Jules seems to think the National Security of the US is advanced by allowing the Middle East to sink deeper into Islamistism in the age of WMD.

it would also be “too bad” for the soldiers who died because their political bosses didn’t have a clue about the Arab world.

Democracy is hard, it takes real grown ups, and personal responsibility.

I agree democracy is hard work and takes great dedication over every generation to sustain it. Unfortunately, the evolved political culture of Iraq is tribal. There’s is limited interest in civil society. When doing good for the country as a whole goes about against tribal concerns the latter win out almost every time. George Bush should have listened to Omar Sharif:

Omar Sharif: I said to Bush, even before he entered Iraq: Forget about all that. We, the Arabs… We are not like [regular countries]. We are sects. This is how we have always been. Egypt is the exception, because we Egyptians are a people that… [I said to Bush:] If you enter Iraq–what will you do with the Sunnis, the Shiites, and the Kurds? You will drown there. You have Iran and Syria next to you–these are Shiites, and those are Sunnis. What do you know about all these things? You will drown there.

Interviewer: How did he respond?

Omar Sharif: He didn’t believe me. I told him that I come from the East and I know… He said: “No, there must be a democracy there.” I said to him: We don’t have a democracy, and we never will. You’ll see, because people like me prefer to go to the neighborhood sheik. I like going to him, and he resolves all the problems. If someone stole from you, or something, you take him to the neighborhood sheik, and you say: This man stole from me. The sheik says to him: Return the money, or never come back to the neighborhood.

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A Tipping Point In Iraq?

By: Andrew Sullivan
06 Jul 2008 11:28 am

excerpt:

The Mosul campaign is a final and critical one, and Marie Colvin, an excellent and seasoned reporter, has very encouraging news…

This is Iraq. But if someone had told me a year ago that fifteen of eighteen benchmarks had been reached, that all the parties were in negotiation over future politics, that al Qaeda was close to dead at the hands of the US and the Iraqis, and that oil contracts were being handed out amid four-year lows in violence, I wouldn’t have believed them.

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/07/a-tipping-point.html

Are Iraq and democracy compatable?

Here’s an Iraqi opinion that makes sense to me:

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excerpt:

What we want to say here is that we-east and west, left and right-all acknowledge that the West has a long history of successfully manipulating the course of events in the Middle East. Let’s look at a bunch of milestones in recent Middle East history. The creation of Hashemite monarchies, the creation of Israel, the counter-Mosaddaq coup in 1953, the Iraq-Iran war, the nationalists’ rise to power, or the Soviet’s defeat at the Mujahideen’s hands. These are all facts, and the decisive role of the West in shaping the outcome of all these events and many more is also a fact.

Now some may wonder why we think this can be useful. Here’s why;

This ability of the West to influence or induce a change in the Middle East can be used to consolidate our efforts to bring about, and sustain, a change in the right direction to produce a democratic secular mass similar to that in the West. This is what America has been trying to do for a while, alas with great opposition in Europe and inside America itself.

The time is perfect to push forward with this now, especially that in the first phase of US-led democratization, Islamist powers have been tested and their shortcomings are being exposed, at least in Iraq and the Palestinian territory.

One of the key questions that usually arise is whether Islam is compatible with democracy or if there’s an inherent obstacle that makes democracy impossible in Muslim societies.

It’s a good question, but it’s also irrelevant. Let’s consider the following questions:

Is Islam compatible with nationalism? Or better, could Islam ever be compatible with godless communism!? Recent history shows that religion did not prevent nationalism or communism from taking root in the region; there were times both ideologies took turns in becoming the prevailing trends.

What many people forget is that in the Middle East, religion is only one identity, among many others, that people adhere to or use to describe themselves. I mentioned the two other identities; communist ideology and nationalistic sentiments because both were at times so strong in the Middle East. So strong that in Iraq in the late 50s and 60s the bloody competition for power was exclusively between the communists and nationalists-one is non-religious and the other is anti-religious.

Given the above points, we believe it is very possible to make the Middle East accept and endorse secular democracy, especially that this is the best among all systems of governance.
The West excelled at manipulating the course of events in the Middle East and we in the Middle East have always gone with the flow. Virtually everyone on the Middle East switched sides more than once and elder people of our parents’ generation for example knows this first hand. Pick a man from that generation, look at his path and you’ll see that he or she was a staunch supporter of the kings in the 1940s, then became a Marxist in the 1950s, then a nationalist in the 1960s and 70s, only to become an Islamist in the 80s or 90s. Some, however, were on the other side and did this course the other way around because of socioeconomic factors, location or mere personal impulses. Anyway, the former path was dominant among a majority of people.

The feeling that things have gone out of control in the region should not discourage us. Western powers have always managed to shepherd the Middle East into positions that seemed to best serve their interests. Now if the West believes that a secular democratic Middle East is in everyone’s best interest, all it has to do is push for it the same way it did at any time in the 20th century. And when we get there all it will have to do is to not rock the boat.

By Mohammed and Omar Fadhil

http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/2008/06/where-is-middle-east-heading.html

If you believe that the President lied, he was after oil, he knew there were no WMD’s, that he hated Saddam for trying to kill his father, that he just loves war, then you can make up any motive or motives.

I believe that the President is an honorable man, that he didn’t lie, that he would never lie or intentionally mislead the American people. That he respects all life, that he would do what ever it took to protect the country. That he says what he means and means what he says. Because he is not eloquent, stumbles, picks his words very carefully so as to not mislead others who may be listening, MSM thinks he is dumb, not capable of leading this nation. After Clinton it’s not hard to imagine, in that MSM could never print what he said without trying to figure out what the lies were first.

One day in history we may know the answers. But one thing I’m sure of is that this President would never have taken this country to war popular or not unless he knew he had to.

Clearly the ones the lefties ignored!

WHICH Administration official said this?

And they also made it plain that the Taliban were in Pakistan. Needless to say Juan does not want to invade Pakistan.

And you know what? We used the NATO forces and the UN and the international community in the fight in Afghanistan. Now people like Juan act as if we should tell the world to go to hell and send 200,000 troops into Pakistan, or something.

You are pathetic. The Iraqis have made more progress in the last few months than the left said was possible. And rather than see something good in that they either wish for another war somewhere else or they act as if it does not matter. Pathetic is the only word for it.

The Christian Science Monitor has a good article on all this.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0703/p01s04-wome.html

As one of the Iraqis interviewed said: “All this calm is temporary, trust me. If we get someone like Saddam Hussein back, Iraq will be itself again. We need someone with his control.” US troops on the ground express scepticism about the lull in the fighting and don’t think it will last.

Even the successful businesses all appear to be heavily subsidized by the US taxpayer.

Democracy and Iraq do not go together; never have, never will. All those US troops and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians have died because of the ideological fanaticism at the heart of US foreign policy.

Love to watch their reaction to Juan William…

Juan hasn’t learned the truth.