It's Stephen Hayes versus Laurie Mylroie in a hilarious "battle of the Iraq/al-Qaeda conspiracy theorists." My preferences here lie with Mylroie who takes on a more extreme, and therefore more coherent, worldview in which we're supposed to essentially believe that Saddam Hussein is the cigarette smoking man behind all evil in the galaxy. Hayes, by contrast, tends to operate as someone who's primarily interested in scoring debater's points -- "liberals sometimes say there was no connection between Iraq and al-Qaeda, but an Iraqi guy and a guy who knows Saddam met once in 1996 so we had to invade to stop another 9/11!"
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Wingnut Versus Wingnut
01 May 2008 08:31 am
Comments (36)
Actually, MY's version is weirdly appropriate. The claim that someone from Iraq once met someone from Iraq is close to a tautology. Basing the question of whether to invade Iraq on a tautology pretty much guarantees that you'll invade Iraq. Which, of course, is what the wingnuts wanted.
Completely OT, but I'm really curious. MY, could you enlighten us to how things work behind the scenes in Chez Atlantic. When you heard about the Goldberg hire, were you able to spout-off to some muckety-muck or another: "Jeff Golberg?!? Are you f***ing kidding me?!?!"
When you heard about the Goldberg hire, were you able to spout-off to some muckety-muck or another: "Jeff Golberg?!? Are you f***ing kidding me?!?!"
People seem confused about this, JG was hired almost a year ago right after I was. His blog is new, but he's written several cover stories for the magazine already.
OK, now we want to know if you've asked Ambinder why he doesn't have the "testicular fortitude" to allow comments
Strange stuff perhaps, but wingnuts? Wasn't Jim Woolsey CIA director under Clinton? Isn't he a Democrat? Wasn't he peddling his theories about Iraq in TNR? Didn't Ackerman accept a job there after those articles were published? Isn't he still trading on the reputation he made for getting fired from TNR?
I'll leave you to judge whether I'm trading on my reputation as a TNR martyr. I won't exactly deny it, though, nor do I see what's so wrong with that. And yeah, I accepted a job there after "Blood Baath" ran. And? As a 22 year old out of college with no job, should I have vetted the magazine for ideological acceptability and journalistic rigor? Is that how the real world works, now?
And stop doing that neocon bullshit. Yes, Woolsey was CIA director under Clinton for like 6 months. Richard Perle is still a Democrat. So? These guys like to con people into wankerish statements like, "Well, Perle's a Democrat and he agrees with Bush, so everyone to the left of Perle is clearly a dirty hippie worth ignoring!" You don't really fall for that, do you?
Thomas, aren't you engaging in the same sort of stuff we're mocking Myrolie and Hayes for doing?
Wasn't Jim Woolsey CIA director under Clinton?
This does not give him immunity from entering the hollowed halls of wingnuttery. That is part of the problem, so many in the beltwayosphere (Republicans, Democrats and journalist) are fully vested in neocon world view.
People seem confused about this, JG was hired almost a year ago right after I was. His blog is new, but he's written several cover stories for the magazine already."
When you heard about the Goldberg hire (which occurred at earlier date then many people assume) , were you able to spout-off to some muckety-muck or another: "Jeff Golberg?!? Are you f***ing kidding me?!?!"
So why doesn't Jeffrey Goldberg has comments on his blog?
And will The Atlantic be giving out more cushy jobs to more who were so tragically wrong, yet oddly arrogant, about the need to invade and occupy Iraq?
Goldberg has blood on his hands. (Can't wash it off, Jeffrey!)
I wish Christopher Hitchens took a reasonable view on this issue - he'd be the perfect person to punk Stephen Hayes on his ridiculous views. Of course, Hitchens is neocon all the way on the Iraq War, which is quite confounding...
"A guy who knows Osama". We regret the error.
Maybe the Bush administration just loves a good game of Six Degrees of Osama bin Laden?
"Jeff Golberg?!? Are you f***ing kidding me?!?!"
I think it would have been more interesting if it had been Jonah Goldberg (or, as the "Sadly No!" web site refers to him, the doughy pantload).
Iraq is, itself, just a front for the Eskimo Liberation Army.
Spencer, a couple of things: You didn't call anyone a wingnut, at least not in the linked post, so my comment really wasn't directed at you. Yes, you should have considered the magazine's strengths and weaknesses before accepting a job there; certainly you shouldn't make yourself out to be a martyr for discovering that TNR is TNR.
Moving to the merits: Woolsey was and is a Democrat, and was nominated by Bill Clinton to head the CIA and served in that position for two years (not six months). He may be mistaken, he may even be crazy. But I don't see why he'd be thought of as a "wingnut".
How do you pronounce Mylroie?
So, if Saddam was in charge of all evil from 1989 until his capture and death, why has evil continued unabated?
Can someone enlighten me on why Goldberg is so horrible? Did he strongly/misleadingly support the Iraq war?
I know of (but haven't read) his 2002 piece on Saddam's use of poisonous gas. That's not the offending act, is it? The use of poisonous gas was real and truly horrible, though long in the past and not part of any credible argument that Saddam posed an immediate threat to the US or our allies.
"People seem confused about this, JG was hired almost a year ago right after I was. His blog is new, but he's written several cover stories for the magazine already."
His cover story on Israel last month was pretty good. Interesting Q&A with Shmuel Rosner he linked to on his blog though. Shmuel asked him about his assumption that a young Jew like David Grossman's son would be at an elite college were he an American, rather than serving in the military as all Israelis do. Goldberg responded, in part,
"...as you know, Jews, and members of other well-educated religious and ethnic groups don't exactly embrace the idea of volunteer military service, which is a shame, but that's another subject."
But this isn't the full story, is it? Goldberg himself, an educated American Jew, did serve in the military -- he just served in the Israeli military. And he isn't the only one. In my opinion, this is stupid and gives ammo to those who perennially accuse Jews of having dual loyalties.
There were connections between Al Qaeda and Iraq. Saddam worked with various terrorist groups, so this should be no surprise. The idea that he took part in plotting attacks with Al Qaeda has no basis in fact, but ridiculing the idea that there was a connection is just as wrong. Many continuously claim that this was a major factor in our going to war, and this is false. The argument for going to war was to prevent another attack, whether carried out by Al Qaeda, someone working for Saddam, or some other terrorist group. The fact that Saddam had BW and CW capability (and we thought at the time stockpiles) and had repeatedly shown his willingness for shall we say aggressive behavior (ie. trying to assassinate a former president, committing mass murder against his own citizens using these weapons, and continuous firing at US and British planes) suggested that Saddam passing some BW or CW material to terrorists was far from inconceivable. Furthermore, I don't remember hearing anyone - not anyone - at the time correctly assess Saddam's stockpiles. Some were in favor of continuing the inspections in the hope that they would find something, or at least be a barrier in Saddam's path to acquiring WMD. But no one correctly assessed that Saddam had covertly destroyed his stockpiles but publicly behaved as if he still had them (including bearing the price of sanctions) in order to intimidate his own people and Iran. If you can find me someone who knew this at the time and publicly said so, then they deserve a lot more recognition than they have gotten thus far.
Duane writes: "The idea that Saddam took part in plotting attacks with Al Qaeda has no basis in fact.... Many continuously claim that this was a major factor in our going to war, and this is false."
hmmmmm, tell that to doug feith.
also, cheney was invested in the "atta meeting somebody in prague" story and told it more than once on meet the press in the runup to the war....
didn't know much about this goldberg character, but here's what ken silverstein at harpers wrote yesterday : "Goldberg [wrote] articles in the run-up to the Iraq War that read like Bush Administration talking points on Saddam Hussein having WMD stocks and ample ties to Al Qaeda. Goldberg so slavishly aped the administration’s views that President Bush and Vice President Cheney both publicly cited his work in making the case for war.
Later, another auther references a goldberg article that claimed to have proof of a link between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda.
check out the whole thing here:
"http://www.harpers.org/archive/2008/05/hbc-90002895
Do you have a quote from Feith to support this? Also, there is a difference between Cheney mentioning the story about Atta meeting someone in Prague "more than once" and the connection being a major factor in our going to war. I bet if you compared the number of times this was mentioned by WH officials to the number of times BW and CW capabilities, stockpiles, connections to terrorism, aggressiveness, etc. were mentioned and you would have very different numbers.
Lots of people said that although Saddam may have had remaining stocks of CW and BW and despite what the Bush administration was saying or implying (reconstituted nuclear weapons/mushroom cloud), Iraq was not near having a NW; and that an imminent nuclear capability was the only threat that might justify a preventive war. The reason was that it was clear post-Persian Gulf War that even with chemical and biological weapons, Saddam was deterrable. Nucs might alter that.
So while you are right that the world was generally agreed that Saddam had CBW, it was only the Bush Administration's conflation of that capability with the notion taht Iraq posed an imminent nuclear threat that was the real deception.
The only other reason to think that there was possibly an imminent threat that might justify preventive war would be if Saddam were linked in any real sense to Al Qaeda. Many administration officials asserted there was such a link. You can pretend that wasn't a "major reason" for the war in Iraq, but that is simply revisionist nonsense.
"Do you have a quote from Feith to support this? Also, there is a difference between Cheney mentioning the story about Atta meeting someone in Prague "more than once" and the connection being a major factor in our going to war."
Just because you were in a coma during most of 2002, please don't ask us to do the research on what is common knowledge to any fair-minded person who was paying attention at the time.
Just because Duane's ridiculous (Bush-style) denial of reality shouldn't be permitted. Here's a link to a report detailing 61 misleading statements by Administration officials about the strength of the Iraq-al Qaeda alliance in 52 public appearances, starting with:
In a November 7, 2002, speech, President Bush stated: Saddam Hussein is “a threat because he is dealing with Al Qaida. . . . [A] true threat facing our country is that an Al Qaida-type network trained and armed by Saddam could attack America and not leave one fingerprint.”
"But no one correctly assessed that Saddam had covertly destroyed his stockpiles but publicly behaved as if he still had them (including bearing the price of sanctions) in order to intimidate his own people and Iran. If you can find me someone who knew this at the time and publicly said so, then they deserve a lot more recognition than they have gotten thus far."
I did. I did and I was hardly the only one. I did and I actually supported the war in 2003, going against my better judgment. (Why I did is another story entirely. My support was that of a Libertarian. But also, patriotism can be a bad thing.)
I was still an aspiring history teacher then, as opposed to an actual one bud I did some research befitting someone of my future station.
Americans who met Saddam prior to the 2003 invasion all described him in similar terms. He was a thug, with some charisma, but who you won’t want to meet in a dark alley. Basically, Saddam was Iraqi version of John Gotti, not Iraqi’s version of Adolf Hitler. The more you read about him, the more you could see that Iraqi was ruled by the Hussein Crime Family.
Truly understand this and you could get a really insight into what Saddam’s reasoning was. He couldn't care less about sanctions, he was able to cheat them enough to ensure that he and his family lived in the lap of luxury. I did make one mistake here; I figure that he wanted to keep the false threat of chemical and biological weapons attacks alive to keep dissidents, (Kurds in the north, Shia in the south), from attempt an uprising. In reality, Saddam wanted to keep the false threat of chemical and biological weapons attacks alive to deter Iran from attacking.
Of course, you don’t have to believe me. I have no blog and thus have a difficult proving my claims. Of course, I’m glad that I was a relative nobody when the war started. I would hate to think that I influenced anyone to support this epic disaster that otherwise would have not.
"But no one correctly assessed that Saddam had covertly destroyed his stockpiles but publicly behaved as if he still had them (including bearing the price of sanctions) in order to intimidate his own people and Iran. If you can find me someone who knew this at the time and publicly said so, then they deserve a lot more recognition than they have gotten thus far."
I did. I did and I was hardly the only one. I did and I actually supported the war in 2003, going against my better judgment. (Why I did is another story entirely. My support was that of a Libertarian. But also, patriotism can be a bad thing.)
I was still an aspiring history teacher then, as opposed to an actual one bud I did some research befitting someone of my future station.
Americans who met Saddam prior to the 2003 invasion all described him in similar terms. He was a thug, with some charisma, but who you won’t want to meet in a dark alley. Basically, Saddam was Iraqi version of John Gotti, not Iraqi’s version of Adolf Hitler. The more you read about him, the more you could see that Iraqi was ruled by the Hussein Crime Family.
Truly understand this and you could get a really insight into what Saddam’s reasoning was. He couldn't care less about sanctions, he was able to cheat them enough to ensure that he and his family lived in the lap of luxury. I did make one mistake here; I figure that he wanted to keep the false threat of chemical and biological weapons attacks alive to keep dissidents, (Kurds in the north, Shia in the south), from attempt an uprising. In reality, Saddam wanted to keep the false threat of chemical and biological weapons attacks alive to deter Iran from attacking.
Of course, you don’t have to believe me. I have no blog and thus have a difficult proving my claims. Of course, I’m glad that I was a relative nobody when the war started. I would hate to think that I influenced anyone to support this epic disaster that otherwise would have not.
"But no one correctly assessed that Saddam had covertly destroyed his stockpiles but publicly behaved as if he still had them (including bearing the price of sanctions) in order to intimidate his own people and Iran. If you can find me someone who knew this at the time and publicly said so, then they deserve a lot more recognition than they have gotten thus far."
I did. I did and I was hardly the only one. I did and I actually supported the war in 2003, going against my better judgment. (Why I did is another story entirely. My support was that of a Libertarian. But also, patriotism can be a bad thing.)
I was still an aspiring history teacher then, as opposed to an actual one bud I did some research befitting someone of my future station.
Americans who met Saddam prior to the 2003 invasion all described him in similar terms. He was a thug, with some charisma, but who you won’t want to meet in a dark alley. Basically, Saddam was Iraqi version of John Gotti, not Iraqi’s version of Adolf Hitler. The more you read about him, the more you could see that Iraqi was ruled by the Hussein Crime Family.
Truly understand this and you could get a really insight into what Saddam’s reasoning was. He couldn't care less about sanctions, he was able to cheat them enough to ensure that he and his family lived in the lap of luxury. I did make one mistake here; I figure that he wanted to keep the false threat of chemical and biological weapons attacks alive to keep dissidents, (Kurds in the north, Shia in the south), from attempt an uprising. In reality, Saddam wanted to keep the false threat of chemical and biological weapons attacks alive to deter Iran from attacking.
Of course, you don’t have to believe me. I have no blog and thus have a difficult proving my claims. Of course, I’m glad that I was a relative nobody when the war started. I would hate to think that I influenced anyone to support this epic disaster that otherwise would have not.
Sorry, I don't know how that happened at all. I swear I only clicked the "post" button once.
Many continuously claim that this was a major factor in our going to war, and this is false.
Really? Bush mentioned the Iraq-Al Qaeda connection in virtually every speech arguing for an invasion of Iraq in 2002-3. Colin Powell made claims about the "potentially much more sinister nexus between Iraq and the al Qaeda terrorist network" a major part of his (in)famous speech before the UN in February 2003.
"But no one correctly assessed that Saddam had covertly destroyed his stockpiles but publicly behaved as if he still had them (including bearing the price of sanctions) in order to intimidate his own people and Iran."
No one? As if you could ever know that! Jeez, that's just plain arrogance beyond stupidity. Do yourself a favor, stop posting this crap here.
Duane writes: "Also, there is a difference between Cheney mentioning the story about Atta meeting someone in Prague "more than once" and the connection being a major factor in our going to war."
From the waxman report: B. Vice President Cheney
Vice President Cheney made 51 misleading statements about the threat posed by
Iraq in 25 separate public statements or appearances, 21 overstated the ties between Iraq and al-Qaeda.
and on the subect of feith, the osp and reports of an al-qaeda/iraq connection:
In February 2007, the Pentagon's inspector general issued a report that concluded that Feith's office "developed, produced, and then disseminated alternative intelligence assessments on the Iraq and al Qaida relationship, which included some conclusions that were inconsisent with the consensus of the Intelligence Community, to senior decision-makers." The report found that these actions were "inappropriate" though not "illegal." Senator Carl Levin, Chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, stated that "The bottom line is that intelligence relating to the Iraq-al-Qaeda relationship was manipulated by high-ranking officials in the Department of Defense to support the administration's decision to invade Iraq. The inspector general's report is a devastating condemnation of inappropriate activities in the DOD policy office that helped take this nation to war."
just out of curiosity what were you watching in 2002?
jeez.... even on mission accomplished day bush was still pushing the al-qaeda/iraq connection:
"The liberation of Iraq is a crucial advance in the campaign against terror. We have removed an ally of Al Qaida and cut off a source of terrorist funding."
And the only "terrorist funding" Saddam did was hand out money to Palestinians killed by Israel. And they aren't "terrorists" in any sense similar to Al Qaeda.
We'll be debunking this bullshit of the right wing for the next fifty years.
Comments closed May 15, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
"A guy who knows Osama". We regret the error.
Posted by John Emerson | May 1, 2008 8:47 AM