The fact that factually inaccurate arguments may have been used does not necessarily mean Saddam should stay. His possible, even probable, lack of involvement in 9/11 is only part of the picture.
oh, absolutely. my point wasn't about Saddam, but rather about pundits who spout tendentious garbage without knowing squat, and who don't have the decency to apologize or stop babbling when their mistakes are revealed.
It's crucial to separate people's positions--what should be done, which cause is legitimate, etc.--from the reasoning that gets them there. The longer I'm in the biz, the less I care about what someone advocates at the end of the process, and the more I care about their intelligence, knowledge, intellectual honesty, and so forth.
Take Pollack, for example, whom you brought up. Three years ago he co-wrote a devastating FA piece on why "rollback" in Iraq was a dumb idea. This year he wrote another strong FA piece advocating invasion. A lot of people attacked him the first time because they didn't like his conclusion; a lot of other people have attacked him the second time for the same reason. Me, I thought both pieces were intelligent and well-argued--as were other pieces in FA on the subject taking very different positions, such as those by Greg Gause (advocating lifting sanctions) or Karl and John Mueller (also pushing a softer line).
The kinds of policy questions we're talking about are very complicated, and involve balancing a number of important but competing priorities. Smart, knowledgeable, well-meaning people can legitimately come to different conclusions about what should be done. And when circumstances change, those kinds of people can even legitimately change their own minds, as Pollack has done. So only ideologues value people for their conclusions; sensible folk value them for the strength and worth of the analysis behind the conclusions, whatever the latter may be.
It was not ridiculous to speculate that Iraq may have been involved in the September 11 attacks (although the most well-informed people were skeptical). But it was ridiculous to try to force evidence into such a predetermined framework rather than following the evidence where it seemed to lead (i.e., elsewhere). To retain their intellectual credibility, moreover, anybody who was drawn in that direction should have to demonstrate that they have learned some lessons from the experience--either by gaining humility, or relying on different sources of information, or whatever.
tb@intellecutalpoliceman.com |
