Who's Sorry Now?
It was a pleasant weekend for those of us who have been against the Iraq War from the beginning. The Washington Post had an article on the bitterness and regrets of those in the Bush administration who concocted and ran the war and have now left. Some of them have nightmares. Nothing like the nightmares of the prisoners of Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo or the Black Sites, but hey, a few nightmares are progress. Maybe they will have more, and then they will have mental breakdowns and they can experience electroshock therapy -- that would be a nice payback for them. In the New York Times magazine, there was an article about Kanan Makiya, an exiled Iraqi scholar who was a big cheerleader for the war, and who seems to have given Bush and Cheney a rationale that they could use as a cover for their real motives. At the end of the article, there's an interesting interview with Ali Allawi, who was the Minister of Finance in the Iraqi transitional government in 2005 and into 2006. Allawi was opposed to the war, but went to Iraq to try and put Humpty back together again. He failed. And, of course, there's Blackwater. Whoops. Americans have recently gotten a good look at our very own right wing death squad (paid for by us to the tune of 445,000 per soldier, per year), and we know there are more RWDSs where that one came from. And I loved the headline of David "the Pig" Brooks' op-ed in last week's Times, "The Republican Collapse" -- is there a lovelier phrase? I used to send letters to David Brooks asking when the New York Times was going to fire him. He never responded.
All the same, though, the emerging consensus (another vast rightwing conspiracy to my mind) is that everyone's intentions were good, if not great. Makiya, for example, knew all the horrors that Saddam Hussein had committed against the Iraqis and the Iranians, and just wanted to get him out of there, even if the odds, as he calculated them, against actually establishing a stable government were 20-1. He thought Ahmed Chalabi was going to be the Nelson Mandela of Iraq. And the same for Meghan O' Sullivan, who was about THIRTY when the fates of the Iraqis were put into her hands -- she just wanted to help. As for Karl Rove and that Permanent Republican Majority -- well, he didn't mean to hurt anyone -- really, the one who's been hurt here is Karl himself (also the refrain of Clarence Thomas).
What I see here, especially when you add in the Israelis and the Neocons and Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, is a perfect storm of opportunism, opportunism compounded of ignorance, greed, self-regard, power-lust, and sheer shallowness. "Opportunism" is when you use someone else for your own ends, thinking that you will pretend to give the other guy what he wants and in doing so, you will get what you want. I think the World Champion Opportunist Award these days goes to those Israelis who ally themselves with the American Rapture people, knowing full well that in Rapture theology, the wholesale conversion of the Jews is the prerequisite for the Second Coming of Jesus. These Israelis will work with people who anticipate another Holocaust -- who hope for it -- in order to get American money and arms for Israel. That is opportunism taken to a new level -- but not that new.
The Iraqi exiles thought they would use the American government and military to get their country back. The Neocons and Israel thought they would use the Americans to get rid of Saddam and remake the Middle East so that Israel would be more secure. Rove thought he would use "war" to entrench his power base. Cheney thought he would use the exiled Iraqis to get access to Iraqi oil fields and to establish an authoritarian presidency in the US. Bush thought he would use everyone to get a sense that he had both avenged his father and outdone him. Tony Blair thought he would use his alliance with Bush to press some of his own programs, like helping Africa and distinguishing Britain from Europe. Rumsfeld thought he would use the war to remake and outsource the army, thereby enriching his friends. Erik Prince thought he would use the American taxpayers to get rich and also to move toward an American theocracy. The religious right thought they would use the war and consequent "patriotism" issues to consolidate, fleece, and militarize their base. The Free Market theorists thought they would use taxpayer money to experiment with privatizing the Iraqi economy. The result is failure and recrimination, not to mention a refusal by almost every one of these people to take responsibility for what they've done. As they see it these days, bad things in Iraq just happened somehow.
Opportunism often looks good on the surface, but it is based on manipulation rather than relationship, and masks an absolute misunderstanding of human nature. What happened with the Iraq war was no mistake and no accident. It grew out of the failure of conservatives, from the time of Ronald Reagan, at least, to understand and accept the necessity of government in a complex and populous society, and therefore to think about what government could and should do. The more they refused to think about it, the less they knew. Reagan, with his smiling soothing phrases and his tone of benign condescension, served as an appealing front man for what the nasty and unlamented Lee Atwater himself called "ruthless ambitions and moral decay". Reagan Republicans thought of government as a mechanism for increasing their own power and wealth. They never accepted that the US has many different regions, ethnicities, and enclaves, all of which have equal claim to citizenship. From at least the 1960s, the Republican Party has worked actively to pit region against region, class against class, and ethnicity against ethnicity, and to reap profits therefrom. Men like Karl Rove came to think habitually in terms of propaganda, manipulation, and deceit.
These were the people Makiya and Chalabi turned to for help against Saddam. These were people who were so cavalier that they didn't bother to read the reports of their own experts about how difficult the aftermath of the invasion would be. Allawi was smarter, though. He says in the Times, "Ahmad Chalabi, Kanan Makiya, all of these people became media stars, but their influence on decision making was next to nothing. I can't believe that a person like Wolfowitz or Cheney or whoever it was in the neocon cabal would allow themselves to be manipulated... They are far too cynical. They have their own agendas. And these agendas were boosted by Iraqis who seemed to be singing from the same song sheet. The Iraqis gave them credibility, gave them substance. But I don't think they were influenced by them."
Various rightwingers maintain that if the Iraq adventure had worked out, we would all be praising the Bush administration. What they don't understand is that it could not have worked out because of how it was conceived and the shallowness of the motives behind it. This was evident in 2003. In fact, it was evident in 2000. When the vote in Florida turned out to be rigged, or at least suspect, Bush and Cheney did, not what honorable men to, but what opportunists do -- they used intimidation (against the vote counters) and influence (on the Supreme Court, notably with Clarence Thomas) to seize what might or might not have been theirs by right (everyone who has read The Best Election Money Can Buy knows that Jeb and Katherine Harris also set up the Florida vote ahead of time, but I think it was in the counting that the real theft took place). Bush could have exerted himself both publicly and privately to make the vote count as scrupulous as possible. He did not. The apple was offered to him and he bit it. He never understood what elections represent in the US -- not seizure of power but acceptance of responsibility -- and so he has never understood his position or his job. His idea and Cheney's idea was that they were going to use their jobs to get what they could for themselves and their powerbase, just as they used the election controversy to get the job. They have surrounded themselves with people of like mind and those who don't think this way have left or been forced out.
The clusterf**k of opportunism that is the last seven years was bound to end in a cluster of fingerpointing and grievance. People hate feeling used and betrayed, even as they are using and betraying others. Remember when Bush expressed his annoyance at the ingratitude of the Iraqis? And have you noted the resentment of the religious right at being the last to know that nobody in the Bush administration actually cares about their agenda? Were the Republicans grateful to Katherine Harris? Nope -- they let her humiliate herself in front of the whole nation. Those Iraqis -- they sure don't show much loyalty to Blackwater. Even Alan Greenspan has done what he can to divorce himself from the very people he sucked up to five years ago.
Is it possible to have no sense of civic responsibility at all? Yes -- that's what Free Market theory, and the last generation of Republican culture is about. It elevates commerce and deal-making above every other human activity, and therefore glorifies opportunism. A generation of coaching by Free Market gurus has robbed Americans of the means of a decent existence.The reason we can't get out of Iraq is that none of the opportunists dares to admit why he or she wanted to make a war there in the first place, and so we, the American people, don't actually know what the goal was and can't ever judge whether it has been achieved. Though Cheney's goal was to secure the oil, he can't admit that to the Iraqis, who don't want to give up the oil. If the Iraqis' goal was to use our military to fight the battle and then take over themselves, they ceded that goal every time they flattered the Americans. If the Israelis consider their existence to be worth every American sacrifice of money, corruption, and human life, they dare not say so. If the military industrial complex really is happy to profit from death and destruction, do they actually pretend to their children that they are human? A lot of PTSD says they do. I could go on.
In order to gain power, the Republicans long ago (and knowingly, thanks, Mr. Atwater and others) handed the citizenry, and themselves, a bill of goods, a set of philosophical and economic ideas that were bankrupt. The citizenry, suckers that we were, bought it because it appealed to their worst selves. The price we have paid and will continue to pay in Iraq for this bad bargain is a steep one, and could break the bank. But if we don't understand how we got here, we could buy it again, because the politicians and the pundits still have it for sale.
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Fascism was supposedly defeated in 1945.
However, it seems that they relocated.
To Washington.
You've got that right!!
Dear Ms Smiley,
I try to read as many entries in the HuffingtonPost that I can. Someone posted a comment above about thanking you for connecting he dots.
One of the best I have ever read. I thank you.
Jane, we will buy it again. But thank you for a wonderful read.
A wonderful read, indeed. If we could get the average Joe and Jane Schmo to put-down the Miller Lite, get off the couch, ignore the boob tube and READ it, maybe they'd be less inclined to buy this product when it's inevitably re-packaged for resale.
The common wisdom is "follow the money." That's usually a good strategy for figuring things out right after you've stepped in the pile...Jane also understands that after the fertilizer has completely hit the ventilator and stuck to all the walls, you can also follow the "recriminations" to get a sense of who was responsible for what.
Archer, I agree with your comment totally. But I think the average Joe thinks and maybe knows about the points mentioned in the article, even if only peripherally. It's just that people feel helpless to do anything. Everybody knows that Bush and Cheney don't give a damn as to what the American citizens want. And they don't care if you know they don't care. Americans are being held hostage by idealogues looking to kill the "evil doers", and there's nothing we can do about it.
But! But!" A half-millon $ per year for a Blackwater Merc is just chimp-change, uh, chump-change! I don't see any problems with that! your beloved "vice" War Presinator, Fuck-Thee Cheney.
CHENEY IS MY NAME & MONEY IS MY GAME!
WHAT'S GOOD FOR BLACKWATER IS GOOD FOR HALLIBURTON!
correct me if my figures are wrong - but from what i've read and come to understand: one blackwater "soldier" or employee, makes more money than general petraeus. this is the price of bush dodging the draft yet again. a draft would make america stop the war instantly - so instead bush and co. work the nether regions - like in every one of their enterprises. their lot is corrupt to the core. it boggles the mind how they can continue unabated, not stopped. one simply feels sick about america itself. america was a sick enough machine to allow bush - and now it deserves bush's karma. if america were healthy and good, bush never would have made it to president. bush is the manifestation of american sickness.
enjoy.
for america - you are him, and he is you. and you have nothing to prove otherwise. after all this - he is still in charge. enjoy.
p.s. blackwater is the perfect name for american mercenaries in iraq:
"blackwater" is a code word meaning...OIL.
The cluster in Iraq could not have been fought without the mercenaries. That is why they are there doing what they do with immunity. The draft would certainly eliminate the need for mercenaries, however I don't see any need for the draft IF all the flag-wavers and their off-spring were willing to put their lives where their mouth is!
If the people at large are not in favor of impeachment, it will not succeed. The House impeaches, but the Senate convicts. Remember the Clinton impeachment. The Senate vote on two charges was 50-50, 55-45. Two thirds are needed to convict.
President Johnson (Not Lyndon) was impeached and missed conviction by one Senate vote.
President Nixon was impeached, and resigned because he would have been convicted by the Senate. A delegation of Republicans including Senator Hugh Scott, Minority Leader, Senator Barry Goldwater, and Representative John Rhodes, advised Nixon to resign.
frank67,
Nixon was never Impeached. Although 3 Articles of Impeachment were passed through the House Judiciary Committee between July 27-30, 1974.
The head count made by Nixon and the Republicans in Congress indicated that he would easily lose and be Impeached by the full House if it came to vote. Similar finding polling the Senate reflected a likely conviction.
Nixon was never Impeached. He resigned before the votes took place.
You are correct and it's a shame that "impeach" has been a buzz word during the 70s that misled many to think to this day that Nixon was impeached.
The Republicans have failed to deliver on their promise to running government like a business. Therefore, it would give taxpayers more value for our dollars. Instead they have created inefficiencies across federal agencies, shamed us around the world and "put the nation up for sale.
Good work Arianna. But how do we stop the hemorrhaging? The Democrats are still in line with so many of the Republican "free trade" policies, it is scarey. We must secure our borders. This is a sovereign nation and we must salvage what is left for ourselves and future generations.
NO NO NO!
again like most other writers, your premise fails from the beginning. You assume they WANT democracy in Iraq and the rest is a failure in planning or execution or understanding.
WRONG!
The GOAL has always been the destruction of Iraq, taking the oil, steal the wealth, plunder the country, and rape the american people of their taxpayers money. They will also destroy the American army and replace it with privately owned mercenaries like Blackwater.
And in this goal they are wildly successful.
KenFr,
They wouldn't profit from contracts that supplement the military troops on the ground if they hadn't been working on shrinking the size of the military ground troops already.
You see how they worked that?
They're not going to replace the military, they wouldn't make any money that way, because that takes the taxpayer out of the equation.
"""""What they don't understand is that it could not have worked out because of how it was conceived and the shallowness of the motives behind it."""""
Kudos Jane for a magnificent well written and true poste. I highlighted a sentence from it that sums up the entire current administration, congress and supreme court.
The citizens of the USA are truly SCREWED.
Jane,
What an excellent piece of writing! You have managed to take a horrendous maelstrom of events and facts and managed to make head AND tails of them! Yes, the dots are all connected! Thank you, thank you.
When the top of our government had no experience in anything but business failure and a daddy who propped him up for his whole life what did anyone expect? He and Cheney both got out of the nastiness of the Vietnam war by way of money, power and priviledge who would have them believe that war was nothing but what they had been told, you knock a statue over hunt down the bad guy and they will throw flowers and be gratefule enough to give you all of their oil. After all we had the "new" soldiers who could do anything including miracles. It didn't matter to anyone then that these new soldiers didn't have any of what they needed to do their job. Oh yeah, toss in the undercover soldiers which drive up the cost of the war. Go ahead veto all the bills of the stuff we US citizens really need so we can pay those paychecks to those gangsters and killers of the common man/women/child in Iraq. All that lost money had to go somewhere and if there is no accountability then who will know the truth. Yep, we the people know how to pick 'em. With elections coming up we have only ourselves to blame if we don't take long hard looks at all running and we have to accept that some if not all will lie to us.
Just one thing, Jane:
The MilitaryIndustrialGovernmental alliance, call it whatever you want, is constantly on the lookout for the creation of "enemies" and "situations" that can serve as an excuse for war.
Make no mistake about it: the true enemy is that alliance within our own country that builds and sells killing devices, weapons of destruction, and will do anything and everything to boost the US economy whenever it begins to slow.
The US economy is war dependent. Imperialistic hegemony involves the destruction of excess military goods since that are the US bread-and-butter export.
ALL of the rationales given for war are phony.
Profits-----blood money------is the real reason.
One of the most important questions which has never been addressed in any meaningful way -- why is the United States of America self-excluded from international law and signed treaties and obligations? Other nations are expected by the U.S. to keep to the laws and deals they have made with them, but the same does not hold true for the U.S. This seems to me to be the extreme heights of hypocrisy, stemming from the very wrong ideology that the United States, as the world's supposed strongest nation, automatically accords itself these rights. One example: Why are Blackwater USA mercenaries working for the State Department exempt from prosecution in Iraq for murder? If it had been the murder of 17 American civilians, the U.S. government would have been screaming bloody murder and calling for their extradition.
Noam Chomsky deals with this serious question of "self-exclusion" in his books "Failed States" and "Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance".
I have yet to see this serious and important issue recognized and addressed by U.S. commentators.
_
1-20-97 The end of an ERROR!
It is opportunism and more. Our entry into the abyss of Iraq and consequential destruction of whatever self-image America might have had left following WWII, was based upon a delusion and belief our own '---t' doesn't stink. We got in over our heads because we liked the taste of ‘freedom fries’ better than the bitter pill of truth and reality.
Politicians know that is so. Look what happens when they dare to tell the truth. Ask the Mondale campaign. “Taxes must be raised to deal with a national debt about to implode.”
The public has exaggerated expectations; without a mature adult’s sense of what might not be possible. Our social-philosophy tells us we can have everything, but reality tells us there are consequences for our choices -- but damned the consequences, full deficit spending ahead.
We blame 'welfare cheats' and the unemployed for being irresponsible, but then create a system of ‘trickle-down’ corporate give-aways and place American farmland on federal subsidies not to produce; but the ones we want to make accountable are those suffering under the weight of standardized testing in "No Child Left Behind."
We could inventory the wrongs committed under our false sense of reality, blinding us to foreseeable consequences. Like the voice crying in the wilderness, it has been predicted for a long time, but nobody wanted to listen. Not most politicians, not most business leaders and most of all, not the citizenry. For indeed, we get the life, the government, the nation we want -- even by our inaction -- we are the responsible agency for the mess we are in.
Find a shovel; grab a bucket, pick-up a mop. We've got years of digging ahead of us, and the full collapse hasn't even happened yet.
Ever get a sense of what Rome was like just before the barbarians sacked the place? It wasn't the lead in the cooking utensils which did it. But if anyone takes comfort in that belief, you're too deep into the delusion to accept that we're a major part of the problem.
EXACTLY ... we're a major part of the problem.
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