One can claim that any faltering policy area, whether it be education, health care, or energy, can be fixed through expending unlimited resources, maintaining vigilant patience and demanding an open-ended time table. This might be an acceptable portion of any policy, but it is just that: merely a portion of the whole. Yet in regards to Iraq, this is the sole predicate to the rationale behind maintaining a presence there. This is why, in the abstract, the typical Bush administration and John McCain argument that we need more time and patience and resources (both human and monetary) in Iraq rings hollow. (Yes I know war is itself unique from any other policy area. Yet, it's still instructive to examine the Iraq war from this perspective because it provides another context from which to examine why our Iraq policy has largely been a failure.)
Looking at any issue through this prism of "more time plus more resources will equal the reversal of a perilous problem" is disingenuous and intellectually dishonest. At least with most domestic issues, there is a specific blueprint on how an issue can be fixed--regardless of whether or not the policy fix will actually work. Failing education system? Provide school choice, increase accountability and money for schools. Widespread lack of health care? Establish private sector mandates, expand government programs. Foreign energy dependence and global warming? Invest more in renewable, clean sources of energy, implement higher efficiency standards. Time, patience and resources are all components of these, but components, not the policy itself. With Iraq, we just hear half this equation from the military and political leadership. We need more time for political reconciliation; we need more resources to create breathing room to ensure reconciliation occurs; we can't have any timetables because this would send the wrong signal. That is where the policy arguments end, though, sans true specificity and without finite policy objectives.
With nearly all areas of policy, we also know or hope for a specific result. Health care: more people insured, a reduction in costs. Education: better schools, smarter kids. Energy: decreased reliance on foreign oil, cleaner environment. You don't just throw money and time at these issues, but you also allocate an exact way to spend the money and resources, and delineate a specific timetable (or at least a desired timetable) for when one should expect positive results. In terms of Iraq, the Administration and others have laid out several desired objectives. The problem is that the various goals have shifted, become amorphous, and quantifiably unattainable over time while the policy itself has remained stagnant: more patience, more resources, and no firm, anticipated timetable for when the results will be attained.
Here's a test: name one other policy area besides Iraq that solely uses endless time, endless patience and endless resources as an acceptable rubric for successfully implementing policy. You can't since none exist. This, more than anything else, might help explain why our presence in Iraq continues to be a bottomless, misappropriated, and misguided mess.
and that primarily has to do with oil drilling contracts. Since
Desert Storm, it's always been about the oil.
The neocon fastasy about erecting a wonderful democracy in Iraq was largely a ploy to conceal the real agenda of control of oilfieds and airbases.
Sounds like our never-ending War on Drugs.
How long has that gone on?
How much has that cost us?
Who even knows how well we're doing?
Who even believes there are fewer drugs available now?
The public need to be convinced that their safety is at risk, so the squandering of hundreds upon hundreds of billions of dollars on unneeded weapons systems etc. goes forward unimpeded.
More tax cuts for the wealthy.
More cuts in services for the needy.
More cuts in regulatory limits on corporate greed.
Over and over.
Will eventually
After the depressions that inevitably happen every time they do the above.
Result in prosperity for all!!!!!
The fact that this has been tried over and over, and never worked, makes no, because these people are impervious to empirical evidence.
Reality is so much messier than their warm and fuzzy ideologies. Especially when they are pretected from the consequences of their policies by their wealthy corporate sponsors.
If he and others in the Media would describe the U.S. presence in Iraq as
a Military Occupation [which it is]...... Public perception would surely be different and perhaps that would be the springboard of change.
/"Here's a test: name one other policy area besides Iraq that solely uses endless time, endless patience and endless resources as an acceptable rubric for successfully implementing policy. You can't since none exist"/
The War on Drugs springs to mind ...... ?
Good point. Anything that is called a "war on [insert desired concept here]" is likely to be an endless quagmire. Most religious wars fit this category as well.
I wonder if pursuing national interest is defined as alienating a large portion of the world. I wonder if pursuing national interest is defined as creating many soldiers who will live with crippling and expensive disabilities for the rest of their lives.
It is interesting that you mentioned other nations occupied by the United States. As this country has debt in the many trillions of dollars, as the dollar is declining and as infrastructure and other services are in want of adequate funding, I wonder how much longer the citizens of this country should be expected to tolerate or support the existence of what many reasonable and educated observers consider to be tantamount to maintaining an overstretched and increasingly untenable empire.
think that we alienated the middle east because
we invaded Iraq.Lets not forget 911 the entire
middle east was jumping for joy after that happened
Our own intelligence has just discovered that
Iran was pursuing nuclear weapons capability
and abandoned that only after we invaded Iraq.
Al-Queda is an organization that existed way before
our involvement in Iraq.It is also an organization that
is totally dedicated to our destruction and always
has been,hence 911.It is also supported by all of
the Arab countries and very popular with it's citizens
One of the reasons they hate us is why most of the
world hates us.Americans are so clueless.
I doubt very much that el Sadr is any sort of angel, but do know that el Makiki is ineffective and corrupt. I have heard from Iraqis themselves that el Sadr supplies the only humanitarian effort around while el Maliki's people only do mundane works for their "constituents" with nice, fat bribes.
It is easy to see why el Makili doesn't like el Sadr, but on the other hand, it is easy to see why many people do like him.
Why in the h**l doesn't the U.S. get out of there and let them sort themselves out. Oh, right!!!! How stupid of me. I forgot the oil.
I would take issue with the statement that the policy has remained stagnant and, instead, suggest that ‘stagnation’ IS the policy...if that makes any sense at all. What I’m trying to say is that it appears that this administration has concluded, a very long time ago, that their desired objectives in Iraq are simply not attainable. And, therefore, they have decided that the best thing to do, during the waning months of their term in office, is to tread water long enough for them to hand off the problem to the next administration.
The problem is that time is of the essence and treading water won’t be an option for the next administration which may very well sink before it learns to swim - UNLESS Senator Biden is given complete charge over the Iraq file and carte blanche to implement his strategy to promote and facilitate a sustainable political settlement in Iraq based on federalism and Iraq’s constitution.
Of course, Iraq may have already run out of time for a political solution. We can only hope that will not have become a certainty by the time the next President takes the oath of office...or the next four years may make the last four look like the proverbial walk in the park!
However abusive of human rights the previous regime was, it is clear that chaotic and violent conditions are commonplace.
How about these:
1. Ending "racism"
2. Promoting "family values"
As with the Iraq War, no one can define what "success" means for these two policy areas, and no one can define a roadmap to get us there. It's a prescription for a permanent commitment to nebulosity and tilting at windmills.
"Affirmative action is a debt that America can NEVER pay off"
-- Patricia Smith, former columnist, Boston Globe
the war on drugs?
Are you kidding me? Name we one government policy that HAS a finite existence. I could start with the so-called "war on poverty". When do we stop throwing money in that pit that has done nothing but enslave generation after generation of urban blacks and rural families. At least the US has stated that as the Iraqis are more and more able to take over their own security, we can cut more and more needed US forces. The same can't be said about poverty, education and just about any other government policy, program or whatever over the last 40+ years. The answer is always throw money at it. And don't hold those that run failed programs responsible for anything.
Want some government money? Just play the victim card. Need some cash for doing nothing? Just enroll in any number of mindless programs that treat you like the idiot you are and don't hold you responsible for anything.
Here's a better test. Try telling everyone what the consequences could be of pulling out of Iraq immediately and what you'll do then.
Just as in Iraq, where we futilely strive to end terrorism by attacking the entire environment in which the terrorists were fomented, in fighting poverty we attempt to throw money into a corrupt and ineffective governing system.
Changing the physical state or actions in which detrimental conditions incubate can only contribute to changing the beliefs and environment conducive to those actions if we take the APPROPRIATE action. We can't "end" terrorism by acting like the terrorists, stop the murder of innocents by killing innocents, prevent war by starting a war, promote stability by destroying the leadership and infrastructure, or model human rights, freedom, and democracy by trampling all three.
Actions taken must further the desired belief set and actions, and create an environment conducive to them, thus inspiring others to adopt that belief set. We cannot "win" in Iraq in part because we can't even define victory; in part because we're taking actions contradictory to our stated intentions, supposed belief system, and necessary intermediate goals; and in part because even infinite time, resources, and patience can't accomplish a task they're not being effectively and responsibly applied toward.
in the same manner, we can't "win" the war on poverty (or any other) without taking the difficult and involved steps of replacing defunct systems with new, effective, involving, and empowering ones.
That said, I fear our Iraq policy is exactly what you suggest – amorphous, stagnant and unquantifiable.
We're treading water and calling it swimming.