Redstate

It looks like you may be right. The Sunnis are marked for death as soon as we leave. Ironically, or stupidly, that's what they are fighting to make us do. Maybe this administration believes that having the Sunnis forever wiped from the map in Iraq might not be such a bad thing. As soon as we leave, wiped from the map is what they will be.

To make such sweeping statments without reference or facts............
You must write for MSNBC
:)
But if your right....

Our troops in Iraq kill al qaida and other terrorists everyday in Iraq. Everyday our troops pursue their mission in Iraq they chip away at the mistrust our betrayal of Iraqis when we cut and ran after exhorting them to rise up against Saddam. Wars are not known to be lost until they are lost, not when responsibility free talking head peanut gallery wags make learned pronouncements. WWII was lost in the middle of the Battle of the Bulge. Our Revolution was lost at Valley Forge. The Civil War was lost until Atlanta fell. Iraq will not be lost unless appeasers choose to lose.

You revere a 1991 war that war , the waging of which was dictated by the lowest common denominator of the sainted coalition. That coalition's policy chose to lose the war by the main criteria of history, ie it left the aggressor regime in power. Plus it left thousands of rebel allies to be massacred.

It left what your ilk describes in Iraq today, ie a "mess." Most of the mess was not on CNN. They were not allowed to film the mass graves. But they were allowed to film Saddam's TV suicide bomber scholarship shoes.

When did the left stop rejoicing at the freedom of 50 million? When JFK was murdered? And btw, that was murder. What is happening in Iraq is voluntary sacrifices for your freedom.

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"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

Rest assured they've their own agenda at this point that is unaffected by any "warm fuzzies" inspired by the actions of our troops. They have a theocratic, authoritarian, fundamentalist world view utterly alien to most Americans. These are not our friends. We may serve each other's interests now and then, but that's as far as it goes. To establish a genuine rapport with a people this different from our way of thinking takes decades, such as our relationship with the House of Saud.

And if you're implying that 50 million Iraqis are now free, I struggle to see how. They can't assemble for fear of massacre. They can't speak for fear of assassination or torture. They can't worship when their mosques are destroyed and ethnic cleansing rages through neighborhoods. And as George Will sagely observed, their last election was largely an ethnic census. It pains me to say it, but their lives were better under Saddam than they've been in the last six months.

And BTW, sneaking up on some sleeping Hessians would have been a victorious fluke in our Revolution without the eventual connivance of the French. And if one has to pick a single point, WWII was won at Stalingrad. Iraq was lost when Rumsfeld and Bremer were appointed...

is about as argumentively supportive as your flip comment on Iraq. The problem with any big change in direction, like going into an unknown Iraq, exiting an unknown Iraq will have large unforseen consequences. We broke it, we own it. We walk away at the peril of millions of lives.

50 million in Afghanistan and Iraq combined. The facts on the ground do not refute the fact that Aghans and Iraqis, anymore than residents of Washington, DC, are free from tyrannical regimes that brutalized them and posed threats to us. See death rate comparisons below based on UN data.

Therefore, the wars have been glorious successes as per the major US goals and have gone a long way, esp in areas outside Baghdad, towards Iraqi goals for a stable society.

George Will can't count. Saddam killed hundreds of thousands political critics and started wars that killed over a million. He sponsored terrorists. He would have nukes now if we had let Hans bl ix declare him rehabbed.

see powerline

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/015994.php

excerpt

The United Nations said Wednesday that 3,709 Iraqi civilians were killed in October, the highest monthly toll since the March 2003 U.S. invasion and another sign of the severity of Iraq's sectarian bloodbath.

That compares to an estimated 3,500 killed in July. If 3,709 people were murdered in October, that translates to a rate of 171 per 100,000. That is a high rate of violent death. But, for purposes of comparison, the murder rate in Washington, D.C. in 1991 was 80 per 100,000. So the rate of violence in Iraq today is just over double the rate in the District during the first Bush administration. I don't recall anyone describing conditions in Washington in the early 90s as a "bloodbath."

I wrote in June that based on the data at that time, the murder rate in Iraq outside of Baghdad is about the same as American cities like Chicago, Philadelphia and Milwaukee. With the current numbers, it looks like that would still be true.

A consensus seems to have developed that Iraq is a disaster because of out-of-control sectarian violence. That consensus is driving proposals to change our policy in Iraq, perhaps in the direction of a pull-out that could lead to truly cataclysmic violence. So I think it makes sense to step back and get a more realistic picture of the level of what is happening in Iraq: violent? Yes. A disaster comparable to a civil war? No.

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"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

First, my understanding is that the figures cited by Powerline are minima that only include registered morgue tallies and bodies collected and recorded off the streets. A large and unknown number simply disappear and are dumped or quietly buried without tally.

Second, I can play with numbers for effect, too. We've roughly ten times the population of Iraq...imagine at least 30,000 Americans dying violently in our streets each month, as opposed to about 1K currently. Imagine taking 9/11-level casualties from mass political violence every day or two. And also imagine if, proportionally, 20 million Americans had fled the United States in three years, 4 million were displaced around the country, and another million were fleeing across the border each month. This is, proportionally, what Iraq is experiencing.

And third, Iraqis are most certainly not free of a tyrannical regime brutalizing them, when they must live in constant fear of thugs in government uniforms dragging them from their homes and leaving them dead in the street with their eyes gouged out. Whether this regime poses a threat to us remains to be seen...we'll see who Maliki has to sell his soul to in an attempt to extend his writ beyond the Green Zone. So far, it's Sadr.

you play games with imaginary numbers, and the residents of Washington, DC live in under a tyrannical regime half as bad as Iraq's, so therefore

The US should bring its troops home and protect them as we wait for the next 911 so we can try and accomplish a goal of finding the one man that leads the next attack, so long as we don't use wiretaps, don't make detainees with info on the cave location stay awake past their bedtime, deprive said detainees of a NY lawyer, or have it last longer than the regular 13 week period for initial episodes of new Tv program debuts. And if we find that the enemy decides to blow themselves and grocery stores up we repeat the process.

Got it.

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Before 9/11 al Qaida was not connected to 9/11.
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

I didn't say the UN numbers were "wrong", I simply pointed out that there is a context in which they should be taken as minimal estimates, rather than comprehensive values, given the severe challenges in getting accurate values and near certainty that a great many deaths are not reported. Do I take it that you have some contrary evidence that these values are exact?

And actually, I was rather kind to Powerline. They cherry-picked one time in one city to compare to the current average in the entire country of Iraq, selecting a few square miles 15 years ago in a single Ameican urban area for comparison.

And I'm not sure how your closing rant has anything to do with what I said. I made no comment whatsoever about wiretapping or interrogation techniques.

But if we are having little or no effect on the progression of violence in Iraq, then I see no reason for us to stay. If the same result will occur pulling out now versus pulling out one, five, ten years from now, then the primary difference is thousands of additional wasted American combat casualties.

If we are honestly making a difference, we should stay. But I don't see that the essential metrics indicate that this is happening. The government is dysfunctional and very literally at war with itself. Ethnic cleasing is rampant. Reconstruction is sputtering out. Operation Together Forward was ineffectual and violence is returning to "cleared" areas, surging elsewhere. Iraqi troop readiness is faltering. The populace is fleeing, most importantly the best and brightest of the Iraqis who have any hope of running the place.

In my opinion, we made a critical mistake in the war in projecting our own values onto Iraqis. We like to believe that folks around the world all secretly want to be like Americans and live in prosperous democratic harmony with one another. A great many don't, apparently including Iraqis, and we vastly underestimated not only the structure of their society and the long repressed antagonisms waiting to be unleashed with the toppling of Saddam, but also the deep extent of the trauma and indoctrination of the populace to violence that occurred under his regime. We expected them to act rationally, and much of what we've done would have worked if they had. But they haven't, aren't, and won't, because sadly they've become a violent people. And I have no idea how we can heal them at this point.

It's a veritable Pike Wall!

"Any love letter is incomplete without a Ronald Reagan quote"
--my sophomore year roommate

The trolling is bad enough, but to do with so deficient a grasp of the basic facts -- inexcusable.

In order to regain your posting privileges, send the following information, with links, to the contact form:

(1) Which generals in the DoD called for "overwhelming force" when the war began or before, and not in subsequent testimony to Congress? Omit any general getting even over the Crusader.

(2) How many 36-42 year olds enlisted for the first time following the increased recruiting age?

(3) Define "power curve."

(4) Following on (3), apply it to the concept of counterinsurgency.

(5) Define "total war." Give three examples accepted by military historians of at least Hastings's credit.

(6) How many quarters, since March 2003, have the United States armed forces (specifically Army and Marines) missed their recruiting and retention goals?

(7) Since January 1, 2005?

(8) What is the rate at which Iraq War veterans re-enlist or renew their commissions?

(9) What was the first Bush administration's official advice to the Iraqi Shi'i?

As I doubt you even know where to look to find this information, so this is just kind of an odd tossaway. If you respond, with links, and the links check out, we may let you back in.

Good luck.

-----------
Even those who learn from history are surrounded by those doomed to repeat it.

it looks like, and if true, then praise the Lord.

Yes, I love the South, respect the Confederate soldiers and the struggle for government by the consent of the governed, but I am an American first by God's providence.

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

Once a certain threshold of violence has been reached, it comes down to the total submission or elimination of one side of the conflict. Problem with the modern USA is the threshold is so high it takes catastrophes to make total victory possible, but even then for only a very limited time. Problem with the UN is it stops some conflicts well short of total victory and results in an ongoing wound that will not heal.

Sorry, which of the Shiites in Iraq are allied with us?

I'm sorry, but where did Tom H say that the Shiites were ALLIED with us? I also didn't see him say that the Shiites were our FRIENDS. I read him to be saying that the Shiites are removing the Sunnis, who've been most sympathetic to al Qaeda and unwilling to cooperate with the new government. Once they're gone or drastically depleted in number, the Shia can then bring the country under control. Fine with me.

And, in the future, if the Iraqi Shia nation starts threatening US interests in the region---more rubble, less trouble.

"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)

That 200 dead Shiite discovered this week that the Sunnis are still more than willing to commit all sorts of evil as well.

"There are those who look at things the way they are, and ask why... I dream of things that never were and ask why not." George Bernard Shaw

That 200 dead Shiite discovered this week that the Sunnis are still more than willing to commit all sorts of evil as well.

My understanding is that the suspicion is that it was al-Qaeda behind the bombings.

If we're talking about the same incident (the Sadr city triple bombings?).

SMG

I'm sorry, but where did Tom H say that the Shiites were ALLIED with us?

The title of his post: "Our Shiite Allies Are Winning For Us"

SMG

Our Shiite allies are getting rid of the problem using atrocity-dripping means which we can't use, but they can.

My emphasis.

"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)

Our Shiite allies are getting rid of the problem using atrocity-dripping means which we can't use, but they can.

My bust. 20 pushups. But, it seems Tom H has a few bones to pick with you, so I won't take up any more of your time.

"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)

The title of my post says that I consider Iraq's Shiites to be our allies and, in fact, they are, just as the Soviet Union was our ally in World War Two. I did not say that Iraq's Shiites are our friends. Allies are not necessarily friends.

There are Shiite groups in Iraq which are allied with Iran rather than America, but the majority of Shiites are our allies, and many of them are our friends. IMO the majority of Shiites are not our friends. A plurality are.

SMG,

I take you are unaware of an organization commonly known as Al Qaeda.

I take you are unaware of an organization commonly known as Al Qaeda.

I take you didn't read my post above?

A good idea is to think first and then type. It usually results in more cogent comments.

SMG

SMG,

You asked for that one. We conquered Iraq to prevent its further use as a base for terrorism against us, particularly state-sponsored terrorism. Our principal enemy was Al Qaeda, whose 9/11 planners were either trained at Saddam's terrorist training facility at Salman Pak, or trained by those who were.

This objective required that we change Iraq's rule from its Sunni Arab minority to its Shiite majority. The one thing we can count on from Iraq's Shiites is that they will not cooperate with Al Qaeda, or conduct terrorism against us at home.

You seem unaware of the differences between Persian and Arab Shiites. Read up on those.

Or keep on proving how little you know about these matters.

Our principal enemy was Al Qaeda, whose 9/11 planners were either trained at Saddam's terrorist training facility at Salman Pak, or trained by those who were.

I guess if you say something enough it eventually becomes true.

"There are those who look at things the way they are, and ask why... I dream of things that never were and ask why not." George Bernard Shaw

SMG,

Read it and weep - http://politics.guardian.co.uk/archive/article/0,,4296646,00.html

"In Ankara, Zeinab was debriefed by the FBI and CIA for four days. Meanwhile he told the INC that if they wished to corroborate his story, they should speak to a man who had political asylum in Texas - Captain Sabah Khodad, who had worked at Salman Pak in 1994-5. He too has now told his story to US investigators. In an interiew with The Observer, he echoed Zeinab's claims: 'The foreigners' training includes assassinations, kidnapping, hijacking. They were strictly separated from the rest of us. To hijack planes they were taught to use small knives. The method used on 11 September perfectly coincides with the training I saw at the camp. When I saw the twin towers attack, the first thought that came into my head was, "this has been done by graduates of Salman Pak".'

Zeinab and Khodad said the Salman Pak students practised their techniques in a Boeing 707 fuselage parked in the foreigners' part of the camp. Yesterday their story received important corroboration from Charles Duelfer, former vice chairman of Unscom, the UN weapons inspection team.

Duelfer said he visited Salman Pak several times, landing by helicopter. He saw the 707, in exactly the place described by the defectors. The Iraqis, he said, told Unscom it was used by police for counter-terrorist training. 'Of course we automatically took out the word "counter",' he said. 'I'm surprised that people seem to be shocked that there should be terror camps in Iraq. Like, derrrrrr! I mean, what, actually, do you expect? Iraq presents a long-term strategic threat. Unfortunately, the US is not very good at recognising long-term strategic threats.'

Saddam Hussein's regime trained non-Iraqi Arab terrorists in EXACTLY the hijacking techniques used on 9/11. If the 9/11 planners weren't trained themselves at Salman Pak, they were likely trained by those who were.

Denial of this is falling for the enemy's plausible deniability games - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plausible_deniability

"Plausible deniability is the term given to the creation of loose and informal chains of command in government. In the case that assassinations, false flag or black ops or any other illegal or otherwise disrespectable and unpopular activities become public, high-ranking officials may deny any connection to or awareness of such act, or the agents used to carry out such act.

In politics and espionage, deniability refers to the ability of a "powerful player" or actor to avoid "blowback" by secretly arranging for an action to be taken on their behalf by a third party - ostensibly unconnected with the major player."

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"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

From the 9/11 Comission on June 16th, 2004

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,122821,00.html

"The commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks reported Wednesday there was "no credible evidence" that Saddam Hussein helped Al Qaeda target the United States.

In a chilling report that sketched the history of Usama bin Laden's network, the commission said his far-flung training camps were "apparently quite good." Terrorists-to-be were encouraged to "think creatively about ways to commit mass murder," it added.

Bin Laden made overtures to Saddam for assistance, the commission said in the staff report, as he did with leaders in Sudan, Iran, Afghanistan and elsewhere as he sought to build an Islamic army."

From the White House's press conference transcripts, August 21st, 2006:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/08/20060821.html

BUSH: The terrorists attacked us and killed 3,000 of our citizens before we started the freedom agenda in the Middle East.

QUESTION: What did Iraq have to do with it?

BUSH: What did Iraq have to do with what?

QUESTION: The attack on the World Trade Center.

BUSH: Nothing. Except it’s part of — and nobody has suggested in this administration that Saddam Hussein ordered the attack. Iraq was a — Iraq — the lesson of September 11th is take threats before they fully materialize, Ken. Nobody’s ever suggested that the attacks of September the 11th were ordered by Iraq.

... but the Select Committe on Intellegence report also dismissed the Salman Pak story. Their September 8th, 2006 report concluded that "[p]ostwar findings support the April 2002 Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) assessment that there was no credible reporting on al-Qa'ida training at Salman Pak or anywhere else in Iraq."

Here is the report as a PDF. http://intelligence.senate.gov/phaseiiaccuracy.pdf

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"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

I don't understand your response. al-Qaeda has attacked us before 9/11 and is determined to do so in the future; it is well documented that Al Qaida elements plotted 9/11 for years with the help of Saudi Wahhabist money, a friendly network in Afghanistan and Waziristan and well-educated recruits from all ranks of Saudi, UAE, Egyptian and Lebanese society.

But they weren’t doing it in Iraq or with the help of Iraqis... if the DIA, the Select Committee on Intelligence, the 9/11 Commission and the President are to be believed, that is. Furthering the myth of Iraqi involvement in 9/11 does us no good in figuring out a way to win the global war on terror, and it certainly does us no good in figuring our way out of the failed state that is Iraq.

based on prior attacks. Prior to 1993, Saddam trained terrorists at Salman pak; harbored abu Nidal, another terrorist abu and YASIM, who was the #3 planner on WTC 1993; was cited by the Clinton Adminm as collaborating with UBL in Sudan wmd production; publicly sponsored suicide bombers; tried to assassinate Bush41; was discovered to be 6 months from having a nuke in 1993 when we thought they were 5 years away; committed acts of war against US aircraft on a daily basis; refused to comply with UN resolutions that demanded he disprove wmd; and

violated, for 11 years, a ceasefire of a war Americans died to achieve.

Bush has said we don't have "PROOF" Saddam was "involved" in 9/11. But Iraq was a terror sponsor state and had contacts with al qaida. But even if he had never had contacts with al qaida

HE WAS AN INDEPENDANT threat before 911 as al Qaida was prior to 911 and a known threat after 1995. Saddam defied us daily after 911. If our word that we would not abide terror sponsors was to mean anything and have any deterrent effect to terror sponsors states, we had to make our word real as per Saddam, esp given the wmd combo that Clinton spoke eloquently and in dire tones of.

Had we eliminated al qaida prior to 911, 911 would not have occurred.

Iraq will not achieve a 911 thanks to GWB.

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

The 9/11 Commission did not say that terrorists weren't trained to hijack airliners at Salman Pak.

There was an airliner fuselage hulk at Salman Pak which the Iraqi government under the Saddam Hussein regime said was used for counter-terrorist training. I repeat what arms inspector Duelfer said:

"Duelfer said he visited Salman Pak several times, landing by helicopter. He saw the 707, in exactly the place described by the defectors. The Iraqis, he said, told Unscom it was used by police for counter-terrorist training. 'Of course we automatically took out the word "counter",' he said. 'I'm surprised that people seem to be shocked that there should be terror camps in Iraq. Like, derrrrrr! I mean, what, actually, do you expect? Iraq presents a long-term strategic threat."

And I repeat the definition of plausible deniability:

"... deniability refers to the ability of a "powerful player" or actor to avoid "blowback" by secretly arranging for an action to be taken on their behalf by a third party - ostensibly unconnected with the major player."

Groucho Marx is appropo here: "Who are you going to believe? Me, or your own lying eyes?"

American forces captured Salman Pak with the airliner fuselage still there. We had testimony from camp staff that they had trained non-Iraqi Arab terrorists at Salman Pak. They just didn't know which terrorist groups their students were affiliated with, on the entirely understandable basis that they didn't need to know that.

The 9/11 Commission resolutely refused to connect any dots. And it missed lots of things.

There was no ****ing way after 9/11 that the United States would tolerate the continued existence of any foreign government which had trained terrorists to hijack airliners. And we didn't.

I guess if you say something enough it eventually becomes true.

If you are please go to your blackboard and write 500 times the economy is great.

Then 500 times we are killing al quaeda operatives in Iraq.

Then 500 times lowering taxes has raised revenue.

Then 500 times Stay the course may not be much of a plan but its more of a plan than nothing.

Because the surest way to freedom is complete and utter ignorance.

Very Orwellian of you. O'Brien would be proud.

"There are those who look at things the way they are, and ask why... I dream of things that never were and ask why not." George Bernard Shaw

don't be a fool. it is the media that is keeping people ignorant and without the slightest shred of perspective. Orwellian is a good descriptor for the (in)version of the Ministry of Truth we are burdened with.

if you lefties would stop calling "up" "down" and vice-versa. one of us is orwellian, but it ain't me.

(I say inversion in the above post, because rather than being a tool of the government, it is actively working against it)

So who is it that is informing YOU of the truth?

Odd that you would use a concept like the Ministry of Truth to describe the largest check against Government corruption we have.

But I guess in this brave new world it is the government we should trust and the media we shouldn't. Not that this is anything new. Jefferson was lamenting the evils of the Press 200+ years ago because they wouldn't play ball with him either.

"There are those who look at things the way they are, and ask why... I dream of things that never were and ask why not." George Bernard Shaw

is the notion that our current media is a check on any type of vice rather than its defender.

General vitriol against the media seems to serve little purpose especially when you are dealing with such a vast group of individuals such as the hundreds of thousands of people involved in the media.

"There are those who look at things the way they are, and ask why... I dream of things that never were and ask why not." George Bernard Shaw

There were numerous media stories about the good purposes lies can serve and that it can be a good thing. Then recently there were stories about the therapeutic values of losing you temper after Clinton revealed Mr Hyde on FNC.

Its all about sex

contrast this with

bushlied
Cheney's FU to Leaky Leahey on the senate floor

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"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

It seems that the surest way to a majority in the House and Senate is complete and utter ignorance.

What better leader than she who doesn't know what we can't do?
--
Iraq "is now becoming a magnet for terrorists from all over the world who will fight our men and women in uniform, and they have not made us safer, they have not reduced the threat of terrorism in the world by the actions they have taken in Iraq," -- Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi, who apparently lives in Iraq.

UBL brought the war to our soil assuming we wouldn't act boldly. We got him and his org. But in Iraq, if we leave withthe world seeing a lack of resolve, we will be showing the next bin laden how to defeat us.

Iraqis know now that we are not going to use our entire military to stabilize their country for eternity. Our job in training an Iraqi army and police to ensure the elected government will not fall to Saddam's Baathist deadenders and al qaida is not completed. Our commitment was not and is not simply to liberate and any pre-text that claims such would be exploited in the Muslim world to declare a victory for al qaida. That we cannot abide. Nor can we once again, as in 1991, abandon allies we have encouraged to fight for their freedom. If we did such a thing, why would any nation fear us in the future with a sure-fire blueprint on how to defeat us?

You are concerned with the Hostility towards us over the war from the dictator and appeasement club at the UN that hasn't killed one American, when it is the hostility towards us prior to 9/11 that made removal of the Iraqi regime and defeat our all our enemies in the region which has killed thousands of Americans.

Just now, we have Iran surrounded on two sides and four carrier groups in the Gulf while the world exhibits no hostility towards the worlds greatest terror sponsor nation as it foment wars in Lebanon and Israel, aid and abet insurgent enemies of the US in Iraq and develops nuclear weapons. A nation with a stated intent to wipe Israel off the face of the earth. Crickets are heard chirping as one strains to hear hostility towards Iran.

Quitters, yellow bellies, soft and weak people and nations can't fool their enemies with an exit strategy rationalization.

see Mark Steyn's takes

What does it mean when the world's hyperpower, responsible for 40 percent of the planet's military spending, decides that it cannot withstand a guerrilla war with historically low casualties against a ragbag of local insurgents and imported terrorists? You can call it "redeployment" or "exit strategy" or "peace with honor" but, by the time it's announced on al-Jazeera, you can pretty much bet that whatever official euphemism was agreed on back in Washington will have been lost in translation. Likewise, when it's announced on "Good Morning Pyongyang" and the Khartoum Network and, come to that, the BBC.

For the rest of the world, the Iraq war isn't about Iraq; it's about America, and American will.

read it all

http://www.suntimes.com/news/steyn/132340,CST-EDT-steyn12.article

- From America Alone: The End of the World as We Know it, by Mark Steyn.

Visitors to America often remark on that popular T-shirt slogan usually found below a bold Stars and Stripes: "These Colours Don't Run." To non-Americans, it can seem a trifle touchy. But for a quarter century the presumption of the country's enemies was that those colours did run -- they ran from Vietnam, they ran from the downed choppers in the Iranian desert, they ran from Somalia. Even the successful campaigns -- the inconclusively concluded 1991 Gulf War and the air-only 1999 Kosovo war -- seemed manifestly designed to avoid putting those colours in the position of having to run. As Osama saw it, those colours ran from the African embassy bombings and the Khobar towers, just as Zarqawi figured those colours would run from the Sunni Triangle. Being seen not to run -- or, if you prefer, being seen to show "resolve" -- should be the indispensable objective of U.S. foreign policy. Were these colours to run from Iraq, it would be the end of the American era -- for why would Russia, China or even Belgium ever again take seriously a superpower that runs screaming for home at the first pinprick?

Don't take Osama's, or Saddam's, or Mullah Omar's, or the Chinese politburo's word for it. Consider those nations who (a) regard themselves as broadly well-disposed toward America and (b) share the view that Islamism represents a critical global security threat, yet (c) have concluded that the United States lacks the will to get the job done. You hear such worries routinely expressed by the political class in India, Singapore and other emerging nations. The British historian Niall Ferguson talks about "the clay feet of the colossus." Admiral Yamamoto's "sleeping giant" has become harder to rouse -- the La-Z-Boy recliner's a lot more comfortable and pampering than the old rocker on the porch. In Vietnam, it took 50,000 deaths to drive the giant away; maybe in the Middle East, it will only take 5,000. And maybe in the next war the giant will give up after 500, or 50, or not bother at all. Our enemies have made a bet -- that the West in general and the United States in particular are soft and decadent and have no attention span. America has the advantage of the most powerful army on the face of the planet, but she doesn't have the stomach for war, so it's no advantage at all. After all, if you were a typical viewer of CNN International, what would have made the biggest impression on you since Sept. 11? That America has the best, biggest and most technologically advanced military on the planet? Or that the minute you send it anywhere hysterical congressmen are shrieking that we need an "exit strategy"? The corpulent snorer in the La-Z-Boy recliner may have a beautifully waxed Ferrari in the garage, but he hates having to take it out on the potholed roads. Still, it looks mighty nice parked in the driveway when he washes it.

read it all

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=99dda468-7db7-4a21-a334...

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"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

---
"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson

This isn't about Iraq and the Iraqi people and the Iraqi government.

It's about the U.S. and the American people and the American government.

We announce a timetable in Iraq, or cut and run, and it's the official death knell of the American Age. Perhaps that time is now, and the world is ready to descend into the long darkness, but God... I hope not. I tremble for the world my son will inherit if our will breaks now.

-TS

"What is a moderate interpretation of the text? Halfway between what it really means and what you'd like it to mean?" - Justice Antonin Scalia

Re: Admiral Yamamoto's "sleeping giant" has become harder to rouse

I think that's a curious assertion when just five years we roused quite ferociously. Anyone looking at the American response to 9-11 could hardly conlcude that an attack on America would produce anything but a most devastating response.

Re: In Vietnam, it took 50,000 deaths to drive the giant away; maybe in the Middle East, it will only take 5,000.

It is not the deaths. It's the perception (as in Vietnam) that our government not only lacks a strategy for winning, but is not even sure what winning means. Compare these conflicts to WWII or the Civil war where victory was simply and plainly defined and we clearly had a strategy for achieving it, albeit one that occasionally ran into serious roadblocks.

Re: America has the advantage of the most powerful army on the face of the planet, but she doesn't have the stomach for war, so it's no advantage at all.

And yet if this perception exists, it lives alongside the converse criticism, much heard from the international Left, that America is fiercely militaristic and imperialist power.

Is America safer risking the consequences of being perceived by the International Left as militaristic imperialists (a lie) or risking the consequences of being perceived as a country that will choose to give up when faced with serious road blocks rather than adapt our strategies to our enemies' use of differing tactics?

Tough choice, but I think I hate 911s worse than being spoken ill of by disarmed appeasing barren old bags of dying old Europe. Crazy, I know, but that's my choice.

And yes, Americans during WWII were pleased as punch to suffer more losses in single days than we have lost since the end of the Vietnam war thru today because they all knew we had a clear strategy that could not fail despite roadblocks that took out the equivalent of small towns. Right. As the names the dead came in, they all said to each other, well, all is well, because we have the strategy.

NO. They had the will to never, never, never, never, give in and the common sense to know that their is no foolproof strategy. The left seems to think that people in WWII knew the war would end in 1945 since it did. Its in the history books after all.

The "perception" was that we could not and would not let ourselves lose, as a people. That we elected our leaders and trusted our military to do all they could. To adapt to what the enemy did.

Yes, and in 1932, 1934 and 1940 they rejected strategies that could have prevented the carnage but didn't because they didnt have the will. They had the strategy then and it would have been much easier.

You also exhibit the same ongoing misunderstanding of our response to 911. Our response to 911 is necessarily similar and quite different from the one to Pearl harbour.

The same, in that we decided that we must eliminate the threat from the direct source of the attack, ie Japan. Which is analogous to what we have done and are doing in Afghanistan. But we also decided that we had to eliminate the overall threat from fascist forces. The strategy was to destroy their armies. That strategy required constantly changing tactics.

And yet, in the Pacific, the strategy did not win the war. The new bomb did.

In this war we also seek to destroy the enemy "forces" but unlike WWII we face a different kind of army. We face an army that is dispersed, even within our country, an enemy that cannot be deterred by threats of death and destruction to a homeland, and by agents that seek no particular goal, but a general goal of terror in a long term plan for us to fall or at least be weakened and deterred from stopping their march in the Middle East.

You see, what we are doing in Iraq IS PART OF THE ONGOING RESPONSE TO 911!!!!!!!!!!! That's what the Left still doesn't gets. We aren't going to wait for the next 911.

Moreover, for the first time we face an insurgency that is willing to kill themselves as a strategy to defeat the liberal American stomachs via TV, Even if the death rate is only twice that of the murder rate in DC.

It seems to be working, based on what you say.

What we are trying to do is hard. But what we are trying to preserve is precious. Our Liberty.

What enrages us is that the left thinks that we can call off the war unilaterally. That leaving Iraq is an option. That we can choose to lose because of a nebulous complaint of the lack of a strategy and that since we quit beacuse of this reason that the only consequence is to the GOP and Bush and not America.

The war will go on for our lifetimes on someone's soil.

There is a strategy that would work. We could use the strategy that we did in Japan all over the Middle east, even in Britain. We could nuke them all and watch the insurgencies cease. Is that what you want? because that is what will be the natural result of quitting.

Because in the end, even libs will eventually act. Its just that the Left will wait till the only option left is mass slaughter.

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

Re: And yet, in the Pacific, the strategy did not win the war. The new bomb did.

Well, yes. but...
The a-bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki won WWII in the same sense that Grant taking Richmond and not Sherman's march through the deep South won the Civil War: both were the immediate contingent reasons for the enemy's surrender. Yet I would propose that an atomic bomb could have been used in 1941 and it would not have won WWII, nor would the fall of Richmond in 1862 have done the trick for the Civil War. In both cases the enemy had to be defeated very thoroughly everywhere else and brought to the brink of surrender before being pushed over the line by the final strokes.

And I really think you are talking past my basic point about Iraq (and by extension, about Vietnam). Of course no one in 1942 knew how or when WWII would end. And certainly the issue in the Civil War hung in balance too, with large numbers of Northerners ready to quit the effort due to the apparent long-lasting stalemate: it took Sherman's victory at Atlanta to convince the North that it was winning. But here in Iraq we do not have a Sherman at Atlanta moment; we are simply left with the impression that the administration is incompetent to prosecute this war in a manner leading to victory and while I was initially in favor, with reservations, of this effort, I have come to believe that the Bush administration has indeed disastrously botched the job, damaging us quite seriously in the larger struggle.

Finally I too am not concerned with the opinions the world Left has of us, perhaps indeed I welcome it since, as Machiavelli said, it's nice to be loved but essential to be feared in international politics. But I am puzzled at how you think two diametrically opposed perceptions of the US can exist at the same time: that of a weak nation and that of an aggressive empire-building nation, and I actually suspect the former is not really what the world thinks of us at all, but rather the latter. And if Osama bin Laden thinks we are weak and inacpable of fighting then he is stark raving nuts and I doubt Allah Himself could correct his idiocy.

But I am puzzled at how you think two diametrically opposed perceptions of the US can exist at the same time

I suppose the same way "two diametrically opposed perceptions" of anything and everything can exist at the same time. Choose any issue or topic and there are going to be perceptions held by different people that are 180 degrees opposite. So if you are puzzled here, you should really be in a perpetual state of puzzlement.

And if Osama bin Laden thinks we are weak and inacpable of fighting then he is stark raving nuts and I doubt Allah Himself could correct his idiocy.

He has a reasonable basis for believing this. He's interested in the long game. If he has to lose some of his generals and troops, he has no problem paying that price. He places little value on their lives. He knows if he can hold out long enough, he will win. We've proved that much in every conflict since WWII.
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"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson

that you would have been able to add WWII to the list had it not been for the A-bomb. This was one war-weary nation and with Germany and the threat to the Soviets gone,the Left would have returned to its anti-war stance. Or started in on how the Soviets should have a piece of Japan. Any number of variables, most of them unattractive.

In Vino Veritas

Re: the Left would have returned to its anti-war stance.

The Left was not anti-war in those days, it was the Right that harbored isolationist tenedencies. See: Pat Bucchanan's doubts about our participation in WWII as a sample of what was once common wisdom on the right back in the 30s. No, the Left was once internationalist and war-ready, espcially if we were fighting reactionary fascists, monarchs and the like. Recall too that it was Wilson, not some comnservative Republican, that engineered us into WWI a generation earlier. Recall too that it was Truman who took us into Korea, and Kennedy and Johnson who took us into Vietnam. The Left was once the war party in this country!
And from what I know of WWII (A good deal since my parents and other relaives lived through it) there was no significant "Peace at any price" faction in the country after Pearl Harbor and, fueled by the optimism that victories bring ("Nothing succeeds like Success"), the American people were fully ready to see it through to the end.
Your view of history is sadly crabbed, warped and distorted.

The Left was not anti-war in those days, it was the Right that harbored isolationist tenedencies...

I've often remarked on this transition myself. Pre-WW II the Republicans were isolationist and the Democrats ready to march off to adventure. Having led the country into Vietnam* the Democrats and the no-war-for-any-reason crowd began to meld and it has been getting worse not better.

Maybe this will change as the Vietnam-era Democrats are flushed out of the party by the ultimate term-limit and their place is taken by the current crop of Democrat Irag/Afghanistan veterans. But I'm not holding my breath.

-----------
* it is interesting, and disconcerting, how many post-Vietnam-era Americans think of Vietnam as "'Nixon's War" rather than Kennedy-Johnson; speaks volumes about the state of American education.

John
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Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

and History isn't it. The Left, both here and in Europe, was vehemently opposed to war from the moment of the Molotov-Von Ribbentrop Pact until Barbarrossa. The trade unions in Europe went so far as to thwart and even sabotage war production because Hitler and Stalin were pals. Of course, as soon as Hitler invaded, it was Second Front Now! There was even a specific draft exemption in the US for what were styled Premature Anti-fascists (PAF) which excluded many members of the Lincoln Brigade and other Leftists from US service.

Now if you want to style FDR Democrats as the Left, I agree FDR wanted to engage in the conflict. Of course, FDR would be attacked as a fascist by most Democrats these days.

In Vino Veritas

Re; He has a reasonable basis for believing this.

I would disagree strongly with this now. His movement has been smashed and he is a fugitive with a price on his head. This is hardly conducive to a view, long or short run, that he has been fighting a paper tiger for an enemy.
And on a much larger question, why are you folksso pesimistic. You remidn me of the doomsayers back in the Cold War who proclaimed that of course the West was doomed and Commumism would win. Yes, Iraq is a mess, but in the larger struggle we're doing OK. Al Qaida is smashed. Maybe morale would be a but better in thsi business if some folks on your side would wuit the handwringing and woe-crying, and actually celebrate a victory or two.

And so who is your larger struggle against, Serbia? PETA?

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

I disagree, had the immediate response to Pearl Harbor been a nuclear weapon on the Japanese naval base at Yokosuka I seriously doubt that the Japanese would have pursued further expansion. However, their response, absent the shellacing sustained in the actual war and its and subsequent occupation, would most likely have been the development of nuclear weapons and their subsequent use against the US.

Having beat beat into abject submission they were not in a position to do anything but fight to the death or surrender. After examples like Iwo Jima and Okinowa, there was little doubt in the minds of the planners which option they would take in response to an invasion of the homeland.

The problem with all of the "what if's" is that you cannot possibly know the truth. The assertion is now made that the Japanese were defeated and using the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was unnecessary. But they did surrender after Nagasaki. What would have happened had we invaded? Contemporary planning was for hundreds of thousands of allied dead and millions of Japanese in an invasion. But it is also possible, no matter how unlikely, that the mere sight of the invasion force would have tipped them over the edge to surrender also. As I said unlikely but not impossible. There is simply no way to know, which is one reason why I have such dislike for revisionist history.

John
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Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

FDR's, HST's, JEC's, GHWB's, WJC's and Dubya's competence. By no historical analogy can our conduct of the war in Iraq be deemed incompetent considering the goals achieved incl, threats to US security eliminated or neutralized, liberty of so many in tyranny, at so low a cost. We are doing the tedious work now. The work would be easier NOW, if we had sacrificed 200,000 plus men in door to door and gauntlet running ambushes or had we nuked two iraqi cities. Are you for that?

Don't say we can't "win" by the WWII model. Oh yes we can. The Iraqis could be made German and Japanese like sheep tomorrow. I don't want to do it that way though. Do you? But the job must be done. And the overall job in the region mat last decades. We simply should not be talking about bringing the troops home. Its silly. War has been since 1993 and is being waged against us and will be for a long time and by taking the fight to them, they have to use resources they would rather use knocking off the Saudis or attacking Chicago.
Kind of like if we left the seas from Hawaii to LA open.

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

John
--------
Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

Re: We simply should not be talking about bringing the troops home.

I don't want to bring them home. At this point I would gradually redploy them to safe bases in Kurdistan and elsewhere in the Middle East and let our enemies destroy themselves by internecine warfare. Better Iran and Syria and Al Qaida and whoever else of that ilk ends up mired in Iraq than us! I am far more concerned with the larger struggle and I do not like to see us wasting our strength of the impossible. Iraq could easily become to us what Spain was to Napoleon: not a place for outright defeat, but a place to waste scarce resources, which losses will cost us dearly in a much more vital battle.

move 50,000 of them to bases in Kurdistan and let the Sunni-Shi'ite idiot kill each other off in the rest of the country. We can offer to hold their coats for them while they bury each other.

John
--------
Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

---
"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

I think that's a curious assertion when just five years we roused quite ferociously. Anyone looking at the American response to 9-11 could hardly conlcude that an attack on America would produce anything but a most devastating response.

Maybe, for a short period of time. Maybe narcoleptic giant would be a better turn of phrase to describe our current state. We'll wake up, but then we'll start to fall back to sleep in a few months. And of course all those previous terrorist attacks on US personnel, US military and US soil were met by a pathetic response (cruise missiles hitting empty tents after a few hours warning) or most commonly, no response at all.

It is not the deaths. It's the perception (as in Vietnam) that our government not only lacks a strategy for winning, but is not even sure what winning means.

It is a combination of deaths and time. It has nothing to do with a lack of objective (to stabilize and prepare Iraq so it can continue to be an ongoing democratic entity that can serve as a positive influence on other populations nearby and to serve as an ally and base of operations in the region) or a lack of strategy (continue to train and transfer responsibility to the Iraqi forces as they are ready to take them on, leaving our troops in place as a backstop). Neither one of those is hard to articulate and they have been articulated over and over again. Just because you don't like the answer doesn't mean there isn't one.

And yet if this perception exists, it lives alongside the converse criticism, much heard from the international Left, that America is fiercely militaristic and imperialist power.

Big frickin deal. I don't know if you've noticed, but we aren't fighting the international left. It's great that they think we are pretty bad*ss but it hardly matters. It does matter what the jihadists think, and they think we are decadent, weak-willed, easily discouraged, and unable to finish anything. That we can be beaten using the same formula that has been perfected in places like Lebanon and Somalia. And they may just be right.
---
"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

With all due respect (since you are just parroting stuff you've read in the press and heard from loooonatics in both parties) a "Withdrawal Timetable" in connection with warfare is perhaps the penultimate asinine idea of all of human (and perhaps all of primate) history. I stand in awe of the level of mental accuity displayed by the proponents of the Withdrawal Timetable; frankly I'm amazed that their neural mass (brain is too generous a term) allows them to have a heartbeat and breathe at the same time.

We would not be leaving with our tail between our legs, we would just be honoring our commitment to be liberators, and then leave.

Had we done this a few months, perhaps even a year, after the liberation you might be able to make sense of this argument. But now al Queda has placed their marker on the table; withdrawal now simply confirms their belief in how to beat us.

I think politically this would be smart, as a lot of the hostitility to the war would be deflated if we had a deadline for leaving.

This is true, the press and the other leftwing loooonatics would have to find something else to be hostile about America, but not to worry they have plenty in reserve.

"General Patton sir, message from HQ. Eisenhower says don't bother rushing to relieve the force at Bastogne, the congressional timetable says we're going home if we haven't beat the Germans by Christmas."

John
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Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

use nukes more likley as well as the rise of the ugly racism that democrats exhibit when they get pushed into a corner. The consequences could truly be dire if come home in perceived defeat whether its really defeat or not.

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

among the "intelligesia" of the left is that delaying action never makes the ultimate situation better. You cna see this in everything from international affairs to familial ralations. The do-gooders always counsel measured responses to ever excalating situations when had the problem been dealt with forthrightly in the fist place one would not have to revisit it a few years later.

John
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Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

doesn't believe in cause and effect.

John
--------
Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

Democrats Face Test In Iraq

The terrorists and insurgents are acting as I and many predicted, they are becoming much more violent as they try to make sure the Democrats make good on their promise and surrender Iraq to Al Qaeda. The problem for the terrorists and insurgents is the American people will not accept handing Iraq over to the Islamo Fascists. The Democrats claimed our departure would force the Iraq government to stand up to their task (as if they weren’t doing so???). So here is the result of Democrat promises to date on Iraq - bloodsher and disorder as the terrorists plan for the Democrats to fulfill both the dreams of liberals and terrrorists allike:

The Bush administration charged yesterday that the escalating violence in Iraq committed by both Shiites and Sunnis over the past two days is a “brazen effort” to bring down the fragile government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

The White House also said President Bush has no intention of backing out of talks next week with the Iraqi leader, despite threats yesterday from a powerful Shiite militia to pull out of the government if Maliki goes ahead with the meeting. The talks, set for Thursday in Amman, Jordan, have suddenly taken on the air of a crisis summit, as Iraq slides closer to all-out civil war.

The Democrats never said they would pull out so the country COULD devolve into bloody civil war and the democratically elected government would be overthrown. There was no election promise to accelerate the fall of Iraq. The truth is the current hope for US surrender can be and should be laid at the feet of the Democrats here in the US who gave the world the impression they would run from the Islamo-Fascists if elected. Sadly there are enough ignorant people across the world who actually believed the Democrats. Or at least believed they had the power and will to force a surrender on Bush. But the Democrats have neither will, nor power nor intentions of surrendering. They made things worse and now they will be held accountable.

As unfair as it seems, the current situation is now owned by Bush and the Democrats. They have sufficient political power right now to start to form the debate and set the expectations. They are doing nothing. They are like deer in the headlights. They won, and as predicted, they have no clue what to do right now.

Bush is right, as is Maliki. If we show no sign of folding (got that Dems - no sign, as in unified front, as in one American policy, as in standing shoulder to shoulder with our men and women in harms way, were politics should end at the shoreline of our country) then the Iraqis will hold firm. They will only crumble if the US is sure to depart. Al Qaeda is on the verge of losing its fantasy Capitol City of their Modern Caliphate - Ramadi, Iraq. And they hope and optimism now flowing through the insurgents can be squashed easily by Democrats coming out and standing firm that they will not allow Iraq’s democracy to fail from a simple lack of will. Yes, if things blow out of control that is one thing. But simply having to stand up and say “we will support the democratically elected government of Iraq as it gains control of the entire nation” is not a huge price to pay to actually crush the Islamo Fascist movement. Is it Dems? You won’t even have to institute a draft to be seen as taking a winning position. These are just words, I am sure Dems can find the stamina to get past the gag-reflex and spit them out with some modicum of conviction. One thing dems are good at is spitting out words with faux conviction!

One other thing to keep in mind with all great wars - the fighting and dying hit a fevered pitch right when the pivotal test of wills is occurring. As with WW II and the Battle of The Bulge, which was Hitler’s last gasp, the death tolls during these periods can be the most intense of the entire war (see my previous post here). This has been true throughout time - from the Battle at Antietem in the civil war to the Road To Iraq in Gulf War I (where there was a massive killing of the Iraqi’s as they feld Kuwait) there fighting hits a fevered pitch right at the point the final outcome is decided. If we are at that point we simply need to stand firm and behind the less than one year old Maliki government. And if the Maliki government survives this test, it will be stable for quite some time to come. The press and the left is simply panicking (or some who are rejoicing in the bloodshed). Don’t mind them, they never grasped the situation and understood how to succeed.

Update: Something to consider from Pierre Legrand concerning the common threat we all face and how to understand what it represents. And it represents this question: Is America still ascending through history - or are we declining?

http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/2998

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

John
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Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

You'll never see any significant negativity from the Americans about the mission in Afghanistan, because Americans understand 9-11 was an act of state sponsored terrorism.

The only reason there is no leftwing objection to Afghanistan is that Iraq is a 'target rich' environment for them right now. Once out of Iraq the drumbeat will shift to Afghanistan; it will start with an AP "observation" that we've been in Afghanistan longer than we've been in Iowa or some such idiocy and the Democrat "braintrust" will be all over it like a cheap suit.

Unfortunately, as a result of this election I've come to the conclusion the American public understands what the leftist press wants them to understand. The MSM can be proud of themselves, the old magic still works.

John
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Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

---
"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson

John
--------
Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

Or Newark? Or Jersey City? Or Paterson? Or ...

Why do I ask?

Well, simple really - we've poured TRILLIONS into rat-holes like those in your state alone over the last 40-years and all we hear from the surrendercrats is "WE NEED MORE!!!". So what's a few billion bucks down the drain if it kills jihadists in the process - that still sounds to me like a much better investment than pouring it into the bastard factories along the I-95 corridor.

Get out of there, cut our losses and figure out how BEST to fight the REAL war on terror.

Ah, winning by losing - such a strategy.

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"I don't know." -- Helen Thomas, when asked by White House spokesman Scott McClellan, "Are we at war, Helen?"

did I hear someone say "Big Dig"? Now that should be the dictionary definition for rat-hole.

John
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Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

I was born and was unfortunate to have lived the first 22 years of my life in "The Garden State" - so I hope you will forgive my irrational distaste for that particular piece of Americana as being bought and paid for honestly.

I would not be hijacked back into that state for more than a weekend under pain of slow death and naked pictures of Rosie O'Donnell.

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"I don't know." -- Helen Thomas, when asked by White House spokesman Scott McClellan, "Are we at war, Helen?"

to the "Big Dig" in Boston, the eleventeen bazillion dollar white elephant of all time.

You know why they call New Jersey The Garden State? because you can't fit The Refinery and Petrochemical Processing Plant State on a license plate. (Before I get overwhelmed with attacks, there are many beautiful parts of The Garden State.)

John
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Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

Although he latest hole in the ground for pouring money into is New Orleans.

"Nothing works like freedom, Nothing succeeds like liberty"
Kyle

I think we lost the peace there a long time ago.
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"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson

It is below sea level afterall.

John
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Ethic humor is part of human nature. The Dutch tell Belgian jokes. The Belgians tell French jokes. The French tell English jokes. The English tell Irish jokes. The Irish tell Irish jokes.

cemented by journalist into the leftist lexicon evermore alongside such greats as Halliburton, quagmire, and unilateralism.
___________________________________________________________
Thou art the Great Cat, the avenger of the Gods, and the judge of words...-Inscription on the Royal Tombs at Thebes

www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson
http://gamecock.townhall.com

--
It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones. -- Calvin Coolidge

Now, that would've been a disaster. You'd have 3 countries all fighting each other over borders and resources, all the time being controlled and supplied by puppet-masters in foreign capitals. I don't see how that turns into anything other than an absolute disaster. It's about as foolish of an idea as Baker's "Hey! Let's ask Iran and Syria for help securing (wink wink wink) Iraq!" plan.

The problem is, Muslims don't seem to want democracy.

Says you. There are an awful lot of Muslims that do. They aren't incapable of it, you know. Just because there are some trouble makers being helped by our friends in the terrorist groups and out biddies in Damascus and Tehran, doesn't mean that the population as a whole doesn't want to control their own destiny.
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"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson

Just ask India and Pakistan how well it worked to split one of those 'arbitrary imperial aggregations.'
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It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones. -- Calvin Coolidge

See, we'll use fractal boundaries to ensure that the states are perfectly partitioned between ethnicities. And since the length of the boundaries will be infinite, any border clashes will average out to an infinitesimal intensity! Isn't math great?

I dub it the Zeno Plan. It can't fail!
--
It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones. -- Calvin Coolidge