The Roundup: "Naughty Pelosi," and the "Succesful" Surge

It’s a pretty dreary Saturday morning (which I like sometimes) and I'm in a pretty chipper mood. Why? Well, first, no hangover (I do have an upset stomach though), second, I have quite a few articles to share and the time to add my take without worrying about going somewhere. Ah, spring break...[Editors Note: I started writing on Saturday, but events have caused it so that I barely finished Sunday evening]

Anyways lets start this thing with the ongoing fake brouhaha over Speaker Pelosi's trip to the Middle East.

Have the GOP and conservatives somehow come to their senses or spontaneously grow some marginally functioning "conscience" that makes them think twice about further repeating hypocritical talking points? Have they seen the light and realized their error?

Well, short answer: no. It’s certain that they knew the hypocrisy of their attacks all along. This is politics after all, and politics is often about having the fucking balls to lie and feign outrage with a straight face.

It continues (Raw Story), even if many more people in the press are seeing this talking point for the crap that it is.

In my previous post, I noted the hypocrisy in attacking Pelosi for visiting President Assad when a Republican legislative delegations did the same only days earlier, but the hypocrisy doesn't end there as many in the blogosphere have come to realize.

Apparently, the GOP and its GOP Speaker (Newt Gingrich) during the Clinton days were quite fond of visiting competing nations as well.

That is where the similarities end though. Unlike Speaker Pelosi who did not seek to undermine or contradict the President by pushing for different policies (promoting the same messages of disarming terror groups and pushing for help stabilizing Iraq), the GOP was very open about directly undermining and contradicting President Clintons foreign policy when meeting with leaders, even going as far as suggesting that these nations forgo dealing with Clinton and instead deal directly with Congress. Now, that is a breach.

Glenn Greenwald with a good catch (lexis nexus likely helped):

This is, of course, totally different than the right-wing outrage scandal de jour:

New York Times, March 31, 1997 -- reporting on a trip to China by House Speaker Newt Gingrich, one week after Vice President Al Gore's trip:

Speaking with startling bluntness on an issue so delicate that diplomats have tiptoed around it for years, Newt Gingrich said today that he had warned China's top leaders that the United States would intervene militarily if Taiwan was attacked.

As he left for Tokyo after a three-day trip to China, Mr. Gingrich said he had made it absolutely clear how the United States would respond if such a military conflict arose.

Referring to his meetings with China's leaders, Mr. Gingrich said: ''I said firmly, 'We want you to understand, we will defend Taiwan. Period.'"

He also said, ''I think that they are more aware now that we would defend Taiwan if it were militarily attacked.''

Mr. Gingrich, the Speaker of the House, delivered his message, among the most forceful ever given about Taiwan by a visiting United States official, to Wang Daohan, China's chief representative in talks with Taiwan. Mr. Gingrich said he had given the same message to President Jiang Zemin and Prime Minister Li Peng in Beijing last week.

Chinese leaders offered no public response to Mr. Gingrich today. But on Friday, Mr. Jiang urged him to treat the Taiwan issue with care. . . .

Asked about Mr. Gingrich's statements, a Clinton Administration official in Washington said Mr. Gingrich had received briefings about American policy toward China, but that Mr. Gingrich ''was speaking for himself'' in his conversations with Chinese leaders.

The White House issued a statement saying that the policy of the United States was to ''meet its obligation under the Taiwan Relations Act, including the maintenance of an adequate self-defense for Taiwan,'' and that the Administration would maintain its ''one-China policy, the fundamental bedrock of which is that both parties peacefully address the Taiwan issue. . . ."

In an interview on Friday, Mr. Gingrich said he had spoken with Mr. Clinton, and with Mr. Gore on several occasions, to make sure that their messages to Beijing dovetailed. At the time, he did not mention his message on Taiwan.

Several days later, Gingrich's remarks in China led to this -- New York Times, April 4, 1997:

China admonished the United States today to speak with one voice on foreign policy and accused Newt Gingrich of making ''improper'' statements on Washington's commitment to defend Taiwan from any military attack by the mainland.

The criticism was made by the Foreign Ministry spokesman, Shen Guofang, who earlier this week had expressed basic satisfaction with remarks made by Mr. Gingrich, the Speaker of the House, during a three-day visit to China.

The visit followed Vice President Al Gore's first trip to Beijing. Both men spoke on issues of contention between Washington and Beijing, but Mr. Gingrich's remarks were noteworthy for their directness and for exceeding the normal State Department formulations on American commitments to Taiwan.

China's decision to criticize Mr. Gingrich came after he traveled to Taiwan on Wednesday and met with President Lee Teng-hui.

Former Republican Speaker of the House Gingrich, one of those no doubt bitching about Pelosis’s current behavior, is guilty of actually undermining the Clinton administrations own stated foreign policy in regards to Taiwan and China. It used language much more inflammatory and…direct lets say, than the more ambiguous promises of “military assistance” that was US policy at the time.

It may seem like there is little distinction but believe me, wording and tenor of the wording does have a drastic effect on how things are perceived. The point is though, as the last bolded part points out; Gingrich made statements that were at odd with official policy, something which Speaker Pelosi did not do during her recent trip. Yet some Republicans seem to have “amnesia” on this issue.

Of course, not all Republicans are guilty of this hypocrisy nor are they staying silent about the attacks on the Speaker.

Republican Senator Arlen Specter gives “Independent” Senator Joe Liberman (jeez I fucking hate this guy) a proper smackdown on the issue of dealing with opponents, plus you’ll see Liberman dodge the issue of the lack of Syrian involvement with attacks on us.

Sen. Specter makes the proper point about relations with “bad” nations

SPECTER: I believe that Assad can be negotiated with. I’ve made 14 trips there, Wolf, in the last two decades, and have been able to be helpful in a number of situations that I can document. And I think opening discussions with Syria are very, very important, and I’d rather Condoleezza Rice did it, but if not, it’s up to Speaker Pelosi and Arlen Specter and others.

But the rest of the exchange is illuminating:

BLITZER: What about Senator Lieberman, what do you think?

LIEBERMAN: I respectfully and strongly disagree with Arlen Specter and with Nancy Pelosi. I believe her visit to Syria was a mistake, that it was bad for the United States of America and good for the Syrians. And I say this because we’re in a war. We’re in a war against the Islamic terrorists who attacked us on 9-11-01. Syria is a state sponsor of terrorism.

BLITZER: But they had nothing to do with 9-11.

LIEBERMAN: But they have — but let me tell what you they have to do with what we’re into now. The Bashir Assad Syrian government has allowed terrorists and arms to flow across its country into Iraq that are being used to kill Americans today. Syria has been implicated in the assassination of a very strong popular Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri. Syria is supporting Hezbollah, which is trying to unseat our ally, Senora, in Lebanon. Syria is supporting the terrorist group Hamas against our allies in the Fatah Palestinian movement, and of course, Israel. The administration, in all fairness — people in Washington should know, if they don’t know, the administration has been trying in many ways, in diplomatic discussions with Syria since 9-11, to get Assad to change his behavior and he has not. When Nancy Pelosi goes there, she sends a message of disunity. She legitimizes the Syrian goverment.

BLITZER: So I assume you disagree with Senator Specter’s decision. I want Senator Specter to respond. Why do you think Senator Lieberman, Senator Specter, is wrong?

SPECTER: I believe in the maxim, hold your friends close and your enemies closer. President Ronald Reagan declared the Soviet Union to be the evil empire, and immediately thereafter undertook negotiations with them. Look, Assad is not a boy scout, but we have to deal with him. he’s there. In my conversation with him, I think there are ways to get him to stop arming Hezbollah and to stop arming Hamas. They came on the brink of a solution to the Golan Heights in 1995 and again in the year 2000. That was done by active negotiation that President Clinton engaged in. So there are ways to move through it, and to isolate them has not been successful.

Notice first how Senator Liberman tries to tie Syria in with the 9/11 attacks in order to paint Syria as a nation that not only can we not negotiate with, we should not (ethically) negotiate with them because it only gives the Syrian government legitmacy.

A quick fact for Senator Liberman: The Syrian government, as led by Bashar al-Assad is a legitimate government. We may not like it and may be angered at many of its activities including many that the Senator mentioned.

But as Senator Specter points out (I’m sure I’ve mentioned it a couple times), it is the most important to have diplomatic relations and talks with ones adversaries, and with nations one deems “bad.”

What Liberman is arguing is that because Syria is “bad” – listing several reasons why – we should not talk with them because it rewards bad behavior with legitimacy. But what Mr. Liberman does not understand is that if the United States does not talk with Syria, it de facto ensures that Syria will continue and will see no incentive to change those very policies that the United States sees as “bad.” Unless you want war, and I don’t think most sane people do.

Senator Specter further notes that when talks and negotiations had commenced in the past, it had come very close to bringing the Syrians to stop the very behavior that we think is so bad.

If we want Syria to stop funding Hezbollah and arming Hamas, a negotiated solution of give and take can achieve that (possibly). Refusing to talk only ensures that it will continue 100%.

If we could negotiate with the “Evil Empire” (USSR), what stops us from talking to a small secular dictatorship in the Middle East?
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Now moving on to Iraq, the situation is not looking all to good at this point.
MKS, a DailyKos diarist, using casualty numbers from icasualties.org, finds that the surge has not been successful in reducing overall US or Iraqi casualties in Iraq overall.

Deaths of U.S. & UK Troops
2007 2006
Jan 83 62
Feb 80 55
Mar 81 31
Deaths of Iraqi civilians and military
2007 2006
Jan 1802 779
Feb 1531 846
Mar 1889 1092

In essence, what one finds is a surprising increase in overall deaths and violence in Iraq since the surge has been implemented, a conclusion that runs counter to many claims of progress stemming from the surge.

Even some war correspondents like CNN’s Michael Ware (who opposes any immediate US pullout of Iraq) think that many, including John McCain’s characterization of the surge as “working” is wrong.

CNN transcript via Think Progress

BLITZER: Sen. John McCain suggests that is crackdown is already working. I asked him about that in the last hour.

[BLITZER CLIP]: Here’s what you told Bill Bennett on his radio show on Monday. “There are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods, today. The U.S. is beginning to succeed in Iraq.”

Everything we hear if you leave the so-called Green Zone, the international zone, and you go outside of that secure area, relatively speaking, you’re in trouble if you’re an American.

[McCAIN CLIP]: That’s where you ought to catch up on things, Wolf. General Petraeus goes out there almost every day in an unarmed humvee. I think you oughta catch up. You are giving the old line of three months ago. I understand it. We certainly don’t get it through the filter of some of the media. But I know for a fact that much of the success we’re experiencing, including the ability of Americans in many parts. Not all, we have a long, long way to go. We’ve only got two of the five brigades here to go into some neighborhoods in Baghdad in a secure fashion.

BLIZTER: Sen. John McCain, a Republican presidential candidate speaking here in The Situation Room within the past hour. Let’s go live to Baghdad right now. CNN’s Michael Ware is standing by. Michael, you’ve been there for four years, you’re walking around Baghdad on a daily basis. Has there been this improvement that Sen. McCain is speaking about?

WARE: Well, I’d certainly like to bring Sen. McCain up to speed if he ever gives me the opportunity. And if I have any difficulty hearing you right now Wolf, that’s because of the helicopters circling overhead and the gun battle that is blazing away just a few blocks down the road. Is Baghdad any safer? Sectarian violence, one particular type of violence, is down. But none of the American generals here on the ground have anything like Sen. McCain’s confidence. I mean, Sen. McCain’s credibility now on Iraq, which has been so solid to this point, is now being left out hanging to dry. To suggest that there’s any neighborhood in this city where an American can walk freely is beyond ludicrous. I’d love Sen. McCain to tell me where that neighborhood is and he and I can go for a stroll.

And to think that Gen. David Petraeus travels this city in an unarmed humvee? I mean, in the hour since Sen. McCain’s said this, I’ve spoken to military sources and there was laughter down the line. I mean, certainly the general travels in a humvee. There’s multiple humvees around it, heavily armed. There’s attack helicopters, predator drones, sniper teams, all sorts of layers of protection. So, no, Sen. McCain is way off base on this one.

And this is before his famous stroll in a Baghdad market that was “safe,” when he forgot to mention that he was backed up by 300 troops 5 helicopters, armored vehicles and warnings of lethal force if one got to close…….Yeah, just a normal stroll down “safe” Baghdad.

Yet there are other consequences of the surge that are just now emerging. The attempted crackdown on (Shia) al-Sadr militias and members has caused the radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to resume calls for attacks on US soldiers. There has been a more or less truce between al-Sadr and the US but that could be gone now.

The situation could get a lot rougher for the US troops due to this turn of events. US troops have had their hands full contending with the Sunni insurgent groups and with the Sunni Al-Qaeda elements; it’s safe to assume that it can only get that much worse with the large Shia militia of al-Sadr resuming its attacks on US soldiers.

BAGHDAD - The renegade cleric Muqtada al-Sadr urged Iraqi forces to stop cooperating with the United States and told his guerrilla fighters to concentrate their attacks on American troops rather than Iraqis, according to a statement issued Sunday.

"You, the Iraqi army and police forces, don't walk alongside the occupiers, because they are your archenemy," the statement said. Its authenticity could not be verified.

In the statement, al-Sadr — who commands an enormous following among Iraq's majority Shiites and has close allies in the Shiite-dominated government — also encouraged his followers to attack only American forces, not fellow Iraqis.

"God has ordered you to be patient in front of your enemy, and unify your efforts against them — not against the sons of Iraq," the statement said, in an apparent reference to clashes between al-Sadr's Mahdi Army fighters and Iraqi troops in Diwaniyah, south of Baghdad. "You have to protect and build Iraq."

The U.S. military on Sunday announced the deaths of four American soldiers, killed a day earlier in an explosion near their vehicle in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad. The province has seen a spike in attacks on U.S. and Iraqi forces since the start of a plan two months ago to pacify the capital. Officials believe militants have streamed out of Baghdad to invigorate the insurgency in areas just outside the city.

So add a large and powerful Shia militia into the mix of an already failing surge and you get the beginnings of a huge clusterfuck…on top of an already pre-existing clusterfuck. Sigh.

At the heart of the failure of the surge is that the insurgents and others have simply adapted to the new surge. There are less sectarian killings in Baghdad yet other types of killings are up in Baghdad. Insurgents and others often are just temporarily relocating to regions outside Baghdad, spreading the violence to other places in Iraq, while at the same time observing the tactics of the new surge and coming up with ways to counter it.

It’s a horrible situation all around, and many Democrats (myself included), Independents, and some Republicans would like to see our involvement end soon. They want to at least see some solid timetable for our exit.

The opposing camp answers that pulling out will be bad for the US and it will only cause the terrorists to follow us back home…somehow. I don’t exactly understand the logic. No doubt our exit will have consequences, and that an Iraqi civil war will intensify with our exit, but it is in the US interest to leave. The conflict is mainly between sectarian groups, and those are not likely to follow the US, they are going to stay and fight the other side. Al-Qaeda might move on, no doubt better trained, more veteran, and possessing more sophisticated recruits than prior to the war.

In any case, the administration makes the faulty assumption that war in Iraq somehow prevents terror attacks here, when there is no way even a successful Iraq conflict would have done much in that area. A bungled war, on the other hand, has proven to be a boon for terrorist organizations in terms of recruits, propaganda, tactics, and sophistication.

That is the unforeseen consequence of initiating this war: We created a new terrorist live-action training camp and the tactics developed and developing here already are being put to use by other terrorist groups worldwide.

But you cannot blame those who want a US pullout for that unfortunate fact, blame lies squarely on the shoulders of those who initiated this war and then bungled it totally.

McClatchy Newspapers William Douglas spoke with many military and diplomatic analysts and found that the dangers of a US pullout are at best overblown.

WASHINGTON - It’s become President Bush’s mantra, his main explanation for why he won’t withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq anytime soon.

In speech after speech, in statement after statement, Bush insists that “this is a war in which, if we were to leave before the job is done, the enemy would follow us here.”

The line, which Bush repeated Wednesday in a speech to troops at California's Fort Irwin, suggests a chilling picture of warfare on American streets.

But is it true?

Military and diplomatic analysts say it isn't. They accuse Bush of exaggerating the threat that enemy forces in Iraq pose to the U.S. mainland.

(snip)

U.S. military, intelligence and diplomatic experts in Bush's own government say the violence in Iraq is primarily a struggle for power between Shiite and Sunni Muslim Iraqis seeking to dominate their society, not a crusade by radical Sunni jihadists bent on carrying the battle to the United States.

(snip)

"The war in Iraq isn't preventing terrorist attacks on America," said one U.S. intelligence official, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity because he's contradicting the president and other top officials. "If anything, that - along with the way we've been treating terrorist suspects - may be inspiring more Muslims to think of us as the enemy."

There are repercussions to this war. Where I think some analysts err, is that they mistakenly believe that radical organizations and other enemies of the US are waiting for the US to pullout to “be emboldened.” They say, “If we leave, we will embolden the terrorists.”

I say: “Are you mad?!! Do you think they haven’t already been emboldened!!?” Do you think they are reserving their judgment until the end!!

They have seen the US bungle an occupation, further marginalize itself, trap itself in a quagmire in Iraq, then they see that the US leadership is so proud, so bullheaded that it cannot even come to terms with its failure and extricate itself and cut its losses. The lesson learned: We are so stupid we will fight an unnecessary war against a nation with little to do with the war on terror, then we are too stupid to leave due to pride.

Terrorist recruitment is up (as are overall terrorist incidents), the image of the US is at all time lows, its back at its full strength after its setbacks in Afghanistan, and it has a cadre of new, battle-hardened troops trained in Iraq and ready to spread its knowledge to the surrounding regions.

Yes, the radical groups are emboldened, and we have George W. Bush and his initial decision to invade Iraq to blame for that. The terrorists have been emboldened; they are not waiting for the US to pullout to reserve their judgment.