Goose the Blog 2.0

While were on the subject of revising language, Juan Cole gives us the speech he wishes the President had given in the Fall of 2002.

I wrote a similar, less well-written piece for this blog back in late May 2004 (I think), and then never published it. I called it:

somewhat disingenuous

Flashback: On April 20, Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of State, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee. He delivered testimony concerning the abysmal human rights record of Saddam Hussein and the progress that has been made in bringing freedom to the Iraqi people. He made no mention of weapons of mass destruction or Iraqi ties to terrorism. Senator Edward Kennedy called it "somewhat disingenuous" that he had neglected to discuss the Administration's primary motivations for going to war in Iraq.

A thought experiment: Imagine it is March, 2003. President Bush has just said, on prime-time TV, that he is going to war against Iraq to remove Saddam Hussein and the Ba'athist Party from power, in order to liberate the Iraqi people. He says that there are no WMDs. He says that there are no meaningful ties to al Qaeda and no convincing evidence Iraq has been involved in terrorist attacks against US interests. He says that the war and its aftermath will cost in excess of $200 billion and result in the loss of more than 1000 American soldiers, plus thousands of hands, arms, legs, eyes, and pieces of brain. The war will also cause the death of at least 10,000 Iraqi soldiers and 13,000 civilians. He says that a side effect of the war will be an increase in the number of international terrorist incidents linked to Islamic terrorist groups, a deepening of the distrust and hatred of the United States in the Islamic world, and the alienation of the international community. Further, he cannot promise a swift victory, a pro-American democratic Iraq, a stable Iraqi nation, or even an exit strategy for the eventual removal of American troops. All he can promise is the capture or death of Saddam Hussein, his sons, and the ruling elite of Iraq, and an end to some of the human rights abuses for which they are responsible.

Would you support this war?

Would you re-elect a President who prosecuted such a war?

If you were given $200 billion and the lives of 1000 soldiers, is this how you would make America safer?

(Aside: You should see my archive of unpublished rants, comments, and other stuff that never made it to the big show. For one reason or another, I keep just about everything I write. I suppose it is in case I need it one day. At the turn of the year, I toyed with the idea of just lumping them all into one approximately chronological block and posting the whole thing. Lucky for you I didn't!)