Donald Sensing speculates about what Bush didn't say. Like him, I hope that there's a lot of it. But I've been hoping that for years. It was the reason that I supported removing Saddam.

Do I understand you correctly? You supported the President's invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq because of what he didn't say? I'm astonished. What do you think he didn't say that he could have said?

This comment from the link is what I suspect is being hoped for:

Likely air/naval strikes on Iran. Iran is the chief funder and organizer of the Shia Death Squads and the Sunni Al Qaeda death squads. So take down Iran and you take down a big part of the killing. -- attributed to Jim Rcokford

Of course, my standing thesis is that air and naval strikes shall be militarily insufficient to "take down Iran" and to start a shooting war we are not willing or able to finish is just plain dumb.

I'm astonished.

I can't imagine why.

What do you think he didn't say that he could have said?

<rolling eyes heavenward>

Please, Jane. There is nothing that I think he didn't say that he could, or should, have said. At least nothing relevant to this topic.

Should Roosevelt or Churchill have said that they were going to invade France at Normandy? Should they have publicly said that Italy was the "soft underbelly of Europe"?

No. My point is that there are things that I hoped that he was actually doing that remained unsaid. I'm concerned that that wasn't actually the case--that they didn't have the strategic plan for Iraq as a basis for resolving the war that I thought they did.

I will put this here as a partial explanation for BDS (Bush Derangement/Devotion Syndrome) which of course permeates any discussion of Iraq:

It is from a HuffPo review of Albion's Seed (link was boinked -- see below)

One especially fascinating section of Fischer's book is his analysis of four World War II commanders, Patton, Eisenhower, Marshall, and Roosevelt. Patton was a warrior, descendant of Borderers, who literally preceded his troops into furious battle. Eisenhower, descendant of Quakers and German Pietists, preferred to stay in the rear, coordinating and planning. George Marshall, descended from Virginia aristocracy, devised, with what Fischer considers to be characteristic honor and generosity, the Marshall Plan. Roosevelt was the Yankee--he "contributed ...high moral purpose, clarity of vision, tenacity of purpose, flexibility of method and an implacable will to win." [p, 879]. But so what? Well, so this--when the war is a war that all or almost all Americans agree is necessary, that all Americans are asked to contribute to and sacrifice for, the warrior and culture styles of each group will make differing but essential contributions to the effort.

Now for my take on Fischer's material. When Fisher was writing Albion's Seed in the 1980s, it still seemed that the four cultures were more or less in balance. What we have seen since, though, is the ascendancy of culture #4, the Borders/Appalachian culture of hot-blooded and violent populism that is xenophobic, religiously aggressive, fundamentalist, and sectarian, that is supicious of learning, antagonistic towards "elites", and antipathetic to women's autonomy. It defines itself by masculinity and arms-bearing, is belligerent by nature and quick to take offense. Its natural (and historic) enemy is the outgrowth of Quaker culture, liberalism.

Quakers begat the modern liberals and the Quaker approach to war is very different that the Scots-Irish approach to war. And it would appear that much of the domestic fury over how to conduct the Iraq war is actually a domestic American civil war between strains of the Anglosphere.

Link:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-smiley/janes-b#ngo-award-for-m_b_37415.html

substitute i for # in b#ngo

= = =

Jim Webb is Scots-Irish to the core and he is furious mad at the Administration over Iraq so I guess this will get more complicated before it gets sorted out.

I'm concerned that that wasn't actually the case--that they didn't have the strategic plan for Iraq as a basis for resolving the war that I thought they did.

I'm concerned that 2+2=4. I was hoping for a secret plan to make it 5.

In the meantime, one of the few decent things that the US could still do --- to help moderate Iraqis like you said --- would be to reopen political asylum channels for Iraqi refugees. At the very least, for Iraqis who worked for the American occupation, for Iraqis with American relatives, and for Iraqi Christians.

I'm concerned that 2+2=4. I was hoping for a secret plan to make it 5.'

That might be interesting, if it had anything do to with what I wrote. I never fail to be amused at the visitors to this site (particularly the cowardly anonymous ones) that have trouble with analogies.

Simberg believed in this war because the neo-cons
wanted this war.

The theory was the road to jerusalem leads through Baghdad.
The theory being that a democratic iraq would spread democracy and peace through the middle east.

Unfortunately, the neo-cons don't know basic geography.
The road to jerusalem leads through jerusalem, baghdad
is 1500 miles out of the way.

Faith is a powerful thing. Interesting that you don't employ it when it comes to intelligent design, but you do rely on it for Iraq. I seem to remember that you once expressed hope that Bush was keeping the discovery of WMDs in Iraq secret, waiting to spring the info right before the election. Was your faith in what Bush didn't say rewarded then?

Instead of grasping for external solutions to an internal problem in Iraq, the focus should be on what new plan, if any, is applicable within. To call 20,00 troops a surge is like calling a nocturnal emission s#x.

Slim pickings in my opinion. Maliki is laughing his head off.

Enough to drive a man to an adult beverage very early in the day ;-) I recommend lots of gin as practiced by the last Dutch governor of Indonesia - when the water is foul, alcohol is the beverage of choice.