Posted on 07/31/2007 7:09:49 AM PDT by IrishMike
As I predicted earlier in the day, the left wing blogosphere has turned on the Brookings scholars who went to Iraq and noted the results of the surge. Glenn Greenwald, a.k.a. “The Lion of Jalalabad”, penned a characteristically windy attempt at character assassination. Thankfully, Matthew Yglesias showed more brevity.
Characteristically, both pieces didn’t take issue with what Brookings-men Kenneth Pollack and Michael O’Hanlon reported seeing in Iraq but instead attacked them personally. If you’ve studied the moonbats in their native habitats as I have the past several years, this comes as no surprise. After all, what is the chickenhawk meme but an attempt to win an argument by attacking your opponent rather than engaging his ideas? Has anyone come back from Iraq recently and not seen progress? Wouldn’t an effective rebuttal of O’Hanlon’s and Pollack’s article sought out such friendly sources?
When it comes to dealing substantively with Iraq, the left has a problem. For four joyous years, the left could properly point to a series of Bush administration miscalculations and screw-ups. In spite of being the first MBA president, President Bush spent years without having his entire administration working out of the same playbook. Donald Rumsfeld wanted to topple nations, not build them. And Colin Powell – well, who knows what his shop wanted? All we know is that State’s viceroy in Baghdad, Paul Bremer, made a series of grievous miscalculations such as the disastrous DeBaathification program.
Historians will long debate how much blame President Bush will get for these blunders. War is a tough business, and even successful ones are chock-full of screw-ups. Abe Lincoln doesn’t take much of a rap in the history books for letting the inept George McClellan or the buffoonish “Fightin’ Joe” Hooker run his armies during the Civil War.
(Excerpt) Read more at hughhewitt.townhall.com ...
Tellin’ it like it is.
“The Democrat Party owns defeat.”
Rush Limbaugh
The problem with the Dems they made 911 political the easy part was attacking Bush strengths and hypnotizing America into believing that we were headed in the wrong direction. Hence the economy... BOOMING no doubt but the message is that it sucks because it is only helping the rich the half of America that they are results oriented fall for this hypnosis crap as they live in the now.... They care little for historical perspectives. We who support at any cost see the threat as existential and care little of the now view.
Yes but the Conservatives still have a slim chance to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat and pen the Democrats as the party on the wrong side of History.
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Osama Bin Laden - D Afghanistan
Contrary to the conventional wisdom, I don’t think Bush made many “blunders” at all. It’s called WAR. You move, they countermove. You could point to a dozen dates in WW II where the war could have been dramatically shortened, or greatly extended, if a few things had changed.
“It takes time to figure out the right plan to win when fighting a civil war wrapped in an insurrection and inspired by religious fanatics.....”
We do have an operational template for this war and it is called Viet Nam.
In 1968 General Creighton Abrams took over command of the war effort from woefully misguided General William Westmoreland who was trying to fight a WWII set piece engagement in the canopied jungles of South East Asia.
The parallels between General Petreus and General Abrams are eerily similar. General Abrams changed the war aim from nation building to strategic pacification and stabilization just as General Petreus is doing in Iraq. And as in Abram’s plan in Viet Nam, Petreus’ plan in Iraq is working.
We must not allow the professional America-haters and defeatniks to steal the victory that is being won on the ground in Iraq as they did in Viet Nam.
Contrary to the conventional wisdom, I don’t think Bush made many “blunders” at all. It’s called WAR. You move, they countermove.
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I absolutely agree with that.
Conservatives are too busy running away from Bush. The NYT article is a set up for the news on Iraq to get better the instant Hillary is elected. Just like the economy will suddenly be reported on accurately around november 10,2008.
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