I have noticed a huge influx of trolls both here at dkos and on other liberal sites of late. I normally just shrug it off and go about my business but, I have, on a couple of occassions now, felt it necessary to respond to their inanity. The following is a post I encountered on
the Huffington Post Blog. This poor deluded fool not only contradicts himself but, his version of the facts is so far spun (he's obviously a right-wing media junkie because ALL the talking points are there) that it's hard to tell if he really believes any of what he typed.
My response to him after the fold...
Good grief it's hard keeping up with the self indulgent lies of the left.
The blame America first crowd can't/won't accept the facts when they could simply just hate W. How about this, put yourself in the President's shoes for 30 seconds:
It's 9/11 and America has just suffered her single most tragic day at the hands of Al Qaeda, a world wide organization based in Afghanistan. You stop them in Afghanistan, but you have information from the CIA and intelligence agencies across the world, that Saddam (you know, the guy who has used WMD's against his own people and Iranians on several occasions) and his minions have met with Al Qaeda 90+ times. Do you wait for the 93rd meeting where Saddam hands off a WMD to the terrorists and New York becomes a smoking hole in the ground, or do you take action?
Had Saddam just said I've destroyed all the WMD's, and opened the doors for full cooperation/verification there would have been NO WAR. But no, Saddam wanted the world, and particularly his neighboring countries to believe he still had the WMD's - he's a mass murdering thug who wanted to be able to forever bully and intimidate the world. Blame Saddam not a President who did the responsible thing given the facts.
Do I wish the war had never had happened? Yes. Was the war a mistake? Yes, the war was a mistake, but W and Cheney didn't lie. They were fooled by a madman who had fooled Bill Clinton and every single intelligence agency in the world.
The war is tragic for all involved, but someday soon (once we train the Iraqi forces) we will turn over Iraq and leave, and in 20 years they will say George Bush brought Democracy to the Middle East.
Posted by: Dave Welch on August 18, 2005 at 05:40PM
Dave,
I would submit to you that it's much harder keeping up with the lies and spin on the right. Many of us who have been against this war from the beginning have tried to put ourselves in the President's shoes but, alas, I don't wear size 22s (or a rubber nose).
As you stated, we suffered our single most tragic day on 9/11/01 at the hands of al Qaeda, a worldwide organization led by a Saudi Arabian ex-pat holed up in Afghanistan. In point of fact, we did NOT stop them in Afghanistan because our President decided to change course and go after Iraq; diverting both troops and over $700 Million dollars away from the cause of stopping al qaeda to pursue their reckless ideas of nation building in Iraq. If we "stopped them in Afghanistan" as you say we did, then I have a single question for you: Where in the fuck is Osama Bin Laden and why has he not been brought to justice? The reality is that Osama Bin Laden, al qaeda, and yes even the Taliban still have complete impunity to operate in large sections of Afghanistan and Pakistan. As to the veracity of the intelligence given to the administration by the CIA and other intelligence organizations, there were MANY individuals at CIA, FBI, and the State Department that had very serious reservations about the intelligence being twisted by the administration to push for war in Iraq. Most of them have since been weeded out by Porter Goss' little pogrom at CIA but, the fact remains that there were serious reservations regarding the way in which the administration was using, and in some cases skewing, the intelligence on Iraq's alleged WMD programs. I would tell you to really look into the real reasoning behind "Bush's Brain", the man who sits 2 doors down from the Oval Office treasonously leaking the identity of a covert operative involved in hunting down and stopping the spread of the same varieties of WMD that were pushed as a rational to go to war in Iraq. I'm certain you won't look into it though because your talking points have already addressed it to your satisfaction. They haven't satisfied the special federal prosecutor though and I would be willing to bet that there are some indictments imminent.
Returning to the matter at hand though, Sadam was ready (and in fact publicly announced) that he was going to let the inspectors back in. Whether or not he had abided by that or not, the point is that our government did not do nearly enough in the realm of possible diplomatic solutions to the problem. As a veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan) and several other operations, I find it unconscionable that our government would controvert International laws and treaties of which our nation is a signor and use our troops as a first resort rather than examining ALL other possibilities. All the IAEA was asking for was another month to finish their examination. That wasn't good enough for the administration. They rushed to war because they saw dollar signs buried under the Iraqi sand and they had to have it!
I am having a difficult time understanding how you can say in one sentence that the war was wrong and a mistake and then, in the next, defend our alleged role there. The fact of the matter is that our role (and our rationale) in Iraq has changed so many times that it's difficult to keep up. You say that G.W. Bush will be remembered as having brought democracy to the Middle East. That's the most farcical statement I've read in a very long time. You, quite obviously, have no idea what the real conditions on the ground in Iraq are (I am in contact weekly with many friends who are currently serving in the theater). Iraq is in the precursor stages of what will probably prove to be a very violent, very bloody civil war. The democratic process surrounding forming a constitution is at a virtual standstill and the violence escalates daily. If anything, George Bush will be remembered for giving Iran the biggest present that they've ever received to go along with the present he gave al qaeda, the group who, unlike Iraq, actually attacked us. Mark my words, the mullahs will, more than likely, have a lot of control in the "new" Iraq. This war has been one foreign policy blunder after another; they haven't done a single thing right even though many voices both within (Gen. George Shinseki and others) and without (too many to name here) the administration warned them that this would be an exercise in futility. Truman is famous for having said, as President, that "the buck stops here". This administration and, in particular, this President have made it a point to make it very evident that the buck stops anywhere but there in their White House. G.W. Bush and, to some extent other members of his administration (some more than others), are DIRECTLY responsible for the nightmare that Iraq has become, the rise in terrorist events in the world over the last 2 years, the fact that Osama Bin Laden and his chief lieutenants are still at large, and the lies that they told to the American people and Congress (an impeachable offense I may add).