Showing posts with label Saddam. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Saddam. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Ahmadinejad Is Our Friend?
The lack of publicly disclosed evidence has led to questions about whether the administration is overstating its case. Some suggest Bush and his aides are pointing to Iran to deflect blame for U.S. setbacks in Iraq. Others suggest they are laying the foundation for a military strike against Iran.
Before invading Iraq, the administration warned repeatedly that Saddam Hussein was developing nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. Those statements proved wrong. The administration's charges about Iran sound uncomfortably familiar to some. "To be quite honest, I'm a little concerned that it's Iraq again," Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV, head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said last week, referring to the administration's comments on Iran.
Before invading Iraq, the administration warned repeatedly that Saddam Hussein was developing nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. Those statements proved wrong. The administration's charges about Iran sound uncomfortably familiar to some. "To be quite honest, I'm a little concerned that it's Iraq again," Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV, head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said last week, referring to the administration's comments on Iran.
Monday, January 08, 2007
O'Rourke on Iraq: Dubya's "Really Violent Bosnia;" and, the problem with Libertarians is that they are too logical.
AA said something about retreating from this crazy blog, and I commend him for it. He needs to focus on what matters. Anyhow, if AA or AI or JJ or Pepe were to read anything this month, this is the article you need to investigate. Unlike O'Rourke, I'd recommend reading Smith's, Wealth of Nations. I can appreciate his desire to bring it to the Modern Man. [note: this was an interview and review by Joseph Rago in The Wall Street Journal published on January 6-7, 2007, page A7.]
O'Rourke sums up what Libertarian Realists have been thinking for some time: "Except as a hard-right conservative myself," he continues, "Bush has been a pretty miserable failure on that front. It's called failure. Bush and the Republicans are offering a Newer Deal, a Greater Society. Where the hell did this come from? And there's no other word for it but failure: failure to control spending, failure domestically and failure in Iraq."
O'Rourke on what that fucking Bush idiot should have stuck with: "I was very much in favor of the Iraq invasion," he says. "What were the questions? Is Saddam Hussein a bad man? Is he doing bad things? Does he have the oil money to do more bad things? Is he likely to do more bad things? If these were the questions, was the answer more cooperation with France?"
After Gulf War One, "the Kuwaitis totally took control, and it was as though somebody had been chased out of, I don't know, Dayton. Everything was working again within days. Civil society came to the fore -- Hayekian social forces. It was amazing. We thought -- I know I thought, knowing a fair number of sophisticated, intelligent Iraqis -- that this would happen in Iraq. You remove the oppressor, and there would be these self-organizing forces. Well, nooo. Instead what you got was Yugoslavia. Triple Yugoslavia. You might call it the really violent Bosnia."
O'Rourke on Libertarians: It's a bit odd to hear P.J. O'Rourke -- who is always calling attention to the fraudulence of earnestness and its Siamese twin, sanctimony -- talk about morality. But his is almost no morality at all, a non-morality, in that it demands nothing: The only basic human right, he says, is "the right to do as you damn well please" and take the consequences. He is not, however, a true libertarian. They're "too logical," he says. "It's a failed but admirable mission. They keep making these suicide attacks on principle, Kamikaze raids on the aircraft carrier of government. . . . Libertarians suffer the same problem that Smith runs into in the last book of 'Wealth of Nations,' which was a pretty considerable failure. He tries to make proscriptions for government that fit his rationalist philosophical and moral logic. Everything comes apart. He's self-evidently wrong, wrong by his own reasoning. The problem with politics is that philosophy and morality are never really options.
O'Rourke sums up what Libertarian Realists have been thinking for some time: "Except as a hard-right conservative myself," he continues, "Bush has been a pretty miserable failure on that front. It's called failure. Bush and the Republicans are offering a Newer Deal, a Greater Society. Where the hell did this come from? And there's no other word for it but failure: failure to control spending, failure domestically and failure in Iraq."
O'Rourke on what that fucking Bush idiot should have stuck with: "I was very much in favor of the Iraq invasion," he says. "What were the questions? Is Saddam Hussein a bad man? Is he doing bad things? Does he have the oil money to do more bad things? Is he likely to do more bad things? If these were the questions, was the answer more cooperation with France?"
After Gulf War One, "the Kuwaitis totally took control, and it was as though somebody had been chased out of, I don't know, Dayton. Everything was working again within days. Civil society came to the fore -- Hayekian social forces. It was amazing. We thought -- I know I thought, knowing a fair number of sophisticated, intelligent Iraqis -- that this would happen in Iraq. You remove the oppressor, and there would be these self-organizing forces. Well, nooo. Instead what you got was Yugoslavia. Triple Yugoslavia. You might call it the really violent Bosnia."
O'Rourke on Libertarians: It's a bit odd to hear P.J. O'Rourke -- who is always calling attention to the fraudulence of earnestness and its Siamese twin, sanctimony -- talk about morality. But his is almost no morality at all, a non-morality, in that it demands nothing: The only basic human right, he says, is "the right to do as you damn well please" and take the consequences. He is not, however, a true libertarian. They're "too logical," he says. "It's a failed but admirable mission. They keep making these suicide attacks on principle, Kamikaze raids on the aircraft carrier of government. . . . Libertarians suffer the same problem that Smith runs into in the last book of 'Wealth of Nations,' which was a pretty considerable failure. He tries to make proscriptions for government that fit his rationalist philosophical and moral logic. Everything comes apart. He's self-evidently wrong, wrong by his own reasoning. The problem with politics is that philosophy and morality are never really options.
Thursday, December 28, 2006
Thursday, November 09, 2006
VDH describes the Pepe's Phalanx of Brown and Red
Be careful of what you wish for
Liberals used to deplore realists—a James Baker (“F*** the Jews” or “Jobs, jobs, jobs”), a Brent Scowcroft (letting the Shiites and Kurds get mowed down by helicopter gunships in late February/early March 1991), or George Bush Senior shaking down the Japanese et al. to pay for the first Gulf War and then leaving Saddam in power to “balance” Iran. But now with Baker and Gates sort of back, and apparent greater reliance on the first Bush’s realism, it will be interesting to see what the Democrats in the House will do—especially if there is a realist-Right and anti-war Left convergence that gives up on Iraq and comes home.
Weird Politics
Since 9/11 I have been fascinated by the Nation/American Conservative affinities—and especially how the “Don’t Support Dictators” abroad protests of the 1960s morphed into a sort of ‘See ya, wouldn’t want to be ya’ about Iraq (cf. Sen. Rockefeller’s statement that the world was better off with Saddam or liberal Dan Rather’s postwar lamentation that it was quieter driving in Baghdad when he used to interview Saddam). Equally interesting is the smash up when multiculturalism (e.g., no culture can be any worse than the West) hits the right-wing, fascistic agenda of Islamic fundamentalism. What an “Other” or “People of Color” Hezbollah or the Muslim Brotherhood are!
I thought something was haywire in the late 1990s when I spoke on California campuses and would see the Hamas booths in the free-speech plazas—right next to the usual 1960s-style teach-ins where Chicanos, blacks, Native Americans, women, etc. handed out pamphlets and megaphoned on American sins. So how did anti-Semitism, gender apartheid, religious intolerance, homophobia, and suppression of free expression synchronize with these groups’ complaints against supposed American fascism?
But it is not just Leftists who are getting what they wished for, but a lot of the neoconservatives as well. It may be that true, as one pundit wrote, that Mark Steyn and myself are about the only two left that both support the war—despite the mistakes—and Rumsfeld in general. But after reading for three years from almost every neoconservative pundit that Rumsfeld should go, they now will get their wish. The only problem is that Gates is more a Baker-realist than a neo-Wilsonian. I suggest they go back and read The Generals’ War or Crusade and review the discussions about not going to Baghdad. That decision, whether right or wrong, was based entirely on realpolitik, not thousands of Iraqis who rose up on our call to overthrow Saddam. Now it might have been defensible not to go to Baghdad in 1991(I would disagree: it was a terrible mistake), but was abjectly amoral to call for insurrection, and then when Kurds and Shiites took us at our word, to have abandoned them.
Liberals used to deplore realists—a James Baker (“F*** the Jews” or “Jobs, jobs, jobs”), a Brent Scowcroft (letting the Shiites and Kurds get mowed down by helicopter gunships in late February/early March 1991), or George Bush Senior shaking down the Japanese et al. to pay for the first Gulf War and then leaving Saddam in power to “balance” Iran. But now with Baker and Gates sort of back, and apparent greater reliance on the first Bush’s realism, it will be interesting to see what the Democrats in the House will do—especially if there is a realist-Right and anti-war Left convergence that gives up on Iraq and comes home.
Weird Politics
Since 9/11 I have been fascinated by the Nation/American Conservative affinities—and especially how the “Don’t Support Dictators” abroad protests of the 1960s morphed into a sort of ‘See ya, wouldn’t want to be ya’ about Iraq (cf. Sen. Rockefeller’s statement that the world was better off with Saddam or liberal Dan Rather’s postwar lamentation that it was quieter driving in Baghdad when he used to interview Saddam). Equally interesting is the smash up when multiculturalism (e.g., no culture can be any worse than the West) hits the right-wing, fascistic agenda of Islamic fundamentalism. What an “Other” or “People of Color” Hezbollah or the Muslim Brotherhood are!
I thought something was haywire in the late 1990s when I spoke on California campuses and would see the Hamas booths in the free-speech plazas—right next to the usual 1960s-style teach-ins where Chicanos, blacks, Native Americans, women, etc. handed out pamphlets and megaphoned on American sins. So how did anti-Semitism, gender apartheid, religious intolerance, homophobia, and suppression of free expression synchronize with these groups’ complaints against supposed American fascism?
But it is not just Leftists who are getting what they wished for, but a lot of the neoconservatives as well. It may be that true, as one pundit wrote, that Mark Steyn and myself are about the only two left that both support the war—despite the mistakes—and Rumsfeld in general. But after reading for three years from almost every neoconservative pundit that Rumsfeld should go, they now will get their wish. The only problem is that Gates is more a Baker-realist than a neo-Wilsonian. I suggest they go back and read The Generals’ War or Crusade and review the discussions about not going to Baghdad. That decision, whether right or wrong, was based entirely on realpolitik, not thousands of Iraqis who rose up on our call to overthrow Saddam. Now it might have been defensible not to go to Baghdad in 1991(I would disagree: it was a terrible mistake), but was abjectly amoral to call for insurrection, and then when Kurds and Shiites took us at our word, to have abandoned them.
the growing revolution, uneasy Warlords, and "Liberal" Democrats
Like I said, when you start giving the masses more and more power, the Sultans grow more and more uneasy.
"Mubarak, a regional heavyweight and a top U.S. ally, appeared to speak for many in the region who are uneasy about seeing a former Arab president tried and sentenced — no matter how much they disliked Saddam's regime."
Also: in our contemporary world, we in the West tend to be easily and understandably offended by singular deaths. It makes sense: thanks to numerous medical discoveries and uncoveries, we're living longer and saucier these days. Therefore, when someone dies, it's hard.
Still, the individual deaths pale in comparison to how many were killed, say, in the American Civil War, taking some 650,000 lives to both keep the Union whole, and, mid-way through, do away with that "peculiar" institution, and emancipate the slaves. It took even longer — about another 100 years — to re-establish Civil Rights.
I think we can all agree that the situation in Iraq and even Afghanistan has been poorly handled. What I wonder is this: do the "Liberal" Democrats have the stomach to re-organize and carry on with bringing more power to the people, both domestically and abroad? Or are they going to continue playing the Victimization game like they did so well in the 19th century, insisting that those "niggers" wouldn't know what to do with themselves if they were free? So is it Abraham Lincoln and Henry Winter Davis, Pepe? Or are you Dems gonna stick with the Stephen A. Douglas and Ulrich B. Phillips game plan?
"Mubarak, a regional heavyweight and a top U.S. ally, appeared to speak for many in the region who are uneasy about seeing a former Arab president tried and sentenced — no matter how much they disliked Saddam's regime."
Also: in our contemporary world, we in the West tend to be easily and understandably offended by singular deaths. It makes sense: thanks to numerous medical discoveries and uncoveries, we're living longer and saucier these days. Therefore, when someone dies, it's hard.
Still, the individual deaths pale in comparison to how many were killed, say, in the American Civil War, taking some 650,000 lives to both keep the Union whole, and, mid-way through, do away with that "peculiar" institution, and emancipate the slaves. It took even longer — about another 100 years — to re-establish Civil Rights.
I think we can all agree that the situation in Iraq and even Afghanistan has been poorly handled. What I wonder is this: do the "Liberal" Democrats have the stomach to re-organize and carry on with bringing more power to the people, both domestically and abroad? Or are they going to continue playing the Victimization game like they did so well in the 19th century, insisting that those "niggers" wouldn't know what to do with themselves if they were free? So is it Abraham Lincoln and Henry Winter Davis, Pepe? Or are you Dems gonna stick with the Stephen A. Douglas and Ulrich B. Phillips game plan?
Sunday, November 05, 2006
Thursday, October 26, 2006
Steyn asks a direct question
“The American people were solidly behind this when you went in and you toppled the Taliban, when you go in and you topple Saddam,” columnist Mark Steyn said to the president. “But when it just seems to be a kind of thankless, semi-colonial, policing, defensive operation, with no end — I mean, where is the offense in this?”
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
what stayin' the course means
The president has shifted language on Iraq before. At a news conference in August, he returned to his prewar argument that Saddam Hussein harbored terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Hussein "had relations with Zarqawi," Bush said. Weeks later, the Senate intelligence committee concluded that Hussein "did not have a relationship, harbor or turn a blind eye to Zarqawi" and that the U.S. government knew that before the invasion. At his next news conference, Bush was asked about that. "I never said there was an operational relationship," he said.
This is reminiscent of Brown (of "you're doing a heckuvah job brownie" fame) who claimed not knowing about the 10,000 people in the superdome. When confronted with the fact that the information had been disclosed by CNN for days, he said he didn't know it "factually".
This is reminiscent of Brown (of "you're doing a heckuvah job brownie" fame) who claimed not knowing about the 10,000 people in the superdome. When confronted with the fact that the information had been disclosed by CNN for days, he said he didn't know it "factually".
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
The trial of Saddam
This has to be one of the most embarrassing fuck ups of this war. Here's a guy whose guilt in countless atrocities is probably just about as undisputable as that of other sorry dictators of last century, from Videla to Pol Pot, yet the courts trying him seem unable to do so without giving the impression of impropriety.
The useful way to nail saddam would have been to try his entourage from the ground up first in order to amass as much evidence as possible and later to go after him based on the fruits of that effort. He's now already managed to mount a successful defense arguing that atrocities were done in the context of the iran-iraq war.
Instead, we are witnessing a pathetic PR attempt at hanging him as quickly as possible that will only serve to make him a martyr. He may get a deserved punishment but the families of his victims will be denied justice as the court is failing to demonstrate his guilt to the arab street - the only one that really matters.
The useful way to nail saddam would have been to try his entourage from the ground up first in order to amass as much evidence as possible and later to go after him based on the fruits of that effort. He's now already managed to mount a successful defense arguing that atrocities were done in the context of the iran-iraq war.
Instead, we are witnessing a pathetic PR attempt at hanging him as quickly as possible that will only serve to make him a martyr. He may get a deserved punishment but the families of his victims will be denied justice as the court is failing to demonstrate his guilt to the arab street - the only one that really matters.
Monday, September 18, 2006
Saddam's Niger Shopping
Now turn to the front page of the June 28 [2004] Financial Times for a report from the paper's national security correspondent, Mark Huband. He describes a strong consensus among European intelligence services that between 1999 and 2001 Niger was engaged in illicit negotiations over the export of its "yellow cake" uranium ore with North Korea, Libya, Iraq, Iran, and China. The British intelligence report on this matter, once cited by President Bush, has never been disowned or withdrawn by its authors. The bogus document produced by an Italian con man in October 2002, which has caused such embarrassment, was therefore more like a forgery than a fake: It was a fabricated version of a true bill.
In now myriad comments, Pepe has disputed Saddam's possession of WMDs as "proven" by Hans Blix and the dictator-friendly UN. AA has pointed out that a couple thousand Kurds can't be wrong and so Saddam certainly had some chems a while back...
Here, Hitchens says Saddam really sent his boys to Niger in spite of what the now-exposed Wilsons say. He has gone on in other more recent essays to say his allegations have not been challenged. In the sidebar a link will send you to an archive of Hitchens' writings. I would be curious to know what Pepe thinks about this.
More here and in its links.
In now myriad comments, Pepe has disputed Saddam's possession of WMDs as "proven" by Hans Blix and the dictator-friendly UN. AA has pointed out that a couple thousand Kurds can't be wrong and so Saddam certainly had some chems a while back...
Here, Hitchens says Saddam really sent his boys to Niger in spite of what the now-exposed Wilsons say. He has gone on in other more recent essays to say his allegations have not been challenged. In the sidebar a link will send you to an archive of Hitchens' writings. I would be curious to know what Pepe thinks about this.
More here and in its links.
Thursday, September 14, 2006
more deception
On Sept. 25, 2002, just days after the CIA received the source's information, President Bush told reporters: "Al-Qaeda hides. Saddam doesn't, but the danger is, is that they work in concert. The danger is, is that al-Qaeda becomes an extension of Saddam's madness and his hatred and his capacity to extend weapons of mass destruction around the world. . . . [Y]ou can't distinguish between al-Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror."
Friday, July 21, 2006
Les grands esprits se rencontrent
The 5,000-word letter is a rambling treatise outlining what Mr. Hussein asserts are the false reasons that the Bush administration used to justify the war in Iraq, from weapons of mass destruction to Iraqi links with Al Qaeda. Mr. Hussein blames Iran and pro-Israel interests for helping lead the Americans into war. He invokes the specter of Vietnam and the spirit of Mao Zedong, saying the Chinese revolutionary is “laughing in his grave because his prediction has been fulfilled and America is a paper tiger.”
Un air de deja vu?
Un air de deja vu?
Saturday, July 15, 2006
what next?
Today, these four--two states, one near-state, and one state-within-a-state--are collectively motivated by opportunity, not fear. The opportunity arises partly because the hated Saddam Hussein is gone, replaced by a weak, terrorist-wracked Shiite-led Iraqi government, propped up by a bleeding America. But each of these actors has its own reasons for exultation and brinkmanship.
Monday, March 27, 2006
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