President Bush commuted the prison sentence of former Vice-Presidential Chief of Staff I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby today. Libby, sentenced to 30 months in prison for his role in the Valerie Plame CIA leak case, was scheduled to go to prison shortly. Bush left intact the conviction, making the case that the sentence was “excessive”. From MSNBC-
“I respect the jury’s verdict,” Bush said in a statement. “But I have concluded that the prison sentence given to Mr. Libby is excessive. Therefore, I am commuting the portion of Mr. Libby’s sentence that required him to spend thirty months in prison.”
Democratic reaction was uniformly negative.
“Libby’s conviction was the one faint glimmer of accountability for White House efforts to manipulate intelligence and silence critics of the Iraq war,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. “Now, even that small bit of justice has been undone.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said Bush’s decision showed the president “condones criminal conduct.”
As a Democrat I find myself not getting to worked up about this. I can criticize the President for substituting his judgement for the judge’s judgement, but I realize that Libby was not the source of the original leak. I do believe that he mislead the prosecutor deliberately and should pay a price for that. I’m not sure that thirty months in jail, along with the fine and loss of reputation and job, was warranted. Maybe I am to cynical, but with the pressure from the right on President Bush on multiple fronts I really expected a full pardon. Am I being to easy on the Republicans?
Bill Manzi.com 
Your Honor,
I suspect you are expecting a response from me?
Here goes;
Your analysis is generally measured and fair. I sense a slight slide toward the middle (going right). Maybe you have to go to DARC (Democrat Attitude Rehab Camp).
President Bush, considering he is at the end of his term and whose popularity is in the toilet, is not to subject to partisan, angst, left or right. His commutation was as measured as was your opinion. Libby still has to pay one quarter of a million dollars fine and loses his law license.
What Valerie Plame case? Who is the prosecutor? Who is the judge?
I noticed you avoided comment from the leading Democratic presidential contender (and her consort) who charged President with some form of corruption. Her words, “Today’s decision is yet another example that this Administration simply considers itself above the law.”
I wonder if she is farmiliar with Marc Rich, a real crook?
Your Honor, she is hypocrite.
The media will bat this around for a couple of days then we can get back to important things.
Your turn.
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Jules,
Maybe I was non-partisan because of the very easy counter-strike on the late Clinton pardons. (Which you took anyway). Your implied point on Plame is well taken, and I alluded to it in my first post. There was no case, but the Administration was shown to have launched a withering political counter-offensive against her and Joseph Wilson. The sensitivity comes here on the larger issue of pre-war intelligence. On that I can not be as kind. The President and Vice-President, in my view, misused the intelligence to achieve the goal of invasion. This Libby case,to many, represents a verdict on the Presidents actions and as such people wanted to see Scooter Libby punished. I don’t believe in that type of transference, but it is my belief that this war is the greatest strategic debacle ever undertaken by our country. There were geopolitical considerations that the neo-cons simply ignored, and for which we are now paying a steep price. (Iranian ascendancy). I tend to agree with Buchanan on the war, and you don’t get any further right than that.
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I DISAGREE HE SHOULD OF SERVED SOME JAIL TIME. HE’S GUILTY AND WAS SENTENCED. OK WHAT ABOUT THOSE TWO BORDER AGENTS THAT WERE SENTENCED. SHOULD THEY BE PARDONED? IT’S NOT FAIR FOR MR.LIBBY TO SERVE NO TIME. WHAT A SHAME THAT OUR COURTS CAN BE OVERRULED. IS IT OKAY TO LIE UNDER OATH? WHAT KIND OF MESSAGE ARE WE SENDING TO THE FUTURE LEADERS OF THE WORLD? JUSTICE WAS NOT SERVED.
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Your Honor,
Justice is not evenly applied.
1. Ted Kennedy killed a woman under his protection while drunk. He was rescued by his handlers and served no time in jail.
2. Bill Clinton lied under oath and lost his license to practice law for 4 or 5 years. No jail time.
3. ED/San Antonio With these examples, and there are many more for both parties, justice is in the eye of the beholder. (Whose ox is gored.) I think those guards should be pardoned. The President has the absolute right to pardon convicted people. Done by every president. Leave me a message, Ed, and I will give you a list worse than the Libby case.
4. Your Honor are you telling me that Mr. Libby is to serve time in jail because you are upset with the Iraq war? How is that justice? Talk about kicking the dog.
I detest the Plames. I believe (uncertain) they sandbagged the President before the war. And are they cashing in on that story. I heard her lie under oath before congress as to who suggested her husband for the trip to Africa. She and Sandy Berger (Stole documents from the archives) will see no Justice at all. He got a slap on the wrist. Is that justice?
I’m going to take a shower and cool off. Happy 4th to you and ED.
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Your Honor,
A couple of more points,
1. Iran has been rising as a rogue state before the Iraq war. The war has given them a foot in the door.
2. Iran has been supporting Hezbolla and Hamas for a long time.
3. Iran has been working on the Atomic Bomb long before the war.
4. America has shown we cannot sustain a long war. I presume we will come home, whipped because of the lack of popular support. Meanwhile the enemy will come to our shore and scare us with devastating attacks. The peace sign will do little good then. (Check out the attacks in England. They were botched. Someday they will succeed.
God help us if that happens.
Back to the shower.
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Jules,
Seeing that I am almost late for the municipal fireworks let me give you an incomplete answer. It appears that you have more of an argument with Ed than with I. My original post took it easy on the President. I think Ed was taking issue with me on that post. As a democrat I am not unaware of inconsistency of argument. I thought the Republicans acted deplorably on the Clinton/Lewinsky matter and I don’t want to engage in what I was condeming a few years ago. My point was that Mr. Libby is being seen as a symbol of the war, and for that many feel he should be punished. But I then said
So I was moderate, as you correctly pointed out. More on the war and Iran later.
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Your Honor,
My comment regarding Clinton had to do with the court case he lost and a judge removed his lawyer license. The Lewinsky thing was a political event.
I stand by my belief, Justice is unevenly applied and can be influenced by money or power.
I look forward to continuing our discussion. Have a good time tonight.
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Mayor, I’m inclined to disagree with some of the content of your original posting. Foremost, now that Bush is considering a full pardon, I’m willing to bet there will be no fine, nor loss of lawyer’s license so even that penalty will be negated — just watch.
Secondly, the man perjured himself under oath, so court case or not (or impeachment hearing or not ala Clinton), he COMMITTED PERJURY and he obstructed a federal investigaton — ironically, an investigation undertaken by a Bush appointee — similar to Judge Walton (another Bush appointee) who has taken flack on his seemingly partisan handling of Sibel Edmonds. So it is, what it is. There was a prosecutor, judge, sworn testimony and a liar. Also, the penalty is what it is….er, was.
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Jim,
I gave it some thought and agree that from my perspective Libby lied and obstructed. I also find it ironic that one of the chief Republican complaints against Clinton was that he failed to confer with the Justice Department when he issued his “late term” pardons. Bush also failed to confer with the Justice Department on this commutation, although with Al Gonzalez in charge I’m not sure why he wouldn’t have. I felt that the fine and loss of license was sufficient, and still feel that way. I do agree that the President is giving every indication that a full pardon may be forthcoming, and I believe that would be an outrage, especially in light of his commutation statement.
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This is to Jim.
The prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, was a special prosecutor, immune to political interference.
Libby was caught and found guilty of lying.
Here’s the kicker- The special prosecutor knew who leaked Valerie Plames’ name (Dick Armitage 2003) before Libby took the stand.
If what I am saying is the truth then what was the purpose of the interrogation?
Was Plame a covert agent? She certainly a millionaire(2 million for the book). Does anyone smell a rat here.
Finally, why has he finished the job and prosecuted the real leaker?
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Ok Now for the war and the talk of Iran. Why have sensible people (not just the anti-war left) spoken out on what a terrible geo-political decision this was. How about former National Security Director Brent Scowcroft, who wrote a book with Bush 41. How about Pat Buchanan, who has had this thing cold from the very begining. And what a begining it was. Lets roll back the clock to the Congressional hearings featuring the Army Chief of Staff Gen. Eric K. Shinseki, who was working for the twin towers of intellect, Don Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. General Shinseki was asked about the required size of the occupation force in Iraq for the post war period.His response was
Wolfowitz, responding to General Shinseki’s estimate, said that it was
And why was it “wildy off the mark” according to the leading neo-con thinker in the Bush Administration. Well, that answer is simple. General Shinseki had been the commander of the peacekeeping force in Bosnia, and Paul Wolfowitz offered several explanations as to why General Shinseki was wrong.
How about the intellectual firepower Wolfowitz brought with regards to the ultimate cost to U.S. taxpayers of the war. Try this one on for size.
Lets not forget Don Rumsfeld, who has almost as much brainpower as Wolfowitz. On the subject of General Shinseki’s estimates Rumsfeld joined the Wolfowitz chorus.
Now the question here is who was right, Wolfowitz/Rumsfeld or General Shinseki. Lets start by answering that question. We know that the Bush Administration cashiered Shinseki because he would not go along with this type of lunacy. Were they right to do so? The record should be clear on that.
And what about the geo-political considerations involved here. Is it a difficult concept to understand that knocking off a Sunni counterweight to Iran and empowering a Shia majority in Iraq benefits Iran. Lets quote Buchanan here.
Lets quote Buchanan again to emphasize the point.
I guess that Paul Wolfowitz was wrong about more than troop levels. The idea that the Iranians were a problem before the war and that they continue to be a problem misses the essential point. We have empowered them to be a significant force by our own reckless actions. It is truly ironic to me that the major players in the Iraqi government that we profess to support “summer in Tehran”. While we are trying to minimize Iranian influence in the region our putative allies in Bagdhad are cozying up to the Iranians. In the Israeli-Hezbollah war the Iraqi government was an open supporter of Hezbollah. What have we wrought here? Our Arab allies are openly fearful of the damage we have created. I wonder if the neo-cons still believe that we should be fighting for democratic reforms in the Middle East after the sweeping victory of Hamas in the Palestinian elections.
The post is to long, so I shall stop here. Read the latest Buchanan column on the retreat of the old bulls of the Republican Party on the war at this link.
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Your Honor,
To answer your question I submit;
1. You couched your argument from a left position. You label Rumsfeld and Wolf with labels as “idiots”, “intellectual firepower”,
“lunacy” “terrible geo-political decision”, “twin towers of intellect”.
This partisan position makes you a participant in the argument not a moderator.
2. You are on one side. And that’s okay. You entire analysis was sort of based on “have you stopped beating up your wife lately”. How do I answer your questions, as a “tower of intellect” an “idiot” or what?
Just let me give you my take on the geo-political world we live in.
1. We are at war with Muslims who view our existence as offensive. We have been at war with them for 25 years. Our response has generally be anemic at best. We ran out of Lebanon (Republican President), returned their assaults with a bomb or two, or a police investigation all that does not discourage further attacks. Their absolute willingness to die for their God makes them a fearsome force.
2.The present geopolitical situation is as follows:
Europe has a relatively large Muslim populations.
Spain has capitulated to Muslim terror with attack on the train. soldiers were pulled out, the government was voted out of office, and is no longer an ally.
France is afraid of their Muslim population who burn cars and riot at will.
Germany fears their Muslim population also.
England is under serious attack and the population have turned against us. I believe the new Prime Minister will disassemble our relation.
The Muslims are in active war with Russia, Indonesia, Australia, Philippines, and North Africa.
Remember not all Muslims are Arabs.
The attack on the Twin Towers in NY brought the war to the US soil.
3.US strategy.
The president has determined we are at war with the Muslim Terrorists supported by some Arab countries. The enemy is comprised of independent, captive, amateur, lone and individual “groups” working in concert or independently. They have a variety of group names and are comprised of many nationalities. They cannot defeat us in open warfare. they have no tanks and the only air force Al-queda had was lost on September 11, 2001. They look forward to conquering us through fear while they assault us with bombs and guns. They have no escape plans (they die). If we are assaulted enough our financial markets could be hurt and our economy could be affected as will our standard of living (our Achilles Heal) collapsed.
THIS IS A WORLD WAR.
President Bush, in his state of the union address, remarked that this war would take years or generation to prosecute.(I hard him say this)
Why Iraq? If you look at a map, you will notice Iraq is located within Muslim neighbors. The strategy is to have a neutralized Muslim countries to interfere with terrorist communications, training and travel.
DO WE HAVE ANY ARGUMENTS UP TO THIS POINT.
We, as a country have, disassembled. We have proven that we cannot sustain a long war. This has always been the case from the Vietnam war onward.
The democratic party has, demonized the president as a matter of policy. They were joined by the News medium and slowly over a period of time they got there way. On September 11, 2001 the assault on New York and Washington D.C. when the president’s popularity improved under his response to the attack.
However, the Democrats and medium returned to attack mode and the presidents popularity turned dipped again. At the same time the anti war groups gained sway including some in the congress. After the Democrats won the 2006 election, hearings kept the anti-bush attack on high supported again by the news medium.
All this has encouraged our enemies to drive harder to affect American opinion. One way would be “kill American soldiers” as much as possible At least that’s I would do if i were an AL-Queda commander.
I support the president’s goal, but think we, as a nation have tipped and will soon require us to abandon the war. This will be to our peril.
I FEEL WE WILL SOON HAVE BOMBS GOING OFF IN OUR STREETS. WE WILL DIE, THE NEWS MEDIA WILL SHOUT.
We will live in the war zone.
All this other stuff you present above us is just the partisan bickering, the setting of blame, the drive to power and to take the government in 2009.
These is my perception of things.
I fear we are at war with ourselves.
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Jules,
I never called them idiots. I merely left a strong implication …. Isn’t this precisely what is wrong with our country. I put up two pre-occupation statements that were diametrically opposite. You know because you follow these things that Shinseki was cashiered by Rumsfeld for his belief that the occupation would require several hundred thousand troops to keep order. And yet you refuse to answer the question because you claim that I come at this from a leftist perspective. Yet that claim seems to be refuted by my using Pat Buchanan and General Scowcroft as the linchpins of the geo-political discussion. Neither Buchanan or Scowcroft has ever been accused of being leftists. This is not about left or right but it is about competence and understanding. I put it to you again. Who was right in the occupation analysis, General Eric Shinseki or Don Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. You know the answer as well as I do. When Democrats and Republicans in Congress demanded answers on what the costs of the war were going to be Wolfowitz gave the nonsensical answer quoted above. In Great Britain that type of incompetence gets you fired. In this country that type of incompetence gets you appointed to the Presidency of the World Bank. (I include McNamara as part of that criticism as well.)
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Jules,
Like you, I also wonder why we haven’t reached a point where bombs are going off in our streets, but my perception is it has nothing to do with G.W. Bush ‘leading’ this nation, and much to do with an ocean’s divide which separates us from our European neighbors. You couch your argument about this always having been about a war against the Muslims. Reflect back on how many different reasons were given for going into Iraq. Reasons ranged from WMD’s, Saddam supporting OBL, Saddam being behind the 911 attacks, centrifuges, mushroom clouds — you name it… However, as we now know, the reason we are in Iraq (ALONE) has very little to do with the aforementioned, and everything to do with the arrogance of Bush and PNAC who had plans to invade Iraq well before the 911 attacks. Coincidentally, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bolton, Libby, Perle are all PNAC signatories (and as should be rightly noted — chicken-hawks as well). In fact, the media that you rag on was actually SO COMPLICIT in selling us this bull, that I actually fell for it as well after having my dissenting viewpoint shouted down by those on the right. It’s nice to know that my viewpoint is now the prevailing mindset after four arduous, bumbled years of war administration (not to be confused with anti-patriotism against our troops). So, here we are my friend, four years later, and no closer to the objectives/accomplishments the mayor noted in his original posting. So yes, it is the correct thing to do for democrats to be undertaking all these investigations. However, those sheep are far too fearful of the foxes in the henhouse than to fulfill my wish that this whole adminstration should be impeached….
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president clinton pardoned mark rich hours before his term was up. who was rich’s attorney…scooter libby.lol washington is a very small world.
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Your Honor and Jim,
Jim, The expanse of the Atlantic ocean has not been a barrier since the age of steam. The airplane has shrunk it to a pond.
Your Honor,
I am going to concede all points to you because they are basically immaterial. What was said and by whom and when doesn’t matter because it takes our eyes off the real danger, assault on our shores.
I would like to make a a few points.
1. Nobody has a crystal ball. We do not know how this will all turn out. The American revolution took 7 years to win. If you look at the rebel position 1 year before the British surrender at York Town, you would find the army in tatters, desertion rampant, the leader, George Washington declared incompetent (he lost more battles than he won) and in general hopless.
Lincoln had the people against him until Gettysburg. He was convinced he would lose the next election. He was maligned savagely, even by Democratic standards.
2 We are our own worst enemy;
The country has a thousand presidents with a cornucopia of advice.
We have ten thousand generals who know better than the fellows on the ground.
We have a print media that is dead set against the war and who have reporters embedded with the troops telling the wars gory details daily. You cannot run a public war. You cannot allow the public to watch it live in their living rooms. It will destroy moral and the effort will lose support of the public.
We have, in fact tipped, the American people do not support the war. The congress has publicly withdrawn its support of the president and the war.
They even argue for political advantage in the next election, a terrible sin in my eyes.
This has given comfort to our enemy. They believed we would not have the stomach for a protracted war, and they were right. The president said it would be a war of decades or even generations, but we did not listen.
Now that they have cowered Spain, France and Germany, our enemies have turned up the terror against England and we will soon follow.
Maybe when our blood runs in American streets we will get a backbone.
There are 1.3 billion Muslims in the world (not all Muslims are Arabs, so this is not racial). If 10% are radical then we have millions of potential enemies. The culture, meanwhile, is instilling hate in future generations.
They have some frightening characteristics; they are willing to die for their cause, in fact some look forward to dying to reach their image of heaven. The doctor, whom they captured in Scotland, attempted to jump back into the burning jeep .
They are without planes, tanks or ships. they fight asynchronously. This means the organize in groups of different sizes including groups of one, and conduct there attacks using material on hand or what supporters provide. They act separately or in concert with each other. There is no head to cut off or to surrender.
There is no one way they act. They learn as they go along. A defeat is a lesson for the next group to learn from.
The fellow who rented a car and attempted to run down students at the university of North Carolina, did it on his own to do his part for the jihad. He was American born.
So while we try and set blame, hold our hearings, march in the streets and blame each other, our enemies are preparing to inflict damage on us through terror.
Gentlemen, this is why I do not want to partake in who said what, when did he say it. A pox on both our political houses.
A factoid; We have been at war with these people 20 years before the Trade Tower attack.
I await your view.
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Your Honor,
My next entry will outline my view of the Iraq war.
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Jules,
I concede that there is danger in our world, and terrorism practiced by Islamic extremists is a central part of that danger. I also concede that they would strike again, if possible, right here in America. I agree that the problem was ongoing before the tragedy of 9-11. That is about all of the agreement I can give. You indicate that you “concede” on the points raised in a prior post, but that they are not material. How is misrepresenting the reasons for war to the American public and the world immaterial? Don’t you see the damage done to our credibility and standing in the world? How is misrepresenting the costs of the war immaterial? The American public was fed nonsense by men who claimed to know more, but who knew substantially less. How is incompetence to be glossed over because there is a continuing threat? Is incompetence not something that we should take into account when deciding who our leaders should be? How is determining the proper troop levels for post-war Iraq immaterial? How do we gloss over Rumsfeld’s arguing for a strategy that the top Army commander said would not work, and then firing him for those views? The resulting chaos and loss of life should simply be glossed over because what happened in the past is not relevant to the future? Should we learn from those errors, or should we keep repeating them because to highlight the Bush/Rumsfeld mistakes is partisan? Once again this is not partisan as far as my views go. It is simply common sense. Bush has squandered the goodwill this country had after the September 11 tragedy, and no amount of handwringing or citing of future threats can take away from the fact that this war was and is a collosal error in judgement by a group that is not even representative of the mainstream of Republican foreign policy thought, much less the country’s. As far as Bush being vindicated by history don’t count on it. Jules, George W Bush is no Lincoln or Washington. His mistakes, already clear, will only be magnified by time.
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Your Honor
I will have more commentary tomorrow. First I want to make a couple of points;
I did not equate Bush with Lincoln or Washington. What I said was they looked like him at crucial periods in there war period. If you read your history you will find that George Washington only had one or two generals he trusted. He was stuck with the others due to politics within the Continental Congress. In fact Washington had to intercept his troops to stop them from mutinying against the Congress.
Lincoln had the same level of problems.
The wars for both these men looked hopeless at one time but prevailed in the long run. This war will carry over to future presidents (maybe more than one). If they feel the war should be terminated then let it be.
My point is there is no crystal ball to tell you where you are going when in a war.
If you want to set Bush, Rumsfeld, etc. against a wall and shoot them I will not argue. Unfortunately, incompetence is not a criminal act. We are all concerned as to how things will work out. While we are at it, maybe we ought to set Clinton up against the same wall for the military leadership he had shown against the same terrorists. The attacks against us went largely unanswered.
We haven’t been well lead since World war II.(except the first gulf war, and that solved nothing in the end except to free Kuwait.)
One more thing, you Honor. If you are concerned as to our relationships with our European Allies, just remember they were skimming oil for food money for there own benefit while the Iraqi people went with less long before the Iraq invasion. They are crooks period. And, I might add, they will get away with it. That is why they were intransigent in the UN.
This is going to be a complex war. From the reports I have seen, Al-Qaeda is merging well planned attacks with quick attacks carried out by amateurs into a single strategy to divert our attention with one while they execute another.
Man, we got to pull together. The heck with the politics. Have you inquiries, your impeachments, your political conflicts. It will mean nothing to our foes.
Your Honor, I believe we are entering a very dangerous period for our country.
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Well, Your Honor, I guess I have to discuss my scallywags in reference to the issues of who did what to whom and when in the Bush White house.
1. The president can issue pardons et al at any time he/she pleases. Clinton issued over 400.
A question;
What was your opinion toward President Clinton while he handed out this many, some of which he profited in cash as did Hillary’s brother?
Actually all president before Clinton issued about 1/2 thousand pardon. It’s their right under law.
2. Your argument charging Cheney, Rumsfeld, and the Generals with lying, incompitence, or acting criminally etc., I believe will not stand up. Read on.
The President felt we were in a world wide war with the terrorist elements of the Muslim culture. To fight the Ben Ladens in Afghanistan and come home would not complete the task of defeating the wide ranging enemies we faced.
He thought an invasion of Iraq would be a tactic in this war. Now if you think Bush’s is the only president to face this situation you would be wrong. What did we learn from the Vietnam war? We had statistical analysts running the war. Generals were fired. Eventually the president was driven from office. I do believe that war also began with a lie. (Gulf of Tonken) No impeachment.
What president Bush did not learn, and Ben Laden did, from Vietnam was that Americans do not have stomach for a protracted war. Bush will pay the political price as did Johnson, probably in a different way.
I believe (can’t prove) President Bush had the best interest of the American people’s safety and security in making his decisions. I believe the planners did not know the consequences after the defeat of the Iraqi army, just as president Johnson did not understand the tenacity of the North Vietmeses.
In a political system in which no good deed goes unpunished president Bush will probably leave office as a looser, and will probably be treated by nearby history unkindly.
In the long run events will show if president Bushes fears were founded.
Question;
Do you have proof of criminal acts or absolute lying; e-mails, memos, telephone conversations or whitenesses (no democrat rants or talking points real whiteness)that could be used to bring charges?
3. As far as firing generals who do not support the official plan, or fail to carry it out, the president can fire and replace them as he sees fit.
Truman fired Macarthur, Lincoln fired four generals (one twice) for failure to be successful. They all complained of the unfairness of it all, several spent the rest of their lives justifying their actions.
None challenged the right of the president to do what he did.
All through history we never learned our lessons well and were forced to relearn them again.
The next president will probably do what president Clinton did. No confrontation unless we can drop bombs from five thousand feet. Now before you think I am being critical and cynical, I know it’s the president’s right to establish policy. What he did though, is convince the terror leaders we are afraid of direct confrontation and gave rise to the attack on the Towers in 2001.
In short, if there is verifiable proof of criminal acts in the Bush White house then have at him. If not, let the American people vote for the person they think will handle the job better. END THE RANCOR. THERE ARE MORE IMPORTANT THINGS TO DO. YOU WILL NOT PUT THE WHEELS BACK ON THE WAGON.
Your Honor, the lesson we better learn is not to denigrate the opposition for the length of their term. We must realize we have political and philosophical differences and that the art of logic and compromise should be the demeanor we carry into office to do the people’s work.
That’s how I see it.
PS Read Amerding’s column about “Scooter” Libby. Compare them against my sentiments in earlier comments.
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Jules,
A lot of ground to cover, here we go. 1)The Clinton pardons were and are undefendable politically. (Unpardonable?)They were a mistake. It is interesting to note that Republican crticism of those pardons was pretty tough. I guess that there is enough political hypocrisy to go around on the issue of pardons. No question in my mind that both Clinton and Bush acted within the scope of their lawful authority, and as I said in my original post I didn’t get all worked up by the Libby commutation. 2) Lets clarify what I said about incompetence. I never alleged criminality, just political deception and incompetence. It is you who bring forward criminality. In any case whats the difference on criminality. Bush would likely pardon them anyway. (Some pardon humor there.)
3)Vietnam! The elephant in the room here. I believe that President Bush did not learn from Vietnam, and that the lessons you draw are the wrong ones. Lets look at our world view then, and how later events showed how wrong they were in several critical respects. The United States viewed world communism as a major threat (which it was) but believed that this threat was monolithic and essentially controlled by Moscow. Our fight in Vietnmam was at least in part derived from the desire to combat “world communism”. (Just as today’s fight against islamic-terrorism is considered by the Bush-Cheney team to be one fight). And yet, as we discovered with “world communism” our intellectual laziness and refusal to consider local history and nationalism when making critical judgements in Vietnam led to a disaster. After the U.S. exit Vietnam fought a ferocious border war with China (both communist nations)and Jules, it was communist Vietnam who deposed the communist Khmer Rouge government in Cambodia. It took Nixon and Kissinger to realize the geo-political advantage to the United States from the opening to China. Nixon succesfully used “triangulation” to pit one communist superpower off against the other to the advantage of the United States. A brilliant political move, and one that was based on hard-headed realism, something that the neo-cons associated with the Bush Presidency ridicule. Vietnam didn’t show America to be weak. It showed that we fought the wrong war for the wrong reasons. Grouping all islamic terror under one umbrella pre-supposes there are no differences between the sects or nationalities involved. It is intellectual laziness more suited for a street corner discussion than for policy-making at the highest level of government. Lets end part three by asking two fundamental questions. Who is the enemy in Iraq? And is Buchanan correct when he postulates that
Is Buchanan right or wrong in that theory?
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Your Honor,
Actually I believe our ideas are coming together.
While you geo-political view makes sense to me, I still believe the Vietnam war showed the public could not support a long war. Our b-52’s and restrictive operations tied the hands of our troops and made the war a meat grinder.
Buchanan has a point too. However, the Iranians, have introduced a joker in the deck; Atomic power. They may develop the Bomb, but that could backfire, and could result in regional destruction.
In fomenting unrest or attacking neighbors, they have power, but they are not an Atomic Power. I hope the Iranian citizenry catch hold of the danger they and their families are in. There will be no winner here.
Let’s summerize.
1. Put Libby thing away. It’s distracting for now.
2. The American people will settle who runs the country in 2008, thereby getting rid of these scallwags and getting a new set.
3. The Iraq thing may have to be settled by the next administration unless outside forces cause the president to modify his plans.
4. I stand by my thought that we are fighting a world war against terrorists. They will be multicultural, intelligent, asynchronous and have a common aim. Weakening of non-Muslim societies and the conversion of Muslim societies that support the west. The new administration ignores this at its (and our) peril.
I agree it will be a complex war, with shifting loyalties, shaky allies and a murderous foe.
5. I like your analysis on Vietnam after we left. Problem, no one is capable of that type analysis before hand with certainty. In fact the war may have made changes within the society that gave rise to that history.
6. Did you give a Republican President an ataboy?
7. The one thing that makes this war different is the religious fever that is brought to bear against us. No hard logic here. Kill all foes, even if you have to kill fellow Moslems in the act. No surrender. Die if you must. No single head. Just creat terror. Blood in the streets. Go for massive casualties Let me know how this figures in a geopolitical sense.
I wonder even if Iran can put this gene back in the bottle. Are the Iranian people ready to follow sharia law? Seems to me they are somewhat westernized.
That’s my view. Like your thinking here.
Are you going to start a water rate blog? That should be fun.
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Jules,
A couple of things before a fuller response. When you say about the communist Vietnmam analyses that “no one is capable of that type analysis before hand with certainty” I can agree with the cerainty part. But our policy simply ignored key facts, such as Ho Chi Minh being a nationalist and the ancient enmity between Vietnmam and China. I guess we can give the government analysts (in a Democratic Administration) a pass because Vietnam and China had only been antagonistic for about a thousand years (give or take a year or two). As far as the water rate blog I was fervently hoping that you didn’t read the Tribune today. Now that you have I guess I will do a post on it.
Bill
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Mayor,
re: the water rates. It would be great if you could provide a breakdown on the new proposed tier rates. That was unfortunately lacking in the 7/08 ET article. I’m also wondering if an irrigation rate will still apply as initially proposed in 12/06. Thanks!
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Jim,
Will do a full post on the water proposal by tommorow, including the tiers and the irrigation rate issue.
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Your Honor,
My only point is that nobody, Democrat or Republican has a crystal ball.
But, sometimes going to war is about principles. The analysis model, if applied, would probably stop us from entering WWII. We responded to an attack.
We were not attacked by Vietnam. The principle here was to stop the “spread of Communism”.
WE WERE ATTACKED BY TERRORISTS ON SEPTEMBER 11, 2001. (Excuse me for shouting). Like (and exactly like) Pearl Harbor, we responded.
We are dong that today. Not just Al-Qaeda, but against the Terrorist forces arrayed against us. That is the principle here.
We know the bad things in Iraqu (as reported by the drive buy media); Inter-tribal warfare, terrorist warfare (different thing),chaos, and a host of other tragedies.
On the other hand we may have done substantial harm to the Al-Qaeda leadership and inflicted casualties to the terrorist fighters on foreign soil (Iraq). This could be one reason that we have not been attacked yet and those that have been foiled were amateurish in nature. All this is what we pay or army to do, and they are doing one hell of a job. (You will certainly not hear this on the Liberal media unless it’s on page 37)
I read a report that Al-Qaeda leadership has threatened Iran with war if the don’t stop sending trained Shiites over to kill the Al-Qaeda fighters. That and their other internal problems may be giving Iranian leaders something to think about.(Would you have imagined gas lines in a Middle Eastern country?)
The problem with analysis, as we have been discussing it, is it does not always predict the unintended or unexpected consequentness.
Question;
Do you think the democrats (who may completely lead the country shortly) have analyzed the consequences of their revived push to extract the troops ASAP. (Americans run away again like in Somalia.) There will dancing in the streets of Terrorville.
That is my opinion.
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