At least they stopped pretending the war has anything to do with freedom for the people of Iraq. It’s more like a Raiders football game — just win, baby!
A few days ago, John Podhoretz of the Post (h/t tristero) made a call for Sunni extermination. That’s how far we’ve come.
His lead-in:
WHAT if liberal democracies have now evolved to a point where they can no longer wage war effectively because they have achieved a level of humanitarian concern for others that dwarfs any really cold-eyed pursuit of their own national interests?
The most conservative confirmed numbers of dead Iraqi civilians are about 40,000. Back in 2004, though, the British medical journal Lancet had already estimated the total at 100,000. Great point, John. About the caring and all.
What if the universalist idea of liberal democracy – the idea that all people are created equal – has sunk in so deeply that we no longer assign special value to the lives and interests of our own people as opposed to those in other countries?
All people? Harrumph. “From 2003 to 2004, real average income for the top 1 percent of households shot up by 17 percent. For the remaining 99 percent, the average gain was under three percent. Indeed, the top one percent accumulated 36 percent of all income increases in 2004, a six percent increase from 2003.” (Thanks, Ezra!)
Improbably, Podhoretz compares the current situation to fighting the Germans and the Japanese:
Didn’t the willingness of [our] leaders to inflict mass casualties on civilians indicate a cold-eyed singleness of purpose that helped break the will and the back of their enemies? Didn’t that singleness of purpose extend down to the populations in those countries in those days, who would have and did support almost any action at any time that would lead to the deaths of Germans and Japanese?
You might remember the Germans from such invasions as Poland and France. You might remember the Japanese from such sneak attacks as Pearl Harbor. You might remember the Iraqis from… from… uh… the last time we invaded them?
Podhoretz genuinely seems unable to see the distinction between the tyrannical forces from 65 years ago and the peoples of the Middle East today. He appears unable to grasp that one set of foes was bent on world domination and got much closer than they should have and the other is simply sitting on some shit we want. Honestly, that an educated American could openly say that the two are equal baffles me.
The only comparison to be made is of the invaders bent on world domination. (Hint: Iraq isn’t one of them.)
What if the tactical mistake we made in Iraq was that we didn’t kill enough Sunnis in the early going to intimidate them and make them so afraid of us they would go along with anything? Wasn’t the survival of Sunni men between the ages of 15 and 35 the reason there was an insurgency and the basic cause of the sectarian violence now?
Boom. There it is. Behold the unraveling of the last threads of our morality.
Oh, and John, since you seem to need to much help, I’ll go ahead and point out that the reason there’s an insurgency and sectarian violence now is because we invaded them and sent their country spiraling into anarchy.
After arguing for cruelty from Israel (presumably the Britain in his warped WWII analogy), JP writes:
And as for the United States, what if we have every tool at our disposal to win a war – every weapons system we could want manned by the most superbly trained military in history – except the ability to match or exceed our antagonists in ruthlessness?
What was that quote from our revolutionary war again? Something about how much harder you fight for your own soil than someone else’s?
Anyway, Podhoretz has the gall to finish thusly:
Can it be that the moral greatness of our civilization – its astonishing focus on the value of the individual above all – is endangering the future of our civilization as well?
If you replace greatness with corruption, individual with rich white straight man, and our with all, I’m listening. But other than that, this homicidal maniac can kiss my sweet bippy.
Good lord that is scary. I have no words, really. Is this America?
Sweet Jesu! I’m going to be sick. “Kill ‘em all and let God sort it out” type bullshit.
Wasn’t the survival of Sunni men between the ages of 15 and 35 the reason there was an insurgency and the basic cause of the sectarian violence now?
Why go so easy on us? Weren’t we negligent in sparing the younger sons and brothers of these men who would grow up wanting to avenge them? What about the women who could have given birth to more dangerous insurgents? The old people who — well, I guess we can let them live, the useless bastards.
Yes, what a wacky notion; that we might actually try to at least attempt to give lipservice to the barest outline of an idea that just maaayyyybeeee there might be a better solution than killing everyfuckingbody.
especially since if we’re to take his idea to its conclusion–huzzah! nuclear war!
but hey, who cares if things spiral out of control and all that’s left of our sorry-ass world is a pile of ashes and rubble and cockroaches? WE’RE NUMBER ONE, BAYBEE!! WE MUST WIN AT ALL COSTS!!!1!!1!
stupid fucktard. I’m sure he’d happily throw himself on the grenade of the greater good, of course. hey, John Podunk: what d’you mean “our people,” white dude? why should any of us go to the mat for your sorry murderous ass, hm?
Uh, so has the right completely abandoned “democratic peace” theory now? You know, the soft side of neocon philosophy which suggests out that it’s more difficult for liberal democracies to go to war?
You mean the country founded on the genocide of indigenous people and chattel slavery? The country that invaded and annexed half of Mexico, on the pretext that Mexico was sheltering escaped slaves? The country that tested napalm on German troops that had already surrendered and nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki in order to frighten the Russians?
Yes, that’s America.
What if the tactical mistake we made in Iraq was that we didn’t kill enough Sunnis in the early going to intimidate them
And what if the tactical mistake we made in Iraq was the huge tactical mistake of invading a country for no apparent reason, for Oil and so Bush could say “screw you daddy, I caught the guy who you turned into a 1 dimensional hate figure.”
That thought never even remotely crossed Podpeople’s mind.
[...] The film is appalling. While it opens with a cursory exemption of the peace-loving Muslim from its crosshairs, it repeatedly shows images like Muslim children celebrating 9/11 — images designed to ease the conscience and pave the way for genocide. [...]
I guess a little more genocide never hurt anyone: and there’s all these nuclear weapons lying around, just, you know, rotting – might as well use them up and make some new ones.
[...] So now it’s the “genetic reality” of Middle Easterners to fight and kill each other? They’re not humans; they don’t share our genetic traits. I guess this justifies outright genocide then to our neoconservative friends. [...]