Still fighting "their" war

Glenn Greenwald has delivered a devastating tirade* against the "serious" foreign policy experts and pundits who, in the run up to war, consistently warned against the Bush/Cheney approach for the invasion and yet consistently cheered the invasion on. Now, those selfsame "serious" men and women see an enormous foreign policy fuckup, an occupation in ruins, and no possible chance for improvement in Iraq, and yet claim that a pullout now is simply not an acceptable course of action. Those, of course, who opposed the invasion and now want to put a quick end to a situation for which the word "worsening" comes off as a sick joke are deemed to be insufficiently serious, dirty hippies even.

Greenwald terms it "Friedman Disease."

It is not merely the case that having been pro-war doesn't count as a strike against anyone. That is accurate. But far worse, the opposite is also true. It is still the case in Establishment Washington that having been pro-war in the first place is a pre-requisite to being considered a "responsible, serious" foreign policy analyst. And having been anti-war from the start is the hallmark of someone unserious. The pro-war Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden are serious national security Democrats but Russ Feingold, Nancy Pelosi and Jack Murtha are the kind of laughable losers whom Democrats need to repudiate.

Establishment Washington really is not interested in how to end this horrendous and despicable debacle we unleashed in Iraq. They are not interested in how to maximize U.S. interests. They are only interested in how to find a way to bring this disaster to some sort of slow resolution that looks as though it is a respectable and decent outcome -- anything that makes it seem like it wasn't a horrendous mistake in the first place. That is what the Baker-Hamilton Commission is about and it's what all of these Beltway analysts are doing by endorsing these premises:

(1) Things in Iraq are disastrous and our current policy there is a total failure.
(2) Our troop presence is not improving the situation; things have gotten steadily worse.
(3) There may be goals that, if theoretically met, would improve things, but those goals can't and won't be met -- either because we lack the resources or because they are just not achievable.
(4) No matter what, we absolutely cannot begin withdrawing, and those who want to do so are radical and unserious.

I could quote his reasoned screed about the calcified and morally bankrupt Washington elite at ridiculous length, so just go and read the whole damn thing.

Watching the recent breathless wait for the Baker/Hamilton commission's findings, not to mention the obsessive reading of Bush's body language following the election in November, I've been struck by something related to "Friedman's Disease" that seems to have most of Washington and those who cover it in fits of delusion and self-importance. That is, that George W. Bush is no longer an actor in this drama. Just as before the war, these wise thinkers worried that Bush would not fight the war "the right way," yet approved of "the idea" of his war making anyway, now you get the sense that they believe that very soon "we" will make the right changes in policy and planning to "fix" the situation in Iraq and achieve a face-saving "way out."

You saw it even before the election and certainly right afterward -- a rebuke of the president and his policies would surely force him to rethink his approach and "start listening to the generals" or so the meme went. The belated firing of Rumsfeld fed into that notion. Then there was the idea that his father's old hands were being dispatched to "save" the boy king and that the B/H commission would provide political coverage for Bush to no longer "stay the course."

Such thinking is an echo of the sentiments by those that shaped our political discourse before the war: to wit, that if only Bush would fight this thing "their" way, then surely we would succeed in building a bright and shiny new Emerald City where Baghdad once smoldered.

They chose to ignore then, as they do now, that Bush is in charge and his character and approach to governing have never changed and never will. As Duncan Black has written, over and over, Bush is absolutely serious when he insists, as he has for the last three years that we're not leaving Iraq while he is the president -- until we "finish the job" -- and that it is something for the next president to deal with. But while the pundits and the White House press corps have all too often given Bush a pass when he's lied about the real beneficiaries of his tax cuts, the imminent demise of Social Security, the effects of climate change, or, most notably, the rationale for going to war in the first place, they refuse to take him at his word on the one subject he's been consistent about all along: we're not going anyplace and we're not changing -- in any meaningful way-- our tactics.

Yes, Rumsfeld was fired, but that was not to usher in a policy change but rather a Rovian feint to take attention away from Democrats the day after their historic success at the polls. It certainly wasn't because Bush thought Rumsfeld had in any way failed, since this has always been Bush's war, not Rumsfeld's. It was just that his party got "thumped" and someone in his administration was going to be the sacrificial goat. And Rumsfeld's successor at the DOD is likely going to be an even more enthusiastic water carrier for his new boss.

And yes, daddy sent in his Fixer to provide cover for his flailing son, but anyone who seriously believed that George the Callower asked for or even wanted such help from a father with whom he clearly has serious issues (and yes, I think this was an anguished cry for help by a rejected father) has just not been paying attention.

But get used to it. We'll be hearing for the next, oh, three Friedman Units or so that if only Bush would take their suggestions about more troops, or "smarter" tactics, or a better effort at communicating with a "discouraged" American public, then we would begin to see "a difference" and that order will once again be restored in Establishment Washington.

And trust me, next stop is the Democratic Primaries, where pundits will wax less than eloquently about "The Democratic Quandary": the nomination can't be won by a candidate not calling for an immediate withdrawal, but the General Election can't be won by a Democratic nominee who appears "weak on national security" for calling for such a withdrawal. Stupid? Yes, but I fear the Democratic Party powers will undoubtedly take such "advice" to heart.

*UPDATE: Good God, I sound like some PowerLine idiot.."has delivered a devastating tirade..." Sorry.