I Cogitate
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It may be overkill but this is too appropriate not to feature
Just where are the television news networks? Why isn't any sort of forthrightness being exhibited by CNN, ABC, CBS and NBC? It's being left to the local newspaper op-ed to confront George Bush with the reality of his own creation. How long will it take for the other important segments of the mass media to begin offering frank simplicity such as the following?
Philadelphia Daily News editorialGo here for the complete editorial.
September 10, 2007
WHAT'S BUSH PLAYING AT?
HIS STRATEGY FOR STAYING IN IRAQ SEEMS MORE A GAME THAN ANYTHING
Last week, two separate but interconnected pieces of news came out that make it clear that President Bush has no intention of bringing troops home from Iraq while he's president.
In fact, it's worse: he wants to make sure the next president can't either.
Sure, while he was there on a surprise visit, he hinted that a few troops could come home, if Gen. David Petraeus recommends it.
At the same time, another interview with the president revealed his true intentions.
In a new book by Robert Draper, the president told the author that when it comes to Iraq, "I'm playing for October-November." Writes Draper, the president's "central goal of his remaining time in office: 'To get us in a position where the presidential candidates will be comfortable about sustaining a presence,' and, [the president] said later, 'stay longer.'"
To heck with progress or lack thereof. Who cares if the Iraqis meet benchmarks - which, according to a new report by the independent Government Accountability Office, they aren't. No matter what happens, the president is dead set on keeping troops in Iraq, and will put in any circuit breaker he can to ensure that the next president will have to as well...
...Elsewhere in this new book, the president muses about "replenishing the ol' coffers" by charging huge fees for speaking engagements when he's out of office, and getting "bored" and then hopping in his truck and going back to the ranch.
What a nice luxury that will be, to feel no guilty conscience for making it more difficult, not easier, for the next president to safely bring our troops home. How lovely it will be to get $75,000 a pop to give a speech to a corporation, while the troops you sent into war toil in 130-degree heat, and you made sure they'd stay there long after you left office.
To the president, who curiously used the word "playing" to describe his war strategy, this is indeed a game, and he's looking for his checkmate. To him, there's no real lives involved, and if progress reports don't look good, either change the benchmarks or use it as an excuse to stay longer - but never, ever, change the course...
Here is the founder of the DailyKos web site on Hardball last night with another simple to understand summary: Notice the superb framin in Moulitsas' frist response.
MATTHEWS: Let me go to Markos Moulitsas. Sir, what did you make of the testimony today and the ad that ran in “The Times” this morning by your colleague here, Mr. Pariser?
MARKOS MOULITSAS, DAILY KOS: Well, to me, you know, way out in California, it‘s—it‘s almost amusing to see how, in Washington, D.C., everyone is all up in arms over an ad.
You know, we are in the middle of this bloody war, almost 4,000 dead, half-a-trillion dollars spent. And people are going to talk about how inappropriate an ad is? I think it‘s patently ridiculous. And most people outside of the sort of beltway environment really don‘t care about an ad. They want to see our men and women coming home safe and sound to their families.
MATTHEWS: What do you make of the Democrats‘ predicament? You‘re part of it. They ran to get elected and to take over the Congress as anti-war, but they are not ending the war.
MOULITSAS: It‘s frustrating. I mean, I—I—I can‘t fathom how a party that is on the right side of an issue, which is getting out of Iraq, with 60 percent or more public support, and moral—being on the right side on the morality scale, still is afraid to move forward strongly on this issue. I mean, this is a party, I think, that has spent a year...
MATTHEWS: OK. What would you do? Let me ask you a question. You don‘t have elective office. You have got a very powerful blog site. You are a very important person in the anti-war movement, Markos. So, I am going to ask you the question. You‘re sitting in that hearing room today. You‘re on one of those committees. You have got five minutes with this guy, General Petraeus. What would you have asked him? How would you have grilled him?
MOULITSAS: I would have asked, quite simply, where they got the facts that they cited. They—nobody seemed to ask—ask them where these numbers came from, and how they justify numbers that are such at odds with publicly available information from the Associated Press, from the United Nations, and from the Iraqi government itself...
...MOULITSAS: The ones that we are inflicting are really quite irrelevant, at the end of the day. As you said, I mean, the issue here is, is there an opportunity to create sort of a safe haven for political progress in the country? That was the benchmark that we were promised three months ago, when this surge was announced. Of course, now they are changing the goal posts. Now they‘re saying they need another six months. We have heard the song and dance before.
MATTHEWS: In terms of what you‘re arguing here, what Eli has just argued, I think, in one regard, he‘s definitely got a case. Why would a general in the field call for a reduction 30,000 troops, if that wasn‘t to meet some political ambition to keep the Republicans in line on Capitol Hill?
MOULITSAS: Well, this is...
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: When the Army has always said they are undermanned. Why would they say, we are not undermanned, unless they are trying to achieve a political goal with the Republicans on the Hill?
MOULITSAS: We—we have known from the beginning that the surge could not be sustained. I mean, this is something that the Pentagon has said before, that, under the best circumstances, they still would have to have a drawdown by March of next year.
MATTHEWS: I got you. That‘s true.
MOULITSAS: So, now—now they announce this as though it‘s some kind of great marker of success, when, in fact, this is something that they had noted was logistically necessary.
MATTHEWS: Well done, Markos, well done, because that is something that Colin Powell said a couple months ago. I heard him say that, that there‘s going to have to be this reduction in force anyway come at the end of next spring. And all he‘s doing is declaring that a policy.
MOULITSAS: Right. So, I mean, this is not a marker of success.
MATTHEWS: OK.
MOULITSAS: It‘s just reality. And, of course, you know, it‘s—it‘s—to me, it‘s a little disturbing that—that the administration needs to spin all of this, you know, and turn it into some kind of case for the success of the war, when, in fact, people have already given up. I mean, people have decided, in overwhelming numbers—not just in the United States...
MATTHEWS: Right.
MOULITSAS: ... in Iraq as well—that they want the U.S. home. People want them home. And they don‘t care if there is success at this point.
MATTHEWS: Well...
MOULITSAS: It‘s almost irrelevant at this point. They want their troops home safe and sound with their families. I wore combat boots. I—I—I feel for these guys over there, because I know what it‘s like to be away from family and friends for extended periods of time.
MATTHEWS: I know. You served in the Marines.
MOULITSAS: They want to come home.
MATTHEWS: Let me tell you, you are Archimedes here. You have found a lever, and you‘re working it to move the world, sir. You‘re moving the Democratic Party.
Go here for the complete transcript of the show.
Here is a libertarian weighing in on the so-called MoveOn ad 'controversy -- very well put:
They Got Nothing
By: John Cole - Balloon Juice
September 11, 2007 at 10:12 am
If you want to understand what an absolute position of weakness the Republican minority is working from (which makes the suckitude of the Democrats even more inexplicable), check out today’s antics from the Grand Old Party:
House Republican leaders introduced a resolution Monday condemning a full-page newspaper ad from MoveOn.org that criticizes the character of Gen. David Petraeus, the commanding general of U.S. troops in Iraq...That is it. The current GOP is a snivelling, brain-dead, spineless group of sewer trout, always focussed on political advantage, never paying a lick of attention to what really matters. In the aftermath of Petraeus’s lame and essentially fact-free testimony (BUT HE HAD CHARTS!), they are not focusing on on the hard decisions that need to be made, they are not soul-searching and trying to determine their role in this mess. That would make too much sense. Instead, they are doing what they always do- lashing out, trying to achieve one more temporary little political victory.
Condemning MoveOn won’t save one god damned life in Iraq. It will, however, make the dead-enders they represent giggle like a self-satisfied toddler on the pot...
Go here for the rest.
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