Thoughts on who the real enemy is.
This demonization of their political adversaries, as Hillary did last night, and Barack Obama does often, is the hallmark of fascists. I disagree with Jim Webb on many issues, but I respect him. I think he’s finding out that he joined the wrong political party.
Good on James Webb.
I, too, disagree with Jim Webb on an awful lot. But I do like him for remembering this:
link: http://www.jameswebb.com/articles/military-and-veterans/peace-defeat-what-did-the-vietnam-war-protesters-want
BTW: It would be a service to humanity if someone could put that part of the awards ceremony on YouTube.
Did Webb really think that a story about his military service would ingratiate him with the democrat party base?
Jim Webb, former United States Senator and always a Marine Officer, seems to have a certain ‘tude on him.
Yeah, yeah, chicken-hawk me and Senator Webb who almost had his leg chopped off for wounds in Vietnam. Excuse the pun, I guess that gives him “standing” to express his ‘tude.
So “we” go into Iraq, or rather President Bush committed us to war in Iraq — with the somewhat bipartisan backing of Congress. I never fully understood the logic of this when, yes, the bad-guys of 9-11 were directed out of Afghanistan, I guess, but the shock troops were all Saudi or Egyptian citizens? But sometimes you have to trust our Guys-in-Charge with Access-to-the-Intelligence-Briefings have a Big Picture View that we peons (without standing) don’t have, and if there is a reason to invade Westphalian-sovereign country in protecting our nation from foreign, terrorist threats, I won’t be holding up protest signs.
Yeah, yeah, “Support Our Troops” is a tired slogan, but if we don’t give aid-and-comfort to our sworn terrorist enemy by snarking about our troops and their Commander-in-Chief (I am talking to you, both Jim’s), the sooner we get this over with.
As the son of refugee immigrants from another “trouble spot” from two generations ago, my world view was shaped that this Iraq thing wasn’t going to be anywhere as “easy” as it was made out to be, and when it wasn’t “easy” and all of the Jim’s of the world started their snark, it really bugged the heck out of me because trite that it sounds these days, when your country is committed to a war, you stand by your country (our Jim, before you “get going”, read a couple more paragraphs).
So now Mr. Obama is President, and he is privy to all the intelligence and I am not. He got us into Libya to “regime-change” Kaddafi, and “only” 4 of our guys got killed instead of 4000. Our four guys getting killed might have had some connection to our attempts at regime-change in Syria, but, blah, blah, “In time of War, Truth needs to be protected by a bodyguard of lies” regarding a film made by a Christian Egyptian, something we would understand if we had the intelligence, so we should trust our Commander-in-Chief and not engage in wing-nut snark about the man?
So why did we want “regime change” in Syria? Isn’t it for the same reason we started agreeing on regime change in Iraq? Homicidal dictator, threat the regional security, state-sponsor of terrorism, and on and on? So Mr. Obama is pursuing regime change in Syria, which is good, but Mr. Bush actually carrying it out in Iraq is proof of his incompetence? Or my backing the Iraq War but starting to have worries about whether getting rid of Mr. Assad is proof of my partisan hypocrisy?
I guess the difference between Iraq and Syria is that at the cost of enormous treasure and altogether too many American lives and missing limbs, the Iraq war rid the world of Saddam and his even more bloodthirsty sons and until we left, it sorta, kinda had a functioning representative government? Syria has only cost us, what, the 500 million to support 5 foreign fighters according to right-wing snark, and no American lives that we know about for sure, but whatever it is that we did by commission or omission is a complete Charlie Foxtrot in Syrian lives lost, even in comparison to the civilian toll in Iraq, which people forget by the way was largely inflicted by our enemy rather than “collateral” damage from our application of military force.
The principle is the same, Saddam had to “go”, Assad has to “go”, only we “did it all wrong” in Iraq by sending our soldiers, sailors, and Marines, and we are doing it all right in “Syria” because we are not sending our soldiers, sailors, and Marines into a Syrian expeditionary war? Is that the difference, our “deep state” that doesn’t change with change in presidential party stays the same and wants all the strong men in the Near and Middle East to go, but the Republicans messed up by involving our brave men and women and the Democrats are so much smarter by not doing that? Is that is what this is all about?
I don’t have much regard for the glib, knee-jerk, un-reflective snark of either Jim.
Dude, that was a lot of snark. But what specifically did it have to do with Webb? I would certainly take him as the Democratic candidate over the others.
A certain President of the United States in welcoming a newly elected United States Senator asks the man, “How is your boy?”, meaning, his adult son, who following his father’s example, enlisted in the United States Marine Corps and was as a consequence serving in Iraq. In an unpopular war that said Senator was elected to office on a platform of opposition. Let’s say that a socially awkward exchange took place for which Senator James Webb later apologized .
Does combat service as a Marine in Vietnam and service as President Reagan’s Secretary of the Navy give a freshman Senator from Virginia standing to be rude to President George W. Bush? Because we all know George W. Bush was incompetent and Iraq was a totally unnecessary war? That makes acting like an untutored, unschooled boor totally OK?
Just saying that difference in social graces between Senator Webb and Secretary Clinton is slimmer than one may think. Maybe there is a difference because Senator Webb later reflected on his conduct and apologized.
The Democrats will never support a candidate that fought against communism while they are in the enjoying the rise of communism in their party. But, it isn’t just that Democrats are embracing communism, they always side with our nation’s enemies.
Chris Kyle is also a war hero but reviled by Democrats because he killed jihadis belonging to the groups that grew into ISIS.
Just pick any geopolitical issue, to find out where Democrats stand, look at which positions are anti-American. Its like a gag reflex for them but don’t dare say they hate the USA.
It may be hard to grasp, but the more bellicose policy is not always the better one. Invading Iraq left the U.S. worse off than the alternative*. Anyone who loves the USA, and opposes its enemies, should regret the decision to invade.
* If a genie appeared today and offered to give Iraq back to a resurrected Saddam Hussein and Baath party, disband ISIS, purge Iraq of Iranian influence, bring back 4,000 dead Americans and heal our tens of thousands of wounded, and hand $3,000 cash to each American citizen, we’d take that deal in a heartbeat.
Anyone who loves the USA, and opposes its enemies
The enemy is defined by all Democrat candidates, other than Jim Webb, to be the GOP, who live in and love the USA. Calling people who disagree with you “the enemy”, does not justify resurrecting Saddam Hussein while saying Khaddafi, Mubarak, and Assad need to go. Your response, in a term, “nonsense”.
I like this reply. Smugly mime wiping of one’s hands and with a standoffish voice say, “Well! We shouldn’t have been there in the first place!”
We can adopt this same attitude on a variety of other topics. For example, now that we know the obvious incompetence of our leaders, where over a trillion dollars has been lost due to fraud (reported by the GAO):
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2015/10/fraudulent-medicare-medicaid-eitc-tax.html where over a trillion dollars in fraud since 2003
we can end the following programs:
Medicare, Medicaid and the earned income tax credit. When mayhem ensues we can simply tell them, “Well! We shouldn’t have had these programs in the first place!”
Thanks for the idea, Jim.
Invading Iraq did not leave the US worse off, abandoning Iraq did. And the latter belongs solely to you and your party.
” Invading Iraq left the U.S. worse off than the alternative*.”
No abandoning Iraq when they needed our help to fight off ISIS and prevent genocide was the worse alternative.
“It may be hard to grasp, but the more bellicose policy”
Uh, I find the shallow arguments of the left to be unpersuasive in dealing with our foreign policy problems. Blame the USA first and rooting against our country is certainly a way to create self fulfilling prophecies. You guys supported the war until it became politically unpopular, then stabbed our troops and country in the back by rooting for failure.
And who were the bellicose ones during this period? The people raging in the street. The same people who flew to Iraq to be human shields. The same people who always side with our nation’s self declared enemies.
“Anyone who loves the USA, and opposes its enemies, should regret the decision to invade.”
Lol, which one of our enemies do Democrats oppose?
“Invading Iraq left the U.S. worse off’
Imagine a world where we didn’t cut and run and retained diplomatic influence in Iraq.
On every foreign policy issue, retaining our presence in Iraq would have strengthened Obama’s hand both militarily and diplomatically. Syria and Iran are two big issues where we could have used a better hand but Obama threw away our aces and kept the 7/2 combo.
Instead we got a terrible deal with Iran that sanctions their nuclear weapon development, genocide sweeping the ME, and Iraq entering the orbit of Russia and Iran. All things Obama claimed to not want.
Yes, but.
I supported toppling Saddam, and now I regret it. Why? Because I should have remembered that keeping the peace in Iraq would require a longer attention span than America is currently capable of.
If next year we elect a no-nonsense steely-eyed patriot, he should temper his actions with the knowledge that, sooner rather than later, he will be succeeded by a Carter or an Obama. Henry V is always followed by Henry VI.
Baghdad Jim probably much prefers Hillary’s war story to Webb’s–you know, her hair-raising brush with death in Bosnia. Of course, Hillary’s war story is a lie. That’s why BJ would prefer it.