| | Quoth Robert Bidinotto:
"Hmmm...Why put 'interim government" in quotes? Was it, or wasn't it? Is it still in power, or isn't it?"
It never really was. The occupation authority turned it loose to some small degree to take over torture duties, especially after the Abu Ghraib scandal broke, but the real decisions were still made (and, for that matter, are still made in many key areas) in DC.
"That election is apparently small change to Mr. Knapp and his anarchic non-voting pals"
Time for some of that context that you love to dish out. The Iraqi people voted. I was hopeful for a successful election before it happened, and I was supportive of the vote as it happened.
It does not follow, however, from the fact that millions of people went and poked holes in little pieces of paper -- no matter the courage they had to summon up to do so -- that the result will be more freedom, less violence or anything resembling what they intended to accomplish by poking those holes in those little pieces of paper.
In 2000, those millions went and poked holes in little pieces of paper with Saddam's guns pointed at their heads (and, for obvious reasons, "elected" him by something like 99.9% for Saddam to 0.1% "abstaining").
In 2005, those millions went and poked holes in little pieces of paper again, this time with Saddam's guns, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's guns, George W. Bush's guns, Iyad Allawi's guns, Muqtada al-Sadr's guns, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq's guns, and any number of other people's guns pointed at their heads. Poking those holes in those pieces of paper has not, thus far, caused a single one of the guns which were pointed at their heads to be lowered or to be aimed in any other direction.
The election wasn't "small change." It was "no change" -- for the present. Whether it eventually results in change, and whether that change is for the better, remains to be seen.
"To declare, as Mr. Knapp does, that the newly elected government is 'an Iranian proxy government' flies in the face of a great deal of what I've read about the adamant desire of Iraqis -- including even devout Shi'ites -- to avoid an Iranian-style theocracy at all costs."
And to declare, as most scientists have, that humankind evolved from an ancient ancestor through a process of natural selection flies in the face of a great deal of what I've read in Genesis.
And to declare, as the US government has, that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons, flies in the face of a great deal of what I've read in press releases from Teheran.
And so on, and so forth. What's your point? You can read all day long. Whether what you've read reflects the reality of the situation is another question entirely.
"But facts like these"
It's debatable whether or not an op-ed piece by a polemicist in "Opinion Journal" is worthy of citation as "facts." But, for the sake of argument, I'll entertain the notion that the column -- which I've only browsed -- is 100% accurate and verifiable. I shall place a more succinctly stated fact, one which is well-documented, across the table from Mr. Chrenkoff's article:
"A timeline of America's wars compiled by The History Channel counts 1,606 U.S. deaths in Iraq as of May 9 with the numbers rising daily."
I do not agree that the alleged positive outcomes in Iraq as frequently cited by Mr. Chrenkoff have been worth the deaths of more than 1,600 Americans, the maimings of thousands of others, and the killings and maimings of a disputed number of Iraqis at the expense of the American taxpayer. The only justification for any of these deaths would have, in my opinion, subsisted in Iraq's former regime having represented a credible threat to the US, which it most manifestly did not.
Tom Knapp
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