Bush Wants An Auto Pilot War
It matches so well with everything else in his auto-pilot life.
Posted by snark at April 30, 2007 08:19 AMThis is indeed great history in the making--30 years from now as the entire planet falls apart from global warming, there will be entire "Bushism" sections in bookstores. It may even become an academic discipline.
Everybody's playing for time, everybody's playing for the next election. This is understandable for Dems (who, to be fair, are actually confronting Bush) but inexplicable for Repubs.
You'd think Bush-Bashin' would become a fun DC parlor game, with each side competing over how viciously they could bring the rhetorical baseball bat down on the hapless, defenseless pumpkinhead, who is so wrong about literally everything and so corrupt that the stench is simply unbearable.
Posted by euzoius at April 30, 2007 08:32 AMwell, it appears we are stuck in Iraq. Waiting for the Dems to take the 08 elections. What if they don't? What if they do and the new Pres decides its in the national interest not to leave Iraq. What if we are indeed stuck there forever...There is only one way we'll leave Iraq in the foreseeable future and that is if the Iraqis drive us out. It wouldn't be pretty, but we'd be out.
Posted by T2 at April 30, 2007 08:41 AMThere is another way we would leave Iraq and that is a soldier revolt. People are working on that. It's what got us out of Vietnam. The pols probably won't do it.
Posted by Don Bacon at April 30, 2007 08:49 AMNews headline: "Tension rises in Washington over war-funding bill standoff--Congress is eyeing three strategies after an all-but-certain White House veto of the Iraq war bill.
"One option, favored by nearly all Republicans and some moderate Democrats, is to agree to strip out deadlines for withdrawal but to still require that the president certify that his own benchmarks for progress in Iraq are being met. These include political reconciliation, a fair distribution of Iraqi oil revenues, and a stronger Iraqi role in improving the security situation on the ground."
Withdrawal deadlines? I don't think so.
I guess it's only fair--after the Repub lies to get us into war we have the Dem lies to get us into peace--a much bettter course.
There are no troop deadlines in the $124 billion ($410 per American) spending bill, full of goodies for the military and for corporations, including agricultural ones. But the Dems are controlling the media on this one, and I heard on NPR that even the administration unworthies have bought the "deadline" story thus strenghtening the calls for a presidential veto. There is also the possibility of Repub defectuions from their party line as unhappiness with the Iraqi occupation builds.
Apparently nobody has actually read the bill (H.R.1591.ENR).
Regarding troop levels, the bill includes:
1. A requirement for a report with "determinations" from the president on or before July 1, 2007 regarding the Iraqi government meeting milestones.
2. "If the President fails to make any of the determinations" (which is probable) then the Pentagon "shall commence the redeployment of the Armed Forces from Iraq no later than July 1, 2007, with a goal of completing such redeployment within 180 days."
3. "If the President makes the determinations" (which is improbable, in my view) then the Pentagon "shall commence the redeployment of the Armed Forces from Iraq not later than October 1, 2007, with a goal of completing such redeployment within 180 days."
4. Troops may be retained in Iraq, despite any "redeployments", for the following:
(1) Protecting American diplomatic facilities and American citizens, including members of the United States Armed Forces.
(2) Serving in roles consistent with customary diplomatic positions.
(3) Engaging in targeted special actions limited in duration and scope to killing or capturing members of al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations with global reach.
(4) Training and equipping members of the Iraqi Security Forces.
So under the bill the redeployment is vague. There is no deadline, only a "goal". The administration has always had the position that "we'll stand down as the Iraqis stand up" so the "goal" is nothing new. According to the bill, troops can be retained to do pretty much what they're doing now. Troop levels could even be increased to combat the exaggerated al-Qaeda threat in Iraq, and of course they would all be "limited in duration and scope".
But propaganda beats truth every time, and if this media "deadline" story can shorten this fiasco then let's go there.
Posted by Don Bacon at April 30, 2007 08:50 AMIt should be most interesting watching either Hillary or Ru-Dee try to deal with the mess known as Bush's Iraq war in January, 2009.
Posted by Christopher at April 30, 2007 08:56 AMI have this silly idea. The Democrats grow a pair and actually solve this problem by cutting off the funds.
It will be much more difficult than the first "100 hours" public relations ploy...which nothing came of. It will certainly be much more difficult than waiting for a lobbyest to send them a check to pass legislation they haven't read. It will be hella more difficult than dog-and-pony investigations.
All of the above are reasons we'll be talking about Iraq in 2009, and well beyond. I have a feeling we'll be talking about Iraq when the market hits $30,000.00, the middle class are roaming the streets with cups in their hands and giving their children to strangers because they can't feed them, and all the wealthy are living in gated cities to guard their possessions.
Iraq is a wonderful tool that acts as a foil to cover what the Administration and Congress are doing otherwise.
Posted by phidipides at April 30, 2007 09:00 AMyou are correct Bacon...Bush could sign the bill and get the money he wants and still keep his war. The PR would be beneficial politically for him if he were to "listen to the American People" and "let" the Dems have their way. The war would be transferred to the Dems back, yet nothing would change really. Politics trumps all with Bush/Rove....signing the bill might be a surprise that would pay political dividends plus allowing Bush to run out his term without having to "lose" in Iraq.
Posted by T2 at April 30, 2007 09:02 AMphidipides, Wouldn't that be a treat?
Posted by Christopher at April 30, 2007 09:07 AMI'm tired of hearing that we're trapped in Iraq. The Democrats can get us out, and they don't need Bush's stinking signature.
Here's what they need to do:
NOTHING. Just don't send any more spending bill for Iraq. Period. No money, no war. Tell the president that the people elected them to Congress to end the war. That's what they're doing: so Bush needs to bring our troops home now. Congress will make more money available to complete the withdrawal as soon as Bush starts.
Or Bush can leave the troops to die and take the consequences. That's Bush's choice. Then, impeachment would be a certainty.
Yeah, I know the Dems don't want to be blamed for pulling the funding. But it's the only choice they have. Endorse the war by funding it, or end the war by defunding it. If our commander-in-chief continues to be a bloodthirsty idiot, then our troops are dead anyway...
Posted by Publicus at April 30, 2007 09:12 AM"You'd think Bush-Bashin' would become a fun DC parlor game"
..."Whack a Bush" by Parker Brothers will hit the shelves around Christmas, at the peak of the impeachment trial.
Didn't Bush also put the Vietnam War on auto pilot by going AWOL from the air guard?
Posted by TIKI AL at April 30, 2007 01:26 PMThank you, Publicus. A breath of fresh air among the doom-seers and doom-scenters whom seem to frequent THC comments section... If Bush veteos the occupation funding bill, great. Then Bush will have finally ended his stupid war on and occupation of Iraq all by his little bitty self. It will be the first positive act in his whole miserable life.
This veto will also bring to an end, our imperial occupation of Afghanistan. After all, the US and the CIA under President Reagan created the forerunners to both al-Queda and the Taliban... I guess that we don't much care for our own handiwork some twenty years later.
That leaves our interference in Somalia and Ethiopia to be defunded and ended. If you are curious as to why B & C are murdering Somalis, do a google or clusty search on "Conoco Somalia Ltd" The first hit along should provide you with plenty of useful background information.
phidipides, Wouldn't that be a treat?
Maybe it will be like Brazil, the republi-con paradise? Each to their own and death squads roaming the streets killing unwanted children like vermin.
The treat is when I'm watching the sunset in Patagonia. That's the treat.
Maybe it will be like Brazil, the republi-con paradise?
Isn't that Paraguay?
Where Little Boots and Pickles just bought their 100,000 acre ranch over the largest fresh water acquifer in South Murika?
Posted by Christopher at April 30, 2007 02:39 PMPresident Bush, May 1, 2003, on board the USS Abraham Lincoln: "In the images of falling statues, we have witnessed the arrival of a new era. For a hundred of years of war, culminating in the nuclear age, military technology was designed and deployed to inflict casualties on an ever-growing scale. In defeating Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, Allied forces destroyed entire cities, while enemy leaders who started the conflict were safe until the final days. Military power was used to end a regime by breaking a nation.
"Today, we have the greater power to free a nation by breaking a dangerous and aggressive regime. With new tactics and precision weapons, we can achieve military objectives without directing violence against civilians. No device of man can remove the tragedy from war; yet it is a great moral advance when the guilty have far more to fear from war than the innocent." (Applause.)
We don't target civilians?
BAGHDAD, April 29 (Reuters) - The U.S. military in Iraq launched an artillery barrage in southern Baghdad on Sunday against suspected insurgent targets, with two dozen loud explosions shaking the southern outskirts of the capital.
U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Christopher Garver said the morning blasts, which were heard across the city, were caused by U.S. artillery but declined to say what the target was.
Tens of thousands of U.S. and Iraqi troops have been deployed in Baghdad as part of a 10-week-old security crackdown to combat sectarian militias and insurgents.
The Iraqi police said the artillery was being fired from the U.S. Forward Operating Base Falcon in southern Baghdad into the al-Buaitha neighborhood of Dora, a volatile district that is a Sunni insurgent stronghold.
Posted by Don Bacon at April 30, 2007 05:15 PMIsn't that Paraguay?
It's only for the beautiful scenery. The no-extradition to America has nothing t do with it.
Posted by phidipides at April 30, 2007 07:46 PMThe reason Bush will not push al-Maliki to adhere to timelines and benchmarks is because (the entire world except for Americans already know) the Maliki government is impotent. The Iraqi people no more see their Parliament as legitimate than they do the US overseeing the country.
Iraqis know their government is a US-puppet government -- al-Maliki cannot make a move until approved by the WH. So is it any wonder Bush will not set up benchmarks, al-Maliki has no authourity in which to enforce them. Bush knows this.
But Bush does not want Americans to find out...
Shhh it's a secret!
Posted by seena1313 at April 30, 2007 10:03 PM