Paul Krugman (NYT): In Front of Your Nose

[Dudley_DUright]

We are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield." That's from George Orwell's 1946 essay "In Front of Your Nose." It seems especially relevant right now, as we survey the wreckage of America's Iraq adventure.

Tomorrow a year will have passed since George Bush's "Mission Accomplished" carrier landing. Throughout that year — right up to the surge in violence this month — administration officials assured us that things were going well in Iraq. Living standards, they said, were steadily improving. The resistance, they insisted, consisted of a handful of dead-enders aided by a few foreign infiltrators — and each lull in attacks brought pronouncements that the campaign against the insurgents had turned the corner.

So they lied to us; what else is new? But there's more at stake here than the administration's credibility. The official story line portrayed a virtuous circle of nation-building, one that could eventually lead to a democratic Iraq, allied with the U.S. In fact, we seem to be faced with a vicious circle, in which a deteriorating security situation undermines reconstruction, and the lack of material progress adds to popular discontent. Can this situation be saved?

Even among harsh critics of the administration's Iraq policy, the usual view is that we have to finish the job. You've heard the arguments: We broke it; we bought it. We can't cut and run. We have to stay the course.

I understand the appeal of those arguments. But I'm worried about the arithmetic.

more...

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/30/opinion/30KRUG.html

[smiley_glad_hands]

1. Excellent.

Kick

[Lindsay]

2. Mr. Krugman hits the nail on the head,

as usual.

[aquart]

3. Oh dear. He's come around to my thinking.

We don't "own" Iraq. We certainly didn't buy it. We stole it. We have to give it back.

The question is WHO DO WE GIVE IT TO? Negroponte is not the answer. I'm kind of looking forward to how they'll deal with him.

But they put up with Saddam. Here's the thing: He wasn't nuts. Cruel, sadistic, sure. Nuts? No. Traditional. Iraqi. We aren't. Do we wanna be? We've made a good start in the prison. Is this our future? YES, IF WE STAY. Nice future.

WE LOST. THEY CUT OFF OUR BALLS. WE DESERVED IT. And now every place on earth knows how to do it to us. We are ninety-eight pound weaklings with nukes. We can end it with nukes. Wanna do it?

DO WE WANT TO KEEP FIGHTING IN AN ENDLESS ATTEMPT TO VELCRO OUR BALLS BACK ON? Think murdering women and children in larger numbers will do it? Are corpses velcro?

We aren't fighting for liberty, neither ours nor theirs. We are fighting to pretend we still have our balls.

We don't "own" Iraq. Now, what is the right thing to do when you have taken something you don't own? WHAT DID YOUR MOTHER MAKE YOU DO? Right. Apologize. And give it back.

I bet we don't have one leader with the balls to do that.

Very small. Again. But who do we give it to? THEM. Call the leaders of every town, ask them to get together, let them choose who will speak for them, and let THEM say what they want. Not in June. Tomorrow.

It's what we should have done the first day.

Oh, and stop paying Chalabi.

[Wetzelbill]

5. Right and does anybody really think....

that there will be a time when an American soldier will not be shot at in Iraq. It doesn't matter if we put ten more or 100 thousand more into the country, they'll still be viewed as an occupying force and will be fought until they leave or every Iraqi is dead.

[Beetwasher]

4. Yeah, It's Pretty Much Over

and the only ways out are all ugly and bad for everybody...