Comments on: He’s Baaack! And He’s Shrillllll!

By: Justin @ RSR

Justin @ RSR — Tue, 05 Oct 2004 01:46:05 +0000

By: Carlos

Carlos — Mon, 04 Oct 2004 01:42:31 +0000

Doc Memory, you came perilously close to having to perform autocephalophagy. I bet more than that can chat a little with the store owners around Atlantic Avenue—you know, the ones Tac/Josh Trevino lied about not putting up American flags after September 11th—but in the interest of you not eating your own head we’ll not count those. C.

By: bob mcmanus

bob mcmanus — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 23:46:39 +0000

“Bob – don’t worry about NE India as part of World Civilisation Collapse.” Didn’t say I was worried, didn’t use the word collapse, didn’t say it was a bad thing, or needed to be. And the centrifugal forces will invariably lead people to fall back on their prior useful narratives, like independent Kurdistan or civil-war re-enactments. But the more I watch Iraq, the more it seems we are trying to impose artificial structures on the place (It is all Sadr; all Zarqwahi; all Syria’s fault) that do not apply. Nice article in the NY magazine today about the curator’s new arrangement for the permanent collection at MOMA. They just can’t seem to find any narrative that leads to the contemporary floors. They keep trying, tho.

By: Margaret

Margaret — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 23:14:27 +0000

What Zogby actually said: “I’m going out on a limb here, but I think that, from now on out, people will looking for reasons why they shouldn’t vote for ‘that tall guy’” “People” meaning undecideds for whom Kerry is “that tall Presidential-looking guy” and Bush is “that guy who’s there now”.

By: Margaret

Margaret — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 23:11:28 +0000

I just heard John Zogby – today – Sunday 10/3 – on Air America “going out on a limb” and predicting a Kerry win. Apparently the undecided voters had their big break last week – BEFORE the debate- and it was against Bush. (The actual question was “Does the president deserve another term?” The answer was stunningly, overwhelmingly, “No.” Zogby doesn’t think the debates will make that much of a difference, except for water-cooler type talk, which of course will favor Kerry.) This is, of course, barring whatever surprise Karl Rove pulls out of his sleeve at the last minute. Yes, it WAS today, not a rerun. Air America is having an all-new Sunday show from now until the election. And speaking of that, Zogby apologized for not having new post-debate data. Oddly enough, “something” took down their entire phone system while they were doing their latest poll. Hmmmmmmmmmm.

By: john b

john b — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 22:23:06 +0000

Bob – don’t worry about NE India as part of World Civilisation Collapse. The ethnically Southeast Asian populations in India’s NE states (especially Assam and Nagaland) periodically have uprisings and blow stuff up claiming they want to be independent; then the Indian government offers them larger state subsidies and they stop. This has been going on since Independence…

By: WeSaferThemHealthier

WeSaferThemHealthier — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 21:15:32 +0000

“start honestly reassessing what is the maximum we can still achieve there” The first step towards a honest assessment is never allowing people like him to influence the debate ever again. Of course, that won’t happen and you Americans will think of the good ol’ days in ‘68. Best of luck.

By: Andrew Brown

Andrew Brown — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 20:53:22 +0000

A 20 year occupation would have been success. A five or ten year occupation will be a failure, and a defeat. But it’s probably inevitable now.

By: Really

Really — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 20:16:50 +0000

Heartrending posts on this same topic by Iraqis …. http://hammorabi.blogspot.com/

By: TPO

TPO — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 20:04:51 +0000

Yeah, the first 80-90% of the Friedman column made sense, but how in the hell did it lead to this conclusion:

Friends, I return to where I started: We’re in trouble in Iraq. We have to immediately get the Democratic and Republican politics out of this policy and start honestly reassessing what is the maximum we can still achieve there and what every American is going to have to do to make it happen. If we do not, we’ll end up not only with a fractured Iraq, but with a fractured America, at war with itself and isolated from the world.

The only answer is a political one, and it happens on November 2.

By: bob mcmanus

bob mcmanus — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 19:01:48 +0000

NE India This hit me when I opened Yahoo this morning. I said:”NE India? Wait a minute.” We may be in a world civilization tipping point that is bigger than Iraq, or Chechnya, or Texas, or Islamism, or whatever. Can the nation-state survive without totalitarianism? Poor Iraq may be the the suffering experiment, and may be worse off for our presence, but maybe not that worse off. If a nation of Iraq can’t be sustained (or some new paradigm created to replace it), that doesn’t mean you are going to get three sustainable nations. Or ten city states. Or anything but anarchy and chaos.

By: abb1

abb1 — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 18:22:45 +0000

So if Bush had gone in with 300,000 troops, immediatly backed up by 20,000 New York/Chicago/London policemen and tons of assistance from other nations, then there would have been at least a 50% chance of creating some sort of stable state. Killing most of their men and raping most of their women could’ve made it stable for a while. It’s still possible or, as you say, doable.

By: roger

roger — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 17:23:19 +0000

Tom Friedman is not being fair. President Bush explained why things went wrong in Iraq very well. “LEHRER: New question, Mr. President, two minutes. You have said there was a “miscalculation” of what the conditions would be in postwar Iraq. What was the miscalculation, and how did it happen? BUSH: No, what I said was that, because we achieved such a rapid victory, more of the Saddam loyalists were around. I mean, we thought we’d whip more of them going in. But because [Gen.] Tommy Franks did such a great job in planning the operation, we moved rapidly, and a lot of the Baathists and Saddam loyalists laid down their arms and disappeared. I thought they would stay and fight, but they didn’t.” That’s the true evil of Saddam all over again. Instead of lining up his guys for a battle, so we could knock them all off, he actually allows them to vanish —and then reappear as guerillas! That’s never ever happened before in world history! How could Bush, a guy who grew up in the Vietnam era, be expected to know about guerrillas? There’s an brilliance to our commander in chief that reminds us of great leaders of the past: the military junta who ran Argentina in the early eighties; President Fujimora of Peru; and the collected presidents of Guatamala, 1956-1989. He’s just awesome. Right for God, right for America.

By: Doctor Memory

Doctor Memory — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 17:08:17 +0000

Cranky: As a resident of New York City and a long-time observer of the NYPD’s shoot-first-ask-questions-later policy for dealing with dark-skinned people who happen to make an unwanted hand gesture, I have to ask: have you thought this plan entirely through? :) (Also, I can’t speak for Chicago and London in this regard, but if the entire NYPD staff, including both uniformed and administrative personnel, contains over 50 people who are even moderately fluent in Arabic, I’ll eat my own head.)

By: Cranky Observer

Cranky Observer — Sun, 03 Oct 2004 16:51:32 +0000

I’m still surprised of the pervasiveness of the idea that the Iraq war was good, but Bush spoiled it. And because of that now we all have to support the war, to do it good from now on.

I don't think the war was good; I opposed it at the time, and told my senators/representative so.

But realistically, I do think it was doable. There were never going to be rose petals, but there were plenty of signs that the Iraqi people were sick of Saddam and weren't totally opposed to a forced regieme change. It is an area of the world that greatly respects strength after all.

So if Bush had gone in with 300,000 troops, immediatly backed up by 20,000 New York/Chicago/London policemen and tons of assistance from other nations, then there would have been at least a 50% chance of creating some sort of stable state. Not to say it would have been the right thing to do, but it could have been done.

Rumsfeld and Bush totally blew that chance, however.

Cranky