chrisishardcore.com

Boy this one made the rounds. Begala quoted Slate on Crossfire today.

Without getting swept away in a fit of blogosphere triumphalism, let me just join in and say...it happens sometimes.

Back in lands where we dissent for reasons other than spite, we may ask, "Why is this occupation so different than others?"

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Here are some quotes from some German historian named Hartmann, one of the people who first took exception to Rice/Rumsfeld's statements:

"First, Iraq does not even come close to matching the devastation of Germany in 1945," he said, including the destruction of the Nazi party
and military apparatus that might have allowed partisans to launch a guerrilla war against the occupiers.

"In addition, Iraq and its people do not have nearly the same shame and sense of responsibility that Germans had after the war and the Holocaust," which Hartmann said had quelled resistance to the victors.

He also noted that despite Nazi Germany's barbarism, the country was grounded in Western culture and traditions which allowed US troops to
find quick and broad acceptance for a new democratic order."

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Well, damn, I guess we should have destroyed more of their infrastructure and purposely killed many more civilians, to cow them into submission?

What conclusion is there to be drawn from the differences of today and yesterday? My conclusion is that it is an unfinished war, and that the so-called "Sunni triangle" needs to be utterly vanquished.

Do Dean, Gephardt, Kerry, or any of the fools' gallery have anything productive to suggest, or are they simply quibbling nabobs like the GOP under Clinton? I care so little about "Ha, ha! We caught you in a lie!" as a criterion for electing or impeaching a President.

They would probably propose UN control as a way to alleviate the cost borne exclusively by US troops and taxpayers.

The real question is, why was it such a necessity to invade Iraq in the first place? Sure, it's over with so there's really no point in refighting this particular war, but an administration that got into this big of a problem on such phony pretexts (where are the weapons ready to launch on the US, or for that matter Israel?) warrants your support in the future for what reason exactly?

Their war on terrorism is full of misplaced priorities, political battles, partisan politics, and phony cynical patriotism.

But don't take my word for it. Feel free to write a living breathing hero of the Armed Forces who's actually in Iraq and see what they think of the administration and their policies. I can give you the address of my cousin, 17 year reserve veteran of the first Gulf War, currently serving in Baghdad, enthusiastic supporter of Bush in 2000, and you can see what he and every other enlisted member he's serving with thinks...

I'll give you a hint: The Ace of Spades in their deck is not Saddam Hussein.

Also, if some private sector historian knows the difference between Germany and Iraq, why did this administration, which can surely attract the brightest minds if it so chooses, promise the public that postwar reconstruction of Iraq would be painless, welcomed by the Iraqi people, and because of oil revenues, free.

Even my 81 year old lifelong Republican WWII vet grandfather told me this weekend that he wants Bush out specifically because of his military policy in Iraq.

"Painless" and "free?" I think a lot of overzealous conservative pundits said that, but not GWB. Got a quote?

I agree wholeheartedly that the Bush administration has been bastardly, improperly re-re-re-redeploying troops (and making idiotic promises like "Hey, the war's over, I'm on this carrier!" and "Sure, you guys can come home real soon!"), but those are criticisms of how the war's being fought, not whether or not it should have been fought in the first place.

Solutions to the problem of being stretched too thin include: UN participation (like you said, and like the pride-swallowing USA appears to be doing?) and military expansion (which would have to be funded by repealing tax cuts [harmful to growth] or cutting spending [harmful to albino pregnant minority welfare mothers, etc]).

I'm not convinced that a) cutting marginal rates from 39.6% to 35% was that great for growth and that b) raising them back to 39.6% would impede growth now.

You're talking about investors who don't invest 100% of their after-tax money anyway (usually a much smaller sum, the types of investors investing 100% of their savings are generally small small business types) and in some cases are living and investing off of a pile of accrued savings that is mostly in fixed income securities anyway.

When taxes were raised in 1993 in a similar way, it hardly killed off investment and business activity, and the tax cuts of 2001 and beyond have hardly been boons to investment -- especially since much of the money that's left American capital markets is foreign money anyway, for whatever reason.

Additionally, feel free to try and cut spending right now, but I would guess that military spending, foreign aid, debt service, education and a lot of basic health care spending is off limits right away and you won't find too much welfare queen money to cut.

There are some serious reforms to be made in a lot of the above, and in a lot of instances these reforms could be conservative or liberal, but Bush just doesn't seem interested in policy specifics and bureaucratic improvement. Just look at the prescription drug "benefit", which is so complex it will surely add hours and hours to the paperwork necessary to get the same drugs you could get easier before.

I guess my overall question is...I have less and less trust in the administration's handling of diplomacy and foreign policy, I don't think it seriously wants to reform American domestic policy (instead choosing to just cut taxes and postpone hard choices, and probably just tax increases, until later, preferably after 2008 when they won't have to be the administration to do it). I understand that many people invested a lot in Bush after 9/11 and pyschologically it would be traumatic to realize that he's the same President he was on 9/10. I guess what I'm saying is you don't have to be a Democrat, but what's the specific rationality behind the continued Bush bandwagon?

Also I reject the blogotriumphalism which reflexively responds to anything that doesn't quite make sense or can't be rationalized easily from the White House with "Bush is playing rope-a-dope and I'm sure we'll all understand how great this strategy is at some point in the future." I want specifics!

Word to the mother, if only Prof Reynolds (Mr. Rope a Dope) read hardcore.

As your man Dean says - Credit Card presidency. It's apt.

But I just don't know how people can continue to give Bush the benefit of the doubt (and less are every day.) The only leg they can stand on is that Saddam was (is?) a bad guy, which was never the debate. It is the policy and the execution, method and timing, of invading and occupying Iraq with an overwhelmingly US force (don't you dare say unilateral, wev'e got 30 countries there!) This Washington Times "Rushed planning" story is just incredible. Why in the world did they think this Iraq thing had to happen so soon? Before anything was ready? Was Bush really that duped by his own administrations fanatical hype about WMD that he thought he had to get rid of Saddam immediately or we'd have mushroom clouds?

The policy (Preemptively striking a beligerent Dictator before he can aquire deterrent WMD) is defensible, but the timing, the manner, are not.

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