Geoffrey Britain:
“But leftist American traitors and liberal useful idiots would never support such an effort and actively undermined public support and thus the strategy within which OIF operated was unsustainable.”

Hence, setting the record straight on OIF accomplishes the “American people understand[ing] that OIF was the right decision and the mission’s opponents were wrong“. I also said, “the false narrative of OIF and its Russian/Left/Democratic proponents must be discredited in the zeitgeist”.

Geoffrey Britain:
“So the fact that OIFs opponents were wrong and even traitorous is irrelevant to restoring OIF’s tarnished image. OIF’s legality can be proven but its flawed rationale cannot be overcome. Bush, his neocon advisers (and I) were wrong.”

I’m not following you logic. Your argument supports the position that the decision for OIF was right and its opponents are wrong.

Now, if the flaw in the paradigm of American leadership that was manifested with OIF is “leftist American traitors and liberal useful idiots would never support such an effort and actively undermined public support”, then discrediting them helps to correct the flaw in the paradigm.

Your vague characterization of “legally valid” in order for you to elevate your understanding of the reason for OIF bypasses that the substantive policy grounds for OIF are plainly stated in the law and policy of the decision.

Hence, Russian/Left/Democratic proponents must be discredited in the zeitgeist, and they must be replaced in the zeitgeist by the actual law and policy, fact basis of OIF.

Once the American people understand that OIF was the right decision and the mission’s opponents were wron

“Once the American people understand that OIF was the right decision and the mission’s opponents were wrong”

Though OIF was legally valid, it was NOT the right decision because it was based on two false premises; first, that there beats within every human heart an unquenchable desire for self-autonomy. Secondly, it was based on the false premise that a yearning for individual liberty superseded cultural imperatives.

Practically, it was not the right decision because OIF was instituted to send a message to the rogue nations and enabling* nations that the prior rules of “the great game” had changed. That America would no longer play the game under the old ROEs. But leftist American traitors and liberal useful idiots would never support such an effort and actively undermined public support and thus the strategy within which OIF operated was unsustainable.

So the fact that OIFs opponents were wrong and even traitorous is irrelevant to restoring OIF’s tarnished image. OIF’s legality can be proven but its flawed rationale cannot be overcome. Bush, his neocon advisers (and I) were wrong.

Bush’s heart was in the right place but the half-way measure of fighting Islam’s ‘radicals’ while insisting that Islam itself is blameless and not the source of Islamic ‘extremism’ is doomed to failure.

*“Rogue states never turn out to be quite the pariahs they are deemed. They are only able to cause, or at least threaten to cause, mayhem because they enjoy the covert support – usually by means of technology transfers – of one or more major powers within the charmed circle of global ‘good guys’.” — Margaret Thatcher

Russia has from the beginning, provided the technological assistance Iran needed to gain nuclear weapons capability. Russia and China have repeatedly and consistently blocked effective international sanctions against Iran from passage in the UN Security Council.

The fact that AKs come from Syrian munitions and weapons training units, is bullshit?

You might want to retake that counter insurgency course again.

So this is like a chain reaction in a nuclear meltdown. One failure leads to another, as the Left intended it to. Stopping it at the source means wiping the Left from the face of existence. Things like repairing the narrative or resteering the propaganda, are merely means to an end.

Again, the President’s stratagem works because the Russians/Left/Democrats successfully established the necessary preconditions and premises for it to work – ie, the “full scale war” taboo derived from the prevalent false narrative of the Iraq intervention that I described at 12:58 pm.

The President knows that all the “better ideas” run up against the stigma that the Russians/Left/Democrats have successfully imposed on the paradigm of American leadership that’s manifested by Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The President further knows that the Republicans have conceded surrender to the taboo that justifies restriction of the American range of action for the War on Terror.

How does he know this?

The Republicans announced their surrender to the world repeatedly and across the board.

See the Republican presidential candidates’ responses to the Megyn Kelly ‘knowing what we know now’ hypothetical about the decision for OIF. The Republicans effectively stipulated the Russian/Left/Democratic claim that OIF was a mistake – which effectively stipulated the stigma on the paradigm of OIF – which effectively stipulated the taboo that restricts the range of American action.

In order to re-establish the social condition necessary to seriously consider “better ideas” to prosecute the War on Terror again, the false narrative of OIF and its Russian/Left/Democratic proponents must be discredited in the zeitgeist, and they must be replaced in the zeitgeist by the actual law and policy, fact basis of OIF.

Once the American people understand that OIF was the right decision and the mission’s opponents were wrong, then we can be set up again to approach the War on Terror as a genuine leader of the free world.