Posted on 08/21/2007 12:15:03 PM PDT by johnny7
Incidentally y'all. The Democrat obsession about Iraq is totally phony, that is, a political theatre. Iraq is far, far too important to ever leave. The bases there now are built as permanent.
If Hillary wins a big deal will be made about "leaving Iraq." Some troops will come home to the "stage" of the Media. It will be a "great" decision. All the while at least one hundred thousand will stay. And the Media will say nothing about that. It will become a non-spoken, non-issue, in deference to child care, healthcare, elderlycare, women's equality, budget balance (by raising taxes) etc.
The people think what the Media want them to think. The people think about what the Media want them to think about. It's called the MATRIX.
To emphasize again, I am not claiming that the achievements of the political process (examples in previous post) in teh U.S. pre-1787 was perfect only that it was light years ahead of Iraq. That’s all I am claiming here.
If the government was functioning flawlessly... the left would damn it for its lack of female representation. Their arguments are really just a PR facade... they've written off Iraq from day-one.
The US’ independence was gained under far different circumstances than Iraq’s, thus there are notable differences. The Iraqi gov’t went through three elections, passed a constitution and is working towards other laudable goals. Certainly they have not achieved as much as we’d like. Nonetheless, the comparison I made and stand by is that both countries faced difficult political challenges that took years to overcome and hash out. Iraq’s is complicated by the prescence of Al Qeada, our forces, and a history of a ruling minority that subverted a majority. The Iraqis, like early America, are struggling politically to overcome great political divides and ideological differences of opinion. In time they may succeed. Rather than bashing them at every turn and discouraging them, we should be supporting them and mindful of the challenges we overcame and refer to that as a source of hope for them to overcome as well.
Sorry about the DU dig. You’re entitled to your opinion about the war and I respect it whether or not agree with it. You’re replied to me with respect and I appreciate that.
Putting aside a difference of opinion, though I’m not sure if and how much there really is, as to how far advanced the political progress of one as compared to the other was, I restate my position more generally again by saying both faced political difficulties, the people of both were not estatic with the progress being made, at times it seemed the country would split apart, and it took a long time and lots of debate to prevent that from happening and arriving at a system that worked.
Mr.
Wright,
Have you ever read Michael Yon’s dispatches?
http://www.michaelyon-online.com/
He has spent the better part of the last couple of years over there, and he seems to report pretty straight.
“This threadbare comparison is completely bogus.”
I know that you think that a coherent argument, but it’s not. It’s impossible to even guess at the point you’re trying to make.
AWW said about Americas political progress between 1776-1789: "It was a paradise compared to Iraq. Let's get real. The Iraqis would be extremely lucky to be governed under the same conditions as operated under the Articles."
Also a much easier task by light years as they were basically all of one and the same religion that had no sects or denominations dictating death to different denominations. Plus it was a nation united (finally) by opposition to a common enemy even thought it was only a minority that rebelled against Great Britain.
Additionally you are also talking about a people (the inhabitants of the new America) who were used to ruling their own lives except for taxation - something light years away from what the people of Iraq experienced during the brutal murderous regime Saddam imposed for the 30 years prior to liberation.
AWW also said, "No Consensus? Well....there was enough "consensus" to defeat the Brits, get a favorable peace, and establish the Northwest Ordinance (all pre-1787)."
He is absolutely correct ... as far as he goes. What he does not address is how the 13 new states put off the major divisions and effectively created two countries (free and slave) that would eventually have their separate postal systems etc. However, putting it off did not solve it. It took the bloodiest war in our history to put those divisions behind us and fully unite the country. I believe it was called by many the War Between the States. And the result of that war left such scars it was not until The War to End All Wars parts of the south once again celebrated the 4th of July. The current death tolls in Iraq are still light years away from the deaths in our very own civil war.
AWW concluded with, "Again, the Iraqis would be lucky to have the same degree of political consensus, safety, and civility as Americans achieved under the Articles. Were the Articles perfect? Of course not. But by any standard of success they were alway light years compared to the political mess in Iraq.
I wonder what the new United States could have achieved if after winning independence from England the French and the Spanish and others had joined with those who opposed independence throughout the Revolutionaray War. While we will probably never know because the French and Spanish were an ocean away - as opposed to light years away. Plus they probably didn't want to be drawn into an actual war with England who most suspected would return to take back what they believed to be theirs. And come back they did in what came to be known as the War of 1812 when they burned down Washington DC. That was when we, the United States of America finally - really - completed the war for independence. Of course we had our own civil war coming in 50 some years before we could truly unite the states. The people would finally unite another 60 some years later during the first world war.
A strange thing history.
Cheers!
The articles use of quotes does not support the conclusions...the opening paragraph is meant to pull the reader into the article, and, the quote used is just two words inserted into a statement that can not be attributed to the subject...Dishonest news article by Reuters...it is just an editorial, but, without the label.
me bad...I meant opening sentence...the second sentence is a direct quote with the two previous quoted words included to validate(somewhat)the opening sentence.
The most important turning point of the war since the fall of Saddam in 2003 has been occurring in the last eight weeks when the Sunni Arabs have begun the major rebellion against Al Qaeda all over Iraq. Al Qaeda terrorists have lost their most important line of defense which was the support and shelter provided by the Sunni Arabs population. Now that the terrorists do not have this anymore, it is all over for them, our troops will annihilate them at a very fast rate.
In five to eight months form now, the whole world will realize that America won the war, and that Al Qaeda, Iran, Syria and their terrorist proxies are utterly defeated in Iraq.
God bless our brave troops and President Bush.
And then 75 years later, that fragile coalition of states cobbled together through a series of compromises at the Constitutional Convention collapsed into 4 years of bloody war that took the lives of nearly 1 million Americans.
Next bogus history lesson please.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.