[btomba_77]

The key line from that piece:
 
“The president was not more specific, but aides hastened to add he was not talking about putting troops on the ground. ”

[Unknown Member]

so – if I were ISIS I would probably be joking with my comrades about how Obama has made a threat – just like in Syria. 
 
 

[btomba_77]

There was virtually 0% chance that we could prevent Irag destabilization without a permanent large troop presence or a substitute strong-man autocrat. 
 
We should have thought about that before we went in to take out Saddam.

[kayla.meyer_144]

Sardonicus likes this whole thing, dergon, because no matter what Obama does or does not do, he is open to criticism for doing nothing or doing the wrong thing, or even being silent. Happily a “no win” all the way around for sardonicus.

[btomba_77]

I have set it multiple times before.

The actions of the Bush administration have dramatically constrained our foreign-policy options going forward. That applies to Barack Obama. It will apply to the next president and even the next president after that.

[Unknown Member]

It is as if the Bush administration knew they were shepherding the demise of the GOP, and Iraq was their [i]”one last breath; I spit at thee!”[/i] Ahab moment back at the Dems.

[Unknown Member]

Quote from Lux

It is as if the Bush administration knew they were shepherding the demise of the GOP, and Iraq was their [i]”one last breath; I spit at thee!”[/i] Ahab moment back at the Dems.

 
More lunacy from the soapster.  You libs on this forum have all the answers, but really don’t know what you think you know. (paraphrasing Donald Rumsfeld)

[Unknown Member]

Obama’s bad choices brought us to where we are today.  You guys continue with the BDS.  It was only months ago that Obama and Biden were touting their great success in Iraq and how they “saved GM.”  
 
They booted the Status-of Forces agreement. They allowed Al-Malaki to purge the Sunnis out of the Army, they booted the Syria and Egypt foreign policy. They allowed Putin to make fools of the West. Obama basically told the cadets at West Point that the US won’t fight for anything except global warming and gay rights.  He paralyzed the US economy with high taxes, Obamacare, incompetence and corruption at every post.
 
I would venture to say that maybe Rev. Wright was right:  “the chickens have come home to roost”
 
Better judgement, less boasting and less speeches may  be in order.

[Unknown Member]

Listen to yourself: “…they ALLOWED Al-Malaki to purge…”

That’s the entire point! Who the hell are WE to “allow” a foreign leader to do this or that? It’s none of our business, and it’s people like you and Dubya who insist on meddling in other countries’ business that end up causing such an international nightmare in the first place!!

[Unknown Member]

Quote from Lux

Listen to yourself: “…they ALLOWED Al-Malaki to purge…”

That’s the entire point! Who the hell are WE to “allow” a foreign leader to do this or that? It’s none of our business, and it’s people like you and Dubya who insist on meddling in other countries’ business that end up causing such an international nightmare in the first place!!

 
Yeah soapy, beer summits are the answer.

[Unknown Member]

And I am not surprised that [i]”beer summits”[/i] is the only possible alternative your mind is able to fathom.
 
 

[Unknown Member]

Frumious, I have always believed that the Kurds were our wild card secret weapon out there. They are the only sane tribal group in the region and will cooperate with the US in a heartbeat if asked.
 
 

[Unknown Member]

Quote from Lux

And I am not surprised that [i]”beer summits”[/i] is the only possible alternative your mind is able to fathom.

 
Sure a lot better than that sorry a%^$d speech your messiah just made on his way out the door to vacation.  Pathetic leadership.  Soapy, you must be one “thrill up the leg” lib right now.

[Unknown Member]

You mean the speech where he said we can’t find ourselves in a situation where when we’re there things are under control but as soon as we leave things go crazy again, then yes, that speech. 
 
I have no idea what “thrill up the leg” means. 
 
 

[scottgood421]

Quote from Lux

Listen to yourself: “…they ALLOWED Al-Malaki to purge…”

That’s the entire point! Who the hell are WE to “allow” a foreign leader to do this or that? It’s none of our business, and it’s people like you and Dubya who insist on meddling in other countries’ business that end up causing such an international nightmare in the first place!!

+1   people have very short memories as to who got us into this mess, and how passionate they were supporting “shock and awe” on their big screen TVs from the comfort of their lazy boy recliners.  Shame on the chicken hawks who got us into this disgusting mess……

[Unknown Member]

Quote from adopted canuck

Quote from Lux

Listen to yourself: “…they ALLOWED Al-Malaki to purge…”

That’s the entire point! Who the hell are WE to “allow” a foreign leader to do this or that? It’s none of our business, and it’s people like you and Dubya who insist on meddling in other countries’ business that end up causing such an international nightmare in the first place!!

+1   people have very short memories as to who got us into this mess, and how passionate they were supporting “shock and awe” on their big screen TVs from the comfort of their lazy boy recliners.  Shame on the chicken hawks who got us into this disgusting mess……

 
Us ???  Are you not a Canadian ??

[scottgood421]

becoming one pointy…………….

[btomba_77]

Quote from aldadoc

They booted the Status-of Forces agreement.

A bit more complex than that.   
 
As you may recall, the Iraqi parliament and leadership was insisting on judicial authority over US troops stationed in Iraq as a mandatory part of the SOFA.    In late 2011 Obama announced the plan for full withdrawl but left a caveat that there could be some opening if the Iraqis changed their position. …. they did not.
 
 
 
Now, did Obama use that SOFA snag as a pretext for accomplishing a full withdrawl that he wanted in the first place? Probably.       In his debate against Romney (who was in favor of an ongoing open-ended large troop presence) Obama said  that “we can’t continue to do nation building in these regions”.   He always wanted out of Iraq.    He always felt that it was a fool’s errand to a) be there in the first place amd b) try to build a democracy there.   
 
__
 
I just wish we would have taken the trillion dollars we spent there and instead spent it on domestic enregy independence.

[btomba_77]

Quote from aldadoc

Obama’s bad choices brought us to where we are today.  You guys continue with the BDS.  It was only months ago that Obama and Biden were touting their great success in Iraq and how they “saved GM.”  

They booted the Status-of Forces agreement.

 
Ray Odierno disagrees with you…. (and Jeb Bush) and said so publically during his retierment speech.
 
[link=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/ray-odierno-jeb-bush-iraq_55ccd562e4b0cacb8d333f96]http://www.huffingtonpost…ccd562e4b0cacb8d333f96[/link]
 
 
“I remind everybody that us leaving at the end of 2011 was negotiated in 2008 by the Bush administration. That was always the plan, we had promised them that we would respect their sovereignty.”
 
 

[btomba_77]

New York Times reporting:

The US will deploy 560 troops to help retake Mosul from ISIS.

[kaldridgewv2211]

You’ve got to wonder how that number came up.  Not 600, not 1000, but 560 troops.  It feels like what’s going on in the middle east has kind of gotten the back burner treatment in the news rooms.  I believe I’ve read only a few things about US involvement with the Kurds.

[btomba_77]

Quote from DICOM_Dan

You’ve got to wonder how that number came up.  Not 600, not 1000, but 560 troops.  It feels like what’s going on in the middle east has kind of gotten the back burner treatment in the news rooms.  I believe I’ve read only a few things about US involvement with the Kurds.

 
 
Anything that is done is a stop gap until after the elections.  The big decision will be made by the next President.

[Unknown Member]

Quote from Frumious

Sardonicus likes this whole thing, dergon, because no matter what Obama does or does not do, he is open to criticism for doing nothing or doing the wrong thing, or even being silent. Happily a “no win” all the way around for sardonicus.

 
Thanks for letting me know how I think. I was confused, I guess
 
 
For the record, I like NO part of this. None of it. 
 

[Unknown Member]

why don’t they just divide the country into thirds?  give the north to the kurds, the west to the sunni’s and the east to the shiites.  then everyone could stop killing each other.

[btomba_77]

Quote from stir22

why don’t they just divide the country into thirds?  give the north to the kurds, the west to the sunni’s and the east to the shiites.  then everyone could stop killing each other.

 
And we should have the Brits draw the map …. that will likely work out perfectly!

[kayla.meyer_144]

A dilemma. We can’t let ISIS win but al-Maliki if typical of Middle East “democratically elected despots” in that they crush opposition. Like all the “Arab Spring” reruns. al-Maliki doesn’t deserve support, just look at his own military dissolving without firing a shot.
 
So who to support? The Kurds are maybe the only group that is palatable compared to the rest of the Sunnis and Shi’a. But that still leaves the rest of Iraq to ISIS.

[Unknown Member]

Quote from dergon

Quote from stir22

why don’t they just divide the country into thirds?  give the north to the kurds, the west to the sunni’s and the east to the shiites.  then everyone could stop killing each other.

And we should have the Brits draw the map …. that will likely work out perfectly!

 
my bad…..i didn’t mean “we” as in the usa, i meant that they should just each take a third and call it good.   fwiw, i think we should stay completely out of the middle east, develop our own resources, take the tax breaks away from big oil and use that money to develop alternative energies.  with the gusto and fervor of Kennedy’s “will we go to the moon and back in this decade.”

[kayla.meyer_144]

Quote from Dr.Sardonicus

Quote from Frumious

Sardonicus likes this whole thing, dergon, because no matter what Obama does or does not do, he is open to criticism for doing nothing or doing the wrong thing, or even being silent. Happily a “no win” all the way around for sardonicus.

Thanks for letting me know how I think. I was confused, I guess

For the record, I like NO part of this. None of it. 

You have a pattern of throwing a match on kindling & then walking away. At least you responded even if minimally.

[Unknown Member]

Quote from Frumious

Quote from Dr.Sardonicus

Quote from Frumious

Sardonicus likes this whole thing, dergon, because no matter what Obama does or does not do, he is open to criticism for doing nothing or doing the wrong thing, or even being silent. Happily a “no win” all the way around for sardonicus.

Thanks for letting me know how I think. I was confused, I guess

For the record, I like NO part of this. None of it. 

You have a pattern of throwing a match on kindling & then walking away. At least you responded even if minimally.

 

[link=http://www.csun.edu/%7Edgw61315/fallacies.html#Argumentum%20ad%20hominem]http://www.csun.edu/%7Edg…umentum%20ad%20hominem[/link]
 
[b][i]Argumentum ad hominem [/i](argument directed at the person).[/b] This is the error of attacking the character or motives of a person who has stated an idea, rather than the idea itself. The most obvious example of this fallacy is when one debater maligns the character of another debater (e.g, “The members of the opposition are a couple of fascists!”), but this is actually not that common. A more typical manifestation of [i]argumentum ad hominem[/i] is attacking a source of information — for example, responding to a quotation from Richard Nixon on the subject of free trade with China by saying, “We all know Nixon was a liar and a cheat, so why should we believe anything he says?” [i]Argumentum ad hominem[/i] also occurs when someone’s arguments are discounted merely because they stand to benefit from the policy they advocate — such as Bill Gates arguing against antitrust, rich people arguing for lower taxes, white people arguing against affirmative action, minorities arguing for affirmative action, etc. In all of these cases, the relevant question is not who makes the argument, but whether the argument is valid.

 
 
I wonder if your answer was simply intended to bait me, and get me to ignore the fact that you really had no substantive response. 
 
In point of fact: Obama did make threats in Syria that he did not follow up on. 
 
Do you dispute this – or are you going to go after me again. 
 
That is why off topic area has become so contentious. Personal attack after personal attack.
 
 

[btomba_77]

I don’t think there’s any question that Obama made statements on Syria that he later regretted.
 
 
But how does that apply to what he has said about Iraq thus far?  I haven’t heard anything but extraordinaly vague language.
 

Quote from Barack Obama

Iraqs going to need more help. Its going to need more help from us, and its going to need more help from the international community.

 
Or maybe you were looking to [i]this[/i]
 

Quote from Barak Obama

I dont rule out anything, because we do have a stake in making sure that these jihadists are not getting a permanent foothold in Iraq, or Syria, for that matter. …I think its fair to say that in our consultations with the Iraqis, there will be some short-term, immediate things that need to be done militarily, and our national security team is looking at all the options.

 
I mean… am I missing some hard line statement made by the President that implies that he plans something aggressive?

[Unknown Member]

Quote from dergon

I don’t think there’s any question that Obama made statements on Syria that he later regretted.

But how does that apply to what he has said about Iraq thus far?  I haven’t heard anything but extraordinaly vague language.

Quote from Barack Obama

Iraqs going to need more help. Its going to need more help from us, and its going to need more help from the international community.

Or maybe you were looking to [i]this[/i]

Quote from Barak Obama

I dont rule out anything, because we do have a stake in making sure that these jihadists are not getting a permanent foothold in Iraq, or Syria, for that matter. …I think its fair to say that in our consultations with the Iraqis, there will be some short-term, immediate things that need to be done militarily, and our national security team is looking at all the options.

I mean… am I missing some hard line statement made by the President that implies that he plans something aggressive?

 
I read the statements as “we will be involved militarily in this war”.    Yes – he did – for the time being – deny he was thinking of sending troops, and I think that is politically not viable. (On the other hand, as his popularity has tanked, he seems to be doing what he thinks is necessary regardless of polls. A more honest way of leading IMHO. So perhaps he [u]would[/u] re-deploy troops.)
 
Any statement that he will not send troops is, of course, a statement of what he would do today, and could easily be changed by changing circumstances, so I don’t think the “not sending troops” statement is by any means binding or permanent. I’m not sure what the purpose of the statement is. Certainly, ISIS won’t retreat as a result, but maybe they will ramp up what they are doing to consolidate before any intervention by outside forces. 
 
Much of what he says is for show, and I think that our allies and opponents have this figured out. None of what he says matters as a result. (As a comparison, #43 backed up what he said. Regardless how you felt about what he said, it was obvious that our opponents took him seriously. Maybe they thought him a bit crazy, but that can be quite useful in power politics.)
 
 

[btomba_77]

Quote from Dr.Sardonicus

Quote from dergon

I don’t think there’s any question that Obama made statements on Syria that he later regretted.

But how does that apply to what he has said about Iraq thus far?  I haven’t heard anything but extraordinaly vague language.

Quote from Barack Obama

Iraqs going to need more help. Its going to need more help from us, and its going to need more help from the international community.

Or maybe you were looking to [i]this[/i]

Quote from Barak Obama

I dont rule out anything, because we do have a stake in making sure that these jihadists are not getting a permanent foothold in Iraq, or Syria, for that matter. …I think its fair to say that in our consultations with the Iraqis, there will be some short-term, immediate things that need to be done militarily, and our national security team is looking at all the options.

I mean… am I missing some hard line statement made by the President that implies that he plans something aggressive?

I read the statements as “we will be involved militarily in this war”.    Yes – he did – for the time being – deny he was thinking of sending troops, and I think that is politically not viable. (On the other hand, as his popularity has tanked, he seems to be doing what he thinks is necessary regardless of polls. A more honest way of leading IMHO. So perhaps he [u]would[/u] re-deploy troops.)

 
I have a hard believing that, regardless of poll (which no way would support troops)) that Obama will put US troops on the ground.
 
Quite to the contrary, Obama always labelled Iraq as the “stupid” war — he won a presidential primary on it — and placed a big hunk of his policy on “get the f*ck out”    (( see my comments on not getting a SOFA above)).
 
The Libya model would be about as aggressive as I could see him going and I would be surprised if it was as hands-off as Syria…. probably somewhere in between.
 
___
 
 
PS –  Did you see that ISIS looted $440 million from the Mosul central bank as it rolled through?  That’ll buy you a lot of jihadis.  
 
[link=http://www.nbcnews.com/watch/nightly-news/isis-becomes-richest-terror-group-in-the-world-280624707806]http://www.nbcnews.com/wa…the-world-280624707806[/link]
 
 
 
 

[Unknown Member]

Quote from dergon

I have a hard believing that, regardless of poll (which no way would support troops)) that Obama will put US troops on the ground.

Quite to the contrary, Obama always labelled Iraq as the “stupid” war — he won a presidential primary on it — and placed a big hunk of his policy on “get the f*ck out”    (( see my comments on not getting a SOFA above)).

The Libya model would be about as aggressive as I could see him going and I would be surprised if it was as hands-off as Syria…. probably somewhere in between.

___

PS –  Did you see that ISIS looted $440 million from the Mosul central bank as it rolled through?  That’ll buy you a lot of jihadis.  

[link=http://www.nbcnews.com/watch/nightly-news/isis-becomes-richest-terror-group-in-the-world-280624707806]http://www.nbcnews.com/wa…the-world-280624707806[/link]

 
(dead link)
I think you are right, probably no way he would commit troops. But then I think I saw that they didn’t want to send in the drones, either. What’s that leave? Battleships? Probably simply arms for the Iraqis. If he doesn’t back this up, he risks another episode where he looks weak by threatening and not delivering. He needs to be careful what he says. Which makes me wonder why did he say anything at all, instead of simply announcing we were sending 10 Billion in arms to Iraq, or something similar. In other words – not threaten but simply announce an action.
 
Re the looting of the banks: Hmmm… superficially, I was thinking “banks actually keep a lot of hard currency these days??”. I thought most was kept electronically in computers. I wonder if there would be a way to make this immediately worthless – like the Iraqi govt changing currency today. (probably most in dollars, though)
 
 
 

[btomba_77]

Lindsay Graham just nearly made me vomit.
 
The same guy that was outraged when Obama wanted to bring Iran to the table (and wanted tougher sanctions instead). 
[link=http://www.politico.com/multimedia/video/2013/11/lindsey-graham-slams-easing-iran-sanctions.html]http://www.politico.com/m…ng-iran-sanctions.html[/link]
[b]Lindsay Graham slams easing Irna sanctions[/b]
 
Now he wants us to sit down and work with our natural ally in Iran to fix the Iraq problem. (Just now on CNN ).   Dana Bash’s face looked literally shocked when that came out of his mouth.  
 
 
 
 

[btomba_77]

Quote from Dr.Sardonicus

Quote from dergon

I have a hard believing that, regardless of poll (which no way would support troops)) that Obama will put US troops on the ground.

Quite to the contrary, Obama always labelled Iraq as the “stupid” war — he won a presidential primary on it — and placed a big hunk of his policy on “get the f*ck out”    (( see my comments on not getting a SOFA above)).

The Libya model would be about as aggressive as I could see him going and I would be surprised if it was as hands-off as Syria…. probably somewhere in between.

___

I think you are right, probably no way he would commit troops. But then I think I saw that they didn’t want to send in the drones, either. What’s that leave? Battleships? Probably simply arms for the Iraqis. If he doesn’t back this up, he risks another episode where he looks weak by threatening and not delivering. He needs to be careful what he says. Which makes me wonder why did he say anything at all, instead of simply announcing we were sending 10 Billion in arms to Iraq, or something similar. In other words – not threaten but simply announce an action.

 
__
 
[link=http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-08-07/iraqi-islamists-overrun-christian-towns-in-push-for-major-dams.html]http://www.bloomberg.com/…sh-for-major-dams.html[/link]
 
[b]U.S. Weighs Aid Drops, Airstrikes on Islamist Militants in Iraq[/b]
 
 
I kind of have a “to hell with them all” when it comes to the Iraqi factions/ ISIS.  But I always kind of hoped the Kurds would come out of all this OK, maybe with their own nation.  Now that’s looking rough.  
Weighing air drops and air strikes to bring relief to the surrounded non-Muslims in the north and hit ISIS.
 

[kaldridgewv2211]

A couple of people I know who served aren’t too happy with the fact that these ISIS people are seemingly taking over everything they fought for.  Put some Devil Dogs in there with an ROE to kill anything that even kind of looks hostile.  Let Allah sort’em out.

[btomba_77]

Quote from DICOM_Dan

A couple of people I know who served aren’t too happy with the fact that these ISIS people are seemingly taking over everything they fought for.  

What did they fight for again?  😉

[kaldridgewv2211]

Quote from dergon

Quote from DICOM_Dan

A couple of people I know who served aren’t too happy with the fact that these ISIS people are seemingly taking over everything they fought for.  

What did they fight for again?  😉

I wouldn’t smile/wink at service men and women. They’ve served their country irregardless of what you think of the war in Iraq. Fighting and shedding blood in the same cities ISIS is now taking over because the Iraqis can’t come together as a people.

[btomba_77]

I’m not winking at the service men.  I’m winking (more like scowling actually) at the mission.
 
I know it’s human nature to want to look back at something you bled for, lost friends for, lost family for, and want to think that it was a wise and noble effort but ………

[Unknown Member]

Scorched earth politics can have disastrous effects.
We are now paying the price for the short-term political gains of politicizing the Iraq war. Opposition to the war got a lot of people elected. Now what?

[odayjassim1978_476]

scorched earth …isn’t that’s Bibi’s foreign policy(just my ho) / no fan of hamas

Quote from aldadoc

Scorched earth politics can have disastrous effects.
We are now paying the price for the short-term political gains of politicizing the Iraq war. Opposition to the war got a lot of people elected. Now what?

[kayla.meyer_144]

Quote from aldadoc

Scorched earth politics can have disastrous effects.
We are now paying the price for the short-term political gains of politicizing the Iraq war. Opposition to the war got a lot of people elected. Now what?

The “politicizing” happened in 2001 when the Bush Administration started talking about invading Iraq in response to 9-11 as “there were no targets in Afghanistan.” And then started talking up Saddam’s complicity in 9-11, as if Saddam were behind the attack.
 
As dergon asked, someone please explain why we invaded Iraq again?

[kaldridgewv2211]

Quote from dergon

I’m not winking at the service men.  I’m winking (more like scowling actually) at the mission.

I know it’s human nature to want to look back at something you bled for, lost friends for, lost family for, and want to think that it was a wise and noble effort but ………

It might not have been wise for the US to go into Iraq but the efforts of the servicemen over there are noble as they all* served with duty and honor for the USA.  
 
*I’m sure there were some bad eggs but I don’t think that reflects the vast majority of military.

[btomba_77]

Quote from DICOM_Dan

Quote from dergon

I’m not winking at the service men.  I’m winking (more like scowling actually) at the mission.

I know it’s human nature to want to look back at something you bled for, lost friends for, lost family for, and want to think that it was a wise and noble effort but ………

It might not have been wise for the US to go into Iraq but the efforts of the servicemen over there are noble as they all* served with duty and honor for the USA.  

*I’m sure there were some bad eggs but I don’t think that reflects the vast majority of military.

I hate to sound crass but, regardless of the honor with which they served, if the original mission was unwise then following up with an attempt to reclaim “what they fought for” is good money after bad.

[eyoab2011_711]

Scorched earth politics can have disastrous effects.

 
So who scorched Iraq?

[kayla.meyer_144]

[attachment=0]

[Unknown Member]

Obama booted the status-of forces agreement (SOFA).  Bush handed him a victory and a stable Iraq.  All he had to do was not to squander the victory, yet, he managed to blow it. 
 
Now Obama has a real problem and is going to have to eat crow yet again. It will be interesting to watch the Dems jockey for position on this one. I think they will find a new respect for Bush who had to deal with tough problems, and for Romney, who sagely predicted all of this and was subjected to DimRats ridicule.
 
To quote one of Obama’s communist idols, Leon Trotsky:
 
[b][i]”You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you”.  [/i][/b]

[odayjassim1978_476]

a stable Iraq…lol

Quote from aldadoc

Obama booted the status-of forces agreement (SOFA).  Bush handed him a victory and a stable Iraq.  All he had to do was not to squander the victory, yet, he managed to blow it. 

Now Obama has a real problem and is going to have to eat crow yet again. It will be interesting to watch the Dems jockey for position on this one. I think they will find a new respect for Bush who had to deal with tough problems, and for Romney, who sagely predicted all of this and was subjected to DimRats ridicule.

To quote one of Obama’s communist idols, Leon Trotsky:

[b][i]”You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you”.  [/i][/b]

[btomba_77]

There might be some people right now asking why we withdrew so soon.
 
But history will ask “Why were we there in the first place?” and “Why did we stay so long?”.    
 
The primary force destabilizing Iraq was not the departure of the US military, it was its arrival.    

[kayla.meyer_144]

A “stable Iraq?” You mean the Jeffersonian Democracy stable Iraq Bush left? That was one of the stated goals, no?

The stable Iraq where Sunnis and Shia lived in peace & harmony?

An oxymoronic fantasy birthed from a similar mindset as “birthers” & other hating fantasies.

[odayjassim1978_476]

 
on the net

Quote from Frumious

A “stable Iraq?” You mean the Jeffersonian Democracy stable Iraq Bush left? That was one of the stated goals, no?

The stable Iraq where Sunnis and Shia lived in peace & harmony?

An oxymoronic fantasy birthed from a similar mindset as “birthers” & other hating fantasies.

[Unknown Member]

Quote from dergon

There might be some people right now asking why we withdrew so soon.

But history will ask “Why were we there in the first place?” and “Why did we stay so long?”.    

The primary force destabilizing Iraq was not the departure of the US military, it was its arrival.    

 
At certain times, I make mental bookmarks, both in my personal life and when watching current events. I did this at the time of the invasion. I thought – we can’t know what will happen with this, but at this juncture, it looks certain that Sadam has chemical, and biologic weapons. He has used them before, likely he still has them. Our intelligence services say he has them, no surprise, certainly he didn’t use everything he had on the Iranians and on the Kurds. He is acting as if he has them, by impeding inspections at every turn. He also has missiles capable of hitting Israel, and he has said he wants to destroy Israel. He has launched missiles at Israel before.  Given all this, it is stupid to just sit and watch him do what he say he will, and what he has done before.
 
nearly every member of congress arrived at the same conclusion. 
That was the appearance at the time, and this has nearly been lost, but it is critical to understanding why this happened. 
Now – things look different, but it is not valid to judge the invasion based on what we know now. You can only use the knowledge we had at the time. It is indeed difficult to erase everything we have learned since that time, but that is how the decision must be judged. 

[btomba_77]

OK – I can grant you [i]some [/i] of that.  But …..
 
 

 He also has missiles capable of hitting Israel, and he has said he wants to destroy Israel. He has launched missiles at Israel before.  Given all this, it is stupid to just sit and watch him do what he say he will, and what he has done before.

 
You seem to be a strong proponent of the “Bush Doctrine”.   Act first.    Turns out he was wrong.  A bad and costly bet.  Too bad he wanted to move so fast.    
 
  I think the Bush doctrine damaged our country… a lot.
 
 
 
 
____
 
That democrats were going into an election fearful of being labelled “soft on terrorism” and were easily swayed into believe the BS the administration was putting forth led to the congress arriving at the conclusion.     It was a failure of leadership from the executive branch and a failure of congressional oversight from the legislative.
 
 
I marked the invasion as well.  I thought it was idiocy.   I was in Vienna on the dawn of the invasion in 2003.  Europe was on fire with protest.  It was only the US (and a bit of Tony Blair) who thought Iraq 2 was a smart sequel.
 
 
My congressman was railing as loudly as possible against it and I thought he was one of the few people making sense.  
 
Here is my representaive’s views:
 

Quote from Dennis Kucinich

In fact, the truth about Iraq was widely available, but it was ignored. There were no WMD. Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11. The war wasn’t about liberating the Iraqi people. I said this in Congress in 2002. Millions of people who marched in America in protest of the war knew the truth, but were maligned by members of both parties for opposing the president in a time of war — and even leveled with the spurious charge of “not supporting the troops.”
 
______
 
President Obama didn’t start the Iraq War, but he has the opportunity now to tell the truth. That we were wrong to go in. That the cause of war was unjust. That more problems were created by military intervention than solved. That the present violence and chaos in Iraq derives from the decision which took America to war in 2003. More than a decade later, it should not take courage to point out the Iraq war was based on lies.
 

 
 
 
That we had no plan of what to do [i]after[/i] will go down in history as one of the great war planning failures of all time.   It ain’t Gallipoli, but it’s pretty damned bad.
 
 
 
 

[eyoab2011_711]

Obama booted the status-of forces agreement (SOFA).

 
Amazing how the right keeps holding on to that lie.  Obama carried out the SOFA negotiated by Bush.  Iraq’s parliament had no interest in giving our troops protection.  Sure Maliki was willing to act like a dictator and make a promise he probably couldn’t and wouldn’t keep…but in essence the Con argument here is that we should have let Maliki become a Shia dictator with our backing (well the first part is true).  Bush apparently never learned the lesson of letting America installing dictators in the Middle East

[btomba_77]

Quote from Thor

Obama booted the status-of forces agreement (SOFA).

Amazing how the right keeps holding on to that lie.  Obama carried out the SOFA negotiated by Bush.  Iraq’s parliament had no interest in giving our troops protection.  Sure Maliki was willing to act like a dictator and make a promise he probably couldn’t and wouldn’t keep…but in essence the Con argument here is that we should have let Maliki become a Shia dictator with our backing (well the first part is true).  Bush apparently never learned the lesson of letting America installing dictators in the Middle East

 
Obama responds in detail on troops in Iraq: 
 
Reporter’s Q:  Do you regret not leaving troops in Irag?
 

Quote from President Obama

What I just find interesting is the degree to which this issue keeps on coming up, as if this was my decision. Under the previous administration, we had turned over the country to a sovereign, democratically elected Iraqi government. In order for us to maintain troops in Iraq, we needed the invitation of the Iraqi government and we needed assurances that our personnel would be immune from prosecution if, for example, they were protecting themselves and ended up getting in a firefight with Iraqis, that they wouldnt be hauled before an Iraqi judicial system.
 
And the Iraqi government, based on its political considerations, in part because Iraqis were tired of a U.S. occupation, declined to provide us those assurances. And on that basis, we left. We had offered to leave additional troops. So when you hear people say, do you regret, Mr. President, not leaving more troops, that presupposes that I would have overridden this sovereign government that we had turned the keys back over to and said, you know what, youre democratic, youre sovereign, except if I decide that its good for you to keep 10,000 or 15,000 or 25,000 Marines in your country, you dont have a choicewhich would have kind of run contrary to the entire argument we were making about turning over the country back to Iraqis, an argument not just made by me, but made by the previous administration.
 
[b]So lets just be clear: The reason that we did not have a follow-on force in Iraq was because the Iraqis werea majority of Iraqis did not want U.S. troops there, and politically they could not pass the kind of laws that would be required to protect our troops in Iraq.[/b]
 
 
Having said all that, if in fact the Iraqi government behaved the way it did over the last five, six years, where it failed to pass legislation that would reincorporate Sunnis and give them a sense of ownership; if it had targeted certain Sunni leaders and jailed them; if it had alienated some of the Sunni tribes that we had brought back in during the so-called Awakening that helped us turn the tide in 2006if they had done all those things and we had had troops there, the country wouldnt be holding together either. The only difference would be wed have a bunch of troops on the ground that would be vulnerable. And however many troops we had, we would have to now be reinforcing, Id have to be protecting them, and wed have a much bigger job. And probably, we would end up having to go up again in terms of the number of grounds troops to make sure that those forces were not vulnerable.
 
[b]So that entire analysis is bogus and is wrong. But it gets frequently peddled around here by folks who oftentimes are trying to defend previous policies that they themselves made.[/b]

[kayla.meyer_144]

Quote from dergon

OK – I can grant you [i]some [/i] of that.  But …..

 He also has missiles capable of hitting Israel, and he has said he wants to destroy Israel. He has launched missiles at Israel before.  Given all this, it is stupid to just sit and watch him do what he say he will, and what he has done before.

You seem to be a strong proponent of the “Bush Doctrine”.   Act first.    Turns out he was wrong.  A bad and costly bet.  Too bad he wanted to move so fast.    

By Sardonicus’s logic, there are a lot of countries deserving our pre-emptive strikes. And the logic has another flaw, why wait to be proven that you have wrong assumptions. Intelligence be damned. Slam-dunk!

[btomba_77]

An awesome piece of satire in [i]The New Yorker[/i]
 
[b]
[/b]
[h1][b]Growing Pressure on Obama to Do Something Stupid[/b][/h1]  
 
WASHINGTON ([link=http://bit.ly/NhEEu0]The Borowitz Report[/link])Arguing that his motto Dont do stupid stuff is not a coherent foreign policy, critics of President Obama are pressuring him to do something stupid without further delay.
 

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) led the attack on Thursday, blasting Obama for failing to craft a stupid response to crises in Iraq, Syria, and Ukraine.

 
Instead of reacting to these events with the haste and recklessness they deserve, the President has chosen to waste valuable time thinking, McCain said. This goes against the most fundamental principles of American foreign policy.

Graham also expressed frustration with the President, telling reporters, The American people are waiting for President Obama to do something stupid, but their patience is wearing thin.
 
In his most withering criticism, McCain called Obamas stubborn refusal to do stupid stuff a failure of leadership. If I were President, you can bet your bottom dollar I would have done plenty of stupid stuff by now, he said.
 

[suyanebenevides_151]

McCain is almost always wrong, if you just do the opposite of his position you can be confident that you made the right decision.
 
Like guy that can’t pick a game in sports gambling, Obama would be best served to just use McCain’s loser ideas to end up on the right side — at least take advantage of another idiot when you’re already clueless.

[btomba_77]

Quote from Dr.Sardonicus

Quote from dergon

I don’t think there’s any question that Obama made statements on Syria that he later regretted.

But how does that apply to what he has said about Iraq thus far?  I haven’t heard anything but extraordinaly vague language.

Quote from Barack Obama

Iraqs going to need more help. Its going to need more help from us, and its going to need more help from the international community.

Or maybe you were looking to [i]this[/i]

Quote from Barak Obama

I dont rule out anything, because we do have a stake in making sure that these jihadists are not getting a permanent foothold in Iraq, or Syria, for that matter. …I think its fair to say that in our consultations with the Iraqis, there will be some short-term, immediate things that need to be done militarily, and our national security team is looking at all the options.

I mean… am I missing some hard line statement made by the President that implies that he plans something aggressive?

I read the statements as “we will be involved militarily in this war”.    Yes – he did – for the time being – deny he was thinking of sending troops, and I think that is politically not viable. (On the other hand, as his popularity has tanked, he seems to be doing what he thinks is necessary regardless of polls. A more honest way of leading IMHO. So perhaps he [u]would[/u] re-deploy troops.)

Any statement that he will not send troops is, of course, a statement of what he would do today, and could easily be changed by changing circumstances, so I don’t think the “not sending troops” statement is by any means binding or permanent. I’m not sure what the purpose of the statement is. Certainly, ISIS won’t retreat as a result, but maybe they will ramp up what they are doing to consolidate before any intervention by outside forces. 

Much of what he says is for show, and I think that our allies and opponents have this figured out. None of what he says matters as a result. (As a comparison, #43 backed up what he said. Regardless how you felt about what he said, it was obvious that our opponents took him seriously. Maybe they thought him a bit crazy, but that can be quite useful in power politics.)

 
It sounds like Obama really, truly does not want ground troops.
 
[link=http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/rift-widens-between-obama-us-military-over-strategy-to-fight-islamic-state/2014/09/18/ebdb422e-3f5c-11e4-b03f-de718edeb92f_story.html]http://www.washingtonpost…e718edeb92f_story.html[/link]
 
The military generals a pressing him for ground troops and Obama has already over-ruled the military’s request for use of troops in a targeted instance going against ISIS in Iraq.
 

Despite Obamas promise that he would not deploy ground combat forces, Dempsey made clear that he didnt want to rule out the possibility, if only to deploy small teams in limited circumstances. He also acknowledged that Army Gen. Lloyd Austin, the commander for the Middle East, had already recommended doing so in the case of at least one battle in Iraq but was overruled.

[kayla.meyer_144]

Well, I guess that latest information of some Generals & Republicans pushing very hard to restart the Iraq war & extend it into Syria is the answer to the OP’s topic.
 
[b]No, it is NOT Obama who wants to start a new war in Iraq.[/b]

[eyoab2011_711]

I fear the press and pro-war interests are driving this train right over a cliff.  Would have been better if Obama just said a firm No, now we are  moving inexorably toward mission creep.  We have a Congress full of cowards as well

[Unknown Member]

I would much rather Obama NOT go to war at all.  He doesn’t have the guts, the instincts or the staying power to do it right, so he might as well not even start.  You go to war with the Commander-in-chief you have, not the one you would like.  Right now, we don’t have much of one, so we might be better off putting our hands in our pockets and whistling a tune.

[kayla.meyer_144]

It takes “guts” to go to war? As in guts to invade Iraq? As in “guts” to declare the Vietnam War based on an invented attack?
 
It takes guts to consider why going to war is the best or only choice. It takes guts to oppose the loud hawks who portray their paranoia and fear as actionable for everyone else. Specifically “everyone else” fighting their war based on their fear & paranoia.
 
ISIS is trying to goad us to fight. The last thing we should applaud is another bout of reckless engagement based on false reasons. More Americans will die over that recklessness.
 
I vote for reality based reasons and a reality based worldview. Not retreat from a necessary fight, just not a reckless headlong rush into an unnecessary war.
 
 

[odayjassim1978_476]

DON’T KNOW what axe to grind Panetta has but if those weapons ended in the wrong hands we all know darn well the GOP hacks would be screaming fast and furious part 2
as Gore learned distancing yourself from the President you were attached to may not have a good outcome..u have to remember your base and who is going to get out and vote…white males in my opinion who voted for Romney will still support a GOP nominee over Hillary no matter how far right/aggressive her rhetoric gets

[odayjassim1978_476]

well strikes have started in Syria…wonder what will be Assad’s response

[odayjassim1978_476]

  Russia Pravda paper=radio silence/saw nothing on the strikes/putin’s ego

[btomba_77]

Well.  Mr. Obama has become convinced …
 
 
[link=http://www.cnn.com/2014/11/07/politics/obama-sends-troops-to-iraq/index.html]http://www.cnn.com/2014/1…ops-to-iraq/index.html[/link]
 
”
President Barack Obama is sending up to 1,500 more soldiers to Iraq to train Iraqi and Kurdish forces to fight ISIS, in a deployment that would almost double the total number of American troops there to 2,900.
The White House said in a statement that it will also ask Congress for another $5.6 billion to fund the fight against ISIS. The troops will not have a combat role, and will operate from bases outside Baghdad and Erbil.”

[btomba_77]

[link=http://insider.foxnews.com/2015/02/17/rumsfeld-isis-brings-back-mind-period-world-war-ii]http://insider.foxnews.co…nd-period-world-war-ii[/link]
 
Rumsfeld thinks we need to go get ISIS because it looks like the lead up to WWII
 
 
I guess in the neo-con mind it’s always 1938.
 
 

[btomba_77]

Obama sends another 450 troops  (50 training advisers and 400 to guard them)
 
It’s starting to feel like a baby-steps version of LBJ in Vietnam.  I think he’s just trying to run out the clock by giving the appearance of action without a defined strategy.
 
 
And I still have no idea what the objective is.  What’s “victory” in Iraq/ against ISIS?
 
 

[kayla.meyer_144]

And if doesn’t do well it will become “Obama’s War” and failure in spite of the war drums from the Republicans who want a Rambo do-over. But they also won’t vote to give him authority either, this way they can have it both ways as they hide in the sideline bunkers shouting for war.

[kayla.meyer_144]

Quote from Dr.Sardonicus

I wonder if your answer was simply intended to bait me, and get me to ignore the fact that you really had no substantive response. 

In point of fact: Obama did make threats in Syria that he did not follow up on. 

Do you dispute this – or are you going to go after me again. 

That is why off topic area has become so contentious. Personal attack after personal attack.

Well you do often post the start of a thread & then respond no further to the conversation. That is ad hominem?
 
“Baiting you?” Because I expect you to fill in some areas & respond to your own topic???
 
“Going after you” because I expect some participation by you to your own topic?
 
May I suggest therapy as a start. If you want to see attack then consult the Red sites that routinely criticize Obama no matter what the situation.
 
Yes, Obama was a bit dumb and premature making veiled threats about using poison gas to Assad. But do you criticize him for making the threat itself or for not following up and escalating by sending in troops or arming the Syrian rebels in the Syrian civil war?
 
BTW, has it been absolutely verified that Assad’s forces did in fact use poison gas or is it still just an assertion? Last I read it was an assertion still with no absolute verification.
 
And considering how Syria has gone. Or the Arab Spring in general, you still think Obama should have either sent in troops to Syria or armed the opposition? Which opposition exactly? Or just ignore the opposition and align & organize forces much like Pappa Bush did in the 1st Gulf War & throw Assad out? And then what? Another exercise in nation building? Like Iraq? And Afghanistan?
 
Criticize away at Obama but I’d like to know what excellent choices of action he had that he passed up on. Or again, are you criticizing merely because he made vague threats and then all he did was have the UN collect Assad’s gas reserves but little else? So, what else? You seem to back away yourself from any real threats & responses to Assad.
 
Or is it you just dislike Obama regardless of what he does or does not do & is deserving of criticism merely for that fact?
 
What are the options Obama is not doing? What will Congress support? What will the American people support? What should we, as a Nation, do??? By your support of #43 I assume you think Obama should do that regardless of the wonderful circumstances #43 had driven us into waving his & our Johnsons around.
 
 

[Unknown Member]

Quote from Frumious

Well you do often post the start of a thread & then respond no further to the conversation. That is ad hominem?

 
I would dispute the “often” word and the contention of “respond no further” implying I often respond no further.
However, to get beyond those issues – at times I have posted on this (as opposed to gen radiology) and seen the ad hominem attacks (or if not purely ad hominem, attacks that had “you are so stupid” implied in the wording) that I realized how futile and unenlightening the responses were and decided that counting raindrops was a more productive use of my time, and so didn’t come back to look at the thread. 
 

“Baiting you?” Because I expect you to fill in some areas & respond to your own topic???

“Going after you” because I expect some participation by you to your own topic?
 

 
Here is what you wrote:
 

Sardonicus likes this whole thing, dergon, because no matter what Obama does or does not do, he is open to criticism for doing nothing or doing the wrong thing, or even being silent. Happily a “no win” all the way around for sardonicus. 

 
That is not asking me to respond to my own thread. That is simply a broad brush insult. To translate what I – and likely others – hear in this – “S has no valid opinions because his motive is simply to oppose anything and everything that Obama does. It does not matter what the issue is, S will knee jerk take the opposite view”  
 
This is beyond insulting, and invites me to defend myself (as, unfortunately, I am doing here to explain to you why someone might see your posts as less than constructive discussion).
 

May I suggest therapy as a start. If you want to see attack then consult the Red sites that routinely criticize Obama no matter what the situation.

 
Well, there it is again. Suggesting therapy…. i.e. only someone who is unhinged could oppose Obama. If you don’t understand how this is a personal attack, rather than a discussion of issues, then there is no point in talking to you.
 
 
BTW – Dergon and I probably don’t agree on everything, but he has a  reasonable way of discussing this without resorting to suggesting therapy and the like. 
 
 
And because I see no point in endlessly setting myself up for more insults, I will not respond to the rest of your post, even though there are points I agree with. 
 
 

[kayla.meyer_144]

So much for #43’s accomplishment. Running headlong & cocksure into disaster never did anyone any good.
 
[attachment=0]

[suyanebenevides_151]

Amazing how Obama can do no wrong, can’t fix anything he claimed he could, and gets cover for it no matter what he does or doesn’t do. The administration is pathetic. And it has done things and set forth programs that have directly lead to American deaths on top of it.
 
With this precedent, no one could ever anything wrong, pretty much ever again. It renders the presidency totally unaccountable … for anything.

[Unknown Member]

What on earth are you talking about? That you have a problem with policies that are that protective of our troops by pulling them home from senseless foreign tussles shows how blindly prejudiced you are about the current administration and what a bully hawk you really are. You sound like Pointless and alda-[i]”why are we [u]ALLOWING[/u] Maliki to do that”[/i]-doc. Obama’s policies have led to fewer deaths than any other President in recent history, possibly back to Carter.
 
You moan about how some people say he can do no wrong. But you’re just as bad, if not worse, by claiming he can do no [i]right.[/i] Some people would say it was indeed [i]very[/i] good things that during the Obama administration, we saw a halt and then reversal of a free-falling economic catastrophe, unemployment  recover back to just over 6% (5.2% is already considered a perfectly healthy due to normal job dynamics in a thriving economy), a doubling of the stock market, the retraction of our military from hostilities we should never have gotten in to in the first place, and everyone here has realistic access to respectable healthcare when they had none previously.
 
Yeah, what a crappy record, huh? I’m sure Obama is quite jealous of Dubya’s fine historic accomplishments. Let’s see, remind us again of all the things Dubya did to improve our way of life for the long haul?
 
 
 
 

[btomba_77]

[h1][b]Fareed Zakaria: Who lost Iraq? The Iraqis did, with an assist from George W. Bush [/b][/h1]  

 
Who lost Iraq?
 
Whenever the United States has asked this question as it did with China in the 1950s or Vietnam in the 1970s the most important point to remember is: The local rulers did. The Chinese nationalists and the South Vietnamese government were corrupt, inefficient and weak, unable to be inclusive and unwilling to fight with the dedication of their opponents. The same story is true of Iraq, only much more so. The first answer to the question is: [link=http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2014/06/10/iraqi-prime-minister-nouri-al-malikis-statement-in-baghdad/]Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki lost Iraq[/link].
 
The prime minister and his ruling party have behaved like thugs, excluding the Sunnis from power, using the army, police forces and militias to terrorize their opponents. The insurgency the Maliki government faces today was utterly predictable because, in fact, it happened before. From 2003 onward, Iraq faced a Sunni insurgency that was finally tamped down by Gen. David Petraeus, who said explicitly at the time that the core element of his strategy was political, bringing Sunni tribes and militias into the fold. The surges success, he often noted, bought time for a real power-sharing deal in Iraq that would bring the Sunnis into the structure of the government.
 
A senior official closely involved with Iraq in the Bush administration told me, Not only did Maliki not try to do broad power-sharing, he reneged on all the deals that had been made, stopped paying the Sunni tribes and militias, and started persecuting key Sunni officials. Among those targeted were the vice president of Iraq and its finance minister.
 
 
But how did Maliki come to be prime minister of Iraq? He was the product of a series of momentous decisions made by the Bush administration. Having invaded Iraq with a small force what the expert[link=http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/yeariniraq/interviews/ricks.html]Tom Ricks called the worst war plan in American history[/link]  the administration needed to find local allies. It quickly decided to destroy Iraqs Sunni ruling establishment and empower the hard-line Shiite religious parties that had opposed Saddam Hussein. This meant that a structure of Sunni power that had been in the area for centuries collapsed. These moves to disband the army, dismantle the bureaucracy and purge Sunnis in general might have been more consequential than the invasion itself.
 
 
The turmoil in the Middle East is often called a sectarian war. But really it is better described as the Sunni revolt. Across the region, from Iraq to Syria, one sees armed Sunni gangs that have decided to take on the non-Sunni forces that, in their view, oppress them. The Bush administration often justified its actions by pointing out that the Shiites are the majority in Iraq and so they had to rule. But the truth is that the borders of these lands are porous, and while the Shiites are numerous in Iraq  [link=http://staugustine.com/stories/020609/world_020609_036.shtml]Malikis party actually won a plurality[/link], not a majority they are a tiny minority in the Middle East as a whole. It is outside support from places as varied as Saudi Arabia and Turkey that sustains the Sunni revolt.
 
If the Bush administration deserves a fair share of blame for losing Iraq, what about the Obama administration and its decision to withdraw American forces from the country by the end of 2011? I would have preferred to see a small American force in Iraq to try to prevent the countrys collapse. But lets remember why this force is not there. Maliki refused to provide the guarantees that every other country in the world that hosts U.S. forces offers. Some commentators have blamed the Obama administration for negotiating badly or halfheartedly and perhaps this is true. But heres what a senior Iraqi politician told me in the days when the U.S. withdrawal was being discussed: It will not happen. Maliki cannot allow American troops to stay on. Iran has made very clear to Maliki that its No. 1 demand is that there be no American troops remaining in Iraq. And Maliki owes them. He reminded me that Maliki spent [link=http://www.wbur.org/npr/307980657/exploring-what-we-left-behind-in-iraq]24 years in exile, most of them in Tehran and Damascus[/link], and his party was funded by Iran for most of its existence. And in fact, Malikis government has followed policies that have been pro-Iranian and pro-Syrian.
 
Washington is debating whether airstrikes or training forces would be more effective, but its real problem is much larger and is a decade in the making. In Iraq, it is defending the indefensible.
 

[eyoab2011_711]

It has nothing to do with whether Obama can do no right or wrong. 
 
What are our realistic options?  How much can we truly accomplish without “boots on the ground” which even Repubs are saying?  The surge was supposed to give space for reconciliation…it didn’t accomplish that; just bought time to the inevitable.  So besides throwing money we don’t have down a rat hole, what can we accomplish?  If you don’t believe we can spend to take care of Americans, why on Earth should we spend more for Iraqis?
 
So in this case I am not sure there is a right or wrong for the President, but like Syria (where he got burned by his own words-deservedly so) he needs to be cautious and only act where there is a clear plan moving forward with measurable outcomes.  We don’t need a repeat of 2003

[Unknown Member]

Look, the GOP knows all too well that Maliki had been in bed with Iran and Syria for decades before he took over Iraq. Iran and Syria gave him sanctuary for 24 years and Iran funded his political party before Bush basically handed Iraq to him. That the Bush admin didn’t see how indebted Maliki was to those countries when he put him in office there shows how ignorant that admin really was about the politics in that part of the world.

The only choice the Repugnantans have now is to try to reframe this somehow as Obama’s fault. Of course, with Maliki getting Iraq in 2006 and Obama being the senator that was against the original 2003 invasion, that doesn’t leave the GOP much wiggle room to make that dog hunt.

There is NO WAY Iran and Syria (and, I suspect, Russia and China) are going to let American troops back into Iraq at this point, and we have the Bush Doctrine to thank for that. Maliki simply will do whatever he must to ensure Shiite dominance in Iraq that perfectly suits the needs of Iran and Syria. Period.

Many people claimed that one of Bush’s strongest assets was his unfaltering faith and Christianity, but if his faith was so rapturous that his plan was to make the pivotal events of Revelations become reality, then there might not be much reason for us to be very jubilant right about now.
 
 
 

[Unknown Member]

At this point the US should stay the hell out of Iraq. The Al-Maliki. Government is corrupt, allied with Iran, and full of contempt toward the US. No way we should help now. Any help we send at this point is going to end up in the hands of ISIS. To quote a famous Democrat legislator: “the war is lost”.

The best thing Obama can do now is to shut his big trap and to wish the Iraqis good luck. A nation gets the government they deserve. The Iraqis were given a second chance by brave US forces at great cost of lives and treasure. They squandered the opportunity, so now it’s: Sayonara MF. Good luck with your country!.
.

[Unknown Member]

And we should blame Franklin Roosevelt for the loss of the Ukraine

[Unknown Member]

Basically Bush F’d up the Mid East even worse by trying to fix it

[Unknown Member]

Basically, Bush handed Obama a two touchdown lead with 1 minute to go in the game. Obama fumbled away the win, because he either didn’t want to play or was too incompetent to win.

[eyoab2011_711]

The Al-Maliki. Government is corrupt, allied with Iran, and full of contempt toward the US.

 

Basically, Bush handed Obama a two touchdown lead with 1 minute to go in the game.

 
Maliki was Bush’s guy and Bush failed to get a SOFA with the Iraqi govt…spin anyway you want Alda, but many here said stay out of Iraq in 2003; Bush installed Maliki, supported and enabled him.  Bush owns this hook, line and sinker.  Obama simply did what needed to be done to disentangle us from the mess.  We could have stayed another decade and the result would have been the same when we left.  There was never a win to have because there was never a coherent plan from the start of the invasion.  Even the surge was a waste of money to delay the inevitable

[Unknown Member]

[link=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/barackobama/10897992/Iraq-Barack-Obamas-self-regarding-goodness-is-bad-news-for-the-rest-of-us.html]http://www.telegraph.co.u…or-the-rest-of-us.html[/link]

“Mr Obama is not a pacifist. He sees the utility of force in individual tricky situations. It would not be at all surprising if he uses a bit of it soon, in drone or aerial form, in Iraq. What he does not see is its strategic value. He does not grasp, apparently, that the Pax Americana, under whose protection we have lived since 1945, has existed because it has always been backed by the credible threat of force. Weakness is provocative to bad actors, and some of the worlds worst have now been provoked. This seems to have come as an almost complete surprise to the Obama White House. The Peace President is starting to leave a legacy of war.”

This is how the world sees this failure. These are not my words.

[btomba_77]

Quote from aldadoc

[link=http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/barackobama/10897992/Iraq-Barack-Obamas-self-regarding-goodness-is-bad-news-for-the-rest-of-us.html]http://www.telegraph.co.u…or-the-rest-of-us.html[/link]

This is how the world sees this failure. These are not my words.

No. That’s how Charles Moore sees it.  Of course the Chairman of a right wing neocon think tank would write that.  It’s like posting an editorial by Jim DeMint of Heritage and saying “See. This is how America feels about it. Not my words.”    
 
 
 
ok- maybe not like DeMint.  More like Buckley.

[btomba_77]

Quote from aldadoc

This is how the world sees this failure. These are not my words.

How the world sees it is as a catastrophe with no chance of success.
 
Polling for the 10th Anniversary found nearly 3/4 of British citizens felt that Iraq would become  permanently unstable, not a Democracy.  
 
[link=http://cdn.yougov.com/cumulus_uploads/document/9p07sppwg8/YG-Archives-Pol-110313-Iraq.pdf]http://cdn.yougov.com/cum…es-Pol-110313-Iraq.pdf[/link]
 
 

[eyoab2011_711]

It never ceases to amaze me… Everything during Obama’s term is his fault. Everything during Bush’s term is someone else’s fault.

The Congress never voted to go to war, thet simply gave Bush the authority to make the decision.

At that time there was still a remote air of bipartisanship as we’ll, so yes some were probably voting to support Bush rather than opining that invasion was a good idea. It was also predicated on the belief that there was a plan for the future. So stop trying to blame Iraq on others. Bush and Cheney own this Charlie foxtrot

[kayla.meyer_144]

I don’t see us going back into Iraq again. & I celebrate the non-election of either McCain and Romney because if you think things are bad now, imagine how much worse they would have been as President. Imagine how things could be better if Republicans weren’t waging total war. Or if Republicans weren’t taken over by the Jon Birch Society & others of their ilk.
 
All this “discussion” about how Obama is not criticized by us in the middle and left is just plain merde and is old and is a deliberate lie. One must presume it is either a deliberate ploy to make us defensive or else the accuser(s) don’t really know their facts because  they get their information solely from extreme sites that is already filtered of fact. A simple Google search would put the lie to the assertion.

[Unknown Member]

When bush came into office his predecessor gave him a record surplus, a vibrant economy and not much to complain about

Bush squandered all of it

all Bush did was give Obama messes to clean up

Financial mess, Iraq war and others

Worst president since Hoover maybe even worse since Buchanan

Bush’s war and failure

Anyone remember Mission accomplished

Bush with the bomber jacket is about as bad as Putin shirtless

[Unknown Member]

Republicans in the USA are responsible for enabling Saddam Hussein, bin Laden, al Qaeda, and ISIS. The historic record is very clear.

I wasn’t even that opposed to installing Hussein…as long as we let him stay there to create his legendary brand of uncertainty in that region which kept things in check with Iran, Syria, and the Kurds. But taking him out unleashed the other forces in the area that are now creating a huge USA opposition, including the Taliban, Hezbollah, and Islamic fundamentalism.

And yes, there were indeed “many” people who saw that coming.

As was said earlier, the problem with the Dems was NOT that they voted to invade Iraq in 03, it’s that they believed all the crappy so-called intelligence coming out of Cheney-Wolfy-Rummy-Tenet and trusted that if they gave Bush the power, he would do the right thing.

Obviously, history shows that the White House simply misrepresented the intelligence to Congress, ergo Garbage-in-garbage-out, and that the “mushroom cloud” gang simply manipulated Congress so they could move forward with their own hidden agenda.

If anyone should be accused of neglect of duty, it was Condi, Colin, and Tenet for neglecting to probe the intelligence and consequences of invasion with more scrutiny before promoting such a catastrophe.

[Unknown Member]

Quote from Thor

…spin anyway you want Alda, but many here said stay out of Iraq in 2003; 

 
There is some revisionist history going on  here. Certainly there were some who said don’t go into Iraq, The word some is almost always applicable. The word “Many” is too imprecise to debate about, but it can be said accurately that the majority of the Senate and the House said go into iraq, including the following Democratic Senators:
 
Bayh
Baucus
Cleland
Clinton
Daschle
Edwards
Biden
Feinstein
Harkin
Kerry
Reid
 
 
Each of these people, in order to do their duty, supposedly arrived at independent judgements about what was wise and what wasn’t with the information at hand.  I think it is fair to say that NONE of these Democratic senators was voting out of love or loyalty to Bush. If anything, there would have been strong resistance to voting in accord with Bush.  So their “yea” votes we can presume was the result of some deep soul searching. And they voted with Bush.
 
Trying to say that they really didn’t mean it just doesn’t fly. Hilary Clinton is particularly guilty of trying to disown her judgement on this. 
 
 
 

[btomba_77]

The result of deep soul searching leading into the 2004 presidential campaign and not wanting to look “soft on terror”.
 
But yes …. it was a true bipartisan failing …. but led by one of the worst teams in history. 

[btomba_77]

The Senate abdicated its role and its senses:
 
Here’s a good one (from the 10th anniversary)
 
[link=http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/15100-democrats-share-the-blame-for-tragedy-of-iraq-war]http://truth-out.org/opin…or-tragedy-of-iraq-war[/link]
 

Members of Congress were also alerted by large numbers of scholars of the Middle East, Middle Eastern political leaders, former State Department and intelligence officials and others who recognized that a US invasion would likely result in a bloody insurgency, a rise in Islamist extremism and terrorism, increased sectarian and ethnic conflict, and related problems. Few people I know who are familiar with Iraq were at all surprised that the US invasion has become such a tragedy. Indeed, most of us were in communication with Congressional offices and often with individual members of Congress themselves in the months leading up to the vote warning of the likely consequences of an invasion and occupation. Therefore, subsequent claims by Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Joe Biden, Harry Reid and other leading Democratic supporters of the war that they were unaware of the likely consequences of the invasion are completely false.
 
The resolution also contained accusations that were known or widely assumed to be false at that time, such as claims of Iraqi support for al-Qaeda terrorists responsible for the September 11, 2001, attacks against the United States. A definitive [link=http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/05/AR2007040502263.html?hpid=topnews]report[/link] by the Department of Defense noted that not only did no such link exist but that no such link could have even been reasonably suggested based on the evidence available at that time.
 
The Senate resolution also falsely claimed that Iraq was “actively seeking a nuclear weapons capability.” In reality, Iraq had long eliminated its nuclear program, a fact that was confirmed in a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency in 1998, four years prior to the resolution.
 
The US invasion of Iraq was opposed by virtually the entire international community, including Iraq’s closest neighbors, who presumably had the most to be concerned about in terms of any possible Iraqi military threat. However, the members of Congress who voted to authorize the invasion were determined to make the case that the United States – with the strongest military the world has ever known and thousands of miles beyond the range of Iraq’s alleged weapons and delivery systems – was so threatened by Iraq that the United States had to launch an invasion, overthrow its government and occupy that country for an indefinite period.
This shows a frighteningly low threshold for effectively declaring war, especially given that in most cases these members of Congress had been informed by knowledgeable sources of the widespread human and material costs that would result from a US invasion. It also indicates that they would likely be just as willing to send American forces off to another disastrous war again, also under false pretenses. Indeed, those who voted for the war demonstrated their belief that:
[ul][*]The United States need not abide by its international legal obligations, including those prohibiting wars of aggression.[*]Claims by right-wing US government officials and unreliable foreign exiles regarding a foreign government’s military capabilities are more trustworthy than independent arms control analysts and United Nations inspectors.[*]Concerns expressed by scholars and others knowledgeable of the likely reaction by the subjected population to a foreign conquest and the likely complications that would result should be ignored, and faith should instead be placed on the occupation policies forcibly imposed on the population by a corrupt right-wing Republican administration. [/ul] As a result, support for the resolution authorizing the Iraq War is not something that can simply be forgotten. There is no reason to be any more forgiving of Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, or Harry Reid than we are of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, or Condoleezza Rice.    

 
 
 
 

[kayla.meyer_144]

Quote from Dr.Sardonicus

Quote from Thor

…spin anyway you want Alda, but many here said stay out of Iraq in 2003; 

There is some revisionist history going on  here. Certainly there were some who said don’t go into Iraq, The word some is almost always applicable. The word “Many” is too imprecise to debate about, but it can be said accurately that the majority of the Senate and the House said go into iraq, including the following Democratic Senators:

Bayh
Baucus
Cleland
Clinton
Daschle
Edwards
Biden
Feinstein
Harkin
Kerry
Reid

Each of these people, in order to do their duty, supposedly arrived at independent judgements about what was wise and what wasn’t with the information at hand.  I think it is fair to say that NONE of these Democratic senators was voting out of love or loyalty to Bush. If anything, there would have been strong resistance to voting in accord with Bush.  So their “yea” votes we can presume was the result of some deep soul searching. And they voted with Bush.

Trying to say that they really didn’t mean it just doesn’t fly. Hilary Clinton is particularly guilty of trying to disown her judgement on this. 

They were all wrong. They all – including Hilary – tucked their tails between their legs in fear of Republican accusations of being unpatriotic & not supporting the President in wartime. Something republicans do not fear when the President is Democratic & you are lacking in your notice of that small fact.
 
But Democrats often tuck their tails in for fear of Republican accusations, you’d think they – AND the American people would have learned by now not to follow loud hawks (& chicken-hawks) into war for no good reason merely because they act cock-sure. That is also the identical reason for Vietnam when Johnson feared being labelled as cowardly in the face of Communist aggression by Republicans.
 
For Vietnam, Johnson deserved most of the blame even though Republicans supported. For Iraq, Republicans deserve most of the blame even though you can list Democrats who supported it. And I fear those who support Presidents who act cock-sure driving us over a cliff like Bush but hold support for a President who questions whether running off that cliff is really a good idea. Being cock-sure is not strength.

[Unknown Member]

Nice revisionist fiction!

Poor little Democrats. Please forgive them, for they know not what they do. Those bully Republicans made them do it.

[kayla.meyer_144]

Quote from aldadoc

Nice revisionist fiction!

Poor little Democrats. Please forgive them, for they know not what they do. Those bully Republicans made them do it.

Which part is fiction? The fact is that they voted to give Bush the right to declare war & they were cowards for that. The fact is that much misinformation was rampant at the time – see Judith Miller; see yellowcake; see WMD’s; see trains housing chemical & biological warfare agents; see Hans Blix & prior investigators of WMD’s; see Ambassador Wilson & Valerie Plame – and anyone who questioned the logic of going to war had their reputations attacked & damaged. Fear was in the land.
 
Even as late as 2010 right wing news was stating that Bush was vindicated as Saddam’s uranium was actually found.
 
[link=http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2010/12/09/the_wikileaks_vindication_of_george_w_bush_108195.html]http://www.realclearpolit…rge_w_bush_108195.html[/link]

[Unknown Member]

Quote from Frumious

Which part is fiction?

Alda’s memories.

It is too funny that the Republicans blame Democrats for not being more diligent about the Republican agenda instead of blaming the Republicans for making those decisions in the first place. Hey Alda, the Dems are not the GOP’s baby-sitter.

Cowards and hypocrites. No accountability, no atonement, no positive outcomes for Americans except the rich, and only for the short term so they can take the money and run. Time after time.

[kayla.meyer_144]

And let’s not forget,

RICE: The problem here is that there will always be some uncertainty about how quickly he can acquire nuclear weapons. But we don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud. 

 
[link=http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0309/07/le.00.html]http://transcripts.cnn.co…PTS/0309/07/le.00.html[/link]

[Unknown Member]

Alda still thinks there were stockpiles of WMD’s

Remember how passionate and convinced he was of that

[Unknown Member]

Quote from Frumious

And let’s not forget,

RICE: The problem here is that there will always be some uncertainty about how quickly he can acquire nuclear weapons. But we don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud. 

[link=http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0309/07/le.00.html]http://transcripts.cnn.co…PTS/0309/07/le.00.html[/link]

Yes, “uncertainty” as in “reasonable doubt”, that had ZERO tangible evidence backing it up. Can you imagine if our judicial system started executing suspects on the basis of “uncertainty” that they “might” do something bad just because we THINK they want to without having any substantial evidence?!
 
What a bunch of third-worlders they were.
And what a bunch of Orwellian alda-esque third-worlders they [i]created[/i] among us.
 
 

[kayla.meyer_144]

And since it has been raised and Democrats criticized for it, what exactly WAS the Democratic support for the resolution in 2003? It was the least supported war vote in US history I believe. A majority of Democrats in the Senate, to their shame, supported the resolution while the majority in the House opposed it.
 
[link=http://usliberals.about.com/od/liberalleadership/a/IraqNayVote.htm]http://usliberals.about.c…ship/a/IraqNayVote.htm[/link]
In the Senate, the 21 Democrats, one Republican and one Independent who courageously voted their consciences in 2002 against the War in Iraq were:
* Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii) 
* [link=http://usliberals.about.com/od/liberalpersonalprofiles/p/SenBingaman.htm]Jeff Bingaman (D-New Mexico)[/link] 
*[link=http://usliberals.about.com/od/congressionalleadership/p/SenatorBoxer.htm] Barbara Boxer (D-California) [/link]
* Robert Byrd (D-West Virginia) 
* Lincoln Chaffee (R-Rhode Island) 
* [link=http://usliberals.about.com/od/liberalpersonalprofiles/p/KentConrad.htm]Kent Conrad (D-North Dakota)[/link] 
* Jon Corzine (D-New Jersey) 
* Mark Dayton (D-Minnesota) 
* Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) 
* [link=http://usliberals.about.com/od/liberalpersonalprofiles/p/SenFeingold.htm]Russ Feingold (D-Wisconsin)[/link] 
* Bob Graham (D-Florida) 
* Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) 
* Jim Jeffords (I-Vermont) 
* Ted Kennedy (D-Massachusetts) 
* Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) 
* Carl Levin (D-Michigan) 
* Barbara Mikulski (D-Maryland) 
* Patty Murray (D-Washington) 
* Jack Reed (D-Rhode Island) 
* Paul Sarbanes (D-Maryland) 
* [link=http://usliberals.about.com/od/2006ussenateraces/p/SenStabenow.htm]Debbie Stabenow (D-Michigan) [/link]
* The late Paul Wellstone (D-Minnesota) 
* Ron Wyden (D-Oregon)
 
[b]UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES[/b]
Six House Republicans and one independent joined 126 Democratic members of the House of Re[resentatives in voting NAY, on October 11, 2002, to the unprovoked use of force against Iraq:
 
[ul] Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii) Tom Allen (D-Maine) Joe Baca (D-California) Brian Baird (D-Washington) John Baldacci (D-Maine, now governor of Maine) Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisconsin) Gresham Barrett (R-South Carolina) Xavier Becerra (D-California) Earl Blumenauer (D-Oregon) David Bonior (D-Michigan, retired from office) Robert Brady (D-Pennsylvania) Corinne Brown (D-Florida) Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) [/ul] [ul] Lois Capps (D-California) Michael Capuano (D-Massachusetts) Benjamin Cardin (D-Maryland) Julia Carson (D-Indiana) William Clay, Jr. (D-Missouri) Eva Clayton (D-North Carolina, retired from office) James Clyburn (D-South Carolina) Gary Condit (D-California, retired from office) John Conyers, Jr. (D-Michigan) Jerry Costello (D-Illinois) William Coyne (D-Pennsylvania, retired from office) Elijah Cummings (D-Maryland) [/ul] [ul] Susan Davis (D-California) Danny Davis (D-Illinois) Peter DeFazio (D-Oregon) Diana DeGette (D-Colorado) Bill Delahunt (D-Massachusetts) Rosa DeLauro (D-Connecticut) John Dingell (D-Michigan) Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) Mike Doyle (D-Pennsylvania) John Duncan, Jr. (R-Tennessee) [/ul] [ul] Anna Eshoo (D-California) Lane Evans (D-Illinois) Sam Farr (D-California) Chaka Fattah (D-Pennsylvania) Bob Filner (D-California) Barney Frank (D-Massachusetts) Charles Gonzalez (D-Texas) Luis Gutierrez (D-Illinois) [/ul] [ul] Alice Hastings (D-Florida) Earl Hilliard (D-Alabama, retired from office) Maurice Hinchey (D-New York) Ruben Hinojosa (D-Texas) Rush Holt (D-New Jersey) Mike Honda (D-California) Darlene Hooley (D-Oregon) John Hostettler (R-Indiana) Amo Houghton (R-New York, retired from office) Jay Inslee (D-Washington) [/ul] [ul] John LaFalce (D-New York) James Langevin (D-Rhode Island) Rick Larsen (D-Washington) John Larson (D-Connecticut) Jim Leach (R-Iowa) Barbara Lee (D-California) Sandy Levin (D-Michigan) John Lewis (D-Georgia) Bill Lipinski (D-Illinois,retired from office) Zoe Lofgren (D-California) [/ul] [ul] James Maloney (D-Connecticut, retired from office) The late Robert Matsui (D-California) Karen McCarthy (D-Missouri, retired from office) Betty McCollum (D-Minnesota) Jim McDermott-D-Washington) Jim McGovern (D-Massachusetts) Cynthia McKinney (D-Georgia) Carrie Meek (D-Florida, retired from office) Gregory Meeks (D-New York) Robert Menendez (D-New Jersey) Juanita Millender-McDonald (D-California) George Miller (D-California) Alan Mollohan (D-West Virginia) Jim Moran (D-Virginia) Connie Morella (D-Maryland) [/ul] [ul] Jerrold Nadler (D-New York) Grace Napolitano (D-California) Richard Neal (D-Massachusetts) Jim Oberstar (D-Minnesota) David Obey (D-Wisconsin) John Olver (D-Massachusetts) Major Owens (D-New York) [/ul] [ul] Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-New Jersey) Ed Pastor (D-Arizona) Ron Paul (R-Texas) Donald Payne (D-New Jersey) Nancy Pelosi (D-California) David Price (D-North Carolina) Nick Rahall (D-West Virginia) Charles Rangel (D-New York) Silvestre Reyes (D-Texas) Lynn Rivers (D-Michigan, retired from office) Ciro Rodriguez (D-Texas, retired from office) Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-California) Bobby Rush (D-Illinois) [/ul] [ul] Martin Olav Sabo (D-Minnesota) Loretta Sanchez (D-California) Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) Thomas Sawyer (D-Ohio) Jan Schakowsky (D-Illinois) Bobby Scott (D-Virginia) Jose Serrano (D-New York) Louise Slaughter (D-New York) Vic Snyder (D-Arkansas) Hilda Solis (D-California) Pete Stark (D-California) Ted Strickland (D-Ohio) Burt Stupak (Michigan) [/ul] [ul] Mike Thompson (D-California) Bennie Thompson (D-Mississippi) John Tierney (D-Massachusetts) Edolphus Towns (D-New York) Mark Udall (D-Colorado) Tom Udall (D-New Mexico) [/ul] [ul] Nydia Velaquez (D-New York) Pete Visclosky (D-Indiana) Maxine Waters (D-California) Diane Watson (D-California) Melvin Watt (D-North Carolina) Lynn Woolsey (D-California) David Wu (D-Oregon) [/ul] [ul]
[/ul]

[eyoab2011_711]

And do not forget the resolution gave Bush the ability to make the decision, it did not require him to go to war in Iraq.  And many have in fact been critical of Dems who voted in favor many of whom did it out of political craveness rather than conviction

[Unknown Member]

It was a historic betrayal and ballsy abuse of the public trust.  Unfortunately, upwards around half of all voting Americans still do not realize how ruthlessly they were manipulated into that fiasco. 
 
I’m constantly reminded of Wolfowitz’ infamous comment in his interview with Vanity Fair where he admitted that he chose to scare the public with a [u]nuclear[/u] threat over a biological or chemical threat, not because he had more evidence that there was a nuclear threat, but rather because he knew the public would cave in more if they though it was a nuclear threat. He openly admitted he applied Goebbel’s laws of propaganda, such as [i]”just keep repeating it and they’ll believe it regardless of whether it’s really true”[/i], and also that old time hit [i]”fear trumps truth”.[/i]
 
Too many people have lost the ability to think rationally. And so we find professionals in the workplace who actually believe we found WMD in Iraq, and that Saddam was harboring terrorists, and that Obama was not born in the USA, and that there’s any possibility that our money might actaully say “In Muhammad we trust”. How farther dumbed-down can the public possibly go? 
 
 

[Unknown Member]

… and that Lois Lerner lost the IRS e-mails.

[kaldridgewv2211]

Quote from aldadoc

… and that Lois Lerner lost the IRS e-mails.

It’s off the Iraqistan topic, but that’s a hard one to swallow.  IRS please explain how a computer crash could lose emails on an email server.

[Unknown Member]

here’s the perspective from someone who was actually there…
 
 
[link=http://www.stonekettle.com/2014/06/absolutely-nothing.html?m=1]http://www.stonekettle.co…utely-nothing.html?m=1[/link]
 
good read.

[kayla.meyer_144]

Quote from DICOM_Dan

Quote from aldadoc

… and that Lois Lerner lost the IRS e-mails.

It’s off the Iraqistan topic, but that’s a hard one to swallow.  IRS please explain how a computer crash could lose emails on an email server.

BENGHAZI! CONSPIRACY!

Start a new thread if you are concerned with a new conspiracy & right-wing outrage. 
 
PS, it might have something to do with nefarious backups.
 
[link=http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/06/16/heres-how-the-irs-lost-emails-from-key-witness-lois-lerner/]http://www.washingtonpost…y-witness-lois-lerner/[/link]

[Unknown Member]

Sorry to rain on the Obama sycophant party. You guys were having so much fun Bush bashing!

It is really hilarious to see the lengths leftist will go to to justify Obama’s amateur hour foreign policy failures. He had a chance to shape the Geopolitical map, and booted it though epic weakness, naivety and miscalculation.

[eyoab2011_711]

The neo-cons still don’t seem to get the irony of this whole mess.  Reagan aided and abetted the mujhaddin and bin Laden in Afghanistan; sold weapons to Iran and Saddam and all have come back to bite us.  Bush then tears apart Iraq and abjectly fails to clean up his mess and bringing in Maliki from exile in Iran who goes on with de-baathification and purging Sunnis.  Then they seem confused when the Sunnis fight back and pretend we could magically get a SOFA that met the approval of the Iraqi parliament and that a few thousand America troops would be anything more than cannon fodder

[odayjassim1978_476]

oh god .. wolfowitz back on this sunday and then there was Bremer who tried to pull jo blow cool with that pic of him walking in Iraq with the boots…only thing is he dismantle the entire army

[Unknown Member]

And yet again, alda deflects. Keep running away alda. Keep running away. Don’t forget to get off the bus when you arrive at WWII.
 
 

[Unknown Member]

“You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you” – Trotski

Its harder to end a war than begin one. Indeed, everything that American troops have done in Iraq – all the fighting and all the dying, the bleeding and the building, and the training and the partnering – all of it has led to this moment of success. Now, Iraq is not a perfect place. It has many challenges ahead. But were leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq, with a representative government that was elected by its people. Were building a new partnership between our nations. – Barak Obama

“The world is a safer place now than it has ever been” – Barak Obama

Really?

[link=http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2014/06/why-obama-owns-iraq.php]http://www.powerlineblog….hy-obama-owns-iraq.php[/link]

[Unknown Member]

You keep focusing on words instead of actions. Yes, the US is now safer than it has been in decades. Ther have been far fewer deaths of our military troops, and no one has attacked us on US soil. That should be, and is, the most important concern of any President.

Can’t say the same for the previous POTUS. You know damn well that if the statement [i]”The world is a safer place now than it has ever been” [/i]is NOT true, then we have Dubya to thank for that, not Obama.

Stop being such an infant.

[Unknown Member]

Most readers here are not so naive that they would vilify a President for simply telling it like he sees it as it is happening. The truth is, the American way of life is far better now than it was the day Obama took over.

There is nothing wrong with being overly optimistic. It is far better than continually scaring the hell out of people to the extent that they duct tape their windows, send thousands of our kids to a senseless death as they fight in an idiotic war, or slay foreign leaders that pose no real threat to us at all. The hate, pessimism, and fear that has been spread by the right is far more destructive than the love, optimism, and security being spread by the left.

[kayla.meyer_144]

Bad & unwelcome advice from those who failed miserably. I guess their excuse is how they failed catastrophically, so who better should give advice.
 
 
[link=http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/06/the-past-is-never-dead-bill-faulkner-said-but-what-did-he-know/372887/]http://www.theatlantic.co…at-did-he-know/372887/[/link]
 

If you’re anything like me, when you hear the words “wise insights about the Iraq war,” two names that immediately come to mind are Paul Wolfowitz and Scooter Libby. 
Fortunately the [link=http://www.hertogprogram.org/]Hertog Institute[/link] has engaged them both to teach a course, “The War in Iraq: A Study in Decision-Making.” 
I will confess that when someone told me about this today, I assumed it was an[i]Onion[/i]-style joke. As in, “The Work-Family Balance: Getting It Right,” co-taught by John Edwards and Eliot Spitzer. But it turns out to be real. Or “real.”

 
 
 

[Unknown Member]

I wouldn’t be surprised if the youth of America boos them off the lecturn.
 
 

[Unknown Member]

If bin Laden was trying to take credit (with the help of the Mujahedin) for Russia’s bankruptcy, then he really WAS nuts. It was Reagan’s nuke race that crushed Gorbachev’s treasury. In fact, that was the fundamental flaw of the neocons and PNAC. Reagan never said “military dominance” was the key to the demise of the USSR, he simply said he needed to make them go bankrupt, and he used expensive nuke technology to do  it.
 
 

[Unknown Member]

I enjoyed reading the comments under Thor’s posted article in the leftist publication Salon. They lit up the Bammer pretty well. The readers aren’t buying the major premise of the blame shift.

[Unknown Member]

Yeah, the muck that lies under all those anonymous comment ‘rocks’ on the internet certainly carry the weight of informed objectivity alright. 
 
But I don’t suppose you were talking about this comment:
[blockquote][i]”Once you got to Iraq and took it over and took down Saddam Husseins government, then what are you going to put in its place? Thats a very volatile part of the world. And[b][link=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w75ctsv2oPU] if you take down the central government in Iraq, you could easily end up seeing pieces of Iraq fly off[/link][/b]. Part of it the Syrians would like to have, the west. Part of eastern Iraq the Iranians would like to claim. Fought over for eight years. In the north, youve got the Kurds. And if the Kurds spin loose and join with Kurds in Turkey, then you threaten the territorial integrity of Turkey. Its a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq.”[/i]
[i]- Dick Cheney, 1994[/i]
[/blockquote] Somehow, I wouldn’t say that comment[i] “lit up the Bammer” [/i]as much as it[i] crushes [/i]Cheney.  
 
 
 

[kaldridgewv2211]

That part about the Kurds joining the Kurds in Turkey.  I was under the impression the Kurds wanted to be the Kurds, kind of like Manny being Manny.  Kurdistan was a name I’ve heard for Northern Iraqistan, and it looked like the had a different value system.  I don’t want to say more western but malls and McDonalds, and they aren’t constantly trying to blow each other up.  I do seem to recall some kind of skirmish between them and Turkey.

[kayla.meyer_144]

Quote from DICOM_Dan

That part about the Kurds joining the Kurds in Turkey.  I was under the impression the Kurds wanted to be the Kurds, kind of like Manny being Manny.  Kurdistan was a name I’ve heard for Northern Iraqistan, and it looked like the had a different value system.  I don’t want to say more western but malls and McDonalds, and they aren’t constantly trying to blow each other up.  I do seem to recall some kind of skirmish between them and Turkey.

Um, have you ever heard of the PKK? Some sort of conflict, indeed.

[odayjassim1978_476]

Malaki better get his act together…we need that embassy/green zone to stand

[Unknown Member]

I believe Maliki is trying to play us like a fiddle the same [i]”sleep with the enemy” [/i]way that Musharraf tried to. Whatever happens, I highly doubt he will take the blame. Rather, he’ll point fingers everywhere else and plead innocent.
 
 

[odayjassim1978_476]

well I always think of his clueless half hearted response  when someone thru their shoe at our President and I thought you know dude you have a guest and you should have jumped in front of Bush…so I kind felt he was not up to the job then   but we have a  vast embassy in a Muslim country that can monitor all sorts of things..that stays

Quote from Lux

I believe Maliki is trying to play us like a fiddle the same [i]”sleep with the enemy” [/i]way that Musharraf tried to. Whatever happens, I highly doubt he will take the blame. Rather, he’ll point fingers everywhere else and plead innocent.

[btomba_77]

A sign of the coming apocalypse:
 
Glenn Beck on Iraq:
 

Now, in spite of the things I felt at the time when we went into war, liberals said: We shouldnt get involved. We shouldnt nation-build. And there was no indication the people of Iraq had the will to be free. I thought that was insulting at the time. Everybody wants to be free. They said we couldnt force freedom on people. Let me lead with my mistakes:  You are right. Liberals, you were right. We shouldnt have.
 
 
 
Not one more life. Not one more life. Not one more dollar, not one more airplane, not one more bullet, not one more Marine, not one more arm or leg or eye. Not one more.  This must end now. Now cant we come together on that?
 
…. 
But if we do to the liberals what they did to us and George W. Bush and make it just about politics, we will be divided more. This cannot become about the president. It cannot become about the Democrats. This has to become about the principles because in the principles we all agree. Enough is enough. Bring them home, period. ” 

 
I know that Beck is just trying to remake his image and this is probably just focus group driven populism … but still.   Nuts, huh?!
 
 

[kayla.meyer_144]

Another right-wing example of seeing which way the radical fringe winds are blowing the $$$ in. The winds are changing.

[kayla.meyer_144]

[attachment=0]

[btomba_77]

Quote from Frumious

Another right-wing example of seeing which way the radical fringe winds are blowing the $$$ in. The winds are changing.

 
Megyn Kelly piles on Dick Cheney on his Iraq performance and the total BS that was his Op-Ed last week.
 

Quote from Megyn Kelly

Time and time again, history has proven that you got it wrong as well in Iraq, sir.
 
You said there was no doubt Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. You said we would be greeted as liberators, you said the Iraq insurgency was in the last throes, back in 2005, and you said that after our intervention extremists would have to rethink their strategy of jihad. Now, with almost $1 trillion spent there, with almost 4,500 American lives lost there, what do you say to those who say [i][i]you[/i][/i] were so wrong about so much at the expense of so many?
 

 
 
 
 

[Unknown Member]

Well, not so fast, toward the end of the interview, Kelly practically apologizes to them and admits she was only asking questions that many people are asking, and what better platform to give them than to answer those questions back at the Faux corral? She could have jumped on him with any number of ridiculous retorts, but she gave him a free pass. Liz, the same way. I don’t know for sure if [i]”there are 58% more terrorist ‘[u]groups[/u]’ now than in 2010″,[/i] but even if it’s true, it seems far more certain the reason for such an expansion is that they’re on a free-for-all spree now that Saddam is gone, the nation is in total disarray, and every faction wants to beat everyone else up for a piece of the pie. Blaming Obama for such civil detritus is patently absurd. In any case, how the hell can anyone make any conclusions about such a terrorist specification? Obviously, the number of “groups” is no indication of the “total” number of terrorists! 
 
Where is Dick’n’Liz on the fact that the USA has still not been attacked under Obama? Where are they on the number of American lives lost in foreign disputes then vs. now? Where are they on the 800,000 jobs LOST each month toward the end of the Bush admin vs. 200,000+ jobs GAINED toward the end of the Obama admin, or the fact that a free-falling Bush economy has reversed and is slowly but steadily recovering? I guess [i]those[/i] facts don’t count, huh? 
 
Liz still can’t get away from her sordid fiction years ago (try to find a copy [i]anywhere[/i] today!), and Dick wants history to remember the he really was POTUS, not Dubya.
 
In fact, Liz slipped and called it the Bush/Cheney administration. How many times has anyone included the VP when referring back to a past WH administration?  A search for “clinton/gore administration” shows only 41 thousand hits, but a search for “clinton administration” shows [b]3 MILLION[/b] hits, the latter being [b]SEVENTY-THREE [/b]times more common than the former.
 
In stark contrast, “bush/cheney administration” shows a whopping 887 thousand hits while “bush administration” only shows [b]12 million[/b] hits, the latter only being about [b]FOURTEEN[/b] times higher!!! 
 
The Cheney’s simply have gone nuts. They can’t even achieve peace in their own family. They’re desperately trying to reframe a legacy that history already has relegated to the toilet. No bantering at Aunt Minnie can change that simple fact. 
 
 

[odayjassim1978_476]

great post

Quote from Lux

Well, not so fast, toward the end of the interview, Kelly practically apologizes to them and admits she was only asking questions that many people are asking, and what better platform to give them than to answer those questions back at the Faux corral? She could have jumped on him with any number of ridiculous retorts, but she gave him a free pass. Liz, the same way. I don’t know for sure if [i]”there are 58% more terrorist ‘[u]groups[/u]’ now than in 2010″,[/i] but even if it’s true, it seems far more certain the reason for such an expansion is that they’re on a free-for-all spree now that Saddam is gone, the nation is in total disarray, and every faction wants to beat everyone else up for a piece of the pie. Blaming Obama for such civil detritus is patently absurd. In any case, how the hell can anyone make any conclusions about such a terrorist specification? Obviously, the number of “groups” is no indication of the “total” number of terrorists! 

Where is Dick’n’Liz on the fact that the USA has still not been attacked under Obama? Where are they on the number of American lives lost in foreign disputes then vs. now? Where are they on the 800,000 jobs LOST each month toward the end of the Bush admin vs. 200,000+ jobs GAINED toward the end of the Obama admin, or the fact that a free-falling Bush economy has reversed and is slowly but steadily recovering? I guess [i]those[/i] facts don’t count, huh? 

Liz still can’t get away from her sordid fiction years ago (try to find a copy [i]anywhere[/i] today!), and Dick wants history to remember the he really was POTUS, not Dubya.

In fact, Liz slipped and called it the Bush/Cheney administration. How many times has anyone included the VP when referring back to a past WH administration?  A search for “clinton/gore administration” shows only 41 thousand hits, but a search for “clinton administration” shows [b]3 MILLION[/b] hits, the latter being [b]SEVENTY-THREE [/b]times more common than the former.

In stark contrast, “bush/cheney administration” shows a whopping 887 thousand hits while “bush administration” only shows [b]12 million[/b] hits, the latter only being about [b]FOURTEEN[/b] times higher!!! 

The Cheney’s simply have gone nuts. They can’t even achieve peace in their own family. They’re desperately trying to reframe a legacy that history already has relegated to the toilet. No bantering at Aunt Minnie can change that simple fact. 

[Unknown Member]

And it looks like Rand Paul agrees with me:

[link=http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/210177-paul-blames-iraq-crisis-on-bush-administration]http://thehill.com/blogs/…on-bush-administration[/link]

Also, I misspoke in my previous post. It was Lynn Cheney who wrote the lude fiction, not her daughter. Liz got into the public tussle with her sister when she ran for public office.

[odayjassim1978_476]

Bremer was like : anyway that’s not the point any more…we are where we are
 
and the GOP went ballistic with HRC comment what difference does it make at this point

[eyoab2011_711]

[link=http://www.salon.com/2014/06/16/sorry_george_w_bush_but_this_whole_mess_is_still_your_fault/]http://www.salon.com/2014…s_is_still_your_fault/[/link]
 
 

Abdul Bari Atwan, editor of the London-based Arabic newspaper Al-Quds al-Arabi, one of the few Western-based journalists to interview bin Laden, who spent three days with him in 1996. In a[link=http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2007/s2013661.htm] 2007 Australian Broadcasting Corporation interview[/link], Atwan recalled bin Laden explaining his long-term strategy:
[blockquote] He told me personally that he cant go and fight the Americans and their country. But if he manages to provoke them and bring them to the Middle East and to their Muslim worlds, where he can find them or fight them on his own turf, he will actually teach them a lesson.
 
Naureckas also cited bin Ladens[link=http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16990-2004Nov1.html?sub=AR] 2004 video message[/link] in which bin Laden recalled fighting alongside the Mujahedin as they bled Russia for 10 years until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat. The same could be done with the U.S., he said, citing estimates that the Sept. 11 attacks, which cost al-Qaida $500,000, had cost the U.S. more than $500 billion in destruction and military expenditures.
[/blockquote]

[blockquote]  
[/blockquote]

[Unknown Member]

Quote from aldadoc

… and that Lois Lerner lost the IRS e-mails.

Oh big friggin deal. As if such inflamed speculation warrants shutting down the government or calling for impeachment. 
 
What idiots.

[Unknown Member]

This discussion is about IRAQ, alda. Please stay on topics and TRY to stop deflecting for once in your [i]full-of-denial[/i] life!
 
 

[Unknown Member]

Quote from aldadoc

The Al-Maliki government is corrupt…

Because he’s beholden to Iran and Syria?

Is Iraq any more “corrupt” than any recipient of The Marshall Plan who felt obligated to support USA’s Pax Americana” policies as a [i]quid pro quo[/i] after WWII?

[btomba_77]

A great article – I recommend reading 
 
[link=http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-06-15/how-u-s-politics-undermines-u-s-security]http://www.bloombergview….ndermines-u-s-security[/link]
 
[b]
How U.S. Politics Undermines U.S. Security[/b][/h1]  

As Iraq [link=http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-06-12/obama-won-t-rule-out-airstrikes-to-aid-iraq-s-army.html]unravels[/link], a painful truth about U.S. politics and foreign policy is becoming more evident: The U.S. is very good in all-or-nothing situations, but all-or-nothing situations don’t often arise.
 
This is a country that can and will meet existential threats with unity of purpose and vast resources. In this regard, even now, it stands alone. Few threats rise to that level. Lesser dangers can still be serious, without commanding or justifying that kind of response. Precisely for that reason, they put greater stress on democratic politics, and U.S. politics seems ever less able to cope.
…
 
In the foreseeable future, there’ll be no victory against jihadism. That’s partly because it doesn’t pose enough of a threat to justify total war against it. Yet the idea that jihadism poses no threat to the U.S. and can simply be ignored is risible. The danger can’t be crushed; it can only be managed. This means confronting it intelligently and patiently — with allies wherever possible, and always measuring the (uncertain) benefits of action against the (uncertain) costs.
 
 
“Mission accomplished” illustrates what Cordesman calls the end-state fallacy — the idea that deep-seated conflicts can be brought neatly to an end. So does President Barack Obama’s remark on the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq in 2011: “We’re leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq.”
 
 
 
The U.S. and the world will be safer if the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria — a group that faults al-Qaeda for its moderation — doesn’t establish a proto-state straddling the Iraq-Syria border. In my view, that justifies airstrikes against its forces, allied with political demands on Maliki and his government. Part of the calculation is that the costs and risks of airstrikes are limited and commensurate to what can plausibly be achieved. All-out war against this emerging new force doesn’t meet that test.
 
Whatever he decides in this case, Obama is certainly inclined to this approach, preferring cold analysis to choosing sides in a war between freedom and people who hate freedom. Witness his [link=http://www.whitehouse.gov/live/president-makes-statement-iraq]statement on Friday[/link], when he said he was looking at options for action against ISIS. Yet it’s striking how often he declares wins, however implausibly, and how trapped he sometimes gets in his own simplistic narratives. When the administration rejected Maliki’s request for airstrikes earlier this year, you can bet a main reason was: “How do we square this with the claim that we just brought the Iraq war to an end?” It’s a claim that should not have been made in the first place.
 
Why was it made? Because of politics, obviously. The pressure to declare victory when nobody has won, to divide factions into fast friends and evil enemies, to ground complex decisions in simple, overriding principles rather than complex trade-offs, isn’t self-inflicted. It’s imposed by voters. It’s all very well to say that leaders need to educate their citizens in the difficulties of foreign policy — which is true — but quite another to do it.
 
In the U.S., this civic task gets harder all the time. The political climate is ever less forgiving. According to his critics, George W. Bush wasn’t just wrong about Iraq; he lied and betrayed his country. Obama doesn’t just disappoint his critics; he disgusts them. Responding to these sentiments and amplifying them at the same time, politicians increasingly find it necessary not just to disagree with each other, but also to repudiate everything their opponents stand for.
 
In this way, political polarization tends also to confound security calculations. Cautious realism and strategic patience — the virtues stressed by Cordesman in meeting the new security demands — are hard to practice under the best of conditions. The first requires a space for doubt and good-faith disagreement, which are increasingly frowned upon. The second requires a policy sustained from one administration to the next, not wholesale rejection of what went before.
 
It’s an open question whether U.S. politics is capable of delivering the foreign policy the country now needs.

[btomba_77]

[link=https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/us-embassy-withdrawal-baghdad-iraq/2020/09/27/9c222de8-00ca-11eb-8879-7663b816bfa5_story.html]https://www.washingtonpos…663b816bfa5_story.html[/link]
 
[b]U.S. tells Iraq its planning to pull out of Baghdad embassy   [/b]
 

The United States has told the Iraqi government and its diplomatic partners that its planning a full withdrawal from its sprawling embassy in Baghdad unless Iraq reins in attacks on personnel linked to the American presence there, U.S. and other Western officials said Sunday.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo notified Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi of the decision Saturday night, according to an official familiar with the matter.

A second person, a Western official in Baghdad, said his countrys diplomatic mission had been informed of the plan. Two European officials said they were due to meet with U.S. representatives Sunday evening.

It remains unclear if the White House has signed off on the decision to close the facility. The process of shutting it down is expected to take 90 days, a window that would give the Trump administration the opportunity to reassess the decision, said a diplomat familiar with the situation.

 
 

[btomba_77]

[link=https://thehill.com/policy/defense/army/560468-us-conducts-airstrikes-against-iran-backed-militia-groups-on-iraq-syria]https://thehill.com/polic…a-groups-on-iraq-syria[/link]

US conducts airstrikes against Iran-backed militia groups on Iraq-Syria border[/h1]

“At [link=https://thehill.com/person/president-biden]President Biden[/link]’s direction, U.S. military forces earlier this evening conducted defensive precision airstrikes against facilities used by Iran-backed militia groups in the Iraq-Syria border region, the Pentagon said in a statement. 
 
The Pentagon said the strikes targeted operational and weapons storage facilities which Iran-backed militia groups Kata’ib Hezbollah (KH) and Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada (KSS) used to engage in unmanned aerial vehicle attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq.
 
As demonstrated by this evening’s strikes, President Biden has been clear that he will act to protect U.S. personnel. Given the ongoing series of attacks by Iran-backed groups targeting U.S. interests in Iraq, the President directed further military action to disrupt and deter such attacks, the Pentagon said. 
[/QUOTE]
 

[btomba_77]

[h1][b]U.S. and Iraq Agree to Combat Troop Withdrawal[/b][/h1]

[link=https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-iraq-to-agree-that-u-s-combat-troops-should-leave-by-end-of-2021-11626975666]Wall Street Journal[/link]: Top Iraqi and U.S. officials plan to issue a statement calling for U.S. combat troops to leave Iraq by year-end, both nations officials said, but would reaffirm the need for a U.S. military presence to help Iraqi forces in their fight against Islamic State.
 

[kaldridgewv2211]

I’ve been reading about how we train these forces to fend for themselves for the last 20+ years.   Look at what happened in Afghanistan.  We pull out and half the country has already been taking over by the Taliban.  These people need to want to make their own country and kick the $h1t out of terrorists.  If they’re like these Afghani people they’ll be fudged too.