What are you dying for?

From Tuesday, April 24, 2007, under the heading 10 Coalition Troops Killed, Dr. Juan Cole has an excellent post. He states that "although we do not yet know the names of those killed, we know who they are like," and provides a heartwrenching list of those who have fallen in Iraq, complete with links. To those who say this is, after all, a war, and the numbers are (still) "very small," I ask that they visit this post and follow the links. The fact that the carnage does not equal that of the Second World War's Eastern Front is simply irrelevant.

Dr. Cole goes continues on: "Saddam is gone. There was never any threat to the US or UK from Iraq, and there is not now one. What is the mission, for which these young people have given their lives this spring? What do we tell their children about why their daddy is no longer there for them? ...

"We ask our men and women in uniform to risk their lives, sometimes to sacrifice them, for the security of our nation. But the security of our nation is not in doubt ... "

The security of the nation was never seriously threatened by Saddam's Iraq, but the lies and greed and ignorance that have fueled this war have threatened the security of the Republic. This is the price of empire, of foreign interventions, of war: tarnished idealism, dead heroes, and innocents who will not remember their fathers or mothers.

Why is this man smiling?

Because no matter what, the President has his back. After testimony in which he stated he did not know why he fired the US attorneys in question, but assured us that he had reasons which were appropriate, one would expect Mr. Gonzalez to be on the ropes and very soon out of a job. Put aside running commentary such as the host of GOP senators who were at least stand-offish and sometimes overtly condemning; leave behind questions such as why did he not research the firings since he knew he would be giving testimony? No, despite a performance that can only be termed dismal, Mr. Gonzalez is safe. Indeed, the President still has "more confidence" in him, and following his crash and burn in the Capitol stated [he] "went up and gave a very candid assessment, and answered every question he could possibly answer, honestly answer, in a way that increased my confidence in his ability to do the job." Statements such as that explain why the nation has increasingly less confidence in the President. Pundits will examine and discuss the reasons for Bush keeping Gonzalez. He's loyal to a fault, they will say, or the GOP strategists do not want to appear weak; the party sees no upside in firing Gonzalez, or the President cannot afford to go through a round of hearings for a new Attorney General. All this is well and good, but the fact remains: Bush and his core team no longer enjoy the confidence of the nation, and are beginning to lose the confidence of their own party. It is about time.

The most astounding thing in 32 years

From Al, the President's Man: Alberto Gonzales is bloodied by his trip to the Senate, by Dahlia Lithwick in Slate.

"One of the finest moments comes when Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., busts out a big, big chart. Which happens after almost everyone has gone home. The chart compares the Clinton protocol for appropriate contacts between the White House and the DoJ on pending criminal cases with the Bush protocol. According to Whitehouse, the Clinton protocol authorized just four folks at the White House to chat with three folks at Justice. The chart had four boxes talking to three boxes. Out comes the Bush protocol, and now 417 different people at the White House have contacts about pending criminal cases with 30-some people at Justice. You can just see zillions of small boxes nattering back and forth. It seems that just about everyone in the White House, including the guys in the mailroom, had a vote on ongoing criminal matters.

"Sen. Pat Leahy, D-Vt., calls this 'the most astounding thing' he's seen in 32 years."

Only in the past 32 years? How about we enshrine this protocol chart in Ripley's Believe it or Not. Talking about the "horse built by a committee."

Appearing "Presidential" ... or not

Speaking at Murrells Inlet VFW Hall in South Carolina, Senator McCain was asked when he thought the US Military might "send an air mail message to Tehran." Mr. McCain began his answer by singing the first lines of a popular Beach Boys song, which he renamed "Bomb Iran." A clip of the exchange can be viewed here. The good senator has gone from "straight shooter" to "eccentric uncle." His decline, precipitated by his lust for the presidency, is sad to watch, but not surprising; this is very reminiscent of Bob Dole ("I'll be whatever you want me to be.")

The office of the presidency has become like Tolkien's Ring of Power -- it corrupts everything and everyone who comes into contact with it. Some fall sooner than others, but all fall eventually. Lord Acton's observation on power is perhaps cliche, but it is as accurate as it ever was and we do well to consider its ramifications as the campaign for the Ring--er, presidency--heats up (no pun intended.)

The "dead-enders"

Today we read the following:

"Majority Expect U.S. Will 'Lose' War In Iraq
By GARY LANGER, ABC NEWS POLLING DIRECTOR
Apr. 17 - ABC News/Washington Post poll finds 51 percent think U.S. will lose war, 66 percent think Iraq was not worth fight; Dems, Pelosi get higher marks in approval and trust.

A bare majority of Americans for the first time believe the United States will lose the war in Iraq, and a new high -- two-thirds -- say the war was not worth fighting. Yet the public divides on setting a deadline for withdrawal.

That mix of sentiments -- unhappy with the war, unclear what to do about it -- is keeping George W. Bush in deep disfavor. Just 35 percent approve of his job performance overall, a scant two points above his career low. And just 29 percent like how he's dealing with the situation in Iraq. "

Everyone knows the outcome, but refuses to face reality (i.e. "the public divides on setting a deadline for withdrawal.") The public knows now that it has been conned. It followed the advice of the politicians and media and "gave war a chance." Now, with the conflict having lasted longer World War II, we face our consciences as we look at defeat, wondering what "victory" would have looked like.

Cheney and Bush refuse to accept timelines, saying this would "legislate defeat." On the attack, they can still muster the tough-guy talk. Only now, the nation realizes that politics and international conflict are not action-movies or video games. Indeed, political decisions have consequences -- in conflict, these consequences are paid in blood and treasure.

Still, despite the billions poured into a conflict that has produced one and one-half positive results (Saddam Hussein is gone, along with any near-term possibility of a resurgent WMD program in Iraq) and a host of negative results (thousands of deaths and shattered lives, a degraded international standing, a strengthened strategic position for Iran, an energized terrorist base, structural damage to the US economy, a strained military with depleted hardware, an expanded use of mercenaries, er, "contractors," the ruin of the Iraqi oil industry, the creation of a new failed state in the heart of the world's oil producing region, the complete disruption of Mideast power politics, etc.) -- still, STILL a full 29% of those polled approve of the President's handling of the situation. These are the real "dead-enders" that Rumsfeld, Cheney and others famously refered to, who could not see the writing on the wall.

Fun with email

From the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, fun times in the world of email:

"The Republican National Committee set up the accounts for about 20 Bush aides, such as Karl Rove and his deputies, who get involved in politics, spokesman Scott Stanzel said. Having the GOP create non-White House addresses and provide separate BlackBerries, laptops and other communications gear was designed to avoid running afoul of Hatch Act rules barring federal employees from engaging in political activities with government resources or on government time, he said

"Under President Clinton, White House aides used separate equipment for political spadework but did not have separate accounts.

"This is entirely appropriate," Stanzel said of the Bush White House practice.
He said staffers used their RNC accounts instead of White House accounts to discuss the prosecutor issue or conduct other official business for several reasons, including extra caution about complying with the Hatch Act as well as the convenience of using one account instead of several. Stanzel said he could not speak to whether anyone was intentionally trying to avoid White House archiving because he had not spoken to all those involved." [italics mine] Well, I have some inkling of whether this was intentional--what do you think?

Stanzel said some e-mails have been lost because the White House lacked clear policies on complying with Presidential Records Act requirements. This seems odd, as email is hardly an emerging technology. The announcement of the lost e-mails gave new fodder for inquiry on fired prosecutors issue, which has been fading from the front pages. "This sounds like the administration's version of the dog ate my homework," said Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt. "I am deeply disturbed that just when this administration is finally subjected to meaningful oversight, it cannot produce the necessary information."

The good news is that email can be difficult to truly eliminate. Somewhere, these emails most likely exist. As electronic communications at work belong to the employer, I would suggest that electronic communications pertaining to running the country belong to the people. Let's take the effort to find them.

The State of the "Front Runners"

We are at that point where the horse-race known as the Presidential Election has taken some form. We learn that Senator Obama is the real deal because ... he has raised a lot of money. Rudy Giuliani's team is debating whether the campaign slogan should be "9/11" or "Death Death DEATH!" Hillary continues her forced "one of the people" stops. I love this gem, from a campaign stop in Iowa: "We have a lot of farms in New York. Do y'all know that? It's true." Great.

For entertainment value, however, the best candidate so far is Mitt Romney. The Mittster has Michigan roots, and was governor of Massachusets -- one would figure he can't be all bad. Heh-heh. But check it out:

'Campaigning last week in Keene, N.H., [Romney] said: "I purchased a gun when I was a young man. I've been a hunter pretty much all my life." He went on to say that "shooting a rabbit with a single-shot .22 is pretty hard" and that he did better with a semiautomatic.

Turns out Romney's hunting experience is brief -- a summer hunting rabbits on an Idaho ranch with cousins as a 15-year-old, and shooting quail last year in Georgia.

Campaign spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom said Romney (who also was razzed through the week in the "Doonesbury" comic strip) also has shot small game on his Utah property.

Said Romney on Thursday: "I've always been a rodent and rabbit hunter. Small varmints, if you will. ... More than two times."

All this comes after Romney conceded earlier in the campaign, after touting his National Rifle Association membership, that he joined less than a year ago.

And after saying that he had a "gun of my own," he admitted that he didn't personally own guns, but one of his sons did.' (from the Freep, Sunday, April 8th)

Yep, Mitt Romney: Gunowner. NRA member. Hunter. Real man. Republican.

The economy is great, you just don't see it because ...

I will continually hear from friends who are (still) supporters of the President that the economy is terrific, going "gangbusters," and be treated to an anecdote of how someone that they met on a trip or know through a friend is doing better than ever. I will be told that my gloom over the economy occurs from being too rooted in my community, that the structural issues of Michigan are clouding my vision of how simply fantastic everything truly is.



I find myself almost believing that this is the case. And then, well, this ...

Josh Bivens of the Economic Policy Institute states the following:

"This much is clear: the current recovery substantially lags the historical average in GDP growth, employment growth, investment in equipment and software, and, with the deflating housing market, even in residential investment.

"Conversely, corporate profit growth in the current recovery (despite a 3% dip in the last quarter of 2006) has been more than twice as rapid as in the past.

"In short, the current recovery looks weak on all measures except profit growth. As a policy lesson, the large tax cuts of 2001 and 2003, which have had ample time to affect the economy by now, have failed to deliver economic performance that even matches up to the past average."
So, corporate profits up, everything else -- well, up in a kinda-sorta way, but not so much. Now, heh-heh, what would another round of tax cuts do?

UPDATE: As usual, my man Kevin Drum can convey more useful information in one sentence than I can in an entire post, links and all. In looking at the same EPI data, he gives us this in a March 5th post:

"The average worker has gained exactly nothing from five years of economic growth."

Yep. That's about it. In the comment string, one of his readers suggested that this be the Democratic slogan of '08. Not a bad idea.

McCain as Baghdad Bob

Separated at birth?

Senator and presidential candidate John McCain was recently in Baghdad to pump up US public opinion (and, no doubt, his own campaign.) In an effort to demonstrate that the surge (as well as earlier tactical modifications) was having success, Mr. McCain walked the streets of a Baghdad market. The results were not pretty, as the juxtaposition between what was said and what was visible were so at odds that the only thing one can be left with is a sense of the ridiculous. In the words of Josh Marshall, the image of "[t]he aging war hawk, proving that security is returning to Baghdad by walking into a market encased in body armor, surrounded by rooftop sharpshooters and enveloped in a shield of a hundred soldiers, helicopters (Blackhawks), helicopter gunships (Apaches) and all after another group of soldiers went in for a pre-jaunt security sweep" was a Dukakis-in-the-tank moment. To say that he did not appear "presidential" is an understatement fitting for The Daily Show.

Dr. Juan Cole points out in an April 2nd post entitled McCain Continues Magical Mystery Tour that "[t]he inexperienced often assume that when a guerrilla war or a civil war is going on, life grinds to a standstill. Not so. People go shopping for food. They drive where they need to go as long as they don't hear that there is a firefight in that area. They go to work if they still have work. Life goes on. It is just that, unexpectedly, a mortar shell might land near you. Or the person ahead of you in line outside the bakery might fall dead, victim of a sniper's bullet. The bazaars are bustling some days (all the moreso because it is good to stock up on supplies the days when the violence isn't so bad). So nothing that John McCain saw in Baghdad on Sunday meant a d--- thing. Not a g--d--- thing."

The radio has been abuzz about how the surge is working in "some areas." And then comes the explanation of why: the Shiite militias are standing down, even after being provoked through suicide bombs by the Sunni insurgents. Why? They are letting the Americans do the bleeding for them. Apparently, our media commentators have not read Mao:

"When encircled by the enemy, guerrillas disperse to withdraw.

When the nature of the ground limits action, guerrillas disperse.

When the availability of supplies limits action, they disperse.

Guerrillas disperse in order to promote mass movements over a wide area."

Senator McCain can walk the streets of Baghdad without suffering attack--but he does well to be armored and with armed men. The surge is in effect, the Apaches and Blackhawks are in the air, and the guerillas ... well, the "guerillas disperse to withdraw" so as to "promote mass movements over a wide area." While the movement toward an ink-blot/mini-fort approach is a welcome improvement over previous tactics, the moment at which that strategy would have been effective in winning "hearts and minds" and quelling the insurgency has long passed. To paraphrase Mao, the fish still have an ocean in which to swim; it is largely an ocean of our own making.

To think that the guerillas are somehow overawed by our show of force or, worse, to think they are beaten because American forces have achieved such-and-such a casualty rate is to totally misunderstand the nature of guerilla war.

It is, in a word, pathetic.