Mike, if you're asking me to reexamine my views and suggesting that most things are shades of gray, don't worry; when I get new input I reexamine and I am more of a shades of gray guy than most.
My position on Iraq has been relatively consistent. The reason for that is not that I read left wing views and adopt them; I don't even read them. I get most of my information from standard news. I hold my views on Iraq because my life's experience and my independent reasoning have led me there.
Unlike some who grab onto the latest, greatest reasons for hope or to despair, I've been uniformly pessimistic and depressed about the war. Please don't attribute that to politics. I'm not a dyed in the wool anything. I detest the politics of the Democrats almost as much as I detest the politics of our current leadership in the Republican party. In fact, before this latest debacle I've not been very political. I've always registered as an independent and I've always been skeptical of the actions of our fearless leaders.
That changed for me when our government began to beat the drums of war, fan feverish patriotic emotions and feed us horseshit rationales for going to war. Even then I wouldn't have cared as much if they were the ones personally dying for such immature, poorly reasoned or sham policies, but I sure as hell wasn't happy to see them feed the shit to a whole lot of well intentioned, young and trusting Americans who would die, become crippled, kill and be changed for life for a cause that was probably corrupt and very likely doomed for failure.
So if I see that the ever-changing excuses for why we went into Iraq finally settle into one reason that has merit, and one reason that has a chance for success, then I'll be the first to say, "now I get it." In the meantime my views of human nature, history, and life will not allow me to swallow all of the silly, "I think you're an idiot, will ignore the evidence and will believe anything" propaganda that is being fed wholesale to all of us on a daily basis.
So as I said, in the meantime we should question all of the built in assumptions that the Bush Administration is so clever at building into the questions they tell us are critical. If we do, then usually we'll find that they're asking us to examine the wrong question. Examples?:
We need to establish a democratic Iraq that will pose no threat to the world.
We cannot leave because that would plunge Iraq into chaos.
It would dishonor our brave young men and women if we left this job undone in Iraq.
We can win in Iraq if we have the will.
We helped rid the citizens of Fallujah of the terrorists who were holding them hostage.
We have to fight the terrorist "over there" so we don't have to fight them "over here."
We're killing the "known" leaders of Al Queda.
"They just hate freedom and that's why they're resorting to terror against us."
"Anyone who questions our efforts in Iraq is aiding and encouraging the terrorists."
"Mushroom clouds, terrorist attacks at home, the U.N. is irrelevant, oil will pay for the war, open arms and flowers" and on and on.
Mike, what I'm saying is that we should know that we're dealing with a government run by men who are very, very, adept at controlling public opinion by giving us semi-plausible reasons for maintaining hope, but it always turns out that the hope was unfounded. In addition it usually turns out that when they advanced the basis for the "hope," they had other information that they withheld which was much less optimistic. That's their modus operandi so why do we continue to swallow thinking it's lemonade when it so regularly turns out to be piss?
As I've said before, I like you. I think you're passionate and that you really, really care about the sacrifices that are being made and the need to keep America as safe as we can. What I don't understand, however, is your continued willingness to swallow the last failure and expect something better based on the next big ruse.
I've still got about 3-4 months to make good on my prediction that you will finally swing to reality and away from the propaganda koolaid. g. Ed |
