Comments on: Jay Nordlinger defends Iran-Contra

By: Robert Lyman

Robert Lyman — Fri, 23 Apr 2004 19:26:23 +0000

jroth, You may or may not be right about the Bush admin. putting “zero” priority on terrorism; I’m inclined to think you’re wrong. But it is certainly clear in hindsight that they put inadequate emphasis on it. However, the question is not “Did Bush put inadequate emphasis on terrorism,” which answer is plainly “yes,” but rather, “Was the Bush adminstration unreasonably lax in its pursuit of terrorism, given all the other things going on at that time?” That is, was Bush focused, on, say, domestic extremists (McVeigh types), despite dramatically more evidence that bin Laden was the real issue? And that question is not easy to answer. Bush presumably get 365 PDBs a year—he can’t demand tree-shaking for every single one.

By: JRoth

JRoth — Fri, 23 Apr 2004 04:15:25 +0000

Robert- Do you know what a priority is? It’s what people use to determine which actions to take when they have limited resources but (virtually) unlimited options. In organizations, the bosses set the priorities. So, let’s say you’re a cop. You have leads on 3 cases: a drug deal, a prostitution ring, and a gangster. Your boss asks you, “Any leads on drugs or prostitution?” Which is the career-advancing answer? A. “Right on it, Boss. I’m staking out the whore and the junkie, and tonight we should make the busts.” or B. “Um, no. I’ve put all my manpower on this other thing. I think it’s really important, even though you don’t.” In case you don’t know, that someone who opposed Rowley’s warrant request was Spike Bowman of the FBI, who got a raise and a framed commendation from George Bush at the end of 2002 for “exceptional performance.” You think Spike is in the ACLU? Or maybe he was just more focused on his boss’s priorities? Is it really so hard to understand why an administration that put zero priority on terrorism would be ineffective at fighting terrorism? No one has argued since Massaoui’s laptop became a known quantity that it could only have been searched with a “lowered Constitutional standard.” That’s your strawman. As Dick Cheney said in a different context, the Bush administration simply had “different priorities” before 9-11.

By: Keith M Ellis

Keith M Ellis — Fri, 23 Apr 2004 00:58:41 +0000

Robert, I eschew that American convention because A) it’s an arbitrary typographical artifact that is no longer relevant; and, B) it creates ambiguity. I return you now to your normal comment thread.

By: Ginger Yellow

Ginger Yellow — Thu, 22 Apr 2004 22:39:49 +0000

From a European (UK actually) perspective, this conversation seems very strange. The reprehensible thing (for Europeans) about Iran-Contra wasn’t negotiating with Iranian terrorists to release hostages. Or even doing so secretly. This sort of thing goes on all the time – the UK does it, France does it, Israel does it. The problem was selling arms to those terrorists, and using the funds from the sales to finance another terrorist campaign in Nicaragua against the express wishes of Congress. That’s several orders of magnitude worse, especially in a democracy that espouses human rights. The clearest sign of the moral bankruptcy of the current administration is the promotion to high office of several Iran-Contra convicts. And its a reflection of how low political discourse has sunk in the US that they can get away with it. Not to mention Otto Reich. Seriously, if Kerry wants to take the fight to Bush on “Homeland Security”, all he has to do is point out that Bush’s cabinet is stuffed with proven (often convicted) terrorist financiers and sympathisers. Abrams, Reich, Negroponte, Poindexter. These people should be in Guantanamo, not government. He could also mention that it was Bush’s dad who pardoned so many of them.

By: Robert Lyman

Robert Lyman — Thu, 22 Apr 2004 15:55:10 +0000

At the risk of taking this thread still further off course, could somebody please tell me what civil liberties have been suspended, and what part of the Constitution is violated, by the Patriot Act? When you answer, please provide citations to sections of the Act, or better, the U.S. Code, as well as citations to the U.S. Constitution. I regret that I cannot take vague assertions disconnected from the text of the law seriously. It may well be that the Patriot Act was a bad idea. I certainly didn’t like the haste with which it was passed. But given that part of the reason law enforcement “didn’t do enough” before Sept. 11 was that they were legally forbidden to do some things, it seems that some kind of reform was in order.

By: Nat Whilk

Nat Whilk — Thu, 22 Apr 2004 15:30:28 +0000

A once small and unimpressive coalition is now falling apart. Countries supplying what percentage of the coalition troops have dropped out?

By: Sandals

Sandals — Thu, 22 Apr 2004 11:05:57 +0000

As I recall: Bush: We have a “Coalition of the Willing”. Left: Your so-called ‘coalition’ consists mostly of England and states you bribed into supporting us, and is dangerously fragile. The term is obviously supposed to evoke comparisons with the Gulf War’s Coalition, but it doesn’t even qualify. Hmmm..

By: luke weiger

luke weiger — Thu, 22 Apr 2004 07:30:05 +0000

Justin, A once small and unimpressive coalition is now falling apart. That was pretty easy.

By: Mark

Mark — Wed, 21 Apr 2004 21:22:57 +0000

Cite?

By: Justin

Justin — Wed, 21 Apr 2004 21:16:41 +0000

My big question for hypocrisy: The left press said there was no coalition and now they say the coalition is falling apart? Which is it?

By: Chris Martin

Chris Martin — Wed, 21 Apr 2004 21:07:44 +0000

Robert, I know that the period usually comes inside the quotation marks. In this case I was not using quotation marks to quote someone but to mark a word that is being mentioned rather than used. Hence I put the period outside. That’s just my personal style and I’m sure you’ll find style guides that disagree. -Chris

By: Harry Tuttle

Harry Tuttle — Wed, 21 Apr 2004 21:03:26 +0000

Nordlinger seems to be suffering under a typical wingnut malady called absurd absolutism. The Patriot Act and its commensurate suspension of civil liberties is not the one and only way to be tough on terrorism just as illegally funneling arms to Iran was not the only way to deal with the hostage situation. Both of those examples are, in my opinion and legally, the wrong way to deal with their respective difficulties. It’s like somebody saying you can’t bitch about your favorite striker skying a ball a dozen metres over the goal when you were urging him to shoot. He took a shot didn’t he? Yea, but it was a shitty shot. All that said, can anyone even imagine Bush II apologizing like Reagan did?

By: bob mcmanus

bob mcmanus — Wed, 21 Apr 2004 20:16:39 +0000

Two points in the article: 1) Press is unfair to Republicans 2) Press was inconsistent,reversed positions, flip-flop, flip-flop. This is about Kerry, and electing Bush. Republican wakes in the morning, thinks “Here are the campaign themes, and I have to write an article about “x”“. How can I work the themes in? Look for it.

By: Robert Lyman

Robert Lyman — Wed, 21 Apr 2004 19:40:46 +0000

No civil libertarian on earth would have opposed the FBI looking at Massaoui’s laptop. Well, someone opposed it, and I find it awfully hard to think that Bush could have changed that with a vague, general instruction to “shake trees.” Can’t you just see that conversation? Agent X: We don’t have probable cause to search this laptop. Agent Y: Didn’t you hear? We’re supposed to be shaking trees! Bush says so! Agent X: Well, when we go to “tree shaking” mode, the Constitutional standard for probably cause gets lowered, so now we do have probable cause after all! Let’s search it and arrest everyone whose phone number is stored there! And I have to wonder about the effectiveness of any law-enforcement operation that needs a vague, unfocused order from the President to do its damn job. Does any cop ever fail to make an arrest because the Chief hasn’t issued a foliage vibration memo in the last week? But this thread is now careening out of control…

By: JRoth

JRoth — Wed, 21 Apr 2004 19:31:05 +0000

Robert- Your example about wanting to stop 9-11 while questioning the Patriot Act being hypocrisy is another strawman on parade. If Bush were curious, engaged, and aware of the real threats to American security in the summer of 2001, his response to the 8-6 PDB would have been to demand that his Secretaries “shake the trees” for leads. This very easily could have led the FBI to approve a search warrant for Massaoui’s laptop, which contained Atta’s phone number. This step alone could have led to the prevention of 9-11. No civil libertarian on earth would have opposed the FBI looking at Massaoui’s laptop. And the Patriot Act did nothing to make that warrant easier to get. The only hypocrisy is in suggesting that asking the president to do part of his job (protect America from attacks) is inconsistent with asking him to do another part of his job (protect the Constitution from abuse). Oh, and Republicans have NEVER admitted that illegally rewarding terrorists in one part of the world in order to fund them in another part of the world was in any way problematic, much less illegal. Witness Ollie North’s career. Any American who feels safer with a Republican in the White House is a fool.