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August 15, 2005
For those who have forgotten --
--and those who mistakenly maintain we have not or ever had goals for Iraq:
Let me be clear on what the U.S. objectives are: The United States wants Iraq to rejoin the family of nations as a freedom-loving and law-abiding member. This is in our interest and that of our allies within the region.
The United States favors an Iraq that offers its people freedom at home. I categorically reject arguments that this is unattainable due to Iraq's history or its ethnic or sectarian make-up. Iraqis deserve and desire freedom like everyone else. The United States looks forward to a democratically supported regime that would permit us to enter into a dialogue leading to the reintegration of Iraq into normal international life.
Posted by Darleen at August 15, 2005 10:51 AM
Comments
I see you are collecting for your daughter's college fund. She could get a free college education from any branch of the armed forces. I guess that's just for other people, eh?
Posted by: Ironhamster at August 15, 2005 11:46 AM
Hi! Found you via the comments at Protein Wisdom and took a look around- great site!
I just wanted to say I have four sons, one Marine and three in the Army; all three Army boys have been in Iraq. I am at a loss as to how to feel about Cindy Sheehan. Part of me is very sorry for her loss; I know how deep just the thought of losing one of my boys there hurts. But the other part of me just wants to slap her silly for the freak show she has constructed as a "memorial" to her son.
Anyway, really enjoyed your site!
Posted by: Marty Fay at August 15, 2005 12:59 PM
Well, I guess that explains Abu Ghraib.
Posted by: JP at August 15, 2005 01:09 PM
Marty
Welcome. And please tell your sons I thank each and everyone of them for their service.
Posted by: Darleen at August 15, 2005 02:53 PM
Marty,
Don't ask Darlene to suggest to her daughter to fight in the War to Resubjugate Brown People. Darlene's daughter is going to college straight away. Her kind of people don't do that sort of thing, you know sacrifice.
Posted by: nosacrifice at August 15, 2005 03:07 PM
hey no
I'm letting your racist/classist comment stand as further evidence of the moral bankruptcy of the We Support the troops when they shoot their officers Left.
Thanks for playing!
Posted by: Darleen at August 15, 2005 03:38 PM
Well, if we're going to be cute with the quotes, let's try these on for size. They are verbatim quotes regarding Clinton's sending troops to Bosnia, a conflict in which ZERO American soldiers lost their lives:
“I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today”
–Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)
“Victory means exit strategy, and it’s important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is.”
–Governor George W. Bush (R-TX)
And for good measure, Cindy Sheehan's brother in arms (who knew?), that 'great Amurrican", Sean "How's my makeup?" Hannity:
“Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?”
Posted by: Hrubec at August 15, 2005 03:41 PM
Hey Hrubec
I actually SUPPORTED Billy Jeff's sending troops to Bosnia.
Go ahead and search my archives and you'll not find ONE Hannity quote...or Limbaugh or Coulter or Delay.
You assume you know how I arrive at my opinions. Silly you.
I believed it a moral good to stop the slaughter. But you know, we even had a greater moral duty to depose Saddam. Something we should have done in 1991, which is why I campaigned against G H W Bush when he listened to the UN and left Saddam alone.
We never finished the war then, Clinton said the right words and signed the right paperwork in 1998 to finish it, but it took GW Bush to stop Saddam and is ill-begotten spawn.
Posted by: Darleen at August 15, 2005 03:53 PM
Now onto the substance of Darleen's apologia.
Although we were told - and our Congress voted on the information - that we were entering Iraq to prevent our being attacked by WMDs, a charge that preyed on our post 9/11 fear and vulnerability...we are now asked to believe that instead our children are dying to spread democracy. A noble cause, one any good person can support. Except it is NOT the function of the U.S. military, which exists for one reason and one reason only - to protect the national security.
However, if Darleen thinks it is noble to sacrifice other people's children in the great cause of nation building, I want to ask her this: When are we going to depose Omar al-Bashire of Sudan who has deposed and killed MILLIONS of his own people, practicing a brutal regimen of religious and ethnic cleansing? How about our allies in Saudi Arabia, where women are brutally repressed, where religious schools breed Islamic fundamentalist jihadists by the millions and where public executions are common? And what of our delightful friend Musharraf of Pakistan, where the director of the national nuclear weapons program was selling nuclear technology to North Korea, Libya and Iran? Of course we have the leaders of Burma, Turkmenistan and Zimbabwe as well, where democracy is brutally repressed and the government routinely murders its opposition.
Is it just a coincidence that we chose the unarmed nation of Iraq to invade? Just a coincidence that they possess the largest untapped oil reserves left on the planet? Just a coincidence that Halliburton's share price has increased 189% since the war started, that it's revenue has increased 68% since 2002?
No, it was the perfect plan you see - installing a democracy in Iraq that would spread like magic throughout the Middle East making us safe from terrorism and giving us lots of cheap oil.
How could it go so wrong? Did the administration not think about things like securing the weapons we left there, things like disbanding an army of career soldiers, things like securing the borders, things like not letting NINE BILLION dollars disappear into thin air, things like making sure the people had an infrastructure of water and electricity?
The right will make it up as they go along because they know their supporters are sychophantic followers who will gladly absorb the apology du jour. They don't care about American values. It doesn't bother them that the President will veto any defense spending bill that contains anti-torture provisions, because these people have lost sight of what made our country great. They only care about being the biggest bully on the block, knowing that any rationale they can pull out of their butts will satisfy their sheeplike followers, even if it's a dfferent rationale from yesterday.
Darleen, look behind you. The polls have turned against your nonsense. you can't claim to be part of the mainstream anymore because the mainstream wants OUT. Repubicans are losing support so fast you can feel their fear. Ergo, the new comments about us pulling troops next summer - just in time for midterm elections.
Answer me this. If Iraq ends up an Islamic state will it be worth it then? If it becomes the best greenhouse for terrorists ever created, will it be worth it then? Do we still "let" them become a democracy, if their votes are to ally with Iran against the West? And, just for kicks, if you saw that Bush would throw all these nonsensical rationales up in the air to ensure Republican victories in Congress next year, would that mean a damn thing to you? Or would you just forget this post you just made, and fall in lockstep behind him, licking his Texas boots?
Posted by: Hrubec at August 15, 2005 04:04 PM
No thank you for playing, I see I hit a nerve.
Posted by: nosacrifice at August 15, 2005 05:03 PM
If Iraq ends up an Islamic state will it be worth it then?
Hrubec, good point...and it will be one of history's greatest ironies that after our years of support for Saddam as a buffer against the spread of Iranian theocracy, this administration has created an environment in which a new theocracy is almost sure to replace it. Making the world safer from terrorism are we? I don't think so.
Posted by: Brad at August 15, 2005 05:32 PM
Darleen is apparently unable to respond with any substantive arguments to this line of reasoning. She spouted the kool aid. How dare anyone ask her to defend it!
Too bad she doesn't know enough about me to insult my sanity or marriage or lifes work. That would, after all, be the Republican way.
Posted by: Hrubec at August 16, 2005 04:02 AM
this administration has created an environment in which a new theocracy is almost sure to replace it.
This is one of areas in which the bare dogmatism of the neocons may end up causing serious problems for us - per their theories of human nature & politics (in which, as if by magic, people are naturally drawn toward Western constitutional republicanism), Iraqis will see the wonders of western government and happily abandon their centuries-long religious traditions.
Maybe - hopefully! - they will, but I would've preferred to see a little more critical thought, a little more skepticism toward ideology, at work on this point.
Posted by: jpe at August 16, 2005 08:20 AM