I recently had an e-mail exchange with David Horowitz about one of his blog entries on Cindy Sheehan. It ended with an exchange in which he made the incredible claim that the Bush administration never cited Iraq possessing WMD as part of its justification for invading Iraq. I responded to the claim and didn't hear from Mr. Horowitz again. The complete exchange is below and it is also posted on my blog
Delaware Watch. (more below)
THE E-MAIL EXCHANGE
Original Blog entry by David Horowitz
It's probably because she's too busy hating her country. Casey Sheehan was not a draftee in a war he didn't approve. He volunteered not once but twice, the second time after the Iraq war was well underway. He was a mechanic and there was no reason he should have been in harm's way the day he was killed except that he volunteered to rescue his comrades who were under fire. Casey Sheehan was a war hero in a war he embraced.To listen to the mother only an idiot could volunteer for the war Casey died in. George Bush's war. Haliburton's war. The Jews' war. Cindy Sheehan is a hateful woman. Not all the grief in the world can excuse her reprehensible behavior. And it certainly can't excuse all the America-haters, Bush-haters, and haters of the war for Iraq's freedom who are willing to hide behind this woman's grief to libel their own country and its President and to bring joy to its enemies' hearts
link
My reply:
Nice try, David. But your commentary won't do because it rests on a false premise. Sheehan isn't speaking on behalf of her son. She has acknowledged ad nauseam (for people like you who seem to ignore the point) that her view of the war differed from her son's. She is speaking about her own grief and pain (do you doubt she has it?) and her own belief that the war was unjustified and hardly constituted the kind of compelling strategic necessity required to make the loss of her son and the other 1,800 plus Americans worth their sacrifice."
In the end, David, your piece assumes that Sheehan isn't entitled to have and express a view as strongly as she can manage simply because it differs from her deceased son's. Not only is that a logical howler, but it is completely irrelevant to understanding what she is about as well.
Horowitiz's reply:
I understand she has a different point of view from her son. The problem is that her point view makes her son look like an idiot. You can't present the war as simply a bunch of lies put over on a bunch of credulous Americans without this result. It's Cindy's hate for America and her extremist views that make her respect for her son doubtful.
My reply:
Come on, David. Isn't there anyone in your life that you fundamentally differ w/ on some issue, but you love them nevertheless? Does the fact that you publicly take [a] stand that differs from this loved one in any way suggest that you believe this person is an idiot? That simply doesn't follow.
Yes, she thinks he was wrong and made a bad choice. But she's in Crawford for herself. That's the essence of the matter.
David, I am on the left, but I frankly don't understand why conservatives haven't argued that Bush should meet w/ her. Have the meeting in private, let her speak her mind, and then w/i a week or two, the matter would end as far as media coverage is concerned. Here's another thing. If he did it, the left would be in no position to say that he didn't do the honorable thing w/ her.
You guys should be angry w/ Bush for not making this go away. But trashing this sad & angry mom only compounds the coverage.
Thanks for your quick reply.
Horowitiz's reply:
Sure. But if you insist as Cindy does that there is no way a decent human being could support the war that doesn't leave much room for respect for those who do, does it?.
My reply:
I don't recall when Sheehan's son died. But many people believed we would find WMD and collaborative AQ links after the invasion. I never thought so, but I confess having a few moments of pause when I heard Rumsfeld claim "We know they have WMD and we know where they are located" or words to that effect. The people who believed Iraq had some WMD capacity before the invasion includes individuals some people would consider surprising: Chomsky, for example. All of that now has come to naught. (Now even the more abstract justifications are being scaled back by the administration: Iraq as a bastion of democracy in the heart of the Islamic Middle East, etc.)"
Sheehan's son might have died before the mounting non-evidence for the war's justification became manifest. That simply means [a near redundancy omitted here] he trusted his government but died before the non-evidence came in. So she might think her son wasn't an idiot, but she could wonder why NOW people continue to believe the war was justified. (To be frank, I have met some supporters of the war that simply cannot imagine any set of evidentiary circumstances that would make them doubt either the wisdom or the justification for the invasion. For them, it is enough that Saddam hated us. Bad thoughts are enough.)
If as you claim, Cindy stated that no decent human being can support the war, then that could simply be a manifestation of where we are in time regarding confirming the original justifications.
Beyond all that, why does she need to respect war supporters to speak for her own grief?
Hororwitz's reply:
This is a desperation move. He died in March 2004 after three weeks [on] his new tour, long after the wmd issue had already been hacked to death. The troops in Iraq understand that they're fighting for the freedom of 25 million Iraqis and the saftey of American citizens -- something Cindy and her friends don't. This kid died a hero trying to save others. Don't think you a decent mother would want to remind people of her son's noble qualities even if she condemned the war policy? There's something terribly wrong with this woman. She's been disowned by her own family (or didn't you notice?).
The justification for the war was not WMDs and you can't find me a single statement of war aims by the president or the Congress that would justify such a claim on your part. Your statement that supporters of the war think that Saddam's hatred for us justified it is absurd.
My reply:
David:
"This is a desperation move. He died in March 2004 after three weeks no his new tour, long after the wmd issue had already been hacked to death."
The WMD issue hadn't been hacked to death in March 2004. The
Duelfer Report wasn't released until 9/30/04, six months after the young man had been killed. Even the UK Guardian didn't think that the
"final verdict" on the WMD question" was in until Duefler. Perhaps you are confused about the chronology?
"The troops in Iraq understand that they're fighting for the freedom of 25 million Iraqis and the saftey of American citizens -- something Cindy and her friends don't."
For someone who has expressed agnosticism about the ability of a mother to speak for her son (something that never was in issue in the first place), you now pretend to be able to speak for over 100,000 troops. The cheek of that is astounding.
"This kid died a hero trying to save others. Don't think you a decent mother would want to remind people of her son's noble qualities even if she condemned the war policy?"
But she has talked about his exemplary qualities. Again, I would remind you. Her point isn't to talk about her son. Her point is to talk about the loss of her son. Sure, that involves her talking about what her son meant to her, what his loss means to her, etc., but what she is doing is clearly distinct from talking for him.
"There's something terribly wrong with this woman. She's been disowned by her own family (or didn't you notice?).
I noticed. I just don't make anything of it because it is not the least bit surprising. She has happened to garner a lot of attention and much of it has been negative. That along with the loss for the family puts considerable stress on the family. In any case, family disapproval is hardly a worthwhile standard by which to judge the virtue of someone's dissent. I don't know if your parents were still alive when you changed your political perspective and began to publicly express it. But I would certainly hope that you wouldn't hold that any (if any at all) disapproval they might have had for your change in perspective [would] be sufficient grounds for you to stifle your expression of it.
"The justification for the war was not WMDs and you can't find me a single statement of war aims by the president or the Congress that would justify such a claim on your part"
Surely you jest. There are numerous public statements that Bush made to this effect. But let's just concentrate on his official ones. Take his letter to Congress on 3/19/03
authorizing the use of force against Iraq. Bush explicitly stated: "
I determine that:
(1) reliance by the United States on further diplomatic and other peaceful means alone will neither (A) adequately protect the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq nor (B) likely lead to enforcement of all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq; and
(2) acting pursuant to the Constitution and Public Law 107-243 is consistent with the United States and other countries continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001.
Although this not at issue between us, let me just point out that Bush unmistakably links the attack on Iraq with 9/11, a link he later denied after the invasion. But more to the point, he states as a justification for the use of force that "reliance by the United States on further diplomatic and other peaceful means alone will [not] likely lead to enforcement of all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq."
What do those resolutions involve? Among others the resolutions [require] Iraq not to produce WMD and/or have WMD programs, as Bush himself claimed to the UN that Iraq was doing (9/12/02). Here is the
entire document he submitted to the UN. He clearly states to the UN that Iraq is producing WMD and/or has restarted WMD programs across the entire spectrum of WMD possibilities (short [of] lasers): nuclear, chemical, biological, and ballistic weapons. Here is
that portion of his case to the UN.
Moreover, the new National Security Strategy of the USA clearly stated that:
Our immediate focus will be those terrorist organizations of global reach and any terrorist or state sponsor of terrorism which attempts to gain or use weapons of mass destruction (WMD) or their precursors....(emphasis mine) (p. 12, link)
The immediate focus is right. It was Iraq. We invaded the country 6 months later, looking for the WMD that weren't there.
In all seriousness, David, although one could make (in my view) a tenuous case that the White House mistakenly believed Iraq was a WMD threat sufficient to justify a preemptive attack, one would have to be either seriously misinformed or fanatically loyal to Bush to claim that WMD was not a significant part of the justification for invading Iraq.
I had no idea you held this view. It surprises me, frankly. You ought to give that one up. That dog will never hunt now.
"Your statement that supporters of the war think that Saddam's hatred for us justified it is absurd."
I specifically said: "I have met some supporters of the war that simply cannot imagine any set of evidentiary circumstances that would make them doubt either the wisdom or the justification for the invasion. For them, it is enough that Saddam hated us. Bad thoughts are enough."
There are some important qualifiers there, David: "I have met them" and "some." I didn't say "all." But, yes, I agree. Being hated is an absurd justification for going to war.