Harry Reid’s war against the Kochs
Here’s the latest installment in Harry Reid’s two minutes hate against the Koch Brothers:
Charles and David Koch are one of the “main causes” of climate change, charged Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on the Senate floor.
“While the Koch brothers admit to not being experts on the matter, these billionaire oil tycoons are certainly experts at contributing to climate change. That’s what they do very well. They are one of the main causes of this. Not a cause, one of the main causes,” Reid said.
You might ask how anyone can listen to and believe something that preposterous, something that obviously disconnected from reality or any scientific possibility, and yet simultaneously continue to believe him/herself to be a member of the party of both tolerance and scientific realism?
But that mind trick is performed almost effortlessly every day. Human beings have a vast capacity for self-deception and acceptance of propaganda, and demonizing the opposition is a tried-and-true method. After all, Alinsky’s Rule 12 was, “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”
But I can’t recall another politician at the level of Senate Majority Leader or higher using his/her position to attack private citizens like this before Obama came to office. It’s one of the things the Obama administration has perfected, encouraged, and unleashed, and it’s one of the most pernicious of its developments.
Scott Johnson wrote a post about Reid and the Kochs a few weeks ago, and that’s where I found this video demonstrating the relentless and repetitive nature of Reid’s anti-Koch campaign:
Reid is a criminal. His attacks on the Kochs are especially rich in light of the number of “fat-cats” that support the leftist establishment.
Funny…considering the evil that is Wall Street, I don’t recall the Obama administration prosecuting anyone important.
We let this man go at our peril. He is no laughing matter. He’s as funny as a Gulag. Those are his intentions. Make no mistake about it.
If Reid shut his mouth a great deal of mitigation of climate change would occur.
Nevada why can t you vote this creep out? Please?
PS not that I support their contention on climate change!
Rule 12 seems to be failing (backfiring) as Republicans demonize Obama. It appears to the liberal leaning to be motivated by bigotry. I think the critics on the right should replace “Obama” with “the Democrats”.
Harry Reid seems to be the victim of obsessive compulsive behavior. He just can’t stop mentioning the Koch brothers. It’s psycotic.
Not to mention Nasty Nancy Pelosi.
Neo: “After all, Alinsky’s Rule 12 was, “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.””
Rule 12 works. Using it against (albeit public citizen) President Bush won the White House for the Democrats.
It’s only reasonable and rational for the Democrats, as competitors, to continue adapting a tactic that’s proven effective.
So, what’s the effective strategy to counter-attack Rule 12? Complaining with an air of offended indignity sure isn’t it.
My counter-attack, which I brought up in a recent previous post, is an aikido-like, 3-prong strategy of Bush was right, the Democrats bamboozled you, and Obama is wrong.
Obviously, the A-good/B-lied/B-bad formula would have to be configured to changing characters and plot points for Reid v Kochs.
The key is establishing the 1st prong, which serves as the necessary contextual re-frame.
Emphasis: The re-frame is critical. Defending in accordance with the opponent’s frame is a failure, eg, defenders of the Iraq mission who rely on the contention that Saddam shipped NBC stockpiles to Syria.
The 2nd prong is the pivot, and conditioned on establishing the re-frame of the 1st prong.
The 3rd prong is the take-away. The take-away value of the 3rd prong and the 2nd prong pivot is conditioned on establishing the re-frame and pivot of the 1st and 2nd prong.
For Bush v Obama, the Rule 12 counter-attack looks like this:
1st prong, re-frame, Bush was right and justified on Iraq;
2nd prong, pivot, the Democrats lied about the Iraq mission for partisan self-serving reasons and harmed the national interest and the pluralistic liberal world order that relies on sure American hegemonic leadership;
3rd prong, take-away, with a Bush v Obama direct comparison based on the 1st and 2nd prongs, show Obama is wrong.
Note: It’s insufficient to only argue Obama and the Democrats are wrong, because they’ve pegged strawman-Bush and by extension the GOP as automatically comparatively worse, no matter how badly Obama does. Electoral politics, of course, is a binary choice where it’s good enough to be the lesser bad.
To break the Democrats’ pegging defense strategy, the Right needs to establish that Bush was right. That’s also aikido-like. It flips the Democrats’ pegging defense strategy. If Bush was right, then by their own comparative pegging formula, Obama is wrong.
Since Rule 12 is “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”, it stands to reason that an aikido-like re-frame of the narrative at the focus point of the frozen, personalized, and polarized target will go a long way towards flipping the whole script.
In Bush v Obama, the obvious point for the Right to do a Rule 12 counter-attack on the Democrats is their all-in investment with the false narrative against the Iraq mission, since that point was the lynchpin issue relied upon by the Democrats to win, and the truth of the Iraq mission is straightforward and open source.
This assumes, of course, the Republicans and Right can properly carry through a Rule 12 counter-attack as activists.
Would the same aikido-like, 3-prong, Rule 12 counter-attack strategy work in Reid v Kochs? You tell me.
Reid grows ever more creepy and demented. Too bad he’s not focusing like a laser on the Nevadans facing loss of medical insurance: http://tinyurl.com/l6k7nf6
Reid’s like a younger version of Palpatine.
Alan F
I think the critics on the right should replace “Obama” with “the Democrats”.
Good point, but it would still be a good idea to personalize the attacks on specific shortcomings of our Democrat friends, instead of a generalized disgust. If the disgust is generalized, then Generic Democrat voter can conclude that disgust is directed toward all Democrats, not just bigwigs. Example: point out that Holder doesn’t want voter ID but ID has been required to hear Holder speak.
I stopped voting for the Democrats long before Obama came on the scene. Ted Kennedy, Chris Dodd, Al Gore, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid et al are just as disgust-inducing as Obama. It ain’t just Barry.
Remember Rachel Jeantel, Trayvon Martin’s girlfriend, at the George Zimmerman trial? “That’s real retarded, sir.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3-1YGgCyQk
Egg-ZACK-lee my opinion of Harry Reid. The vomit continually emanting from the dude’s mouth is “real retarded”. And of course, the mainstreamers never call him on anything.
Eric (5:56 pm) is right. It’s time to stop whining about all the retarded things the enemy (and enemedia) do, and fight back. Even if we find we might occasionally act a bit “retarded” ourselves. The retarded among us won’t know the difference — which is what Harry Reid and ilk are counting on, anyway.
Gringo is right. It’s all of them. So much evil infested rot, no wonder the US is dying, one way or another.
“I can’t recall another politician at the level of Senate Majority Leader or higher using his/her position to attack private citizens like this before Obama came to office. It’s one of the things the Obama administration has perfected, encouraged, and unleashed, and it’s one of the most pernicious of its developments.”
That’s my perception as well. Its perniciousness is not to be underestimated or lightly dismissed. It’s a very certain step closer toward unrestrained tyranny.
For once Mike and I are in agreement, Reid’s intentions are the Gulag. The ‘banality of evil’, fits him to a ‘T’.
gringo I am a neighbor to the North & was always amazed how an obvious criminal like Ted Kennedy was continually elected.
Kennedy was never charged with manslaughter, leaving the scene where a death resulted, failure to report event to police
( I believe a sheriff spotted the car the next morning) & not ONE charge was brought against him !
despicable!
Molly NH,
Teddy boy was protected his whole life from the consequences of his actions because his older brothers were Camelot martyrs.
For once GB and I slightly disagree. There is nothing banal about Reid, nothing. The whole notion of the Banality of Evil, partial title of the book on the Eichmann trial IIRC, is of tenuous validity. Banal=boring, ordinary, not interesting. Eichmann was not generic evil, even if Arendt thought him so. But NY literati liked the idea; anyone can be evil, no matter how insipid or uninspiring or Republican or suburban. It can lurk in any one of us and (I’m reaching now) we need special elites to sniff it out, like Ghostbusters.
Let’s name some well-known evil types and then let us see how well the banality test works. I’ll start with Ivan the Terrible: not banal. Dr Kermit Gosnell, not banal. Reid, not banal. These people are fascinating in their eviltry. Next?
“My counter-attack, which I brought up in a recent previous post, is an aikido-like, 3-prong strategy of Bush was right, the Democrats bamboozled you, and Obama is wrong.”
Won’t work, at least not without revision and, its premature. It won’t work because Bush lied through omission, never revealing why he actually invaded Iraq.
The primary reason for the invasion of Iraq was to send a very clear message to other nations that the ‘game’s’ rules had changed. That the US was now taking terrorism seriously, that the ‘kid gloves’ were off (you’re either with us or against us) and that al Quada and Islamic Terrorism had once again, in the words of Yamamoto, “awoken a sleeping giant”…
Bush and the neocons did not publicly articulate their rationale because it was judged too complicated for the public and too easily attacked by the leftist MSM.
Neocon analysis; The threefold nature of Islamic Terrorism consists of:
1.) Various ideologically disparate terror networks. Theologically fueled by hate-filled radical Fundamentalist Islamic mullahs and imams operating out of state-funded madrases.
2.) The Rogue nations who use these networks as ‘stealth’ quasi-military arms of aggression to ensure the furtherance of their national goals and agenda.
3.) The ‘enabling’ status-quo nations, who out of short-term national self-interest, block effective international sanctions against the Rogue nations, especially in the U.N.
“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
North Korea has its China and Iran its Russia.
And, Bush was wrong in two particulars, that defined his response to the threat. Bush was wrong that Islam is a religion of peace. Bush was also wrong in believing that the desire for self-determination superseded cultural and religious imperatives. Muslim middle eastern cultures are non-productive ground for democracy. Because Islam’s most fundamental theological tenets are incompatible with classical western precepts.
That Bush was right that, invading Iraq and deposing Saddam would begin to send a message that the US would no longer tolerate International support for terrorism, cannot counter-act where Bush went wrong.
Bush’s errors in perception provided the ammunition his enemies on the left needed to hinder him and his error in believing that democracy could be grafted on to Muslim cultures doomed his policies.
It’s premature because too many Americans are not ready for the truth.
The correction of America’s illusions about Islam being compatible with the West will be dispelled by Islam.
In time, Obama’s errors both domestic and foreign will become self-evident. China’s claim to the South China Sea and Putin and Ukraine is just the beginning.
that s true the camelot martyrs
ABC, lap dog media, is the epitome of this necrophilia
Don Carlos,
Whether or not ‘evil’ is banal, it can be reasonable, rational, and effective, which are productive and competitive standards, not moral/ethical standards.
Neo’s commenters usually make dismissive tut-tutting moral/ethical judgements when she posts her latest information or warning about the Left.
They need to stow their soap boxes and start thinking like competitors. Reid, the Dems, and the Left are certainly thinking as competitors, and one-sided competitions usually end one way.
Geoffrey Britain: “It won’t work because Bush lied through omission, never revealing why he actually invaded Iraq.”
Huh?
The opposite is true.
The 1991-2003 Iraq enforcement was one of the best – and arguably the best – documented missions in modern US military history.
@Eric: “So, what’s the effective strategy to counter-attack Rule 12? Complaining with an air of offended indignity sure isn’t it.”
There was a line from The Rock about losers complaining they did their best while winners dis something to the prom queen…
I don’t have a whine about Harry Reid or any Democrat left in me. What I do have is a desire for the good guys to start fighting as hard as the bad guys do, without complaint.
We need to get to the point where before Harry Reid even gets a chance to literally think about demagoguing the Koch Brothers, or anything at all, we have him slammed to the ground with incoming the man can hardly get a breath.
He should be personally attacked from about 6 AM everyday until about 5:59 AM the next day, and that should be all year long until he is neutered and quits.
His slimy name should be mud forever in America.
Then the only questions should be, “Whose next?”
The billionaire leader of the anti-Keystone XL pipeline, Tom Steyer, is the Asia coal king. He made millions really polluting the air; not just carbon dioxide.
Global warming is the biggest scam in history.
Eric,
Documenting the history of Saddam’s violation of the accords after Bush senior left was hardly sufficient explanation for the low info voter, as to why Bush the younger invaded Iraq as part of the war on terror. It might be sufficient for you but could not stand as plausible explanation for why we had to go into an Iraq whose ‘fangs’ had already been pulled. Bush had prior Congressional authorization, so Bush never would have had Powell conduct his dog and pony show in the UN if Saddam’s documented history of inept resistance was a sufficient political rationale for invasion.
Bush and his neocon advisers decided that they couldn’t offer as explanation that 9/11 was the result of active and passive collaboration between al Qaeda, Afghanistan’s Taliban, the Saudis, Pakistani madrases and the collaboration of Russia, China, Germany and France in the UN blocking sanctions against the rogue nations.
The neocons argued, quite plausibly, that activist leftists, liberal intelligentsia, libertarian isolationists like Ron Paul, the democrats and the MSM would have characterized such an analysis as wild and irresponsible ‘paranoia’ to the public, annihilating Bush’s public support.
So he left unspoken the real reason and instead advanced the plausible rationale that Saddam had WMD programs and was just waiting for cancellation of the UN inspections. That BTW was true but without a smoking gun was insufficient provocation for invasion. Thus the canard that Bush lied about WMD’s, when every major democrat with the exception of Obama was on record before 9/11 stating that they had seen intelligence that Saddam was pursuing WMDs, which is why they gave Bush the authorization in the first place.
More Americans are ready for the truth than many here understand. Most Americans (I estimate about 65%) will see the truth if it is well-prepared for them, and voiced again and again. More listen to conservative talk radio than ever; the leftist talk programs have very few listeners.
It needs to be a well-designed campaign, gently but persistently pounding away at leftist programs in convincing ways: So-and-so’s grandma is suffering and dying because of Obamacare (show her). The elderly are whipsawed by crappy interest on their savings, inflating food and energy prices. Show school classrooms with one disorderly retard student messing it up for all the others despite his fulltime teachers aide (and show total compensation). Show Michelle’s kids leaving Sidwell Friends and voucher-denied black kids in DC. show central Cal Mexicans out of work because of a 2″ minnow.
Hammer it. Mix it up. Keep it up. It will work.Use the quality of the 1930s Statist imagery of the Dustbowl to bring contemporary emotions into play. Lots of things you can do with a camera.
Iraq war 1.0 ended with a cease fire and conditions requiring Iraq (Saddam) to allow complete and thorough inspections; which would include searching Saddam’s underwear drawer for vials of anthrax. Saddam’s continuing intransigence to allow full inspecttions should have been justification to resume wholesale hostilities during all 8 years of Clinton. If we were a superpower then, which we are not now, we needed to start acting like one and toast Saddam’s ass and all of his seed.
Bush 2 was correct to start Irag war 2.0; but he did it in a half assed manner. Forget nation building, forget shock and awe, kill anyone who gets in the way and bomb the rubble until it jumps. Then, stand back and prep to do it all over again, if necessary. The same goes for Afghanistan. Civil society can not be imposed where there is no historical concept of civil society; which includes every nation state where Islam holds sway with the majority. Kill any who harm us without mercy. Otherwise stay home and make excuses and whimper.
Because Bush II’s coalition was international in nature, many of them wanted to be in the UN for domestic reasons, like Tony Blair. By Blair’s a socialist. Though he spoke well in America.
Bush’s advisors were able to use that as the tipping point. It’s certainly not the same strategy the Afghanistan planners used. Not until NATO came along, at least.
The thing is, polling shows that Reid’s rants haven’t moved the needle one iota against the Kochs. 50% of Americans haven’t even heard of them. The rest already had their opinions, and Reid’s oratory (and I use that term loosely) isn’t enough to change any minds.
I therefore come to the conclusion that he isn’t trying to persuade anyone. He’s doing it for some other reason.
Since it’s Reid we’re talking about, “madness” is never off the table. But here’s another thought I had: maybe this is an attempt to inoculate Democrats from criticism over accepting Tom Steyer’s millions.
If criticized, Dems can say that it’s just a counter-attack by rightwing billionaires. A childish tit-for-tat. By (falsely) claiming that the Kochs are bankrolling the vast rightwing conspiracy, they are creating breathing room for the vast leftwing conspiracy (which is actually a thing).
Geoffrey Britain,
You’re over-complicating it. As I said, the truth of the 1991-2003 Iraq enforcement is open source and straightforward. The answers are in the record or a simple extrapolation from the record.
Try this:
Q: What were Bush’s alternatives with Iraq?
A: By the close of the Clinton admin, only 3 options remained for the US-led Iraq enforcement: A, kick the can with ‘containment’ (status quo), B, free Saddam, or C, resolution with credible threat of regime change.
Q: Why did Bush leave the ‘containment’ (status quo)?
A: One, the pre-9/11 threat calculation of the Saddam problem was based on a conventional military, regional standard. Post 9/11, Saddam’s terrorist ties and unconventional capability changed the threat calculation for Iraq, eg, Clinton’s statement that after 9/11 Bush had an “absolute responsibility” to push to “finish the inspections” in Iraq, and Bush’s statement that a smoking gun might be a mushroom cloud in Manhattan.
Two, the ‘containment’ was broken. After Op Desert Fox, Saddam had voided the ceasefire and resolutions in Iraq policy, reconstituted Iraq’s NBC capabilities, fostered international opposition to the Iraq enforcement, and largely de facto neutralized the sanctions.
In other words, although it was 9/11 that pushed President Bush to resolve the Saddam problem, with or without 9/11, the Saddam problem had reached a head with the ‘containment’ broken.
Q: Why not free Saddam?
A: See Saddam’s history from 1980 onward.
Dealing cautiously with competitors that are rational actors is normal for the US. However, Saddam proved to be an irrational actor with dangerously bad judgement. As Bush said, we simply could not trust Saddam with any less than full compliance on all obligations, weapons and non-weapons related.
Freeing Saddam was out of the question. The Duelfer Report confirms that Saddam was not rehabilitated.
IR realists like to claim the US would have been better served with Saddam countering Iran. Their faulty premise is Saddam could be trusted to serve US interests. However, Saddam was convinced Iraq needed WMD in order to counter Iran. Iran’s WMD development is bad enough by itself. Irrational Saddam spurring an urgent Iran-Iraq WMD arms race was not the solution for countering Iran.
Q: Why did resolution of the Saddam problem require a credible threat of regime change?
A: One, because every lesser non-military and military option on Iraq had been used up during the Clinton admin. The bombing campaign of Dec 1998 was the penultimate military enforcement. By progressive sequence, the next step up was ground invasion, the ultimate military enforcement.
Two, when Clinton had exhausted the lesser coercive measures, he concluded regime change was most likely the only way to bring Iraq into compliance. Clinton made the object of regime change for Iraq a US law. Clinton also reinforced the US legal authority to use military force to bring Iraq into compliance.
Three, according to Hans Blix (UNMOVIC) and confirmed by the Duelfer Report, the credible threat of regime change was the only tool that could compel Saddam to cooperate with the UNMOVIC compliance test.
Again, after ODF, Saddam had set Iraq policy that the ceasefire and resolutions were void.
In the end, the credible threat of regime change wasn’t enough, either.
Q: Due to the Iraq enforcement that Bush inherited from Clinton, the US didn’t need a new UN authorization to invade Iraq. UNSC resolution 1441 merely summarized and restated the existing UNSC resolutions on Iraq. So, why the “dog and pony show in the UN”?
A: Because President Bush’s primary intent was not to invade Iraq. Rather, Bush’s primary intent was to resolve the Saddam problem expeditiously and conclusively.
It only looks as though Bush was intent on invading Iraq because a credible threat of regime change was the necessary piece to compel Saddam’s cooperation.
However, the record shows that Bush first gave Saddam the opportunity to prevent OIF and stay in power via compliance with all of Iraq’s obligations, weapons and non-weapons related.
The centerpiece of the opportunity that Bush gave to Saddam to switch off the credible threat of regime change was the chance via UNMOVIC to comply with Iraq’s weapons obligations.
Inserting UNMOVIC into Iraq required the US going to the UN, and UNMOVIC functioning in Iraq required a credible threat of regime change.
Q: Did Bush lie his way into a war with Iraq?
A: No.
One, the unreliability of intelligence on Iraq’s WMD was known from the outset and accounted for with Iraq’s presumption of guilt and burden of proof. By design, the intelligence could not trigger enforcement. Only Iraq’s non-compliance could trigger enforcement, and only Iraq’s compliance could switch off the enforcement.
Two, that Iraq did not sufficiently account for its documented NBC stocks isn’t disputed. The controversy is over the intelligence on subsequent Iraqi NBC stocks and programs.
The intelligence was what it was. In the context of the Saddam problem, Clinton and Bush officials were obligated to judge the intelligence in an unfavorable light for Iraq, and 9/11 compelled US officials to increase their wariness due to Saddam’s belligerence and guilt on terrorism.
The intelligence that Bush presented was the intelligence that was available. Bush’s mistake was presenting the intelligence inapposite of its actual, limited role in the Iraq enforcement.
Clinton had cited to Iraq’s non-compliance to declare “Iraq has failed its last chance” and justify military action. The non-compliance basis matched the enforcement procedure. Bush also cited to Iraq’s non-compliance, like Clinton, but Bush also cited to the intelligence, despite that the intelligence could not trigger enforcement.
Propagandists pounced on Bush’s error of presentation, but his mistake doesn’t change that Bush correctly applied the enforcement procedure.
Moreover, the Duelfer Report shows Iraq was in broad violation, just not in the same way suggested by the pre-war intelligence.
Q: Iraq failed its compliance test. Saddam called our bluff. Was that sufficient justification to trigger the credible threat of regime change?
A: Yes.
One, Bush had to make his call considering Iraq’s unaccounted for weapons and the intelligence at hand.
Two, Bush’s decision was for keeps. After Op Desert Fox, the credible threat of regime change was the last remaining leverage to compel Saddam’s cooperation. A credible threat of regime change is no longer credible if it’s a dud when triggered.
Calling off the regime change would have meant either a return to ‘containment’ or freeing Saddam. If returning to ‘containment’ was even practical at that point, the ‘containment’ option was broken. That only left freeing Saddam.
In hindsight, the Duelfer Report shows that a free Saddam meant a Saddam rearmed with WMD. Saddam’s motive was defeating the Iraq enforcement and rearming Iraq, not compliance and rehabilitation. He was reconstituting Iraq’s NBC capabilities, with an active program in the IIS, and was intent on fully restoring Iraq’s WMD, which he believed was necessary for Iraq’s national security, countering Iran, countering the US, and advancing his regional interests.
Three, the US-led Iraq enforcement was the defining UN enforcement of the post-Cold War. UN enforcement was already unreliable, and Bush wanted the UN to work better for the challenges after 9/11. If the US backed down when Saddam called our bluff, then UN enforcement of international norms with rogue actors and WMD proscription would have been undermined, perhaps beyond recovery.
You can criticize Bush’s liberal faith in the UN as idealistic, maybe even naé¯ve. You can say Bush should have bypassed the UN for military action like Clinton did. But Bush deserves credit for giving Saddam a last full chance to avoid war, which indicates Bush’s chief motive was not invading Iraq, and did try to reform the UN as a credible enforcer for the 9/11 era.
—
I think that covers the usual range of questions that people have about the Iraq mission. Like I said, the truth of the Iraq mission is straightforward and open source. It should be easy to explain when correcting the popular narrative.
The thing is, polling shows that Reid’s rants haven’t moved the needle one iota against the Kochs. 50% of Americans haven’t even heard of them. The rest already had their opinions, and Reid’s oratory (and I use that term loosely) isn’t enough to change any minds.
1% of people control 99% of the people in a democracy. It’s how it actually works over time.
So Reid only has to convince 1-10 people in the rich crowd to sanction or prefer deals against koch, and it shifts the power of the money train in Reid’s favor.
Wow, outstanding response Eric but politically and propaganda wise, completely irrelevant. What the low-info voting American public (who decides the elections) was hearing was how the UN sanctions were ‘unjustly’ hurting Iraqi children and about Sean Penn’s brave willingness to place himself between those children and the agents (soldiers) of an oppressive American empire desirous of Iraq’s oil.
That’s the propaganda that Bush had to counter before he could justify invading Iraq and because Bill Clinton’s methods were touted as sufficient by the media who were (and still are) the only source of news for the low info voter… the media consensus was that we should maintain the air denial but drop the sanctions…for the children’s sake. If Bush wanted to do more, he had to make the case and a documented history by Saddam of non-compliance didn’t cut it as justification to a purposely kept ignorant public.
I think the point of Reid’s push is that the Dems are having immense problems in motivating their base and stand a very good chance, because of that, of losing the Senate and, hence, their entire control of the government.
Reid isn’t talking to you. He’s talking to the Democrat base——-and that doesn’t require rocket science level conversation.
Dennis,
Good point.
The Chris Plante show on WMAL (Wash DC) had a montage of Harry Reid mentioning the Koch brothers. The montage went on for over a minute. Reid has mentioned them over 130 times so far. Reid’s behavior is truly bizarre.
Hussein and his minions probably mentioned Fox News almost as often back in 2009.
Knocking down those who speak truth to power.
Geoffrey Britain: “Wow, outstanding response Eric but politically and propaganda wise, completely irrelevant.”
Indeed. Truth by itself is not enough. It can’t stand alone. That’s why I advocate for activism.
In the zeitgeist of the competitive social cultural/political market, the truth is just another competing narrative, and the narrative contest is a function of activism. Rhetoric, let alone dialectic, is just one piece of activism.
The truth is a powerful narrative that can win the narrative contest, and the truth of the Iraq mission is straightforward, but programming the zeitgeist with the truth requires the same activism to compete versus opposing activists wielding false narratives.
A skilled activist with a lie will defeat a lay person with the truth. But a skilled activist with the truth should defeat a skilled activist with a lie.
If any truth could stand without activism, it’d be the truth of the Iraq mission.
The 1991-2003 Iraq enforcement is actually exceptional among modern-era international enforcements for its abnormally strong grounding in law, policy, and precedent.
That’s why the false narrative against the Iraq mission is patient zero for the wrong turn in US foreign affairs, and why it remains urgent to correct the narrative of the Iraq mission beyond just American partisan politics:
Every element of American liberal hegemonic leadership was contained in the Iraq mission. The Iraq mission represents the zenith of American leadership of the free world.
If the precedent has been established that the Iraq mission was wrong specifically, then that means American leadership of the pluralistic liberal international system we have known all our lives is wrong generally.
The pluralistic liberal international system depends on sure American liberal hegemonic leadership. Stigmatizing the Iraq mission and the essential law, policy, and precedent contained therein is the beginning of the end for American liberal hegemonic leadership.
Is American liberal hegemonic leadership worth saving? Do you want the truth to become relevant
“politically and propaganda wise”? If your answer is yes, then you need to become a Marxist-method activist, because the activist game is the only social-political game there is.
GB, Eric…
Coming at this from the other side of the elephant…
American culture grandly assumes that all of humanity can step up and become a successful democracy, that the American ‘template’ can be stamped globally.
Vietnam and Iraq should’ve proved that this grand assumption is false.
1) There were many fault lines in the Vietnamese polity — it’s a Balkanized ‘nation.’ DC grandly assumed that the pieces could be shuttled around on its political fabric.
2) However, Vietnam was, and is, so fractured that even now it makes more sense to break it down into cantons.
3) As for the idea that Vietnam was ready to join the 20th Century…! No nation gently throws off the French legacy. It’s astounding that DC felt no sting from that clue bat.
%%%
1) Iraq was Vietnam on steroids — culturally. It’s (Western) patron was France. (again… always a bad sign.)
2) Saddam was even nuttier that Hitler or Stalin or Mao. That puts him truly ‘out there.’
a) With a much smaller, weaker nation this tyrant tries to play in the biggest league.
b) Uniquely, Saddam is on record for having never tolerated dissent… even from his stalwarts. His council meetings were thus quite bizarre. He did all of the talking, all of the time. The only item up for debate was just how much the boys agreed with him. (It ranged from completely to totally.)
c) He had their follies as counter-templates.
3) Iraq is, and was, seriously dumber than Vietnam. This epic dose of stupidity was bio-engineered by Saddam. Genocide was policy. In the case of the Shia and Kurds, Saddam deliberately starved whole populations. In this, Saddam was taking pages from Stalin, Hitler and Mao.
Many, many of the ‘suicide troops’ used by the enemy were full blown mental retards. They had no volition at all. From time to time, their nefarious schemes would go awry, and the intended victim would survive.
The human brain is largely formed before birth. So the result of massive, chronic (pre-natal) starvation is millions of idiots. It’s too late, no remediation can reverse this slow-motion genocide.
&&&
The capper is that democracy and stupidity don’t mix well. Greek democracies blew up time and time again when LIV started really calling the shots.
Like mold getting into the cheese, once LIV logic permeates the polity, conditions deteriorate at a remarkable clip.
To be an effective voter you need to be informed enough to cast an intelligent vote.
Unfortunately, the ‘ins’ have so rigged the game that they are immunized from the vote.
California voters have returned the (sitting) legislators 100% of the time for the last twenty-years.
Which brings us back to the Ummah. The average IQ in the Ummah is 78-80ish. (Bad diets and cousin marriage will do that.) So there’s no chance of an informed voting public. Pre-democratic conditions just don’t exist.
As history illustrates, stupid societies can only function via monarchy or tyranny. There are simply not enough ‘smart fraction’ people to go around. (IQ above 106)
Consequently, American policy should not even aim for democratic revolutions. Instead, the aim ought to be pre-democratic conditions. This is, more or less, the path taken by Korea and Singapore.
One should recognize that exiting the colonial culture of Holland, France, Spain or Portugal is a multi-generational saga. Like Moses, one must be prepared to witness two age-cohorts passing into history.
Eric said:
“The 1991-2003 Iraq enforcement is actually exceptional among modern-era international enforcements for its abnormally strong grounding in law, policy, and precedent.”
I’m reminded of the speeches of Edmund Burke regarding the impending English war against the colonies (us). He said that the crown absolutely had the right to go to war with us, but was it wise?
He lost the debate, but was proven correct.
By the same token, we had the right to go to war with Saddam, but things didn’t end up as rosy as predicted. That includes the opposition from the left: What did the brain-trust in the White House expect? That the left would get all patriotic and just sit idly by as the war was prosecuted?
The left has been trying to re-live the “glory days” of Vietnam for as long as I can remember, all the while shouting “LOYAL OPPOSITION!”
If neocons didn’t take their perfidy into account, then that shows a lack of vision on their side.
The main conservative argument, and the view of the founders, I might add, is epistemological humility. Imperfect knowledge.
There is a limit to what we can know.
When one tinkers with a system as complex as the geopolitical balance-of-power, one cannot be even reasonably sure of the outcome. And Iraq was a very large piece to remove from such a system.
“If the precedent has been established that the Iraq mission was wrong specifically, then that means American leadership of the pluralistic liberal international system we have known all our lives is wrong generally.”
Yep. Pretty much.
There is no “liberal international system,” per se. Just a loose collection of interests among countries. After all, something like 2/3 of U.N. member states are autocracies of one type or another. What interests, exactly, do we have in common with such states?
And as someone quoted Margaret Thatcher in another thread, there is no rogue state that prospers but for the support of an advanced state in the “civilized” world.
“…you need to become a Marxist-method activist, because the activist game is the only social-political game there is.”
Other than telling the simple truth. If we can’t win without resorting to Marxist-method manipulation and lies, then it’s an implicit admission that American citizens are dumb cattle that can’t handle the truth and can’t be trusted to make an informed, rational decision.
And if that’s the case, this country is lost no matter what any of us do.
Until I see that confirmed, I will continue to fight the good fight.
In the meantime, I am buoyed by the comment of Winston Churchill, “You can always count on Americans to do the right thing – after they’ve tried everything else.”
Eric,
Another thing that people like Geoffrey sometimes overlook is the extent to which the starving children story was pushed around the world with little play given to the oil for food money going to bribe the UN, France, and Russia. Saddam knew how to play on anti-Americanism. Furthermore, had we backed down from removing him, he would have been the strong man in a strong men culture and would have attracted and supported terrorist groups as AQ in Afghanistan was weakened,
I’m also bugged by the the constant criticism of the religion of peace phrase. Should he have said that all Muslims are retrograde terrorists? How would that have played in places like Jordan and Morocco, to say nothing of the Euro countries with large numbers of Islamic immigrants? How could these countries support us even behing the sceenes with intel sharing etc when we had just announced that their populations were are enemies? Some people have no idea of the number of balls Bush had to juggle during his administration. Meanwhile the Dems lined up for the opening of a Michael Moore film, lending credibility to the books he was selling all over. Some sold more in Germany than in the US because Germans love to feel they are getting inside information, especially when it confirms their own predjudices.
This is, more or less, the path taken by Korea and Singapore.
Korea’s still occupied by American troops. Iraq isn’t. If America’s problems are oversea entanglements, having forever entanglements isn’t a good idea.
Hussein’s solution is to wreck the country, kill or depose the leaders by funding terrorist groups in Libya/Syria, and then watch the fireworks later as he gets a big fat smile on his face whenever Americans die or are tortured by those same terrorists.
We all know or suspect it is Truth now.
Geoffrey Britain,
I said “I think that covers the usual range of questions that people have about the Iraq mission”.
On afterthought, I left out two of the usual questions: ‘Was Operation Iraqi Freedom illegal?’ and ‘The reasons kept changing – was OIF about WMD or democracy?’.
Before I answer them, you said Bush “had to make the case”. Bush did make the case. Read his statements on the issue. Preceding Bush, Clinton made the case for the Iraq enforcement.
The Iraq enforcement was over a decade along in 2002; by then, the President shouldn’t have needed to explain the Saddam problem to us. But Bush, along with former President Clinton, did explain it. The rest was up to the people, where activists, including media activists, determine whether the truth or a lie predominates.
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Q: Was Operation Iraqi Freedom illegal?
A: There’s no domestic legal controversy. According to American law, OIF was legal.
The lawsuits claiming Public Law 107-243 did not rise to a declaration of war by Congress or that Congress improperly delegated the power to declare war to President Bush have been dismissed as a ‘political question’, meaning President Bush’s decision on OIF – right or wrong – was within the Constitutional scope of the Executive.
Under Presidents Bush I and Clinton, Congress had repetitively made clear the President was authorized to use military action to bring Iraq into compliance with the UNSC resolutions. OIF was well grounded in the national interest, multiple statutes, as well as modern foreign-policy precedent. For example, P.L. 107-243 and UNSC resolution 1441 included strong humanitarian grounds. In 1999, while still bombing Iraq in the wake of Operation Desert Fox, President Clinton used humanitarian grounds to bypass Congress and the UNSC altogether when he deployed airpower and ground forces against Serbia. (Over a decade later, President Obama cited humanitarian grounds, specifically Responsibility to Protect, to deploy airpower in Libya without Congressional authorization.)
A2: While there is no domestic legal controversy over OIF, there is an international legal controversy, ie, the episodic view that UNSC authorization was required for each US military action and erased (for some critics) Iraq’s presumption of guilt, versus the American progressive view that longstanding a priori and de facto authority for the US-led enforcement of the UNSC resolutions carried over the legal authority of the original Gulf War resolutions to all enforcement of the ceasefire and subsequent resolutions.
President Clinton’s military enforcement with Iraq cited to the US law and UNSC resolution in the original Gulf War authorization:
The same legal basis for military enforcement with Iraq, which Clinton inherited from Bush I, was inherited by Bush from Clinton.
There is no dispute that by Spring 2003, Iraq was established to have remained in breach of its obligations. At that point, the international legal controversy was over whether the US President or the UNSC held ultimate authority to trigger the credible threat of regime change.
According to President Clinton, based on the foundational US law and UNSC resolution from the Gulf War, the US President held the ultimate – as well as sovereign – authority to deploy US forces for the Iraq enforcement.
The claim that OIF was illegal by international law is based on language in UNSC resolution 1441 that the UNSC was “seized” on the issue, which opponents interpret as requiring UNSC authorization for each US military action with Iraq.
International law is murky on the question of OIF due to the loose and ‘gray’ character of UN enforcement.
On balance, I believe the American progressive view wins out over the episodic view due to precedent set in Iraq and elsewhere, and UN reliance on sovereign authorities, especially US sovereign authority, for military enforcement.
In Iraq for over decade and other contemporary international enforcements, the US had deployed the military with sovereign authority, and only at times with concurrent UN authority. The US-led Balkans intervention, conducted without UN authority, was the closest precedent for OIF.
The regime-changing intervention in the Balkans, like OIF, was not green-lit by the UNSC, but also like post-war Iraq, the post-war peace operations in the Balkans were conducted with UN authorizations.
Q: The reasons kept changing — was OIF about WMD or democracy?
A: OIF was about both. The issues of Iraq’s WMD and regime change in Iraq were tied together. There was a bundle of reasons for OIF. The short answer to ‘Why?’ is ‘All of the above’.
The regime change mandate in Clinton’s 1998 Iraq Liberation Act was based on Clinton’s conclusion that the source of the “clear and present danger” posed by Saddam was not Iraq’s WMD, but rather the intrinsic nature of Saddam’s regime.
In other words, Iraq’s WMD was a symptom only, albeit a very dangerous symptom. The cancer of Iraq was Saddam, unreconstructed, and curing Iraq’s cancer required regime change.
For the liberal hegemonic leader of the free world, regime change equaled pluralistic liberal reform, commonly called democracy.
The objectives set by President Clinton to resolve America’s Saddam-Iraq problem were achieved with Operation Iraqi Freedom: Iraq in compliance, Iraq at peace with its neighbors and the international community, and Iraq internally reformed with regime change.
Compared to the achievement of the first two goals, however, the future progress of Iraq’s internal reform has been left uncertain by the premature departure of US forces from Iraq.
Explaining this issue, as evidenced by the amount of words Eric had to write, isn’t easy. It requires special people, with special passions or talents.
The Left handles it by having a priest-politician craft the propaganda, and then every zombie in their ranks regurgitates the propaganda, word for word, thought for thought. That kind of centralized system doesn’t work with free individuals. Free individuals must be trained up to a standard, to understand what they are doing and why they should be doing it to get the most bang.
Propaganda is an indirect weapon. I started to prefer direct weapons after seeing what the Left wrought in Iraq, after 2006.
Matt_SE: “There is no “liberal international system,” per se. Just a loose collection of interests among countries.”
‘Liberal international system’ is a euphemism for ‘liberal world order’. ‘System’ downplays that the pluralistic liberal international community, such as it is, is structured – ordered – by the will and power of the American hegemon, the alpha wolf of the pack.
The need for American leadership is less evident on the inside of the ‘system’ than on its edges, but you know, things fall apart, the center does not hold. Failed American hegemonic leadership anywhere resonates everywhere that’s tied into American leadership.
Matt_SE: “By the same token, we had the right to go to war with Saddam, but things didn’t end up as rosy as predicted.”
But that’s normal. What wars in US military history unfurled like their optimistic predictions?
Our victories almost invariably have been built on defeats. In Iraq, as previously, failure taught American soldiers like GEN Petraeus how to win.
The standard of perfect preemptive anticipation, preparation, accounting, and execution that critics apply to OIF is ahistorical. Consistent with military history, the learning curve for victory in Iraq was driven by necessity on the ground.
Our military has always undergone steep learning curves in war. OIF just demanded a steeper learning curve in the post-war.
Keep in mind, we were only in Iraq for 8 years.
8 years is a very short time when compared to past post-war occupations. Heck, 8 years after we took charge of South Korea from the Imperial Japanese, we were fighting the Red Chinese there. Who predicted that on VJ day, or 07Dec41 for that matter? Yet almost 70 years since we took stewardship, South Korea has exceeded the most optimistic predictions with our steadfast partnership.
So, what did we accomplish in our brief 8 years in Iraq, despite the incredibly, many said impossibly, difficult circumstances in the post-war?
The objectives for resolution of the Saddam problem set by President Clinton were achieved: Iraq in compliance, Iraq at peace with its neighbors and the international community, and Iraq internally reformed with regime change.
The problem isn’t that we went to Iraq to resolve the Saddam problem. Our peace-building in Iraq was well on track when Obama bungled the SOFA negotiation. With the perspective gained from our 20th century peace operations, the problem is we left Iraq much too early, before we secured the permanent peace.
Matt_SE: “When one tinkers with a system as complex as the geopolitical balance-of-power, one cannot be even reasonably sure of the outcome. And Iraq was a very large piece to remove from such a system.”
Iraq wasn’t removed. Saddam was removed.
The ship sailed on “tinkering” when we intervened with Iraq in 1990-1991, then decided to give Saddam a chance to rehabilitate rather than oust him with the Gulf War. Everything else followed from Bush I’s decision not to remove Saddam as a “very large piece” from the system.
Somehow, in some minds, Saddam has been retroactively transformed since his death into a stabilizing force who served US interests. Yet the US was pulled into Iraq in the 1st place because Saddam was an out-of-control destabilizing force acting against US interests. At every step after we intervened, Saddam was given opportunities to rehabilitate and didn’t.
By 2002, we were down to 3 options: Kick the can, free Saddam, or a last chance to comply with credible threat of regime change.
By then, the indefinite ‘containment’, which was toxic to us in its own right, was broken and a dead end. Freeing Saddam meant a winning and irrational Saddam rearming with WMD.
None of the 3 options were pretty, but it’s what we had. It’s clear to me that faced with 3 ugly options, Bush made the most responsible choice for the long term, though certainly not the easiest choice in the short term. The easiest choice for Bush would have been kicking the can and hoping that when the ‘containment’ collapsed, it collapsed on the next President’s watch.
Of the 3 options, what would you have chosen rather than a last chance to comply – kick the can or free Saddam?
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blert: “Saddam was even nuttier that Hitler or Stalin or Mao. That puts him truly ‘out there.’”
An all-time propaganda coup of the Left was to characterize the Duelfer Report as discrediting OIF when it actually shows that Saddam was growing more dangerous, and regime change couldn’t have come sooner.
According to the Duelfer Report, Saddam was growing increasingly irrational, in the various senses of the word, and removed from whatever checks and balances remained in his circle. Why is that dangerous? Because at the same time, Saddam wasn’t withdrawing from his ambition. He was consolidating power and pursuing his vision quest, which included WMD.
An ambitious tyrant with bad judgement and WMD is really bad. A crazy, ambitious tyrant with bad judgement and WMD has to go.
Ymarsakar: “Explaining this issue, as evidenced by the amount of words Eric had to write, isn’t easy.”
Well, I am trying to be comprehensive because even supporters get basic parts wrong. It is broken down by Q&A with sub-points. I suggest deploying the parts smartly in a responsive sequence rather than dumping everything all at once in a jumble.
The concepts are easy to understand and ought to make sense, though some parts like the legal controversy require a little more explanation.
What should work for the Rule 12 counter-attack is to build up the schema by using a repetition of the Bush-right/Dems-lied/Obama-wrong with each point of the Q&A. Remember, the goal isn’t only to set the record straight on the Iraq mission. This is activism. The 1st prong’s re-frame is the foundation only. The counter-attack works as a 3-prong formula.
I agree about the Left’s cult liturgies. They’re tough, but it can be beat.
expat: “Some people have no idea of the number of balls Bush had to juggle during his administration.”
President Clinton knew.
From Saddam, to al Qaeda, to Russian discontent, to European sullenness about US “hyperpower” – the international challenges that Bush had to navigate were all inherited from Clinton. Bush’s Iraq policy and count-terror policy were built from the Iraq and counter-terror policies he inherited from Clinton.
The thing that most angers me about the Democrats is that all the Democrats who served in Congress or the Clinton administration in the 1990s knew the difficulties facing Bush. In many cases, they likely appreciated the problems better than Bush did entering office.
Those Democrats, Clinton and his officials most of all, were in the best position to educate the American people on America’s challenges – the balls Bush had to juggle – after 9/11.
Instead, the Democrats who understood America’s challenges the best made the deliberate choice to bamboozle the American people for partisan gain.
At first, Clinton did support Bush and try to share perspective by citing to Clinton’s own presidential experience. But when Clinton caved into the leftist activist pressure and betrayed his successor in the White House, I knew it was bad.
Me at May 8th, 2014 at 7:17 pm: “…and regime change couldn’t have come sooner.”
Fix: I think the correct idiom is: and regime change couldn’t have come too soon.