… PELLEY: What would you say right now in this interview to the Iranian president about the meddling in Iraq?
BUSH: I'd say, first of all, to him, "You've made terrible choices for your people. You've isolated your nation. You've taken a nation of proud and honorable people, and you've made your country the pariah of the world. You've threatened countries with nuclear weapons. You've said you want a nuclear weapon. You've defied international accord. And you're slowly but surely isolating yourself." ...
And there, in the vacuum of space, the Goddess of Irony screamed silently for three hours as if She were being torn apart by wild dogs.
In which Joementum predicts Joemageddon if everyone doesn’t Shut the Fuck Up and do exactly what the Decider tells them to do.
Oh and the Bears won.
At least that’s what the press reports, although I expect to hear that the problem at Soldier Field was really that the media refuses to report all the good news about the Sea Hawks.
All the balls they didn't fumble.
All the times they didn't hold.
Fucking liberal sports media.
Dick Cheney is A Portion for Fox News today.
Wallace does push back a little bit on Cheney’s blobby evil. Mind you, Wallace is never going to commit premeditated journalism on one of his GOP Paylords, but I must admit Lassie did at least yip some today at Evil Timmy. A leeetle bit. Subaudibly. But still.
Preznit Speech. Why not more troops? Why depend on the Loser Iraqis?
Cheney : This is not an All US Show. We’ll hand shit over when the time is right.
Wallace: Will the US do “whatever it takes to win?”
Cheney : Yep. Its just part of a Global War (on Terra).
Cheney : Since 9/11…ding ding ding.
Man, I never, ever thought anyone could chew all the blood and tears out of that tragedy, but these ghouls have almost managed it.
Cheney : Remember what Bin Laden’s strategy is…
driftglass: Bin Who? Oh yeah! He's that guy the Preznit “isn’t worried about”. That you let go.
Wallace: Mr. Veep, why should we believe you?
Cheney : Well remember when we were four years ago. Saddam is dead. His kids…dead. His dog…dead. Life is good.
Wallace: But this is the plan that didn't work before? Why will it work now?
Cheney : No war goes smoothly.
The Preznit always says he does what the commanders say. Gen Abizaid said, “Fuck No!” when asked. Why did you overrule the commanders?
Cheney : We didn’t overrule them. Up is down. Black is white. Mommy likes to get her teeth knocked in. Go back to sleep. These are not the 'droids you are looking for.
Wallace: But…
Cheney : Shut the fuck up, Chris.
Wallace: Yassa, Boss.
Cheney : (Now that we have sacked everyone who disagreed with our lunatic scheme) this New Plan has the support of the commanders. Malaki has been a disappointment, but its all good now. Time will tell.
Wallace: What do we do if Malaki fucks up?
Cheney : I’m not gonna get into that. We’re focused on making this plan work.
Cheney : Congress has been very important. They have made an excellent potty seat so far. Spectacular foot massagers. Also Boehner gives a helluva rusty trombone. He may not be Speaker, but he's still Chief Reacher-Arounder
Cheney : The Preznit is the Commander in Chief. You cannot run a war by committee.
driftglass: But you can run it with a monster puppeteering an imbecile.
Cheney : I have yet to hear a coherent policy out of the Democrats. We’d just revalidate Bin Laden. They have an obligation to put forward a blah blah blah.
Cheney : The most dangerous this to do now would be to dissipate our Global Conflict. Or our bodily fluids. Or something.
Cheney : This is an Existential Policy. We must prevail. Chuck Hagel is an ass.
WALLACE: The president and you have repeatedly said that you are on the path to victory, sometimes proposing exactly the opposite policy of what the president did this week. Let’s take a look.
BUSH: Sending more Americans would undermine our strategy of encouraging Iraqis to take the lead in this fight.
BUSH: Not only can we win the war in Iraq, we are winning the war in Iraq.
BUSH: Will we be nimble enough? Will we be able to deal with the circumstances on the ground, and the answer is yes, we will.
BUSH: Absolutely we’re winning.
WALLACE: Mr. Vice President, why should we believe that this time you’ve got it right?
CHENEY: If you look at what’s transpired in Iraq, Chris, we have in fact made enormous progress.
Wallace: Haven’t you ignored the expressed will of the American people.
Cheney: No Preznit should govern by polls. You can’t just stick you finger in the wind.
driftglass: So an election – an Historic Election -- was just a transient public opinion poll? Funny, when the Decider slimed and lied his way to re-election in 2004, it was called “My Big Fat Fucking Mandate”.
But what can you expect? Dick Cheney is ambulatory evil with a Halliburton heart. He runs the country, and when Republicans went to the polls in 2004 they said – loud and clear – they wanted this oily, evil thing bestriding the world.
And they got just what they wanted.
On Iran/Syria.
Iran is nutty. So maybe we have to whack ‘em. Maybe. Not gonna say it though. No siree. I'm just gonna sneer and drool a little.
On Domestic spying. The Department of Defense has legitimate authority to spy on Americans. It’s nothing new. Move along. Nothing to see here.
Chris Wallace, we also learn, was invited to the Cheney Christmas Party: one may assume he slings drinks and canapés with the same soggy deference he brings to his other Parti duties.
On Meet the Press and elsewhere, Stephen Hadley – the emphatically smirky, squinty, aggresively depilated Bush-doppelganger – gets out there and spins Dubya’s shit-discs like a champ. This while the fact that his Administration has reversed itself, then re-reversed, then re-re-, all the while squealing that anyone on the other side of every debate is a terr’ist lover is as big and bright and painfully obvious as a rabid, fluorescent manatee clamped to his privates.
It truly is their only constant: their unvarying, slanderous berserker attacks on anyone who stands opposed to any facet of their short bus tyranny.
We’re gonna replace Malaki.
No, we wuuuuv Malaki.
We’ll listen to the commanders.
No, we’ll sack the commanders.
We’ll heed the Wise Men.
Hey, fuck the Wise Men.
All in that same, blustery, “Get the Hell offa my lawn!” old crank monotone.
But of course the losers and liars who head this Administration who aren't solely to blame; this is equally the fault of the losers and liars and bigots and trolls who actually voted for these freaks in the first place, and then renewed the franchise for another four years.
It is that vast bucket o’ tard -- those dribbling dinks of the GOP rank and file -- who have demonstrated beyond any doubt that they are electorally unfit to be treated with anything but dismissive contempt. Their ideals are absurd. Their religion is a ridiculous, hateful cartoon. Their opinions are nothing but worthless regurgitated wingnut bumper-stickers hydroponically grown in their fascist think tanks.
And they should never, ever be allowed anywhere near the levers of power ever again.
I appreciate the heartfeltiness of ninth inning converts like Andrew Sullivan or Rod Dreher, but before I’d break bread with a’one of ‘em, they would need to come up with answers to these question:
What is it about you – you personally – that made you simultaneously such a completely incompetent citizen and such a completely bullet-proof ideologue?
How did you not see the truth staring you in the face all this time?
What was your major malfunction?
What deep sickness of the soul stunts a human being into a Modern Republican and how can you help to eradicate that fucknozzle gene from our body politic?
There is a strong implication from Bush insiders that politics played a huge part in shaping strategy. That Bush wanted to be able to say “We’re Winning!” for the 2006 elections, so no one wanted to put anything in front of him that said otherwise.
Hadley: “The Iraqi Army didn’t fragment.”
driftglass: What “Iraqi Army”?
After Hadley got the hook, Senators Dodd, Leiberman, Kyl and Hagel.
Chris Dodd came out. Talking sense.
Then Lieberman had to open his pie hole and re-stink up the joint.
Joementum: This is a New Plan, bitches. All other plans are failures, because they’re about Withdrawal. Then the Bad People would follow us back here. Give it a chance, babies!
Joementum warns against Joemageddon!
Joementum: If Democrats cut Dubya off from his hooch, then they’ll be responsible if he goes violently DT and start starts shooting up the halls of congress!
It would bring the end of all things, sez Pooka Joe. The ruin of the world. The collapse of Iraq.
Cats and dogs, living together!
Hagel: Let’s be clear; no one in Congress – or anywhere – wants a collapse in Iraq. That is not the question. The question is, is an escalation of our military involvement the answer? No, it isn’t.
That Dubya has chosen to wipe his ass with the Baker/Hamilton Report is tragic. The idea that we’re going to solve the problems of the Middle East by shoving more kids into the fire and killing more people is batshit.
Dubya has no support from the American people. Our allies don’t support this. Our “friends” in the region are silent.
Hagel: The people who are so fucking dead-solid-sure that this plan will work out great are the same cockstains who were dead-solid-sure four years ago that everything was going to work out great. Why the fuck is anyone still listening to them?
Projecting ourselves further and deeper into a situation we cannot win. This is a war of attrition, and we cannot win a war of attrition.
Kyl: We needed a new strategy. The Preznit went to the mountain-top and came back with this Fucking Brilliant Plan. The only other strategies are strategies for Failure.
Dodd: Every single officer I talked to last week in Iraq – every other one – said this escalation is insane. We have jobs the need to be done in Iraq that we cannot do. I talked to a sergeant last week that said that his job is to send young Americans down streets to get shot at. No other reason.
Dodd: The false assumption is that more troops = more security.
Joementum is such a dangerous, disingenuous ass. God smite the cockheaded morons in Connecticut. The only upside is that I never have to form my mouth to say “Democrat, Joe Lieberman” again in my life.
Joementum: There are only two exit strategies. Victory or Defeat. The Preznit offered an option for Victory.
Joementum: On 9/11 we were attacked by the same people we are fighting in Iraq.
Hagel slaps Joementum lying ears back hard enough to make his fat head hum.
Here’s the Zapruder…
Tim: If this doesn’t work – if in a few months this doesn’t work – then don’t we have to get out.
Kyl: The only alternative I have heard – this “diplomatic” crap – that isn’t specific. And there’s a lot of al Qaeda in Iraq. It is not possible to get a peace statement (?) with al Qaeda.
Dodd: I cannot believe we squandered. I cannot believe where we were on 9/12/01 and where we are today.
On This Week…Stephen Hadley shows up here, followed by John Murtha.
Murtha talks straight and clear.
It’s weird listening to people like Murtha, and then the fawning toadies of the Boy King.
Like listening to humans and methane-breathers each describing a bag of ammonia.
It’s Poison.
No, it’s yummy!
Murtha: We’re giving the troops exactly what they need. We should not send troops in until they’ve finished their training cycle. We have no strategic reserve. I’m the one that uncovered the scandal that our troops were being sent into combat with inadequate armor.
On Face the Nation I had no time…
No time…
On Chris Matthews: Dan Rather. Andrea Mitchell. Andrew Sullivan. Katty Kay.
Matthews: He seems like he’s alone. No grown ups around him.
Katty: Nixon delivering bad news looked confident. Bush looked like a changed man.
driftglass: Blown out and hollow.
Andrea Mitchell: There are no good options. He had to choose something he knew he couldn’t sell.
Sully: True conservatives do not want this war. They don’t want US kids policing an Iraqi civil war.
Katty: Sam Brownback coming out against the Preznit was amazing. A blow to the White House.
Rather: I can’t believe they were expecting it.
Sully: Maybe the Buchanan Conservative is coming back. The America First and the Christopaths.
Oh joy!
Sully: It is also possible that Dubya thinks this will fail. That the Malaki government will fall and then he can bail and blame.
Rather: Most Americans would take any attempt to attack Iraq as sheer madness. Of course that doesn’t mean Dubya won’t do it….
Matthews: That’s what scares me. We used to have something of a check on the Preznit. But now there is only in the room with toadies, and with generals who he fires if they tell him what he doesn’t want to hear.
Sully: Yeah, there is someone else in the room with him. Dick Cheney, who is telling him “Yes! Attack Iran!”
And then it becomes the Hillary Show.
On Sixty Minutes, the Boy King “strongly denies” that he was dishonest with the American people. And then stutters the English language to a standstill over his mouth trying to say that he is not a vengeful man, and his brain practically drooling over it.
Shorter Preznit: I have to keep ‘splainin to the Murrican people until they understand Iraq.
‘Cause they’re stoopid.
Finally, just for fun, let us snap on the hazmat gloves, unsheathe the poo-snippers, and unfairly flense a few sentences from Bobo’s
Friday NYT column and assemble them out of all context just to see what we can divine from them – like reading chickenhawk entrails -- about Iraq and who is about to be framed for the GOPs historic failure there.
See if you can spot the card Bobo is trying to palm...
If the Democrats don’t like the U.S. policy on Iraq over the next six months, they have themselves partly to blame.
…but the Democrats never came up with anything remotely serious.
…The liberals who favor quick exit never grappled with the consequences of that policy…
…The centrists who believe in gradual withdrawal never explained why that wouldn’t be like pulling a tooth slowly.
Joe Biden, who has the most intellectually serious framework for dealing with Iraq, was busy yesterday, at the crucial decision-making moment, conducting preliminary fact-finding hearings, complete with forays into Iraqi history.
The Democrats…but when it comes to alternative proposals, a common approach is social Darwinism on stilts…
So we are stuck with the Bush proposal as the only serious plan on offer. The question is, what exactly did President Bush propose last night? …
Funny, Bobo is usually a little more deft in hiding the razor in the apple.
But then again, when attempting to spackle over such an enormous mound of shit with such a weak and watery thimble of third-rate prose, one has to deal with the fact that entire limbs of feces are going to stick out all over.
And now, standing at a safe distance from the clatter and claptrap, we can see all the GOPixels resolve themselves into the Real NeoCon Way Forward.
1. Iraq is fucked and they all know it. “Victory” is not possible, however,
2. The loss of this war will mean the end of the GOP for a generation.
3. Therefore any plan that doesn’t claim to lead to “Victory” is to be rejected out-of-hand.
4. Furthermore, any plan that does not loudly call for impossible “Victory” it is to be dogmatically assaulted as unserious and terrorist-friendly.
5. And since all things in Heaven and Earth, no matter how vital or tragic or insane, are simply political variables in the Neocon Power Calculus, the Rove Playbook is still very much alive and well. So,
6. From the Mouse Circus to the NYT to 60 Minutes, the game of Pin the Blame on the Dirty Hippies now begins in deadly earnest.
It is not always disinterring some scrap of cloth or potsherd from a 6,000 year old burial site and trying to dope out what was going on in the long yesterday or parsing the shoulda-woulda-coulda of Napoleon and Moscow.
Sometimes just holding yesterday’s newspaper up to today’s light is like reading Toynbee.
The solemn promises of days gone by are not lost: All those yellowing newsprint corpses of the crises of our recent past are just sitting there. All dutifully transcribed, catalogued and shelved, but in the mad race to stay one lie ahead of the Subpoena Fairy our Dear Leader sometimes forget everything he said just moments ago.
Of course it helps when your followers are All RAM/No Hard Drive idiots who wipe their collective memories before toddling off to Republican Dreamland every night and awake -- refreshed and reformatted -- every morning, ready for the Moving Hand of Fox and Hate Radio to “Meme, Meme, Tekel, Upharsin” today’s Bright New Lies right onto their tiny trampled cerebellums.
So for example, on January 5th Ollie North – gigaconservative thug and He-Whose-Various-Treasons-Should-Still-Have-Him-Making-Big-Rocks-Into-Little-Rocks-In-Graybar-Fedland – actually broke ranks with the Dear Leader.
I tell you, the breakdown of discipline among the GOP fascisti is becoming downright shocking.
North said:
"Not one of the soldiers, sailors, airmen, Guardsmen or Marines I interviewed told me that they wanted more U.S. boots on the ground. In fact, nearly all expressed just the opposite: "We don't need more American troops, we need more Iraqi troops," was a common refrain. They are right."
and,
"A "surge" or "targeted increase in U.S. troop strength" or whatever the politicians want to call dispatching more combat troops to Iraq isn't the answer. Adding more trainers and helping the Iraqis to help themselves, is. Sending more U.S. combat troops is simply sending more targets.
So according to Ollie, the real problem with Iraq is the lack of Iraqi troops on hand to whom we can pass our burdens.
But…but…but we have “Iraqi troops”.
Legions and legions of Iraqi troops.
I know we do.
How do I know?
'Cause the Dear Leader told me so.
This from September of 2004:
Bush: “Let me first tell you that the best way for Iraq to be safe and secure is for Iraqi citizens to be trained to do the job.
“And that's what we're doing. We've got 100,000 trained now, 125,000 by the end of this year, 200,000 by the end of next year. That is the best way. We'll never succeed in Iraq if the Iraqi citizens do not want to take matters into their own hands to protect themselves. I believe they want to. Prime Minister Allawi believes they want to.”
That was a promise from the Commander-in-Chief to the American people in 2004. One massive, specific and solemn promise among dozens that helped him and his supporters mock his opponent and win re-election.
The unambiguous history of our times. A clear record of what we were guaranteed by the leader of our country during a time of war. All there in black and white.
A pledge that we were training up Iraqi troops at a furious rate.
A promise I know the Dear Leader kept because he
Kept.
Fucking.
Repeating.
It.
Over…
(Also from September, 2004…same debate but later in the transcript)
Bush: "There are 100,000 troops trained, police, guard, special units, border patrol. There's going to be 125,000 trained by the end of this year. Yes, we're getting the job done. It's hard work. Everybody knows it's hard work..."
And over…
(From October 8, 2004)
Bush: "My opponent says he has a plan; it sounds familiar, because it's called the Bush plan. We're going to train troops, and we are. We'll have 125,000 trained by the end of December. We're spending about $7 billion."
And over again…
(From October 13, 2004)
Bush: "The best way to take the pressure off our troops is to succeed in Iraq, is to train Iraqis so they can do the hard work of democracy, is to give them a chance to defend their country, which is precisely what we're doing. We'll have 125,000 troops trained by the end of this year."
An oath he wouldn’t dare renege on because changing one’s position -- showing any degree of inconsistency -- on these critical matters will cause us to lose the War on Terror!
How do I know that inconsistency would lead to defeat?
'Cause the Dear Leader told me so.
From September 2004 (all emphasis mine).
Bush: The only consistent about my opponent's position is that he's been inconsistent. He changes positions. And you cannot change positions in this war on terror if you expect to win.
So because sweet, sweet History tells me that the Dear Leader’s men have been cranking out Iraqi soldiers like cheeseburgers at the Billy Goat Tavern during the lunch rush (because any deviation from that promise would Lead to Defeat) I know that…
…we had 125,000 Iraqi troops trained and ready to “stand up” by the end of 2004.
…we had 200,000 Iraqi troops trained and ready to “stand up” by the end of 2005.
And if we follow that metric, we must have had around 300,000 Iraqi troops ready to “stand up” by the end of 2006.
So by my cipherin’, as of about a week ago we were supposed to have a third of a million Iraqis under arms – more than enough by a factor of more than 2-to-1 to take over for the 140,000 American troops currently bleeding and dying in Iraq.
Which should be happening any day now.
How do I know?
'Cause the Dear Leader told me so.
From September, 2004.
Bush: “And so the best indication about when we can bring our troops home -- which I really want to do, but I don't want to do so for the sake of bringing them home; I want to do so because we've achieved an objective -- is to see the Iraqis perform and to see the Iraqis step up and take responsibility.”
See, it’s all part of George Bush’s Plan for Victory.
You didn’t know there was a Plan for Victory?
Well there is.
How do I know?
'Cause the Dear Leader told me so.
From September, 2004.
Bush: “We will succeed. We've got a plan to do so. And the main reason we'll succeed is because the Iraqis want to be free.
“I had the honor of visiting with Prime Minister Allawi. He's a strong, courageous leader. He believes in the freedom of the Iraqi people.
“He doesn't want U.S. leadership, however, to send mixed signals, to not stand with the Iraqi people.
“He believes, like I believe, that the Iraqis are ready to fight for their own freedom. They just need the help to be trained. There will be elections in January. We're spending reconstruction money. And our alliance is strong.
“That's the plan for victory.”
A plan he kept repeating...
(From October 8, 2004)
Bush: "Our plan is working. We're going to make elections. And Iraq is going to be free, and America will be better off for it."
A plan his Vice President also repeated,
(From October 5, 2004)
Cheney: We've made significant progress in Iraq. We've stood up a new government that's been in power now only 90 days. The notion of additional troops is talked about frequently, but the point of success in Iraq will be reached when we have turned governance over to the Iraqi people; they have been able to establish a democratic government. They're well on their way to doing that. They will have free elections next January for the first time in history.
We also are actively, rapidly training Iraqis to take on the security responsibility.
Those two steps are crucial to success in Iraq. They're well in hand, well under way. And I'm confident that, in fact, we'll get the job done.
…
And how do I know this Plan to Victoriously Stand Up Hundreds of Thousands of Iraqi Troops so that We Can Stand Down is working?
Because the Dear Leader told me so.
Actually his Vice President told me in this exchange between Himself and John Edwards on October 5, 2004
CHENEY: Classic example. [Edwards] won't count the sacrifice and the contribution of Iraqi allies. It's their country. They're in the fight. They're increasingly the ones out there putting their necks on the line to take back their country from the terrorists and the old regime elements that are still left. They're doing a superb job. And for you to demean their sacrifices strikes me as...
EDWARDS: Oh, I'm not...
CHENEY: ... as beyond...
EDWARDS: I'm not demeaning...
CHENEY: It is indeed. You suggested...
EDWARDS: No, sir, I did not...
CHENEY: ... somehow they shouldn't count, because you want to be able to say that the Americans are taking 90 percent of the sacrifice. You cannot succeed in this effort if you're not willing to recognize the enormous contribution the Iraqis are increasingly making to their own future.
We'll win when they take on responsibility for governance, which they're doing, and when the take on responsibility for their own security, which they increasingly are doing.
While digging around my digital dainties drawer looking for a 2004 poll, I came across this remarkable, spanking new study of American political opinion by the estimable people at the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA).
What did they find?
“Bipartisan Public Consensus on Wide Range of Foreign Policy Issues”.
Holy mackeral, kids. As Peter O'Toole says in "The Lion in Winter",
"To these aged eyes, boy, that's what winning looks like".
I guess I must have missed that little item in the rising tide of news about Dubya’s Brand New Bag.
So the Man in the Blue Surge Suit will have his say tomorrow night. And unless he’s going to fall down, start spontaneously speaking in Churchillian glossolalia, and shock and awe us all with an Iron Burka Speech girded by a sudden gift for precision guided forensics on the order of Henry V’s St. Crispin's Day Address, this is the last speech of note of his career.
Well, until he quits.
Quits, crawls into a Midland titty bar, and spends the rest of his days raging drunk and whining about how Nancy Pelosi and the internets lost Iraq.
That speech will be one for the ages, but until then he has tomorrow night to re-brand a disaster that he has already spent the last three years using all the power of his Imperial Presidency choking down our throats until our national gag reflex will not allow one more bite.
So unless Dubya’s marketing plan for his New Huế Forward involves promising unlimited free pussy, Porches, and punkin’ pie to every man in America, America has already test-driven this shitwagon and wants no part of it. (Sorry ladies; his faith keeps him from promising you anything but the opportunity to submit obediently to your Christopath husbands and dutifully breed Christopath babies.)
Because in droves people are now blowing right on past that smelly, Lieberman/McCain tar pit of fake centrism and Friedmanic “One more shot for six more months” bullshit.
After a steady diet of criminal incompetence wrapped in smirking, transparent lies, citizens in huge numbers are showing up starved for a little truth and a little reality.
The November up-ending of the GOP Snake Oil Wagon was not primarily about meth smoking, rent-boi-ass-matadoring Evangelicals, although that helped. Not about a perp conga-line a block long composed entirely of shrill, lifetime members of the Party of Personal Responsibility. Not just about the Macaca hitting the fan.
Not just about an overpowering, basal hypocrisy that rots in the bones of modern, self-righteous Republicans.
Majorities of Both Parties Agree on How to Deal with Iraq, Iran, Nuclear Proliferation, Climate Change and Other Issues
… Among members of the U.S. public, however, there is broad bipartisan consensus about how U.S. foreign policy should be conducted. A wide ranging analysis by WorldPublicOpinion.org of polls from numerous organizations reveals substantial agreement across party lines on many of the most contentious issues facing policymakers today. Not only do overwhelming majorities of Democrats and Republicans favor a bipartisan approach to foreign affairs in general, they also agree on specific policies to address problems ranging from the turmoil in the Middle East to nuclear proliferation to global warming.
And Americans support the key recommendations of the Iraq Study Group regarding the withdrawal of U.S. troops and talking with Iran and Syria.
This study includes a newly-released poll (conducted Dec. 6-11) and other recent surveys by WorldPublicOpinion.org/Knowledge Networks. In addition, it analyzes polls by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and other organizations.
…
The following are some examples of areas where there is bipartisan consensus:
The War in Iraq
• WPO’s new December poll finds that majorities favor withdrawing almost all U.S. combat troops from Iraq by 2008 (Republicans 62%, Democrats 88%) and that they believe the U.S. government should clearly state it does not want permanent bases there (Republicans 65%, Democrats 81%).
• Americans support talking with Iran about the problems in Iraq (Republicans 72%, Democrats 81%) and also talking with Syria (Republicans 72%, Democrats 82%).
• Large majorities are in favor of holding an international conference to discuss how to stabilize Iraq (Republicans 79%, Democrats 80%).
Iran’s Nuclear Ambitions
• Americans from both parties think the U.S. government should build better relations with the Iranian government rather than try to change its behavior through implied military threats (Republicans 56%, Democrats 88%).
Majorities also would support a deal allowing Iran to enrich uranium at the very low levels needed for nuclear energy production provided that U.N. inspectors were given full access to nuclear energy facilities (Republicans 53%, Democrats 62%).
The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
• WPO’s December poll shows that Americans believe the United States should “not take either side” in the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian territories. (Republicans 58%, Democrats 80%)
North Korean Nuclear Threat
• Majorities in both parties think the United States should offer to give North Korea security guarantees (Republicans 61%, Democrats 82%) if the government in Pyongyang is willing to eliminate its nuclear weapons
Protecting the Global Environment
• Republicans and Democrats favor legislation limiting U.S. emissions of the greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming (Republicans 61%, Democrats 82%).
• Majorities in both parties favor requiring car makers to increase fuel efficiency even if it increases the cost of owning a car (Republicans 71%, Democrats, 86%).
Defense Spending
• Bipartisan majorities believe government spending on defense should either be kept at present levels or scaled back (Republicans 61%, Democrats 83%)
• Given the opportunity to balance the foreign affairs budget, members of both parties favor non-military over military programs. On average, Republicans cut defense spending $110 billion and Democrats slash it by $264 billion.
On balance, game over. The numbers speak for themselves and there is nothing more to limn, except maybe this:
“Steven Kull, editor of WorldPublicOpinion.org, said the study showed “sometimes it is easier for the public to find common ground than it is for politicians.”
“Should Democrats and Republicans in government aspire to find common ground on foreign policy the American public can provide them with guidance on a wide range of international issues,” Kull said.
Someone should tell Mr. Kull that it is time to switch off his Media Wingnut Compensator. That acquired reflex referenced here in this splendid rant by David Roberts over at HuffPo.
… The same dynamic plays out on virtually every issue: there's the virulent far-right position, funded by deep-pocketed reactionaries and pushed by talk radio, an enormous network of mutually reinforcing conservative pundits in every major media outlet, an entire cable news network (three now, really), and numerous powerful politicians in leadership positions in every branch of government. Then there's the avowedly liberal position, represented by some obscure professor or a guy in the comment section of a blog or a random placard at a protest. Then there's the "centrist" position, which is the far-right position with the edges rubbed off.
How does one establish oneself as a "centrist"? Why, by bashing the dirty hippies. After all, if you bash the virulent reactionaries, you're criticizing "real Americans" and the heartland and the baby Jesus. Everybody positions themselves by way of their distance from the -- at this point largely mythical -- dirty hippie. There's no faster route to media exposure for someone on the left that to spend every minute of the day criticizing other people on the left. Mickey Kaus. Joe Klein. Richard Cohen. Joe Lieberman. The list goes on and on.
… Well. We see how the war has gone. It's a cataclysmic disaster by every conceivable metric. The serious people were wrong about everything. Literally everything. The dirty hippies -- the great masses of the public and the very few public figures (Feingold, Gore, Kucinich) who stood with them -- were right. The war went horribly wrong for just the reasons they said it would.
So what's the dynamic now amidst the Beltway chattering classes? Where's the center? Why, it's still in the exact same place! The people who advocated for war, and who advocate for more war, and who were wrong about everything, are still the "serious" people. The people who advocated against this fiasco, and are advocating for ending it, and who were right about everything, are still the dirty hippies who never show up on cable news or in major media op-eds. Expeditious withdrawal is a fringe leftist position, despite being supported by a clear majority of the country.
In other words, the "center" has become utterly detached from facts, substance, or majority opinion. It's an insular, self-sustaining myth, all about the vanity and egos of powerful people in the Beltway clusterfuck. It's about them, their self-flattery, their exclusive club, not Iraq. For a truly parodic example of this dynamic and its incredible staying power, check out Joe Klein's blog post, wherein he informs us that OK, the dirty hippies were right about Iraq, but they still sound silly and their opponents are still more "serious." One can only marvel. …
Could not have said it better myself and so as I commend the entire, lovely thing to your attention I only add one thing.
Someone please inform Mr. Kull -- who I am sure is an otherwise laudable person -- that his wish that “Democrats and Republicans in government aspire to find common ground” is just silly.
Not one of those positions cited in his own poll is the product of a mealy Broderian median between two utterly imaginary and equally and oppositely “extreme” positions. If anything, some of them have been watered down by a compromise between Left and Center Left, but the Right has shit-all to do with any of it.
Virtually every one of the positions cited in his own poll is comfortably at home deep in bluest Dirty Hippyville.
The Center, Mr. Kull, is now officially the Left.
And the Right is now officially the Dirty Fucknozzle Fringe. Which -- HINT HINT -- might have something to do with why they spend such an insane amount of time, ink, money and bandwidth focusing obsessively on gays, flags, Jebus and snowflake babies instead of on , y'know, actual issues.
But beyond that crucial correction your work is top-notch.
Wednesday night the Decider is scheduled to announce his plans to hogtie more of our children to the altar of his boundless ego.
Plans for yet another round of grisly auto de fes to his personal pantheon: Oedipus, Ares, Vanity and Imbecility.
Plans to announce it in broad daylight, on national teevee. Right out in front of God and everybody.
It will be more useless butchery. More graves. More widows. More families with a ragged hole that will never heal blown through them. More crippled Americans. More men and women -- sons and daughters -- wives and husbands -- lined up to be physically, mentally and emotionally mutilated.
And for no reason. As has been true for every aspect of this debacle since the day is was cooked up in its Neocon Petri dish, since there is no way this latest sacrifice the military and their families are being asked to bear will achieve the results the nation is being promised, the whole murderous waltz is all being acted out almost…fetishistically.
All of us, incarcerated by the stupid, hateful half of us inside the sodden nightmares of a weak and vicious idiot. Forced to watch as he walks us right off one cliff after another to the squealing cheers of the pig people.
And all of it now being done as reflexively -- as mechanically -- as an industrial robots doing vehicle underbody welding on a Toyota chassis. So fucking ritually , to serve the demented motives of a bestial leader and his mad gods as sure as if our children were to be stretched out across a slab of blood-caked granite and have their still-beating hearts carved from their chests.
A nightmare where every expert -- every 'commander on the ground' -- is ritually listened to and then ritually sacked if he does not obediently regurgitate the Wisdom of the Decider back at the Decider's feet.
But this is no dream, and the Gods the Decider worships are DT phantoms slithered into his skull by his regent, and kept fed and flattered by his bootlickers and pet pundits.
And now somewhere in the neighborhood of 8-out-of-10 Americans damned well know it.
On this issue we are the minority no longer, so the question is this:
