Iraqi Transfer of Power

[Bereta_Eder]

america will try and get its oil and it stays

but it's now in a position that even if it doesnt manage to do that (which is a heavy blow) it cant leave completely lest there is an outbreak of civil war which would be due to its actions.

i hardly see how they are making any kind of service seeing as this would be a catastrophe (even bigger than the present one) for US leverage worldwide.

[Verto]

Anyone using the war for oil argument deserves a 3 day banning just for their sheer stupidity.

[Bereta_Eder]

funnily enough your bigger ally in all this was countries like France. it was one of the few that warned you that you'll **** up and you did **** up.

[Bereta_Eder]

Originally posted by Verto
Anyone using the war for oil argument deserves a 3 day banning just for their sheer stupidity.

i doubt you realize you're a smal minority in the world who DOESNT believe it was about oil.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Verto,

Is your sig line from Michael Moore or ghost written by any of a number of 'Poly posters advocating failure?

[Verto]

Originally posted by paiktis22

i doubt you realize you're a smal minority in the world who DOESNT believe it was about oil.

There was an NPR poll that once showed the majority of German males from 18-30 or so thought the 9/11 attacks had been staged by the US government.

[dannubis]

Originally posted by Lincoln
Ever heard the expression "experience is the best teacher"? I am a Vietnam vet. I know what it is like to be second guessed by people who don't have the slightest idea what they are talking about. And I know the damage it does to moral when people constantly pick at the mistakes and refuse to see any success. The left does not want success in Iraq unless it is accomplished by a Democrat. They glory in failure as long as Bush is in charge. Meanwhile brave men die trying to help the people and the left continues to descourage them in their efforts. Also, I am not talking about specific people but the nitpicking left in general. Why not have some patience and see if the efforts actually pay off. Nothing will change overnight.

last time i checked nobody was critizing the US soldiers... only the US governement, who is btw ****ing your soldiers over again.

[Arrian]

Well, if you don't want to mention it, fine.

Que? Mention what? Cost? I specifically did mention it. That was the whole point of my post, Cruddy: that the cost of what we're doing in Iraq is already high enough to squash any talk of going off on any more Iraq-style adventures (subject, of course, to Ogie's point: that in 30-40 years, just about anything can happen). I'm not sure what you were trying to say there...

It is the purpose of opposition parties to oppose the govt.

I was discussing Agathon's statement about what the "real Left" wants in Iraq.

An opposition party's objective is to BECOME the government. Most of the time, that involves directly opposing the government, but not always - sometimes that can just be stupid. Hoping for spectacular failure in Iraq is such a case. The invasion has already happened. The thing to do now is to a) critique the process that resulted in the decision to go to war; b) critique the planning of the reconstruction (or lack thereof); c) critique the diplomacy (or lack thereof); d) critique the current strategy (to the extent there is one). NOT to hope for spectacular failure.

-Arrian

[GePap]

If "the left wants failure", then "the right ignores the current failure". I guess acting blind and stupid is OK, no?

To MrFun some:

I want success in Iraq-and the last 15 months show me that that victory is NOT POSSIBLE under the current regime. Things are just getting started, but a botched birth invariably makes everything afterwards much harder. This admin. does not seem to learn from mistakes-instead they change directions wildly until they find the route of least cost to themselves.

It's going to take at least 5 more years to see if a viable democracy has taken seed in Iraq (thought that is no guarantee it will remain democratic always)- if those 5 years are under a Bush regime, then I think failure is all too likely.

[Sava]

June 29, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Who Lost Iraq?
By PAUL KRUGMAN

The formal occupation of Iraq came to an ignominious end yesterday with a furtive ceremony, held two days early to foil insurgent attacks, and a swift airborne exit for the chief administrator. In reality, the occupation will continue under another name, most likely until a hostile Iraqi populace demands that we leave. But it's already worth asking why things went so wrong.

The Iraq venture may have been doomed from the start — but we'll never know for sure because the Bush administration made such a mess of the occupation. Future historians will view it as a case study of how not to run a country.

Up to a point, the numbers in the Brookings Institution's invaluable Iraq Index tell the tale. Figures on the electricity supply and oil production show a pattern of fitful recovery and frequent reversals; figures on insurgent attacks and civilian casualties show a security situation that got progressively worse, not better; public opinion polls show an occupation that squandered the initial good will.

What the figures don't describe is the toxic mix of ideological obsession and cronyism that lie behind that dismal performance.

The insurgency took root during the occupation's first few months, when the Coalition Provisional Authority seemed oddly disengaged from the problems of postwar anarchy. But what was Paul Bremer III, the head of the C.P.A., focused on? According to a Washington Post reporter who shared a flight with him last June, "Bremer discussed the need to privatize government-run factories with such fervor that his voice cut through the din of the cargo hold."

Plans for privatization were eventually put on hold. But as he prepared to leave Iraq, Mr. Bremer listed reduced tax rates, reduced tariffs and the liberalization of foreign-investment laws as among his major accomplishments. Insurgents are blowing up pipelines and police stations, geysers of sewage are erupting from the streets, and the electricity is off most of the time — but we've given Iraq the gift of supply-side economics.

If the occupiers often seemed oblivious to reality, one reason was that many jobs at the C.P.A. went to people whose qualifications seemed to lie mainly in their personal and political connections — people like Simone Ledeen, whose father, Michael Ledeen, a prominent neoconservative, told a forum that "the level of casualties is secondary" because "we are a warlike people" and "we love war."

Still, given Mr. Bremer's economic focus, you might at least have expected his top aide for private-sector development to be an expert on privatization and liberalization in such countries as Russia or Argentina. But the job initially went to Thomas Foley, a Connecticut businessman and Republican fund-raiser with no obviously relevant expertise. In March, Michael Fleischer, a New Jersey businessman, took over. Yes, he's Ari Fleischer's brother. Mr. Fleischer told The Chicago Tribune that part of his job was educating Iraqi businessmen: "The only paradigm they know is cronyism. We are teaching them that there is an alternative system with built-in checks and built-in review."

Checks and review? Yesterday a leading British charity, Christian Aid, released a scathing report, "Fueling Suspicion," on the use of Iraqi oil revenue. It points out that the May 2003 U.N. resolution giving the C.P.A. the right to spend that revenue required the creation of an international oversight board, which would appoint an auditor to ensure that the funds were spent to benefit the Iraqi people.

Instead, the U.S. stalled, and the auditor didn't begin work until April 2004. Even then, according to an interim report, it faced "resistance from C.P.A. staff." And now, with the audit still unpublished, the C.P.A. has been dissolved.

Defenders of the administration will no doubt say that Christian Aid and other critics have no proof that the unaccounted-for billions were ill spent. But think of it this way: given the Arab world's suspicion that we came to steal Iraq's oil, the occupation authorities had every incentive to expedite an independent audit that would clear Halliburton and other U.S. corporations of charges that they were profiteering at Iraq's expense. Unless, that is, the charges are true.

Let's say the obvious. By making Iraq a playground for right-wing economic theorists, an employment agency for friends and family, and a source of lucrative contracts for corporate donors, the administration did terrorist recruiters a very big favor.

link: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/29/opinion/29KRUG.html

[Arrian]

If "the left wants failure", then "the right ignores the current failure". I guess acting blind and stupid is OK, no?

I don't think that the left actually wants failure. Only the "true left" Agathon refers to (aka him, and those who agree with him). The mainstream left (not "true") wants as much success as can be salvaged, and like you does not believe that to be possible under Bush.

I agree.

-Arrian

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Giancarlo
The real left would rather see tens of thousands Iraqis dead in a civil war. That's how the real left is. I think they are evil scum.

Congratulations -- not only is this comment bigoted but its also retarded.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

MrFun,

How is Fezzie's comment that much different than Aggies? (short of the evil scum portion)

[MrFun]

Originally posted by GePap
To MrFun some:

I want success in Iraq-and the last 15 months show me that that victory is NOT POSSIBLE under the current regime. Things are just getting started, but a botched birth invariably makes everything afterwards much harder. This admin. does not seem to learn from mistakes-instead they change directions wildly until they find the route of least cost to themselves.

It's going to take at least 5 more years to see if a viable democracy has taken seed in Iraq (thought that is no guarantee it will remain democratic always)- if those 5 years are under a Bush regime, then I think failure is all too likely.

Why are you addressing me with this? Seems like for the most part, you and I already agree.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Ogie Oglethorpe
MrFun,

How is Fezzie's comment that much different than Aggies? (short of the evil scum portion)

Agathon's comments do not make any sense either.