Category: Internet

From the Times of London:

“All right, all right. But apart from liberating 50 million people in Iraq and Afghanistan, undermining dictatorships throughout the Arab world, spreading freedom and self-determination in the broader Middle East and moving the Palestinians and the Israelis towards a real chance of ending their centuries-long war, what have the Americans ever done for us?”

Heh heh heh.

Jon Gallagher has a blog, and even though he’s being a stinky liberal you should check it out on account of his being all smart, technical, and literate. Right now: San Diego Soliloquies

Has this Juan Cole idiot every made a correct prediction about anything in the Middle East or West Asia? Last time I checked he hadn’t, which makes his credential-preening bitch-fight with Jonah Goldberg all the more pathetic.

(…and I say this as someone who has lived in an Arab country and another couple Muslim countries, learned Arabic and a few other languages, and read extensively about the Middle East and stuff, of course.)

If you want sober and informed comment about the situation in Iraq these days you could do a lot worse than turn to Tom Friedman (a man who knows Arabic, has lived in the Middle East, read books, etc, etc). Friedman has some pointed criticism of people like the arrogant Dr. Cole in his election column:

But wait – not everyone is wearing a smiley face after the Iraqi elections, and that is good, considering who is unhappy. Let’s start with the mullahs in Iran. Those who think that a Shiite-led government in Iraq is going to be the puppet of Iran’s Shiite ayatollahs are so wrong. It is the ayatollahs in Iran who are terrified today. You see, the Iranian mullahs and their diplomats like to peddle the notion that they have their own form of democracy: “Islamic democracy.” But this is a fraud, and the people who know best that it’s a fraud are the ayatollahs and the Iranian people.

When any Iranian reform candidate who wants to run can be vetoed by unelected ayatollahs, and any Iranian newspaper can be shut by the same theocrats, that is not democracy. You can call that whatever you want, but not democracy. They don’t allow bikinis at nudist colonies and they don’t serve steak at vegetarian restaurants, and theocrats don’t veto candidates in real democracies. The Iraqi Shiites just gave every Iranian Shiite next door a demonstration of what real “Islamic” democracy is: it’s when Muslims vote for anyone they want. I just want to be around for Iran’s next election, when the ayatollahs try to veto reform candidates and Iranian Shiites ask, Why can’t we vote for anyone, like Iraqi Shiites did? Oh, boy, that’s going to be pay-per-view.

The trouble with people like Cole isn’t their lack of education, it’s their inability to see events outside the US in their native context. The war in Iraq is no longer about George W. Bush, if it ever was. It’s about the Iraqi people and their aspirations for self-rule and the forces of fascism and repression that would deny that to them. For all his training, Cole has unfortunately decided to ally himself and his aspirations with the Iranian mullahs instead of with the Iraqi people.

As the canard that wouldn’t die has been raised in the comments to the Weinberger post, let’s review the President’s SOTU from 2003:

Some have said we must not act until the threat is imminent. Since when have terrorists and tyrants announced their intentions, politely putting us on notice before they strike? If this threat is permitted to fully and suddenly emerge, all actions, all words, and all recriminations would come too late. Trusting in the sanity and restraint of Saddam Hussein is not a strategy, and it is not an option.

Any questions?

UPDATE: Here’s what we said after Powell’s UN presentation, which was clearly not on some “imminent threat” theme. The criticism of the president at the time was largely based on the wisdom of breaking policy by deposing a regime that didn’t present an “imminent threat”.

Want to read a misleading poem about being misled? Click and thee shall find.

This is what I heard about Iraq: 25 million oppressed people have been freed, and the torture chambers, rape rooms, and mass graves used by their former oppressor are out of business.

Ace of Spades is hilarious on the dilemma the anti-war crowd faces today:

Liberal Legislators Seek “Timetable” For End to Discussion of Everything To Do With Iraq

W A S H I N G T O N (Acewire News Service) — Calling their previous pessimism and gloom on the prospects of free and fair Iraqi elections an “unending quagmire,” several leading Democrats called for an “exit strategy” for all discussion of the topic whatsoever….

[Aaron] Brown immediately held an envelope to his forehead and intoned “Me, Peter Jennings, and Katie Couric.” Tearing open the envelope and blowing into it, he read the contents of the card inside. “Name three people currently being watched by friends and family for signs of suicidal depression, and who have had their shoelaces, belts, and Percoset confiscated by mental-health care professionals.”

“It’s more true than funny,” he explained wryly.

Liberal bloggers instituted their own exit strategy unilaterally and by and large refused to mention January 30th’s historic events entirely. Joshua Micah Marshall could only offer a single line — “I question the timing” — although the January 30th vote has in fact been scheduled for six months.

Some anti-war bloggers have developed a quick case of amnesia regarding the turnout in the Iraq Election – see Notes in Samsara for one example.

UPDATE: Perhaps our amnesiacs are protecting their health from this:

Jon Stewart, late in the Daily Show last night to Newsweek pundit Fareed Zakaria: “I’ve watched this thing unfold from the start and here’s the great fear that I have: What if Bush, the president, ours, has been right about this all along? I feel like my world view will not sustain itself and I may, and again I don’t know if I can physically do this, implode.”

Gloat, gloat, gloat.

UPDATE: One enemy of Iraq’s liberation still refers to the Baathist/Al Qaeda terrorists operating in post-election Iraq as an “insurgency/partisan resistance” despite the fact that many of them, like Zarqawi, aren’t even Iraqi. Self-delusion is a more powerful force than gravity.

This is really shameful:

And that’s why I like it.

Mohammed’s day-after observations from Iraq the Model:

We here remain assured that we’ve put our feet on the right track and that the bright future we wish for Iraq has become much closer after the 30th of January but we all have to reevaluate our previous assumption according to the new facts on the ground in order to find the best way we can push the process to further successes.

Meanwhile, Riverbend doesn’t even acknowledge there was an election.

You find no larger load of crap about the Iraq election than this one from Kevin T. Keith:

So while there is quite a bit to be pleased about (no one should minimize the courage of the Iraqis. People literally died in order to exercise their franchise), this election was not a success, in that it will not produce a government that will be able to resolve the differences that hang over the country, and it will not produce a government that will be seen as legitimate in enough places to substantially reduce the violence. We are, in fact, pretty much where we were yesterday, with the possible except that civil war ? in the form of a lopsided constitution ? may be closer to day than yesterday.

This is interesting because I’ve read some things from this boy on evolution that were eminently sensible, so I know he’s not stupid. But like many on the left, he’s become emotionally invested in the idea that nothing good can possibly come from the liberation of Iraq, so he has to see a half-full glass as completely empty. There was heavy turnout in 80% of Iraq, and the Sunnis who didn’t vote will still be represented to some degree in the government.

You’ll probably find similar bitterness all over the elite, Bush-hating part of the blogosphere if you care to look; Duncan “Atrios” Black and the arrogant Juan Cole are in severe pain, for example. But I’m not linking additional examples because it’s just too pathetic. This was a great day for the Iraqi people, and the only appropriate thing for us to do right now is share their joy and give them congratulations.

Just to show that not all left-wingers are as bitter and blind as Mr. Keith, check this grudging congratulations from MyDD:

Of course, I know all that it is wrong in Iraq and what could still go wrong – Sunni disenfranchisement/refusnikism, terrible security, very high unemployment, terrible infrastructure, and so on. But for a majority of non-Sunni Iraqis, this election really does represent a step towards a better life, if only in small measure. What, after all, do liberals believe in? Do we not believe in the enfranchisement of the formerly dispossessed and downtrodden? Do we not believe in democratic elections, even if flawed?

And Marc Cooper is similarly sober in his leftist’s assessment of the election:

Those of who opposed this war and who want to see the U.S. troops withdrawn as soon as possible should unequivocally encourage the tenuous political process now underway in Iraq. We should stand for more and better elections, not fewer. We should be encouraging the writing of a fair constitution, an inclusion of the Sunnis into the process in order to reduce the violence, and a bolstering of civil society (as a safeguard against fundamentalism). If we merely write off yesterday’s vote as only potemkin or charade elections we take ourselves out of any serious debate and we degrade the legitimate aspirations of the Iraqi people. Indeed, the more one opposes the war and its pretexts, the more we should support the stabilization of a successful, pluralistic Iraqi state.

Those inclined to sentiments like Mr. Keith’s bitterness would do well to read these whole things.

UPDATE: Podhoretz notes the bitterness:

There are literally millions of Americans who are unhappy today because millions of Iraqis went to the polls yesterday. And why? Because this isn’t just a success for Bush. It’s a huge win. It’s a colossal vindication.

There’s a nice summary of the Iraq issues on Cold Fury:

Okay, look, I?ll put this as simply as I can:

1) Condi didn?t lie to anybody, and neither did Dubya. Lying implies both knowledge and intent, and neither has been remotely established, nor will they be, because they do not exist. We know that Saddam at one time had WMD?s; there is simply no argument possible on this. The fact of their existence was unquestioned by anybody, including the UN, after the first Gulf War, and we know he actually used them on more than one occasion. What we don?t know is where they all went, and if you on the Left were truly concerned about American security in the age of global terrorism you?d be a lot more worried about that than you are. You are not serious about defending this country. You are dead wrong, and you do not deserve to be taken seriously.

2) Bush acted on the best intelligence available in making the decision to remove Saddam from power; the same intelligence led President Clinton to make regime change the official goal of the USG back in ?98. You on the Left did not denounce that policy change when Clinton made it; your interest in the matter begins and ends with your hatred of your fellow Americans who happen to be Republicans. You on the Left are not seriously concerned about the security of this nation. You are dead wrong, and you do not deserve to be taken seriously.

3) WMDs were by no means the only reason to remove Saddam. Saddam was an avowed enemy of this country. He called for our destruction many, many times. He aided and abetted Islamic terrorists of every warp and woof…

Go see the rest of it.