John McCain And Iraq -- A George W. Bush Clone

When John McCain spoke recently before the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) he had this to say about Barack Obama: "It's a very clear choice, and whether it be on Iran, or whether it be on Iraq, or whether it be on other national security issues, Senator Obama does not have the experience and the knowledge and clearly the judgment, my friends."

Saber rattling and threats of U.S. military violence against Arabs and Persians are always sure winners at AIPAC rallies and have become election year boilerplate; all presidential candidates eagerly engage in this form of predictable demagoguery. But McCain's macho rhetorical thrusts about using American military power are scarier and more real because of his bona fides as a first-rate warmonger.

On March 20, 2003, John McCain said on television: "The Iraqi people will greet us as liberators." Three days later he said: "This conflict is . . . going to be relatively short." Thereafter McCain has become one of those guys, like Thomas Friedman, who sees the looming American victory in Iraq in six-month intervals. On September 10, 2003, McCain said: "I would argue that the next three to six months will be critical." On February 4, 2007, he said: "We can know fairly well in a few months." On September 12, 2007, he said: "The next six months are going to be critical."

McCain claims to have seen for himself all of the wonderful progress being made in Iraq. He doesn't like to dwell on the 4,100 American lives lost, and the 500,000 to 1 million Iraqi deaths. Neither does he wish to acknowledge the 2 million internally displaced people, nor the 2 million refugees who have fled the country since 2003, nor the gutted infrastructure, nor the profiteering from Haliburton and KBR and other American contractors, nor the hatred and animosity the occupation of Iraq has engendered throughout the world.

In all of his many speeches on the subject of Iraq, John McCain has shown very little empathy with the suffering of the Iraqi people. He has shown about as much concern for the deaths of innocent civilians in Iraq as he had shown for the deaths of innocent civilians in Vietnam at the time he was bombing them.

On March 26, 2007 McCain said in an interview with the Bill Bennett radio show: "There are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods today. The U.S. is beginning to succeed in Iraq." And then there was his famous "stroll" through the open-air Shorja Market. Fittingly, on April Fool's Day 2007, McCain told a news conference in the heavily fortified Green Zone: "Things are better and there are encouraging signs. I have been here many years -- many times over the years. Never have I been able to drive from the airport, never have I been able to go out into the city as I was today. The American people are not getting the full picture of what's happening here."

Add to this litany of terrible judgment McCain's many gaffes revealing that he doesn't know the difference between Shias and Sunnis, and that he thinks Iraqi nationalism emanates from Iran, or the motivation for the insurgency in Iraq is hatred of "our way of life," and what we have is a George W. Bush clone.

"I will never surrender, my friends," McCain recently promised a Republican gathering. Surrender to whom? He does not explain. Bush said the other day: "Iran is an existential threat to peace." What the hell does that mean? Both McCain and Bush speak gibberish about Iraq and it's very dangerous to be speaking gibberish when you're occupying a nation of 27 million people in the heart of the Middle East. It is useful gibberish though: It masks U.S. imperial goals in Iraq and frames the occupation as part of a defensive "war on terror."

Comments

[Javalation]

Are you suggesting that the Bush Admn has done such a wonderful job in securing the ports, borders and airports? Naaa, more likely the reason is geography, and BTW, did you forget the anthrax thing? Odd that the authorities were able to trace where the anthrax strain came from, but the trail ended there. It was American made in case you forgot.

The war in Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11, and little to do with the threat of terrorism in America. 9/11 was a failure of the FAA. Had pilot doors been secure and box cutters been outlawed, the airplane takeover couldn't have occurred.

[elevando]

It is frustrating reading articles like this because, I think the true George Bush clone is Barack Obama. There are too many parallels. This is conjecture, but both will have won elections that were nothing more than beauty contests, because neither had blemishes - they both lack a record to judge them against. Also, both GW and Obama will have made campaign promises to bring the two parties together, but again if you look at the records, we know what Bush did, and if you look at Obama's record in the Senate, he couldn't get anyone to play ball with him, dem or otherwise. I want change, but is Obama the one to bring it?

I

[VET613]

Yeah...McCain "really gets it right", his greatest military asset seems to be his father and grandfather. Bush clone? Certainly. Our next president...thankfully not a chance!

[BADEN]

IRI's stated mission is to "support the growth of political and economic freedom, good governance and human rights around the world by educating people, parties and governments on the values and practices of democracy." However, it has also been linked to efforts to foment a violent military coup in Haiti. Max Blumenthal reports that Stanley Lucas is the program officer for the IRI's Haiti program. [1]

While based in Washington, D.C., IRI maintains offices around the world, including in Africa (Abuja, Nigeria; Luanda, Angola; and Nairobi, Kenya), Asia (Dili, East Timor; Jakarta, Indonesia; Phnom Phen, Cambodia; and Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia), Latin America (Caracas, Venezuela; Guatamela City, Guatamala; and Lima, Peru), Central and Eastern Europe (Belgrade, Serbia; Bratislava, Slovakia; Bucharest, Romania; Istanbul, Turkey; Skopje, Macedonia; Sofia, Bulgaria; Tirana Albania; and Zagreb, Croatia) and the former Soviet Union (Almaty, Kazakhstan; Baku, Azerbaijan; Belarus; Kyiv, Ukraine; Moscow, Russia; Tashkent, Uzbekistan; and Tblisi, Georgia).

"In 1994, the International Republican Institute (IRI) began a relationship with the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR), a civil society organization, dedicated to implementing democracy-strengthening initiatives." [2]

IRI Board of Directors and Personnel includes major Republican foreign policy voices, and other prominent Republicans.

JOHN MC CAIN IS THE HEAD OF THE INTERNATIONAL REPUBLICAN (???) INSTITUTE:
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=International_Republican_Institute

[stevebehindthechapel]

Thank you, Dr. Palermo. Another outstanding report. I especially found your paragraph particularly illuminating because it highlights the magnitude of this mess we've found ourselves in:

"McCain claims to have seen for himself all of the wonderful progress being made in Iraq. He doesn't like to dwell on the 4,100 American lives lost, and the 500,000 to 1 million Iraqi deaths. Neither does he wish to acknowledge the 2 million internally displaced people, nor the 2 million refugees who have fled the country since 2003, nor the gutted infrastructure, nor the profiteering from Haliburton and KBR and other American contractors, nor the hatred and animosity the occupation of Iraq has engendered throughout the world. "

That about sums up the success of "Mission Accomplished".

Please keep up the fine work, Dr. Palermo. ~Steve, Iona

[georgiaR]

You forgot to mention that we have not had another terroist attack in this country in over 6 years - which I think is a "Mission Accomplished".