Imagine this man could have been our President

[FishForLunch]

Take a Ride on the John Kerry WayBack Machine

by Nathan Tabor
Posted Jun 25, 2006

After making a wrong turn in the lobby of a Washington hotel a few weeks ago, I found myself having to edge my way out of a conference room filled with glassy-eyed liberals, standing in rapt adulation while Senator John Kerry (D-MA) stood on stage, publicly purging himself of his 2002 vote for the Iraqi war resolution. My good friend, Professor Maroon was with me. “I was afraid this might happen,” he said. “We’re in the middle of the ‘Take Back America’ conference. Last time I saw a group of liberals look this catatonic was when Al Gore was in town. I almost feel bad for them, poor devils.”

“Forget them, Prof. Did you hear what Kerry just said? I thought he voted for intervention in Iraq? Now he says he was wrong. Now I’m confused.”

“Well son, I’m still working out some of the kinks, but let’s head up to my room and step into my John Kerry WayBack Machine and look at some of Long John’s earlier statements about Iraq.”

“Here we go. Put the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign on the door knob. C’mon. Step in and don’t be afraid…but hold on. This could get bumpy!”

“Wow. Pretty cool! Stop here Professor Maroon…2002. The time gauge says October. Look! There’s Kerry now.”

”"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force - if necessary - to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."

“Hey…this is fun Professor. But let’s ease up on the Kerry WayBack Machine lever a little. Here we go, December of 2003. Stop here.”

"Their sudden embrace of accelerated Iraqification and American troop withdrawal dates, without adequate stability, is an invitation to failure. The hard work of rebuilding Iraq must not be dictated by the schedule of the next American election."

“Did Kerry really say that Professor or is there something wrong with your invention?”

“Well, my boy. I might have to bring it in to the lab for some fining tuning. Then again, maybe we’ve entered a political wormhole, a disruption of the Space/Time Continuum, where things aren’t always what they seem to be. Lot of that going around in D.C.”

“A-w-w. This was starting to be fun Professor. Can we try it just one more time? Maybe set the machine to just a few days ago? Look Prof. There’s Kerry sulking on the Senate floor because only 6 of his fellow senators voted “aye” for his end-of-year troop withdrawal proposal. But I’m confused. I thought he said at our last stop that he was against cutting and running? But wait, now he’s talking with that fellow from Wisconsin, Senator Russ Feingold. Don’t they make a pair?”

“Turn the Kerry WayBack Machine off a moment, Professor Maroon. I think the junior senator from Massachusetts is now saying that he and Feingold have a new withdrawal plan. July 2007? What??”

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to pull the machine back into the lab, my boy. Something must be wrong with it.”

“I don’t know, Professor. I’ve been taking some notes. Correct me if I’m wrong, okay?”

“Let’s see. Kerry voted for the use of force against Iraq.”
“Check.”

“Kerry said a timetable for troop withdrawals is ‘an invitation to failure.’’
“Check.”

“Kerry said he was wrong to vote for the use of force against Iraq.”
“Check.”

“Kerry wants troops out of Iraq by the end of 2006.”
“Check.”

“Kerry wants troops out of Iraq by July, 2007.”
“Check.”

“Well son. Id rather be safe than sorry. It must be the Kerry WayBack Machine. This is still the beta version. We’re heading back to the lab so I can take a look under the hood of this thing. No politiciancould flip-flop so many times on an important issue like Iraq.”

“Check.”

[nashtymavsfan13]

Kerry is such a loser.

[Arne]

The USA shouldn't even have gone to Iraq to begin with. But to pull those troops back now, is the most stupid thing one could think of.

I'd suggest this:

Send even more troops to Afghanisthan, handle the situation, built up the country, then leave it to European troops and UN troops. Then as many troops as possible to Iraq and try the pretty difficult rebuilding once again.

But leaving now, is not an option. A war that isn't finished propperly, cannot be a successful war.

[Mavdog]

wow, it's all so clear now, over the timeline of those kerry quotes the situation in iraq has improved tremendously, hasn't it?. there is a stable government that controls its country, the insurgents have all but vanished, the sunnis and the shias have joined together and disbanded their militias, we don't continue to read daily about the death of american servicemen and the american troop levels have begun to decrease.

what? none of that has happened?

yeah, imagine if kerry had won the election....

I don't expect the us to be out of iraq anytime soon. unless of course the idea of a civil war and anarchy in iraq is acceptable to you. what are the odds we are out by the end of this decade?

[dalmations202]

Originally Posted by Mavdog

I don't expect the us to be out of iraq anytime soon. unless of course the idea of a civil war and anarchy in iraq is acceptable to you. what are the odds we are out by the end of this decade?

About the same odds as us being out of Germany 10 years after WWII, or us being out of Korea 10 years after the truce.

We are not leaving that area. We won't strategically, nor for a number of reasons. We will stabilize the area "as best as possible" though.

[Mavdog]

Originally Posted by dalmations202

About the same odds as us being out of Germany 10 years after WWII, or us being out of Korea 10 years after the truce.

We are not leaving that area. We won't strategically, nor for a number of reasons. We will stabilize the area "as best as possible" though.

the difference of course is that the troops in germany, as well as those who stayed on the korean peninsula, didn't see any combat during those "10 years".

the suggestion that the us will always have troops stationed in the mideast is unfortunate. the best scenario is the us will be able to stabilize the area sufficiently to remove all its troops. otherwise your suggestion only goes to validate powell's famous "pottery barn" comment, if we break iraq we'll end up owning it.

just one more reason to label the bush iraq policy as one of the greatest blunders of our time.

[GermanBlitzkrieg]

Mavdog, do some research. The Nazi faithful had insurgent activity (terrorists) 5 years after WWII. The battles in the Pacific continued long after the treaty with Japan was signed.

You young people don't know very much aboutt history, do you?

Do you have any idea how many American men lost thier lives just on the PREPARATIONS for D-Day? Not the actual battle, but just the weeks prepping for the battle? Over 2000!

That was in PREPARATION for ONE battle in the war.

Do you know how many Americans were lost in WWII? Over 400,000!

The problem with people today is lack of perspective.

Do some research. Realize everything living dies, including yourself. Then, decide what's important, realizing that no matter what anyone does, everything alive dies.

I don't want to die. But to try to make decisions on the basis of some overall "Save This! Save that!" philosophy, as if you are providing immortality to that person or animal, is delusional.

Acting as if the trouble ended when Tojo signed the treaty to end WWII and all hostilities ceased, and some sort of final peace magically happened, is ignorance.

Like it or not, people will ALWAYS have conflict. Unless we all become "global citizens" as part of the dictatorship some people want.

Oooh, Oooh, gotta get my tin foil hat on! They're trying to take me over! AAAAAHHHHH!

[Mavdog]

Originally Posted by GermanBlitzkrieg

Mavdog, do some research. The Nazi faithful had insurgent activity (terrorists) 5 years after WWII. The battles in the Pacific continued long after the treaty with Japan was signed.

you are comparing apples and oranges. there were rouge elements of nazis who were able to act, yet those elements were 1) not an organized resistance but more like criminal gangs, and 2) not like the iraqi insurgency in the ability to take control of complete cities. The same is true of the japanese, where forces who were still fighting allied troops did so because they didn't even know the war had ended.

You young people don't know very much aboutt history, do you?

take a look in the mirror...

Do you have any idea how many American men lost thier lives just on the PREPARATIONS for D-Day? Not the actual battle, but just the weeks prepping for the battle? Over 2000!

That was in PREPARATION for ONE battle in the war.

gee, thanks for bringing that up. too bad it has nothing to do with the discussion...

Do you know how many Americans were lost in WWII? Over 400,000!

The problem with people today is lack of perspective.

to compare the war in iraq with ww2 is what can best be described as a "lack of perspective."

Do some research. Realize everything living dies, including yourself. Then, decide what's important, realizing that no matter what anyone does, everything alive dies.

I don't want to die. But to try to make decisions on the basis of some overall "Save This! Save that!" philosophy, as if you are providing immortality to that person or animal, is delusional.

Acting as if the trouble ended when Tojo signed the treaty to end WWII and all hostilities ceased, and some sort of final peace magically happened, is ignorance.

Like it or not, people will ALWAYS have conflict. Unless we all become "global citizens" as part of the dictatorship some people want.

Oooh, Oooh, gotta get my tin foil hat on! They're trying to take me over! AAAAAHHHHH!

such a fatalist philosophy...

war is not an action that should be pursued as a natural course of events, it is an action that should be a last resort to reach a necessary result. the phrase "war is hell" has truth to it.

those who advocate war as a natural and acceptable means to resolve conflict do need to remove the foil hats from their heads. they are living in a fantasy land, war provokes more and more conflict, it does not reduce it. is that you? wake up before it's too late....

[GermanBlitzkrieg]

War happens. Over and over again. From the first time a bunch of cave men attacked other cave men. (Neanderthal vs. Neanderthal? Cro-magnon vs. Cro-magnon? Neanderthal vs. Cro-magnon?)

You live in a truly fantasy world. What are you willing to do to avoid war? Jail? In 1920, you could smoke dope and shoot morphine legally IF you could get your hands on it. Now, it is the threat of force that keeps people from smoking dope and shooting morphine. Or murdering.

Freedom is under a squeeze constantly. Dictatorship is the rule, democracy the exception, throughout history.

Here, I see nothing wrong in our war with Iraq. MI5(England), CIA, Isreali intelligence, Russian intelligence, Hell, French intelligence, all said he possessed weapons (WMDs). Either a world-wide deception, or a huge mistake. It was reported his own generals believed he had many weapons, up until the war. And, of course, they've found 500 to date. Just old weapons, so they don't count, right? THey aren't the "right" weapons, right? (Exactly what is a "right" WMD, anyway?)

But more importantly, a ruthless dictator fell. We are now facing our enemy, and he is losing (according to intercepts from the Jihadists).

And (I had a slight insult here) mavdog, WWII stopped the Nazis, Italians and Japanese by brutal force of war, not holding hands and singing "Kumbaya".

And the Revolution was won by force, and the Civil War, etc., etc., etc..

In fact, the only way transgressions throughout history have been stopped is by war.

Yes, it's terrible. But generation after generation after generation learns: aggressive, evil people have to be stopped by force: they don't care about reason. Usually, they think they are in the right. They are "true believers".

AND IF YOU DON'T FIGHT, YOU ARE CONQUERED.

Much the same way law enforcement works: stop with the threat of force behind the police, and you WILL have anarchy.

And show me where overthrowing a dictator caused ongoing violence? Had you rather have dictators?

Why do you deny basic human emotion and reality?

[mcsluggo]

War and conflict will necessarily occur. However, that doesn't mean that the good-guys have to go looking for it, enough of it will come looking for us. Without a question (in my mind) war in Afghanistan came looking for us, and we did what we had to do (at least at first, current progress there is up for debate)

In Iraq, war was "optional". Whether to go in came down to a benefit cost analysis:
(1) does the benefit of throwing out a loon outweigh the cost in termns of money/lives to going in.
(2) Added to that is the benefit/cost to area stability, which ex-ante was debatable-- would going in increase or decrease the stability of the greater region.
(3) Also, once the fact that we are going in (went in) HOW WELL DO YOU HANDLE THE OPERATION?

On question 1, I think clearly the world is better off without saddam in charge of a county. Duh. But at what cost? Imagine if just the money spent on the Iraq operations (and ignoring the non-fiscal costs) were spent on development aid to africa/afghanistan/nepal/yemen/indonesia...etc...etc... I think THOSE benefits would've greatly out-weighed the benefits we've seen in Iraq. Easily. Every action has an opportunity cost.

on question 2. We can still debate whether the region is more or less stable because of our actions in Iraq, but I'd argue that the area is LESS stable.

on question 3. I think this action was handled with an incredible level of incompetence. We began by alienating and pushing away almost EVERY other stakeholder that would've been helpful in actually having our long-run objectives take place (we kept one important one, england, but totally lost the english people). We (they) also purposely oversold the case for war, ensuring that public support would dwindle... (We could go on for a while here, but I've gotta get back to work, and these topics have been bashed back-and-forth quite enough in this forum)

but in the end, war is inevitable, but THIS one wasn't. However, given the fact we DID go to war, some competence executing it would've been welcome.



Back to the title of this thread: imagine, this man IS president. AGAIN!
http://www.george-bush-pics.com/uplo...-58-772515.jpg
it boggles the mind.