Libertarian Leanings

Pelosi in the crosshairs

Over the weekend a CBS golf analyst David Feherty pushed the humor envelope a little too far with a joke at the expense of Nancy Pelosi. "From my own experience visiting the troops in the Middle East, I can tell you this though," Feherty wrote toward the end of his column.  "Despite how the conflict has been portrayed by our glorious media, if you gave any U.S. soldier a gun with two bullets in it, and he found himself in an elevator with Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Osama bin Laden, there's a good chance that Nancy Pelosi would get shot twice, and Harry Reid and bin Laden would be strangled to death." Mr. Feherty apologized for the joke, which when you get right down to it doesn't seem all that funny. But I think it's pretty interesting that people are beginning to take this kind of potshot at the speaker. By coincidence, an interesting photograph showing Ms. Pelosi with some American troops accompanied an article in Politico.  The gist of the  Politico article is that the GOP has settled on the Pelosi strategy for dealing with leftist inspired investigations of Bush administration officials over enhanced interrogation techniques that were used on three al Qaeda terrorists.  As Pelosi continues to call for investigations, Republicans call for Pelosi to be the first witness. '“If someone is going to schedule hearings, I believe that the first witness should be Nancy Pelosi,” Rep. Pete Hoekstra, the ranking member on the House intelligence committee, told POLITICO. “Clearly, she was involved in policy formulation.” According to records released last week by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Pelosi and other congressional officials were told in 2002 that enhanced interrogation techniques had been used on terrorist suspect Abu Zubaydah. The report appeared to contradict Pelosi’s claims — made earlier and again after the report was released — that she had been told only that such techniques might be used in the future, not that they had already been used.' Meanwhile, Ms. Pelosi spent Sunday in Baghdad, hoping to burnish her patriotic image by spending quality time with the troops.  As one might expect there was a photo op, hence the picture of Ms. Pelosi with the troops.

They don't appear to be packed into an elevator. A good thing maybe, since the troops don't seem to be looking on in adoration. Anybody got a good caption for this snapshot?

Wait while I suspend my disbelief...

What a remarkable surprise, and what a difference it makes when your side owns the White House and congress.  Hillary Clinton now says Iraq is on the right track, and she says it in the wake of its worst violence in more than a year.

'BAGHDAD -- U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said on Saturday that this week's deadly suicide bombings in Iraq are a sign that extremists are afraid the Iraqi government is succeeding.

Making her first trip to Iraq as America's top diplomat, Ms. Clinton said the country has made great strides despite the recent violence that killed at least 148 people in Baghdad and outside on Thursday and Friday.

"I think that these suicide bombings .. are unfortunately, in a tragic way, a signal that the rejectionists fear that Iraq is going in the right direction," Ms. Clinton told reporters traveling aboard her plane ahead of her unannounced visit to Baghdad.

"I think in Iraq there will always be political conflicts, there will always be, as in any society, sides drawn between different factions, but I really believe Iraq as a whole is on the right track," she said, citing "overwhelming evidence" of "really impressive" progress.'

Over and over again, Democrats demonstrate an amazing ability jump from one position to its exact opposite without batting an eye.  Are we to suspend our disbelief at her new outlook for Iraq?  In fact, the Democrats own Iraq now, and now that they do I expect we're in for an entertaining balancing act.  How long will Democrats continue to spout nonsense about the rise of democracy in Iraq being the worst foreign policy disaster in American history, while declaring their undying support for its success? 

Preserving liberal psyches

Liberal psyches be preserved!  It seems that elements of the mainstream press have embarked on extensive retrospective analyses that seek to trace all anti-American sentiment back to origins in Bush administration policy.  A recent Pentagon report on the Guantanamo Bay military prison was ordered by President Barack Obama.  In spite of its conclusion that detainee treatment meets the requirements of the Geneva Conventions, a remarkable front page story in the Washington Post tries to make the case that Guantanamo is turning otherwise likable young men into jihadists as a result of their detainment. 

'Since his death, U.S. intelligence agencies have sought to determine when Ajmi became a hard-core jihadist. Was it in the late 1990s, when he came under the sway of a radical preacher while serving in the Kuwaiti army? Was it in 2001, when he allegedly joined the Taliban? Was it upon his release in 2005, when extremists back home celebrated him as the "Lion of Guantanamo"?

Or is the answer potentially more alarming: Was his descent into unrepentant radicalism an unintended consequence of his incarceration?'

In March 2008 Ajmi drove a pickup truck packed with explosives onto an Iraqi army base outside Mosul killing 13 Iraqi soldiers and wounding 42 others.  U.S. military officials at Guantanamo had Ajmi pegged as a trouble maker at best, but according to the Post, his lawyerThomas Wilner says the problem was Guantanamo.

'Wilner tried to talk to Ajmi about his upcoming administrative review board hearing -- the Guantanamo equivalent of a parole board meeting -- saying it would give him an opportunity to tell the truth about what he was doing before his capture. But Ajmi wasn't interested. He wanted to talk about how he was being treated at Guantanamo, about the IRFing, about how the guards rifled through his papers.

Wilner urged him to focus on legal issues. If he wanted Shearman to keep representing him, he needed to sign a form to that effect. If he did not sign, Wilner said, he would not be able to see him anymore.

Ajmi tried to change the subject again. Wilner's interpreter, a young Egyptian American man, interjected. "This guy is just trying to help you," he said. "Can't you address him?"

Ajmi glowered. He bared his teeth. Then he threw a cup of hot tea in the interpreter's face.

Wilner ended the session, but he soon forgave Ajmi. The detainee's hostility, he believed, was a result of mental deterioration caused by his confinement at Guantanamo.'

The forces that drive suicide bombers to their explosive ends stand revealed.  How fortunate that we have a savior in President Barack Obama who will end the scourge by closing Guantanamo.  Suicide bombing will be soon be a distant memory.  Well maybe not, but at the very least liberal consciences will be salved in the conviction that future bloody deaths from human bombs are not their fault. 

But this is just one of many stories intended to place blame where the press would like it to be.  Unfortunately for the Washington press, their ongoing campaign to discredit the Bush administration is running into obstacles.  For one thing, it's becoming clearer by the day, that what the press considers the worst foreign policy disaster in recent American history, the invasion of Iraq, has planted the seeds of democracy and they have taken root.  The recent Iraqi election has resulted a resounding victory for secular government, a rejection of Islamic religious rule, and a rejection of control by Iranian sponsored parties.  The establishment of a democratic government in Iraq represents a shift in the balance of power in the Middle East, and it' has shifted dramatically in favor of the U.S.  

This is not good news for Washington Post reporter extraordinaire, Thomas Ricks, who has a new book.  According to Mario Loyola his new one is as wildly off the mark as his last one.  (Disclosure:  Aside from the excerpts of "Fiasco" that appeared in the Post, I haven't read either and it's not likely I will.)  In Loyola's analysis Ricks' new book "The Gamble" promotes the conventional media wisdom on the War in Iraq.  You know the drill.  Democracy in Iraq is doomed to fail and would already have done so but for the dumb luck of the surge, and even that was a political failure.

'Following the Woodward method, Ricks interviewed enough people that he can quote somebody saying pretty much whatever he wants said in support of his narrative, and he puts those who gave him the greatest access in the most favorable light. Ricks had surprising access to a lot of senior people. Gen. Jack Keane, one of the signal proponents of the surge, reports being surprised at how much information Ricks already had by the time of their interview.

But in the absence of archival research, this mountain of quotations fails to communicate so many critical aspects of what happened — and of how decisions were made — that it would risk incoherence if it had to stand on its own as history. Ricks solves that problem by weaving his reportage around the most familiar propositions of the conventional media narrative: 1) Rumsfeld and his senior generals stubbornly refused to implement a proper counterinsurgency strategy and nearly caused a disaster; 2) the surge has succeeded militarily but failed politically; 3) democracy is a pipe dream in Iraq, where “lots of little Saddams” have replaced the one we toppled; 4) the Iraq war has been most of all a victory for Iran; and 5) Obama will be fighting the Iraq war long into the future, with an uncertain outcome. Each of these propositions is seriously flawed if not completely wrong.'

But there is a method to the madness in all this.  The sad fact is that the media and many of liberal intelligentsia really wanted America to lose the war in Iraq.  It wasn't so much the war that was objectionable as the pain of having to acknowledge that George W. Bush might have been right about it.  Chicago Sun-Times columnist Mark Brown wondered aloud on February 1, 2005, shortly after the Iraqis first went to the polls, "What if Bush has been right about Iraq all along?"  Brown wrote:

'But after watching Sunday's election in Iraq and seeing the first clear sign that freedom really may mean something to the Iraqi people, you have to be asking yourself: What if it turns out Bush was right, and we were wrong?

It's hard to swallow, isn't it?

Americans cross own barrier

If you fit the previously stated profile, I know you're fighting the idea, because I am, too. And if you were with the president from the start, I've already got your blood boiling.

For those who've been in the same boat with me, we don't need to concede the point just yet. There's a long way to go. But I think we have to face the possibility.

I won't say that it had never occurred to me previously, but it's never gone through my mind as strongly as when I watched the television coverage from Iraq that showed long lines of people risking their lives by turning out to vote, honest looks of joy on so many of their faces.

Some CNN guest expert was opining Monday that the Iraqi people crossed a psychological barrier by voting and getting a taste of free choice (setting aside the argument that they only did so under orders from their religious leaders).

I think it's possible that some of the American people will have crossed a psychological barrier as well.

Deciding democracy's worth

On the other side of that barrier is a concept some of us have had a hard time swallowing:

Maybe the United States really can establish a peaceable democratic government in Iraq, and if so, that would be worth something.

Would it be worth all the money we've spent? Certainly.

Would it be worth all the lives that have been lost? That's the more difficult question, and while I reserve judgment on that score until such a day arrives, it seems probable that history would answer yes to that as well.

I don't want to get carried away in the moment.

Going to war still sent so many terrible messages to the world.'

The Daily Show's Jon Stewart had similar misgivings.

'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.'

Here we are four years down the road with another Iraqi election in the books, but no implosions on the left, no facing of possibilities, no worrying over whether or not Bush was right.  Instead we have denial.  Yes, the surge that was doomed to failure, but it "succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated."  Obama's words.  And that's the ticket.  Nobody with a brain could possibly have figured the surge would actually work.  What else could it be but luck?

So as long as things go well in Iraq, we can expect the Rickses of the world to remain locked into a cycle of "investigative" journalism and "non-fiction" literature that will explain to their self satisfaction how luck saved the situation in Iraq, after George W. Bush made such a mess of it.  They will endlessly explain how anything that worked was less a result of administration purpose and planning than it was of pure chance.  Or if it can't be written off to chance pundits will opine that the flowering of democracy in Iraq is really not such a good thing anyway.

Of course, it's not clear that President Obama will help them out of their liberal quandry.  Sure he was as big a critic as the best of them, but the buck stops on his desk now, and talk is cheap.  Easy to say invading Iraq was a mistake, but now that security has improved and Iraqis are deciding issues with ballots rather than bullets, can the liberals keep saying it's a huge mistake and do it with a straight face.  Will Obama really want to risk having a democratically governed allied country disappear on his watch by pulling up stakes and leaving as he promised early on in his campaigns.  As with other campaign promises, this one may also have passed its expiration date.

'WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama faces split opinions within the military on whether to make the speedy withdrawal from Iraq he championed as a candidate.

Obama's top generals in Baghdad are pressing for an elongated timetable. Some influential senior advisers inside the Pentagon are more amenable to a quicker pullout.

Obama has yet to decide the matter. But his recent announcement that he is sending thousands more combat troops to Afghanistan implies a drawdown of at least two brigades from Iraq by summer.

That does not answer the question whether Obama will stick to his stated goal of a 16-month pullout or opt for a slower, less risky approach.

Gen. Ray Odierno, the top American commander in Baghdad, favors a longer timetable for leaving Iraq. He sees 2009 as a pivotal year, with parliamentary elections set to be held in December; he doesn't want to lose more than two of the 14 combat brigades that are now in Iraq before the end of the year. And he believes the U.S. military will need to remain engaged in Iraq, to some degree, for years to come.

Odierno's boss at U.S. Central Command, Gen. David Petraeus, leans toward Odierno's view.'

Meanwhile, back on the liberal ranch, the Ajmi saga continues in Post pages this morning.  Just in case anybody missed the story on Sunday.

'When Thomas Wilner learned that his client had become a suicide bomber, he said he felt physically ill. He thought of the victims, and he thought of Ajmi. "Here was this poor, dumb kid -- I really don't think he was a bad kid -- who was thrown into a hellhole of a prison and who went mad," he said. "Should we really be surprised that somebody we treated this way would become radicalized, would become crazy?"'

A Kuwaiti national was captured with al Qaeda in Pakistan after fighting in Afghanistan against the Northern Alliance.  And the Washington Post thinks it's Guantanamo that turned him to jihad.  It's sounds like a typical liberal mea culpa.  "Yes, America is to blame, particularly the America that isn't me."  There.  Doesn't that feel better?  It's George W. Bush, who's really to blame.  That will be the media theme for the next four years, anyway.  It's something liberals can swallow.

Best Seller

According to Power Line the recently released paperback edition of Douglas Feith's War and Decision advertises itself as a Washington Post and New York Times best seller. This in spite of the fact that both papers refused to review the book when the hard cover edition was first published.

'The MSM's decision to ignore War and Decision was understandable. Through the painstaking use of documentary evidence, Feith destroys much of the false narrative the MSM labored so hard to assign to the Iraq war and the decisions surrounding it. The MSM apparently had no substantive response. In fact, Doug said today that, to his knowledge, no one has identified a single factual inaccuracy in the book. Under these circumstances, from the standpoint of the liberal MSM, the best approach was simply to ignore the book. Meanwhile, lefty bloggers limited themselves, as usual, to invective.'

Remember when...

Nearly two years ago the media and the lefty blogosphere were hooting over John McCain's claim that a recent visit of his to a Baghdad market was proof that security had improved in Iraq's capitol city.

'Yesterday, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) told CNN that that President Bush’s escalation in Iraq is going so well, “General Petraeus goes out there almost every day in an unarmed humvee.” On Monday, he told radio host Bill Bennett that there “are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods, today.”

This morning, during an interview with McCain, CNN’s John Roberts rebutted McCain’s assertions, stating, “I checked with General Petraeus’s people overnight and they said he never goes out in anything less than an up-armored humvee.” He added that a new report by retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey “said no Iraqi government official, coalition soldier, diplomat reporter could walk the streets of Baghdad without heavily armed protection.”'

The message of course:  Security has not improved, will not improve.  That message was officially blessed a couple of weeks later when Senate Majority Leader and Democrat Harry Reid said the war was lost.  Lefty reporters and bloggers were positively giddy over McCain's comments.

That was two years ago.  A few days ago an Iraqi student posted this:

'I finished my exams last Wednesday; the teachers brought very hard questions, but did fine. I was planning to have 2 lectures everyday during the midyear holiday, but my grandparents, and everyone urged me to take a break, relax and spend the holiday in Baghdad, after I thought about it, I decided to take their advice, and have a break, I rally deserve one after 9 months of continuous studying so that I don't get bored later.

So in the first day of my holiday I traveled to Baghdad, the road was really good except the two hours we stopped before we reach Baghdad because of the crowded road as the cars must be inspected before we reach Baghdad gate..

I am having a pleasant time here, Baghdad is much safer than mosul, we can go out, wear what we love without fear, walk and enjoy the warm weather, I love Baghdad and I wish I can stay here forever!'

My, how things have changed.  Iraqis went to the polls yesterday to vote in their provincial elections.  It's hardly what you would call big news, though.

The Great Foreign Policy Blunder

In early 2007 George W. Bush confounded his critics when he announced a change in the conduct of the Iraq War.  He said that he would commit 20,000 more troops to the fight and that they would employ a new counterinsurgency strategy that made protecting the Iraqi population the highest priority.  This, he said, was intended to "create space" that would allow political progress to move forward.  Hopeful Democrats and their supporters in the mainstream press had been urging surrender. 

2006 was a bad year in Iraq.  An eruption of sectarian violence raised monthly death tolls to their highest since fighting began in 2003.  By the end of 2005 the insurgents had recognized that they had no hope of defeating U.S. forces militarily.  In 2006 insurgent stategy had shifted comletely -- away from confronting the Americans, to attacking Iraqi civilians instead.  The insurgents went about demonstrating their ability to randomly inflict murder upon large numbers of Iraqi citizens. 

This was described in the press and in Democratic political speeches as evidence of the coming U.S. defeat in the Iraq war.  It was to be the signature failure of the Bush administration, although it would be a neat trick for the insurgents to win the war without winning any military battles.  It meant they would have to win the war on the information front by convincing the American people that victory against them was impossible. 

Murder was the insurgency's only vehicle for doing this -- the bloodier the better.  As the U.S. set out to protect Iraqi civilians, the insurgents set out to prove it couldn't be done.  In this the insurgent's natural ally was the media.  "If it bleeds it leads," so goes the saying, and the worldwide press celebrated the spectacular misery visited on the Iraqis. 

Democrats were aghast that President Bush failed to heed the opinion polls and instead set the surge in motion.  Call it an accident if you wish, but Democrats had lined themselves up with the insurgency.  As the insurgency endeavored to prove the impossibility of defeating them Iraq, the Democratic obliged by agreeing with them publicly and constantly. 

2006 was a bad year for Republicans seeking re-election.  While Democrats campaigned against the war Republicans tried to change the subject.  Instead of standing with their President, Republicans stood by and watched the Democrats take control of both the Senate and the House.  They felt they would hurt their chances if they appeared to be connected to George W. Bush and the war in Iraq.

The newly minted Senate Majority Leader and Democrat Harry Reid famously declared that the war was already lost.  Time and again Democratic leaders in congress moved to cut off funding for the "failed" war, but each time they failed to win enough votes to do it.  Unfortunately, by the time George W. Bush announced his intention to build up troop levels, 70% of Americans opposed the move believing Democratic and media pronouncements that it wouldn't do any good. 

It did, though.  When the additional troops finally reached Baghdad and the surrounding area, violence took a dramatic plunge.  It took time, but eventually Democrats were forced to admit that the surge worked after all.  Even Barack Obama, late in his presidential campaign, was forced to admit, "the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated."  Nobody?  Really?

After a while, even media luminaries who had opposed the war and opposed the surge had to admit it worked.  Recently Peter Beinart writing in the Washington Post said it's no longer even a close call.  The surge worked. 

The fallback position is:  So what?  The new reality now being force fed to the news consuming public is,

'...even if the calm endures, that still doesn't justify the Bush administration's initial decision to go to war, which remains one of the great blunders in American foreign policy history.'

In Beinart's mind and in the minds of Democrats in congress it's a given.  They casually throw it out there at every opportunity, confident that American support for the war has been decimated by the relentlessly negative reporting by the media and rhetoric of their Democratic clients.  But it's a claim that gets its support almost solely on the media, which is virulently anti-war and anti-Bush, and on opinion polls which are media driven.  What happens when this, too, turns out to be just another premature assessment? 

In is recent interview with Jim Lehrer, Vice President Richard Cheney put things into perspective.  It's what Beinart considers a blunder.

'MR. LEHRER: Mr. Vice President, getting from there to here, 4500 Americans have died, at least a hundred thousand Iraqis have died. Has it been worth that?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: I think so.

MR. LEHRER: Why?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: Because I believed at the time that what Saddam Hussein represented was, especially in the aftermath of 9/11, was a terror-sponsoring state - so designated by the State Department. He was making payments to the families of suicide bombers; he provided a safe haven and sanctuary for Abu Nidal and other terrorist operations. He had produced and used weapons of mass destruction, chemical and biological agents.

He'd had a nuclear program in the past. He killed hundreds of thousands of his own people and he did have a relationship with al-Qaida. Now, we've had this debate, keeps people trying to conflate those arguments.

That's not to say that Saddam was responsible for 9/11; it is to say - as George Tenet, CIA director testified in open session in the Senate - that there was a relationship there that went back 10 years.

So this was a terror-sponsoring state with access to weapons of mass destruction and that's the greatest threat we faced in the aftermath of 9/11: The next time we found terrorists in the middle of one of our cities, it wouldn't be 19 guys armed with airline tickets and box cutters, it would be terrorists armed with a biological agent or maybe even a nuclear device.

So I think, given the track record of Saddam Hussein, I think we did exactly the right thing, I think the country's better off for it today, I think it's been part of the effort alongside Afghanistan to liberate 50 million people and establish a vibrant democracy in the heart of the Middle East. I think those are major, major accomplishments.'

And this:

'MR. LEHRER: One more general scope here, Mr. Vice President. What do you make of a current suggestion that you have been in fact the most powerful vice president in history, but in one of the most failed presidencies in history?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: I don't buy that.

MR. LEHRER: You don't buy that?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: No, I think the argument that this is a failed presidency is just dead wrong. I think we'll hear that from some of our critics, but when I look back at what we've been able to do - we dealt with big issues.

We didn't deal with school uniforms, we dealt with the fact that we brought down two of the worst regimes in the 20^th century: the Taliban in Afghanistan and Saddam Hussein in Iraq. We were forced when we arrived - shortly after we arrived - to have to deal with the global war on terror, which had not been managed properly before that.

We ended up inheriting a situation that has been very challenging, but we've been very successful at it. And when you look at what we've been able to do, both in terms of our activities overseas as well as our operations that allowed us to block any further attack against the United States here at home, I think those are great successes and I think there aren't many administrations that can point to successes on that scale.'

If Democrats were aghast at Bush's refusal to quit and accept defeat, they and their media cronies were enraged as his determination has led to the victory that can now be declared in Iraq with the passage of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1859.  Omar Fadhil of Iraq the Model celebrated its passage.

'Iraq has started to reap the benefits of the status of forces agreement with the United States. The United Nations Security Council voted to set the ground for relieving Iraq from the restrictions of Chapter Seven of the UN Charter.

In fact, the remaining effects of previous resolutions will from now on serve only to protect Iraq’s assets from claims by other parties, not to impose anything on the people of Iraq. Sovereignty, which was lost two decades ago under Saddam Hussein’s capricious and belligerent reign, is being restored to the nation.

The Security Council resolution 1859 states, among other things, that Iraq is no longer a threat to its neighbors, region, or the world. The United States has succeeded in transforming a bellicose, autocratic state into a friendly one that is making steady progress towards becoming a self-sustaining democracy — the international community is finally coming to recognize this transformation.
This resolution is bound to make a positive impact on the domestic and regional levels. First and foremost it is a testimony to the United States’ true desire to help Iraq get on its feet and relieve it from restrictions that belong to a past era — the United States is indisputably a friendly protector of Iraq, not an occupier as many like to claim.

However, this achievement did not receive as much attention in the Arab media as did the shoes of a disturbed young journalist...'

It's an achievement that received no attention in any media, not just Arab media.  Was anyone even aware of Resolution 1859?  A Google search came up with only three news items about it.  Here is the screen shot, as of January 23rd.

It's hard for me to think of our Democratic leadership and our journalistic elites as anything but treasonous, after having done everything in their power to hand victory to a terrorist insurgency over our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines, .  They gave air time and credibility to the insurgents' message, they fought their legislative battles hoping to end the American struggle to beat them, and they waged a relentless public relations campaign against anything and everything the Bush administration hoped to achieve.  But still, they failed.  Now they say that they would like to prosecute George Bush.  For what?  Winning a war they said couldn't be won? 

By claiming that Iraq was a foreign policy blunder Democrats absolve themselves of their faithlessness.  Over the next four years liberal pundits, especially the ones masquerading as journalists, will cling to the fiction that deposing Saddam Hussein was a foreign policy blunder.  Fighting the War on Terror was a foreign policy blunder.  Winning the war in Iraq was a foreign policy blunder.  Conversion of two enemy countries to allied countries was a foreign policy blunder.  The spread of democracy in the Middle East was a foreign policy blunder.

The question now, is what happens when it becomes apparent that this "foreign policy blunder" has laid the groundwork for lasting peace to the Middle East?  Will our Democratic leadership sabotage the peace in order to correct the foriegn policy blunder?  If an election hangs in the balance I think we can count on it.  Maybe then the Republicans will finally find the stomache to fight them on it.

The Road Untravelled

Just over a week ago, Neurotic Iraqi Wife vented her frustration at Israel's incursion into Gaza.  Among the tragedies in Gaza was the death of a school friend of hers, which prompted her to direct one of her blog posts, The 21st Century Murderers... to "everyone who thinks the Gaza massacre is justifiable."  She wrote,

'Im not saying Hamas is right. Im not a supporter of Hamas or any organization that deals with violence. But at the same time THIS SHOULD STOP. IT SHOULD STOP NOW. What did my school friend do? What was his fault? Why did he die? He died as a result of this inhumane war. BOTH SIDES ARE WRONG.

I don’t give a damn why this war started in the first place. Nothing, nothing whatsoever justifies kids dying. NOTHING. This post is for every single ignorant person who supports Israel’s current actions. And then you sit and wonder why do people hate us? Why do people dislike us. This is exactly why. You sit and wonder why people want to kill us? All these kids, the kids that have been orphaned, the kids who woke up having no family around will grow up thinking of ways to take revenge. And you wonder why suicide bombers do what they do in your part of the world. Bloody hell even people in other countries are asking to go fight in Gaza...This is exactly what happens as a result of unjustifiable violence.'

It turns out that several "ignorant persons"who support Israel's actions stopped by to explain why in Neurotica's comment section.  First out of the gate was Tex who asked,

'What do you want Israel to do Neurotica? Open their borders to the palestinians and let the murderers flood across and murder all their children and kill every last living jew? Would Israel then be justified in defending themselves? Should Israel pull out of the occupied territories and let them govern themselves? Oh wait...they already did that and the thanks they received for forcing their own citizens to give up their homes was what? Thousands of rockets and mortars fired indiscriminately at civilians.'

Programmer Craig added his two cents soon afterward,

'By the way, Neurotica... every Palestinian blogger I know of has been preaching hate and violence against the Jews (or "zionists" as they call them) for years. Every single one. How am I supposed to sympathize with people like that, when it seems they got exactly what they wanted? You say that the people in Gaza aren't all like Hamas, and that is undoubtedly true, but where are the voices of those in Gaza who DON'T want war? Why aren't they being heard? Why aren't they on the news? Why aren't they on they internet? You say those people are important... shouldn't they be front and center in the Arab world, then?'

Julie added,

'I think a caring heart "gives a damn" why this war is started. How do you fight wrong/evil if you don't? You're not saying "Hamas is right" but can you say they are WRONG?'

Since Neurotica published her essay there have been 80 comments attached to it, far more than I've seen on her blog in the brief time I've been reading it.  To her credit she responds... up to a point.  Yes Hamas is wrong but Israel should target the militants, not the children.

But it's pretty well known that Israel targets the militants, even going so far as to warn civilians to clear out before the shooting starts.  Hamas has made a practice of setting up its rocket launchers near schools and hospitals in order to win the information war with footage of massacred women and children.  Neurotica seems reluctant to believe it, reluctant to accept the possibility that Hamas is to blame for Palestinian deaths.  The best she can do concede that Hamas and Israel are both worthy of blame, and refusing further comment she throws up her hands and says,

'Whether people agree with me or not is not the point here. How can we stop the massacres thats what is important right now. Im leaving it at that.'

Although Neurotica seems predisposed to believe the Arab media take on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, she was willing to acknowledge, in a more recent post, that there is another side to the story. 

'A few days ago I had to attend some family lunch that my parents were hosting. I wasn’t really up to it but I had to go. As we sat down chitchatting, a few mobile phones beeped simultaneously. “Please donate to Gaza at such and such banks” One of the ladies read the message out loud. She then threw her phone in dismay at the table. “Why should I care about Gaza” She said “While my own country is suffering. What did the Palestinians do for us Iraqis when my people were getting killed by the hundreds” She continued. “Let them go to hell.”

I was in shock. “But Khala (Aunti), these are humans dying, not animals. Surely you can be more compassionate” She had a very hard look on her face. She took out a cigarette, lit it, inhaled, then exhaled and shook her head and said “Neurotica, Iraqis are humans too. Do you know what they (Palestinians) did in Iraq? Do you know how the preyed on us when Saddam was in power. I don’t give a damn about these people. They elected their government so let them suffer the consequences”

Another woman joined in and said “She is right Neurotica. You know where the money is going? Its not going to the victims, it will end up in Hamas’s hands, and surely Hamas will buy weapons. All this is propaganda. No, not a single penny from MY own hard earned money is going there, Id rather spend it on the Orphans of Iraq. Half the millionaires in the Emirates are Palestinians, why don’t THEY help their OWN people?” Then she said, “Hamas don’t even care about their own people, theyre sitting comfortably in Syria and Lebanon while their people burn.”'

Is Neurotica ready to challenge long held convictions?  Wonderful if true.  More people should do it, and if there is ever to be peace in the Middle East, they'll have to.

Of course, there's the alternative that's popular in certain circles -- destroy Israel and annihilate the Jews.  In the conventional view, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the source of all unrest in the Middle East.  But if the Jews were to disappear from the face of the earth, would that bring peace?  I think not.  What about the next enemy of Islam? 

Arab dreams of Israel's destruction gained justification from the reported death of Muhammad al Durah, a twelve year old Palestinian boy said to have been killed by Israeli gunfire in 2000.  But was he?  A challenge of the original news report by Charles Enderlin of France 2 resulted in a 2006 libel suit against Phillippe Karsenty, the challenger, in which Enderlin and France 2 prevailed.  The appeal, however, favored Karsenty.  The French Appeals Court found that Enderlin's report of the death scene was a fake.  

So what's a Palestinian "freedom fighter" to do?  What kind of an identity crisis would each of us endure at the destruction of a core cherished belief?  At some level, what we believe is who we are.  There are core convictions that are not relinquished easily, if ever at all.  Convictions likely to be more tightly held in Palestine and other Arab places, where keeping the faith is a matter of life and death, where deviating from the straight and narrow can draw the wrath of religious enforcers who will kill any who offer dissent.

Iraq had been on the verge of becoming one of those places, but for the success of Bush, Petraeus, and the soldiers and Marines who conducted the surge.  Neurotica's post testifies to the fact that differing opinions can and do exist among Iraqis.

'As I was about to voice my own opinion another lady said “You forgot what they did to our country Neurotica? To our People? They sent suicide bombers, they joined so called “Jihad” groups and killed hundreds even thousands of our people. They backed Zarqawi, that criminal man” Again as I tried to say something, a few teenage girls (daughters of another woman) announced they were leaving to join the protests. “What protests?” we asked. “There is a protest here in AD” They answered while they fixed their Palestinian scarves around their necks. The women rolled their eyes and shot the girls’ mother an evil look.

“How can you let them go?” The mother shrugged and said, its their choice, and I wont stop them. I just got up and left the table for I knew that the poor mom was going to be lectured. The conversation was already draining me.'

The overthrow of Saddam, the battle for Iraq, and the introduction of its democratic government were seismic events that caused a dramatic change in Arab perceptions of the U.S. and of themselves.  But if there was a shift in Arab expectations it is one that was imposed.  If real change is to be sustained, Arabs must begin to arrive at those perceptions on their own. 

Over the last thirty or forty years conventional wisdom has had it that achieving peace in the Middle East depended on resolving the Palestinian situation.  The obvious but unspoken reality is that the Palestinian situation is designed to be irresolvable.  One might have expected the Israeli departure from Gaza in 2005 to lay the groundwork for peace, but instead Gaza became a launch site for lobbing Palestinian rockets into Israel.  Whenever Palestinians thugs are threatened with peace they find a way to avoid it.

Recognition of terrorist tendencies caused Michael Scott Doran to write in a 2003 Foreign Affairs article,

'It is worth remembering that Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait in 1990 came on the heels of the first Palestinian intifada, which also provoked much Arab hostility toward the United States. It was Saddam's defeat that cleared a space for the Madrid Conference and eventually the Oslo peace process. Then as now, defeating Saddam would offer the United States a golden opportunity to show the Arab and Muslim worlds that Arab aspirations are best achieved by working in cooperation with Washington. If an American road to a calmer situation in Palestine does in fact exist, it runs through Baghdad.'

If Neurotica is to be believed, a rift has appeared in Arab circles, or at least in Iraqi circles.  The Palestinian cause no longer enjoys unanimous, unqualified support in the Arab world, if it ever really did.  Continuing erosion of Arab support for Palestinian demands may eventually exert enough pressure to prevent militant Palestinians from torpedoing every substantive peace initiative that comes down the pike. 

But who is willing to challenge the conventional wisdom?  Neurotica's outspoken Aunti suggests that Doran's "road to a calmer situation in Palestine" has been cut through and construction is well under way.  The question remains as to whether or not the Obama administration, or the rest of the world for that matter, will choose to travel that road.

It's not victory... not yet

So says the Washington Post about the situation in Iraq.  Today's editorial voices some concern about Barack Obama's predicament.  It seems the Iraqi parliament has taken the situation out of Obama's hands.

BARACK OBAMA recently reiterated his campaign promise to order up a plan for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq. But the Iraqi parliament has beaten him to it. Its ratification Thursday of a new bilateral military agreement with the United States not only establishes a timetable for the redeployment of American troops but delimits the missions they can undertake between now and the end of 2011. Mr. Obama has always said that his strategy was aimed at forcing Iraqi leaders to take responsibility for their country and its security. In adopting and ratifying the accord, the government and parliament have taken a major step toward that goal.

The situation seems less distressing for the President-elect than it is for the editors at the Post.  I mean, what was Obama going to do anyway.  He's keeping Robert Gates at Defense, for crying out loud.  Do they think Obama kept him on so that he could yank the troops and undo everything he's been in charge of doing over the past two years?  Please.  It's all over in Iraq, the war has been won, the Status of Forces Agreement has been accepted.  But for Post editors it can't be a victory.  For Post editors it's denial.  Time to postpone the victory.

The Bush administration worked patiently and tirelessly to negotiate the new agreement, which will have the effect of removing Iraq from United Nations supervision on Jan. 1. Having all but destroyed his presidency through mismanagement of the war, Mr. Bush can now fairly argue as he leaves office that his successor will inherit an Iraqi mission that has been stabilized both militarily and politically. That's not the same thing as the "victory" Mr. Bush has often spoken of; Iraq could still unravel if its leaders or the Obama administration act unwisely.

Of course, this is Mr. Bush we're talking about, so it's not victory.  But it's close, so close that Post editors feel obliged to warn that Obama could still throw a wrench in it.  Perhaps a little patience would be in order.

There is now, however, a workable road map for winding down the U.S. troop presence in the country and for consolidating the new political system. Mr. Obama will receive this framework from the president and the Iraqi government he has spent the last two years campaigning against. Though we don't expect him to say so, Mr. Obama is fortunate that he was wrong, both about the surge and about the capacity of Iraq's leaders.

It can be safely admitted now.  Post editors concede that Obama was dead wrong about the surge, and wrong about Iraq's leaders.  But what was abysmally poor judgment during the campaign is good fortune now that the election is over.  The media propped this guy up all through the campaign, and apparently they're not done yet.  I'll boldly predict that among Obama's first presidential accomplishments will be the victory in Iraq that eluded President bush for the last five years.  That is, if the President-elect can just keep from screwing it up.  

Not to worry.  No matter what happens the press will compose history's first draft, of this historic administration, with Barack Obama as the hero of the Iraq war.   Victory will be declared right after the inauguration. 

Maliki puts it on the line

Sami Moubayed, Forward Magazine editor-in-chief and Syrian political analyst, describes a last minute parliamentary scramble over the Status of Forces Agreement between Iraq and the U.S.  Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, originally unenthusiastic about the agreement, now says he will resign if it is not ratified, and he wants it to pass by a convincing parliamentary majority.   A narrow victory, he fears, will deepen political divisions among Shi'ites, Kurds and Sunnis.

Iraq was given the right to say "no" to the Americans if they wanted to launch a war from its territory on neighboring countries. It was previously feared, by the Iranians and their Iraqi proxies, that the agreement would be used to legitimize the use of Iraqi territory to launch a war on Iran. Now that Iran is assured, Iraqi Shi'ites of the United Iraqi Alliance (UIA) can approve such an agreement. Not only is the UIA now lobbying for the SOFA - to please the Americans who helped bring it to power during the last parliamentary elections - Maliki also is threatening to resign if the agreement does not pass on Wednesday.

It will be fascinating to see how all this goes down with the Iraqi people, and for that matter, with the rest of the Arab world.  Mr. Moubayed sees the deepening divisions arising in the debate, but I suspect unity will win out in the end, and it will win out in a big way.  The debate has not been conducted in secret.

Watching the weekend debate, which was broadcast live on Iraqi TV, one gets a feeling of how polarized Iraqis have become. The 44 members of the Iraqi Accordance Front, the 30 members of the Sadrist bloc, 11 members of a small Sunni bloc the Iraqi Dialogue Front, and the 15 members of the Fadila Party, are all likely to vote negatively, if a deal is not struck in advance with the prime minister.

Kurds, Shi'ites, and Sunnis are all into hard bargaining for the political power that can be secured in exchange for supporting the agreement.  The Iraqi people, and perhaps the rest of the Arab world, are watching as Arab democracy plays out on TV.  It's hard to imagine this having anything but a lasting impact.  It's huge.

Taheri predicts passage

Amir Taheri predicts that the Status of Forces Agreement between Iraq and the U.S. will pass the Iraqi Parliament with more than a two-thirds majority.

With the SOFA so obviously popular in Iraq, Tehran has softened its opposition to it these last few days. Most Iraqi observers now expect SOFA to pass with more than a two-thirds majority.

The agreement opens the door for officially ending Iraq's dispute with the United Nations, which started with Saddam Hussein's August 1990 invasion of Kuwait. Iraq would be released from UN sanctions, regaining its full sovereignty.

It also gives Iraq three years during which it will hold two crucial sets of elections. Local government elections, to be held on Jan. 31, will allow a new post-Saddam generation of leaders to secure a popular mandate. Parliamentary elections, to be held in 2010, should foster the emergence of proper parties competing through political programs rather than sectarian lists of candidates.

Beginning in January, SOFA gives Iraq three years in which to complete building its new democratic army. By mid-2009, the new army should have replaced all foreign troops in urban areas while the remaining four of the 18 provinces come under Iraqi government control.

The pact will deny America's various enemies - from al Qaeda to the Khomeinist regime - an opportunity to claim that they forced the Americans out of Iraq. It also will enable America to consolidate its victory in Iraq by ensuring that the democratic institutions created since 2003 are safeguarded in new elections.

The US had two key objectives in Iraq:

* To dismantle what was left of Saddam Hussein's war machine, ensuring that it wasn't rebuilt and used against Iraq's neighbors or other nations.

* To restore to the people of Iraq the power that had been confiscated from them by the Ba'athist dictatorship.

Both have been achieved, ensuring a clear US victory - although many in Washington seem to believe that it would be impolite or impolitic to admit that. It is one of those ironies of history that Barack Obama, who opposed toppling Saddam Hussein, now inherits this victory.

America also benefits from the fact that, by signing SOFA, it shows that it isn't a fickle friend - that its commitment to allies isn't cast aside as a result of a change at the White House.

I think Taheri is overly generous to the incoming Oval Office Occupant.  Obama would be quite content to cast our Iraqi allies aside, but he's been boxed in, first by the victorious surge troops, and now by the S.O.F.A.  It will gall the Democrats mightily to know George Bush has achieved what he set out to do.  It should be entertaining to watch the ways in which their denial manifests itself.