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John McCain and al Qaeda
Historians of early 21st century American politics will remark the degree to which radical forces, usually called neoconservatives, perverted language as recommended by the National Socialist Party in 1930s Germany. Continue to demonize liberals, blame them for all social and economic problems, and soon enough no one will be willing to admit to being a liberal. Claim that liberals and Democrats are too soft to combat terrorists and soon enough a majority, even in the oldest democracy on earth, will believe it. Open up entire electronic networks, such as Fox, and chains of radio stations, such as Clear Channel, and buy enough newspaper chains, and make all these media available to pre-programmed neoconservative ditto heads, and sure enough a subculture will emerge which distrusts its own government and believes that an entire political party is not to be trusted.
This has all happened before. And where it has happened, authoritarian government emerges.
Worst of all, a formerly "maverick" Republican, one who was sensible enough to understand the dangerous perversions involved in this radicalization of American politics, will find himself repeating the idiotic mantra that we are "fighting al Qaeda in Iraq so we don't have to fight them here."
John McCain knows better. I know he knows better. But it is appalling when a serious patriot like McCain is forced to fall into line with these radical perverters of language, one of the most dangerous things that can happen in a democracy, in order to lead a party that is so far off the mainstream rails that it will take decades to return to civility and normality.
If John McCain seriously believes we are at war with al Qaeda in Iraq, that alone is such a serious error in judgment as to rank him with George W. Bush at his worst and therefore disqualify him from any chance to govern this country.
John McCain is intelligent enough to know that our tragically flawed invasion of Iraq has indeed kicked open a hornets nest, a 1300 year old hornets nest of violent rivalry inside Islam, and that for us to put all the hornets back in the nest will take decades and trillions of dollars, that it will assure the decline of the American republic, and that it will represent a grasp at empire that would cause all of our founders to revolve in their graves.
Why then would he, a combat veteran, a courageous prisoner of war, permit himself to be captive to the perverters of language? Does he want to be president so badly that he will join that band of radicals who have seriously damaged American democracy, who have tortured and lied, who have twisted our very Constitution so wrongly that it is hardly recognizable?
I refuse to believe it. It is not the John McCain I have known for 30 years.
John McCain can redeem himself and redeem the soul of his party by admitting once and for all that what is flawed about Iraq is not our military strategy, not our lack of will, not our failure of national commitment. It is that we chose the wrong war at the wrong time with the wrong enemy. John McCain's problem is not al Qaeda. His problem is George W. Bush and the people he chose to advise him.
We will pay for their arrogance for years to come. Our 35,000 casualties are paying with their lives and their futures.
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I'm confused. This article suggests that McCain says we are fighting Bin Laden's Al Qaeda forces which are in Iraq. That's obviously bogus. But what about the actual group that calls themselves "Al Qaeda in Iraq?" They are real.
Scary, isn't it? Obama is between a rock and a hard place - if he tries to educate the American people, those that are ill-informed, ignorant, under-educated, fearful, hateful people, he'll be met with anger, mistrust, and hate. If he doesn't educate them, we continue down the same road to ruination. Either way, he loses, we lose.
According to US Intelligence Estimates the PEAK number of Al Qaeda in Iraq was about 10,000 and as of March 15th, 2008 there were about 6000.
Petraeus and Craker reported in April 2008 that there are 540,000 Iraq Security Forces,
the US has 140,000 Troops, Our Allies have 10,000. That is 690,000 and I think you have to add the Awakening Force (Sons of Iraq) which was reported to be 80,000 at $16 Million/Month which would bring the total to 770,000 Good Guys vs. 6000 Bad Guys. We have have lost over 4063, they have lost about 4000, we have had 30,000 wounded, Al Qaeda have had ??? wounded. Allies have lost 310, Allies have over 1000 wounded, Iraqi Security Forces killed ????? (top secret), over 100,000 Iraqi Security Forces Wounded, over 100,000 Iraqi Civilians have died due to War related incidents, 300,000 - 500,000 Iraq Civilians have been wounded, over 4 Million Iraqi's have been displaced from there homes in the FIRST FIVE YEARS.
If we continue this TERRIFIC PROGRESS it will take at least another 7 years to kill or capture the remaining 6000 Al Qaeda. ALL the other metrics will most likely follow i.e. another 4000 Dead GI's.
OOOPS I forgot, we have to continue fighting the CIVIL WAR until there is only ONE PARTY remaining. Then we will have come FULL CIRCLE.
Of course as a result of this great track record General Petraeus will be awarded the 5th Star by June 2008.
Jim Frego
Great piece Mr. Hart. Unfortunately I don't think John McCain is the man you knew for 30 years anymore. He is obviously suffering some sever form of mental decline. If he was even the McCain of 2000 he would have a chance to win this Fall but he simply is not.
Great piece, Gary! The foolish decision to invade Iraq, compounded by the idiotic decision to disband the Iraqi army and security services, created the colossal fiasco that John McCain wants to perpetuate,
in part to help cover up the supreme stupidity of the decision-makers who created the mess. The same game played out in Vietnam.
Thank you, Mr. Hart for your insights. As Rove says to Plato in the Bizarro Cartoon, "But surely you agree that truth can be created by the repetition of a lie."
If you think Al- Quida, and Iran, one a terrorist government, one a terrorist organization, you Mr. Hart Are A left-wink loon. Both with backing by Saudi oil profits paying their bills will destroy the world. At the present time they are working on the world economy.If we don't continue the fight we all are doomed.Liberals and Conservatives.
Ok, raymondf: resort to namecalling when you lack the facts and logic.
Senator Hart knows that al Qaeda in iraq is only a few years old. The people killing our troops and the majority of Iraqis are Sunnis and Sadrists killing each other.
You are so wrong you have earned the right to send your kids to fight this war and to sell the two SUVs.
They aren't working just on the world economy, they are working on our Freedoms. Haven't you noticed a change in the Bush years? Freedom is not free, as they say.
Iran is NOT funded by Saudis. Iran (Persia) is responsible for funding Hezbollah and Hamas, but neither of those organizations are threats to us in here in the USA. As for al-Qaeda their main leadership is in Pakistan or Afghanistan--remember Osama bin Laden? Russia with the contemptible Vlad Putin as its titular head is a bigger threat than al-Qaeda and Iran COMBINED. Please do a little homework.
Actually, Hamas are Sunnis and get their funding from Saudi Arabia. Hezbollah are Shiites and that's who Iran funds.
I don't think Russia is a bigger threat than al-Qaeda. It's a little nuts to think that.
Saudi are backing Iran by paying their bills????
You should do some history reading before making such a comment. Iran are Shiites, Saudis are Sunni. They hate each other since Ali and his sons were assassinated.
One more thing: Iran has the third biggest oil reserve. I don't think they need the Saudis to pay their bills.
Please read some history! Go to a library. Ask the librarian to recommend some books for you. The ignorance of people like you will to do us in.....is doing us in.
Thank you Mr. Hart. It is necessary for the Democratic Party leadership to loudly challenge these lies each and every time they are spewed all over the body politic. That McCain would attempt to parrot the CheneyOilCo's monkeypuppet at this stage, and expect to gain any real political coin, is as telling as it gets.
An enormous part of the electorate, no longer buys into this lie anymore. It took a while, but we have consistently revealed the truth for all to see... and it is NOT McCain. He is a changeling... a metamorph whose little remaining credibility is being quickly spent in a desperate attempt to claim some legitimate standing in this race.
McCain has not yet quite grasped the fact that his candidacy is the product of a deeply flawed Republican campaign. That he has any voice, is more the result of the Clinton campaign's erosion of the Democratic Party's moral high ground, than anything that his party has produced to date.
His platform is built on lies and corruption. He is part of a very dark Republican Party legacy. That he would more closely tie himself to that abject failure, tells us of his own personal failure to grasp the lessons to be learned. He has no political future.
First will come the destruction of Israel, then Europe then the United States, not nesessaryly in that order. Opec has already started on the world by inflating oil prices, places Like Germany, Switzerland, and Italy were paying over 6.00 a gallon for gas already next the Untied States, If the US economy colapses then the world colapses. Then we will have all the rich Arabs Running the world. We will be dancing to a different drummer. We will be a third world country then.
Actually, OPEC is not inflating oil prices. Speculators are inflating oil prices, along with the sustained increase in global demand brought on primarily by China and India's new thirst for crude oil. Add to that instability in Nigeria and Iraq, our saber-rattling with Iran and Venezuela and a greenback that has fallen like a rock and you have a good picture of why crude will probably be $130 a barrel before the end of this coming week.
Do the research my fellow citizen. One you do the research you can apply critical thinking skills to the data and perhaps then your comments will make more sense. At the very least they will be based in FACT.
The price of gas in Germany is over $6 a gallon because they tax the hell out of it. Instead of letting the oil companies take outrageous profits, the Germans take a cut for themselves, then they invest in their infrastructure. We could do this too, but the excuses take the lead. Some say that the extra taxes would be passed on to the consumer. Big deal. If we had done a big tax on gas years ago, we'd be paying what we pay now, only we'd have the money to work on our infrastructure. What we have now, however, is high prices with no return, no benefits and plenty of heartache.
I agree. EVERY DAMN time the Republicans talk about a firefight or a killing in Iraq they say it was Al Qaida involved.....That means the whole friggin population of Iraq, with weapons, are Al Qaida....They are using fear tactics to try to make us think that Iraq is full of Al Qaida.......Realistically, only 2% of the trouble in Iraq is Al Qaida, but LET THESE DAMN REPUBLICANS state their case and then the news agencies follow up with the same lies.....We are in a CIVIL WAR in Iraq and that's it....If we leave Iraq, AL Qaida will follow us where we go...SICKENING.
"If John McCain seriously believes we are at war with al Qaeda in Iraq, that alone is such a serious error in judgment as to rank him with George W. Bush at his worst and therefore disqualify him from any chance to govern this country."
Just try bringing up that point in a debate. His response will be something like
My friend, you can say a lot of things about me, but at least I know there aren't 57 states in the USA
Anyone who blames 9/11 on something that happened months and years before is forgetting the very specific warnings and obvious intelligence that preceded that horrible day by just days and weeks. The Bush adminstration in its 'at home on the ranch' style of governing missed it all, ignored specific warnings about airplance terrorist attacks, and frankly just missed the boat.
Between Rice, Bush, and Cheney, plus the other assorted ideological extremists in his administration, they missed it all, they weren't smart enough or sharp enough to step up and discern what was happening. It happened on their watch and they can blame the past as much as they want, but they screwed up, they blew up, they missed the blatant warnings. Arrogance and corruption are the signatures of this adminstration and no amount of legal wrangling or war/fear mongoring will erase that. They have made our country a far worse place. They have altered our self-perception and world-perception to such an extent that we may never recover our integrity, our land of 'truth and justice.' This war is Bush and Cheney's fault - they are the butt boys of the neoconservatives and the oil companies. Those who have profited are those groups, those Bush/Cheney cronies. We've been screwed over by these men...badly. Now they want to go to Iran. When will the country full wake up and realize that the evil is within.
You think Obama is ready for that kind of stuff. thats funny I don't care what you say, Gobless the pigmes in New Guniea. Get ur done!.
He won't sit in a chair reading "My Pet Goat" after the attacks occured until he is pulled out by his staff. Obama will make Bush look like the Alfred E Nueman dofus that he is.
McCain is a prisoner of his own recent rhetoric. His path to the nomination has been a continuous compromise of everything he has stood for over the decades. His own words are going to be played back to him over and over. I can't wait for the "agents of intolerance" speech and lots of pictures and video of him smooching with Bush.
U need to be clear. Regardless of his past compromises, poor baby, what he says today is what he believes. We can't take McCain as just an actor. He is marshalling the forces of darkness because he really believes this stuff.
I can't wait for the first debate
Maybe he's being paid by the Pentagon or by some defense contractor and he needs to make the sale. Or maybe he's actually bought into the idea, repeated ad nauseum on the Tele, that we ARE fighting "Al Queda." And if CNN believes it, it must be true. Or maybe, just maybe, Mr. McCain is not the same person he was; maybe he's been brainwashed and chipped as a perfect Manchurian candidate for the evil cabal that desires to turn our country into a police state (for your safety, no doubt.) Or it could be that he's just REALLY OLD and senile; he doesn't remember what he said yesterday or why, and now he's just repeating stuff he heard in the green room on Fox News. But no matter what the case, he cannot be our next president. Unless we want to seriously downgrade the position of president and make him more of a figurehead than a thinking head.
"Does he want to be president so badly that he will join that band of radicals who have seriously damaged American democracy, who have tortured and lied, who have twisted our very Constitution so wrongly that it is hardly recognizable?"
Answer: Yes. That may not be the McCain you knew, but you'll get a lot farther judging people based on THEIR actions and words than on YOUR beliefs. It's sad, but (everyone say it with me) "THE MCCAIN OF 2000 IS NOT ON THE BALLOT IN 2008!"
Erich Fromm first wrote about authoritarian personality disorder in the 1950s in The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness and other books. He found via survey research that it was the predominant personality type in Nazi Germany. Nixon Administration whistle-blower John Dean recently surveyed the latest social scientific knowledge on the subject and lamented the triumph and prevalence of such aberrant personality types in the leadership ranks of party he hardly recognizes from his youth and middle age. These are domineering tyrannical super-conservative people who fetishize order, regimentation and status quo arrangements in our Not-Great Society and who are incapable of reasoned debate or of brooking disagreement. They lack empathy or objectivity, and traffic in demonization and manichean ideation. They took over the Republican Party in the late 1970s and have not looked back.
The unwillingness of the political representatives of normal Americans to call a spade a spade is remarkable -- 30 years after witnessing the rise and empowerment of these true dregs of society. I sometimes think the adages about liberals being so open-minded that their brains have fallen out, or being unable to take their own side is an argument, have more a few grains of truth. Thank you Gary for breaking the politesse by which a plainly deranged rightist element has been treated with wholly misguided deference and civility for 30 years. And for warning that if left unchecked, the worst can and will happen here.
Eric C. Jacobson
Public Interest Lawyer
Culver City, California
A seriously late addition to this post, however the author brings up the use of language and terminology as a right-wing tool to divide and conquer, and their use of the media as a tool to purvey their message. In another post (on DailyKos), we were discussing how perhaps the fact that many are now avoiding TV news altogether says a lot about Obama's success and the kind of people who vote for him. I believe the real demographic for persons who voted for Obama is linked to internet use, more than race, gender, age and latte-preference. The old demographic analyses don't hold in this election. Obama's team successfully waged his campaign through the internet, kept the participants informed through the internet, got his donations through the internet, began a voter registration drive through the internet, and on and on. Participants were immunized against the right-wing smears because they had so many alternative avenues for investigation and discussion that would be out-of-reach for a public that is dependent on MSM for its news. It is precisely those who find their varied and interesting news through the internet, rather than being dictated to by a biased MSM, and who are interactive in their news gathering in that they can discuss the news with their sources and with each other, who have access to the only fair and balanced reporting available, i.e., reporting from all sides, and instantly available with a click of a mouse.
I agree completely - now the question is: how can we keep this Media (the Internet) open?
I already have difficulty posting an honest, moderate (no TOS violations) message on AOL!
Since 2006, virtually every one of my postings gets the "sorry, but your comment cannot be saved at this time - please try again later" This has happened at all hours of the day & night - so I don't think it's traffic!
How do we separate the man who will say anything to get elected from the man who knows better?
McCain has some idea, but Obama has NO idea. Which is worse?
Gramppy's ideas are only the wrong ideas. I guess that makes his the worse.
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Posted May 14, 2008 | 10:04 PM (EST)