I’m kind of glad I let my subscription to The New Republic lapse about two years ago, because the kind of nonsense passing for advice to pols over there is amazing. Noam Schreiber wants Democrats to push for military action against Iran or North Korea so that they can be “credible” on national security.
Lemme ask a question here: who was more credible on the Iraq war, looking back at things – The Washington Post and The New Republic, or Al Gore and Howard Dean?
I thought so.
Democrats get credibility on national security by doing what we’ve always done: kill the bad people who threaten America. It was a Democrat who defeated the Nazis, a Democrat who dropped the atomic bomb and ended WWII and it will take a Democrat to really lead us in the war and terror, destroying Al Qaeda and their affiliates. Because the people currently in charge can’t even stage a fake media event right.
Good point.
After North Vietnam attacked us, I was glad Kennedy and Johnson went in.
That’s exactly the point – Kennedy and Johnson made the mistake of trying to look tough, the same road Schreiber’s pointing down here. I don’t even want Republicans to make that mistake, cause it gets people killed.
Here s a hypothetical to chew on;
What if George Bush, Cheney and Rummy were mind-melding during the Bay of Pigs invasion. Think the outcome might have been different?
PSU94-
You fool! Don’t you realize that the road to Cuba lay through Vietnam?
Wow, that’s obviously an important question since two different people asked it.
Okay, I’ll bite. Bush would’ve attacked Sweden.
Here’s a hypothetical to chew on;
What if George Bush, Cheney and Rummy were mind-melding during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Think the outcome might have been different?
Larry, Moe and Curley Joe
I think the first (and biggest) mistake of the cold war was not letting MacArthur threaten nukes in Korea in 1950. China had none, Russia only a few. It would have shut the cold war off IMO.
It was a Democrat who defeated the Nazis, a Democrat who dropped the atomic bomb and ended WWII and it will take a Democrat to really lead us in the war and terror, destroying Al Qaeda and their affiliates
It’s really incredible that you could minimize one of America’s finest hours of unity into a partisan effort by Democrats — and a Democrat, no less.
It will take a Democrat to really lead us in the war [on] terror, destroying Al Qaeda and their affiliates.
I’d really love to know how “a Democrat” would acomplish the destruction of “al Qaeda and its affiliates.”
The right wing was talking appeasement of Hitler. It’s really amazing that you could ignore the fact that our greatest battle ever was led by two Democrats who also pushed social security, national healthcare, and would consider Bill Clinton and John Kerry on the far right.
>>It s really amazing that you could ignore the fact that our greatest battle ever was led by two Democrats who also pushed social security, national healthcare
Don’t confuse poor Frank with actual statement of fact. He may implode.
JK
Oliver: You know better than that — what was the vote for a declaration of war in December 1941?
Which Republicans didn’t join the armed forces? Ration war materials? Participate in Civil Defense? Which Republican didn’t go to work in defense plants? How many Democrats were in the Manhattan Project?
Trust me, Clinton and Kerry would never be considered on the far right of anything, except maybe Stalin’s regime.
And, JK, we know whose side you would have been on in WW II – the “let’s exterminate the inferior ones” side.
Al Gore 2002 — “Iraq does pose a serious threat to the stability of the Persian Gulf and we should organize a national coalition to eliminate his access to WMD. Iraq’s search for WMD has proven impossible to completely deter and we should assume it will continue”
Is this what you mean by Al being right? Because it was Bill Clinton who changed our Iraq policy to one of “regime change”. Back when Stephanoupolis (sp?) was calling for Saddams assassination on Meet the Press. I could go on and on here with similar quotes from Dem’s, even the Uber-lib Ted Kennedy sang a similar tune when it was the Dem’s attacking Iraq, ineffectually and w/out U.N. approval i might add.
As one could also list Republican Quotes concerning Bosnia at the time that sound a lot like what those on the left are saying now. Politics as usual I am sorry to say.
How about all the things Dems were predicting that never came true, were they lying to me? No, they were just wrong. Off the top of my head i remember… 1. we would institute a draft 2. there would be a thundering herd of refugees pouring over the border when we went in, remember the empty tent cities that were prepared. 3. The elections will never happen on schedule, too much chaos, well they happened on schedule and yesterday’s voting with very little opposition from the “insurgents”.
As for Dean, please, he has got to be the worst politician i have ever seen. Well the worst that actually made it somewhere anyway. Mr. Clinton is the best I’ve ever seen, wether that is good or not I don’t know,
on a personal level i prefer people who would not make good politicians,
at the same time, a person needs to win an election to enact his/her policies.
Oliver, i must commend you on speaking out against Farrakhan (sp?) etc. While I am not steeped in knowledge concerning Black leaders I can only assume there are far better examples. Especially Louie, did you hear that bit the other day where he talks about going up into spaceships and speaking with Muhammed, holy crap, this guy might be the nuttiest “religious” leader in America, I can’t believe he is given more credibility than any other U.F.O. cult leader. I thought Pat Robertson was embarrassing, yikes.
Anyway, i can see why you like Dean, brothers in bomb-throwing and all. I prefer calm, respectful, reasoned debate myself and find my self usually disagreeing with you, especially when you call others stupid, this does not serve your purpose, is not Progressive AT ALL, and I’m pretty sure with a little reflection you could think back on stupid things you have done/said,
realize that you, like all of us, will probably say or do something stupid
in the future and stop pointing puerile fingers.
Enjoy yourselves all.
Also, as to your comment on WWII.
Willkie, FDR’s opponent in the election as I’m sure you know, supported
Rooseys foreign policy of aid for Britian, he voiced his opposition to his other policies, New Deal social programs, etc.
It is my understanding that until he was elected he also was promising not to take the U.S. into the war, he just wanted to aid the Brits in the fight.
A lot like LBJ who called his opponent a war monger ( I am forgetting his name, McGovern was it?) and promised not to send “our boys to fight a war that should be fought by Asian boys” and then 2 weeks into his Presidency he sent in the troops.
It is my understanding that when FDR gave his S of the U address in ‘41
and spoke disparagingly of the non-interventionist and spoke of appeasement it was a surprise and shortly thereafter he proposed the Lend-Lease act which would give the Brits a line of credit for our aid shipments. The Republicans did vote against this, 135 of 159 anyway,
yet I think this speaks more to partisan politics and isolationism than to appeasing Hitler, regardless, the Republican he had ran against supported aiding Britain.
So, if you could please, tell me who these Republicans were and where i can find them speaking of appeasing Hitler, a far cry from isolationism. I
do not doubt you have this info, I would like to see it for myself.
Also any pre ‘41 quotations of FDR’s where he calls for American intervention in Europe would be appreciated.
The Democrats of the WWII era were not the Democrats of today. The same should be said of the Republicans. Have we forgotten the mass exodus of Dixiecrats (and their northern kin) after LBJ freed the slaves in 1964?
Seriously, though, OW, methinks you are oversimplifying history in your statements about WWII. Personally, I don’t see the value in identifying with an historical precedent that doesn’t exist. FDR and Truman didn’t “defeat the Nazis” by themselves; the Germans set themselves up for defeat by opening up a two-front war against the U.S./UK on one side, and the angered, desperate Soviets on the other (not to mention the latters’ greatest ally, the Russian winter). I won’t even get into the whole nuking of civilian targets thing; that bit of propaganda has long since been discredited.
That said, when you begin talk about national security with the phrase ‘killing the bad people,’ I don’t see how you can expect to be taken seriously. Who gets to decide who’s bad, and based on what criteria? If we think they are in another country, do we reserve the right to traipse across the globe and kill them? Should we then be held accountable for any innocents who become ‘collateral damage’?
It’s not good enough to be smarter imperialists than the neo-con-led Bushies. If we’re really serious about national security, then we have to take an honest look at how our arrogance and imperialism upset global security and make us ripe, worthy targets. Anything short of that is just hypocrisy.
“It s not good enough to be smarter imperialists than the neo-con-led Bushies. If we re really serious about national security, then we have to take an honest look at how our arrogance and imperialism upset global security and make us ripe, worthy targets. Anything short of that is just hypocrisy.”
Copy that
Quote of the Day…
…and as so often lately, a blogger says smarter stuff than most anybody else. Oliver, this time…
You two are into the “root causes of ____” game again.
I know the main causes of the miltant Arabs’ hatred for the West, and the short list doesn’t include either arrogance or imperialism.
There has been no shortage of arrogance in the Middle East since the beginnings of the Ottoman Empire. The problem is two fold — heresy against fundamentalism, whoever is practicing it, even in the modern Islamic world.
The second problem is, come on, spell it with me: I – S – R – A – E – L.
When the entire Islamic is ready to go back to the 12th century, and “push Israel into the sea”, the terrorists will be done, and not before.
This “arrogant imperialist” nonsense is just that — nonsense; self – flagellation.
Since this is OW’s space, Frank, I won’t bother to scold you for your bigotry. Not that it would do much good, anyway. However, I will reprimand you for trying to force my arguments into the narrow framework of your bigotry.
By trying to dilate everything– from legitimate Arab/Muslim grievances to violent Islamist extremism– into some amorphous, practically genetically encoded ‘hatred for the West,’ you immediately move the goalposts out of the stadium. Nice try.
We don’t have to destroy Israel, just get it to move back to the 1967 borders and abandon all the illegal settlements. (Israel did not exist between the first century C.E. and the mid-20th century. It was primarily cynical Western support for radical modern Zionism which led to the Israel we have today.) Then we can help the Palestinians build their independent state– free of Israeli influence. After we do that, we can pull our military bases out of the oil-rich countries that host us, or at least force the dictatorships we support (e.g. the House of Saud) to start actually respecting the human rights (you know, liberty, freedom, democracy, that sort of thing) of their citizens.
We’ll never get rid of violent extremism, religious or otherwise. Even here in the Land of Freedom and Plenty, you’ve still got legions of spoiled, nihilistic nitwits who dream (and plot) of taking up arms against ‘the government’, or negroes, or some other such scapegoat for their own feelings of failure and insecurity.
What we can do is stop participating in the oppression of people in the name of cheap labor and cheap oil (activities not limited to the Middle East). The U.S. is by no means the only evil actor in such affairs, but to pretend that we haven’t been involved in any such thing is the real frickin’ nonsense. Grow up.
Alex;
If you asked this guy what he thought 40 years ago, it would be a duplicate of his mindset today. He is fixed, immutable. Proceed at the risk of interminable frustration. His thinking needs no fixing. His goal is to change yours and has much in common with the calcified RWR and Bush II. In other words, little or no imagination, just absolute certainty of righthood. But, for your own amusement, proceed with caution. Keep low expectations.
Alex:
“Scold me for my bigotry?” Are you kidding me?
I was referring to Islamic militants. While I don’t believe that all Muslims are fanatical, or extremists, or even anti – Western, I certainly do believe that the average Muslim has, for whatever reason, some difficulty in criticvizing them.
But that has nothing whatever to with my point. My point (and you’ll never know how much I hate repeating / explaining myself to people who claim to have the ability to read) was that the anti – colonialist, anti -imperialist impulses in the Middle East have been played out, acted upon and realized. The formation of OPEC was the final chapter of the colonial and imperial story in the Middle East.
What drives the current crop of Islamic extremists is not a variation thereof. It is religious fanaticism, and anti – Israeli hatred. Period. All the other stuff you’re selling — “It was primarily cynical Western support for radical modern Zionism which led to the Israel we have today”; “we can pull our military bases out of the oil-rich countries that host us”; “start actually respecting the human rights … of their citizens” is propaganda — a way of making extremist schemes sound more palatable.
The last two paragraphs of your post, as far as I’m concerned, have nothing whatever with my point, so I have nothing whatever to say about them. They’re your hang ups, not mine.
Leo: You’re doing it again. You’re not contributing anything with your senseless criticisms. What you (wrongly) think I may have thought 40 years ago, couldn’t be more irrelevant. I don’t even know what RWR is, let alone why it might be calcified (and, yes, I know hat calcified means.)
When it comes to the Middle East, my thinking is far newer and fresher than 40 years old. And, “immutable thinking”, as you call it, can also mean, “I was right then, and and I’m right now.” Have every one of your ideas changed since you first developed them, or are some “immutable”? If they have all changed, I find that sad.
To say I have little or no imagination is gratuitously insulting, and obviously designed to discredit me in the eyes of another poster, as is “… proceed with caution. Keep low expectations.”
Perhaps you are attempting to “fix his thinking”?
I thought maybe you were ready to approach this blog like an adult …
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