by Charles
Several terms and phrases have floated across my computer screen the last few days, and I thought I’d dig into a few of them. In a prior post on Muslims, a certain prominent commenter stated that there is a "massive sense of cultural humiliation in the Muslim world." Perhaps there’s some truth to it, but I can’t help but interpret "cultural humiliation" to mean "we lost and our feelings are hurt!" I don’t believe it’s a sound idea to craft policy based on another group’s emotional state. After all, the saying goes, we can only control our own emotions, not the feelings of others. It also sounds suspiciously like the victim card is being played, with those facing "cultural humiliation" to be the next candidates for interest group status. Approaching psychobabble levels, there’s even a feelings-based community ready to fertilize and generate interdisciplinary research (both intra and interculturally) on macro, meso and micro levels.
In a Google search, "cultural humiliation" is oft applied to Iraq, Guantanamo detainees, Abu Ghraib, black American women, and so forth. In a February 2004 essay by Jessica Stern of the Harvard Kennedy School of Goverment:
Individually, the terrorists I interviewed cited many reasons for choosing a life of holy war, and I came to despair of identifying a single root cause. But the variable that most frequently came up was not poverty or human rights abuses as has been posited in the press but perceived humiliation. Humiliation came up at every echelon of terrorist group members leaders and followers.
In other words, the terrorists are emotional midgets who lash out and murder innocent civilians because their feelers got mushed due to some perceived slight. Makes me want to pull out my tiny violin, especially for al Qaeda extremists like Zawahiri, who considers the New World Order a "source of humiliation." In many cases, avoiding the humiliation of others with face-saving acts are appropriate and necessary. Not so with the unreasonable ones. Also, don’t get me wrong, I don’t approve of the mistreatment and abuse of detainees. They should be treated humanely because it’s the right thing to do, regardless of how detainees feel about it.
Even if the humiliation is genuine, the remedies for dealing with it can be 180 degrees wrong, as can be the reasons for these emotions in the first place. Rather than casting blame on backward leaders who repress their countrymen, how much more convenient to blame Western Civilization and Jews as the culprits. The real solution isn’t to declare jihad and behead the nearest Westerner in the vicinity, but to change their society from within. But to do that, a country should have some democratic governance and respect for human rights, and perhaps that is the real source for the frustration. In the absence of any democracy and human rights, perhaps revolution is the real answer.
Maybe I reacted this way because I’m a heartless conservative who would rather puree cuddly kittens than look at them (yum! kittens!). But I don’t think so. I suspect that this marks a liberal-conservative divide where, in my opinion, too much emphasis is placed on emotional well-being and not enough on achieving concrete results. Instead of group hugs and pep talks, I’ve always thought that the best way to raise one’s sense of self-worth is to get out and actually accomplish something. I believe this works on a personal level, and perhaps it could work on a larger scale as well.
Germany and Japan seem to have recovered quite well from their humiliating WWII experiences. In the Middle East, Iraq could very well be the next nation that gets a shot in the arm since it is on a similar track toward freedom and economic well-being. Or Lebanon.
Switching gears, an article with a Berlin dateline concluded the following:
The number of Islamist extremists based in Germany increased slightly last year but the country faces far lower threat of terrorist attacks than states which took part in the Iraq war, an official report said Monday.
There were 32,100 Islamists living in Germany last year – an increase of about 300 from 2004, said the report by Germany’s domestic security agency, the Verfassungsschutz.
The numbers were estimated using the guilt-by-membership method, i.e., counting the number of members in various Islamist groups such as Milli Gorus (a Turkish movement), Hamas, Hezbollah and the Muslim Brotherhood. Of course, not counted are the unknown numbers who would rather keep their Islamist identities under wraps which, to me, bollixes their other conclusions. In other words, the article doesn’t really tell us a damn thing.
Finally, now that Iraq has an elected and functioning government, it can no longer be said that the United States and the other coalition forces are "occupiers". As of last Friday or so, our forces are in Iraq at the invitation of the legitimate and internationally-recognized Iraqi government, no different from our troop deployments in Germany, Japan and South Korea. In that vein, the term "insurgent" should also be inoperative. The paramilitary groups who are attacking civilians and police/military authorities should now be identified as terrorists and criminals, just as Omar would describe them.
I thought the whole Iraq debacle was a result of American nationalist’s humiliation on 9-11.
(Bush’s expression, during My Pet Goat, was pretty humiliating)
You guys should have mourned; you would not have made so many humiliating mistakes.
“I don’t believe it’s a sound idea to craft policy based on another group’s emotional state.”
Not by itself. But it is be a sound idea to craft policy around a group’s emotional state if it affects their behavior, and that’s the situation we’re facing here. Cultural humiliation, far from being a new invention, has been one of the great motivating forces in history, and you ignore it to your peril. It’s part of what propelled Hitler to power. In the era of the Roman Republic, it drove Rome’s military machine onto conquest after conquest in reaction to just about any percieved slight.
Charles, I suspect you and I are on the same side when it comes to the validity of a lot of the “emotional humiliation” of terrorists – I think there’s a little justification, but not much, certainly not for killing indiscriminately – but what you and I think of it doesn’t really matter. Acknowledging that it exists and crafting policies around it isn’t a “touchy-feely liberal” thing. It’s a reasoned reaction to a very real world, very tangible phenomenon.
I don’t believe it’s a sound idea to craft policy based on another group’s emotional state.
… said Neville Chamberlain.
Well, no, not really. But the emotional state of the post-Great War German population certainly went a long way toward Germany looking around for a don’t-take-no-guff-from-no-one kind of leader, wouldn’t you say?
Charles, it is a pleasure to agree with you about our inability to control the emotions of others. Indeed, it is a challenge to control my own emotions.
I have to disagree, though, about the status of the government in Iraq. You write,
The most basic function of a government is to have a monopoly on the legitimate use of foce. The new Iraqi government has so far failed even to appoint ministers in charge of the use of force (interior, defense, national security). When they do, the real power in Iraq will still be the U.S. forces. This is likely to continue for some time.
Rather than casting blame on backward leaders who repress their countrymen, how much more convenient to blame Western Civilization and Jews as the culprits…..
…who fund or arm or fund and arm our backward repressive leaders!
And then lecture them from afar about how we need to stop whining and suck it up.
Fittingly, the very next blog piece I read after this one was from Amanda at Pandagon, on a very fascist-looking thing called “Battlecry Philadelphia”:
The truth is that it doesn’t take as much for people to slide towards fascism as we’d like to think. The ingredients are a population that feels disempowered, a leadership willing to provide them scapegoats in order to consolidate power and a some rhetoric about how they are the true stewards of history. The major thing that’s salvaging our country from a takeover by the mindset we’re seeing here is that most Americans don’t actually feel as emasculated and out of power as the handful agitating for a more fascist America seem to feel.
Aaaarrgh! “force,” not “foce.”
Further on in CB’s cite of Jessica Stern:
Instead of group hugs and pep talks, I’ve always thought that the best way to raise one’s sense of self-worth is to get out and actually accomplish something.
One analysis of the rise in militant Islamism in the last twenty years that I read a while back covered this angle tsomewhat, in that many Muslim cultures went through the experience of a time under colonial rule, then under various dictators at the service of one superpower or another. As people everywhere tend to have a bit of pride in their culture, religion, ethnic character, or what have you, this necessitates a question – if we’re so great, why are these other guys running our lives? (Being Scottish, I have some experience with this, but not as much as my celtic brethren and sistren in Ireland).
The answer supplied by some, and listened to by others, is that they have strayed from Allah, and that a return to the basics will surely result in a return to greatness. This, by the way, is also a central message and defining characteristic of fascism.
Now, does recognizing this mean that we’re engaging in “group hugs and pep talks”? Or is it, y’know, actually trying to recognize and deal with the core problem? As simply killing these guys seems to create more and more of them, so that approach isn’t working.
I’ve noted that a certain proportion of the hawkish right take any attempt to seriously analyze the mindset of these fundamentalist as a treacherous attempt to humanize the enemy. Would the “group hugs and pep talks” comment be a symptom of that, Charles?
When I think about cultural humiliation driving the state of affairs of the world, I think about my homeland, the American South, and how its still-bitter “emotional midgets”, as Charles puts it, have quite a lot of say in who leads the free world. Like DPU, I don’t think “hurt feelings” should be dismissed quite so lightly.
Iraq could very well be the next nation that gets a shot in the arm since it is on a similar track toward freedom and economic well-being.
I stopped reading here. Will not read anything else by Charles from here on out.
Break out the tiny violins.
Thread Available.
The paramilitary groups who are attacking civilians and police/military authorities should now be identified as terrorists and criminals, just as Omar would describe them.
If only Charles had been blogging when the Contras were active.
I wouldn’t say the terrorists accomplished nothing.
In one fell swoop, they convinced America to turn itself into a paranoid authoritarian culture.
In one fell swoop, they convinced Americans that our most cherished ideals weren’t worth the parchment they were written on.
In one fell swoop, they enabled a corrupt, lawless regime to grab enough power that it can violate the Constitution on a whim, defy court decrees, and operate in secrecy, immune to oversight.
I’d say that’s quite a set of accomplishments. The radical, America-hating terrorists succeeded in doing what the Axis Powers and the Soviet Union couldn’t do.
So, up until this magical transformative moment last Friday, every war supporter acknowledged that we were occupiers? Is that right?
Know how not to cure cultural humiliation? Inflict further humiliation.
Does cultural humiliation exist? Only a fool would deny it. Is it a significant factor in the thinking of people not already committed to jihad as to whether or not they should fight the West? Heavens to Betsy, yes it is. Imo, and seemingly that of everyone paying attention. They don’t hate us for our freedom, but for our conduct — or the effect our conduct has on their society.
Listen to the people complaining about illegal immigration. A great many of them are actually talking about a humiliation: we’re going to lose out in some grand cultural struggle if we don’t stem the tide. Now CB, I know you’re not on this bandwagon, but you’ve surely seen it drive by. This is real and — here, I get to say the Marxists got human nature pretty badly wrong — is a much more important factor in people’s lives than mere economics.
Once again, though, you’ve really missed the boat on why ‘liberals’ are interested in the extent to which terrorists are motivated by humiliation. It’s not to feel sorry for them. Or exculpate them. The idea is to figure out why the other guy is doing what he’s doing, and then use that knowledge to (a) get him to stop if possible or (b) get other people not to join up. To tailor our responses so that, to the extent possible, we’re not creating new enemies faster than we can kill the ones we’ve already got.
In general, ime, ‘liberals’ do not oppose the most aggressive policies because (i) they feel sorry for the poor terrorists with their hurt feelings or (ii) because they don’t understand what awful things the terorists do. It’s a question of whether what Clemons called ‘f*ck-yeah-ism’ is going to work. If you want to win hearts and minds in Missouri, the answer is yes. If you’re trying to win a complicated struggle in the Middle East, a more nuanced effort is required.
Switching gears, our post-war troop deployments in Germany, Japan, and South Korea did not involve armed internecine conflict among residents of those countries, and had, as their primary mission, the protection of all three — and by extension us — from Soviet expansion. We’re still a long way from this in Iraq.
I haven’t looked at the thread on purpose.
Charles, I believe that the feeling of helplessness is very real in many semi-quasi-democraticized former colonies. In the thread to your last post, Anarch hoped that Islam had not yet become the religion of the dispossessed, as Communism once was; I fear it already has become so.
I believe–or suspect, since I’ve been relatively privileged all my life–that humiliation is one of the strongest motivating factors for violent action. Feeling helpless in the face of the destruction of one’s values sucks, absolutely. Even K-Lo’s vapid invocations of 1950s patriarchy somehow trigger my nostaglia-ganglion.
Mercifully, I don’t know what it feels like for my country to be invaded or occupied by an incontestably superior force. No matter how much I try to follow news from Iraq, I can’t really imagine what the daily uncertainty about who will survive, who to trust feels like. I can’t say Saddam Hussein’s horrific regime was any better, but there is part of me that despite any evidence suspects it was somewhat more predictable, at least for the average Ali.
When people feel helpless, in the face of economic, environmental, military, or political situations, they start to behave in erratic ways. They have much less to lose.
Humiliation is a very important motivating factor in global terrorism, and I’m glad you’ve opened a thread on the idea, however skeptical you may be.
It’s also worth noting that our post-war occupations in the ’40s and ’50s involved a pretty just set of policies, applied with general openness, and with a serious commitment to developing and protecting the economic and social institutions required for a liberal society. American forces busted their butts to earn credibility. Whatever one may think of the status of Iraqi civil institutions, the openness isn’t there, and it’s not there as a matter of policy. The Bush administration demands and gets secrecy like none of its predecessors. So there is, surprise, no reason for anyone else to trust it.
Obviously CharleyCarp knows all this much, much better than I do.
I’m experiencing well-deserved cultural humiliation for supporting Bush in 2004.
That’s kind of the point, Sebastian.
Throwing a couple of other things out there.
After losing in Vietnam, the United States suffered its own version of cultural humiliation and it rankles to this day. Every one of our military actions since the mid-1970s has been colored by events in Vietnam.
Failed States are certainly a factor, just glancing at the Index, and one prime example way back when was post-WWI Germany. Japan, OTOH, doesn’t much apply. I note that Afghanistan and Iraq are in the top 20 of failed states, but they are two main fronts in the War Against Militant Islamism, and I expect things’ll stay shaky there until enough terrorists and criminals get killed, give up or run oft.
But I don’t think failed states are a driving factor. Zimbabwe, Haiti and several other African nations are not known for terrorist or suicide-bomb attacks, so it seems that ideology would be higher on the list.
In my post, I laid blame at the feet of the leaders of repressed countries, but in my previous post, Bernard Lewis had some interesting arguments. One, with modernization and technology, leaders of Middle Eastern countries moved away from more participatory rule and were able to consolidate power and rule more by dictat. Two, ideologies such as Nazism, followed by communism, were influential (or at least more influential than I thought). You could probably throw a little colonialism into the mix, too.
Last thought. I’m not dismissing the existence or relevance of “cultural humiliation”, just that I think it’s easy to overemphasize it.
I stopped reading here. Will not read anything else by Charles from here on out.
Huh. That’s all it took, Nell?
In one fell swoop, they convinced America to turn itself into a paranoid authoritarian culture.
I find that view itself paranoid, Casey.
I think that Al Qaeda’a attack on the US resulted from too much self-esteem. OBL pointed to the Russian experience in Afghanistan and our retreat from Somalia as reasons that AQ could topple the US and liberal democracies in general.
False dichotomise much, Charles?
Definitions of insurrection and insurgent.
hmmm.
CB, could you post a link to the Status of Forces Agreement between the sovereign nation of Iraq and the USA?
until such time as the govt of Iraq CONSENTS to our presence there through a SOFA, we are occupiers and those who attack US forces can legitimately be seen as resistance forces. (Allons enfants de la patrie! La jour de gloire est arrivee!)
now, i’d rather that the attacks stop and the troops come home, but it seems to me that you’re a little quick on the draw to declare anti-occupation forces to be “terrorists”. Given this comment and others, i think you’re doing your utmost to delegitimize anti-american sentiment. you may have persuaded yourself, but you’ve got a long way to go (about the length of a divan, to be precise) to persuade me that attacks on americans in iraq are the acts of so-called terrorists.
but you’ve got a long way to go (about the length of a divan, to be precise) to persuade me that attacks on americans in iraq are the acts of so-called terrorists.
If they strike American civilians, yes, they’re terorists. If they strike military targets, they’d be criminals. There is also a sizable criminal contingent involved in kidnappings and so forth.
If they strike military targets, they’d be criminals.
That seems false on its face, or at least massively unsupported.
“Germany and Japan seem to have recovered quite well from their humiliating WWII experiences.”
Germany, yes. The way Japan has handled it seems to be denial. But both have had significant economic progress, probably supported by the fact that they were forbidden from keeping an expensive army.
Charles: I wouldn’t puree those kittens if I were you, it looks as if your mascot has you in its sights.
Seriously, these accusations of group hugs and touchy-feeliness is a straw man if there ever was one. The point of recognising cultural humiliation is primarily to not provoke it if it can be helped.
DonBoy, you quoted: “The major thing that’s salvaging our country from a takeover by the mindset we’re seeing here is that most Americans don’t actually feel as emasculated and out of power as the handful agitating for a more fascist America seem to feel.”
I don’t know. It seems to me there is a lot of cultural humiliation on the right in the US (and in my country, too).
Charles,
Did you actually read your link about the “feelings-based community” to see what it might be about? I took a look. Here’s a sample:
In the light of that, let’s look at your prescription:
Now, what would a Hutu refugee in a camp in DR Congo make of this advice? If the refugee were a young male, my guess is that he would interpret it as a call to go and kill some Tutsis. Of course that isn’t what you mean by accomplishing something. You mean, go and get yourself a modern, democratic, capitalist society; start a business; create prosperity. Indeed these are good things to do. But you see, an angry young Hutu who has spent most of his life living a hand-to-mouth existence since his parents fled from Rwanda really doesn’t have the resources to accomplish such things. He does, however, have the tools and know-how to take revenge on those whom he blames for his humiliating circumstances.
That’s the problem. If you want to think seriously about the solution, you may find that members of the “feelings-based community” have published the sort of analysis you will need to get you started.
Charles writes: “As of last Friday or so, our forces are in Iraq at the invitation of the legitimate and internationally-recognized Iraqi government”
I believe the ‘legitimacy’ of Iraq falls under the ‘group hugs and pep talks’ side of things: there might have been a process that was intended to create a legitimate government, and international (or American) institutions may have approved of that process, but that doesn’t meen the Iraqi populace has approved of it. Real, functional legitimacy depends on the acceptance of the vast majority of the citizenry; the new government in Iraq doesn’t seem to have it.
And just to join in the general pile-on, another thing:
CB: maybe the constant references to post-WWII Germany and Japan ought to get modified or qualified a bit; as their relevance to both the situation wrt Iraq, and the greater “War on Militant Islamism” (“WOMI”?) seems to be getting further and further afield with each post you make.
Relating to the conditions of an occupation/reconstruction: there may be a few parallels (d*mn few, imo, but there you are). But in connection with the issue of radical-Islamist activism/violence/terrorism/warfare, I think the analogies break down. The one thing that the WWII-era Axis Powers had in common, (aside from expansionist fascistic ideologies) was they they were nation-states: and ethnically homogenous nation-states at that; bent on campaigns of conquest on behalf of their particular nations, and waging warfare against other states – and when defeated, were able to be “reorganized” along more-or-less national lines: but still maintaining an existence as autonomous “countries” (two -artificially – in the case of Germany).
Islam, however, is not a discrete political entitity, but a specifically transnational religion; and its violent-extreme fringe (“Islamism”, if you will) is a diffuse, decentralized, and decidedly transnational movement – and combatting its threat is, despite your seeming disdain for psychological nuances, going to be a problem which cannot be dealt with simplistic comaparisons to the “conventional” warfare of the past.
Besides, there MUST be some middle-ground policy to explore in how to confront MI between “group hugs and pep talks” (and exactly who, Charles, is it who has advocated this approach?) and merely bombing the sh*t out of the nearest Muslim country for effect’s sake – even if the concept seems to escape your analysis.
“Even if the humiliation is genuine, the remedies for dealing with it can be 180 degrees wrong, as can be the reasons for these emotions in the first place. Rather than casting blame on backward leaders who repress their countrymen, how much more convenient to blame Western Civilization and Jews as the culprits. The real solution isn’t to declare jihad and behead the nearest Westerner in the vicinity, but to change their society from within.”
They do cast blame on backward leaders who repress their countrymen. Have you paid any attention to Islamist rhetoric and actions in the last 50 years or so? Zawahiri himself was arrested by the Egyptian government after the assassination of Sadat, although they couldn’t prove the case. This idea that the West is the focus of most Islamist terrorism is demonstrably false with even the most cursory glance at the evidence. The overwhelming majority of terrorism is directed toward local or occupying regimes with the precise intent of fomenting the revolution you suggest might be the “real answer”. That doesn’t make terrorism justified.
When compared to “Ignoring it and calling the culture a bunch of whiners,” almost anything looks like overemphasis.
This idea that the West is the focus of most Islamist terrorism is demonstrably false with even the most cursory glance at the evidence.
I’ve noticed quite a lot of people recently who wear an injured expression and protest that, quite unfairly, everyone hates Americans. This is magnified to the point where it resembles a persecution complex, and even things that aren’t slights at Americans become points of outrage. For example, just after the Asian tsunami a UN official’s comment that western nations were somewhat stingy was quickly (and almost eagerly, IMO) transformed in many minds to “America is stingy.” I believe that Glenn Reynolds still runs the occasional post with the ironic comment “More American stinginess.”
Another possible form of cultural humilation?
Cultural humiliation and cultural defensiveness are two different things, methinks. The Vietnam War strikes me as the only real instance of ‘cultural humiliation’ that can be cited. We’ve always been used to being a country of winners, and even calling that war a ‘Technical draw’ rankles many people.
As (I think) the person who introduced the phrase ‘cultural humiliation’, I’d like to clarify a few points.
First, I do not, and have never, excused the actions of terrorists on this basis. I do try to understand what makes them tick, for (what strikes me as) the perfectly good reason of wanting our policies to address, or at least not exacerbate, the underlying causes of terrorism. But that’s completely different. (It’s like wanting to know what causes a disease in order to cure it, or at least not make it worse.)
This is, for me, all about achieving concrete results. One’s take on the emotions of other people affects the policies one adopts to achieve a given end. Thus, Rumsfeld seems to have believed that the Iraqis would respond to our invasion with gratitude, and (in part) because of this belief about their emotions, he did not prepare for an insurgency. And this mistake has led to very bad “concrete results”.
Second, I do not blame anyone for this cultural humiliation, in general. Blame depends on the specific case. If you look at the comment in which I brought this up, I used the example of the influence of teaching kids to read on Sinai bedouin society. I do not in any way fault the Israelis for having built schools for the Bedouin; I think they were right to do so. I also think that one of its side effects was this completely disorienting ability of children to see that their elders were wrong about religion. But I do not think that the Israelis should have protected the Bedouin from this by keeping their children illiterate.
Likewise, another source of cultural humiliation was the enormous technological superiority of the West. I think I said somewhere that when our technology first appeared, it was so far ahead of what could be produced in the Muslim Middle East that it might as well have been made by fairies. — Within living memory, what was produced in the Muslim Middle East was: what could be made or grown in villages without electricity, or by skilled craftsmen working by hand. Not cell phones or vacuum cleaners or TVs or refrigerators.
I can’t make a refrigerator, but this is not a source of cultural humiliation for me, since people more or less like me can and do. There’s no temptation for me to think that my culture is in some way at fault; it’s obviously just my lack of training and/or mechanical aptitude. But if no one at all like me could make a refrigerator, and refrigerators were made only by people from distant places that I did not understand, I might be tempted to feel differently.
But obviously I do not think any of the following: that we should not have invented the refrigerator; that we should not have exported them to the Muslim countries of the Middle East; that we should have prevented people from those countries from traveling here and finding out about refrigerators; etc. That would be insane.
Again: for me, this is not about blame. It’s about understanding.
Third, it’s also not about tiny violins. The point, again, is not whether or not anyone should feel sorry for anyone else; it’s just about what we should do as a result.
Speaking for myself: I think that it’s easy to underestimate the effects of having your entire cultural world-view come apart. This isn’t just a “perceived slight”; it’s a calamity that makes it hard for people to respond well, since our responses are often structured by the very world-view that has just come apart. I think that the best thing to do is simply: to have the self-confidence to affirm what is good about your own culture and the new and threatening one, and to make your own synthesis, one that works for you.
I also think that this self-confidence is a lot to expect of people, especially when they think their culture is under attack. Much more common reactions include both tossing one’s culture aside much too quickly, and dismissing the new and threatening culture much too quickly while retreating into (what is generally) a parody of one’s own. (A parody because in normal circumstances, cultures absorb and deal with new things; they don’t have to be clung to like life preservers.)
I do not blame people for being in this predicament. And I think it behooves us to understand it. I do blame people for some responses to it, e.g. joining al Qaeda.
But in general, I think that my emotional response to this, with or without tiny violins, should not be the main point. The main point, again, is trying to figure out how we should respond to terrorism, which (I think) involves trying to figure out what drives it.
Lastly: I do not think that anything I said is in conflict with the idea that Muslim countries in the Middle East (I’m sticking to them because I know them) need democracy. Of course they do. Nor is it in any conflict with the idea that people who have experienced cultural humiliation would be well advised to do something they can be proud of. I think that’s true, though I also think that (as someone said upthread) it’s sometimes hard to see what one can do. If, for instance, you were an unemployed Egyptian 22 year old, living in a corrupt country in which literally everything was rigged against you (which, for a person without the right connections or enough money to bribe people, it often is), it might be hard to see what exactly one should do.
But since I am me, I am more interested in the question what I should do than in giving advice to other people whose situation I’m not at all sure I understand, and whom I’m not in contact with. And, being me, I think: I need to understand this. I need to advocate for policies that will not needlessly make it worse. I need to try to figure out what the long-run solutions to this are, and what I can do to make them happen. That’s my responsibility.
I’m amazed that nobody’s mentioned General Dyer’s crawling order after the Jallianwalla Bagh massacre in 1919, which was decisive for Indian nationalism.
Gandhi is supposed to have thought that the racial humiliation was almost as bad as the preceding massacre.
emmanuel g: after I wrote my comment, I thought that in addition to examples in which I would not blame the agents of humiliation (e.g., the builders of schools and inventors of refrigerators), I should have made it clearer that there are lots of other cases in which I do. Luckily, you have just provided the perfect example.
Here’s a 1981 take on cultural humiliation from Gil Scott-Heron:
so, CB, it appears from your followup comment there is no SOFA and the legal relationship between Iraq and the US hasn’t changed one iota.
you, the President and Don Rumsfeld can all close your eyes, clap your hands and wish really hard that the rest of the world will perceive those who attack americans in Iraq as terrorists.
but i suspect that, despite the formation of a new iraqi govt, big chunks of the rest of the planet’s population will continue to see attacks on americans as the acts of a legitimate insurgency.
hil: ” I do try to understand what makes them (terrorists) tick,”
That bomb they’re wearing, perhaps?
(Sorry, couldn’t resist.)
Hil: I literally do not understand why people with no apparent cognitive defects always seem to respond to “so why are they doing this?” with “OH, so it’s our fault, now.” Empathy/understanding and sympathy are not the same thing.
CharleyCarp,
Dude that’s B-Movie….that is soooo cool.
Pooh: I think that a lot of conservatives believe that liberals are consumed by guilt and a desire not to do anything ever that would make those poor unfortunate terrorists a teensy bit unhappy; and so when anyone says anything that might possibly be construed that way, that’s how they construe it. This is one of Limbaugh’s main lines of “argument”, for instance. I’m sure liberals leap to similar conclusions on different issues.
But this one bears no relation to reality, and moreover it has the bizarre effect of making people think (a) that doing anything nice, ever, is motivated by wimpy guilt, and (b) that it is “realistic” to discount entirely the effects of one’s actions on other people’s emotions.
Sounds like today’s right-winger is a Nietzschian.
Let’s not forget what usually happens when right-wing nihilists become so politically powerful.
“I think that a lot of conservatives believe that liberals are consumed by guilt and a desire not to do anything ever that would make those poor unfortunate terrorists a teensy bit unhappy; and so when anyone says anything that might possibly be construed that way, that’s how they construe it.”
From an explanation not excuse point of view I suspect this is an overreaction to the ineffective liberal policing/punishment systems of the 1960s and 1970s (with a little trickle into the early 1980s).
As an example of the similar conclusions on different issues I suspect that whenever conservatives talk about putting incentives to work (or other incentives to decrease long term dependency on ‘safety net’ programs) into welfare programs, this gets translated into conservative “meanness”.
I am however skeptical that the cultural humiliation argument has much explanatory utility so far as technological prowess goes. There have been many cultures exposed to extreme difference in technological prowess in the past 200 years. Middle Eastern Islamic cultures have reacted somewhat differently than those. (Speculatively it might be that the boost of economic power from oil has let just enough people in the Middle East gain the fruits of technology without the culture going through many of the steps necessary to learn to make it which has caused a unique problem.) But Vietnam for instance went through many of the same technological disparity issues and a huge war besides but I would be unshocked to find that 20 years from now it is doing much better than say Saudi Arabia or Syria in terms of overall technological know-how.
SomeOtherDude, please read the posting rules. You are very close to getting banned.
You are very close to getting banned.
For over-generalizing? Sheesh.
Is cultural humiliation listed in the posting rules, now? Why, if I could have a dollar every time I’ve heard liberal secularists referred to as Nietzsche-reading nihilists, by William Bennett alone….. never mind.
Sorry, I couldn’t resist. 😉
Perhaps there’s some truth to it, but I can’t help but interpret “cultural humiliation” to mean “we lost and our feelings are hurt!”
If this is your take on this, then you need to broaden your point of view. The term “cultural humiliation” refers to the dislocation and rootlessness when one culture sweeps away the underpinnings of another, and the attendant problems that follow. It applies in many situations — for example, it could also be used to suggest a cause for the high rate of alcoholism amongst American native peoples. To simplify it to “my feelings are hurt because I lost” is childish — trivializing.
Remember first that the point of Hilzoy’s remark (why not just identify her in your post — weird) was to counter your suggestion that Islam is inherently violent. The point was to identify one of many better candidate for identifying causes of the hostility and violence that grips the Middle East.
You seem to be in denial about the role that the West has played in provoking so much anger and hostility — and to some extent, that has simply been the result of a more powerful culture overwhelming another, whether or not accompanied by other bad behaviors. And being aware of this as a cause does not require a knee-jerk puppy-loving response. It just represents a reality-based view of how things really are instead of a fantasy world in which you remain mystified as to why there is such hostility when we are allegedly so pure — a fantasy world which results in the bigoted belief that Islam is inherently violent because other much more likely and reasonable causes somehow are off your radar.
______
In that vein, the term “insurgent” should also be inoperative. The paramilitary groups who are attacking civilians and police/military authorities should now be identified as terrorists and criminals
The British thought so, too, despite 1776 and the Continental Congress.
Why this fetish about labels — insurgent vs. terrorist? Most of these people are insurgents against the current Iraqi government and always have been. The status of the occupation has no relevance to describing what is going on. They are using terror tactics as have insurgents from time immemorial. Its odious, but certainly not an Al Queda type phenomena. Most of the violence is being directed against other Iraqis as part of the insurrection/civil war.
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As of last Friday or so, our forces are in Iraq at the invitation of the legitimate and internationally-recognized Iraqi government, no different from our troop deployments in Germany, Japan and South Korea.
This is just nonsensical (and bad history about the post-WWII occupations; also, what is the relevance of South Korea here?). A key to such a situation is the extent to which the host country has control over the deployment, use, and actions of the visiting troops. When the host country has no such power, then its still an occupation; albeit, one that may be transitioning away from occupation.
One example — do we obey Iraqi demands concerning persons detained by US forces? I think not.
I probably should give up writing comments or just stick to quoting Monty Python etc.
The combination of hilzoy and dmbeaster have said everything I can think of and more. Not only that, John Thullen is funnier than I am.
Sebastian: “I am however skeptical that the cultural humiliation argument has much explanatory utility so far as technological prowess goes.”
I didn’t mean to suggest that any time one culture meets another one that’s technologically more advanced, this happens. That’s plainly not true, any more than it’s true that any time someone meets another person who does something better than s/he does, s/he resents that other person. But it sometimes happens, and when it does, it’s useful to recognize it.
I mean: I say this based on having lived in the region and seen this at work. The Arabs I knew generally loved their culture and their villages; and in a lot of ways they were right to do so, I thought. But they had somehow to deal with the fact that they had been militarily defeated, technologically completely outclassed, their elites spectacularly failed them, etc., etc. A lot of them didn’t know (so to speak) who they were supposed to be, or what to do with all this.
Some just tossed their culture aside far too quickly, and tried to be “modern”. Some did the opposite. Both responses, I thought, were much too quick, and threw aside things of real value.
But the alternative — having the self-assurance to pick your way through this minefield, take what’s of value to you, and leave the rest — is very, very difficult. I should say that I only knew one person who really did this (my ex, the novelist), and he was not thanked for his efforts, by any of the million and one “sides”. He now lives in the US, things having gotten intolerable over there.
I should also say (in response to Charles) that I do not think Vietnam is a case of ‘cultural humiliation’. Nothing about the war in Vietnam suggested that our culture was somehow inadequate, or that we had to (for instance) try to become more like the Vietnamese, our own culture having failed us.
Hil
should also say (in response to Charles) that I do not think Vietnam is a case of ‘cultural humiliation’. Nothing about the war in Vietnam suggested that our culture was somehow inadequate, or that we had to (for instance) try to become more like the Vietnamese, our own culture having failed us.
Though I tend to agree with you, I’m guessing that many on the right would say that the war in Vietnam did suggest ways in which our culture was/is inadequate. I certainly think that’s where a lot of the invective to “clap harder” comes from – the perception that we didn’t do so in Vietnam, but if we do it now, things will be different. That was certainly an underpinning of Steele’s…article a few weeks back, no?
I certainly think that’s where a lot of the invective to “clap harder” comes from – the perception that we didn’t do so in Vietnam, but if we do it now, things will be different. That was certainly an underpinning of Steele’s…article a few weeks back, no?
I thought the underpinning of Steele’s article was that our cultural humiliatino prevented us from bombing harder.
I thought the underpinning of Steele’s article was that our cultural humiliatino prevented us from bombing harder.
Yeah, we needed to get tough, get together, show our resolve and kill some people.
Yeah, we needed to get tough, get together, show our resolve and kill some people.
Its a variant of: The floggings will continue until morale improves.
I just re-read the original post again, and I’m struck by the fact that this is one of the most obviously wrong-headed presuppositions I’ve read in, well, at least a few days.
The goal is not ’emotional well being.’ The goal is ‘concrete results,’ and understanding the motivations of our enemies — and the motivations of those who are ‘in the middle’ — is a part of that. It’s just as easy to say that ‘conservatives place too much emphasis on looking tough and not enough on achieving concrete results — as long as they can play cowboy, the outcome doesn’t matter.’
In some cases, obviously, there are liberals who care more about warm fuzzies than survival and conservatives that care more about demonstrating their stunning machismo than saving actual lives. Framing the issue as you do, though, Charles, presupposes that the only weakness could motivate a search for insight and understanding. That strikes me as shockingly backwards.
We bombed a people for no other reason, but spite.
Our leaders were incapable of protecting us and getting the original perpetrators who did us harm.
So we went after people who were incapable of protecting themselves.
Now that is humiliating.
We bombed a people for no other reason, but spite.
Say what? I think the Iraq venture as a whole was poorly conceived and the reconstruction poorly executed, but I don’t see how it can reasonably be considered a war of aggression against the Iraqi people.
Aha, an opportunity.
Happy Valley
it appears from your followup comment there is no SOFA and the legal relationship between Iraq and the US hasn’t changed one iota.
I’m not aware if the SOFA has changed, francis, but the more important point is that the Iraqi government has. BTW, by what reason can anyone now view the “insurgency” as legitimate?
by what reason can anyone now view the “insurgency” as legitimate
The government is not legitimate, ergo, the insurgency is.
There are groups in Iraq that appear to be targeting the US military and not civilians. Those groups, while certainly our enemies, are ‘legitimate’ in the sense that they are insurgents fighting what they see as an invading military power, rather than terrorists striking out at other civilians for political ends.
The distinction is not meant to dillute the fact that they are attacking our servicement. Rather, it’s meant to point out the fact that All Bad Things Are Not Terrorism.
kenB,
It certainly became a toilet where every sick policy maker aligned with the Bush Whitehouse, was allowed to defecate, vomit, and spew their noxious agenda.
An actual war in Afghanistan would have made no one any money or fit into the latest coolest right-wing theories concerning American hegemony, however in Iraq policy makers (Energy, Weapons Developers, Mercenaries, and the Neocons who love them) aligned with the Bush Whitehouse will make out like bandits.
When the dust settles, Bin Laden would have gotten away with mass murder and Bush’s allies would have made some major cash.
9-11 made sure everything stayed the same. Wealthy right-wing elites taking advantage of their power, no matter what country they were from.
In spite of 9-11…nothing changed.
If they strike American civilians, yes, they’re terorists.
They are freedom fighters resisting the occupation.
If they strike military targets, they’d be criminals.
They are freedom fighters resisting the occupation, soon to be heroes of the Islamic Republic of Iraq, to be granted the highest honors possible and positions of leadership.
i honestly can’t tell — is Sancho’s comment snark or straight?
Such is the world Francis…sometimes I feel like I wouldn’t be surprised if that when the lights were turned on, half the people would be revealed as lefties spoofing righties or vice versa
Or maybe even lefties spoofing righties spoofing lefties, a la Victor/Victoria.
OwMyHead
The government is not legitimate, ergo, the insurgency is.
Then every single government in the Middle East (except perhaps Israel) is less legitimate than the one in Iraq, Ugh, therefore every violent “insurgent” group in those countries has even more legitimacy than the terrorists and criminals in Iraq. The same applies to most of the governments in Africa and Asia. You’re not making sense.
Hi Chuck!
Thanks for providing me with my Daily Dose of Stoopid!
It’s an open secret that you are one of Blogistan’s more reliable procurers of this tempting drug; It’s a closed secret why Hilzoy consents to hang out with you.
Pleasantries aside, you might be wise to look more carefully into the politics of humiliated populations. After the policies you advocate have reduced my beloved America to a stinking third world hellhole, you may find appeals to the humiliated masses of North America to be your ultimate calling.
Whether, Sancho is being ironic, sarcastic or snarky, his comments seem to be a sharp indicator of who will be leading the future Islamic theocracy.
Warriors who defy occupations are admired….look at the Early American revolutionaries who battled the Crown…or ask Southerners who admire their forefathers for defying Northern occupation.
When did the Iraq Civil War end, and why didn’t anybody tell me?
As I have said in reference to, umm, other circumstances, legitimacy is not gained at the ballot box. 51% of the vote doesn’t matter if the losers are shooting at you. Of course a disaffected 1% doesn’t make a gov’t illegitimate but in such cases the minority has so little support it is rarely dangerous.
Freedom is not “majority rule” but “consent of the governed.” I would not expect Bush to ever understand this, Freedom is really hard, and I don’t think he would approve.
They are insurgents, who sometimes use terroristic tactics.
CB you do understand, right, that ‘legitimacy’ is completely a human construct? And that it’s based on a pre-existing values set?
If you’re saying ‘no one who shares my terms of reference could find the insurgencies legitimate’ then you may as well be saying ‘no one who shares my taste in ice cream can prefer vanilla to chocolate.’
On the other hand, if you are saying that there are no imaginable terms of reference under which one or more of the insurgencies can be considered legitimate, then I think you’ve got a failure of imagination.
It is a great hoot to imagine you visiting Basra, say, and telling ordinary folk that their government is almost as legitimate as that of Israel. Or maybe you could try it in Ramadi. I bet you’d find some folks who have different terms of reference . . .
Don’t get me wrong, my terms of reference largely overlap with yours. I think that the Israeli government is perfectly legitimate as to areas within its 1967 borders. I’m not sure you and I have the same views of the legitimacy of Israeli governance of over areas, or of the legitimacy of Venezuelan governance anywhere. But we probably agree more than disagree. As to the Iraqi insurgencies, I’m not sure I’m ready to say that all resistance to goons from the Ministry of Interior is ‘illegitimate’ even under my terms of reference.
Robert, that’s a pretty ban-worthy comment (in my unofficial opinion). You could probably take that thought over to ihatecharlesbird.blogspot.com, though I think it’s having something of an identity crisis at the moment.
Robert L. Bell’s comment certainly looks like a violation of the posting rules.
Robert L. Bell: please consult the posting rules. They require civility. Do it again and I’ll ban you, unless someone else gets there first.
hilzoy, cultural humiliation is just the wrong term.
more properly say, disrespect.
there are millions of moderate muslims. but they are not reformist muslims.
so it does no good to chide them and berate them about not excommunicating the fundamentalists, or for not nailing ultimatums to the mosque doors.
they would just like a modicum of respect for their religion and their way of life.
the same as xians, buddhists, confucians, shamanists, pagans, and the rest of the supernaturalists out there.
treason never prospers, for if it prospers none dare call it treason.
which particular forces in Iraq are righteous and which are treasonous remains, shall we say, …… undecided.
it’s a little early, cb, for you to be applying victor’s justice. no one has won yet.
Then every single government in the Middle East (except perhaps Israel) is less legitimate than the one in Iraq, Ugh, therefore every violent “insurgent” group in those countries has even more legitimacy than the terrorists and criminals in Iraq. The same applies to most of the governments in Africa and Asia. You’re not making sense. [Emphasis added.]
No offense, Charles, but you should definitely look in the mirror on that one. Or at the very least, you should be damn clear about what you mean by “legitimacy” before making this claim — and be prepared to back it up against criticisms of, say, the fiction versus the reality of democracy.
For, to be really blunt about it: legitimacy is not conferred by American imprimatur, whether or not there’s a figleaf of factuality to support it; and “legitimacy”, in and of itself, is a completely worthless concept when talking about these matters anyway. [Just ask Alexander Kerensky.] It’s a diplomatic fiction that, in this case, seems to be put forth to make us feel better about ourselves. [Just ask Hamid Karzai.] So while I’m not completely immune to the charms of “legitimacy”, I think we’d be better served by talking about the realities of the situation instead of our optimistic propaganda.
FWIW, the armed conflict between Americans and Filipinos between 1899 and 1901 (or 1902 or 1903 or whatever) was officially referred to by us as the “Philippine Insurrection” (or “Insurgency”) from that era until roughly the 1970s, when enough historians had said “WTF?” about this nomenclature to cause the Library of Congress, inter alia, to alter the term.
(“Insurrection” still crops up now and then, mostly – my extremely random sampling suggests – from those who get their information primarily from US military studies and archives.)
It is now generally referred to as the “Philippine-American War” (or sometimes “Filipino-American War”) on the quite reasonable grounds that Filipinos were fighting Americans, and as historians or observers we were in no position to prejudge the legitimacy of the regime holding power in Manila (i.e., us), just because the US government had declared that the islands were part of our sovereign territory.
It only took us about 70 years to figure this out. So may we expect the descendants of CB (or the grand old man himself, should he survive with his wits intact) to come around in about 2073? Or should we adapt now and beat the rush?
Dr Ngo: It only took us about 70 years to figure this out. So may we expect the descendants of CB (or the grand old man himself, should he survive with his wits intact) to come around in about 2073?
FWIW, the war between the Chinese Boxers and the 8-nation alliance is still referred to as “the Boxer Rebellion” or “the Boxer Uprising”, even though almost from the beginning, right to the end, the Boxers had the support of the Imperial Government.
kenB: but I don’t see how it can reasonably be considered a war of aggression against the Iraqi people.
The US air force carried out aerial bombardments of civilian areas in Iraq from day 1 to the present day. We know that at least 100 000 Iraqis have been killed, the majority of them by the US military dropping bombs on them* – and we know that most of the individuals reported killed by coalition forces were women and children. It is wholly unreasonable to look the other way and pretend that this is not a war of aggression against the Iraqi people.
*And since the results of that survey were published in October 2004, and the Bush administration was hardly encouraging of any other study, we have no idea what the proportion of civilians killed by the US military has been in the total casualties in the last 18 months: all we know is that US bombing raids on Iraqi cities have increased since 2004, and according to the Lancet report, aerial bombing was responsible for the majority of civilian deaths.
Ah, the Lancet. Something I can contribute to, having participated in every obsessive discussion on it that I’ve seen online.
Though I suspect the Lancet paper is relatively close to the truth, when you read the thing in detail it doesn’t actually say that 100,000 people had been killed by wartime violence by Sept 2004. It says that the excess mortality was (taking the midrange estimate) 100,000, excluding Anbar province. The neighborhood they surveyed in Fallujah had such a high death rate they couldn’t get any sensible number for Anbar, so it was left out. Anyway, of the 100,000 deaths, about 60,000 were from violence and roughly half of those were inflicted by the Americans. (39,000 deaths from either the Americans or the insurgents and almost all were from the Americans.) The error bars on all this are massive, because we’re actually just talking about 21 violent deaths recorded in the survey.
The Fallujah neighborhood which they couldn’t use in their analysis had suffered 52 deaths (out of 250 or so people) from American military action, 25 or so in August 2004 alone, when we were bombing in preparation for the second assault in November. A great many homes were deserted and the neighbors said that these deserted homes had suffered numerous deaths as well. It’s the Fallujah numbers that led the Lancet authors to conclude that air strikes were the prevailing cause of deaths–they suspected that if you randomly surveyed 33 Iraqi neighborhoods you’d probably find one or two that were hit as hard as Fallujah, but they couldn’t include it in their quantitative analysis because it increased the already large confidence interval too much. But they went ahead and made the claim about air strikes being the leading cause of death–it would have been better to say that there’s a strong possibility of that from their data.
There’s been a nasty debate about the Iraq Body Count vs. the Lancet numbers and IBC responded on their website to their critics by circling the wagons and trying to discredit all the critics. But if you read their response (on their website), they tacitly acknowledge that the Lancet midrange estimate is probably only a little too high,not that they put it in those words. They compare it to a UN survey conducted for the first year of the war which showed 24,000 war-related violent deaths (excluding criminal murders) and say that the correct extrapolation to Sept 2004 would be 28,000, not the 39,000 in the Lancet. So if the same correction applied to all the Lancet deaths, by Sept 2004 there were about 70,000 excess deaths. Iraq Body Count also admitted that their own violent death count for civilians might be low by a factor of two. They strongly disagree that the unreported deaths are disproportionately American-inflicted. I think this goes against common sense–of course the US will try to cover up the number of civilians it kills. My impression is that we only know about the results of American actions from what the US military tells us, and I’ve read of cases when reporters are able to investigate that the civilians on the scene give a dramatically different account from what the US claims. Someone should be doing an “insurgent body count” and keeping track of the source of the numbers–I bet a lot of “insurgent” dead are actually civilians.
One other point. To me the most interesting thing about the Lancet paper isn’t the 100,000 dead figure–it’s the reporting of what their survey team saw in Fallujah. When they started doing their survey in the neighborhood they picked, they found 23 out of 52 houses deserted, with neighbors describing widespread death has having occurred in the deserted houses before the families left. And the impression of the survey team was that vast areas of Fallujah had been hit just as hard or harder than this neighborhood.
And that was in Sept. 2004. I had no sense that Fallujah had been hit anywhere near this hard from reading the NYT, though there were stories that indicated we were bombing.
Thanks for the clarifying comments, Donald.
My key point still stands, though: the US military has been launching attacks against Iraqi civilians since the beginning of the war on/in Iraq. What person of sense would argue that this is not a war of aggression against the Iraqi people?
the US military has been launching attacks against Iraqi civilians since the beginning of the war on/in Iraq.
according to Jessie Macbeth.
Anyone following the story of Iraqi mortality should take a look at the UNICEF report on food insecurity in Iraq. I noticed it on Tim Lambert’s blog – which is also the one-stop shop for discussion of the Lancet report.
What person of sense would argue that this is not a war of aggression against the Iraqi people?
I for one wouldn’t put it like that and I’m no Bush apologist. It started as an attack on a regime which was justifiably perceived to be weak, unpredictable and hostile to US interests. These are all characteristics which get small powers into trouble when they step on the toes of great powers, never mind superpowers. The invasion certainly flouted the precepts of international law and just war theory as I understand them. Frankly I could live with that; the world is a rough place. What pisses me off, more than I can express, is the fact that the US has made a pig’s ear of the job in every phase from the pre-war diplomacy to the present, harming the interests of America, Iraq and the world at large. If it had been done right then the vast majority of the Iraqi people would have reason to be grateful.
And we would all be one pony to the good.
Argument about the war can be a cold thing when we start making sematical arguments about agressive war against a people. Of course the military wasn’t attacking people. It was attacking government, military, and industrial targets. The people in, near and around these targets are just collateral damage. Of course we only attack the Republican guard, who just happen to be hiding themselves and their equipment in, near and around civilian neighborhoods. Of course we just attack the insurgents – whose family, friends and neighbors are civilians and become collateral damage. Saying we don’t target civilians and that we do target civilians is saying the same thing.
This is why we shouldn’t wage these stupid, pointless, unnecessary, stupid wars. War is monsterous and it turns our fighting men and women into monsters. Throw people into extreme situations and they begin to act a bit extreme – as in Abu Whatever and in the recent “cold-blooded murders” Murtha was talking about. We don’t need that.
DaveC:
I read with relief today that Jesse Macbeth* is a hoax. Turns out no civilians have been killed in Iraq. There was a guy in Fallujah who stuck a fork into his toaster and died of cardiac arrest. A woman outside Baghdad
expired from shock after finding out the red stuff on her kids was ketchup, the scamps. And, some shower-room towel-slapping got of hand at Abu Ghraib, resulting in a degree of flaying not seen since the final take of the flaying scene in “The Passion of Christ”, but it takes a masochist to enable a sadist. Plus Nelson Rockefeller’s heart gave out while attempting a little love with a younger woman not his wife. His wife’s name was Happy and who would have the heart to face that?
All of the bombs missed and yet Rumsfeld still has a job.
The upside is that all of those stateside who speak of unavoidable collateral damage as a necessary part of war haven’t got a leg to stand on, there being no collateral damage. Unlike Iraqi civilians, who all, to a man, have two legs. I can’t speak for the women.
*It’s like getting to the end of Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” and finding out the witches hadn’t a clue and what had really happened was that Macduff had devised the game of golf and the oddly shifting Birnam Wood was just a ruse to take a mulligan. I know the feeling.
DaveC: according to Jessie Macbeth.
Actually, I read about Shock and Awe on CNN first. (Never heard of “Jessie Macbeth” until you mentioned him, to tell the truth.)
The Jesse MacBeth thing is a hoax promoted by Michelle Malkin.
She really is a contemptible human being.
(39,000 deaths from either the Americans or the insurgents and almost all were from the Americans.)
A lot of anti-war folks want to believe that the US military is indiscriminately killing civilians, and engage in wishful thinking. Hence all the talk about Americans bombing innocent civilians, and little blame given to the various bombers of the Red Cross headquarters, the golden mosque, the murderers of Iraqi politicians and their relatives.
The fact of the matter is that US aerial bombardment of Iraq had pretty much ended by July 2003, and the casualty count by none other than Marla Zuniga and Raed Jarrar was 2000 dead, 4000 injured
If you really believe that all we know is that US bombing raids on Iraqi cities have increased since 2004, and according to the Lancet report, aerial bombing was responsible for the majority of civilian deaths., show me some real report, not some of your latest propoganda
Geez, I had no idea what DaveC was talking about until I googled it. Amazingly, it looks like the first 3 pages of links are to pretty hard right sites. None of the usual suspects on the left have Jessie MacBeth link in the Google top pages. Is this one of those American flags that is actually a blanket story, DaveC?
Cue throngs of cheering right-wing bloggers carrying Jessie Macbeth on their shoulders.
Cut away to Ward Churchill, last year’s model of the living strawman, wiping away a tear.
DaveC, do a Google on Jesse MacBeth and you will find him all over rightwing blogs. You will find him only on one small left blog and that blog’s commenters recognized that he was a hoax. So please stop promoting him as a leftist piece of propaganda. The Jesse MacBeth phenomena is just another example of rightwing faux outrage over a phenomena of their own creation, like O’Reilly’s War on Christmas.
It really detracts from the discussion to bring up mythologoical stuff.
I don’t know how many civilians have died from our invasion of Iraq. I just got done rading The Assassin’s Gate, and the impression I got was that American troops on the ground were very conscious of the necessity of winnng a hearts and minds war but that they were consistantly and persistantly undercut by directives from Washingotn Dc. According to Murtha, who is sympathetic to soldiers, the incident of civilians murdered in a unnecessary raid was the direct result ot the decision to fight without adequate numbers of troops and to keep the troops in, tour after tour, far too long. I suspect that the pattern of incompetent leadership from Bush is holding and that the current policy of moving troops to bases, shifting to some airstrikes, and declaring victory regardless of the facts on the ground, will result in more civilians being killed but they will be killed mostly by other Iraqis. Not that that makes it OK. The point is the bad policies are coming from Washington, not from the Americans in Iraq.
CB: Then every single government in the Middle East (except perhaps Israel) is less legitimate than the one in Iraq, Ugh, therefore every violent “insurgent” group in those countries has even more legitimacy than the terrorists and criminals in Iraq. The same applies to most of the governments in Africa and Asia. You’re not making sense.
Legitimacy is in the eye of the beholder. What if the Government of India violently invaded the U.S., overthrew the U.S. government, and then held elections to elect the “new” government of the United States? How would you feel about the legitimacy of the resulting regime? How would you feel about the people who participated in the process? How would you feel if Prime Minister of India subsequently indicated, with two million Indian troops still in the country, that he was “unhappy” with the person selected to lead that “new” government, resulting in his resignation and replacement with someone more pleasing to the Prime Minister?
What if the Government of India violently invaded the U.S., overthrew the U.S. government, and then held elections to elect the “new” government of the United States?
Not really a fair comparison, since Saddam was an unelected tyrant, whereas Bush… well… OK, but still not quite a fair comparison.
None of the usual suspects on the left have Jessie MacBeth link in the Google top pages.
Natch. His video has probably been taken down from anti-war sites, after it was proven that he was bogus.
But what about the assertion that Iraqi civilian casualties almost all were from the Americans? That’s bogus, too. But
the assertions like we start making sematical arguments about agressive war against a people, is in fact a semantic argument, that most of the commenters let pass. I’d say that “against a people” is very misleading. The US is being blamed for the deeds of the militias, Al Qaeda in Iraq, etc.
http://neurotic-iraqi-wife.blogspot.com/
Geez, I had no idea what DaveC was talking about until I googled it.
Since I have neither the stomach nor the heart to figure out this latest round of insanity, anyone want to summarize for me?
DaveC: The fact of the matter is that US aerial bombardment of Iraq had pretty much ended by July 2003
Saturday, December 24, 2005, in the Washington Post:
DaveC: The US is being blamed for the deeds of the militias
Well, that too – besides the attacks directly committed by the US military, the US can be justly blamed for starting a civil war in Iraq.
Sure!
1) Some guy who looks nothing like you’d imagine a Ranger might have to look is featured on a film made by a no-name guy and posted on a no-name website.
2) Word gets out, in one way or another.
3) Guys who actually have been rangers or who have the slightest notion at all about what military uniforms look like, what military personnel look like, what training is required to become a Ranger, etc cry bullshins!
4) Word spreads around amongst people who are most outraged about such things.
5) Various webhosting sites take their copy of the film in question down.
Fart in a windstorm, recalling other, similar farts in windstorms.
Hope I didn’t condense it too much.
“A lot of anti-war folks want to believe that the US military is indiscriminately killing civilians”
A lot of pro-war folks don’t have any idea what anti-war people think and aren’t prepared to give it much thought, either. Lord, I hate this pro-war, anti-war dichotomy.
My brother-in-law and his brother were both in the army in VietNam. When the brother’s son went to Iraq they both advised him that if they see somebody do anything funny, shoot. If somebody is walking towards you, shoot. They were advising him to liberally interpret the rules of engagement and whereas that might increase the likelihood of innocent dead it might also help him to get home safely.
That’s advice from people who have seen the elephant. The young man was being told not to descriminate, not to even think, just shoot. And it’s because they love their son/nephew and I don’t blame them at all for their advice.
When we send our men and women to fight they can be killed, maimed, dismembered and scarred. They can also commit such savagery that it disturbs their dreams and psychology for the rest of their lifes. I’ve known people thus affected by Viet Nam and they are both pitiful and perhaps dangerous. In short, war sucks.
Knowing that, how can somebody be pro-war? Its almost like being pro-evil, not to make a the case for moral equivalence between the two (though one could be made) but its really too abstract to have any meaning at all. To engage in aggressive military action or not is a calculus of risk and benefit that one can be pro or anti only on a case by case basis. Given the costs in lives, treasure, morality and psyche I think the threshold for war should be very high. How can anybody think different?
Look, I realize we live in different worlds.
At firedoglake the headlines are
David Broder, Panty Sniffing Pervert
To Sniff or Not To Sniff
and
Weeding Out The Racists
At pandagon
The never-ending sadism of the church
No tampon ads during Papa Ratzi’s Poland tour
Natural vs unnatural ias a cover to romanticize oppression
and proof that Christians are the same as Nazis.
Don’t be alarmed at the scary wingers!
“A lot of anti-war folks want to believe that the U.S. military is indiscriminately killing civilians, and engage in wishful thinking. Hence all the talk about Americans bombing innocent civilians, and little blame given to the bombers of the Red Cross headquarters, the golden mosque, the murderers of Iraqi politicians and their relatives.”
Well, this is sufficiently passive voiced that I can’t tell precisely who is wishing that the US military is indiscriminately slaughtering civilians. I mean, Hilzoy is busy wishing the sage green goes with the butternut squash in the dining room, and Donald Johnson didn’t end his post above by exclaiming “God, I’m glad this is happening.” If Jes is wishing anything, it would be that no civilians get scragged, but then she has unreasonably high standards.
As for me, if we could get the civilian casualties under 2000 dead, I would be happy as a clam. A number like 1999 dead would have me giving up wishful thinking all together. There is a guy over at Red State who wants to crank the number up a good bit, but I can’t think what that has to do with anything.
As for little blame given to various killers and such, could someone with more authority than I possess please issue a statement of requisite blame.
All I can think of is the time my brother (who wasn’t Governor of Florida) and I took a stick and did a really crappy job of whacking a hornet’s nest that was just out of reach in a tree off in the woods that really had nothing to do with my other problems at the time (like the bully who lived down the street). My brother was out for mere fun, whereas I, the earnest, well-intentioned one, took it personally that the bees didn’t organize their society around lower marginal tax rates thereby incentivizing higher revenues for the queen, but never mind that. Big clouds of pissed-off hornets chased us to the house and some of them stung us. A couple even got my sister who was minding her own business, not in a mosque, but in her sandbox.
When my Dad arrived home from work, he heard the story and listened bemused to our expressions of outraged blame-casting on the horrid bees. Then he went out around dusk when things were quieter and went door-to door where the bees lived, who were still hovering around their partially destroyed nest, and took them out. He sawed the smallish limb off the tree and placed the whole mess in a big metal trash can, doused it with gasoline and threw a match in. Even the civilian bees were goners, the little shits.
It was cool. Then my Dad looked at the brothers standing there and asked “Everybody happy now?”
There is a dichotomy, for sure.
Hope I didn’t condense it too much.
Nah, that was fine. The real question, I guess, is: why the fnord is he being invoked at all?
“There is a dichotomy, for sure”
The real point of my post above is that you don’t do much thinking about it.
Dunno. I considered bringing it up, but I really hate to carry that sort of thing in first. I mean, even in a moderately well-educated society as this (I’m saying this in a relative, historical sense), there’s always an alarmingly large number of people who will believe Stupid Stuff, like 9/11 was secretly engineered by the Jooos. I don’t take it all that seriously, and neither should anyone else. Pointing and laughing, though, is always fun.
Thullen. Oh, Thullen. Let me just say that you’ve had several useful and amusing comments in this thread and though I haven’t mentioned it before, I’m mentioning it now, I appreciate them for their usefulness and their amusingness.
But the comment at 11:49 was off the charts. The perfect morality tale for our age. If I remember, and most assuredly I will not, I will recomment you for a Koufax for best commenter. Brilliant.
I think you’ve just coined a new one. Either that, or I just don’t get out much.
I knew there* was something funny about that sentence** but it took your italics to flush it out for me. I’m so pathetic.
*originally spelled their
**originally spelled sentance
Let me second LowLife’s praise of Thullen’s 11:49, even though I’m allergic to bees.
There’s much to be said for misspelling the right word at the right time, LowLife. Some folks have raised this to nearly an art form.
DaveC
It’s a bit depressing that you not only elide the titles that doesn’t quite have the oomph of the other three from Firedoglake and do the same for Pandagon, but that you fail to note that the ‘weeding out racists’ refers to the fact that CNN used the CCC (the Council of Conservative Citizens) as a source for the Aztlan myth. Perhaps you didn’t read it and automatically assumed it was describing the Republican party, or perhaps you did, but either way, it doesn’t really correspond to the reality of the piece.
“There’s much to be said for misspelling the right word at the right time”
This may be analogous to the hypothetical million year/million monkey typewriting session that culminates in a good portion of the Shakespeare folio. The real art is in the editing. Which is to say my dire spelling is only redeemed by your wry observation.
If we had some swiss cheese, kraut, thousand island dressing and corned beef to go with that wry, we’d be more Rubenesque.
Or we could forgo the calories and just drink it straight.
ok, i admit it. i’m overweight and drink too much.
what’s for lunch?
Lay & Skilling just convicted; story over at CNN.
Some might say that John Thullen misspelled “bee” as “hornet” a few times, or vice versa, but they’re simply missing his subtle allegory on ethnic divisions within the enemy.
It’s kinda late in the threat, but:
I don’t believe it’s a sound idea to craft policy based on another group’s emotional state…. In other words, the terrorists are emotional midgets who lash out and murder innocent civilians because their feelers got mushed due to some perceived slight. Makes me want to pull out my tiny violin…. I suspect that this marks a liberal-conservative divide where, in my opinion, too much emphasis is placed on emotional well-being and not enough on achieving concrete results.
That depends on whether you think pulling out a tiny violin is the sort of concrete result we’re looking for.
If dealing with issues of cultural humiliation makes our foreign policy more successful (ie achieves concrete results), then that’s a good thing, right? And if ignoring those issues has real costs, that’s bad, right? So how about some examples to shore up your theory?
Contrawise, why write a long article about how you don’t *feel* like being sympathetic, and then sum it up by claiming that conservatives such as yourself want concrete results?
(and then tack on a nonsequitur paragraph of Orwellian Newspeak dictats, wherein you define the term “civil war” out of existence and demonstrate unfamilarity with the definition of the word “insurgent”).
Bees, hornets, Arabs, Persians, illegal Mexican immigrants. Michelle Malkin, waspish harridans, what’s the difference?
Malkin’s a WASP? Who knew?
No, but I sure wish she’d bee quiet.
Malkin is a Catholic with a stinger. What’s that called? Does it start with bee?
Here’s a graphic depiction. Caution, this is a video link that downloads immediately.
One short answer is that unlike wasps (including hornets) bees don’t eat meat in their lifecycle.
what’s for lunch?
Tofu and banana curry. I made a big pot and you’re all welcome to come over except for LowLife, because I can’t tolerate people who make spelilng misteaks.
She’s a Phyllis Schafly of a different .. forget it, I’ve lost my touch.
I never get invited anywhere. I’ll just set out by the curb, drinking wry and grilling misteaks.
CB you do understand, right, that ‘legitimacy’ is completely a human construct?
Up to a point. Iraq has had three free and fair elections with incredible turnout, it has a formed parliamentary government (albeit with a few holes) and it has overwhelming recognition from the international community, yet apparently to you and others the Iraqi government is not legitimate and both Sunni and Shiite paramilitary thugs and terrorists do have legitimate gripes and a legitimate cause. Sorry, but I simply don’t accept it. These “insurgents” were given three fair chances to address their grievances democratically, and they chose to pass, and now most of the blood they’re shedding is Iraqi, in the form of terrorist attacks, guerilla attacks and felonies. But I’m the one who needs to look in the mirror? You set your standards regarding Iraq such that that 80% of the rest of the nations on the planet would not be able to meet. Are 80% of the world’s nations illegitmate? Again I say, you’re not making sense, but at least more so than Sancho.
If you think I said that I don’t think the Iraqi government is legitimate, you need new reading glasses.
The part that worries me, though, is the ongoing squabble over the Constitution. The Sunni factions were persuaded to sign onto it because they were promised it would be significantly revised as soon as a government could be formed, but as soon as it was signed into law, the Kurdish factions declared game over–and maybe they’d exercise their right to succession aaaany day now–and the Shia declared themselves unwilling to negotiate with the Sunnis. That’s a fight waiting to happen; either it will happen in political negotiations, or it will be decided–as it already may be–on the streets.
And of course we’ve only just now even got a government together, and it certainly doesn’t have a “monopoly of force.”
Legitimate or illegitimate don’t seem to me to be exactly the right words to use to describe what is probably a terrifying lack of predictability about authority within Iraq. Almost every group within Iraq seems to be hedging its bets; if the central government goes “phut” for whatever reason, each group wants to be well-armed and mobilized for whatever follows. The other guys are thugs and terrorists, after all.
The elections do confer a degree of legitimacy–on paper. But that paper needs to be backed up by a monopoly of force and a enforceable system of law. Iraq isn’t there yet.
DaveC, I’m aware of Raed’s survey. Do you think it was complete? Anyway, there are other Iraqi groups that have done other surveys of civilian dead and I don’t recommend that you believe them necessarily, but I’ve seen numbers like 30,000 by late 2004, 37,000 dead by late 2003, and over 100,000 by sometime last summer. That last one appeared in the Washington Times.
I’ve been critical of Iraq Body Count, but I have to give them some credit–they do a very good job keeping track of the number of civilian dead as reported in the press. And their figure for the first two months of the war is just under 7000 civilians killed by US forces. After that, according to them, the number drops dramatically. Their total for Fallujah in 2004 is under 2000, which includes the April fighting, the November fighting, and the bombing in-between. The Lancet paper suggests (doesn’t prove) that the true number is far higher. Who is right? I don’t know. I think it’s almost true by definition that the correct figure is higher than what gets reported in the press, but how much higher God only knows. Which I mean literally. If the US government keeps a secret tally of the number of civilians they kill I bet it’s an undercount.
I’d never heard of Jesse MacBeth, I don’t think, or anyway the name doesn’t ring a bell.
A guy who recorded a videocast wearing a badly-faked Green Beret costume, or somesuch. Claimed to have served in Iraq, and talked about all the civilians they killed and the massacres and so on and so forth. Some web site was hosting the video, but I’d never heard of the guy until conservative bloggers started picking it to pieces (rightly so).
Then Michelle Malkin ran a picture of him photoshopped next to Kerry, or something like that… Basically, he’s the next Ward Churchill meme.
Then Michelle Malkin ran a picture of him photoshopped next to Kerry
what a loathsome little cancre is she.
Well, GW Bush seems to think that the figure is around 30,000 civilians killed as of a few months ago. Perhaps that could be accepted as the low end of the scale for discussions regarding casualties.
yet apparently to you and others the Iraqi government is not legitimate and both Sunni and Shiite paramilitary thugs and terrorists do have legitimate gripes and a legitimate cause.
CB, for the 99th time, it’s not we bloggers who count. The point is that many IRAQIS believe that their own govt is not legitimate and have taken up arms against it. (see, eg, CSA 1861.)
We have Kurds setting up for secession, apparently believing that the US will rein in Turkey. We have the Shia establishing Sharia law in the south, likely with Iranian assistance. We have Sunni rejectionists p*ssed off at losing power and attacking the occupying US forces. Each major power bloc appears to have established death squads to ethnically cleanse disputed territory. and last on the list we have AQ-in-Iraq, just stirring the pot.
and this is progress!!??
you’re still getting cause and effect backwards. (you’re in good company; the President hasn’t figured it out either.) Elections do NOT create legitimate governments; free and fair elections are the RESULT of the population accepting as legitimate one particular form of government — democracy.
Thanks Jeff.
The Lancet paper is politically correct on the subject of US troops committing massacres–that is, they are careful to say that they found no evidence of such things being committed by ground troops. In the weird sort of morality Americans (or maybe most humans) have, it’s less upsetting if large numbers of people are killed as “collateral damage” in air strikes. Of course, given the size of their sample they wouldn’t be likely to pick up an occasional massacre if such things occur. They found 3 cases of US ground troops killing people–in one case it was a military-age man (and perhaps an insurgent) and in another it was an old guy shot at a checkpoint and in the third it was a security guard shot by mistake. 2 deaths in the Lancet study correspond to about 6000 deaths, but the error bars are, once again, gigantic. Still, there are probably thousands of such cases or the Lancet survey most likely wouldn’t have picked up 2. If there were only 1000 such events the expected value for the Lancet survey would be about 1/3 and getting 2 is possible, but not terribly likely.
These “insurgents” were given three fair chances to address their grievances democratically, and they chose to pass, and now most of the blood they’re shedding is Iraqi, in the form of terrorist attacks, guerilla attacks and felonies.
Just as the American South lost an election just before the Civil War. Yet we don’t call the Confederates ‘terrorists’ and ‘criminals’- we recognize that when a substantial subset of a country doesn’t accept the legitimacy of the government, there is a big problem. A big problem which doesn’t go away when you start calling that subset nasty names.
Seriously, there is an actual problem in Iraq, and the best you can do is suggesting that we delegitimize the oppositional groups and alter our language to fit that deligitimization. How does that accomplish *anything*?
(Other than making members of certain political parties feel better about themselves for advocating the Iraqi adventure in the first place, since the blame can now be shifted from their criminally bad judgement to the insurgents for not ‘playing fair’ and giving up after losing some elections.)
Francis, I understood CB’s comment to employ second person singular, and so you don’t need to be looking down to see if the shoe fits.
It’s true, of course, that it doesn’t matter whether you and I think the Iraqi government is legitimate. We’re not planning on taking up arms either way. On the other hand, if someone engages me to represent them in a matter in which the power of the Iraqi government to take some action or other is in issue, well I’d be happy to look into the question from the client’s perspective. I’d expect you’re in the same boat.
Yet we don’t call the Confederates ‘terrorists’ and ‘criminals’
Speak for yourself.
30,000 was the IBC count when Bush used that number. The unfortunate thing about the Iraq Body Count number is that it is frequently cited as an estimate when they themselves say it’s a media-based count and surely too low, perhaps by a factor of two. (They disagree with critics who say the violent civilian death toll is too low by a factor of maybe 5 or 10. If you include infant mortality and other things then the true number probably is several times larger than their number, which I don’t think they’d dispute.)
I’ve been looking around for statistics on the number of insurgent dead, on the theory that these numbers are probably going to be comparable to the number of civilians killed by the US. (According to the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, the Israelis have killed more unarmed Palestinians than armed ones and I don’t know why the US would have a better record in Iraq, especially when Israel surely has much better intelligence.) The number isn’t commonly cited. But the Brookings Institute puts out their tables of numbers fairly often and as of early May, a graph in their report shows the US had captured or killed over 60,000 insurgents. One interesting point is that there is a dramatic surge in the numbers in November 2003, which they attribute to better data and not necessarily to any actual increase–which I take to mean we don’t know how much violence our government inflicts unless the government tells us. And in the article (address below) I just read, Michael O’Hanlon of Brookings estimates that around 1500 to 2000 Iraqis die violently each month, about half of those being insurgents. I wonder what the evidence is that all those insurgent dead really were insurgents. Or putting it another way, does the term “insurgent” include sympathizers, which probably includes most of the Sunni population.
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2005/10/25/172649.shtml
Donald Johnson, you’ve spoken before about your work on and criticism of the Iraq Body Count, and I’ve never quite understood where you’re coming from.
I became aware of IBC when they started up at the very beginning of the war. Their methodology, and its built-in limitations, have always been stated clearly. It is, if I haven’t totally misunderstood it, to count and as far as possible verify the civilian casualties from press reports and military reports.
That takes a fair amount of media analysis to do, but in order to get a real statistical account of Iraqi mortality, one would have to do a study like the Lancet’s. So IBC has a very limited usefulness, as its numbers will always be low, and it always has done.
The Lancet’s study, done some time ago, was absolutely above-the-board as far as epidemiological methodology is concerned, and their numbers, which measure increased mortality rather than reported violent deaths, were much higher.
It would be excellent to have another such study conducted, but the last one was so poorly and politically received, and Iraq become so dangerous, that it’s unlikely that another will be commissioned.
So, I don’t entirely understood your disagreement. Both of these studies are research models, with their own inherent limitations.
Regarding your last comment, I’m very skeptical of any numerical reporting that pretends to know who is an insurgent.
According to CB’s standards the Vichy Goverment was legitimate.
I’m very skeptical of any numerical reporting that pretends to know who is an insurgent.
Simple, if they are not British or Americans and they are dead, they were obviously insurgents.
Hmm, I thought my own position was fairly clear, but maybe I’m too familiar with my own position to see how unclear I’m being when I explain it.
I had no problems with IBC until I downloaded their two year analysis last summer. It came across as the work of people who’d fallen in love with their methodology and were claiming more for it than it could deliver. What really stuck out were the bar graphs and tables showing the number of civilians killed by coalition forces. Quite frankly, if those numbers are true or even in the ballpark it’s a mystery to me why so many Iraqis favor attacks on coalition forces. From all accounts that I’ve read most Iraqis didn’t hate the US in the earliest months and hatred only grew later and if so, judging by IBC statistics Iraqi hatred of the US is almost inversely related to how many civilians our forces are killing. According to IBC, the overwhelming majority of civilians killed by US forces were killed in the first two months (7000 by their count). Roughly 2000 were killed in Fallujah in 2004. And outside of that, IBC shows that in most months the number of civilians killed by coalition forces was typically in the range of a few dozen. Yet according to the Brookings Institute, in virtually every month of the war the US has been killing nearly 1000 insurgents a month and civilians are dying at about the same rate, but mostly from criminal attacks, insurgents, and more recently (not so much in the first two years) Shiite death squads. IBC also mentions another 1000 “crossfire deaths” to be added to the mix, where civilians died in firefights between the US and insurgents. So over the first 24 months of their study that’s another 40 deaths a month the US is partly responsible for. That still means the US contribution to the civilian deaths is in most months a small fraction of the total.
Maybe the IBC data is giving us a roughly accurate picture of the war, in which case the US is extraordinarily good at counterinsurgency warfare, far better than the Israelis. Or maybe there’s something wrong with the data.
My problem with IBC is twofold. First and less important is the total number. Their “maximum” count is frequently cited as an estimate, which it is not. If they think the true number might be double their own they should state that their “max” is likely to be a serious undercount so that this confusion would end.
My second problem is that I suspect the data is probably slanted–I suspect that many of those “insurgent” deaths are civilians. If so, IBC’s data is actively misleading. It’s probably just as well that hardly anyone seems to have paid close attention to their two year study.
On the other hand, if I’m wrong then it’s worth knowing that the US can fight a counterinsurgency campaign and kill well over ten times as many insurgents as civilians. Or maybe the insurgents are being chivalrous and fight their battles making sure that they don’t use civilians as human shields.
Belatedly, I too want to applaud John Thullen’s comment. I especially liked this: “I, the earnest, well-intentioned one…” 😉
I assumed that ‘Jesse MacBeth’ was some sort of pun on Jesurgislac that I didn’t get, and that the ‘Malkin started it!’ was riffing by people who did get it, whatever it was, until very late in the thread. Yeesh. Fwiw: you did not hear about him/her/it from me.
Oh hell, I thought that earlier reply had gotten through.
I hadn’t been aware that IBC was trying to differentiate insurgent and civilian deaths. That’s inherently problematic. But I’d always assumed that their method of counting would be low, and that their reported “maximum” would be according to the admissable data under their collecting methods. In other words, I’m really glad they’re doing the work they’re doing, but that work has always seemed to be of limited use. I’d far rather see another Lancet-style study.
Anyway, thank you very much for clarifying your position for me, Donald.
Darn, I’m not doing very well on clarifying, I’m afraid. IBC doesn’t count insurgent deaths. What I’m doing is comparing the numbers the Brookings Institute gives for the number of insurgent deaths with the number of civilians allegedly killed by US forces according to IBC and to me the two sets of numbers don’t seem plausible when compared–that is, the US seems to be killing an amazingly large number of insurgents according to the Brookings Institute when compared to (in most months) the relatively small number of civilians killed by the coalition according to IBC.
Charles Bird: But I’m the one who needs to look in the mirror?
As I was the one who made the mirror comment, I should probably respond even though your remarks are technically addressed to CharleyCarp. Most of what I want to say has been said by Jackmormon, Charleycarp and Carleton Wu, but there’s larger point I think that’s worth addressing more… bluntly than others have done.
You set your standards regarding Iraq such that that 80% of the rest of the nations on the planet would not be able to meet.
80% of the rest of the nations on the planet possess significant numbers of people so infuriated at their government that they are taking up arms against it? That’s certainly news to me; do you have any particular support for this contention or are you just bloviating at random?
…that’s an unfair question, of course, because we’re talking at cross-purposes. So let’s get this cleared up once and for all. To reiterate what most people in this conversation have been saying: it does not make a goddamn bit of difference what we, the bloggers, or we, the American people, would like to consider a “legitimate” government. Legitimacy is not conferred by American imprimatur. Meaningful legitimacy is not conferred by the simple presence of elections, no matter how much we’d like to believe the contrary. “Legitimacy” itself is a colossal red herring, in fact, at least from the American perspective.
What we can say right now is: there is a government that’s been democratically elected according to certain standards — one that we more or less like, and one which, if it lives up to its promise, seems like it might help engender a free and fair society — and it’s being forcibly opposed by other people who want to see a different government installed instead. [The precise composition of these people, as well as their goals, being a matter of some dispute.] Anything else we might say on the matter — anything else at all, whether it’s a question of “legitimacy” or “appropriateness” or of “moral justification” or whatever — is obscurantist propaganda bullshit, empty rhetoric whose sole purpose (intended or not) is to impede an accurate assessment of the situation.
Period.
The upshot, then, is that your remarks re “legitimacy” are completely vacuous, and they’re distracting from the topic at hand. I don’t know how much clearer I can be. The sooner you can get off this particular high horse, the sooner we’ll be able to have a productive discussion about what’s going on in Iraq.
“Just as the American South lost an election just before the Civil War. Yet we don’t call the Confederates ‘terrorists’ and ‘criminals'”
I’d like to add the term traitors to the list.
Muslim cultural humiliation is the theory of Samuel Huntington and Bernard Lewis, not exactly famed left or liberal thinkers, so you might want to take your argument up with them, rather than with the left, who didn’t invent this theory.
(Though I’d say it has a moderate amount going for it in its own limited way, myself.)
so, when it turns out that Murtha was right, does that mean he’s no longer Working for The Enemy ?
someone with a better grasp of Right Wing Logic needs to work this out for me.
someone with a better grasp of Right Wing Logic needs to work this out for me.
He remains a traitor because he spoke of it out loud.
I will come clean.
After all the whining about censorship on the web, from various parties, I undertook a little experiment:
How obnoxious would I have to be, before anyone called me on it?
Based on my experience, here and on Americablog, the answer seems to be “Pretty fargin'”
Your response was correct, and it gives me a data point. Better still, for practical purposes, it gives me an anecdote: when some blathermouth starts attacking blogs, I will have a certified personal experience to offer up.
I hope that I have not annoyed you, at least not beyond the point where you can forgive me in the name of Science.
Mr. Bell,
Your use of us as unwitting experimental subjects reminds me of a joke:
A guy’s sitting at the bar, asks the young lady next to him what time it is. She shouts back at him “How dare you speak to me like that!!!” He, surprised and embarrassed, ducks his head and mumbles, “I just asked the time, miss”. She yells even louder “Stop it right now, I’ll call the police if you say another word!!!!”. He grabs his drink and retreats to a table in a dim corner of the bar.
A few minutes later she quietly comes over and sits down at his table. “I’m sorry to have done that to you — I’m a grad student in Psychology and I’m doing research on how people react to surprising and embarrassing situations.” He goggles at her a second, then yells out at the top of his voice, “You’ll do all that for me all night for just five bucks??!!!!”
“so, when it turns out that Murtha was right, does that mean he’s no longer Working for The Enemy ?”
I, myself, am a “sickening soul” who is on the “far left” who is “gloating” over this horrible event, it turns out.
But I’m sure everyone here already knew or assumed that.
Reading list:
On cultural humiliation and war in the American psyche: Sherman’s March and Vietnam by James Reston, Jr..
On Japan, cultural humiliation, and the recovery from WWII: Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II by John W. Dower.
I am quite boggled by Charles’ dismissal of “cultural humiliation” as a Muslim motive, when it just seems like another way of saying “culture war” to me. Cultural resentment in the Muslim world is a profoundly conservative force — reactionary, even — just as it is in the US. Would you be more sympathetic if they talked about “dishonor” instead of “humiliation”?
From my POV, it sure doesn’t look as though liberals are the ones who place “too much emphasis . . . on emotional well-being and not enough on achieving concrete results”. Rather, the difference is that though we *all* hold our own emotional well-being (religious feelings, for instance) very dear, liberals try act as though other people’s feelings are as real as our own.
Dower is good.
so, when it turns out that Murtha was right, does that mean he’s no longer Working for The Enemy ?
No.
It means reality is 😮
Charles’s comment reminds me of a classic jokes about economists:
Three people are stranded on a small island. One is a physicist, one is a circus strongman, and one is an economist. After a few days of surviving on fruit, they discover a cache of canned food, and they have to decide how to open it. The physicist says to the strongman “Why don’t you climb that tree, and smash the cans down on the rocks, and burst them open?”
The strongman says, “No, that would spatter the stuff all over. I can open the cans with my teeth!”
The economist says “First, we must assume that we have a can opener.”
Charles’s solution: assume Muslims are not feeling encroached by the West … and tell them to get over it.
Sounds a lot like McCain’s solution.
someone with a better grasp of Right Wing Logic needs to work this out for me.
He remains a traitor because he spoke of it out loud.
Sigh.
Sigh
wow. Murtha’s “agenda” is an issue?. BD would benefit from a little self-reflection.
As I’ve blogged, quoting these from news reports:
Another Kline quote:
Moreover, the only way it would seem Charles could substantiate his mindreading of Murtha that he wants us to lose, and says things to further that cause, is by mind-reading. Until he can demonstrate said mind-reading capability, or otherwise explain his knowledge of Murtha’s evil intent, he loses the argument.
I do, needless to say, desire and invite Charles to respond.
Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and a few other NGOs, have designated June Torture Awareness Month. I’ve created a blogroll you can join if you’re interested. You can find it here. The idea is that everyone is linked to from the blogroll, and in exchange, you discuss torture (as you already do), and link to the Torture Awareness site to help support the NGOs.
There’s a lot of bloggers concerned about human rights abuse in the War on Terror. If we coordinate, we can show our support and help Amnesty and HRW make Torture Awareness Month a success.
If you think I said that I don’t think the Iraqi government is legitimate, you need new reading glasses.
Sorry, Charley.
Just as the American South lost an election just before the Civil War.
Your problem is equating the American Civil War with what’s taking place in Iraq, Carleton, and that the “insurgency” is a “substantial subset”.
According to CB’s standards the Vichy Goverment was legitimate.
You really go sit in a corner, Sancho. Your comment is too stupid for futher response.
free and fair elections are the RESULT of the population accepting as legitimate one particular form of government — democracy.
Not the last election, francis. The December 15th election established the very government that is in place right now.
The precise composition of these people, as well as their goals, being a matter of some dispute.
Anarch, when only 30% (or less) of the people stay out of the democratic process in the previous election, the people have spoken, and they’re the ones who conferred legitimacy on the current Iraqi government. Obviously you have a different opinion. But if you think 4,000 or so terrorists and 20,000 “insurgent” fighters have legitimate grievances–even though many aren’t even Iraqi and the rest eschewed participating–fine, go to town. To me, it makes little sense.
Jack made a point about Iraqi forces and their ability to keep the peace on their own, and I think it’s reasonable. Almost. Since we were responsible for disbanding the Iraqi in mid-2003 (which was a huge mistake), it’s only fair that the Iraqi government outsource their security forces until they get enough troops up to Level 1 and Level 2 proficiency.
I do, needless to say, desire and invite Charles to respond.
I’m sorry y’all don’t like my use of “loser-defeatist” as it pertains to Murtha, but it is exactly what his strategy is, in my opinion, for the reasons stated here. Murtha brought up the matter, and then expressly reiterated his position that U.S. forces should immediately withdraw from Iraq. Murtha is a politician, so by default he will act in a way that furthers his agenda. In this matter, he had a choice: sit by and let events unfold and then respond after the information was officially released (or not), or to immediately splash his views on Hardball and other venues in order to try to change American opinion to his way of thinking. He chose the latter, jumping ahead of the story and bringing himself and his agenda maximum exposure. He couldn’t have been the only Congressman who was briefed, but he was the only one who splashed it, and we all know where he stands. He took alleged war crimes committed by fellow Marines and used them as a club for bashing current policy. That’s why I wrote what I did. That he exploited this incident by stepping out the way he did looks pretty self-evident to me.
He couldn’t have been the only Congressman who was briefed
Cite?
He took alleged war crimes committed by fellow Marines and used them as a club for bashing current policy.
And Congressman Kline? What’s his crime?
I say it’s spinach and to hell with it.
Actually, not me. Others.
He took alleged war crimes committed by fellow Marines and used them as a club for bashing current policy.
It seems to me he was holding up evidence, quite damning evidence actually, of why the current policy is both fundamentally flawed and incompetently executed.
And oh, protecting the honour of both the Corps and the country. Of course, that’s mindreading, but looking over the transcript of that Hardball interview, and viewing the reaction from the Marine High Command, I feel somewhat confident in my interpretation, as I am confident, based on the dearth of evidence you provide, that your charges are scurrilious. Remember, assertion is not argument.
Murtha has an agenda. Heaven forbid that every human being on the planet operates with some sort of goal.
What’s your agenda?
Goodness, here I am again. It’s probably obvious by now, but I’m positively livid. Given the subject, which is serious business of the highest order, this is quite frankly the most dishonourable thing you have ever written, Charles. In my opinion, of course.
People might hold other statements of yours in higher disregard. I couldn’t say, I haven’t read everything you’ve written. Thank goodness for small miracles.
I’m going to step away from the computer now for a few days. Cheers.
When the Abu Ghraib story broke, Donald Rumsfeld testified,
Charles, do you really believe we can trust administration investigations? The events in Haditha occurred in November, 2005. If not for the publicity attracted by Congressman Murtha, might this not have been another example swept under the rug? The investigation of Tiger Force in 1975 was killed the same month that Donald Rumsfeld began his first tenure as Secretary of Defense.
He chose the latter, jumping ahead of the story and bringing himself and his agenda maximum exposure
he didn’t jump ahead of the story, he accurately reported what happened. the only people who jumped ahead of the story are those who went on to invent a myriad of fantasies in which the our troops didn’t do what they did, and then tried to sell those stories, along with accompanying tall tales about the hoardes of imaginary traitors trying to bring our innocent country down. talk about an agenda.
“loser-defeatist”
delusional apologist
Having not been around for most of this thread, I’d like to respond to what Carleton said here: “Yet we don’t call the Confederates ‘terrorists’ and ‘criminals’- we recognize that when a substantial subset of a country doesn’t accept the legitimacy of the government, there is a big problem.”
Yes, we call the Confederates “traitors” and “rebels,” actually.
Charles: “Your comment is too stupid for futher response.”
Be that as it may, a tad more courtesy might be in order.
“Since we were responsible for disbanding the Iraqi in mid-2003 (which was a huge mistake), it’s only fair that the Iraqi government outsource their security forces until they get enough troops up to Level 1 and Level 2 proficiency.”
Just to surprise you, Charles: I agree.
“I’m sorry y’all don’t like my use of “loser-defeatist” as it pertains to Murtha,”
Before addressing other points here, I’d like to get to one I’ve never bothered to: I don’t quite understand what this phrase means.
I understand perfectly well what it means if you just call him a “defeatist.” I would tend to argue, but I understand it perfectly well.
But are you calling him a “loser” as in when 8-year-olds do: “you loser!”
Or is “loser” intended to modify “defeatist” in some way? (I can’t see how.)
Or do you simply mean that he is for us losing, just as he is a defeatist, in which case the term is pointlessly redundant, and any copyeditor would strike it as such.
I can’t think of a fourth possibility, but if that’s just my lack of imagination, which is perfectly possible, please clarify. Because any way about it, I don’t even understand this coinage, and thus have difficulty discussing it, when I don’t know what you mean by it.
I’ll, however, attempt to do so on the basis that it’s a redundant synomyn of “defeatist.”
“…but it is exactly what his strategy is, in my opinion, for the reasons stated here.”
Plenty of military thinkers and advocates and strategists, Charles, believe that a large force stimulates as much resistance and offense in the general population as any good it does, or more; you know who the most prominent such in the United States is?
His name is “Donald Rumsfeld.”
I’ll give you plenty of cites, if you’d like.
Presumably having been made aware of this, you will now never again refer to him as other than “loser-defeatist Donald Rumsfeld.”
Right?
If not, why not?
In any case, when and how withdrawals should take place is perfectly debatable and something that reasonable people can and will differ about. But everyone is for them, including one “George W. Bush.” The only arguments are about when.
But, in any case, I wasn’t arguing with you above about Murtha’s timetable for withdrawal. I was arguing about people calling him a “traitor” for a) suggesting a withdrawal timetable of a very vague sort; and b) currently for having done nothing more than pass on — clearly at the request of the Marine Corps, their briefing, which they confirmed, and which Congressman Kline has gone on to say considerably more inflamnatory (if you think such statements are) statements about, as regards the events at Haditha.
If you’d care to address that point, I’d appreciate it.
“He took alleged war crimes committed by fellow Marines and used them as a club for bashing current policy.”
This is horsepucky, unless you can either mind-read, or produce a statement from the Marine Corp confirming your mind-reading that he wasn’t authorized.
Maybe you’ve not followed the news stories. He was briefed. The Marine Corps made the same statements he made simultaneously. I’ve given cites in my posts. Please familiarize yourself with the facts. Please explain why you’re lambasting Murtha, but not the Marine Corps spokespeople, Commandant Hagee, and Congressman Kline, save that you wish to policitize this tragedy to bash a politician you have disagreements with, to further your agenda. That you’re exploiting a perfectly reasonable behavior utterly inconsistently to further your political agenda looks pretty clear to me, but it might be unreasonable of me to engage in such speculation: what do you think?
And please address the facts with other facts, not your imaginative mind-reading of intent of a war hero decorated Marine Colonel who fought in two wars, if you would be so kind.
“He took alleged war crimes committed by fellow Marines and used them as a club for bashing current policy.”
Cite?
I’m too lazy to look for it, but I seem to recall reading that there was a poll some months back which showed that nearly half of Iraqis approve of violent attacks on American troops. Which, if true, sounds as though there might be a fairly large amount of Iraqi support for the groups which actually do that.
Why they feel that way is another question.
“If not for the publicity attracted by Congressman Murtha, might this not have been another example swept under the rug?”
No, that’s clearly not so. An investigation began promptly in January when Time brought the results of their investigation to the Corps, following investigations by human rights groups, and the video provided by one, and it’s clearly been proceeding thoroughly ever since.
And, as I’ve been repeating until my fingers grow tired, Murtha only passed on what he was cleared asked to by the Corps, simultaneously with Corps spokespeople addressing the issue.
Here’s Time on Mar. 27, 2006, and March 23, and March 19th: Collateral Damage or Civilian Massacre in Haditha?.
How anyone, such as Charles, can claim Murtha was releasing info last week, I don’t know, other than stipulating that he and many are ignorant of the facts.
Okay, I see another post to make. See here, if you like.
Gary: Please explain why you’re lambasting Murtha, but not the Marine Corps spokespeople, Commandant Hagee, and Congressman Kline, save that you wish to policitize this tragedy to bash a politician you have disagreements with, to further your agenda.
And, to be blunt, to cover up war crimes in the service of that agenda.
Now, apparently, I too will need to step away from this thread for a day or so, lest Godwin reign; but for the record, I too agree that this sentiment is one of the most sickeningly dishonorable you’ve ever expressed, Charles, and you should be ashamed of yourself.
I might as well note here that I added the following addendum to this post:
Should add Chiarelli, too, I guess, for prematurely calling the allegations “very very serious[ly].”
The ‘loser-defeatist’ labal has always amused me. The implicit meaning is, essentially, “Here’s a problem. I favor one solution to it. Anyone who points out that my solution only makes it worse is a DEFEATIST. Clap harder.”
“Duncan Hunter called for hearings on Haditha:”
Color me cynical. The only point to Republicans calling for hearings is a desire to provide immunity.
And Congressman Kline? What’s his crime?
Kline who, sparti? I don’t know who he is or what he said, but if said the same as Murtha, the same charge applies to him.
What’s your agenda?
Sometimes to advance moderate conservatism. For Iraq, a free, peaceful, non-theocratic representative republic. To me, Murtha’s agenda is the exact anti of that objective. As for what’s “scurrilous” or not, Murtha clearly referenced on Hardball to the statements he made last November regarding immediate unilateral withdrawal.
So what’s your agenda?
Charles, do you really believe we can trust administration investigations?
Abu Ghraib was under already investigation when it was made public, and it was inevitable that it would be publicized. This has happened for every scandal, non-scandal and pseudo-scandal that has occurred in the last six years. Why ever would Haditha be the one incident to not get full-throated coverage? As far as we know, Time magazine alerted the Marines to Haditha, and the Marines in turn investigated, and it looks like they’re ready to court-martial several men for murder.
If not for the publicity attracted by Congressman Murtha, might this not have been another example swept under the rug?
With the left-wing blogosphere ready to blow this up on all of their front pages? With adversarial-to-hostile mainstream media poised to give this front page coverage? Anything’s possible, but sweeping under the rug sounds completely implausible to me.
…he didn’t jump ahead of the story, he accurately reported what happened…
He reported allegations as foregone conclusions, cleek, AND he jumped the story by going to Chris Matthews before the Marines finished their investigation.
Gary, I’ll agree that “loser-defeatist” is redundant. “Defeatist” works just as well.
Plenty of military thinkers and advocates and strategists, Charles, believe that a large force stimulates as much resistance and offense in the general population as any good it does, or more; you know who the most prominent such in the United States is?
There are plenty of military thinkers, etc. who believe a whole range of different things, Gary. What I believe is that Rumsfeld shouldn’t be gainfully employed in the Bush administration. He was wrong in having too few troops in mid-2003 Iraq, and we’re still paying for that mistake to this day. The security situation still remains the number one problem, and sufficient numbers of coalition and Iraqi forces are needed, and the strategy most needed is clear-and-hold which is, of course, my opinion. But Rumsfeld’s policy is not Murtha’s policy of immediate withdrawal, so I don’t know why you would think Rumsfeld’s is defeatist, or why you would attempt to conflate the views of Murtha and Rumsfeld.
The Marine Corps made the same statements he made simultaneously.
Your WA Post cite stated the Marine Corps briefed govt officials. I didn’t see any reference to the Corps simultaneously briefing the media. I also didn’t see where the Corps stated as fact, like Murtha did, that “Marines overreacted . . . and killed innocent civilians in cold blood.”
Cite?
No cite necessary. It is an opinion which I thought was obviously self-evident, but NBC News did happen to confirm it:
That you’re exploiting a perfectly reasonable behavior utterly inconsistently to further your political agenda looks pretty clear to me, but it might be unreasonable of me to engage in such speculation: what do you think?
I think you have a strange view of what “exploiting” is, Gary, not to mention that disagree with your judgment. This is the first time ever that I’ve commented re Murtha and his statements on Haditha, comments which happen to be off-topic in an aged thread of a middling-trafficked blog. On the issue of timing, yes, Haditha had been reported earlier, but it was Murtha who started the firestorm when he stated as fact that “our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them and they killed innocent civilians in cold blood”, rendering his verdict before the investigation is completed, in a goddam press conference that he initiated in order to commemorate the six-month anniversay of his defeatist policy. In the NBC News link above:
That doesn’t come across to me as simultaneous, but as in response to.
AND he jumped the story by going to Chris Matthews before the Marines finished their investigation.
He Was Right
suck it up.
“Kline who, sparti? I don’t know who he is or what he said, but if said the same as Murtha, the same charge applies to him.”
Well, Charles, thanks for proving you don’t read what I write.
You wrote a response to this comment of mine, Charles.
And now you say you don’t know who Congressman Kline is.
At this point, I’m apt to give up writing to you, when you blatantly respond and yet haven’t read what you’re responding to.
I then wrote about him again.
Moreover, I linked to my posts about him. You obviously read none of this.
Come back to me when you’ve read what I’ve written. Respond. I’ll respond to then. Thanks.
He Was Right
suck it up.
I never said he was wrong, cleek, but that wasn’t what I was talking about. In fact, I feared that those Marines did indeed murder innocent Iraqis.
Well, Charles, thanks for proving you don’t read what I write.
When sparti wrote it, I didn’t who Kline was and responded to him to his May 27 at 9:36pm comment. I didn’t click on your May 26 at 9:39pm comment until just now. So, I’m sorry for not reading what you wrote in that instance. But you would be wrong in claiming that I don’t read what you write. When you excerpted Kline further downthread, I clicked and from there learned more of what he said. I hope that clears it up.
“I didn’t click on your May 26 at 9:39pm comment until just now. So, I’m sorry for not reading what you wrote in that instance.”
Yeah, except you already responded to it.
Yadda yadda yadda.
You now agree that you responded to a message you didn’t read.
I really don’t know what to say.
When you actually respond to what I wrote, as I said, I’ll get back to you. I’d like to hope that you’ll try reading it first, this time.
This is really quite incredible, though. Just incredible.
What I find remarkable is that Charles feels that when you hold a particular position – say that the United States armed forces are overstretched (indeed, breaking) by an endeavour in which their very presence exasperates the problem they are trying to solve (the insurgency) – and you are presented evidence that supports that position – say Marine units on their 3rd and 4th rotation abandoning their training and code to massacre Iraqi civilians (exasperating the insurgency) – that this is, somehow, exploitative.
Let’s say that again: presenting evidence that supports your argument is an act of exploitation.
So what’s your agenda?
My agenda is to live in a world run by pragmaticism: when a policy or approach is shown to be in error, or inoperable, it is abandoned for something else. A “democratic, non-theological Iraq” sounds super. I’m pretty sure, and I admit this is mindreading, that’s what MURTHA WANTS TOO. Too bad the evidence is overwhelming that is not going to be achieved by the current approach.
Another part of my agenda is to live in a world where absolutism is downplayed as much as possible. If someone disagrees with your favoured approach to achieve a goal, for example, they are not labelled “losers”, “defeatists”, or “traitors”. If I was to adopt that approach for myself, I could say something along the lines of those who have been so consistently and dramatically wrong, by trumpeting the threat of Iraqi WMD, of Iraqi-al Qaida ties, who minimized the dangers of a military occupation, who continue to support a war they themselves won’t participate in, have lost the right to an audience.
And who exploit the deaths of US soldiers and Iraqi civilians to further their agenda.
OK, here’s what I did, Gary. I read and responded to sparti first, then I went on to read your earlier comment, even though chronologically yours came first. In any event, when I read and responded to sparti, I didn’t know about Kline. When I read and responded to yours, I clicked on your link and learned more about him. This is what I hate about this comment format, because everything is chronological and there are no subthreads for carrying side conversations, such as in Scoop. In sum, I didn’t read every single comment in chronological sequence and respond exactly in chronological order. That was my crime.
More evidence that a democratic non-theological Iraq is not in the cards:
Don’t be afraid to speak Farsi in Basra. We are a branch of Iran.
It occurs to me that since it’s clear only a smattering of folks here look at my blog (weep! wail!), I should highlight the addendums I’ve added today to this post, particularly including links to Mike Duffy’s Time piece put online about an hour or two ago, and this local news story about the battalion commander, who turns out to be from Colorado, and tonight’s ABC report, but most of all, this video, with video from the Hammurabi Human Rights org that Time got back in January, which when they handed it over to the Marines, got the investigation started, which includes shots of the bullet-ridden walls of the house, which appear deeply stained with blood, and an interview with what is said to be the sole survivor, 12-year-old Safa Younis, who says she hid under bodies and wasn’t seen.
Perhaps, of course, she’s lying. I wouldn’t know. Without doubt, we’ll see blogs explaining she was coached by The Bad Guys. And, as I said, I wouldn’t know.
But if you don’t assume that, it’s pretty godd-amned grim and heart-breaking. Be warned. Be very very warned.
Also in the local tv station report:
More traitorous loser-defeatism, since the investigation isn’t complete.
Of course, most of Washington is now such by that definition, as is the entire press corps, and to their credit, most all of conservative blogdom, save the fringe nutbars (shame Charles hasn’t caught up with the very long list of conservative bloggers who have now spoken up about Haditha as of this morning).
And incidentally, as I mentioned in that post, Mark Kleiman was nice enough to speak up for me.
With all due respect, Gary, (and it is considerable), getting on Charles’ case about what he has or has not read really give Chas the psychological out of thinking that this is just about the niceties of reading and responding, leaving his world view unchallenged. I mean, Chas’ Tacitus comment was in response to a brief post about Congressman Kline, so him telling slarti that he doesn’t know who Kline suggests that he’s not actually considering any information that is being rendered.
Now, saying that, I have no idea what sort of information would be necessary to have Charles rethink this or how to get him to consider it. You’ve laid it out pretty clearly at your place (and I note that the blogger who called you a sick soul is now on about Kerry going into Cambodia. I know he’s quoting a current NYTimes story, but talk about trapped in amber. I also note your updates and CY’s response. I really don’t think he’s worth the effort, but I can understand how you might be incensed), so I’m not sure what information would cause Charles to re-evaluate his position. Certainly Murtha’s service record won’t, nor his close connection to servicemen and women, so I despair of presenting anything that might pierce the armor of self-assurance.
I would note that Charles has the good graces not to make his statement here, and I appreciate that. I’m always had trouble determining whether one should be held accountable for everything one says in every forum, or one should limit it to one forum. It may be that Charles is pretending to be a moderate here and deep down inside, he’s an extremist conservative who can’t acknowledge that people can have different opinions without being labeled as defeatist. On the other hand, given that it was a one line statement, he could have said it in a fit of pique and is now trying to defend it so he doesn’t have to say he should reconsider. I’m not sure which is a more charitable interpretation, but it’s clear that simply haranguing him is, at this point, meaningless.
I never said he was wrong, cleek, but that wasn’t what I was talking about
you’re smearing him because he was right without your permission.
“That was my crime.”
Charles, you don’t get it.
I wrote this comment:
That is, “I strongly suggest trying it.”
That is, I suggest Charles trying following discussion in linear order, and if he’s responding to my comments, to read them in linear order.
LJ: “I also note your updates and CY’s response. I really don’t think he’s worth the effort, but I can understand how you might be incensed)….”
If you look back at CY’s post/thread, you’ll see that I posted a final comment and signed off. He has quite a few links and readers, by the way. And his cite was picked up by at least six other conservative bloggers, a couple as loony as he is, but not all, and they repeated how sad it was that those damn leftists were gloating, but what can you expect, etc.
In the thread at SisterToldja’s that I also commented at, similarly, people were going on about those leftists who were using this to smear all Marines as baby-killers and people who massacre, etc., and nobody, of course, cited any actual cases of this. It was all fevered imagination: they knew it must be happening, so actually bothering to find cases of it before denouncing them wasn’t necessary.
Kinda fascinating in a frighting sort of way.
I never expected to get anywhere in the first place with CY, but I figured I’d give him an opportunity to do the right thing.
Besides, it’s been a slow weekend. 🙂
Coming very late to this thread, because I was on vacation last week. I’d just like to make a few minor observations about how different cutlures have reacted to being humilitated by outside cultures.
In 1853, the Japanese were humiliated by the appearance in American warships in Tokyo Bay, which they could do nothing to prevent. They were subsequently forced to open up to foreign trade. They reacted by engaging in a forced march to industrialization and built themselves a modern army and navy, until they could face the West on equal terms. Humiliated again in 1945, they turned their backs on war and concentrated on becoming an economic great power.
Why didn’t the Arabs react the same way to their various defeats and humiliations? After WWI, the Turks modernized themselves. The Iranians at least took their own destiny in their hands in 1979, though I believe they have since come to regret their choices during the Revolution. The Afghans kicked out the British back in the 1840s and the Russians in the 1980s (though our Stingers helped – you’re welcome, Mullah Omar!) So why do the Arabs continue to indulge themselves in paranoid fantasies about Jewish and Western conspiracies, against which they are apparently helpless? Why do so they continue to believe that 9/11 was perpetrated by Mossad? Why do so many of them condone terrorism? Why can’t they build nations capable of functioning in the modern world?
I do not deny that the Arabs have suffered cultural humiliations at our hands, and I do not deny that they have many legitimate grievances against us. But hey, so do the Latin Americans, and you don’t see them flying planes into buildings or strapping bombs to their children.
I consider myself a moderate conservative, but on this subject I sometimes feel like a troglodyte. There is something wrong at the heart of Arab culture – it infects other Islamic cultures to varying degrees, but it starts with the Arabs. I don’t know what the solution is, and I’m pretty sure it’s something they need to discover for themselves. I hope they figure it out soon.
(Preemptive caveat – yes, I am aware of the Tamil Tigers, the ETA, Timothy McVeigh, etc. I am also aware that Muslims did not invent terrorism, and that it has existed in one form or another probably as long as humanity. But the Arabs, in particular, have chosen it as their primary tactic for expressing their rage. Again, I ask why?)
Umm, the Arab countries were created out of whole cloth to be weak? They’ve been the center of outside meddling to an unusual extent? Oil money leads to a bread-and-circuses/authoritarian regimes? They started out farther back than much of Latin America? Plenty of awful stuff happened in the latter area too, we just don’t care much about it since it hasn’t touched us lately, and anyway we’re not trying to run Bolivia? They tried various modernisms (sadly not ours) already without success? Having Israel (causing some legitimate grievances along with the nutty stuff) next door has been an irritation and a convenient excuse for failing regimes?
ThirdGorchBro: Well, within the West, we’ve got the examples of the Confederacy here at home, Opus Dei and its drive to resurrect everything that drove the Reformation the first time around, those who glorified the Irish Republican Army, the “stab in the back” crew in Germany after the First World War, conservative revisionism about the Vietnam war and its French counterpart about Algiers, the noble savage myth in all its flavor…what was it about Europe in any century, or America in any century, that brought forth such responses?
Me, I think it’s just human nature showing one of its common faces.
Rilkefan and I will now demonstrate “complementary”.
“…the Russians in the 1980s (though our Stingers helped – you’re welcome, Mullah Omar!)”
Perhaps I’m biased by only reading western accounts (Steve Coll, the late George Crile’s Charlie Wilson’s War, etc.), but it seems very clear that there’s no way the Afghans could have gotten the Russians out without the combination of American, Saudi, and Pakistani aid. Just footnoting to no particular point.
“So why do the Arabs continue to indulge themselves in paranoid fantasies about Jewish and Western conspiracies, against which they are apparently helpless?”
Because it’s so easy?
But I’m not comfortable with your generalization about “the Arabs.” How about “some Arabs” or “many Arabs” or “the Arabs that choose to support terrorism” or some other “the Arabs that….” formulation.
Because plenty of Arabs don’t. Lots write articles about going in different directions, and obviously for each one who writes an article readable in the West, there are countless more who agree but don’t write such articles.
“But hey, so do the Latin Americans, and you don’t see them flying planes into buildings or strapping bombs to their children.”
No, but lots are awfully awfully awfully pissed off. Most, probably even, to one degree or another.
And it’s hardly as if most Arabs are engaging in terrorism, you know. Especially against the West outside of Iraq and Israel/Palestine. It’s like .000000001% or so.
Unless you’ve been seeing a lot of suicide bombers in your neighborhood lately, and haven’t mentioned it. Let’s not stereotype “Arabs” as terrorism supporters.
“…you don’t see them flying planes into buildings or strapping bombs to their children.”
Point is, we don’t see more than an unbelievably tiny fraction of Arabs doing that, either, outside Iraq and Israel/Palestine. And even in Israel/Palestine, it’s still a tiny percentage, and the overwhelming majority support a two-state solution. (I’ll show you the polling figures if you like. Heck, I just happen to have Marshall McLu– er, this post standing right here.)
It’s easy to get a distorted notion, of course, if one reads hate sites like Little Green Footballs and its satellites, and is credulous about them without much contextual knowledge of the Middle East.
In 1853, the Japanese were humiliated by the appearance in American warships in Tokyo Bay, which they could do nothing to prevent….Why didn’t the Arabs react the same way to their various defeats and humiliations?
3GB,
There’s actually a lot of “humiliating stuff” that you are eliding there, though it is not something that people should be expected to know. The bakufu system was teetering and the arrival of Perry was taken by a number of the stronger han (city-states) as a ‘see, I told you so’ moment. Also, there were a large number of Japanese who were opposed to the westernization, with the climactic battle occuring just down the road from me. Saigo Takamori, who founded the first modern army, was the leader of the rebellion and though considered a pivotal figure in Japanese history, he, and any other samurai who died fighting against the Imperial Government Army, have not been permitted to be enshrined in Yasukuni.
And even after Japan had a modern army and navy, the cycle did not end. A large number of currents in Japanese society arose because of the various “humiliations” given by western powers, including the Portsmouth treaty that ended the Sino-Japanese war, the 1924 Exclusion Act, and the The Washington Conference agreement. Two notable ones would be the March 1931 attempted coup d’etat, and the attempt to prevent the emperor from surrendering by killing the members of the privy council charged with relaying the recordings of the emperor’s surrender speech to the radio broadcasting station.
Last weekend, I visited the kamikaze museum at Chiran. I don’t mean to be snarky, but I really don’t think the example of Japan gets you to where you want to be.
(ps, I agree with several of the others that you would be a worthwhile addition to ObWi)
“Saigo Takamori, who founded the first modern army, was the leader of the rebellion and though considered a pivotal figure in Japanese history, he, and any other samurai who died fighting against the Imperial Government Army, have not been permitted to be enshrined in Yasukuni.”
Yeah, and people now know him as Ken Watanabe.
😉
Quick responses before I go to bed:
rilkefan, maybe I’m just being judgmental but I don’t think the examples you gave are enough of a reason. Did China suffer any less? How about Africa?
Bruce, I grant that it is a human response – I don’t wish to dehumanize the Arabs. But William C. Quantrill is long dead, and Osama bin Laden is (probably) not. I find Opus Dei and its like-minded counterparts in Protestantism despicable, but you have to admit there is a big difference in the number of people killed by them and killed by al Qaeda.
Gary, I should have added a second caveat that by “the Arabs” I did not mean all Arabs or even most Arabs. A disturbingly large minority, perhaps.
Yeah, LJ, I skipped over a lot, though I’m tempted to emulate Gary and point out that the Portsmouth Treaty ended the Russo-Japanese War, not the Sino-Japanese War. 😉 But instead, I’ll just say that the example of Japan was given only to provide contrasting responses to defeat and humiliation, both negative (militaristic Imperial Japan) and positive (post-war Japan).
OK, now I’m off. I’ll check back here in the morning.
the Portsmouth Treaty ended the Russo-Japanese War, not the Sino-Japanese War. 😉
My cheeks are a glowing sakura pink…
Still, I don’t think that it’s such a simple compare and contrast. Japan had a flowering of democracy during the Taisho era, and the rollback to militarism was due to the deft deployment of nationalistic ideals coupled with the utilization of slights to national honor (whether actual or imagined). And unless we want to take the whole of the Middle East to a point that we took Japan to (remember, there was a faction that argued that Japan could be completely starved into submission, can you imagine that situation obtaining in Iraq?), I don’t see how this is actually a contrasting response.
Furthermore, that anti Western response seems to lurk under the surface in many interactions. The protests to the rape cases in Okinawa as well as the banning of US beef suggest that there are currents that run quite deep. And this is a country which has probably been the recipient of more American largesse than any other. I shudder to think what Iraqis, who see little investment and peace brought at by the barrel of a gun, think.
In re KenB: “Say what? I think the Iraq venture as a whole was poorly conceived and the reconstruction poorly executed, but I don’t see how it can reasonably be considered a war of aggression against the Iraqi people.”
It would be nice to think it were not. However, if it is not a war of aggression against the Iraqi people, I have trouble explaining the 1+ million to 2+ million Iraqi dead (“depending on the break” – Gen. Turgidson) over the last 15 years, the medical items on the list of sanctions, the deliberate bombing of water treatment facilities, the continued operation of Abu Ghraib (Why did no one bother to change its name?), the millions of dollars in oil revenues missing under the CPA, the bottom-of-the-barrel security priority accorded Iraqi cultural and educational institutions, the near ubiquitous military mantra that the only thing Iraqis understand is force, the imposition of unpopular leaders like Chalabi, some of the other issues raised by SOD at 6:05pm, etc.
Understandably, some infrastructure needs to be destroyed if you are after cutting off the head of an enemy nation. But beyond that caveat, what conclusion can you draw from the examples above of the nature of this war? Is it possible that the reason for the poor execution of the reconstruction is that, despite rhetoric to the contrary, it is not an important goal for the US?
I’m glad you found someone who agrees wholeheartedly with Murtha, sparti. Good for you. I don’t agree with Rosen because the so-called insurgents are mostly killing fellow Iraqis, not Americans. I guess the excuse is that they’re all collaborators. Rosen also has a disturbing level of sympathy with those who chose to bypass the democratic process. And I wonder what Israeli-born Rosen did that the Israeli army would reject his admittance because he was “enemy of the state”. He doesn’t say. Perhaps because he’s “…wondering if a punitive bombing of Tel Aviv, the city I love, until it complies with international law, might be a good (albeit quixotic) idea.” In this interview, Rosen conferred directly with present and former terrorists. I wonder how an Israeli-born Jew was able to get access. Perhaps you should ask Rosen what his agenda is. From a person who knows him:
Kudos to him for going into dangerous places, but you have to wonder how he convinced these terrorists and hardliners not to behead him, like what happened to Daniel Pearl.
“I don’t think the examples you gave are enough of a reason. Did China suffer any less? How about Africa?”
Come by my office sometime and we’ll chat about the complexity of the simplest, most basic interactions known. What reason is sufficient unto the human heart I cannot say.
But… Consider the Congo. Consider Rwanda. Consider the men forcing children to commit atrocities against their families as a recruiting technique. Consider how lucky we are in Mandela.
Consider that China has (has had) a continuous ancient tradition/culture/control structures, a nearby safety valve in Formosa, a seat on the security council, a clear path to world prominence, some military success against the West, an effective elite authoritarian govt., and a fairly recent history of inconceivable internal bloodshed. Not much like say Syria. Lebanon might be a nice place now if not for the PLO, and Syria, and (I guess) great power infighting and incompetence. Do you think Iraq ever had a clear path to becoming Belgium skipping say Richelieu-era France?
Still, there might be something to what you say – but how one could show it given the available data is beyond my pay scale.
CB, interesting points about Rosen – but if this article is in question, do you contest any of the factual claims he makes (which seem to make up the entirety of the article as I read it)? Stuff like “in what witnesses described to me as summary executions” and ‘”No,” he said definitively. “They could level all of Baghdad and it would still be better than Saddam. At least we have hope.”‘ seem pretty fair and balanced to me.
LowLife’s comments, so far, have been the best at getting to the nut of some topics in this thread, especially, “Saying we don’t target civilians and that we do target civilians is saying the same thing.” Thanks.
What is the point of making such a distinction? Does such a distinction matter to Iraqis? Would it matter to us if we were on the receiving end of another nation’s air strike?
Two issues here that are nonsense: 1) US military forces indiscriminately kill innocent Iraqis (the malice afore thought variety). Nonsense. 2) The war in Iraq is not a war of aggression against the Iraqi people. Also nonsense.
If President Bush said, “This is a war against the Iraqi people,” or if he said, “This is a war about WMDs/regime change/promoting democracy/etc.,” how would we be able to tell the difference vis-à-vis the reality on the ground in Iraq? Saying this is a war solely to rid the world of evil and not a war of occupation against another nation seems a convenient device for avoiding affronts to our identity and national narrative.
Charles wrote (about Nir Rosen)–
“Kudos to him for going into dangerous places, but you have to wonder how he convinced these terrorists and hardliners not to behead him, like what happened to Daniel Pearl.”
Robert FIsk has gotten interviews with Osama Bin Laden and probably various other unsavory characters because they know he is harshly critical of Western behavior in the Middle East (and also very critical of Arab behavior, btw.) Possibly Nir Rosen has credibility with some Muslim terrorists for the same reason. I have no problem with this. But I get the impression CB suspects something worse.
TGB’s point about how many cultures have been humiliated by the West, but only the Arabs have flown planes into buildings is one I think I first saw made by Hitchens. It’s always struck me as funny–there seems to be the unconscious presupposition that it’s in the natural order of things for us to have killed innocent people overseas, but a bizarre aberration in need of special explanation if some member of another culture murders innocent people here. Look at those other cultures–we piled up bodies all over the place and they sucked it up, seems to be the argument.
But anyway, if you actually look at Asian, Latin American, and African reactions to Western colonialism you’ll see countless examples of extreme brutality. 9/11 is different because it’s a massive atrocity that occurred on our own soil. Does TGB really want to uphold China’s 20th Century history as a more reasonable sort of response to Western imperialism? I kinda doubt it.
I don’t know, it is difficult to know how well Adesnik knows Nir Rosen, and I have the sinking suspicion that for Oxblog gents, they probably think that they can tell what people are like because they knew them in Junior High school. At any rate, any prognosticator who felt that Richard Lugar or Richard Armitage had a snowcone’s chance in Hades of becoming Sec of State is not coming to this enterprise with a high batting average.
Nir Rosen’s website is here and his blurb about his book is worth quoting.
In the Belly of the Green Bird is a searing report, unlike any other book about the American experience in Iraq. Almost everything covered in the Western media has been at least one or two steps removed from the minds and acts of the people who will determine the future of Iraq. Some of them are peaceful, some are violent. Some of them hate one another with the intensity of ancient enemies. The depth of discord between Sunnis and Shias is difficult to fathom without listening to them. Their anti-Americanism is much more recent, but not much less intense. The divisions within this cobbled-together country, much like those within Yugoslavia after Tito, are simply too intense to contain.
Charles links to David Adesnik about Nir Rosen as an expert opinion. As it happens, I had read David’s post that got Charles’ attention, which he didn’t bother to quote, many hours before Charles linked.
Charles neglects to quote other things David says, David having known Nir so well and long since junior high school. Let’s go, instead of to David’s post from yesterday, not the one from 2003 that Charles selectively quotes (I don’t believe Charles happened to recall a three year old post, rather than that he saw the link to the three year old post in David’s post yesterday, which is still the top-most post at Oxblog).
Here:
Bear in mind that David also is of the mind that the press doesn’t publish enough positive things about Iraq, that Iraq is on the way to success, that it’s a mystery why people are being so negative, that the CIA is engaged in “trench warfare” against the administration, etc.
Wow, Charles’ 2:43 am is an awful lot of words just to say “I summarily dismiss the man’s argument because of his political opinions”
“Nir Rosen’s website is here and his blurb about his book is worth quoting.”
It’s not his blurb. It’s the cover copy written by Simon and Shuster. Writers don’t do this for their own work.
Perhaps more relevantly, one can read Rosen’s articles for one’s self, and judge them for one’s self. There are plenty of them, and they’re long and thorough, and extremely good reading, as those of us who have been reading them for the past couple of years know.
He’s rather busy writing responses to comments he hasn’t read. You’ll have to forgive him. He’s clearly very, very, busy.
I mean, Chas’ Tacitus comment was in response to a brief post about Congressman Kline, so him telling slarti that he doesn’t know who Kline suggests that he’s not actually considering any information that is being rendered.
Several points, LJ. First, yes, at Tacitus I caught the title to the diary but the read body too quickly before spouting off. The reference to Kline slipped right past me. Either that or I forgot that it was Kline who said what he said. On a second reading of the Tac diary just now, indeed there was mention of Kline, so my bad. The point remains that I read this thread non-chronogically and caught sparti’s comment first (and responded), then I read Gary’s comment (and responded). Second, nothing I wrote in the Tac diary or here takes away from the fact that Murtha held a press conference at his own instigation in order to commemorate the six-month anniversary of his calling for immediate unilateral withdrawal of troops from the Iraqi theater. In that press conference, he exploited for his political gain (in my opinion, which still seems obviously self-evident) the Marine incident at Haditha by stating as fact that Marines killed innocent civilian Iraqis “in cold blood”, using it as a political club to bash current American policy. His own transcript of the press conference makes that fairly clear to me. By the way, it was “sparti”, not “slarti”. We must be right about every single possible detail, no?
you’re smearing him because he was right without your permission
Where exactly did I smear Murtha, cleek?
OK Gary, but one more shot. You asked if I was mindreading Murtha. My answer to that is no, I don’t think so, because he made his agenda clear, foldeding Haditha into his “it’s time for us to leave” press conference and then went on the talk show rounds. Second, I also understand the timing of how the news came out. The difference is that Murtha used the phrase “in cold blood” in his press conference, seemingly rendering his verdict before the investigation was finished, and he expressly used Haditha when he commemorated his initial call for immediate redeployment, then he went on to Hardball and ABC This Week to do the same thing all over again. A politician could hardly have politicized it more. Third, let’s be clear on what I didn’t say. I didn’t say Murtha was a traitor nor did I question his patriotism. Never have. Those that did must answer for themselves, because I never agreed with their take. I didn’t question his accuracy. I didn’t say that he released unauthorized information. It does come across that he rendered his own verdict prematurely, which you would think an elected official would be more careful about, especially since we have the fairly recent case of Ilario Pantano. But on its face, it does look pretty bad, that Marines did kill innocent civilians. And if it’s true, it’s worse than Abu Ghraib because so many were killed. Fourth, my apologies for not reading a thread in proper linear progression.
“But on its face, it does look pretty bad, that Marines did kill innocent civilians.”
How dare you slander the Marines involved by this accusation, when the investigation hasn’t finished, and there’s been no report!
Why would you comment prematurely, like this!?!
Clearly this demonstrates that you are a loser-defeatist, as only a loser-defeatist would hate the United States and our Marines enough to attack them so viciously this way.
———————–
Okay, I don’t mean any of that: I’ve just been getting it all weekend from certain blogs, which isn’t your fault.
But I really don’t understand what the rationale is for how you can differentiate between the above and between condemning Murtha for having said the same thing last week.
I’m not interested in discussing Murtha’s policy notions at this time, and I find the fact that you find them inseparable (apparently — if you can separate that from this discussion, and drop that issue for another time, more power to you) telling. It’s a separate and separable issue.
So, setting that aside, you say: “The difference is that Murtha used the phrase ‘in cold blood’ in his press conference, seemingly rendering his verdict before the investigation was finished….”
Aside from the fact that that’s what all the Marine attestations say, and if you give any credulity to the now extremely multiply-attested to accounts, you have to note that the “cold-blood” part is inextricably at the heart of the whole point of what’s so terrible in what appears (at present, given as yet not-fully-confirmed information) to have happened here, so I don’t for the life of me understand what distinction you’re making, once one separates out your pre-existing disagreements with Murtha over Iraq policy (which are, to repeat again, irrelevant to whether he’s given an accurate account of the information).
I’ll repeat again for emphasis that it’s become clear that Murtha was personally briefed by Marine Commandant Hagee. Yet again, I’ll ask you to please comment on that. Yet again, I’ll ask you — for the last time — to please comment on what Represenative Kline has said, and compare and distinguish it from what Murtha has related and characterized in describing this issue (without bringing in extraneous issues about Murtha’s other views).
Thanks in advance.
And I wonder what Israeli-born Rosen did that the Israeli army would reject his admittance because he was “enemy of the state”. He doesn’t say.
Neither do you. Neither do you address anything in the article in a substantive way. Now, if I was to turn around and adopt the tone you’ve displayed, I would probably say something like “so the Israeli Army won’t have Rosen. What reason did the U.S. Army give you?”
But that wouldn’t be very constructive. You’re not being constructive here Charles, either here on this thread where you’re displaying either a laziness in reading and responding to comments or I’m afraid, a degree of bad faith.
And you’re not being constructive in the larger “meta” sense by labelling those that disagree with you traitors (and no, I’m not going to buy your weak arguments that loser-defeatists isn’t a rather transparent euphemism). Especially given the fact you don’t seem to have the courtesy enough to read what your “opponents” say.
“…and if you give any credulity….”
Very poor word-substitution there: I meant to say “grant any credibility….”
I’ll defend Charles on that.
“Traitors” is vastly more flamnatory, and has a very specific meaning.
It’s precisely because of that that I carry on about its misuse. Treason carries the death penalty. It’s defined in our land by Article III, Section 3 of the Constitution. The word should never be used in a lesser context.
“Loser-defeatist,” aside from being subliterate, and better replaced with the normal “defeatist,” is merely an accusation that can be debated. It carries no criminal penalty attached, let alone the death penalty. The choice of which to use is vast and important.
It also has the advantage that you wouldn’t be able to sue for defamation, like you could with “traitor.”
Given the current climate, I feel confident, though, that “loser-defeatist” is being employed as code (and probably for the above reason). YMMV
“Given the current climate, I feel confident, though, that ‘loser-defeatist’ is being employed as code (and probably for the above reason). YMMV”
I prefer to limit my mind-reading attempts, so I couldn’t say. But if people can be shamed out of accusations of “treason” and “traitor,” to far more reasonable language (if still entirely debatable), than I feel something has been accomplished.
“Defeatist” is something I think is within the bounds of decency and argument.
I feel strongly that “traitor,” absent specifically providing aid and comfort to an enemy in time of war by acts, witnessed by two people (not by words), is not within the bounds of decency in our society, and is unacceptable, and people who make such accusations without cause should be shamed and shunned.
“Defeatist,” though, is merely a disagreement over policy within normal bounds of political discussion. Harsh and perhaps foolish, but within bounds.
You are, Gary, using the words as they are defined by the law and the dictionary (and as they should be). But I am continually troubled how defeatist is employed in a manner which suggests the “defeatist” actually hopes for defeat.
Treason. Not of the [narrowly defined U.S.] law, but of the spirit.
Mindreading, of course.
rilkefan’s 2:54 AM post and Donald Johnson’s 8:35 AM post both kind of get to the heart of what I am talking about. Of course I wouldn’t suggest China’s response to Western imperialism in the 20th century was positive. But suppose instead of overthrowing Chiang Kai-shek, Mao had instead sent bombers over to the US to emulate Sacco and Vanzetti? And suppose Chiang was giving covert support to Mao and railing in private about occupied Hong Kong, while smiling to our face? Wouldn’t Americans resent the Chinese much more than we did in the wake of the Korean War? Isn’t it better to have an enemy who will face you?
I know that I’m generalizing about responses to cultural humiliation, but generalizations ususally have a core of fact (uh-oh, now I’m generalizing about generalizations).
Whatever our sins in the Middle East, and they are many, nothing justifies reliance on terrorism as a primary tool, and it’s hard to respect people who do so (again I note for the record that I do not consider most Arabs terrorists, nor do I yearn for a cultural or religious war).
Where exactly did I smear Murtha, cleek?
you mean besides your insistence that he’s using the Marines to advance his own craven political agenda ?
“Traitors” is vastly more flamnatory, and has a very specific meaning.
given the amount of rightwing stuff you must read to keep up your blog, you should know as well as anyone that the words “traitor” and “treason” get tossed around on the right quite freely. personally, i don’t think there’s much reason to assume “L-D” isn’t just another way to express whatever the tr* words are meant to express (“working for the enemy”, “blame America first”, “objectively-pro ___”, yadayadayada).
in other words – it seems silly to assume that people who throw accusations of treason around willy-nilly are paying attention to the nuances of synonyms.
Let me say that I give Charles credit insofar as he does, to the limited extent he does, show up here to defend his remarks and positions; I wish he did it more, but, of course, he could just quit and not do it at all, and I know it isn’t easy for him to face a largely hostile set of responders.
But I see his view on Murtha in the contest of the environment of uncivil nutbars on the conservative wing who eagerly through around the words “traitor” and “defeatist,” as well as other slurs, like kids throwing popcorn at the movie screen of a bad movie.
Here, for instance, we see Hindrocket:
Of course, this is a lie. Murtha received the briefing that was personally given by the Marine Commandant, General Hagee, to the House Armed Services Committee. But Hindrocket isn’t interested in the fact, he’s interested in slander and slur, so he lies, and says it’s a “leak” to Murtha.”
Of course, he’s the top end of the market.
Here we find the “Gateway Pundit”:
Murtha: defeatist.
Here we have “Macsmind,” topic header, “No matter what happened in Haditha – Murtha’s still a coward”:
Sound familiar?
Mind, this is said of a former Marine Colonel with the Bronze Star, Purple Heart (2), Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry, Navy Distinguished Service Medal, who, well, let’s cut to the record:
Damn the coward for all that. It takes a brave man to stand up and note that such a record is clearly the mark of a coward.
Now, a decent person could disagree all they want with Murtha’s choice of policies; that’s cool, that’s fine. But they could do so civilly.
Or they could act like disreputable children with a shocking lack of respect for actual military service in our nation’s defense, and potty mouths.
But they show who they are and what sort of honor they truly hold when they do so. So perhaps we owe them our gratitude for making clear what sort of people they truly are.
In any event, we see the tropes Charles uses in milder form: Murtha can’t be disagreed with civilly, he must be smeared and slurred personally. Murtha’s policy advocacy is what is relevant in discussing Haditha, not whether what he said about Haditha was accurate or in any way out of line with what Republicans and conservatives otherwise say. Since that’s not an argument Charles can win, he’ll go with the smear argument, and besides, it’s pre-made by his compatriots, and merely has to be repeated; this has the side benefit of demonstrating his bona fides with the nutbar wing, and giving him some comfort level there, where he already has too many disagreements.
But the Murtha=Traitor meme is all over the right. John Murtha, Traitor. This from May 18th:
Malkin the 18th:
Dan Riehl has words of inspiration:
Rousing, eh?
Of course, this is the same Dan Riehl who, two days before he wrote that on the 28th, wrote this on the 26:
But, you know, when he says it, it’s okay.
It just goes on and on. Most of the big name conservative bloggers have all now written stuff about how it appears that dreadful crimes were committed at Haditha.
But that’s okay. They’re on the right side. That makes all the difference.
Presented just for curiousities sake, but defeatism is an actual crime in some [nasty] countries. Ex.
cleek: “given the amount of rightwing stuff you must read to keep up your blog”
I actually only do so quite sporadically; I feel no obligation to spend much time in the cess pool, and in fact I don’t generally frequent the more flamnatory liberal/left/Democratic blogs, either. They’re not tempermentally to my taste. I prefer facts and calm reasoning to being shouted at, no matter by whom and in what cause.
I prefer unadorned nouns when discussing heated issues, rather than loaded adjectives and adverbs.
But that’s just me.
I make exceptions at times, and that’s what I’m doing in this case. Precisely because I feel so strongly that a line is crossed when “traitor” and “treason” are words tossed about so casually. I find that appalling. And highly dangerous. I want to do everything I can to damp that down, to try to encourage a sense of shame to be spread in regard to anyone who uses such flamnatory terminology.
There’s a reason that since early 2002 my blog has had on its sidebar “Proudly free of calling anyone a ‘traitor’ since 2001.”
Spartikus: “But I am continually troubled how defeatist is employed in a manner which suggests the ‘defeatist’ actually hopes for defeat.”
Yes, but I still find that within acceptable terms of debate. It’s offensive, but I don’t object to accusations of “treason” because it’s offensive. I object because it calls for the death penalty.
Presumably prefigured by arrest and trial.
And in an environment where we already have the Attorney General of the U.S. saying he has the right to try reporters for printing classified leaks, and Congressional Republicans calling for the arrests of reporters, not to mention a President who reserves the unilateral right to torture, to imprison indefinitely without charge, to eavesdrop at will without warrant, to assassinate at will, and so on, accusations of “treason” are as serious as can be.
They’re calls for killing one’s opponents, with whatever degree of legality might or might not be involved in our Brave New World.
That’s a whole ‘nother thing than merely being offensive.
Back as regards Charles, we do know why he has to tie his charges against Murtha to Murtha’s “loser-defeatist” policies. He has no choice. He can’t maintain without reference to Murtha’s policies that Murtha said anything out of line in reporting the known facts given to him by the Marine Commandant on Haditha. Most conservatives have also said such things by now. Those reports are made by every news source. Plenty of Republicans are now on record as repeating them. He doesn’t address Congressman Kline, because if he, and the rest of his friends taking this line, were honest and consistent — and this is very simple and plain and utterly undeniable — nothing complicated about this — they’d have to condemn Kline for saying what Murtha said, and they’d have to condemn most of themselves.
It’s illogical and indefensible; it’s not a stand that can be taken, even by people given to the most amazing twists of logic.
So the only possible way to throw more mud at Murtha and make charges about this are to insist that the true fault is that he’s “using” this incident.
And then you have the absurdity of accusing a politician of citing facts in support of the policy he desires.
Which, of course, is absolutely no different from what all these pro-war guys are doing by citing Murtha’s statements to denounce his policies in favor of their policies.
It’s remarkably twisted, but there we are. They’re being complete hypocrits, and can’t face up to that, of course, so they engage in further hypocrisy by claiming there’s something wrong with citing facts in support of a desired policy.
The right and proper and honorable thing to do, of course, would be to simply argue with Murtha’s policies on the merits. And that’s all.
That’s fair game. They’re free to simply say “I oppose Congressman Murtha’s advocacy of rapid redeployment of our troops to stations near Iraq, but to no longer base them there, because that is a bad idea for reasons A, B, D, and C.
But that isn’t good enough. Civil disagreement isn’t good enough.
Apparently they are afraid logic is insufficient to make their case convincingly. That, or they are simply tempermentally incapable of not smearing and slurring.
So they smear and slur.
And when they do that, they show they have no honor.
It’s all very sad.
Sorry, Chas, don’t mean to be ganging up on you, but you said
First, yes, at Tacitus I caught the title to the diary but the read body too quickly before spouting off. The reference to Kline slipped right past me.
Work with me here. You make a harsh comment about Murtha in a kneejerk reaction to a title. Now, wouldn’t it be better to just admit to that up front rather than try to defend the last trench of ‘murtha is a loser-defeatist’? Instead of spending all this time and effort over getting offended that some other people are getting offended over your rhetoric, especially when you yourself admit it was not a thought out point, but a reaction to a title, wouldn’t it have been better to all concerned to just acknowledge you feel strongly about it and let it go?
Gary provides a number of excerpts to show why some of the leading lights of the right blogosphere arouse such ire on this. We know that they are completely unconcerned with having a dialogue, but why do you seem to throw your lot in with them? Or, conversely, why do you waste your time here?
Precisely because I feel so strongly that a line is crossed when “traitor” and “treason” are words tossed about so casually. I find that appalling. And highly dangerous. I want to do everything I can to damp that down, to try to encourage a sense of shame to be spread in regard to anyone who uses such flamnatory terminology.
agreed.
i enjoy responding to people making those charges with a simple URL: https:/tips.fbi.gov. that way they can report the crime they’ve witnessed with no more effort than it takes to write a blog post.
“But suppose instead of overthrowing Chiang Kai-shek, Mao had instead sent bombers over to the US to emulate Sacco and Vanzetti?”
Aside from the fact that Mao had no such intercontinental bombers, the other problem with this example is that Sacco and Vanzetti were famously railroaded in an unfair trial, and Vanzetti was innocent, it appears. (Possibly Sacco, too, but we can’t know; what we know is that the trial was ludicrously unfair — that’s why they’re famous.)
“And suppose Chiang was giving covert support to Mao and railing in private about occupied Hong Kong, while smiling to our face?”
That’s not so far from what happened, insofar as he was deeply corrupt, and most of those around him were deeply corrupt, and in any case, when we gave him endless support in WWII to fight the Japanese, he largely hung back, made a profit, and hoarded troops and equipment to fight his true enemy, Mao, rather than the Japanese.
But instead of being vilified, as he was by, for instance, General Stilwell, and those in the know, the American public lauded him, and kept lauding him even after he died, thanks to the anti-Communist crusaders who instead put the blame on Democratic traitors who, by way of being Communists, deliberately turned China over to the Communists. Thank Richard Nixon, Joe McCarthy, Henry Luce, and most of the Republican Party for that.
“Whatever our sins in the Middle East, and they are many, nothing justifies reliance on terrorism as a primary tool, and it’s hard to respect people who do so….”
This would not seem to be a controversial sentiment, and I wouldn’t expect much debate. 🙂
“Whatever our sins in the Middle East, and they are many, nothing justifies reliance on terrorism as a primary tool, and it’s hard to respect people who do so….”
Though let me note that America, overall, had little problem dealing with, or forgiving, Yitzhak Shamir and Menachem Begin, whose career as terrorists is quite famous, though not to all Americans, to be sure. Not everyone is familiar with the history of the Irgun Tsvai Leumi and the Stern Gang.
Hokay, I’m off and out for a few hours now. Talk amongst yourselves. 🙂
interesting points about Rosen – but if this article is in question, do you contest any of the factual claims he makes
I don’t think I’m able to, rilke, but if he came to Iraq with the agenda that Adesnik suggested, then I am skeptical with his choosing of the facts that he is putting forward, because it feels like I’m not getting the whole picture. At the risk of jumping the linear progression of comments, Gary linked to a new Adesnik post which I thought was interesting.
But that wouldn’t be very constructive. You’re not being constructive here Charles, either here on this thread where you’re displaying either a laziness in reading and responding to comments or I’m afraid, a degree of bad faith.
Here’s a fair question, sparti: Why are you so exercised about my agenda yet give noot the slightest damn for Rosen’s? Surely as a published writer, he is much more influential than lil ole me. It doesn’t sound terribly pragmatic of you, and from where I sit, your uncuriosity does not contribute to this world of pragmatism that you said you were seeking. Quite frankly, I think you’re applying an unfortunate double standard. BTW, I’m not dismissing what Rosen wrote in the WA Post, just expressing serious skepticism, justifiably so, in my view.
And you’re not being constructive in the larger “meta” sense by labelling those that disagree with you traitors…
That is simply a false statement, sparti, “meta” or in any other way, and you’re bordering on violating the posting rules with such a detestable mischaracterization.
Given the current climate, I feel confident, though, that “loser-defeatist” is being employed as code…
Your confidence is misplaced. Code is not a language I speak in. Going one further, I wrote months ago that I thought Murtha was a patriot who loved his country. I actually and honestly meant what I said back then, and I hold that same opinion today. Believing that a person is horribly wrong does not mean that said person is unpatriotic, treasonous, seditious, etc.
Yet again, I’ll ask you — for the last time — to please comment on what Represenative Kline has said, and compare and distinguish it from what Murtha has related and characterized in describing this issue (without bringing in extraneous issues about Murtha’s other views).
I don’t accept your conditions, Gary, because Murtha himself made inseparable his comments about Haditha and immediate withdrawal. But to excerpt the NY Times:
Although not in quotes, his statement was qualified with “allegations indicated”, but more clearly delineated qualifiers would have been helpful. The context of his comments also counts. He didn’t set up a press conference, he didn’t go on Hardball. Instead, he was there are at the DoD briefing, and when reporters called, he answered their questions. This is important because the point I made was specifically about political exploitation, not a comparative analysis of what Persons A and B said. If you think Kline exploited Haditha to advance his political agenda, tell me how. Perhaps he did, and I just missed it.
Murtha said a lot of things in a lot of places, but getting to his signature comment: “Our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them and they killed innocent civilians in cold blood. And that’s what the report is going to tell.” Taranto offered a pretty fair analysis of Murtha’s words. The phrase “our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them” does bother me. While you accused me of mindreading, wouldn’t it be more accurate to put that one on Murtha? He’s the one who was divining the states of mind of those Marines. Also, Murtha did not see the report, and his phrasing suggests that he arrived at his own verdict.
you mean besides your insistence that he’s using the Marines to advance his own craven political agenda ?
First, cleek, Murth didn’t use the Marines, he used Haditha. Second, “craven” is your word, not mine.
You make a harsh comment about Murtha in a kneejerk reaction to a title. Now, wouldn’t it be better to just admit to that up front rather than try to defend the last trench of ‘murtha is a loser-defeatist’?
You mean I can’t do both? Yes, LJ, I made a harsh comment. Yes, there was some kneejerk in my reaction to it. Yes, I made the mistake of not committing Kline to memory. But those are separate from my views that Murtha politically exploited Haditha and that his “it’s time to leave” proposals are defeatist.
We know that they are completely unconcerned with having a dialogue, but why do you seem to throw your lot in with them? Or, conversely, why do you waste your time here?
That’s exactly why I like to have a presence on both the left AND right sides of the blogosphere. I suggest that there are hefty numbers on both sides who are “completely unconcerned with having a dialogue”, and that there are hefty numbers on both sides who do. It’s a little unsettling at times, being in both places, and there’s a lot of dissonance, but I like being able to have my feet in both puddles. I think it brings a wider understanding and perspective on the issues. Having seen quite a bit of freerepublic and Atrios, for example, I’ve seen little difference in tenor, tone and substance between the two commentariats.
Here’s a fair question, sparti: Why are you so exercised about my agenda yet give noot the slightest damn for Rosen’s?
Possibly it may be Rosen is in Iraq actually bearing witness, while you barely seem read the comments you respond to.
That is simply a false statement, sparti, “meta” or in any other way, and you’re bordering on violating the posting rules with such a detestable mischaracterization.
If you feel you’ve been mischaracterized maybe, instead of threatening banning, you could clarify your meaning. Or not. It’s up to you. Quite a few people, myself included, have not been convinced by your efforts to date. FWIW:
Defeatism is acceptance of defeat without struggle. In everyday use, defeatism has negative connotation and is often linked to treason and pessimism,
“He didn’t set up a press conference, he didn’t go on Hardball. Instead, he was there are at the DoD briefing, and when reporters called, he answered their questions. This is important”
That’s cool, because in fact I’ve seen Representative Kline give several tv interviews, and he’s in dozens of different newspapers. Try another.
Let’s back up: Charles, define “exploited” in this context, and precisely what you view as wrong about it, please.
And let me see: you’re saying that it’s just fine for people to utter opinions about what they’ve been officially briefed as regards Haditha, and as regards news reports on what is alleged to have happened at Haditha, or not?
If not, precisely what’s okay in your view, and what’s not, as regards passing on what someone has learned in an unclassified briefing and as regards opining about what appears to be tentatively know so far?
Lastly, are you saying that you have no problem with what Congressman Murtha said as regards Haditha except insofar as it connects to “his political agenda,” or are you saying that you have a problem with it that is separable and isolatable simply as regards just what he said about the Marines — or not?
For the record, in my 12:24 p.m, when I wrote: “But I see his view on Murtha in the contest of the environment of uncivil nutbars….”
What I meant was “context,” not “contest.” Apologies.
Incidentally, in the new, very safe, terribly democratic, ever -improving, full-of-good-news-we’re-not-told-about Iraq, a CBS newscrew was just mostly killed.
This may interfere with their presenting good news from Iraq any time soon.
Gary,
CW:”Yet we don’t call the Confederates ‘terrorists’ and ‘criminals’- we recognize that when a substantial subset of a country doesn’t accept the legitimacy of the government, there is a big problem.”
Yes, we call the Confederates “traitors” and “rebels,” actually.
Im not sure if you’re agreeing with me, or disagreeing- since (“traitors” and “rebels”) are not equal to (“terrorists” and “criminals”). But the context (why bring up these alternatives) and the “actually” make me think that you’re drawing an equivalence & therefore disagreeing…
Two main differences:
1)Rebels (the most commonly-used term I’ve seen) is not really perjorative (my high school mascot was a rebel). I have yet to encounted a “criminals” mascot. “Traitor” is admittedly perjorative though (but also in the eye of the beholder, Oleg Penkovsky may not seem like a traitor to us…)
2)The former two terms accurately describe action against a country, either in the service of another power or en masse representing an internal power/faction. The latter two terms describe a)deviant or self-serving behavior or b)the use of violence (or threatened violence) against civilian targets to cause sociopolitical change.
The Iraqi insurgency could reasonably be called rebels. I think traitors would be a less reasonable appelation (since they are opposing an order they have never assented to- likewise, calling Confederates traitors ignores the fact that their fealty was given to their states, and that secession was certainly considered a legitimate action by those Confederates).
Neither should be called criminals or terrorists, except insofar as their specific actions meet the criteria for those names.
(nb saying that the Confederates and the Iraqi insurgents were not criminals or traitors should not be considered an endorsement of eithers’ agenda).
I probably should have included:
But I’m sure there’s good news, too.
“1)Rebels (the most commonly-used term I’ve seen) is not really perjorative (my high school mascot was a rebel).”
Pejorative. “Perjorative” isn’t a word.
It’s funny how Southern rebellion-inspired mascots never are called “the Traitors.” Probably isn’t as catchy.
But we probably don’t want to digress into offensive mascot name discussions.
I’m afraid I’ve lost track of the relevance of the rest of your points; sorry. It’s not as if there’s a single “insurgency” in Iraq, or it’s the chief problem there, in any case.
Incidentally, in the new, very safe, terribly democratic, ever -improving, full-of-good-news-we’re-not-told-about Iraq,
Along similar lines, this story highlights the burdgeoning non-theological nature of the new Iraq.
Charles,
Abu Ghraib was under already investigation when it was made public, and it was inevitable that it would be publicized. This has happened for every scandal, non-scandal and pseudo-scandal that has occurred in the last six years.
Are you saying that every scandal that has occurred has been publicized? Or that every scandal that’s been investigated has been publicized? Every scandal has been both investigated and then publicized?
Or just that every scandal that you’ve heard of has been publicized?
You’re either omniscient, or you’ve decided to grace us with a truism.
Third, let’s be clear on what I didn’t say. I didn’t say Murtha was a traitor nor did I question his patriotism. Never have.
Let’s be clear- saying that someone wants our military to lose is questioning their patriotism. Quoth Charles: “Murtha is betraying the American soldiers who have been there.– but apparently this was only the patriotic kind of betrayl.
Also, you didnt address the Confederacy point. Noting that political analogies are never an exact fit is *not* addressing the point, it is fleeing (in a loser-defeatist manner, no less) from engagement with the point. If you think that the Confederates were not criminals and terrorists (using your logic), please explain how their situation was different rather than just asserting that this is the case.
And finally, you’ve neglected to tell us how re-labeling the insurgents in the American media is going to produce “concrete” results (that’s the kind you profess to like, after all)- as opposed to shifting the blame for the current problems from those who were in favor of the original decision to invade over to those recalcitrant Iraqis who cannot play fair and accept that they’ve lost.
Gary,
Thank you for courageously correcting my spelling- the world is a better place now.
Im sorry to hear that you can’t remember why you made your original comment, but Im afraid I can’t return the favor by helping you with that…
You make a harsh comment about Murtha in a kneejerk reaction to a title. Now, wouldn’t it be better to just admit to that up front rather than try to defend the last trench of ‘murtha is a loser-defeatist’?
You mean I can’t do both? Yes, LJ, I made a harsh comment. Yes, there was some kneejerk in my reaction to it. Yes, I made the mistake of not committing Kline to memory. But those are separate from my views that Murtha politically exploited Haditha and that his “it’s time to leave” proposals are defeatist.
Morning Charles. You can do both, but if you had done the first from the beginning, we might be having a more meaningful discussion about the question. And by not doing the first from the beginning, it reinforces the suspicion that you are thinking, you are simply reacting.
I’d also point out that there is a hierarchy of errors, so you not knowing who Kline is might be considered more grevious than me typing slarti for sparti (especially when you look at the keyboard and see where l and p are located) In fact, I had no idea what you were talking about until reviewing this.
Since this is a big pile on, I’ll sneak back up into the stands, but I’m wondering what kind of evidence would be necessary to change your opinion. To be honest, I’m not sure what evidence is necessary to change mine, but I take Murtha’s previous record of service as well as the position he had previously staked out as a politician evidence, while you seem to dismiss all of that out of hand.
Eye-witness after-the-fact testimony about the bodies at Haditha from Lance Cpl. Roel Ryan Briones.
I’d also like to assume that everyone read this post that I’ve pointed to a few times, with all the various links and cites and quotes, including to this ABC account of the other night, and seen this this video of the shot-up house, and of Safa Younis, the 12-year-old girl said to be a survivor of the event. Alternate version here.
Of course, Dan Riehl and others immediately find it questionable and hint it’s a lying fake (he has a number of posts along that line; so do many others who love to engage in wishful thinking.
But I’d like to hope everyone is keeping up with the story.
Carleton: “Im sorry to hear that you can’t remember why you made your original comment….”
No, I remember that.
From spartikus’s link: “In addition, the leaflet forbids men from wearing goatee beards and anyone from buying mayonnaise.”
Iraqi fundamentalists prefer a different condiment?
Dreadful story, of course. But also reinforcing one of my points above: this has nothing to do with the “insurgency.” It’s part of the civil war.
Possibly it may be Rosen is in Iraq actually bearing witness…
So it doesn’t matter how partisan or agenda-driven the person is, what’s most important is that the person was there? It looks to me like your double standards are still showing, or do you place equal weight on all of the other numerous firsthand accounts, such as here? If not, why? They were there, after all.
If you feel you’ve been mischaracterized maybe, instead of threatening banning, you could clarify your meaning.
No, I don’t feel mischaracterized, sparti, you actually did it. You made a clearly false statement, so the warning still stands. How many times must I explicitly state–before it finally sinks in–that when I criticize someone like Murtha, that I’m questioning his policies and not his patriotism? For what it’s worth, I’m pretty sure I did clarify my meaning, but if you desire a dictionary definition, this is the one I had in mind, not wikipedia’s. Does that clarify?
Gary, I take your word that Kline was on television and in more than one newspaper. Tell me how Kline exploited Haditha to his political advantage.
As for “exploiting”, I’ll take this definition and say that Murtha took unfair advantage of the briefing information he received by folding it into his commemorative press conference, adding Haditha to his litany of reasons for immediate redeployment out of the Iraqi theater, possibly going as far as mindreading by stating that “our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them”, thus lessening the responsibility of those who shot those unfortunate Iraqis (allegedly) and shifting the blame up the chain of command. Wasn’t this how Calley & Co. got such piddling sentences?
Noting that political analogies are never an exact fit is *not* addressing the point, it is fleeing (in a loser-defeatist manner, no less) from engagement with the point. If you think that the Confederates were not criminals and terrorists (using your logic), please explain how their situation was different rather than just asserting that this is the case.
I liked Charley’s and Gary’s answers, so I didn’t feel the pressing need to respond, Carleton. Criminals or traitors would fit the bill for me, but to be neighborly with our southern compatriots, and since the war is fourteen decades past, southerners also works for me. I don’t remember terrorist attacks being much of an issue back then, but those who did target civilians for attack would be terrorists.
And finally, you’ve neglected to tell us how re-labeling the insurgents in the American media is going to produce “concrete” results…
I take it that you reject the works of Lakoff? Are we not fighting an information war as well as a physical one?
So it doesn’t matter how partisan or agenda-driven the person is, what’s most important is that the person was there? It looks to me like your double standards are still showing, or do you place equal weight on all of the other numerous firsthand accounts, such as here?
Is there something specific, as in some sort of concrete fact, in Rosen’s piece you are calling into question?
Is there something specific in Iraq the Model you wish me to read and address? Otherwise, they’re entitled to their opinion.
You made a clearly false statement, so the warning still stands.
Ridiculous. I have not mischaracterized, and certainly have not “lied” about anything you’ve said. If you don’t like that your words carry connotations beyond what you intend….STOP USING THEM.
As for threats of banning, this is abusing your moderator’s position.
“…and say that Murtha took unfair advantage of the briefing information he received by folding it into his commemorative press conference….”
So what you’re saying is that he shouldn’t use facts in the course of espousing his opinions, and that that’s wrong, is that it?
The wrongness comes from what, precisely, other than that you don’t agree with him?
This seems to be a key point. I have no idea what you think is wrong here. You assert that something is wrong, but what it is: beats me.
I’m pretty sure that using facts to disagree with you is not, in fact, wrong.
It wasn’t a classified briefing, after all. If it were, and Murtha gave away secrets he shouldn’t have, than I’d join you in criticizing that.
But that’s not the case. It was an unclassified briefing. It’s the same information that has been provided to the public.
I’m fairly sure that part of the job of elected officials is to speak to the public about the facts as they know them.
So, the problem here, beyond that you disagree with Murtha, is?
“Is there something specific in Iraq the Model you wish me to read and address?”
Regarding that, oh, my, but the negative things I can quote from Iraq The Model, and every other Iraqi blogger Charles has ever mentioned. None of them is a happy camper. It’s hard to believe that he actually reads them consistently, rather than picking up on a few of the more positive bits as cherry-picked by the Usual Suspects.
Similarly for the way Michael Yon is beloved by the right, save for his insistence for many months that what’s going on in Iraq is a civil war, and his denunciations of those on the right who he says are refusing to listen to him.
From the latter — but don’t let that stop you from reading the whole thing, or the other post I cited:
I’d also note that gung-ho conservative bloggers aren’t providers of Truth about Iraq any more than IndyMedia is.
Looking at Iraqi bloggers is a good step. Shall we do that next?
Does that clarify?
No, the wikipedia entry, and the citation of those jailed in times past on the charge of defeatism, was to illustrate the word carries beyond it’s dictionary entry. Like the context of coupling it’s use with a sentence like Murtha is betraying the American soldiers who have been there. & Murtha is betraying the Iraqi people.
Here is an Iraqi blogger, Charles. Do you read her regularly, to find out the truth in Iraq, or do you filter her out, because you don’t like what she says?
But let’s look to Iraq The Model at the moment. Here is a post from Thursday about the wire from Mohammed’s neighborhood generators being stolen at night, so they have no power — no one in Iraq relies on official power, of course, since there is little, and never for long. Good news!
Here a post from the 21st on the new government.
They haven’t been. That’s without having had any new government at all since those elections in December Charles is so fond of.
Good news!
Good news!
On the 19th:
Good news!
Tuesday the 16th:
Good news!
May 7th:
Good… well, you know.
Why is it that the American MSM refuses to bring us this good news?
I, for one, want to know.
Shall we look at some other Iraqi bloggers? Remember, these guys are the most rose-colored-glasses ones you can find. The others are a heck of a lot more negative.
“I take it that you reject the works of Lakoff? Are we not fighting an information war as well as a physical one?”
Um, Charles? Lakoff talks about framing ideas in a democracy, for political use.
He doesn’t suggest that reframing wording is going to win a war.
But, by all means, if you can get him to back you up on this, go for it. I’ll just wait here. I have lots of popcorn on hand.
Let’s look at Healing Iraq. Zeyad was quite the favorite of American rightwing bloggers, after they had dropped Salem Pax as their favorite, because Salem said some unflattering things about the American invasion.
Of course, then when Zeyad told the story of how American soldiers had made his cousin and another man jump in a river at night, and his cousin drowned, most of the American rightwing bloggers declared that Zeyad was lying and making things up, and dropped him. A few later apologized. Zeyad eventually quit blogging for over a year. He came back a while ago, but is still infrequent; he’s also fleeing for a journalism degree in the US at Columbia U. soon. What’s going on now in the former favorite’s view?
May 8th:
Okay, that’s about as cheery as he gets with the good news. Don’t believe me? Go look for yourself.
Just some typical phrases in recent posts: …7 to 12 residents were killed in the clash. […] The fire was random now…. […] We heard from friends and relatives that life was going on ‘normally’ in other parts of the capital; the obligatory car bomb or roadside bomb, politicians still bickering, corpses still turning up at random locations, people still being kidnapped and assassinated, you know, the usual everyday stuff. […] The area is now one huge fortress, armed to the teeth and expecting an attack any moment now.
Here is a post on his job.
Earlier: “[…] I’m not sure if it’s an ill-fated omen or something else, but random violence seems to follow me wherever I go in Baghdad.”
And so on and so forth.
Wanna look at some more Iraqi blogs for the good news we’re not hearing in the MSM, Charles?
Charles,
I assumed that when you took issue with my characterization of the Confederacy as worthy of the same labels as the Iraqi insurgency (I say ‘took issue’ bc you said Your problem is equating the American Civil War with what’s taking place in Iraq, Carleton…). Now you seem to agree that the Confederates could rightly be given the same labels (ie “criminals”).
I don’t agree, but at least you’re consistent on this point now.
As for questioning Murtha’s patriotism- you said that the man betrayed American troops. No amount of reiteration (or banning, for that matter) is going to change this. While you may believe that you’ve somehow managed to make that statement without impuning Murtha’s patriotism, it is perfectly reasonable for someone to draw the opposite conclusion. Disclaimers are not magical, and we are not obligated to believe them when the evidence to the contrary is so overwhelming.
And I haven’t read Lakoff; Im less interested in political framing than I am in practical, concrete (some might even say “conservative”) solutions to problems.
Gary,
Carleton: “Im sorry to hear that you can’t remember why you made your original comment….”
No, I remember that.
Excellent. I’ll just stick that in the big “Im sure Gary had a point in there someplace” pile, then- since your original comment was so poorly worded that it was unclear if you were supporting the position or attempting to ridicule it, and you apparently spent so much energy spellchecking mine that you’re unable to summon enough to explain it, or respond further.
Hey, it was a tangential point anyway, Im glad to be done with it.
Charles, Bush has given up on Iraq in all but the rhetoric. The troops are being pulled back to bases. Our role will be to watch from the sidelines as the Iraqis kill each other. Southern Iraq is now controlled by SHiite militias with ties to Iran. . The only good news is that with the Sunnis at only twenty percent of the population I don’t expect you will have to wait for more than three or four years for “victory”–the Shiite militias should be able to kill most of them off by that time.
“The troops are being pulled back to bases.”
This is is a considerable over-generalization, to the point of being not particularly helpful, insofar as that without discussing at least with slightly more granularity and specificity, it’s as untrue as it’s true, or probably more untrue than true. It just isn’t useful to speak so broadly in this context.
“Our role will be to watch from the sidelines as the Iraqis kill each other.”
This is, at this time, still more than a little speculative.
Lily, you have many wise things to say, and many excellent points that you often make in excellent fashion. Discussing military specifics isn’t one of your strengths, however, and I’d like to gently urge you to, if you feel the need to address them, to perhaps put a bit more effort into at least being a bit more specific. Because I’d prefer you when you argue with Charles, to not leave him holes the size of the Holland Tunnel to drive through.
I mean this in the friendliest fashion, and hope I don’t seem condescending, as I know it’s so easy for me to do unintentionally in trying to say something like this.
“Southern Iraq is now controlled by SHiite militias with ties to Iran.”
This is closer to a true generality, but still slightly over-stated; better to at least, though, use some modifiers. “Close to being controlled.” “Largely controlled.” “Heavily controlled.”
Something like that.
“…the Shiite militias should be able to kill most of them off by that time.”
Extraordinarily unlikely, given the tendency towards regionalization; what might happen are more complete ethnic shifts by geography, but the complete wiping out of the primarily Sunni region is not at all likely to be in the cards; were it to start to look that way for some reason, Sunni neighbors would intervene and we’d have a regional war, to point out one perfectly obvious and well-known reason.
Also, the Kurds are Sunni.
Are you saying that every scandal that has occurred has been publicized? Or that every scandal that’s been investigated has been publicized? Every scandal has been both investigated and then publicized?
I could’ve written it better, Carleton. The point earlier on was that there is no reason to believe that Haditha would be swept under the rug.
As for questioning Murtha’s patriotism- you said that the man betrayed American troops. No amount of reiteration…is going to change this.
I disagree that betraying the troops who have been there equates to a betraying of one’s country. What I wrote:
I don’t believe what I wrote was tantamount to calling Murtha a traitor or questioning his patriotism. I think it’s highly troubling that Murtha told American soldiers that they’ve done all could, that their efforts are a waste, and that their mission is no longer worthwhile. I also don’t believe that a betrayal of the Iraqi people is unpatriotic because Murtha’s not an Iraqi. But I will reiterate it again. I think he’s dreadfully and horribly wrong, not unpatriotic.
Im less interested in political framing than I am in practical, concrete (some might even say “conservative”) solutions to problems.
Me, too, re concrete, which is why I believe framing is important, and why I also believe that the information war is just as vital as the physical one. It’s a multi-front conflict, and our enemy also wants to prevail mediawise. Zawahiri:
Today’s news re the attacks against CBS journalists should be a reminder that journalists are being targeted by terrorists, as I wrote here.
No, the wikipedia entry, and the citation of those jailed in times past on the charge of defeatism, was to illustrate the word carries beyond it’s dictionary entry.
Sparti, I already told you that I didn’t accept the wikipedia definition as mine (add to that your citations of those folks jailed long ago in other countries), and I don’t know why you’re trying to push your wikipedia definitions on me. I use wikipedia, but I don’t consider it the ultimate authority. I gave you one that fits my interpretation and use of the term. You said: “If you don’t like that your words carry connotations beyond what you intend….STOP USING THEM.” All kinds of words carry connotations beyond the conveyor’s intentions, but that is no reason to stop. In situations where there is uncertainty, then the thing to do is ask for clarification, which you did. Clarification given, but now you seem to be going back on that.
You wrote: “And you’re not being constructive in the larger “meta” sense by labelling those that disagree with you traitors.”
I will say again. Your statement is patently false. Treason carries a heavy meaning, and I don’t use it unless a person is actually tried or proven to be a traitor in a court of law. I disagree with Gary, Hilzoy, you, Carleton and dozens of others on this blog almost every I time I show up, and I label none of them traitors. I disagree with left-wing political figures all the time (and right-wingers) and I’ve labeled none of them traitors. Your statement is absurdly untrue, and it’s a detestable mischaracterization. It is egregious to the point of being a personal attack, which is why I consider it a posting rules violation.
Is there something specific in Iraq the Model you wish me to read and address? Otherwise, they’re entitled to their opinion.
You brought up Rosen because he agrees with Murtha that immediate withdrawal is the best course. His opinion has weight, according to you, because he was there. Omar is there, too, and more so than Rosen, and he is against immediate withdrawal. Because being there is such an important prerequisite to you, and since Omar has lived there for quite a bit longer, I’m glad you changed your opinion re the immediate redeployment of our troops from Iraq.
So what you’re saying is that he shouldn’t use facts in the course of espousing his opinions, and that that’s wrong, is that it?
Tell me how the phrase “our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them” is a fact, Gary. Also, Murtha did relay facts, although I don’t think “in cold blood” was said to Murtha by DoD officials. That was Murtha’s own spin. The setting in which he dispensed this combination of facts and opinion and spin was overtly political and overtly agenda-driven. Obviously you see nothing wrong with it, and that’s your opinion.
Wanna look at some more Iraqi blogs for the good news we’re not hearing in the MSM, Charles?
You’re veering dangerously close to jerkoff comment territory, Gary. My point upthread (and the ITM link) had nothing to do with good news or bad news in Iraq, but with the topic of immediate withdrawal.
“While it’s commendable that Murtha goes to Bethesda and Walter Reed hospitals ‘almost every week’, he should spend more time in Iraq, talking to the soldiers on the ground, getting firsthand accounts of what’s taking place.”
Of course, the ludicrous part of your writing this, Charles — and let me again thank you for participating in some discussion — is that the only people possibly privileged to write this are people who have done what you are lecturing about.
But if you’ve, in fact, been to Iraq and talked to the soldiers, I apologize.
If not, I’d like to bring to your attention the absolute absurdity of your taking it upon yourself to lecture Murtha (in his absence, to be sure) that he’s only privileged to speak about Iraq if he’s been there (which I think he has, but never mind), but somehow, this applies to him, but not to you.
You do realize, if you think about it, that this is cuckoo, right?
“It is egregious to the point of being a personal attack, which is why I consider it a posting rules violation.”
I’ll agree with Charles here; regardless of your feeling, Spartikus, that “loser-defeatist” has some connotations of “traitor,” words have specific meanings, and those are different words — not synonyms. You’re on safe ground in charging Charles with the implications and connotations of “defeatist” in various circumstances, but you really don’t have standing to insist that Charles means one word when he uses another, nor to insist that words that are not synonyms are, just because it feels that way to you. In my opinion.
But you’re free to carry on telling Charles why “defeatist” is a problematic word choice by itself, in my view.
“Tell me how the phrase ‘our troops overreacted because of the pressure on them’ is a fact, Gary.
It’s not: it’s an attempt to apologize for their behavior and defend them, insofar as it is anything. A lot of people have disagreed with that statement of Murtha’s, and you’re free to, as well. But what justification you have for regarding it as something beyond something to disagree with, for whatever reason, and as something to slur the man, I have no idea.
“Also, Murtha did relay facts, although I don’t think “in cold blood” was said to Murtha by DoD officials. That was Murtha’s own spin.”
Charles, the entire point of what’s so horrible about this is that the handful of troops involved apparently spent a considerable time, hours, on the scene, shooting people they had no reason by the rules of engagement to shoot, and then covered up their crime. That’s the point. If it were in a battle, that would be different.
Now, if you want to say they were in a rage because of the death of Lance Corporal Miguel (T.J.) Terrazas, then you can argue that, but while neither you nor I are in a position to judge many facts for now, given that Murtha was briefed personally by General Hagee, I’d presume he’s presently in a better position to know than either of us. In any case, sooner or later the facts will be relatively clear, and you can then judge how accurate or inaccurate he was.
Have you been following the news stories I’ve been linking to? Should I run through the accounts again?
“The setting in which he dispensed this combination of facts and opinion and spin was overtly political and overtly agenda-driven. Obviously you see nothing wrong with it, and that’s your opinion.”
You’ve not answered my question: you’re being overtly political and overtly agenda-driven: is there something wrong with that?
No, I don’t see anything wrong with people being political and agenda-driven, so long as they’re not lying or distorting facts. You?
“My point upthread (and the ITM link) had nothing to do with good news or bad news in Iraq….”
“Omar is there, too, and more so than Rosen, and he is against immediate withdrawal. Because being there is such an important prerequisite to you, and since Omar has lived there for quite a bit longer, I’m glad you changed your opinion re the immediate redeployment of our troops from Iraq.”
I guess you’ve, on this logic, changed your mind about how the MSM isn’t giving us the good news that the Iraqi bloggers are telling us, then.
You didn’t answer my query about Riverbend: do you read her, or not? Do you disregard her opinions simply because you don’t like them and they contradict yours? What about giving weight to Iraqi bloggers? What about how people should “should spend more time in Iraq […] getting firsthand accounts of what’s taking place.”
Is that only if those firsthand accounts accord with your preconceived desires of what you want to believe?
What about my point in quoting all the stuff that I quoted from Iraq The Model, and Healing Iraq: you’ve simply ignored it in your reply, other than to tell me that I’m “veering dangerously close to jerkoff comment territory.”
That you choose to not deal with the accounts I’ve cited, but to jump to ad hominem, instead, tells me just that: you choose not to deal with accounts that you don’t like, even when they’re the sources you just cited as most authoritative.
How does that work? How is that intellectually honest, Charles?
Why not discuss the substance of what I quoted, please? What do you think of it? Things going well and getting better? Good news that the MSM isn’t telling us because they’re biased against the war? Reconcile, by all means, rather than dodge into calling me names, if you wish to persuade anyone of anything other than that you have ad hominem to fall back on.
Thanks.
Your statement is patently false.
Obviously you didn’t read this comment. Honestly, how many times must you be taken to task for not bothering to read what’s been written?
You brought up Rosen because he agrees with Murtha that immediate withdrawal is the best course.
That’s funny. There’s no advocacy for withdrawal in the article. Could it be something else you haven’t bothered to read? I wouldn’t be surprised if Rosen felt that way, but his observations from Iraq, quite damning, were presented to show that the goal of a “free, peaceful, non-theocratic representative republic” isn’t being achieved by the current policy. I’ll ask again: is there any factual claim you dispute from the Nir Rosen article Iraq Is the Republic of Fear?
Omar is there, too, and more so than Rosen, and he is against immediate withdrawal.
Good for him. I’ll ask again: is there something specific from Iraq the Model you wish me to read?
I’ll agree with Charles here; regardless of your feeling, Spartikus, that “loser-defeatist” has some connotations of “traitor,” words have specific meanings, and those are different words — not synonyms.
Unless they are employed in a manner inconsistent with those specific meanings. Then it becomes a flag of convienence.
That said, I’ve already admitted it’s mindreading.
You know the funny thing my original comment didn’t even call out Charles Bird by name.
Another part of my agenda is to live in a world where absolutism is downplayed as much as possible. If someone disagrees with your favoured approach to achieve a goal, for example, they are not labelled “losers”, “defeatists”, or “traitors”.
In case anyone’s tired of the above repartee, this is striking.
i think Tony Blair summed-up the situation pretty well:
I think it’s easy to go back over mistakes that we may have made, but the biggest reason why Iraq has been difficult is the determination by our opponents to defeat us.
Wow. I think he’s onto something!
(via CNN.com)
It’s late in the thread to be making any comment, let alone as silly a one as I’m about to make, but, hell.
I’m %75 sure that I met Nir Rosen at a dinner party, about a week before he shipped out to Iraq in the winter of 2002-2003. He was first headed for Kuwait. “What if the war doesn’t happen?” we asked, and he said he’d come back. And then we asked “What if the war does happen?” I couldn’t quite believe that he would really stay and cover it, as he said he would, because it just sounded so dangerous. There was an interesting dynamic between him (if I’m right about this) and his beautiful, very smart wife: they’d already argued about his going into such danger, it seemed, and they’d come to a wary understanding. Watching them I had that sense of icebergs below the surface.
I remember being very impressed by him, and not the least because when I described a project I was working on at the time, he listened carefully to my then still-fuzzy ideas and then disagreed amicably with my basic conceptual framework. If I’m right about his being Rosen, that is.
(It’s hard to say from the photos I’ve seen: famous-Rosen is thinner and wears glasses, and my visual memory of that night isn’t clear.)
Anyway…
I have a fresh post with new links on Haditha stories, incidentally, if anyone is interested; I recommend reading the full pieces, not just my quotes, of course.
Reaction to the Nir Rosen piece summarized.
So, we go from chimera to chimera. My stock response back when the great hope was the unified secular Iraqi national army was “Robert E. Lee.” Now I’m reduced to saying, “William Clarke Quantrill, anyone?”
Back in busy mode again. I haven’t read any comments since my last one, but I need to say to Gary that I’m sorry about my own last jerkoff comment. I take it back.
Charles and I already had this exchange in e-mail yesterday, where I thanked him, and again told him I appreciated his coming back when I’m roughing him up. (Though, of course, I look forward to him coming back soon so I can continue cuffing him. ;-))
This morning’s Haditha roundup here, by the way.
Last two comments – good stuff.
Um, Charles? Lakoff talks about framing ideas in a democracy, for political use.
Is not politics war by other means? Do you disagree that we are in an information war as well as a hot war?
Of course, the ludicrous part of your writing this, Charles — and let me again thank you for participating in some discussion — is that the only people possibly privileged to write this are people who have done what you are lecturing about.
That wasn’t my point about Murtha, Gary. It had to do about where he was getting the information which formed the basis for his wrong conclusions. As a Congressman who chose to turn his back on who knows how many of his own constituents fighting in Iraq, surely it would’ve been more helpful for him to go there from time to time, such as what McCaffrey did, to get a broader perspective on what’s taking place.
Murtha has a higher responsibility than I do, so I don’t know why you would compare him to me. I haven’t been to Iraq, but I’ve read a broad range of accounts from folks who are (or were) there. Murtha is an elected representative who’s not only speaking for himself, but also for his constituents as a representative of the U.S. government, and especially so because he has purposely put himself on the national stage. And what about the opinions of thousands of troops who disagree strongly with Murtha’s take? Did he consider their opinions? Doesn’t look that way. Which general, retired or otherwise, agrees that immediate redeployment is our best course of action?
But what justification you have for regarding it as something beyond something to disagree with, for whatever reason, and as something to slur the man, I have no idea.
What slur? Is it not possible that Murtha is doing the slurring by reading the minds of those Marines? To me, he was trying to blame-shift, not apologize for their alleged behavior.
Charles, the entire point of what’s so horrible about this is that the handful of troops involved apparently spent a considerable time, hours, on the scene, shooting people they had no reason by the rules of engagement to shoot, and then covered up their crime. That’s the point.
That’s the difference between you and Murtha, Gary. You used the word “apparently”, which was my point. Murtha not only rendered his judgment, he also apparently knew their states of mind. He may end up being right, that an atrocity occurred, but I still believe he wrong for politicizing it in the manner he did.
I guess you’ve, on this logic, changed your mind about how the MSM isn’t giving us the good news that the Iraqi bloggers are telling us, then.
My long-running point is that Iraq is a big country, and journalism that follows the if-it-bleeds-it-leads playbook does not paint an accurate picture of what’s taking place, especially with the magnifying effect that news reports (especially TV) can have. There is also an information war we are fighting. Yes, there’s plenty of bad news, and it’s out there every day. I’ve never not acknowledged that, so I’m not sure why you may think I’m fixated on good-news-only.
That said, I am concerned that there are many who are eager to talk down Iraq, just as there are Krugmanites who will talk down the economy at every opportunity. It may be a bad analogy, but it reminds of a time when I was playing golf with a fella who bitched and moaned after every single shot but finished at two over. Barone has another perspective.
You asked if thought the situation in Iraq is getting better. It depends. Right now, the violence is worse since the new government was established. There’s a bunch of militant Islamist Sunnis in Hadith, Ramadi and Baghdad and other places who need to quit or die, and there remains thousands of Iraqi troops who need more training to help do the job. It’s going to take time.
You didn’t answer my query about Riverbend: do you read her, or not? Do you disregard her opinions simply because you don’t like them and they contradict yours? What about giving weight to Iraqi bloggers?
I read her for awhile, but when she broke out with a lingering and virulent case of BDS, I quit her. I do read other Iraqi bloggers and other bloggers in Iraq, and I generally take what they say seriously.
Obviously you didn’t read this comment.
I read it, sparti, and I agree with Gary and I disagree with you. And your statement remains patently false. Defeatism, even political defeatism, does not equate to treason, especially since this is the third time that I’ve said that I don’t accept your wikipedia definition. If I meant treason, I would have said it outright, not backdoored it.
Also, let’s be clear on what I didn’t read in this entire 276-comment thread: it was one single link from one comment written by Gary, which I have since read. So please keep that in mind before you start making more stupid generalizations.
That’s funny. There’s no advocacy for withdrawal in the article.
You’re correct. It simply reinforced his earlier theme, which is in virtual lockstep with Murtha.
I’ll ask again: is there any factual claim you dispute from the Nir Rosen article Iraq Is the Republic of Fear?
Asked and answered.
I read her for awhile, but when she broke out with a lingering and virulent case of BDS, I quit her.
Well, that certainly says it all.
I don’t accept your wikipedia definition.
That’s your prerogative. Nevertheless, the labelling of people with the term in wartime remains, in my opinion, shorthand for treason, in spirit. I’m sure you’ll be able to live with the fact we disagree on that.
If I meant treason, I would have said it outright, not backdoored it.
Maybe. I have no way of truly knowing without mindreading.
Asked and answered.
Where’s your answer? Could you link to it? Or is it simply a case where an author disagrees with your politics, therefore the things they write about are, by definition, untrue.