There Are Good Arguments Against the War in Iraq

So how come nobody on the left can make them? How come it's all conspiracy-theory, black-helicopter, America-is-evil nonsense?

While there are always arguments against war, certainly arguments against waging pre-emptive wars, arguments against the costs and hubris of nation-building, and obvious arguments to be made against the war in Iraq, the anti-war movement and the left in this country seem to be incapable of making them.

So, for much of this post, I'm going take the position of a rational devil's advocate--someone who is against the war (which really isn't me at this point) and believes it was a mistake, thinks there are probably good reasons to withdraw, but recognizes that the American and European left are all as detatched from reality as the most homicidal terrorist who believes blowing up a bus is going to lead them straight to honor and prestige in Heaven. Because the left is missing every opportunity to make a solid case against the war, and instead weaves political spin in with fantasy in with self-congratulatory delusion in with blind pessimism to make a mix of wishful black bile that makes them impossibly good and their ideological opponents, and America (at least, those who believe in American exceptionalism and endorse and support America's super-power status, and consider America a force for good in the world) as greedy, evil and self-serving. When, if they were serious about arguing against the war, they could make real progress. If they could resist the tempation to villify their enemies and gaze wistfully at themselves through the soft-focus lens of their own narcissism.

Where to start? I couldn't begin to encompass all the examples. So, I'll start here:

For example, AlterNet refers to it's ongoing war coverage as 'The War On Iraq', and certainly isn't alone in calling the war 'The War On Iraq'--in order, of course, to make the point that the U.S. is waging war against a nation and it's people, not, say, engaged in a hubristic effort to bring Western-style Democracy and freedom to a troubled and oppressed part of the word, where such an effort is largely unprecedented, and the history of such well-intentioned meddling isn't very good.

Which, to me, suggests that if you find it difficult to agree that the U.S. is conducting an imperial or unjust war on Iraq, most on the left are telling you that you are wrong, and that you are, in essence, the enemy. I find this even more ironic given the left's repeated, completely hollow claims of patriotism and "love of country". It's one thing to claim patriotism while dissenting from policy; quite another to claim patriotism while claiming that your country is imperialistic; that it is waging an unjust war on innocent people; that it's men and women in the military terrorize Iraqi men and women in their houses in the middle of the night. It's one thing to say that nation building is not something we should do, that it's not an effective use of our resources, and even that (as is often suggested) it is not, strategically, the way to wage a war on terror. Quite another to say that the war on terror is an excuse for the evil US to torture brown-skinned people and steal their oil. If you really consider yourself a patriot, but have questions about the war in Iraq, is looking at your country as a source of evil and bad things in the world (which is not an unusual refrain from the left) going to resonate? Or is it going to alienate you from people you might otherwise support and vote for, because they've gone too far?

At the very least, it's an open question.

Going on: in a recent book (reviewed here by AlterNet, my convenient source for all the left's best irrationality), called Unembedded, four "independent" journalists show us the true face of the Iraq war. It is a photo documentary of the "human face of war-ravaged Iraq". I tend to wonder if it touches any upon the human face of opressive-dictator-ravaged Iraq, where entire families often ended up shot and buried in mass graves, where all the prisons were dens of torture of the tongue- and hand- and eye-removing kind, where there were rape rooms, and so on. While it may not be our job to save the world from despots and dictators, no matter how many children get shot in the head in front of their parents as part of government intimidation, and no matter how many political dissidents get blinded with a red-hot poker or have their tongues cut out with dull knives, to simply behave as if that didn't happen while simultaneously bemoaning the human cost of war seems disingenous. Certainly, there would be reasons not to have gone to war in Iraq, and the human cost is one of them. But to pretend the human cost in Iraq started (and ends)with American military action is simply untrue, and certainly doesn't strike one as the kind of "patriotic dissent" the left is so fond of claiming.

The review bemoans what they feel is an attractive portrayal of American soldiers (and if you think that, by and large, anything has changed on the left in regards to how they see and feel about the American soldier since Vietnam--other than a vague awarness that spitting on them and calling them "babykillers" does not serve their political goals very well--then I have a bridge to sell you; a heroic portrayal of the American soldier, no matter how accurate and newsworthy, is anethema to the left). But here's a book to the rescue that shows you what happens when the American military does it's job (which, if you don't know, is to kill people and break things): things are broken, and people get killed.

And that's the whole problem. We rarely see who is at the receiving end of a hellfire missile, or a 50-caliber rifle, or a 500-pound bomb. The politics of that destruction and the anger and desperation it fuels, remains hidden.

So, that's the problem: the American people are stupid, and don't understand what happens when people get bombs dropped on them or get shot repeatedly by a machine gun! People who supported the war, or voted for Bush, don't understand that people die, and things get blown up, in wars.

As is often the case in regards to difference between the right, the middle, and the left, I have to question the entire orientation of that sort of thinking, the entire template they are operating from. American's have seen the face of war, and most everybody knows somebody who knows somebody who has been to Iraq, and almost everybody has known somebody, or known someone who knew somebody, who was injured or died on the battlefield.

Many of the people who voted for Bush were veterans of wars and military engagements in the past and, indeed, the military--those most likely to have seen, up close and personal, the ravages of war--voted overwhelming for Bush (something the left knows and expects, which is why they have, at various times, tried to have military absentee ballots disqualified for technical reasons). This is not a nation of complete ignoramuses who don't know that people die in wars and that bad things happen when bombs start falling. Right at the beginning, I think they lose everyone who isn't already one of the enlightened faithful (who can sorrowfully shake their head and how others don't understand the true face of war), because their foundational assumptions are just wrong.

Along the way we visit hospitals in Fallujah and Baghdad where relatives wash their dead and care for the wounded. We see a mosque in Baghdad where women mourn more than 50 killed by a U.S. bomb. We see an Iraqi boy triumphantly celebrating the explosion of an American vehicle. And from the courageous Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, the lone Iraqi photographer in the group, (Alford and Anderson are Americans, Leistner is Canadian) we see an extraordinary sequence of photographs of civilians running from a U.S. helicopter attack on Harif Street in Baghdad in September 2004.

Now, maybe it's just me, but does anybody else detect a potential political agenda in this "journalism"? There was nothing good to see? At all? I wonder if there were any pictures of, I dunno, Iraqis voting in free elections for the first time. Or Iraqis picking through Saddam's mass graves, trying to find evidence of loved ones, long lost without a trace. Or maybe a picture of the woman who, when voting in Iraqi parliamentary elections for the first time who said, "Anybody who doesn't appreciate what America has done, and the president Bush, let them go to Hell!" No pictures of her, I'm betting.

And, more to the point, since the template is wrong--stupid ignorant Americans don't know people die in wars!--they completely miss what seems to me a very logical question: couldn't what they, the authors, are doing have been done during any war? Couldn't it have made the rebels look like quite the murderous cads during the revolutionary war? And wasn't the human cost terrible? Certainly, it was during the Civil War. Perhaps America should have just let the South secede? And during World War II, and World War I, and the Korean War? And certainly, we did it in Vietnam. Certainly, I'm sure there were plenty of French collaboraters unhappy with America fighting the Nazis in France, and I'm sure there could have been plenty of ugly pictures. Again, the human cost of war is not unique to Iraq, and acting like it is presumes and either (a) an ignorance in the intended audience that is not there or (b) a near religious devotion to the anti-war, anti-American-exceptionalism crowd that is really the exclusive domain of the far left.

And in case it isn't obvious, they hate American-exceptionalism, and believe that anyone who embraces it does so through ignorance:

Consider this: The picture most widely distributed during the Marines' violent siege of Falluja last November was a close-up shot of Marine Lance Cpl. James Blake Miller, otherwise known as the Marlboro Man, his face smeared with the grime of war and a cigarette seductively hanging from his lip. This image was taken by Los Angeles Times embedded photographer Luis Sinco and published in over 100 newspapers on Nov. 11, 2004. On that day in Baghdad alone an estimated 19 people were killed and an unknown number lost their lives in Falluja. But it was the Marlboro Man who made the front page coast to coast. There are no Marlboro Men in Unembedded.

See, the reason you aren't against the war, and the reason you don't loathe the American military, is because you have been brainwashed (you stupid people) by these "artificial" images of American soldiers looking like strong, brave, honorable American soldiers, and you were too dumb to know that people also died during military actions in Baghdad and Falluja. Because you're ignorant and shallow (proof: you voted for Bush), you think the American military and war in general are all about standing around looking cool with cigarettes, and don't know that real bombs get dropped on real people, and real people get shot, and people really die in wars.

This one just amazes me: Ten Ways to Debate Iraq, by Michael Schwartz. You must read it to believe it, and unless you are already a die-hard leftist, I expect you, too, will be amazed at the willful ignorance and unapologetic, unwavering single-minded one-sideness to the orientation. These "Ten Ways to Debate Iraq" are an excellent example of why the left has so much trouble debating Iraq, and why they can't make the sort of traction with the public at large, or the American voter, that they feel they should (indeed, Bush never should have been elected--much of this was going on, and being "debated" by the left, before the 2004 elections in November).

Just some samples. A reader complains that no mention is made of anything that has improved in Iraq since the U.S. "invaded", and the author explains why this was, previously, just ignored as a topic: it's wrong, everything is, in fact, worse that before, in every conceivable way!

Water and energy delivery as well as schools are worse off than before the U.S. invasion. Ditto for the state of hospitals (and medical supplies), highways, and oil production. Elections are a positive change, but the elected government does not have more than a semblance of actual sovereignty, and therefore the Iraqi people have no power to make real choices about their future.

To prove this, the author cites this "report" on YubaNet (interestingly, a "community-created" website where the material on it is completely unvetted, and no one is particularly accountable for the content, and the author is given as "Committee on Government Reform - Minority Office". The article cites it's request for the investigation by representative Henry A. Waxman (he couldn't have a partisan dog in this fight, could he?), which is interesting as the Commitee on Government Reform - Minority Office seems to, for all practical purposes, be Henry A. Waxman and is clearly a house organ of the Democratic Party. Fascinating.

Nothing was mentioned about Iraqis who want the U.S. to remain (especially the Kurds and the majority of Iraqi women. ... I know of no study indicating that Iraqi women favor the U.S. presence. Perhaps you are referring to the fact that large numbers of women in Iraq are upset and angry over the erosion of their rights since the fall of Saddam. I know some commentators claim that the U.S. presence is insurance against further erosion of those rights, but everything I have read indicates that a significant number of Iraqi women (like all Iraqis) blame the Bush administration for these policies. After all, the Americans installed in power (and continue to support) the political forces spearheading anti-woman policies in the country. Polling data do not indicate that any sizable group of Sunni or Shia women support a continued U.S. presence.

I note they don't mention this poll, from ABC News (they're going to lose their MSM media credentials if they don't watch it), which seems to indicate that most of the people in Iraq are optimistic and thinks are and/or will be getting better, and at least half feel that things are better off than before the war. Nor are the more informed and thoughtful comments and folks like Peter Beinart, of the once-lefty now more moderate New Republic: who notes both that the Kurds (those who have benfitted most from Western-style liberal Democracy, and have been in more direct contact with America and her military, over the past 15 years) want America to stay, and that bad things that would happen if America simply cut and ran, or started scheduling immediate troop withdrawal, as most on the left advocate.

Indeed, it's curious as the left argues against the war in Iraq and agitating for withdrawal without candidly acknowledging the almost certain consequences, for both the Kurds and everybody else. As Peter Beinart (traitor to the left) notes in his article, "anyone who thinks U.N. peacekeepers can protect Kurds against armed fundamentalist militias should do a Google search with the terms 'Rwanda, 1994' or 'Srebrenica, 1995'".

Certainly, the U.S. gains military and political "experience" from the war, as from any war, but at the expense of many deaths (2,127) and injuries (at least 15,704) to American soldiers. Beyond these publicly listed casualty figures lie the endless ways in which the lives of our soldiers are permanently damaged: On November 26, for example, the New York Times reported on a recent army study indicating that 17% of all personnel sent to Iraq have "serious symptoms of depression, anxiety or post-traumatic stress disorder." Since about a million American troops have now seen service in Iraq, approximately 170,000 have gained the "experience" of having a severe mental problem. Moreover, the war experience in Iraq has proved so demoralizing to the military that many of the best soldiers are leaving at the end of their tours, instead of staying on in active or reserve status. This is undermining the viability of the military, long term.

This is simply sophistry. While I don't argue, and would never, that training and educating our military in modern warfare is a reason to go to war, or remain engaged in war, the idea that having the military actually do what a military does--that is, fight enemies and occupy territory--somehow weakens our military strength is nuts. There are plenty of indications that the "many of the best soldiers" canard is just that: re-enlistments are up, not down, and most of the best soldiers would in fact be leaving at the end of their tours if their companies weren't engaged in Iraq (there are more profitable and less dangerous lines of work for such people). They simply aren't willing to leave their brothers in arms in the midst of a war. It's a reason commonly cited for going back into the field, and even wounded soldiers do their best to find their way back to the battle lines. American soldiers don't want to leave their fellow soldiers while there's still work to be done. An idea, I'm sure, quite alien to the author, Michael Schwartz.

While I wouldn't normally engage the point about the future benefit of oil reserves, given I don't think it's really an argument for or against the war, I do have to quote one part of the author's debunking of that as a good thing about the Iraq war:

Moreover, such privileged access would have deprived the Iraqis of their right to use the oil to their own benefit -- something they desperately need now that the Saddam Hussein regime, twelve years of brutal sanctions, and the current war have gutted the country.

Catch that? Twelve years of "brutal sanctions"? What's the template of this guy, do you think? One wonders why he didn't just say "now that Saddam's benevolent but misguided regime and fascist America's brutal Sanctions of Death have gutted the country". Why not just go all out?

In regards to the benefits of Democracy in the Middle East being a potentially good reason for the Iraq war, and at least for not cutting and running now, the author says this:

We can all agree that a strong democracy in the Middle East would have huge benefits for Iraq and for its neighbors as well as for the rest of the world. If I thought that our actions there were actually helping to bring this about, perhaps I might also believe that the benefits of an active democracy outweighed at least some of the many problems we have been creating. But from the beginning, the talk of democracy was a hollow mantra, just one of a group of public rationalizations for a war motivated by the Bush administration's desire to dominate Middle Eastern politics and economics. The U.S. government has never actually relinquished sovereignty to the Iraqi government.

It's been, what, two years? A little impatient, aren't we? Did anybody ever say we'd be relinquishing complete control the day Saddam was overthrown? Uh, no. No. Nobody said that. And it's not a reasonable expectation. And it's really a non-issue--immediately relinquishing sovreignty wouldn't make anything better for anybody in Iraq. While the author claims, bizarrely, that he would be for a strong democracy in the Middle East, if he believed we were actually helping bring this about, he fails to mention how leaving Saddam Hussein in charge of Iraq (until his admittedly more psychotic and belligerent kids finally took over) would have been better for democracy in the Middle East. But, the author claims, talk of Democracy was a "hollow mantra" (no, if it were hollow, there wouldn't have been two significant elections in the two years since the U.S. "invaded" Iraq to "impose" freedom and democracy). Again, sophistry. It makes no sense. How is having two elections in two years paying lip-service to democracy?

Next, the question is raised about what fundamentalist Muslims hope to achieve. The author, being liberal, feels a compulsive need to mention that Christians can be bad people, too:

I assume that, when you refer to "fundamentalist Muslims," you are referring to terrorists, including those in Iraq and those who attacked the World Trade Center, the London tube, and the Madrid trains. First, I have to disagree with this identification of the terrorists (who are indeed fundamentalist) with all fundamentalist Muslims. That would be the same as characterizing those who bombed the Oklahoma City Federal Building as "fundamentalist Christians" and then implying that the destruction of such buildings is what all fundamentalist Christians yearn to achieve.

Actually, it wouldn't be, because the folks who bombed the Oklahoma City Federal Building weren't fundamentalists. They weren't even Christians. Timothy McVeigh was agnostic. Check out this Townhall.com article on the subject.

The longer the U.S. stays, the more the Islamic terrorists there are likely to gain strength; the sooner the U.S. leaves, the more quickly the resistance will subside, and -- with it -- support for terrorism. The administration's Iraqi occupation policies are the equivalent of a nightmarish self-fulfilling prophesy.

Nothing is cited (except the author's previous opinion piece on the subject) to prove this claim. And it would need to be proven. But, again, it's the template: America is bad, so the longer every day Iraqi's are exposed to America and American badness, the more they will hate America, and the easier it will be to recruit new terrorists. Couldn't it be that the longer we are there, the more the humanitarian side of Americans will win over ordinary Iraqis? No, that's crazy talk, they'll all hate America more, just like the American left! And how does leaving before we've finished huge infrastructure projects that will take years to complete help anything? Before, he complains that water and electricity and everything else is worse than before, and even though that's largely not true, it can sure be a hell of a lot better than it is today, and it certainly falls short of American standards. So, while there are still many improvements to be made, we should just leave? That would make them like us better? And as the "resistance" more and more targets Iraqi police and recruits, Iraqi government officials and ordinary Iraqi citizens, where exactly are they supposed to withdraw to to make the "Iraqi" (i.e., former Baathist/Syrian/Iranian) insurgency subside? And it doesn't even address the main issue, which is what was that nothing was mentioned about what fundamentalism Muslims wish to achieve, which is a fundamentalist theocracy under which women are slaves and dissenters are dead. While Hussein's secular despotism was despicable, an Islamic theocracy would and will be worse. And is the likely outcome of an early American withdrawl.

7. Nothing was mentioned about the results of the U.S. evacuation from Southeast Asia (over a million killed within 5 years).

I think we need to disentangle two different events involving the (forced) American departure from Southeast Asia. First, there was Vietnam, where it was always predicted that a horrendous bloodbath would follow any American withdrawal. Indeed, there were certainly deaths there after the U.S. left, and many refugees fled the country, some for the United States. But whatever these figures may have been, they were dwarfed by the incredible bloodbath that the U.S. created by being in Vietnam in the first place. Reputable sources suggest that millions of Vietnamese died (and countless others were permanently wounded) during the war years.

Our withdrawls from Vietnam were forced? By what, other than the U.S. Congress, Nixon, and the U.S. Media? And it was "always predicted that a horrendous bloodbath would follow any American withdrawal"? Then why did the left, the anti-war movement, and many of the Democrats agitate for that actions that led directly to that horrendous bloodbath? And "dwarfed"? All facts--that is, documented evidence--contradicts that. The deaths in one year after our withdrawal, in fact, dwarfed the Vietnamese casualties of the entire Vietnam war.

But he's not done with the morally myopic historical revisionism (and he's not done earning David Horowitz's label of leftists as "soaked in the blood" of the results of their cluess policies and causes):

Second, there was the holocaust in Cambodia, which may well have resulted in a million or more deaths. This was also, however, a complex consequence of the U.S. presence in Southeast Asia, not a result of our departure. Cambodia had a stable, neutral government until the Nixon administration launched massive secret bombings against its territory, invaded the country, destabilized the regime, and set in motion the grim unraveling that led to the rise of the murderous Khmer Rouge. If the U.S. had withdrawn from Vietnam in 1965 or 1968, that holocaust would quite certainly never have happened.

Even if you grant, without reservation, the template the author is writing from, you could still ask would the holocaust in Cambodia have happened if American troops had still been there? And the short answer is: no.

But the idea that Cambodia had a stable, neutral government before the "massive secret bombings" is willful blindness. That the Khmer Rouge would never have been, except for America, comes from the left's normal template: everything bad is America's fault. Bad things happen because America was involved. And it's just stupid. It's an infantile understanding of the world. And even if the Khmer Rouge was only there because of America (just like the terrorists in Iraq are only there because America is in Iraq), pulling out clearly wasn't the answer. But it will work in Iraq? Huh? Oh, he explains (not):

The situation in Iraq is not that dissimilar. If the U.S. withdraws soon, there is at least a reasonable chance that the violence will subside quickly and that peace and stability in the region might ever so slowly take hold. The longer the U.S. stays -- further destroying the Iraqi infrastructure and destabilizing neighboring regimes (like Syria and Iran) -- the more likely it is that horrific civil wars and other forms of brutality will indeed occur.

Okay. It doesn't get any better. You'll have to read the rest yourself. But rest assured: although there can be good arguments against war in Iraq, those on the left are not capable of making them.

The Left's New Majority

The problem is, the left doesn't have a majority, and isn't likely to get one if they keep thinking in those terms.

"Something vital, exciting, and underreported is happening across the United States," reports Colin Greeg, in The Left's New Majority. "Marginalised groups in the poorest communities are joing forces to improve their condition and win local electoral victories."

Sigh. So much about what's wrong with the perspective, and the performance, of the left and the Democrats is embodied in just the first sentence. Who are the all about? The poor, the marginalized, the victims of the world. From their perspective, those are the only people that deserve a voice, and everybody else is just the evil non-poor, non-victims, who need to be taxed and regulated to make things better for the poor. And that's not a winning, vote-getting strategy with anybody but, as Ann Coulter so accurately describes the American left, "the extremely rich and the extremely poor, neither of whom have much of a stake in society".

And plenty of people in the middle vote. And even some of the super poor and super rich don't see the point in voting for the finger-pointing, blame-finding, victim-making, entitlement-creating politics of the Democrats.

More perncious is the iea that people "improve their condition" by who gets elected in their community, and beyond. The problem with their condition is not, fundamentally, who is in office (although that can help or hurt, in ways big and small, and I would disagree with that author about which political side does more damage), but the problem with their condition is what they are doing. They are responsible for their condition, and they are responsible for changing it, and if the only thing they can be bothered to do to imrpove their condition is elect one more self-serving local politician from a different party to office, then their condition will not improve appreciably. Thus, after forty years, the War on Poverty still has not been won--because it's not a fight the government can win through bureaucracy and largesse.

The next line is also telling:

This is the America of Latinos, African-Americans, religious progressives, union members, young people, and single women.

Assuming that religious progressive means far-left Unitarians, Wiccans and Satan Worshippers and dogmatic atheists--which it almost certainly does--who is it not the America of? Why, it's not the America of white people (still the majority of the population, duh!), mature adults, religious conservatives (i.e., traditional Christians), people who work and aren't in unions (the majority of working Americans, and even many union members don't like the unions these days)and married women, families, and parents! Holy crap! They've got the angry disenfranchised Latino and incense-burning Wiccan vote locked up, though, so screw the white guys and married adults with kids.

Which is pure fantasy, like this:
Combined, these mostly progressive groups of the left constitute an actual and significant national majority.

Come on! While polls, on average, show people split down the middle on most partisan issues, the test of "a signficiant national majority" in a democratic society is whether they are winning, and Democrats (and liberals) don't even enjoy a majority in terms of those willing to self-identify as Democrats or liberal. And this shows up in the polls, as Democrats continue to lose ground in the house, the senate, and governerships.

Since the 2004 presidential election, the fashion on the American left has been to look at what the right did and try to do the same, as though the right have won a major victory in American consciousness. Even the second wave of progressive critics, who complain we obsess too much over Republican strategy, end up using the right's supposed victory over hearts and minds as an axis from which to build their arguments. But George W Bush never won a public mandate.

As it relates to the author's argument, the relationship of the above isn't clear, but I will note that the fasion of the American left has been to mischaracterize what the right did, and certainly almost nobody on the left is advocating they do the same . . . and completely, as always, ignores the policies generally advocated on the right as being a potential election advantage! Oh my gosh, could a lot of people actually think tax cuts were good for the overall economy? The possibility doesn't even seem to enter their thinking.

And as far as having a national mandate--if you win, you had a mandate. The mandate comes from being in charge. While there is both accountability and the rule of law, the mandate of the presidency is inherent in victory, no matter how slim. But I think the author is arguing that it means that people really don't agree with the Republican agenda, or that they keep electing Republicans by accident, so the the fact that strong Republicans running on a strong conservative agenda (ala, Contract With America) almost always win has nothing to do with the repeated Republican victories that the Republicans have, so far, enjoyed. Hmmm.

Interestingly, the author attributes Bush's four millionvote victory in 2004 to "the withdrawal of Democratic campaigns from most states, in a flawed strategy to focus on 'swing states'." Given that the Republicans did much the same thing, except on the grass roots where both the Democrats and the Republicans had workers doing the hard, door-to-door work of getting people to the polls, how would that have singularly failed the Democrats?

Poll after poll has found American citizens largely in support of progressive solutions to public problems, even as Democratic Party support for these ideas has dwindled.

I note, despite all these polls, that the author mysteriously fails to cite a single one. And I expect that might have something to do with the fact an indepth analysis of any such poll would reveal a more complicated picture. But I think there is a lot of truth to this particular assertion: lots of people do believe big government is the solution to intractable social ills, and they certainly don't see any harm in another social program designed to help women, children, or the disenfranchised. And most people like the idea of receiving some new "free" entitlement. But the Democrats rarely find a moderate, fence-straddling, entitlement-dolling position to take. IN fact, what the author fails to note is that what was replaced Democratic Party support for expanding the welfare state (what "progressive solutions" basically means) is hating Bush, and Republicans. They've taken the Republicans failed impeachment/Lewinski strategy and multiplied it times 10. Sure, they hated Clinton, but we _really_ hate Bush! Really, really bad. So vote for us.

After talking about the interesting statiscal fact that ever city with a population over 500,000 went for John Kerry in 2004 (hmmm . . . and what does that tell us?) and that more than half with populations for 50,000 went for John Kerry, and noting Arnold Schwarznegger's crushing defeat of his right-wing special election issues by (contain the laughter, please) "community-based grass roots organizations", he says this:

True, the right itself has effectively organised base constituencies of fundamentalist evangelicals, and disaffected and frightened working Americans. But the progressive work on the local frontline has not been about trying to "do something the right does", but rather about drawing effectively on old progressive organising traditions.

See, that's who votes for conservatives! Fundamentalists evangelicals (read: Bible Thumpers) and frightened and disaffected working Americans. Any plain decent folks in there? I wonder, who else votes for Republicans in large numbers? Rural communities? Farm communities? Small towns? Church-goers? Married women with kids? Our American military men and women? Policemen? Firemen? Come on now, I think some details are being left out.

But the last sentence is the kicker, just more evidence that they don't get it: "drawing effecitvely on old progressive organising traditions". It's still the thirties! It's the Great Depression! It's the Sixties! Iraq is Vietnam! Just follow that template, and we'll win, win, win.

And now, the sort of curdled pabulum that makes me want to barf:

Today's Republican call to black and Hispanic voters is very different from their calls for segregation and immigration quotas in the past. It is to the credit of social-justice activists that Condoleezza Rice, a black woman, is secretary of state; and that a Hispanic man, Alberto R. Gonzales is attorney-general.

The first part (calls for segregation) is simply false: the Democrats were the "white man's party", and most notorious souther segregationists were ALL Democrats! But, more to the point, it's a credit to social justice activists that Condoleeza Rice (a black woman, in case you didn't know) is secretary of state? Who was it who appointed Condoleeza Rice secretary of state? Your progressive friends? No, sorry, it was progressive cartoonists drawing her as Aunt Jemima and as Butterfly McQueen from 'Gone With The Wind'. Do the progressives take credit for Clarence Thomas, who they lined up against (and they weren't exactly friendly to Alberto Gonzales, either, or Bush's judicial appointment of Miguel Estrada). To take credit for things they either opposed or had no hand in is pure sophistry. It points to the tendency on the left to confuse amrophous good intentions with concrete, measurable action, and to dismiss the concrete, negative actions of their own historical progeny (Bull Conner, hmm?) by the amorphous good intentions, held at the time they are sure, by good progressives and northern Democrats with no practical power at the time.

And there's a lot more to the article, more than I have time to get into. But it's more complete and utter cluelessness on the part of the political left as to what wins elections. And, for bonus points, it you go read the article, read the comments from the good leftists who patronize AlterNet. Some of them are very englightnening.

A Day in the Life of Joe Republican

It's the same old theme: conservatives are foolish, thoughtless, selfish, evil. All good things that have ever happened come from the left. If you've been exposed to the original, and would like a solid refutation, I provide you with both right here.

Here's the original, as recently posted to a mailing list I'm on. You may have seen it, too.

Joe gets up at 6:00 a.m. and fills his coffeepot with water to prepare his morning coffee. The water is clean and good because some tree-hugging liberal fought for minimum water-quality standards. With his first swallow of coffee, he takes his daily medication. His medications are safe to take because some stupid commie liberal fought to insure their safety and that they work as advertised.

All but $10 of his medications are paid for by his employer's medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance - now Joe gets it too. He prepares his morning breakfast, bacon and eggs. Joe's bacon is safe to eat because some girly-man liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.

In the morning shower, Joe reaches for his shampoo. His bottle is properly labeled with each ingredient and its amount in the total contents because some cry baby liberal fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained.

Joe dresses, walks outside, and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean, because some environmentalist wacko liberal fought for laws to stop industries from polluting our air. He walks to the subway station for his government-subsidized ride to work. It saves him considerable money in parking and transportation fees because some fancy-pants liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.

Joe begins his work day. He has a good job with excellent pay, medical benefits, retirement, paid holidays, and vacation because some lazy liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Joe's employer pays these standards because Joe's employer doesn't want his employees to call the union. If Joe is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed, he'll get a worker compensation or unemployment check, because some stupid liberal didn't think he should lose his home or go hungry because of his temporary misfortune.

It's noontime, and Joe needs to make a bank deposit so he can pay some bills. Joe's deposit is federally insured by the FSLIC because some godless liberal wanted to protect Joe's money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the Great Depression.

Joe has to pay his Fannie Mae-underwritten mortgage and his below-market federal student loan, because some elitist liberal decided that Joe and the government would be better off if he was educated and earned more money over his lifetime.

Joe is home from work. He plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the country. He gets in his car for the drive. His car is among the safest in the world, because some American-hating liberal fought for car safety standards. He arrives at his boyhood home. His was the third generation to live in the house financed by Farmers' Home Administration, because bankers didn't want to make rural loans. The house didn't have electricity until some big-government liberal stuck his nose where it didn't belong and demanded rural electrification.

He is happy to see his father, who is now retired. His father lives on Social Security and a union pension, because some wine-drinking, cheese-eating liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Joe wouldn't have to.

Joe gets back in his car for the ride home, and turns on a radio talk show. The radio host keeps saying that liberals are bad and conservatives are good. He doesn't mention that the beloved republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Joe enjoys throughout his day.

Joe agrees: "We don't need those big-government liberals ruining our lives! After all, I'm a self-made man who believes everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have."

Now, here's my revision, to make it just a little more accurate:

Joe gets up at 6:00 a.m. and fills his coffeepot with water to prepare his morning coffee. The water is clean, in part because of the Clean Water Act of 1972 and the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974, both sponsored and signed by Evil Republican Richard Nixon. It's also possible, Joe allows, that work done by the Environmental Protection Agency over the past thirty years has also possibly helped. Turns out, the EPA was created by Evil Republican Richard Nixon, as well. It also turns out that sewage treatment and water processing that keeps the water clean, healthy, and fluoridated (good for his teeth!) is that way because of work done on the local level by Democrat and Republican politicians and even some people who consider themselves politically independent, and that local standards were in fact increased over the national level because of work done by conservation group that is largely peopled with churchgoing conservatives.

It turns out that the water for his coffee does cost three times more than it needs to, because some well-meaning liberals discovered that concentrations of arsenic of levels nearly a million times what was actually present in the water supply made some snail darters pale and sluggish, and were immediately sure that, despite the fact 3-parts-per-trillion arsenic had not caused any discernible health problems in the whole of human history, legislation needed to be immediately passed to filter out any dangerous-sounding trace mineral at any level, cost be damned, because, "how can we put a price on our children's lives?"

Well, with his first swallow of coffee, he takes his daily medication. His medications don't work as well as the one's he used to take, because a well-meaning consumer-advocacy group fought to take the more effective drug off the market, because 1-in-100,000 people had a fatal allergic reaction to it. Fortunately, this drug is safe and he can rely on it's contents, in part because of the Food and Drug Administration, a government bureau that started with the Bureau of Chemistry, started by the first Evil Republican, Abraham Lincoln, and was altered, supported, and strengthened over the years by Democrats, Republicans (And a Bull Moose ), conservatives and liberals. Since liberals believe, for some reason that apparently cannot withstand the withering scrutiny of applied logic, that they are the only people that like safe medicine or clean air and water, they tend to forget most of that history. In addition to expanding the powers of the FDA, establishing the procedure of reviewing Over-The-Counter drugs, establishing the National Center of Toxicological Research, and moving the regulation of biologics (including serums, vaccines, and blood products) to the FDA, Evil Republican Richard Nixon called for the reviews of the FDA's GRAS list, which led to the lifting of the ban on saccharine.

Oh, and let's not forget the tamper-resistant packaging regulations, the Orphan Drug Act (for the FDA to promote research and marketing of drugs for rare diseases), the heavy increase of fines and penalties for all federal offenses (which includes violations of FDA regulations), the approval of the AIDS blood test, the Childhood Vaccine Act, the Food and Drug Administration Act, and the Prescription Drug Marketing Act, all authored by Democrats and Republicans and signed by the Evilest Republican of them All, Ronald Reagan (when he wasn't busy stealing food from poor people and dancing on the backs of AIDS victims). So, Joe's helped out there, too.

All but $10 of his medications are paid for by his employer's medical plan, because his employer was finding it difficult to attract qualified applicants without providing a comprehensive health plan and so, in order to compete for quality employees, his employer started offering a a very good health plan, from a private insurer. However, the truth is, since the health plan is part of the cost of employing Joe, nobody but Joe is really paying for his health plan--he just doesn't ever see the money. While his employer his eligible for better overall benefits because the employer employs many workers, if Joe had the money his employer spent on his membership in the healthplan in his pocket, Joe could still afford more than adequate health care (but not such a good dental plan), but he probably wouldn't because he'd spend the money at the dog track, because Joe has some issues with gambling (that, unfortunately, aren't qualified for treatment under his healthplan).

He prepares his morning breakfast, bacon and eggs. Joe's bacon is safe to eat, aside from the cholesterol and fat and salt content, which is bad for his health, and a consortium of liberals and trial lawyers is busy, even as he stuff his face, working to allow Joe to sue Jimmy Dean and Oscar Myer for selling him fatty foods without warning him that eating bacon is not as healthy as eating broccoli. Still, to the degree the bacon is safe (although bacon has always been pretty safe, because the heavy salt content acts as a preservative and kills most molds and bacterias), it is safe because people of all political stripes fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry. As time passed, liberals began to believe that only they liked safe meat, and that for some reasons conservatives enjoyed eating tainted pork that could make them sick and die. However, Joe, and most conservatives, don't actually like tainted meat. They like fresh, safe meat. Although some well-meaning liberals did douse Joe with red paint the last time he went to the butcher shop.

In the morning shower, Joe reaches for his shampoo. His bottle is properly labeled with each ingredient and its amount in the total contents because various Democrats and Republicans (and perhaps even a few apolitical folk) fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained. Though, for some reason, as time went on, liberals convinced themselves that they were the only people who wanted to know what was actually in the products they consumed.

Joe dresses, walks outside, and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean, in part because he's a rich Republican and moved out past the suburbs to a almost rural area, leaving the poor and disenfranchised to choke in the dying cities. However, the air is also clean because many state and local governments, made up of liberals and conservatives, Democrats and Republicans, had passed legislation dealing with air pollution because of the needs of their citizens in their localities. Then, both Democrats and Republicans in congress Passed the Air Pollution Control Act of 1955, the first federal legislation regarding air pollution, and it was signed by less-Evil-But-Still-Slow-and-Stupid Republican, Dwight D. Eisenhower. Eight years later, Democrats and Republicans in congress passed the Air Act of 1963, which began imposing regulations on factories, but not automobiles. The Act was strengthened through amendments, authored by both Democrats and Republicans, in 1965,1966,1967, and 1969, under both Johnson and Nixon.

Then there was the Clean Air Act of 1970, authored by Democrats and Republicans, with the blessing of Prime-Evil, Richard Nixon. Thankfully (for conservatives everywhere) all this crazy air cleaning stuff stopped, and Ronald Reagan pinned pollution problems squarely where they belonged: on the trees.

Alas, Better-Than-His-Son-But-Still-Evil-Republican George H.W. Bush signed off on the Clean Air Act of 1990, which has demonstrably improved air quality. So, Joe is glad he voted for Bush I.

To do his part, Joe doesn't drive the Hummer to work today. Instead, he walks to the subway station for his government-subsidized ride to work. While some liberals say that it saves him considerable money in parking and transportation fees, Joe knows that the government doesn't get it's money from the money-fairy, they get their money from his back pocket, and quite a lot. Since he's a rich Republican, and earns a good income, they take enough out of his paycheck each year to pay his house note. So Joe knows that "government-subsidized" actually means "Joe-subsidized", because there ain't no free lunch.

Joe begins his work day. He has a good job with excellent pay, medical benefits, retirement, paid holidays, and vacation because Joe is a talented guy who worked hard for his skills, and right now his abilities are in demand, and if his employer wasn't offering such an attractive package, he'd have taken that job offer from the firm in Syracuse, which was otherwise similar but didn't offer as much vacation in the first year.

Joe's employer offers these benefits because Joe's employer doesn't want Joe to quit for a better job. If Joe is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed, he'll get a worker compensation or unemployment check, because both liberals and conservatives, both Democrats and Republicans, didn't think he should lose his home or go hungry because of his temporary misfortune, especially as the overall economy grew, thanks to the free market, and allowed such safety nets to be constructed. Such things benefit everybody, which is why most people support such things, within reason, and on-budget. As time goes on, liberals decided that only they wanted people to be able to keep their homes or eat a square meal or see a doctor or have a decent job, somehow becoming convinced that conservatives and Republicans didn't like good jobs, medical treatment, safe food, clean water, and breathable air. From that point forward, liberals made all their arguments, and ran most political campaigns, against easy-to-defeat straw men that didn't really represent what most Republicans and conservatives advocated and supported. This makes Joe smile as he does his work, because he knows it's going to keep conservatives and Republicans in office for a long time to come.

It's noontime, and Joe needs to make a bank deposit so he can pay some bills. While Joe's deposit hasn't actually been federally insured by the FSLIC since 1989, when it was replaced by the SAIF, under the FDIC, it is federally insured, by legislation in which both Democrats and Republicans have had a hand in over the years, because both Democrats and Republicans wanted to protect Joe's money from unscrupulous bankers(and problems created by well-intentioned banking regulations that not only allowed, but in some ways encouraged, bankers to do foolish things with the money in their banks) that ruined the banking system before the Great Depression.

If Joe weren't a rich Republican, he might have to pay his Fannie Mae-underwritten mortgage (which means, largely underwritten by the tax-payers, like Rich Republican Joe and his ilk) and his below-market federal student loan (and also state financial aid) because many Republicans and Democrats decided that Joe and the government would be better off if he was educated and earned more money over his lifetime. For some reason, many liberals later decided that only they thought education and earning money was a good thing, and that conservatives wanted people to be ignorant, uneducated, and poor.

Now, Joe is home from work. He plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the country. He gets in his Hummer for the drive. His car is among the safest in the world, because it was originally designed for the U.S. Army, to help them more effectively kill people and break things, and also meets or exceeds car safety standards established, largely with bi-partisan support, by the U.S. government. He arrives at his boyhood home. His was the third generation to live in the house financed by Farmers' Home Administration, because bankers didn't want to make rural loans, because of the outrageously high default rate that would have eventually put the banks under, and cost the savings of all their other investors. The house didn't have electricity until George Norris, Republican from Nebraska, and Sam Rayburn, Democrat from Texas, authored the Rural Electrification Act. A majority of Republicans voted for the act, but, over time, liberals forgot and gave themselves and the Democrats 100% credit for Rural Electrificaiton.

He is happy to see his father, who is now retired. His father lives on Social Security, which he paid into most of his life and Joe pays into now, and there was a union pension he used to get, because some leg-breaking, scab-shooting union organizer helped make it happen, but modern union management looted the pension for political activism, and bankrupted it, so now all Joe's dad has is Social Security, and Joe, but since Joe is a rich Republican, it's not a problem..

Joe gets back in his car for the ride home, and turns on a radio talk show. The radio host keeps saying that liberals are wrong on most of their contemporary policy efforts and that conservatives are right about theirs, and he also mentioned he is a proud conservative and Republican, unlike the news magazines Joe has on his coffee table and the cable news network Joe watches when he gets home, which tell him that conservatives are bad and liberals are good, and then insist they are proud, non-partisan journalists. So, Joe turns on the talk radio show host again. He doesn't mention that the beloved Republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Joe enjoys throughout his day, because it's both logically absurd on the face of it, without even delving into the empiric evidence, and, when actual facts and history is reviewed, and real names, ideologies, and party affiliations are reported in regards to the acts, efforts, and processes which have afforded Joe the infrastructure of his rich Republican lifestyle, it turns out that trying to give one group credit for everything good that ever happened, and one group blame for everything bad, is not just logically silly, but demonstrably wrong.

Joe agrees: "We don't need those big-government liberals agitating for ever-increasing government control and involvement in every aspect of our lives, without any accountability for results! After all, I'm a self-aware man who believes everyone should take a look at the practical results and consequences of what they do and how they do it, instead of just the 'good intentions'. And I think, when deciding where we're going to go in the future, we should actually look at where we've actually been in the past--not where some people imagine we've been, in a way that makes them the hero, photographed in a noble pose, filmed in soft-focus with symphonic music swelling in the background. I say we look at what actually works, what the actual costs are, and what our priorities are versus our resources, how we're going to hold new programs and bureaucracies accountable for real results, and go from there. And I am a proud conservative!"

There ya go! Feel free to pass it around, if you see the mistaken liberal version. And have a great day!

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Update: Francis Drouillard pointed out the following:

You forgot to mention MTBE, which was thrust upon us by well-intentioned liberals During the Clinton years in collusion with refineries that needed a better way to get rid of one of their byproducts their nasty byproducts. They "forced" the refineries to make regional oxygentated gasoline formulations that used the former byproduct, which not only required more gasoline to drive the same distance, but polluted our water wells as well.