70 Percent Turnout, "Mostly Peaceful"

Matt Welch | December 16, 2005

That's today's happy news from Iraq.

Comments

|12.16.05 @ 8:56AM|#

Maybe you didn't didn't get the memo Welch, but that's yesterday's "good" news. Ixnay on the Raqiay 'til shit starts going boom again.

|12.16.05 @ 9:03AM|#

I hope this works. I hope this brings stability and a liberal, democratic, rights-defending government to that poor country.

Peace on Earth, Goodwill to Man.

|12.16.05 @ 9:09AM|#

I sincerely join joe in proclaiming the same wish.

I sincerely hope that happens.

|12.16.05 @ 9:26AM|#

So...who's going to be the first to nominate George W Bush for the Nobel Prize?

|12.16.05 @ 9:29AM|#

I hope this works. I hope this brings stability and a liberal, democratic, rights-defending government to that poor country.

Just like here in the US!

|12.16.05 @ 9:42AM|#

Joe, your wishes have warmed my heart and I second them.

Here! Here!!

|12.16.05 @ 9:49AM|#

I agree with joe, and this is now the first thing on my secular-holiday present wish-list:

1) A stable, free, democratic Iraq

2) Pictures of our government pouring concrete

|12.16.05 @ 10:40AM|#

This is the only positive outcome we can hope for. Otherwise the invasion was a complete mistake.

|12.16.05 @ 10:54AM|#

while i hope the outcome is as great as we all want it to be, bush is not close to being a candidate for the nobel prize.

there are other means of promoting peace than through war.

oh yeah, and the whole torture thing kinda ruins his chances in my book.

|12.16.05 @ 11:32AM|#

This is the only positive outcome we can hope for. Otherwise the invasion was a complete mistake.

Which means it was a complete mistake. Bring the troops home now!

Like joe, I also hope this brings a rights-defending government to that poor country. If it does, the stability will likely take care of itself.

I also echo joe's wishes:

Peace on Earth, Goodwill to Man.

|12.16.05 @ 11:39AM|#

There are a lot of forms of democratic governments. One of the bigger problems here is that the near majority plurality would like a government not all that different from Iran's, many of whom would like to eliminate the second largest group to consolidate power, but also as a payback for the hideous treatment they suffered earlier.
It is feasible that the Sunnis + Kurds + some Shia could come together to form a semi-secular government (for more on that possibility read D^2.).
Best of luck with whatever happens, but Nobel prize seems unlikely.

Yaron|12.16.05 @ 12:35PM|#

Nobel peace prize? Yeah, no way could Bush be in the same league as that great Crusader for Peace, Yasser Arafat.

|12.16.05 @ 2:10PM|#

The best thing I heard from this was from a 70 year-old Sunni who said somethig along the lines of "I boycotted the earlier elections, but now I see that this was wrong. We elected a bunch of people who don't know God."

Getting people to the polls and to care about the process always seemed like a pretty important goal. It certainly is encouraging that this sentiment is expressed instead of "I wish I blew up the polling place".

|12.16.05 @ 2:17PM|#

Nobel peace prize? Yeah, no way could Bush be in the same league as that great Crusader for Peace, Yasser Arafat.

And don't forget Henry Kissinger.

|12.16.05 @ 6:35PM|#

"This is the only positive outcome we can hope for. Otherwise the invasion was a complete mistake."

"Which means it was a complete mistake. Bring the troops home now!"

Two samples from this thread that ignore the reality of national security interests in the region... Even without WMD's, this is a win for the US. The better news is that it's a win for the people of Iraq, and maybe someday, the rest of the Middle East will drag itself down the same path.

For the record, I'm against regime-changing nation-building for humanitarian purposes, but I'm certainly in favor of it when it dovetails with US national security self-interest.

Just as an aside - why don't I hear more complaints from joe and company about the previous administration's "humanitarian" military efforts?

Is it the fact that Kosovo and Somalia had little or no possible affect on US interests? Why is it okay to expend blood and treasure there, but not somewhere that actually matters?

As for the Nobel Peace Prize, considering those who have won it, it's really an oxymoron anyway...

|12.16.05 @ 8:26PM|#

Peace and liberty to all the people of Iraq!

...and to the American people too.

|12.17.05 @ 3:26AM|#

What Ken said.

|12.17.05 @ 6:13PM|#

The great thing about peace in Iraq is that it will seem so much more peaceful after what they have been through.

The cynic in me (or is it the realist) thinks though, that Iraq will soon be ruled by a bunch of ignorant, authoritarian mullahs, just like Iran. I guess we will see in time.

|12.17.05 @ 7:43PM|#

Briefly noting that The Greatest Foreign Policy Mistake by the Stupidest American President Ever appears to be turning out to be a fabulous success...NUFF SAID! - let's get back to Bush-bashing!

|12.17.05 @ 8:15PM|#

Who's "Bush-bashing"?

|12.18.05 @ 9:51AM|#

rob,

"Just as an aside - why don't I hear more complaints from joe and company about the previous administration's "humanitarian" military efforts?"

Like the Catholic Church, I believe that a practical analysis of the likelihood of success is necessary to judge the righteousness of a war. I, reluctantly at the time, supported the operations in the Balkans because I thought we had an excellent chance of success. Iraq on the other hand would have been enormously difficlut under even the most able, decent, intelligent administration - and we've got Rumsfeld, Cheney, and Bush.

In 2002-2003, I repeatedly described support for the Iraq War as "a close call." It was ultimately my certainty that the incompetant criminals running the show would screw it up and make things worse that led me to oppose the war, not a philosophical opposition to humanitarian efforts.

(BTW, on Bush 41's Somalia adventure, I supported guarding food convoys, opposed the expansion of the mission into nation building and arresting warlords, for the same practical concerns).

Glad I could clear that up for you.

|12.18.05 @ 9:53AM|#

Don't worry about Andrew - if this great success goes south, he'll be happy to tell us that the real great success is just around the corner.

Again.

And again.

And again.

|12.18.05 @ 12:09PM|#

BTW, rob, at the time I considered Iraq "a tough call," before the war, I was fully aware that the WMD excuse was a charade, and that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 or any other terrorist attack on America. Like The Ne(ocon)w Republic, I was basing my judgement on the humanitarian and strategic mission of eliminating the terrible Saddam regime and trying to replace it with a stable, liberal government.

|12.18.05 @ 12:38PM|#

joe

Coming from you, I will accept the above as the closest your character permits you to the abject apology circumstances require from you!

thoreau is next

|12.18.05 @ 12:53PM|#

"In 2002-2003, I repeatedly described support for the Iraq War as "a close call." It was ultimately my certainty that the incompetant criminals running the show would screw it up and make things worse that led me to oppose the war, not a philosophical opposition to humanitarian efforts...

...and I was wrong."

Something like that!

Of course they were incompetant criminals! All the Administrations, of all the Presidents from Washington to today have been incompetant criminals, because that is the nature of government as an enterprise - "decemt" and "intelligent" are words with no applications inside the Beltway.

But THESE incompetant criminals got the job done, whereas the gangs assembled around Gore or Kerry - at best - could only have done as much (and, in Kerry's case, almost certainly not).

|12.19.05 @ 9:00AM|#

Somebody's counting chickens, and is going to end up eating crow.

|12.19.05 @ 9:05AM|#

Uh, yeah, Andrew, it's really, really Mission Accomplished this time! Not like all the other times you told us victory was assured.

Seriously, Andrew, you did the same little dance when Saddam was captured and when the first set of elections happened, assuring us that events had proved you right, and that we were winning.

And things just kept getting worse. Falling in the same hole over and over seems to be a common theme among right wing hawks. It's ok, everyone, our troops have never lost a battle, and the Vietnamization of the war is on schedule.

|12.19.05 @ 12:39PM|#

Yeah joe

It is sorta like Lincoln saying "We are going to win this war" over and over again!

Typical Republican, right? It took most of five years...and his "original" war aims morphed from preserving the Union, to abolishing slavery (thoreau must be scratching his head...prob'ly has all kinds of sarcasms).

John "two tours in four months" Kerry could no doubt have enlisted European allies to expedite the creation of a slave kingdom in N America in a matter of weeks...and NO casualties after Sumpter, right?

If Lincoln had been using the "Catholic" metric, what then joe? He had no way of knowing victory was certain in 1860, it was for a certainty going to take time and spill blood, and he could have reasonably lost heart anytime during the first two years...no?

|12.19.05 @ 12:58PM|#

BTW joe

Lincoln's administration contained ALL KINDS of incompetance and criminality.

All you have said in the above post is what anyone may have suspected for quite a while...that your problem with THIS war, is that it was Bush's war.

|12.19.05 @ 1:05PM|#

"on Bush 41's Somalia adventure, I supported guarding food convoys, opposed the expansion of the mission into nation building and arresting warlords, for the same practical concerns"

Really joe? How old were you at that time? (A prodigy!)

|12.19.05 @ 1:51PM|#

Andrew,

Lincoln didn't claim that recent events proved we were winning immediately after Ft. Sumpter. That's the difference. Had the current administration and its supporters been as honest about admitting setbacks, and as forthright about not claiming victories where none existed, the credibility of your "Mission Accomplished" crowing would be greatly increased. But instead, you've turned so many corners, you're spinning!

FYI, I was a college sophmore when Clinton won the 92 election.

|12.19.05 @ 1:55PM|#

"All you have said in the above post is what anyone may have suspected for quite a while...that your problem with THIS war, is that it was Bush's war."

Actually, if you had read a little closer, you would have noticed two, not just one, variable: the asshattery of the Bush administration, as you note, and also the difficulty of the mission.

I supported Bush's Afghan War, because the mission he was attempting to carry out - the overthrow of the Taliban, their replacement by the existing Northern Alliance, and the denial of the country as a staging area for Bin Laden's crowd - seemed to be more within the administration's abilities. It's about both the difficulty of the mission AND the abilities of those seeking to embark on it.