Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
You are an astonishingly rude young man, JaTo. I'm sorry to see this. But it certainly is in keeping with the behavior of your political soulmates (Cheney, Rove, O'Reilly, Hannity, Limbaugh, etc.). One's behavior is the mirror of one's character.

As is one's intellect a reflection of their abilities. Again, you've done little more than rehash and prop up partisan propaganda. Furthermore, I do get angry and I think folks should get angry when countered with sincere ignorance. It has entered every crevice of American society to the detriment of all. It's a curse and a disease that tells people to swallow sound-bytes, polls the latest "feel-good" philosophy du-jour because it makes them feel better about swallowing distortions and obfucations.

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
You concede that the insurgency is increasing its attacks.

This is a fact. Everyone with any measure of intelligence projected this occurance, so you proudly throwing this up is akin to claiming that the sky is blue. With twice the amount of troops or half the amount we have today, there would exist the certainty that the closer we approached elections in Iraq, the higher likelyhood of attempts by malcontents to disrupt the process.

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
So, I take it we agree that Bush has not secured most of Iraq and its borders. Let�s call this what it is: a military failure. A competent commander in chief would not get bogged down in a guerilla war in a hostile region.

Most commander in chiefs have only had to deal with fixed military entities within geographical or political borders; need I rehash that yet again Iraq is different and no amount of troops could come close to stemming the inrush of wackos that are making their way into that region? Competency or a lack of it has next to nothing to do with the external factors that are working against us here, because the ALWAYS would be there, no matter how well planned the post-invasion excercise would have been.

Take most any war in a geographically sizeable area throughout history and you will find that any border that hasn't been walled in WILL be pourous, no matter how many troops you try and throw at the situation. I challenge you to look at a map of Iraq and gauge the distances that would have to be covered. To make a similar comparison, gauge it with the US/Mexican border and run the numbers on how many illegal immigrants pour across them on a daily basis.

Let me put this in as simple and easily understood terms as I possibly can:

IRAQ'S BORDERS ARE IMPOSSIBLE TO LOCK DOWN AND SECURE.

This situation would have existed no matter how well the post-war planning was mapped out and executed.

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
You try to excuse this failure by saying "it's getting closer to election time," but does that make it any less a failure? The insurgents have been increasing their attacks virtually throughout the occupation. The upcoming election may be one motivation, but they have never lacked for motivations.



Which is it? You can't have it both ways! You claim that insurgents would have these motivations despite anything detracting them from it, so AGAIN, let me put forth that it's not because of a lack of troops that we are seeing so many attacks. True, more troops means better response time towards these pockets of insurgents, but it's not a PREVENTATIVE measure.

When you have a group of extremists that see suicide as one of the preferred methods of attack, it doesn't matter HOW many troops you have on the ground, as is seen in Israel.

We are working towards getting the Iraqis up to speed on taking care of their own security needs, though it is slow-going. We are also working towards stemming the influx of extremist nutcases into Iraq; this is also difficult and slow-going. The fact is that if things had the stamp of the Jackass on it, as well as a seal of UN approval, no matter HOW bad they would have been proceeding, it would receive popular applause.

Failure? No. Difficult and slow-going? Absolutely. I've seen nowhere that this administration said reconstruction would be a walk in the park; quite the opposite. Every time I've heard it discussed, it was mentioned that it would be time-consuming, difficult and an iterative process.

Mistakes have been made, but to call the occupation a wholesale failure simply reaks of partisan ignorance. I am unaware of any occupation by very many countries througout history that have been "walks in the park", but that it should have been has magically seemed to manifest itself during an election year. It's as if mass stupidity has become an airborne disease and it's no surprise, since the mainsteam media makes a living serving as the mouthpieces of sensationalism, pain, suffering and death. Good news is UNPROFITABLE news these days, as it apparently doens't draw the pairs of eyes towards the idiot-box as rape, murder, despair, etc.

The fact is we aren't bogged down in a military advancement; we are bogged down in reconstruction.


Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
The fact that the insurgents are not in control of all the remote areas and the borders does not make the occupation a success.

Nor does it make it an epic failure, either.

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
As you know, the only "secure" area is the Green Zone, and even that is questionable lately, considering the recent attacks there.

Welcome to the new face of military occupation in the 21st century. Somalia was a harbinger of this (though not technically an occupation), Afghanistan a potent reminder and Iraq a full-fledged lesson in it. We are no longer dealing with societies of cohesive, highly educated and motivated individuals that are self-contained in a geographical area that get the picture when they've been soundly "whipped".

We are dealing with fractured groups (some of which are lead by extremists), all jockeying for positions of political significance and trying to maintain or build power. We are also dealing with a population that has been suppressed for DECADES and that is in the throes of massive economic and political turmoil, that is being stabilized slowly. We are dealing with extremists external to Iraq coming in and exacerbating matters that much worse when they get a chance to.


Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
Sure, lots of agencies said they thought Saddam had WMDs. But most agencies also admitted that they had no solid recent intelligence, and that they could only really guess. The CIA was so badly burned by 9/11 (and so pressured by the Bush Adminstration) that they were overstating the threat dramatically. Bush chose to ignore the thinness of the CIA's evidence. That was a huge mistake.

Then EVERY Senator needs to be hit over the head with this, as I cannot recall but a smattering of a few that didn't see Iraq as an acceptable risk in light of their lack of cooperation over a decade and especially in the days past 9/11. Before March of '03, would you REALLY want to give someone like Saddam Hussein the "benefit of the doubt"? Someone who had failed to account for tons of VX gas and a fair amount of biotoxins under UN mandate?

Intelligence agencies don't speak of certainties very often. They talk in terms of "probability"; it's the nature of the business. Perhaps when clairvoyance is visited upon them, then they can cease to speak as such. Until then, all we have is probability based off of the intelligence we have in hand.

No, the mistake would have been if Bush had told Tenet to kiss off after he said that the WMD case for invading Iraq was a "slam dunk". One doesn't typically naysay their DCI and I challenge you to find a US President who has wholesale discounted what their intelligence arm has provided them.

The FACT stands that there existed NO way of knowing whether Hussein still possessed WMD without invasion. We invaded, and as it turns out, our intelligence seemed to be wrong (apparently driven by the lies that Hussein's lieutenants told him and his rampant fears over Iran).


Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
What? Of course there were "concerns"; that is not an issue. Here's the real issue: the UN weapons inspectors found nothing! And the collective intelligence of the UN was that the evidence of a WMD threat was too weak to support an invasion.



This will continue to be a fundamental disagreement, as the UN weapons inspectors continued to find "nothing" even though equipment and armaments continued to be moved around and hidden until around '95 when one of Hussein's brother-in-laws defected and tattled on him. The continued to find "nothing", even though more discoveries were made in '98 and I believe in '00 as well (have to check on the last date). For the US to entrust it's security to a group that had roadblock upon roadblock put in front of them and who also voiced RAMPANT concerns about the level of cooperation they received, the dual-use equipment that disappeared, the scientists who they never were able to fully interview without Iraq military personnel in their immediate presence, and who considered Iraq a big enough threat to maintain weapons inspections for a decade just smacks of myopia.

This is further compounded by recent information that Hussein possibly wanted to keep up the ruse with the UN on weapons inspections and WMD so as to keep Iran in the dark and give them a level of doubt, as he apparently saw them as the bigger threat to his rule. If this is indeed the case, then invasion was inevitable; it was just a matter of time.

So, the UN may have been proven right in their offhand assertion that Iraq possessed no WMD, despite being metaphorically shackled, chained and blinded when conducting these inspections (many palaces were never visited, and the ones that were visited were done so only after a period of warning was given).

The US and many other countries that asserted that Hussein still had unaccounted for a fairly large amount of WMD (this is still true today, as there still exists amounts of material that remain unaccounted for) were proven wrong, due to the shell game Hussein was playing with the UN and the game of standoff that he wanted to play with Iran.

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
You are making a HUGE and dangerous assumption here. Do you really think the war in Iraq is preventing Al Quaeda and other terrorists from planning attacks on the US? On which facts do you base that opinion, or is it just a wild guess?

Although the Iraq war wasn't meant to do this, it certainly has "moved the target" in the short-term with regard to a fair portion of extremist groups. If it's keeping a significant flow of extremists from turning their eyes and efforts here, then it is FACTUALLY pulling resources away from hitting targets on US soil, NO? This isn't detracting from planning attacks on the US; nothing will do that. I figured this would be construed as common sense, but I've seen a large lack of that in recent years...

Do I need to further simplify this down?

It is much better to fight this war on our own time and place of choosing, than letting terrorists dictate the when and where. If we are attracting them to Iraq, God save our troops, but isn't this better than not attracting a fair amount of them somewhere else other than the continental US? Somewhere where we have the weapons and materials at ready to deal with them?

It's not a pleasant situation, but it is what it is.

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
Then why did they start hating us at about the same time we started supporting Israel and supporting repressive dictators in the region, including (to name a few) the Shah of Iran, the Saudis, every oil-rich principality in the Gulf, and Saddam himself?

Islamic fundamentalists and nationalists started hating Western powers since the British times of empire, hated the Western powers for establishing a Jewish state in their midst, and hating US and Russia for playing each side off of the other during the Cold War. They hate western ideology and progressiveness (as shown with Saddat's assassination in Eqypt)...

Our actions aren't guilt-free during the Cold War, as we had bigger concerns than breeding dislike among the Arab population; we sacrificed attention to one extraordinarily small issue then (terrorism) to pay much more attention to the defeat of communism and keeping the USSR at bay in the Middle-East and away from one of THE strategic resources that both of us were vying for: oil.

So, let me guess: In order to appease the relative unknown issue of terrorism, you would have totally revamped our foreign policy during the Cold War to appease the extremist Arab element, instead of taking care of relevant issues at hand with the USSR?

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
BUSH and CHENEY call Iraq the centerpiece in the war on terror! Do you need proof of this? Their speeches have made that claim several times.

No, your pals in the media and the left side of the aisle in the Senate have shoved these words in the mouths of Bush and Cheney. They have recently said that Iraq "is now at the center of the war on terror", as this is precisely what it has evolved into.

I can't find anything that shows where they state that it is the "centerpiece of the war on terror", but I can find spots where Kerry hops up and down claiming they are saying this.

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
It really is best to concede obvious points, or your credibility is ruined, JaTo. Even Republicans admit that Bush has alienated a great many of our most important allies.

I want sources on this, instead of vauge references and translations that amount to "we've pissed France and Germany off". We haven't been popular within certain circles due to our actions, yes, but this insipid foolishness that we've alienated our allies fully and utterly by our actions with Iraq shows a large amount of ignorance. Some of our allies have given us cause to march down a path of our own choosing, intstead of a path of coercion and political muckery...

Some of our allies have alienated the US in order to further their own political agendas and control (take France and Germany for example over control of the EU vs. many countries that support US policy that can't stand Chirac or Schroeder and the way they are strongarming Europe into doing their bidding). Take the issue of Turkey being admitted into the EU and the roadblocks that France has CONSTANTLY put forth, as they know that this fairly strong US ally will marginalize their efforts of control. Take the "Food for Oil" scandal, look at the unsecured loans that both France and Germany have given Iraq, look at the oil ties, the financial ties, look at the personal ties that Chirac had with Hussein, look at the French-made nuclear reactors that were built for Iraq (and the Iraelis smartly bombed) in the '80s, look at the UN Security council votes that Iraq apparently bought France out with...

....need I go any further?

France and Germany have alienated themselves in part due to their actions and insistences, their political stances and the rhetoric they have used against the US. We have responded in like in many instances, though both sides are busy trying to stabilize things.

Spain has been given a cool reception in part due to their present administration's overt hostilitity to US policy in GENERAL. Zapatero has been reckless in his thoughts of how he would handle ETA in the past and there exist many doubts on how well he's going to handle the current threat his country faces.

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
They admit the "coalition" in Iraq is really just a fig leaf consisting of the UK and a few very small and weak countries. But I see you fail to concede even that. Please post a list of these "allies" that you think are so important. The rest of us could use a laugh.

Well, I'm glad you think Japan, Turkey, Australia, Hungary, Poland, South Korea, Romania, Italy and the other smaller entities are a joke to you. This is precisely the type of elitist, snobbish and totally disrespectful thinking that seems to pervade those that are in disagreement with Bush's actions. If you think that the way to attract others to our cause is to sh!t all over those that have given what they are capable of, then there's a certain liberal candidate running for the White House that is the man for you. The US has almost ALWAYS been the anchor behind any multi-lateral action; the disparate troop and dollar count we've spent on Iraq has been mirrored in countless UN-sponsored activities for decades.

The fact that France and Germany weren't apart of the US-led coalition isn't due to the US "alienating" them; it has to due with their financial ties to Iraq, their power play in the EU, close relations with Hussein and apparently taking bribes to buy out a UN Security Concil vote...

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
What does this have to do with Bush's performance in the war on terror?

Bush has aggressively pushed for far greater attention to be paid towards terrorism than any other President. Why? 9/11. If you equivocate Iraq being the only metric in the war on terror that this administration should be judged by, then you are far more shortsighted and foolish that I initially thought.

It is a sizeable one, but it is not the only one.

Originally posted by Rex Barnes:
By the way, you insinuated several times that my original post was a "cut and paste", or that it was written by some other individuals. I'm not sure why you feel that is meaningful, but I can assure you that I wrote it in its entirety. I drew on the many publications I read, but I wrote it after reading this forum for some time and seeing that many members assumed, without explanation, that Bush was worthy of our support almost solely on the basis of his performance in the war on terror.

I'm sorry, but so much of this smacks of the typical "spin cycle" factoids that get thrown out unthinkingly without the weight of careful consideration behind them. The RNC has done their fair share of populating the airwaves with their own swill and sewage, but I see FAR more from the left that I think I ever have.

I look forward to the rest of your "defence"...

JaTo e-Tough Guy Missouri City, TX 99 Contour SVT #143/2760 00 Corvette Coupe