Oops, history may vindicate Bush

Note: this guy is NOT a conservative

Winds of Change?

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Twenty years ago, I wrote a book about the Middle East, and recently I was thinking of updating it with a new introduction. It was going to be very simple — just one page, indeed just one line: “Nothing has changed.”

It took me two days covering the elections in Beirut to realize that I was dead wrong. No, something is going on in the Middle East today that is very new. Pull up a chair; this is going to be interesting.

What we saw in the Lebanese elections, where the pro-Western March 14 movement won a surprise victory over the pro-Iranian Hezbollah coalition, what we saw in the ferment for change exposed by the election campaign in Iran, and what we saw in the provincial elections in Iraq, where the big pro-Iranian party got trounced, is the product of four historical forces that have come together to crack open this ossified region.

First is the diffusion of technology. The Internet, blogs, YouTube and text messaging via cellphones, particularly among the young — 70 percent of Iranians are under 30 — is giving Middle Easterners cheap tools to communicate horizontally, to mobilize politically and to criticize their leaders acerbically, outside of state control. It is also enabling them to monitor vote-rigging by posting observers with cellphone cameras.

I knew something had changed when I sat down for coffee on Hamra Street in Beirut last week with my 80-year-old friend and mentor, Kemal Salibi, one of Lebanon’s greatest historians, and he told me about his Facebook group!

The evening of Lebanon’s election, I went to the Beirut home of Saad Hariri, the leader of the March 14 coalition, to interview him. In a big living room, he had a gigantic wall-size television broadcasting the results. And alongside the main TV were 16 smaller flat-screen TVs with electronic maps of Lebanon. Hariri’s own election experts were working on laptops and breaking down every vote from every religious community, village by village, and projecting them on the screens.

Second, for real politics to happen you need space. There are a million things to hate about President Bush’s costly and wrenching wars. But the fact is, in ousting Saddam in Iraq in 2003 and mobilizing the U.N. to push Syria out of Lebanon in 2005, he opened space for real democratic politics that had not existed in Iraq or Lebanon for decades. “Bush had a simple idea, that the Arabs could be democratic, and at that particular moment simple ideas were what was needed, even if he was disingenuous,” said Michael Young, the opinion editor of The Beirut Daily Star. “It was bolstered by the presence of a U.S. Army in the center of the Middle East. It created a sense that change was possible, that things did not always have to be as they were.”

When I reported from Beirut in the 1970s and 1980s, I covered coups and wars. I never once stayed up late waiting for an election result. Elections in the Arab world were a joke — literally. They used to tell this story about Syria’s president, Hafez al-Assad. After a Syrian election, an aide came in and told Assad: “Mr. President, you won 99.8 percent of the votes. It means that only two-tenths of one percent of Syrians didn’t vote for you. What more could ask for?”

Assad answered: “Their names!”

Lebanese, by contrast, just waited up all night for their election results — no one knew what they’d be.

Third, the Bush team opened a hole in the wall of Arab autocracy but did a poor job following through. In the vacuum, the parties most organized to seize power were the Islamists — Hezbollah in Lebanon; pro-Al Qaeda forces among Iraqi Sunnis, and the pro-Iranian Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq and Mahdi Army among Iraqi Shiites; the Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan; Hamas in Gaza.

Fortunately, each one of these Islamist groups overplayed their hand by imposing religious lifestyles or by dragging their societies into confrontations the people didn’t want. This alienated and frightened more secular, mainstream Arabs and Muslims and has triggered an “awakening” backlash among moderates from Lebanon to Pakistan to Iran. The Times’s Robert Mackey reported that in Tehran “chants of ‘Death to America’ ” at rallies for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad last week were answered by chants of “Death to the Taliban — in Kabul and Tehran” at a rally for his opponent, Mir Hussein Moussavi.

Finally, along came President Barack Hussein Obama. Arab and Muslim regimes found it very useful to run against George Bush. The Bush team demonized them, and they demonized the Bush team. Autocratic regimes, like Iran’s, drew energy and legitimacy from that confrontation, and it made it very easy for them to discredit anyone associated with America. Mr. Obama’s soft power has defused a lot of that. As result, “pro-American” is not such an insult anymore.

I don’t know how all this shakes out; the forces against change in this region are very powerful — see Iran — and ruthless. But for the first time in a long time, the forces for decency, democracy and pluralism have a little wind at their backs. Good for them.

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I blame Bush.

But, seriously, it cracks me up how Friedman always includes something to demonstrate his liberal bona fides. Unqualified praise for Bush is grounds for termination at NYT.

You must be joking, doobs: William Kristol, David Brooks, William Safire, John Tierney, Tom Friedman, Judith Miller. And that's just off the top of my head. It might be a funny thing to say, but it's totally inaccurate IMO.

"forces against change in this region are very powerful"

Friedman, a Jew, bought all the dickheaded lies about Iraq, so of course he's going to justify his erroneous support for the phony Iraq war.

The Muslim cultures are truly incapable of democracy, totally, now and for decades. Political corruption, politicized/corrupt police, army, judiciary, absence of a political/judicial/legislative infrastructure, and uneducated populace.

Friedman is totally wrong, laughably wrong, again.

Iraq was/is/will be not about democracy, but about oil.

lol @ revisionist bush history in june of 2009

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Originally Posted by boutons_deux

"forces against change in this region are very powerful"

Friedman, a Jew, bought all the dickheaded lies about Iraq, so of course he's going to justify his erroneous support for the phony Iraq war.

The Muslim cultures are truly incapable of democracy, totally, now and for decades. Political corruption, politicized/corrupt police, army, judiciary, absence of a political/judicial/legislative infrastructure, and uneducated populace.

Friedman is totally wrong, laughably wrong, again.

Iraq was/is/will be not about democracy, but about oil.

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And this years' winner of the coveted Spurstalk Dickhead of The Year Award goes to......

boutons_douche

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

Note: this guy is NOT a conservative

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This guy has always supported the Iraq war. He even got a unit of time named after him.

Victory is always one Friedman Unit away...

I take any trash talk from DarrinS, or from any other wrongies here, as best-in-class compliments.

Thank you. You love me, you really love me.

To get back on topic, GFY.

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Originally Posted by PixelPusher

This guy has always supported the Iraq war. He even got a unit of time named after him.

Victory is always one Friedman Unit away...

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He agreed with the justification, but he was very critical of the execution. Pretty much where I stand.

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Originally Posted by boutons_deux

I take any trash talk from DarrinS, or from any other wrongies here, as best-in-class compliments.

Thank you. You love me, you really love me.

To get back on topic, GFY.

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Not even people on "your side" like you.

The problem is, the issue ultimately is not whether it was a success or a failure, but whether should the US continue on this course of Neo-Wilsonian democracy spreading through the use of the state's armed forces (or being the "world's police" - take your pick)?

If Americans find the Iraq invasion objectionable simply because it failed or that some of the methods employed were dishonorable, objectionable, and/or _________ (insert your favorite term here) then we're still caught up in a cult of state worship in which citizens live through the state and its triumphs. Had Iraq been a quick success, nobody would have cared and it would have simply been yet another affirmation of American exceptionalism and a great exercise in living vicariously through the US military.

Hey, democracy is spreading. Let's go spread some more! Plus did you notice how the entire nation tends to unite prior to a new war? That's exhilarating. Such a great opportunity for the state to tackle some other 'problems' as well without bothering too much with little things like the legislature. Too bad Bush wasted it....

</s>

"we're still caught up in a cult of state worship in which citizens live through the state and its triumphs"

That's not true for everybody, just the dickless twerps who need that emotional crutch to validate themselves.

That's true for the wrongie "scoundrels whose first and last refuge is to wrap themselves in the flag" but "have better things to do" while the poor white/black/brown kids die for the wrongies' imperialistic machoisms.

There's a lot of people who don't live and breathe "USA Number 1" and don't run around with, need a psychological crutch of, a sense of superiority over all the sub-humans who aren't Americans.

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Originally Posted by Marcus Bryant

The problem is, the issue ultimately is not whether it was a success or a failure, but whether should the US continue on this course of Neo-Wilsonian democracy spreading through the use of the state's armed forces (or being the "world's police" - take your pick)?

If Americans find the Iraq invasion objectionable simply because it failed or that some of the methods employed were dishonorable, objectionable, and/or _________ (insert your favorite term here) then we're still caught up in a cult of state worship in which citizens live through the state and its triumphs. Had Iraq been a quick success, nobody would have cared and it would have simply been yet another affirmation of American exceptionalism and a great exercise in living vicariously through the US military.

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You don't think spreading democracy in the ME is in the best interest of US national security?

A really interesting part of Friedman's article was how technology (internet, cell phones, etc.) has really brought about change in that part of the world. No one really wanted to comment on that.

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

You don't think spreading democracy in the ME is in the best interest of US national security?

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How did that work out in the West Bank and Gaza? Iraq? How might it work out in places like Egypt?

It seems to me important not to beg this question. "Spreading democracy" is not automatically consistent with the principle of self-determination or with national security. The bromide that democracies are inherently more stable and more peaceful than other kinds of government seems to me not well proven. And the arrogance that presumes to foist it on others is facially anti-democratic and imperialistic.

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

You don't think spreading democracy in the ME is in the best interest of US national security?

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No. We're hated in that part of the world. A hatred that has a lot to do with our attempts to tell everyone in the ME how they should be doing things. All a democracy does is allow people who hate us to elect a government who hates us. If we're looking for the best interests of US national security then we should be looking for pro-American monarchs, like we have in Saudi Arabia. Of course political correctness won't allow us to invade someone and install any other form of government, so whenever we want to spread our influence abroad it has to be under the guise of "spreading democracy".

So far, US democratic *evangelism* in the ME has spread danger and instability.

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Originally Posted by Winehole23

So far, US democratic *evangelism* in the ME has spread danger and instability.

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The same could probably be said of East Germany and Eastern Europe (in general) after WWII. But look at it today.

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

The same could probably be said of East Germany and Eastern Europe (in general) after WWII. But look at it today.

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you're right. all it took was fifty years and economic collapse.

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

The same could probably be said of East Germany and Eastern Europe (in general) after WWII. But look at it today.

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The Soviet sphere of operations? We let them have it, uncontested. We did nothing when they cracked down in Hungary in 1956 or Prague in 1968.

What the hell are you talking about DarrinS?

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

You don't think spreading democracy in the ME is in the best interest of US national security?

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why stop there?

it's almost impossible not to think of Team America: World Police when I see posts like this

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Oops, history may vindicate Bush

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How many times in the past have I said that history will treat him well?

What surprises me is that it's in a NY Slimes op ed!

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Originally Posted by Blake

why stop there?

it's almost impossible not to think of Team America: World Police when I see posts like this

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:rolleyes

Its just fucking stupid to argue about long term consequences with our actions in Iraq right now. It may turn out well, it may turn out poorly...

And for those of you who think that the US has screwed up the ME, well, read some history about how fucked up that area has been since, oh, I don't know, forever. I'm not saying that the US didn't cause problems, I'm just saying that those problems or others just as sever have been there before we took a hand.

What the flying fuck? We're giving Bush credit for getting Syria out of Lebanon now? Fucking WOW.

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Originally Posted by sam1617

And for those of you who think that the US has screwed up the ME, well, read some history about how fucked up that area has been since, oh, I don't know, forever. I'm not saying that the US didn't cause problems, I'm just saying that those problems or others just as sever have been there before we took a hand.

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I think the thinking was not that the US will screw up the region more or less. I think what's laughable is the US thinking they could just simply walk in there, be greeted as liberators, forcefully install a democracy, and all of a sudden the entire region would simply follow along... delusional I tell you.

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Originally Posted by ElNono

I think the thinking was not that the US will screw up the region more or less. I think what's laughable is the US thinking they could just simply walk in there, be greeted as liberators, forcefully install a democracy, and all of a sudden the entire region would simply follow along... delusional I tell you.

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I don't recall anyone suggesting it was that simple...

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

:rolleyes

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http://www.starstore.com/acatalog/Te...ne-sheet_L.jpg

America.....fock yeah

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Originally Posted by sam1617

Its just fucking stupid to argue about long term consequences with our actions in Iraq right now. It may turn out well, it may turn out poorly...

And for those of you who think that the US has screwed up the ME, well, read some history about how fucked up that area has been since, oh, I don't know, forever. I'm not saying that the US didn't cause problems, I'm just saying that those problems or others just as sever have been there before we took a hand.

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All the more reason for the US to stay out of the nation-building game in the region. The ME is screwed up and will always be screwed up, so why go out of our way to make ourselves part of their problems?

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

You don't think spreading democracy in the ME is in the best interest of US national security?

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The question isn't as simple as that. It's also whether it's cost effective.

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Originally Posted by coyotes_geek

All the more reason for the US to stay out of the nation-building game in the region. The ME is screwed up and will always be screwed up, so why go out of our way to make ourselves part of their problems?

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Sure, either we need to go all in Soviet style (not that they were hugely successful either), or stay the heck out, cause there isn't any real way to nation-build unless you fully commit, which is expensive, both financially, politically and with personnel.

It makes more sense to not try to nation build.

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Originally Posted by Wild Cobra

I don't recall anyone suggesting it was that simple...

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Then you are incredibly ignorant.

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Originally Posted by Wild Cobra

I don't recall anyone suggesting it was that simple...

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I do, specially when they were trying to 'sell' the war...

"spreading democracy in the ME"

... in the interest of US oil security.

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

You don't think spreading democracy in the ME is in the best interest of US national security?

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Originally Posted by LnGrrrR

The question isn't as simple as that. It's also whether it's cost effective.

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...or even desirable. Our closest allies in the region, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, are repressive regimes. They help to advance our policies and protect our interests in the region. I don't know what you think is going to happen when you give a few tens of millions of followers of Islam the vote, but I can almost assure you it won't be pretty from the standpoint of American interests.

Even if it's "cost effective" and in the "best interest" of the someone's strategic thinking, should it be done? One can think of many invasions that could be justified along those lines. If you open up the possibilities of American state aggression to include "spreading democracy" by overthrowing two bit dictators, then is there a war that cannot be justified?

Bonus question: How is any of this related to national defense?

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Originally Posted by Marcus Bryant

Bonus question: How is any of this related to national defense?

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Bingo!

Gee, I wonder why the rest of the world viewed the U.S. as imperialistic...

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Originally Posted by boutons_deux

"spreading democracy in the ME"

... in the interest of US oil security.

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Never understood the war for oil argument. That's not exactly what you said but some people do. Ever. Ever.

Bombing the Iraq oil fields until there was nothing left and bombing them every time someone tried to rebuild them would have been in the interest of US oil. We certainly could have and no one else in the world would have given a damn. We'd been periodically blowing up crap all over Iraq for no reason under Clinton for years.

If you want prices to go up you blow up supply, not take over it.

And if they just wanted more oil there are plenty of other much cheaper ways of doing it. They had a Republican majority, they could have pushed drilling in Alaska. That would have been a lot easier than waging war in the middle east.

No, IMHO the reason we went into Iraq was because Bush was butthurt at Saddam and wanted to go on a crusade in the middle east.

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Originally Posted by Marcus Bryant

Even if it's "cost effective" and in the "best interest" of the someone's strategic thinking, should it be done? One can think of many invasions that could be justified along those lines. If you open up the possibilities of American state aggression to include "spreading democracy" by overthrowing two bit dictators, then is there a war that cannot be justified?

Bonus question: How is any of this related to national defense?

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As far as the bonus question goes, there's a theory backed up by some evidence that democracies are less wont to war against each other.

But yes, I agree that even if it WERE cost effective, and we could do it in a moment's notice, that doesn't necessarily mean we SHOULD do it, or even give us the 'moral authority' to do so.

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Originally Posted by angrydude

No, IMHO the reason we went into Iraq was because Bush was butthurt at Saddam and wanted to go on a crusade in the middle east.

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why was Bush butthurt at Saddam?

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why was Bush butthurt at Saddam?

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Tried to kill his dad?

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Originally Posted by angrydude

No, IMHO the reason we went into Iraq was because Bush was butthurt at Saddam and wanted to go on a crusade in the middle east.

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I always leaned more towards the "bush gave in to pressure from daddy's cronies who thought there was unfinished business" theory.

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Originally Posted by Winehole23

Tried to kill his dad?

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Man, after 6 months of powder-puff words, I forgot what real leadership sounded like.

Oops.

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Originally Posted by fyatuk

I always leaned more towards the "bush gave in to pressure from daddy's cronies who thought there was unfinished business" theory.

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hey, saving Kuwait was never about oil. It was about spreading democracy in the ME.

Damn. Look at this little gem I found.


Al Gore, in 1992, criticizing Bush Sr for ignoring Iraq's ties to terrorism.

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Originally Posted by Blake

hey, saving Kuwait was never about oil. It was about spreading democracy in the ME.

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.........just not in Kuwait. Monarchs who we get along with can stay.

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Originally Posted by coyotes_geek

.........just not in Kuwait. Monarchs who we get along with can stay.

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Its not like we should really expect the gov't to remove friends from office...

Democracy is not the end all of government, and spreading democracy blindly isn't a good goal. Now, saying that you wanted to replace corrupt dictatorships with good democracies while leaving the alternate forms of government that are working well, thats kinda maybe a decent goal.

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Originally Posted by sam1617

Its not like we should really expect the gov't to remove friends from office...

Democracy is not the end all of government, and spreading democracy blindly isn't a good goal. Now, saying that you wanted to replace corrupt dictatorships with good democracies while leaving the alternate forms of government that are working well, thats kinda maybe a decent goal.

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I agree, spreading democracy blindly isn't a good goal. When and where we try is very much calculated, and can usually be characterized by the presences of a non-U.S. friendly government and the presence of natural resources.

Of course the U.S. is hardly alone in doing this, as every country that ever qualified as a global power has tried at some point during their history.

History? The USA attacking Iraq was and is a great decision. USA citizens has a bunch of pussys living large bitching about beauty pageant winners supporting straight marriages. These same faggots don't want to free a country that has a dictator who kills it's own citizens and attacks other countries because he can.

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Originally Posted by jack sommerset

History? The USA attacking Iraq was and is a great decision. USA citizens has a bunch of pussys living large bitching about beauty pageant winners supporting straight marriages. These same faggots don't want to free a country that has a dictator who kills it's own citizens and attacks other countries because he can.

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Thanks jack for your insight today...:lmao

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Originally Posted by George Gervin's Afro

Thanks jack for your insight today...:lmao

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:lol

Team America.......fock yeah!

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

Damn. Look at this little gem I found.


Al Gore, in 1992, criticizing Bush Sr for ignoring Iraq's ties to terrorism.

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From what I've read, Gore seems hawkish. Or at the least, not anti-hawk.

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Originally Posted by LnGrrrR

From what I've read, Gore seems hawkish. Or at the least, not anti-hawk.

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Both Clinton and Gore seem very hawkish compared to the current admin. Or, they just seem hawkish by today's standards because so many have moved farther left.

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

Both Clinton and Gore seem very hawkish compared to the current admin. Or, they just seem hawkish by today's standards because so many have moved farther left.

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I think it seems that we've moved left because we've steadily creeped to the right, up to this 'backlash'. It's probably an overcorrection, but a necessary one IMHO.

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Originally Posted by LnGrrrR

I think it seems that we've moved left because we've steadily creeped to the right, up to this 'backlash'. It's probably an overcorrection, but a necessary one IMHO.

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a necessary overcorrection?

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Originally Posted by doobs

a necessary overcorrection?

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Yes, because no one ever has a backlash to the appropriate area. Gotta instill fear in those who go too far by threatening to move as far back as you can.

Long-term, people threatening to move things all the way to the left will only end up moving them somwhat to the left anyways. :D

No matter who's nominally in charge, the march of the imperial state moves on. Greater parts of our lives fall under the purview of the state, relieving us of our liberties for our own good. To resist is futile. For either you are not a patriot or you are an economic royalist (or whatever it's called these days). Two groups of mushy headed knuckleheads yell at each other, relegating the demise of our liberties to nothing more than just another team sport. No matter who wins, you will still lose.

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Originally Posted by Marcus Bryant

No matter who's nominally in charge, the march of the imperial state moves on. Greater parts of our lives fall under the purview of the state, relieving us of our liberties for our own good. To resist is futile. For either you are not a patriot or you are an economic royalist (or whatever it's called these days). Two groups of mushy headed knuckleheads yell at each other, relegating the demise of our liberties to nothing more than just another team sport. No matter who wins, you will still lose.

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I'm optimistic (read: foolish) enough to hope that my generation will be more libertarian socially, as well as defense-wise, if pretty liberal economically.

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Originally Posted by 4cc

Obama WON.

He's the PRESIDENT.

Why do you hate America?

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We don't hate America, liberals do. Why do they always forget the truth of what their heroes said in the past?

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

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Yes, those are gems.

How about it liberals...

Your heroes say your claims about Bush's wars are wrong!

^^^Appeal to authority.

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

Man, after 6 months of powder-puff words, I forgot what real leadership sounded like.

Oops.

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The missiles hit the Iraqi intelligence headquarters.

Number of Iraqi assassination attempts against Americans afterwards: zero.


Shit, Clinton almost accidentally toppled Saddam with Operation Desert Fox. That's just how weak and ineffective Iraq was after the Gulf War.

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Originally Posted by DarrinS

Damn. Look at this little gem I found.


Al Gore, in 1992, criticizing Bush Sr for ignoring Iraq's ties to terrorism.

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Yeah, he talked about Iraq's links to Al Qaeda before Al Qaeda existed!

:rolleyes