Broder touted Lindsey Graham's desire for "reality-based [Iraq] policy"
In his September 16 column, Washington Post columnist David Broder stated that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) "has been an outspoken advocate of the surge strategy -- claiming real success on the ground and urging its continuation." He later quoted the senator as saying, "I want reality-based policy [on Iraq]." But Broder ignored the fact that in April, Graham touted "signs of progress" in Iraq following his April 1 visit to Baghdad's Shorja market. However, soon thereafter, it was reported that Graham's delegation had traveled to the market in armored military vehicles while under heavy guard by more than 100 U.S. troops and five helicopters.
In a column headlined "Lindsey Graham's Realism," Broder wrote, "A Republican with a notable record of independence, Graham has been an outspoken advocate of the surge strategy -- claiming real success on the ground and urging its continuation." He went on to characterize the questions Graham asked of Gen. David Petraeus and U.S. ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker during their September 11 testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- in which Graham asked if staying in Iraq to achieve a national security aim was "worth" the $9 billion and the loss of 60 lives a month -- as "surprising." Broder added:
When I talked with Graham on Thursday, he said he had asked those questions because "I am sick and tired of people posing choices between the two extremes; I want reality-based policy. [Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid is as bad as Rumsfeld was in rejecting reality. He said in April that the war is lost, and he refuses to accept anything else."
But Graham said that he thought Crocker was "making a pretty major statement that the clock is running out on the Maliki government -- and we can have an effect on it by what we do here."
"There are alternatives," he said -- Shiite political leaders who are willing, for example, to tour the Baghdad jails with Graham and be photographed with Sunnis who are protesting the imprisonment of so many of their coreligionists. "The good news," Graham said, "is that Kurds and Sunnis and Shiites are ready to play politics. Judges feel more secure because of the surge, and that is important, because all of them have experienced rough justice.
"What we do can affect the outcome. But if we don't see progress on two of the three big issues -- oil revenues, de-Baathification, provincial elections -- in the next 90 days, it may not happen. And Iraq could be a failed state."
As Media Matters for America documented, however, a previous claim of progress in Iraq by Graham came under criticism after reports came out about the circumstances surrounding his claims. Following an April 1 visit to a Baghdad market, Graham declared "signs of progress" in Iraq and claimed: "I bought five rugs for five bucks. People were engaging." However, according to an April 3 New York Times article, "Ali Jassim Faiyad, the owner of an electrical appliances shop in the market" claimed that "[t]hey paralyzed the market when [Graham and other lawmakers] came." The Times reported that Faiyad also said of Graham's visit, "This was only for the media." Reuters reported that snipers returned to the market area one day after Graham's visit.
Moreover, Broder uncritically quoted Graham's assertion that Harry Reid "said in April that the war is lost and refuses to accept anything else," without noting that Graham mischaracterized what Reid had said. As Media Matters documented, during an April 19 press conference, Reid said that the Iraq war "is lost" and later stated that the day before, he had told President Bush "what he needed to hear" about the war. He then said that the only way the war could be won is "diplomatically, politically, and economically." In addition, during a speech on the Senate floor the same day, Reid reiterated his stance, advocating a "political solution" in Iraq and asserting that "there is still a chance to change course." Media Matters also documented that Broder himself misrepresented Reid's comments in his April 26 column.
"...if we don't see progress on two of the three big issues -- oil revenues, de-Baathification, provincial elections -- in the next 90 days, it may not happen.
And Iraq could be a failed state."
That's Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, telling us that in 90 days, Iraq could be a failed state.
90 days.
So far in 2007, there have been almost three 90 day periods. There were four 90 day periods in 2006. I'm pretty sure that the year 2005 also had four 90 day periods. Now that I think of it, there were also four 90 day periods in 2004 too.
In 2003, there were two complete 90 day periods that followed George W. Bush's declaration that "major combat operations have ended in Iraq" (MISSION ACCOMPLISHED, the banner read).
That's a total of seventeen 90 day periods since MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.
Seventeen seperate and consecutive 90 day periods.
Fifteen 90 day periods have passed since saddam hussein was captured.
Eleven of those 90 day periods have passed, since the Coalition Provisional Authority disbanded, and Iraqis took over their National Governmemnet (LET FREEDOM REIGN, the memo read).
It's been ten 90 day preiods since National Elections were held in Iraq (PURPLE FINGERS they gave us), and seven 90 day periods since a National Parliment was seated, and about the same number of 90 day periods have passed since the adoption of an Iraqi Constitution.
The present administration of Iraq's National Government has governed for about five 90 day periods.
Just one more 90 day periods, and we'll have it made!
That's the new "finish line", 90 days from now!
Just 90 more days, and we'll be there!
(If it was a bill you were trying to collect, a debt you were owed, you'd have maybe given up and written it off, probably about four 90 day periods after it was overdue... as opposed to being strung along now, for seventeen 90 day periods, since MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. Just one more 90 day period please... I promise!)
Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, in addition to wanting 90 more days to transform Iraq into a "Stable Free and Democratic Iraq, at Peace with it's Neighbors" (just one of several "rotating missions", that take turns for whichever circumstances require them)...
In 90 days, we risk the consequence of:
"And Iraq could be a failed state"
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace publishes a magazine, titled "Foreign Policy" (sounds like something that Bush and Condi should subscribe to).
In their magazine Foreign Policy, they maintain what they call a "Failed State Index".
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=3865&page=7
That's just one page, showing the Index, of several pages both forward and back, that you might also wish to read.
In their Failed State Index of 2007, Iraq rates #2 on the list. The Sudan is #1, and Somalia #3.
But that doesn't matter because what do those eggheads know about it anyway?
Where's their Faith?
Where's their Belief in, and Support of, the "mission"?
Why are those eggheads "surrendering" Iraq?
What do they know.
Just ask Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, if you want to know what's going on in Iraq, and whether or not Iraq is a "failed state" now, or will be anytime in the future...
Because in just 90 days my friend, things are going to happen in Iraq!
In just 90 days!
Iraq may be #2 on those egghead's "Failed State Index" right now, but you just wait!
Because when you're #2, well all that means is you just try harder... you SURGE and SURGE, and SURGE some more!
In 90 days the whole thing will change!
We'll be #1, you just wait and see... just wait 90 more days, I promise.
I understand the distinction between reporting news and reporting an opinion. The Washington Post publishes columns by Broder in which he is supposed to take current events and historical facts and, through a process of informed analysis, present a perspective that allows the readers to better understand what is happening in the world.
Rather than do this, Broder distorts current events, ignores historical facts, and attempts to spin an partisan view of reality into "informed analysis". The readers of this columns that already share his views are comforted, but those looking for new ideas are misdirected.
Imagine if such a person were writing a medical or investment column? Rather than giving our informed analysis on what drugs to take or how to manage your money, you are presented with Homopathic cures and Multi-level Marketing scams. Having lost your health and/or money would you read the Washington Post again?
The problem with Broder's column is that the harm done is much more indirect and long term. We can vote people into and out of office and our decisions will influence our lives in many ways. Our children may be sent to die in a war or our jobs destroyed by the failure of our economy. Such things can and do result, in part, from Broder failing to do his job and presenting a dishonest picture of the world.
Broder has a platform from which he can influence public opinion and yet he takes it so lightly and demonstrates a great deal of intellectual dishonesty. Being a Hack carries with it a level of moral stain, but cynically hiring a Hack, as the owners and publishers of the Washington Post have done, is much worse.
Could Iraq be a failed state?
Is the question up for debate
Just because Graham could buy
Cheapo rugs and not die
Doesn't change their ultimate fate
David Broder of Washington Post
Uses strawmen more readily than most
Reality based Graham?
Is a bit of a sham
Partisan spin he can boast
Broder and the strawman...now only if between the two of them, there was a brain!
We're off to see the wizard! Good one, Mary.
If we're talking "reality", let's at least be honest about why we're there.
[link to www.rigzone.com]
I have heard nothing about this from the talking heads on cable TV. I suppose they're too busy hyperventilating over O.J.'s latest escapade. Kieth Olbermann covered it briefly, and it's been reported in several newspapers. Apparently this Hunt guy is a long time Bush croney. Is anyone really thinking that this is just a coincidence?
I hope everybody takes a moment to read and think about the story that you've linked to.
In essence, it tells us that Hunt Oil (of Dallas Texas) is acting as a broker of sorts, for Exxon-Mobil Chevron Shell and BP; they're conspiring to go around Iraq's Parliment and National Government (both seated in Baghdad), and go right ahead and start privatizing Iraq's vast national reserves of oil, by dealing the a local Kurd government, far from Bahgdad.
In the article you link to, Iraq's Oil Minister Hussain Al-Shahristani is quoted as saying "Any contract signed by the Kurdistan regional government isn't valid until it is approved by the central government in Baghdad," and he added that the government in Baghdad can't approve any contract until Parliament passes the oil law...
...this is a little like George W. Bush (and Hunt Oil and the other multinationals named above), unable to persuade the U.S. Congress for them to drill for oil on Federal Lands in ANWR (Alaska), to just go ahead and sign a deal with Alaskan "officials" (like Ted Stevens and his son), and start taking that oil anyway, the National Legislature be damned.
Who thinks this won't simply ratchet the violence up in Iraq?
Of course it will.
It will aggravate Iraq's factions, and spur the civil war there.
It almost amounts to signaling an attack on the Bahgdad National Government, by drawing their attention and their forces away from Bahgdad, and toward Kurdistan.
It's an attack on Iraq's sovereignty, from private commercial oil interests here in the U.S., in Texas!
It will provoke more violence and more bloodshed, and as you know, the more we set our sights on privatizing Iraq's vast reserves of oil, the more we ensure our continued and unending occupation of Iraq, and the more we promote a civil war in Iraq, and an "insurgency" against their National Government (an "insurgency" that Hunt Oil in Dallas is a part of, as a front in Kurdistan)...
This crap will never end with stuff like this happening.
And you know what else?
George W. Bush continuously leers and grins at the American People, and hunched-over at a podium, cackles at the American People that "they're going to follow us home from Iraq", and "they're going to come here to kill you and your children."
You know what?
Him and his friends are doing everything they can to see that that happens... they're giving millions and millions of Iraqis every reason to want to bring bloodshed and violence to American soil... those Iraqis never had any reason to do that, to "follow us home"...
...but the moment we privatize their vast reserves of oil, then they will have that reason to bring violence and bloodshed to our shores.
Then they will "follow us home", at George W. Bush's (and ray hunt's) invitation.
Isn't this the same Hunt Oil Co. that tried to corner the silver market back in 1980?
To my recollection, yes.
I recall h.l. ("binky") hunt as one of those silver pirates; he had a brother too, whose name I can't remember; in addition to oil, h.l. or his family did then (and maybe still do) own the Kansas City Chiefs of the NFL...
I'm reasonably sure that h.l. is dead now, but I don't about his brother in the silver scheme; and I don't think that ray hunt (mentioned now as trying to aggravate Iraq's civil war, and make for a front in that violence, out of Dallas and for oil)...
I don't know if ray is that old, to have been one of the silver pirates.
I've got a question: Has the oil industry, and for that matter, the people who run it and the arms industries out of Texas, have they done anything good for the American People lately?
I mean, it seems like nothing but death and destruction and billions upon billions being siphoned off from the U.S. Treasury, in the name of oil and arms, by those industries and their business agents, out of Texas.
When you take this into consideration, it makes Ari Fleischer's propaganda commercials featuring injured Iraq vets even more obscene.
Oil is part of the reason we are "staying the course". I think the other part of it is the money going to U.S. companies to "rebuild" Iraq.
What it amounts to is taxpayer money being laundered out to private corporations. And since this will leave Bush and company with a nice golden parachute come Feb. of 2009, all the more reason to "stay the course".
And let's not forget. Have a surge of 20,000 troops, withdraw them and make it look like you are withdrawing troops when in fact you continue to "stay the course".
Now I know why they are called "Neo-Cons"
I fully expect Bush and Cheney both to land on several "Boards of Directors" for these big corporations when they leave office. They'll finish out their lives drowning in money, and will never be held accountable for the gigantic sh*tstorm they left in their wake.
Forget it, Nerzog. It's Chinatown.
Short History of the Iraqi war.
Graham is one of the dolts with a brain less than the size of a walnut.
Graham's little media ploy cost many market personnel their lives as they were killed immediately afterwards as a direct result of Graham's liitle rug buy. Graham didn't bat an eye,.."What is that to me". Is referring to someone as a sniffeling self-centered self absorbed hypocrite really name calling when it is a statement of fact. Why Graham goes to the pony show in Iraq for credibility is beyond me as he has his mind set before he ever arrives there. Truth is not in his vocabulary except as a defense mechanism. No matter what occurs in Iraq he will tout the presidents rhetoric...and his appearances are proving deadly for those he imposes on. Hope the rugs you jewed them down on 5-$5 - was worth it to you...others in the marketplace paid for them in blood.