The Bush Administration Drives Rahm Emanuel Shrill!

Rahm says, about the September "surge report":

Quote Of The Day | TPMCafe: After years of slogans and soundbites Americans deserve an even-handed assessment of conditions in Iraq. Sadly, we will only receive a snapshot from the same people who told us the mission was accomplished and the insurgency was in its last throes. We’ve spent hundreds of billions of dollars and lost thousands of lives in Iraq. An honest report from our generals and diplomats about the status of the war isn’t too much to ask...

Comments

[ed]

More like this, please.

[bakho]

We already got the honest report:

"There is no miliatary solution, only a political solution."

Unfortunately Bush is clueless and in denial. Someone who denies reality is not capable of giving and honest answer to anything. Bush thinks the military will find a pony in the pile of sh*t he has created in Iraq.

[andres]

I wouldn't put it as harshly as bakho, but yes, Ramh does sound rather naive in believing that an honest report isn't too much too ask. The invasion of Iraq was both an immoral crime and a strategic blunder, and systematic denial of the situation is the only way this administration is going to be able to pass off this mess for someone else to clean up, and without being put on trial.

[christofay]

The White House is going to write the anticipated September report. There will be ponies, and there might even be a page where you can color in a pony yourself. As the surge has gone on, one of the depressing facts that has developed is Gen Betrayus is Bush's guy, a get along to go along kind of guy. You can go fishing with 'em or have a beer with 'em as you will.

I am afraid security for the States should include a 20% cut in our Pentagon and CIA spending. We're spending way too much and just creating more risks as we go. Economizing would be a solution to focus on where we should be focusing. Purging military officers who have become more red than expert would also be good.

Cutting any private contractor in either of those edifices should be a given. Enough of that boondoggle. Otherwise offer the choice of decimation if something goes wrong, you know, an incentive.

will it happen, no way. Let's drift.

[David Lloyd-Jones]

Funny, Petraeus strikes me as a perfectly competent writer, while I don't know of any honest and competent writers in the White House.

I'm sure that whatever General Petraeus might decide to write might be a reasonable basis for discussion. (In his shoes I suspect I would be thinking "Wey-yull, since I can't have the 600,000 troops I need, what can I cobble up until, until, uh, until...?")

If it comes out of the White House then I expect slime and misdirection, in which any sort of discussion one might tr will lead into a concoction of irrelevancies.

[PeterE]

Expressions of moral indignation such as Emanuel's seem self-serving to me-- rather than naive. The Democrats don't have a clear and plausible policy on Iraq and the Middle East, or even on issues such as wiretapping. They just have a cacophony of slogans and sound bites. I think it likely that the next President will be a Republican, faute de mieux.
BUT one thing is clear: The Democrats are walking a road paved with good intentions.

[sglover]

Look, the Dems should have taken the lead, and simply refused to fund Bush's strategic disaster. Before that they should have cranked up serious investigations with impeachment right ON the fucking table, dead center, like a big fat candelabra.

It is no longer possible -- if it ever was, really -- for Dems to reflexively point in Bush's direction and wail, "Waaah! He did it! " It only emphasizes their own cowardly, and jaw-droppingly stupid, betrayals.

[Hal]

sglover has it exactly right. In a sense if the Bush administration is beyond terrible the Democrats are even worse since they have systematically and consciously betrayed the voters who elected them in 2006 and lied to those voters about what they could expect of them. The Democrats are no more honest than the GOP but they are more hypocritical and shameless.

[andres]

Quiet please, this meeting of moral midgets is hereby called to order. Now that we've finished with the preliminaries of calling the Democrats traitors to their constituents and accusing them of playing Chamberlain to Bush's Fuhrer, let's look at what the reality-based (ie non-infantile) anti-Bush community has to say on the subject:

(1) There are simply not enough votes for impeachment and removal. _Maybe_ you can sweet-talk centrist Democrats in swing districts on the House to vote for impeachment, but if you think you can persuade sixteen Republican senators to vote for removal, I want to know what you idiots are smoking.

(2) The mainstream media is controlled by players who have backed the invasion to the hilt, and they will be quick to label any attempt to Defund the Iraq war as a vicious betrayal of our brave troops. And if Defunding is imposed by Congress against the wishes of the President, the MSM _will_ be believed. Does the term dolchstosslegende mean anything to you clowns?

And of course, there is the small matter of not having enough votes to go through with Defunding. Any of you people feel up to persuading the newly non-Democratic Joe Lieberman?

(3) It's true that Democrats don't have a clear and plausible policy on Iraq. Headline news: the last asshole who had a clear and plausible policy on Iraq is the one who got us into this cluster****. Good policy requires looking at all sides of the issue; get used to it. And yes, a substantial number of Democrats voted for the invasion in large part because they believed the lies and wishful thinking put forward by Bush and co. Too openminded and willing to give the benefit of the doubt? Definitely, but that's the price one has to pay for looking at the issues without ideological blinkers.

I'm willing to believe that leaving Iraq immediately may well be the best solution. But I absolutely refuse to shut down debate on what is the best way to leave or to reject _nuanced_ considerations on what will happen after we leave.

(4) If you want impeachment or Defunding or an immediate pullout, ask yourself what you've done to help that wing of the Democratic party enact such policies, ie by getting more of them elected. But oh, I forgot, you're sick of the Democratic party and plan to vote for Ralph Nader or whatever other "Democrats are just as bad" stooge runs next year.

Sorry about the anger, but it's people like your bunch who get manipulated again and again to the benefit of right-wing political parties in all countries. And if another left-wing candidate ends up throwing the presidential elections to Romney or Giuliani next year (or whatever other jerk who thinks he can end the Iraq war by winning it), as happened in both 1968 and 2000, then I hope you people fry. I really do.

Brad, feel free to delete this comment if it's too inflammatory, but I stand by every word of it.

[anne]

All I know is that 4 1/2 years of needless tragedy have passed with thousands of American s deaths and tens of thousands of casualties, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi deaths and 2 million internal and external refugees, $2 trillion squandered, but each of the 3 leading Democratic candidates for President are telling us we will continue to occupy Iraq indefinitely if elected.

I only care that we leave Iraq immediately and completely, and will likely not vote for a candidate who is not pledged to leave Iraq immediately and completely no matter the choice.

[anne]

Rahm Emanuel does not in the least impress me with this supposed shrillness. I want us to leave Iraq. Impress me by calling for peace; there is shrillness I appreciate. All else is pretense.

[anne]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/07/opinion/07tue1.html?hp

August 7, 2007

The Fear of Fear Itself

It was appalling to watch over the last few days as Congress — now led by Democrats — caved in to yet another unnecessary and dangerous expansion of President Bush's powers, this time to spy on Americans in violation of basic constitutional rights. Many of the 16 Democrats in the Senate and 41 in the House who voted for the bill said that they had acted in the name of national security, but the only security at play was their job security.

There was plenty of bad behavior. Republicans marched in mindless lockstep with the president. There was double-dealing by the White House. The director of national intelligence, Mike McConnell, crossed the line from being a steward of this nation's security to acting as a White House political operative.

But mostly, the spectacle left us wondering what the Democrats — especially their feckless Senate leaders — plan to do with their majority in Congress if they are too scared of Republican campaign ads to use it to protect the Constitution and restrain an out-of-control president.

The votes in the House and Senate were supposed to fix a genuine glitch in the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which requires the government to obtain a warrant before eavesdropping on electronic communications that involve someone in the United States. The court charged with enforcing that law said the government must also seek a warrant if the people are outside the country, but their communications are routed through data exchanges here — a technological problem that did not exist in 1978.

Instead of just fixing that glitch, the White House and its allies on Capitol Hill railroaded Congress into voting a vast expansion of the president's powers....

[Thank you, Rahm Emanuel....]

[anne]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/10/opinion/l10wiretap.html

The Uses of Fear to Manipulate Americans

To the Editor:

"The Fear of Fear Itself":

I was very glad to read this editorial. I do believe that President Bush's entire administration has been a grab for power using fear-mongering to manipulate the American public. We cannot allow anyone, even a president, to water down our constitutional rights, because good solutions can come only from informed dissent and debate on the issues.

If people are afraid to voice their opinions, even on the phone or by e-mail, because their communication can be tapped without warrant, then we lose our right to free speech.

While we realize that it is necessary to protect ourselves from terrorist connections operating within the United States, we cannot give up our constitutional rights in the process without giving up our freedom in the end.

I think it's time to stand up and remind this administration that it works for us and not the other way around — before it takes that right away from us, too.

Suann Strickland
Warner Robins, Ga., Aug. 7, 2007

[Thank you, Rahm Emanuel....]

[anne]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/08/opinion/l08wiretap.html

The Democrats and the Wiretap Law

To the Editor:

"The Fear of Fear Itself":

To their shame, 16 Democrats in the Senate and 41 in the House voted to hand the president monarchical powers that the signers of the Constitution had withheld. The Fourth Amendment has served to safeguard citizens against warrantless searches and seizures; this president says instead: Just trust me.

These Democrats will no doubt be astonished, but Republicans will not stop calling them weak on terrorism. The rest of us just think they're weak, period.

Fred Roberts
Decatur, Ga., Aug. 7, 2007

[sglover]

Andres, if we weren't in the middle of an epochal national tragedy, people like you would be hilarious.

OK, for your sake, let's forget about recent history, and skip the many blown opportunities and sell-outs that the Dems have given us since only January. Let's look ahead. Why don't you clue me about how your precious Dems are trying to head off an even greater disaster in Iran? You can't, because they haven't, and they won't.

EVEN AT THIS LATE HOUR, the Dems simply refuse to put any restraints on an administration that is now infamous for unscrupulousness and incompetence. The time when one could fairly claim, "Golly, I didn't think they'd go that far", was years ago.

[andres]

Just to clarify a few things, I do support an immediate pullout from Iraq as urged by anne, with the one exception that I want it preceded by an Iraq-wide referendum on the presence of US troops, in order to provide a shield against a MSM-manufactured dolchstosslegende. However, I do not grant myself the authority of moral certainty and I'm willing to listen to counterarguments against immediate withdrawal. What I'm _not_ willing to tolerate is petty infighting and accusations of betrayal between the very people who are supposed to be in a _united_ opposition against an incipient Presidential dictatorship.

And no, sglover, they're not my precious Democrats, and authorizing the wiretapping bill was reprehensible on the part of the Democrats who voted for it.

But to paraphrase that other jerk, you have to fight for what you believe in with the political party you have, not the political party that you wish for. And instead of whining about how the Democrats betray their constituents (which is also somewhat unfair, since Democrats in Congress represent the constituents in their districts/states first and only then can start thinking about the Democratic party/constituency as a whole), or even worse, running on some hopeless left-wing third party platform that only helps the Republicans to power, you need to ask what you've done to help the Democratic party move to the left. Unless you live in Connecticut and voted against Lieberman in the primary, I suspect the answer is, not much.

And to give the Democrats their due, I doubt they will support any military action against Iran by this administration. The bombing of Iran, if it is done, will be presented to Congress as a fait accompli in the full knowledge that the Democrats lack sufficient votes to impeach and remove.

So answer me: if you want impeachment and/or prosecution of Bush/Cheney, if you want a pullout from Iraq and a restoration of democratic checks and balances, how the hell do you intend to go about it? Do you want to start up a third party from scratch, knowing that the electoral system is stacked against third parties? Or maybe, just maybe, you should put away the Democrats-are-traitors-to-their-constituents bullshit and actively work to put more left-wing _Democrats_ in Congress, Democrats who won't be so afraid for their political future that they'll vote for wiretapping and other infringements of the Constitution.

Think about it.

[sglover]

"So answer me: if you want impeachment and/or prosecution of Bush/Cheney, if you want a pullout from Iraq and a restoration of democratic checks and balances, how the hell do you intend to go about it? Do you want to start up a third party from scratch, knowing that the electoral system is stacked against third parties? Or maybe, just maybe, you should put away the Democrats-are-traitors-to-their-constituents bullshit and actively work to put more left-wing _Democrats_ in Congress, Democrats who won't be so afraid for their political future that they'll vote for wiretapping and other infringements of the Constitution."

----------------------

The ostensible "leader" of the House Dems is from one of the most liberal districts in the country. (One would think that, as a "leader", she more than most could have headed off some of the more egregious sell-outs with deft parliamentary moves. She didn't, did she?) My own congressmaggot, Al "I occupy space and collect a check" Wynn, also hails from a solidly liberal district. As does Steny "Never an accomodation that can't be reached" Hoyer -- he's from the district right next door. There's not much more promising soil for your more "left-wing _Democrats_" than these districts, yet all of them are total disappointments. (I'll concede that, as first female House Speaker, Pelosi has ascended to the ranks of a good mid-range "Jeopardy" question.)

Sorry, but the call for ever more struggle rings hollow. I've done the canvassing, I've written the checks, and every time I did, the Dems did something to make me feel like a sap. I chipped in something like $1500 in '04. Right after the Dems got trounced there, they turned around and midwifed the monstrosity called "bankruptcy reform". Oh, sure, not ALL of them did -- only many of their leading lights. By blurring the distinction between themselves and their supposed opponents, they showed that they learned NOTHING from a defeat that they incurred only WEEKS earlier. I put in money and time in '06. After that, despite all the evidence of history, I was one of those dumb saps who actually believed that this time, the Dems had the winds at their backs. This time they meant business, baby, and they were gonna FIGHT! And ever since, I've been treated to a cavalcade of the same old shit.

I think it's time to realize that the political order drawn up for a bunch of agricultural coastal provinces no longer works. You effectively admit as much here:

"And to give the Democrats their due, I doubt they will support any military action against Iran by this administration. The bombing of Iran, if it is done, will be presented to Congress as a fait accompli in the full knowledge that the Democrats lack sufficient votes to impeach and remove."

It's true. It's also the kind of rationale that Quisling appreciated. Every day brings more evidence that the Cheney crime syndicate is taking us to an epochal, once-in-a-century, 1914-like catastrophe. But according to you (and certainly them), poor Nan & Harry can't accomplish anything, not one thing, because they're just a few votes short! So it ain't their fault, waaaah!

Did you ever stop to think that maybe the fucking Dems, noticing what a juicy and rare opportunity it is to run against a contemptible crew like the Bush crowd, are content to leave things exactly as they are? That maybe they, every bit as much as Bush, want to keep the Iraq waste shambling along, thinking that they'll be the big (short-term) winners?

Why shouldn't they? The GOP has done essentially the same thing over the abortion issue: Kinda funny how, with the White House and solid majorities in both houses of Congress, the "Party of Values" never quite got around to ending the greatest horror since Auschwitz, or the Crucfixion, or whatever they're calling it this week.

In life, if I spend time and money with people who betray or use me at every opportunity, sooner or later I need to confront the unpleasant fact that if I keep coming back for more, I'm not a victim, I'm an accomplice to my own humiliation. That's where liberals are with the fucking Dems. As for the broader question, what to do, I don't have any answers. I think our political system has run completely off the rails. It's gone neurotic, and is no longer capable of discussing reality, let alone responding to it.

[PeterE]

Andres,
You write "It's true that Democrats don't have a clear and plausible policy on Iraq. Headline news: the last asshole who had a clear and plausible policy on Iraq is the one who got us into this cluster." I'm not sure, but I think you are referring to the arguments for the invasion-- i.e. that you think they were clear and plausible. Why? I think I and many other people thought that they were muddled, bogus or incoherent.

You support an immediate pullout. On what grounds? I confess to having no opinion, because I don't know enough. It's alleged that a pullout would cause a catastrophe (like the partition of India in 1947). On what grounds? It's denied that a pullout would cause a catastrophe. On what grounds?

We seem to be governed by a political class more clueless than Wilson was at the Versailles Conference.

[andres]

Last post on this subject--sglover and PeterE can reply as they see fit.

sglover, you've certainly done more for the Democrats than the average "Democrats are just as bad" idiot, and that is commendable. You could go even farther and try to talk to Pelosi, Wynn, Hoyer, and co. (or more likely their spokespeople) in order to let them know your low opinion of their efforts and maybe to get their feeadback on this as well. I strongly suspect that they'll say that they fully agree with your objectives but don't have the political resources, including votes and media, to carry them out.

If all else fails, the place to get the Democrats that you want is in the Dem primaries, not in general elections or by whining in blogs about how useless the Democratic party is. I fully understand and am sympathetic to Cindy Sheehan's announced attempt to unseat Pelosi, though I don't agree with it. Perhaps you should do what you can for her.

So far so nice. What I don't agree with and even find shocking in your argument is the belief that the Democratic party leadership is cynically letting Bush and co. run amok because they think it will benefit them in the elections. That pig won't fly. Iraq was already a disaster in October 2004, and Bush and co. had already deeply undermined civil liberties, and it didn't make a difference in the elections as a whole--Bush won, or more possibly, again came within easy stealing distance. So if Democrats are really relying on the Machiavellian political calculus that you accuse them of, then in effect they want even more American soldiers to come home in body bags, and more dead American civilians to wash up on the riverbanks after the next hurricane. Please forgive me if I don't share your cynicism about their motives.

PeterE's interpretation of Iraq makes me wonder if he went on a trip to Timbuktu during the years 2002-2003. Bush and co's stated rationale for the invasion--Iraqi WMD's and possible contacts between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda, were crystal clear. Their overall objectives--the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, a democratic and federalist government for Iraq--were also crystal clear. And both the stated rationale and the objectives were utterly without foundation in reality, even if you lay aside the morality of launching an unprovoked war of aggression.

The Democrats, by contrast, are both cursed and blessed by their lack of an overriding ideological vision and their distrust for clear and oversimplified solutions. Cursed, because such an outlook is less compelling in elections and political debates. Blessed, because it prevents them from diving in head first into the sort of disaster that Iraq has turned into--at least they learned something from Vietnam, and the Republicans didn't.

What is best for Iraq now is worthy of discussion with all ideas being placed on the table. I do think that given the current situation, Iraq will continue heading on a course towards disaster no matter what the US does. The best option, I therefore think, is to get out of Iraq as soon as possible after the Iraqi people (not their government) tell us to leave, as they almost undoubtedly will. However, I am willing to listen to reasoned arguments to the contrary, which makes me and most other Democrats the complete opposite of Bush, Rumsfeld, and co.

Bottom line: if you're dissatisfied with the Democrats you can either (a) form your own third party, go through the grossly inequitable process of obtaining campaign funding and getting your candidates' names on the ballots, only to run the significant risk that the lack of runoff elections will throw the election to the Republicans, or (b) campaign actively for the Democratic candidates that you want in the Democratic primaries. There's no getting around that today's Democratic party as a whole is a center-right party because of various factors relating to campaign financing and the mainstream media. You can work actively to change that, but please stop _whining_, as it does no good at best and encourages apathy and disunity at worst.

[PeterE]

Andres, We must have different standards of clarity and plausibility. I wonder whether you tried to set Barbara Lee straight after she wrote in September 2002 (in Counterpunch:
"The president has submitted a resolution to Congress seeking a proverbial blank check to wage war against Iraq using "all means." Just two weeks ago, he went to the United Nations and called on that organization to prove its relevancy by ensuring Iraq's disarmament. But he has undermined the United Nation's chances to succeed, first by issuing it an ultimatum and now by asking Congress for a use-of-force resolution that distorts the language of the U.N. charter, supports a pre-emptive strike by the United States and ignores the grave security risks posed by such an approach.

The president has told us that we must attack Iraq because our nation is in imminent danger from Saddam Hussein. We have received no proof of immediate danger, and scant evidence that Iraq has the means or intent to use weapons of mass destruction against us. We have not been told why the danger is greater today than it was a year or two ago or why we must rush to war rather than pursuing other options. We have not given the United Nations time to try to reach diplomatic solutions."