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I see an increasingly precious part of critical political discourse that is slipping away in favor of fascist-flavored media labeling and bombast.


Assuming I understand what you mean, I'll agree with you on this. I think both sides are equaly at blame. What's sad is that the labeling and bombasting isn't just in the media anymore - it's made it's way the floors of Congress. Maybe we were spoiled in the last half century. It seems that this type of politics was quite common in the not too distant history.

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Am I *rooting* for failure? I think Rush et al work pretty hard to equate *predicting* failure with rooting for failure. I feel a responsibility to predict failure if that is my conviction. Do I wanna tell my sisters "Oh, don't worry about <my nephew>, cuz it's all going to work out great in Iraq?" Should we not opine/predict? When placing the country in a complete lose/lose situation, it is pretty hard to predict success (although we seem to have a pretty good supply of functionaries who try!). Should I try to predict success like the starry-eyed Rumsfelds and Condis?


Well, we certainly have a disconnect here then. Are you truely "convict(ed).. to predict failure"? I could undertand if you saw failure and were convicted to express it, but it seems that being determined to arrive a certain prediction is pretty close to rooting for it (failure). The Iraq War is far from a lose/lose situation in most people's minds. We can go on and on about who is more likely to be right, but there have already been a million threads on this and I don't think this one needs to stray into that area. But the only way to ensure failure is to concede to it. Ted Kennedy seems to prefer this route, I do not.

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Karzai isn't called the "Mayor of Kabul" for nothing. Afghanistan is part of a region. I don't think it can be treated as a compartment separate from places like Pakistan. We made some mistakes and then made some bigger ones -- diverted focus. As Derrick suggests, the country is not secure. Not only has the Fat Lady not sung, I don't think her costume is back from the cleaners yet.


Do you really go through life predicting doom and gloom at every turn? Would anything short of Utopia satisfy you? There were a LOT of people shouting that military victory in Afghanistan was impossible and had in fact already been lost. We were going to ignite a nuclear war between Pakistan and India. Iran was going to jump into the frey. I'm not claiming that things are all hunky dory over there, but it amazes me what sort of results are being expected here. Maybe this wholePESD thing is real.
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Brad B.