmatch, invading Iraq would have STILL been completely idiotic.

-Who bombed the WTC? Who founded Al Quada? Who bankrolled the Taliban? Not an Iraqi or Palestinian in the bunch.

Egyptians, Saudis, Pakistanis using Iranian money and ideas.

Where the fuck does invading Iraq, run by a secular dicator, who was HATED BY BIN LADEN come into play in any kind of rational strategy when Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 or Al Quada?

It doesn't.

Sure, a democratic, friendly Iraq would have been great, but peace on earth would be great too.

[peter from New York]

I suppose at least I can give you kudos for aknowledging that things are sliding terribly in Iraq and that this President appears weak in the face of it.

We've made the most serious strategic blunder of perhaps our entire 230 years in deciding to fight a voluntary war in Iraq and then botching it so terribly. If this is indeed the first battle of WW IV as some so inaccurately claim, then we fought it to lose. But it isn't. It's the biggest misadventure of our entire history, and the result is a fragmented, radicalized, de-secularized Somalia-like nightmare of a country square in the center of the Mideast, breeding violence and mayhem and ITS ALL OUR FAULT. And we can't do much about it. The best we can do is pull back and be ready to strike if it looks like the violence will be exported. And it will be. We will be paying for this in violence directed against us throughout the Mideast and the world for the next 10-20 years, and ITS ALL OUR FAULT. And, again, there's not much we can do about it. Bush will go down in history as the abysmal disaster he is, the Republicans will carry this as their fault and burden for years to come, and they should. They stood by - worse - enabled this nonsense by senselessly standing on the sidelines and cheering this sad administration as it tragically led us into this nightmare. Who cares what the intentions were. The results are what counts. We have a failed state on steroids in the dead center of the mideast, decaying before our eyes. Republicans need to be more than ashamed. More than embarassed. More than appalled. This was their idea from day one, their war, their crusade. Completely, irrevocably, undeniably theirs.

Thanks. America will pay the price. Millions of Iraqis pay it now. By the way: they're not better off now then they were under Hussein. Not by a long shot. And that's our fault. The stain on our conscience. Or at least those of us who have a conscience.

[Jason Coleman]

yyy,

You obviously have a very limited understanding of the events and scope of the previous 2 (or 3) world wars. The who has what strength military is immaterial to the debate as to whether or not this is the next world war.

What is material is that this is a World War between multiple combatants who have differing agendas that in some cases coincide and others contradict. The size of the militaries involved does not rise it to level of world war, the scope and breadth of the conflict does.

As for Islam and global conquest, I'm sorry, but you're wrong. Islam is a Universalizing Religion, it's goal is Universal Conversion and elimination of competing ideologies. That's it, yyy, and it's right there in the Koran. Islam is not a religion limited solely to "the middle east" and it never has been. Your insistance that Islam only wants regional religious domination is simply incorrect on the most basic level.

Likewise, your opinion of Iran is similarily flawed. The Islamic Republic wants a worldwide Shiite Caliphate, and in the creation of said Caliphate or with the coming of the 12th, Iran will cease to exist and Iran is fine with that. If you examine the writings of Khomeni and the other founders of the Islamic Republic and you examine a bit of what they are saying now (beyond the "death to America" "wipe out Israel" soundbites) their working for and leading up to the coming of the 12th and if he doesn't show, they'll continue on trying to bring about the Caliphate in accordance with Shiite teachings. You should learn a bit more about Iran's modern history and their objectives before you declare they are only interested in the Middle East, they've got designs on the Near East, Far East, North Africa, Southern Russia, the Stans and more just not under the name of Iran, but rather under the construct of the Caliphate. Further, they admit quite freely that their goal is the domination of all religions and all people to Islam and they will play a part in bringing that about willingly even if they are not destined to be the leader of such.

As for nuclear weapons or worse, they most certainly will have an effect on the scale and shape of this global conflict and to deny that is to deny reality. It may not be the Islamists who bring the nuclear card to the table, it may be Kim, it could be some other faction that aligns itself on one side or the other, but the nuclear card, as well as the biologic card, do most certainly change all of the preconceived notions of regional conflict. Your ostrich approach to threats will work about as well for us as it does for the ostrich, I.E. not at all.

Bin Laden, has said ALOT, and has contradicted himself many times, but I'm not a big fan of listening to him all that much as he's a marginal player now, if he's even a player at all. I will however read and pay close attention the Koran, and I suggest you do as well. I'm not engaging in hyperbolic chicken little cries of the "muslims are coming to get us", they, the Muslims and their holy book say it quite clearly for me. If you haven't read the Koran, I suggest you do. The folks at CAIR will be happy to send you one free of charge. Take them up on it and you'll be able to see for yourself just one faction in the forces that are arrayed against us in this conflict.

I don't wish or care to debate with you YYY, because your not grounded in reality. If it was all about the middle east, what are the Islamists doing in Thailand, Russia, South America, Micronesia, etc. Even the most basic critical thinking trashes your points without much work at all. Reading the Koran simply buries your points six feet deep in irrelevance.

The fact is, and it's undeniable, that we are in a global conflict, with multiple enemies and multiple allies. An allignment of global ideology will come about as a result of this conflict (that's what world wars do now). The conflict rages on every continent, and not all are Islamists, not all are Capitalists, or Democratists, not all are Communists and not all are Christians, but the conflict is beginning, it's growing and it's not stopping any time soon. It's only going to get worse from here until that orogenic event or series of events that elevate it in popular consciousness to the level of world war. The critical thinker however can easily see that the level has already been reached and we're merely trying to keep a lid on it for as long as we can.

The reaction will not be stopped by keeping it under pressure however, it will only explode with greater force.

Your "this is a middle east thing" is simply false on it's face and in denial of all reality.

--Jason

PS, YYY, I know you want to see the world solely through your partisan prism, but the majority of the world is not partisan, they are merely eeking out their existance trying to get ahead, we have the luxury of being able to sit back and intellectually debate it, while most do not. Your insistance on denying reality and suggesting things that are patently untrue even on the most basic examination of the tenents of Islam are not doing anyone, especially you, any good. Perhaps you should learn a bit more about the ideology of those we are facing before you decide what the intentions of a Universalizing Religion (unreformed) are.

Have a nice day.

-JC

[Layer Seven]

Democrats win, Iraq EXPLODES, and it's Bush's problem -

Clinton who grabbed ankle, turned tail, and CRAWLED out of Mogadishu, is your man.

[Dan Riehl]

Oh well. Dan, I think you might want to take a step back, survey the entire situation and return to a more reasoned analysis.

Jason, I think it is a reasoned analysis of what we should expect from a Commander in Chief. Bush is staying quiet and letting everyone else steer the discussion in a hundred ways. "We are going to talk to Iran and Syria" "Maliki is weak" "We should go / stay / run / fight". As the CIC it is Bush who should be leading, not allowing things to swing in the wind.

This Baker Comission BS is just that BS. The nation should not be looking to a Baker when we already have a damned President. There is no edge in it for a leader who allows himself to look so damned weak.

It's Bush's job to handle Iraq, not Bakers, and he should damn well start acting like it, again.

[Dan Riehl]

And Jason - note that I am discussing Baghdad in my post, not all of Iraq. I very much meant to make the distinction. Baghdad is the heart of the political battle and it is our current failing. Just two months ago or less we deployed troops there to tamp down the violence. That was the last great tactical shift and it has been a disaster. I see no reason to let Bush off the hook on that. If nothing else, it may be time to consider firing a General or two and getting someone in there who wants to fight. I'm tired of the post-Vietnam Generals who are more politicians than they are field Generals. And it is increasingly looking like that's what we have in this case.

[Jason Coleman]

Dan,

Hey, I'll be the first to admit that Bush could be a better communicator with the people, but I'll also have to note that any communication he does make via the media becomes immediately distorted even before he speaks.

I don't have any faith in the Baker commission, I don't know where you got that from, but I simply don't. I view most of the Baker commission report to come as a means to force the Dems hands into aligning themselves to a policy, which they've not done apart from demanding impossibilities and then casting blame when such impossibilities are not met. Baker will force the Dems now in Congressional power to articulate their position and we'll work from there.

As for who controls the discussion, I wish it were the President who got to lead the discussion, but the media prevents that. Instead we get a leadership through the media who present us with a series of fabricated and false storylines, hyperbolic inflation of stats and constant comparisons of dislike events. Even when caught in flat out distortions, the media simply goes silent until the storm passes (usually with the help of another storm of their creation).

Can you imagine if all of the distortions of the media did not happen what the situation today would be? What if the media reported on ALL 17+ reasons for going to war in the AUMF (Iraq) and also noted the Iraqi Liberation Act? Instead we get the tired WMD line. What if the media would have put it front and center when Chemical weapons were found instead of page A28 of the NYT? What if the media would finally admit that hundreds of thousands of decalitres of bacillius anthracis were seized in Iraq? What if the media would have reported on the front page of the 1.8 tons of enriched uranium made from the 18 tones of yellowcake that was supposed to be under seal?

If in the first go round we'd get the truth from the media and the detractors of the effort to free millinos we would be faced with a very different discussion today and a very different Iraq today.

We've been lied to, not by Bush, but by the media REPEATEDLY. You can make a list of the gross inaccuracies, false stories, blatent lies, hyperbolic inflamations and more that we've been subjected to by the media and it will stretch miles. The corrections and admissions of culpability won't get your more than an index card worth of text.

I wish Bush would spend 30 minutes twice a week talking about what we are doing and how we are doing it, but that 60 minutes would be met with hours and hours of commentary refuting what he said BEFORE HE SAYS IT and then hours more after the fact. It doesn't matter if Bush says the sky is blue, the media will line up to show it's not and then when faced with irrefutable evidence of a sunny day, then twist it back to say we're being deceived by Bush on the very fact he gave us and we ascertained to be true.

I could go on and on about the absurdity of Plame, the fauxtography and more, but it's basically pointless. Even if Bush came straight out and told us more, it'd be burried under the blather of media whores wishing for pulitzers for publishing materials they KNOW to be false.

The parallels with the media now and the media pre Pearl Harbor are so close they almost seem to form a single line, and the distorted journalism we are presented with now is only serving to push us deeper into a larger conflict and intentionally enrage our enemies so more copies of Newsweek can be sold.

I think Bush is probably doing more reasoned analysis than you and I put together, but I also have noticed lately that you're jumping on the emotional bandwagon more and more and leaving your critical thinking skills behind. You know my IP Dan and you know I read almost everyday. You and I agree on alot, but I wanted to also point out that I think you're beginning to let your emotions get the better of you and you don't seem to be exhibiting the same critical objective analysis I think you are capable of. I'd like to see you return to that and not climb aboard the feel-good-bash-Bush bandwagon.

Notice that further down your main page you have a post about an even that has been proven to be false in the reporting, yet you've left it stand even though your commentary is off base given the event was a fabrication. There was a day you wouldn't have bought that line, sinker and hook from the MSM, but now you seem more willing to swallow what they throw at you.

I'm just trying to encourage you to return to your more critical thinking self and steer away from the easy acceptance of information you know is more likely than not, to be false.

--Jason

[Jason Coleman]

I understand your comments about Baghdad Dan, and I truely wish Babylon would have been handled differently from the get go. I'm not sure that the "people" here would have had the stomach for what needed to happen in post liberation Baghdad, and given the tendency for the media to flip out and draw parallels, the forced reverse migration of large Baghdadi population back to their original locales would have been twisted by folks at home to be untennable.

Saddam drew in millions to the slums surrounding Baghdad to make any conquest more difficult. It was a brilliant move on his part, but it's also caused a very dangerous mix of people who don't want to be mixed together. Unfortunately, very few have the balls to come out and say that Baghdad needs to be depopulated and development encouraged along the four axes of the Tigres and Euphrates. Althoug I'll note that that's exactly what's happening, and as such migratory development occurs, those newly created neighborhoods have proven to be extremely well managed and peaceful places.

Baghdad will ALWAYS be a problem because of it's historical significance and it's symbolism.

As for post Vietnam generals. I think there are plenty left that want to bring force to bear in an overwhelming way to break the back of the forces arrayed against us. But I'll also note that even when they don't use such force, they get accused of it and the outcry is enormous even if the event the outcry is over is shown to have never occured. I'm directly referring to the 15 "pulverized" buildings in the "airstrike" that never occurred. I'm also indirectly referring to hundreds if not thousands of other "events" that never occurred but have become "outrages" and the hundreds of innocuous events that became "travesties" and "outrages" that never should have so someone can push their "scoop".

The closer and closer I get to the local Iraqi media, the more positive I feel about the conflict in Baghdad/Iraq specifically, the further from Iraq I read, the more horrible it seems. That, to me, is a prime indication that the media functionality is severly broken. When Iraqi's are painting a better picture of their conditions that American media is, something is wrong, wrong, wrong, not with the war, but with the coverage of said war.

I still think that lately, you've allowed an emotionalism into your posts that is doing you a disservice. I'll just leave for today with a word of advice, take it however you wish. When you read a report, question is like you once did. Don't focus on how you feel about it, but rather question whether or not you believe it. Remember when you used to do that Dan? Remember that you were RIGHT in doing so?

Now please, go down and correct that Iraqi Mosque Burning story, OK?

--Jason

[Doc]

It is a great shame, and symptomatic of what wusses we are, that we should view whatever's happening in Iraq as The Issue. It ought to be viewed as a sideshow, the equivalent of a little light colonial policing. Disagreement about the initial invasion should have been similar to the disagreements over how when and whether to invade the Phillipines in WW2; a matter of general tactics/strategy. Concern over whatever's happening there now should be similar to whether we had enough landing craft at Guadalcanal.

We're in a global war against Muslims. The violent ones have thoroughly declared themselves. The 'moderate' ones (what's the definition of a 'moderate' Muslim? he only wants to kill the Jews) actively or tacitly support the violent ones. The only Muslims who don't support the violence are the apostates, the ones who don't take the Koran seriously. If they were Christians, they'd be Episcopalians.

Unfortunately none of our leaders, Dem or Repub, are willing to accurately identify our enemy and vigorously prosecute the war. Only the latter, and one of the former...oh, sorry, they kicked him out, didn't they...are willing to prosecute it at all. I am losing hope that we'll do what's necessary to prevent an even more major attack on this country. I can only hope that we will be willing to do what's necessary after one of our cities becomes a glowing cinder.

[Dan Riehl]

Notice that further down your main page you have a post about an even that has been proven to be false in the reporting, yet you've left it stand even though your commentary is off base given the event was a fabrication.

I don't feel obliged to correct every post. I assume blog readers get a mix of things from around. The response to that generated enough attention, I assume most blog readers realize there was a conflicting report.

But, there again, no response from the White House? No absolute confirmation either way, Jason. Sitting back and just blaming the media isn't a strategy. Someone in the administration has to rebuke these things and it isn't being done.

The Reagan administration undertood the battle and went over the media's head to the people. So it doesn't take a genius to define the strategy. Instead we get Rove pushing a centrist line on immigration. Should I help make that the conventional wisdom, too - even though it isn't?

I've always been a Bush supporter, but he's looking worse and worse everyday. If he plans a moderate approach on key issues over the next two years, I've no intention of carrying his wat for him. He is bringing these things on himself.

[Darren7160]

I love the cowards that cringe in fear... they try to disguse it as patriotism but it isn't. They declare with authority that the muslims are either terrorits, or soon to be terrorists. They see no correlation between action and reaction. To them, I guess that answer is to kill as many muslims as possible until they are cowed? I just don't get it I guess. They yammer on and on about those bad people wanting to kill us and destory everything that American stands for (while it appears that this administration is doing a good job of that by itself).

Because we don't agree with invading and killing everyone in the middle-east we are somewow seen as "weak on terrorism" and other such garbage. Again, what is their solution? Bomb more? Take over more troops? Let the Republicans and President Bush spend 3 years driving it into the ground and then blame the Democrats?

President Bush's political capital is spent. His credibility is gone along with that of our nations. He is schizophranic with the UN, contemtpuous of them before the war, uses their resolutions to justify the war, shuts them out of the war, then wants them to come in and clean up his mess, then tries to get his puppy confirmed to be the Anti-UN Ambassador.

People still talk about his LEGACY! Can you believe that? His legacy! I guess if you think about even a bad legacy as being a legacy, well...

I have never seen such a large group of sniveling cowards in my life. Instead of standing tall, they whine about how everything that happens now is a result of the Republicans loosing the house and senate. My God, they are, if nothing else, masters of twisting reality to rationalize their own failures! Cry me a river about how dissent against President Bush weakens his abilities. Cut the crap. He and the Republicans have not cared about the Democrats for 6 years because we were powerless... now we are supposedly the ones causing this mess? Pull the other one!

Just a word of advice... cowards fear the reaction of terrorists to what America does... Americans who are brave do what it best for our country and the terrorists be damned. From what I have been reading of VP Cheney, President Bush and the Republicans, the terrorists have pretty much defined and controlled what they have done for the past 5 years.

So, go ahead and snivel and whine about how the terrorists are happy with the Democrats winning... someone has to pull this country back from the incredibly ineptitude of the Republican heros... Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Perle, AEI, PNAC and all the other idiots that so arrogantly brought us to where we are. Oh wait! You can blame the Democrats! I forgot. Carry on!

[gil]

Jason

I have read some of your many postings. My friend, you are either looking at a new TV channel out there that no one has ever seen, or you live in the twilight zone.

We are fighting WW III or IV ?
Iraq had all kinds of Chemcical weapons and Uranium?

Really?

Is that happening on hearth?

OH, I guess you are now going to come back and tell me that you are some kind of an intellectual that has figured out the WWIII thing all by you lonesome, and actually found Irak's Uranimum weapons under your bed, not to mention you are a pen pal with Khomeni.

You answer to YYY "You abviously have a very limited understanding of the events and scope of the previous 2 or 3 World Wars"... No Shit!! .... And you do?... 3 World Wars!! Now, that alone tells me that you most be among a select group of humans that lived trough a war that the rest of us mere mortals .... Missed.... Or you don't know how to count... With all due respect of course. And as for the U.S. media.... What's your point? We have a massive conspiracy against "enlightened" people like you and Rush? "The closer and closer I get to the local Iraqi media the more positive news I get"..... So that's the Channel you are watching!!! Iraqi media is now the standard of Journalistic freedom!!! .... When not taken over by Al Sadr Militias of course as it happened just two days ago right? .... Are you for real pall?

Bush by the way, forgot all your "17+ other reasons" fro invading Iraq in his speach to the UN.... So let's just say that the "17 reasons" that were also not mentioned by Powell in his report to the UN came from the Iraqi Channel.

Show me a solid group of historians that is calling Bush's mess in Iraq, or Osama's terrorist attempts against Western Interests as World War III and you actually will have some SERIOUS backing... Until then don't be surprised if you get answers like mine.

[gil]

Dan Rihel

I commend you in you post. I have been following some of your posts in the last few months, and I have to admit that about 95% of the time I disagree with your opinions about Iraq, and Bush.

Your's however is one of the rare Conservative blogs that has the decency to call an incompetent Administration for what they have become.

Thank you for your new found objectivity.... Is a breath of fresh air.

As for Jason. Is funny how for the most part there is always some one out there posting opinions that are complete fabrications, distorsions, very personal opinions, misrepresentation of events, or conspiracy theories ... And actually believes them!! Go figure. Jason, unfortunatelly has a lot in common with a bunch of Neo-Cons that though in their arrogance that they could change the Arab world .... The same Neo-Cons that are now jumping out of the sinking ship.

[jvf]

I remember in the days leading up to the election, Rush Limbaugh saying that the violence in Iraq was an attempt to influence the elections and put D's in power. If so, how do the dittoheads explain what's going on now?

"How strange; democrats take over congress, Iraq EXPLODES, and it's Bush's problem?"

the old congress is still in session. A little early to pin this on the Democrats.

This is a Republican war, folks.

[Nikolay]

Jason:

1) You are talking about the future "Shi'a caliphate". Shi'as make 10% of the worldwide Muslim population. I think you must have noticed that Shi'a and Sunni don't get along well. So the talk about Shi'a caliphate as some real possibility is nonsense.

2) You know, Scientology has some pretty crazy ideas as well. This doesn't prove that it's the great danger to the world. Just to take some lunatic's words at the face value is not always right.

3) Radical Islam works not because of what it stands _for_, but because of what it stands _against_. Kind of similar to Communism. Remember, it all started in Iran, where they overthrew Shah, who was, by all accounts, a bastard. For people in the Middle East Islamism is a symbol of an alternative to corruption, bureaucracy etc.
As with Communism, people find out quite soon that it's not cool to live by Shari'a. This is one of the reasons Iraqi people will never forgive Bush: he brought Mullahs into power in Iraq.

4) This thing about "moderate Muslims not speaking up to terrorism" is pure nonsense. Moderate Muslims said millions of words against terrorism, but nobody cares to listen to them, just as all the people complaining about Human Right Watch only speaking against Israel, not Hezbollah, never care to find out that this is just not true.
"Being Muslim" is in most cases just a cultural identity, a label with almost no meaning. There's too many things under the surface of violent rhetoric of leaders that go unnoticed. There are good grounds to expect that Iran will stop being extremist in a dozen or half a dozen years, for its own internal reasons; unless it goes to war, of course. It's not a backwards country, after all. They have world-famous cinema. They beat Israel, Japan, Germany, Honk Kong, United Kingdom, Australia, France, etc., etc. in Mathematical Olympiads for many years. The election of Ahmadinejad was a direct response to Iraq.

The great war for the "United Caliphate" is totally impossible because of the internal structure of the Islamic population. This idea that Shia's and Sunnis will fight each other until there will be a winner who will "take over the world" is just nuts. The geopolitics of Middle East makes it possible that the region will plunge into the endless civil war, but it also makes sure that there will never be a single winner in such a war.

That is really a bad option, with all the oil in the region, and could cause of a lot of terrorism -- there's no doubt that those people will surely blame US for all their misfortunes, but there's a zero chance that the power capable of world domination would emerge from this fight. This is really a false alarm, especially with other countries that _could_ indeed make US irrelevant in the 21 century. You know, fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, an almost fanatical devotion to the Imam is not enough to take over the modern world.

Hitler, after all, made a lot of great things for his country's economy, meanwhile most of the Islamic radicals are used to making money out of nothing (oil, drugs, etc.) They are not well-adjusted to the "real world".

P.S. Some minor points.
a) You ask: "what are the Islamists doing... in Russia?" Rest assured, they are doing _nothing_ in Russia. There's a civil separatist war in Chechnya (just as in some other places in former USSR). There's some Islamist rhetoric in Chechen's life nowadays. They don't care _shit_ for Islam. They (unfortunately) just turned into a nation of thugs that live very materialistic life.
Otherwise, there are some nations in Russia that are Muslim and always were Muslim. This causes _zero_ troubles.

b)"The closer and closer I get to the local Iraqi media, the more positive I feel about the conflict in Baghdad/Iraq specifically, the further from Iraq I read, the more horrible it seems."
Do you mean "US army media" by "the local Iraqi media"? You know, when you read Iraqi blogs, it seems to be sooo much worse than what MSM tells. Just check the translated messages from Iraqi message boards at Healing Iraq (healingiraq.blogspot.com).

[Jason Coleman]

Let's take the above numbered points quickly.

1. Germany made up less than 10% of the world's Caucasians, but they managed to bring the world to the brink. Likewise the Japanese didn't even make up 10% of the World's Asian population. Italy and Germany combined didn't make up 10% of the European population. Your 10% argument is largely irrelevant.

2. When Scientology starts cutting off heads, suicide bombing, crashing planes into buildings or overthrowing governments, I'll look at them a whole different way. Radical Islam is out there causing far more problems than Scientology, your attempt at comparison seems a bit apples and oranges.

3. Who exactly do you think "radical Islam works" for? Are you suggesting that Radical Islam "works" for any people? Personally, I'm not a big fan of slavery, female circumcision, beheadings, stoning accused adulteresses, dropping brick walls on top of accused homosexuals and the like, I'm also not a huge fan of Radical Islam's "Death to America" mindset. You may think that "radical Islam works" but I'm not going to subscribe to that, especially not as an atheist, they (radical Islam) reserve a very special treatment for the likes of me, and as such, it certainly won't ever "work" for me. (I'm also not a big fan of the "women as chattle" mindset they are so fond of.)

4. I'm not sure who number 4 was direct at, but if it was directed at me, then I suggest you go back and re-read and notice I said nothing about moderate Muslims or their lack of voice. Although I'd certainly say that the moderate Muslim voice is very low in volume compared to radical Muslim voice. I'd love to see alot more moderate Muslim voice out there in the media though. If as you say there are millions of moderate Muslims speaking out, and if as you say there are more moderate Muslims speaking out than there are radical Muslims speaking out, I'd assert that the media is failing to get their moderate messages out there to the people.

As for Chechnya/Russia, I'll agree that alot of that is civil separatist, but not all of it, and I'll also point out that Chechnya is not Russia's only Radical Islamic problem, there's also Kabardino-Balkaria (not Chechen, but close), and I'm sure you know that Osama was behind attacks in Buinalesk and Voldogensk, not the Chechens. Then of course if we stray and take the scope of the former USSR into consideration, we've got troubles in Belarus, the Stans and Ukraine. Your statement that "nothing" is going on in Russia with regards to Radical Islam certainly comes as a surprise to many Russians and former Soviets who died at the hands of non-Chechen Islamists.

As to the poster, Gil above, are you denying that we've recovered hundreds of chemical weapons from Iraq? Are you denying that we've also recovered thousands upon thousands of decalitres or bacillus anthracis and bacillus thuringenisis? are you denying that we've recovered 1.8 tons of enriched uranium? If you are denying any of this, you're simply wrong, we've recovered all of this and none of it was supposed to be in Saddam's possession. Also, of course, let's not forget why the Iraq Documents Portal was closed.

As for Bush's speech to the U.N., if you go back and read it, you'll see that many of the points in both the AUMF (Iraq) and Clinton's Iraqi Liberation Act were mentioned by both Bush and Powell in their U.N. speeches. However, that really means little to me because I see the AUMF and the ILA as far more important than any speech to the U.N.

As for World War 3, many historians and intellectuals have associated the Cold War as World War 3, I understand that many don't as well, which is why I left the option open there.

As for the Media Gil, no I don't think it's a conspiracy against myself or Rush (personally I can count on 1 hand the number of times I've listened to Rush, but that's immaterial). I do certainly feel that the media has frequently fabricated complete lies and misrepresented the truth, and there certainly is a groupthink associated with such fabrications and misrepresentations. As to Iraqi media, just like with any conflict or event, not always, but many times, closer observations tend to be more accurate those taken from afar and then filtered through a partisan prism. Iraqi media is ceratinly not the pinnacle of journalistic freedom and I never made any claim that it is, but if you want to know the truth of what people feel in Germany, you read Der Spiegel, not the Santa Cruz Sentinel. While they certainly have a long way to go, there is a significant independent Iraqi media developing where once there was none, I'm doing my best to pay attention to what they are saying as they are living it day in and day out. Unless you are so prejudiced against Iraqis that you feel they are incapable of reporting on their nation for themselves, I would suggest you look at them as well.

Lastly, I want to go back to the World War 3 (or 4 if you're so inclined). I doubt you'll find many "serious historians" in 1938 calling the rising conflict with Germany, World War 2, nevertheless, Germany had taken over Austria (note that this was AFTER the German Military rolled into the Saar(1935) and the Rhine(1936)). After Czechoslavakia, people still hadn't come to call it World War 2. Japan invaded China in 1937, not many called that World War 2 then either. In April 1939, Italy invaded Albania, yet still few called it WW2. In September 1939, the "World War" appellation was finally applied and began to stick. On paper, the Second World War started on September 3, 1939, but for the Austrians, Czechs, Chinese, Manchurians, Albanians, Poles and others, it had already begun.

I could really care less if you disagree, I could care less if you dispute the facts, we can hash those out or not, but to level the ad hominems isn't necessary.

You may not see this as World War 3, but I think it's already begun, and at some point in the probably very near future, there will be an event like the Gleiwitz event, and a few days later, just as in World War 2, people will use the name, and it'll stick.

[Nikolay]

1) So, in your world-view 9/11, which was perpetuated by Sunni group Al-Qaeda, the same Al-Qaeda that once tried to assassinate Hezbollah's Nasrallah, was the first step for the world-wide Shi'a caliphate? This is kind of sick logic.
And I guess everyone should be friends with bin Laden now, he will definitely be able to help stop this nightmare.
You know, "politics is the art of possible". You have to have some contact with reality to make political opinions.

2) If the serial killer tells you that he is the reincarnation of Jesus Christ, you don't take his words seriously "because he killed so many people". The world caliphate is just another goofy idea.

3) "Radical Islam" works as a political force. People in Russia didn't choose Communism because they wanted to be butchered by someone like Stalin. They chose it because they had million grievances with Czar's rule. Same thing with Islam. Politically, it stands for "responsibility", "power to the people", "moral rule" and the other populist and socialist stuff. Works pretty well in the countries where money are made out of the air (natural resources etc.) and all end up with whoever the westernized corrupt leader is.
The "let's cut all their heads" message works well with some psychotic youth, but not well with the general public. The "let's cut all their heads" message has nothing to do with the political success of revolutionary Islam as far as there is such.
BTW, female circumcision was a common practice in pre-Islamic cultures and has survived in a way of "odd custom". It's expressly forbidden in Koran and most of Islamic scholars call it a crime.

[Devil's Advocate]

Bush has checked out. He is no longer interested. As he has done all his life, he is now leaving it to others to clean up his mess. He is just waiting out his remaining time in office, fully intending to pass on the mess to the next President. And, of course, he and his henchmen are hoping that the next President will be a Democrat, so that he, the other architects of this mess, and the rubber-stamping GOP Congress that aided and abetted this disaster, can blame it all on the Democrats. That's the Republican way of life: make a mess, leave it for others to clean up, and reject all blame.

The Baker initiative is just another PR move. Nothing constructive will come of it.

[Devil's Advocate]

Darren 7160,

"sniveling cowards" is indeed the proper description for both the Bush Administration and the crowd that aided and abetted the monumental disaster that is Iraq in particular, and the total destabilization of the Middle East in general.

The chickenhawks have nothing left to hang their hat on. Expect them to spew more garbage at the majority of Americans who are sick and tired of this endless war, and of the abysmal incompetence demonstrated by the administration both on the domestic and international fronts. They were duped used by the BushCo propaganda machine and they know it. They are full of impotent rage and they are choking on it. It's fun to watch them shout their frustration and hatred in the desert.

[yyy]

I disagree about the Baker group, someone has to try and find a solution that at least minimizes the damage done by Dubya and the neocons.

As far as reading the Koran, well, if I read the Bible I would come away with a view of Christians and Jews as blood thirsty lunatics who believe anyone that believes differently deserves death if they won't convert, wouldn't that be the definition of a 'universalizing religion'

Oh wait, I forgot, "we" in the West are smart enough to understand that the Old Testiment values of death, stoning, killing and enslave your enemies are not appropriate for today, "we" are smart enough to have repudiating the brutal evangelical bent we went on for several centuries in Africa and South America, forcibly converting the locals, "we" understand that the Bible's more bloody and antiquated doctrines are not for actual use in the modern world, e.g. we don't enforce death for disrespecting one's parents or for adultery, but "they" are not that smart, "they" are not able to do what "we" havfe done with our equally blood thirsty, brutal and antiquated religious text.

Got it.

[Devil's Advocate]

YYY,

The Old Testament is downright frightening. It is all about blood, lust, revenge, and killings. But that is what our "moral values" crowd likes... The Taliban has nothing on our fundamentalists "Christians".