There were many democrats who did not support it- I'd like to see a little more nuance in the opinions of some (and only some) conservatives, when they slam all dems as hypocrites, when not all dems voted for the war.
Aside from that I agree with you. Those dems who voted for the war need to see "OOOPS we blew it. We SHOULD have checked things out more carefully, or maybe we SHOULD have read a couple of books on Iraq so we knew what we were getting in to."
I'll be honest with you MrLucky- you can go back and check my posts- I'm not expert on Iraq, but I did not believe Saddam was continuing his weapons programs. I did not know WHY he was blustering, and refusing to comply, but I did not see him as a major threat- and you can check my posts on that. From what I knew about Iraq, I did not think it was wise to go in and depose Saddam- because as awful as he was (and he was) he's not more awful than many other leaders (especially in the petrostans) and I saw him as holding the country together- which I think we can all agree now he was. I also thought that once the country was broken apart, there were only a few options- and topping the list were the possibilities of civil war, or an extreme religious government- similar to what we are seeing emerge in Afghanistan. I really didn't see the point in sending American men and women to fight for a Muslim Theocracy.
I think if I could figure these things out, other democrats- and especially people who purport to be our leaders, can and SHOULD have. And yes, they need to get down on their knees and beg my forgiveness, for being for the war because they were afraid to be labled traitors. That's a big part of it. After 9/11 people were SO ready to see anyone with an independent thought as some sort of traitor to our country. There was a vile thread on SI that labled people "Bin Laden Lovers" if they disagreed with the party line, and quite frankly it's a pretty fair summation of the lemming-like mood the country was in at the time. Do I understand why people are lemmings, and cave in to social pressure? Sure- we see it time and time again in history. But I can't forgive them for it, not if they have a brain. Those with head traumas, comas, strokes (serious ones), serious drinking problems, and alzheimers, and certain serious mental illnesses, I will excuse for being lemmings, but no one else. |
