Wrong on Iraq, David Brooks silent on five-year anniversary.
Wrong on Iraq, David Brooks silent on five-year anniversary.
Last week, as America commemorated the fifth anniversary of the Iraq war, New York Times columnist David Brooks was silent on the issue, instead writing about the housing crisis and social entrepreneurship. Editor & Publisher’s Greg Mitchell writes that Brooks silence is odd, considering that he was “serving as senior editor of the most influential (inside the White House) pro-war publication, The Weekly Standard” during the rush to war. Here, according to Mitchell, is just one example of Brooks’ pre-war writing that he refuses to re-examine:
The president has remained resolute. Momentum to liberate Iraq continues to build. The situation has clarified, and history will allow clear judgments about which leaders and which institutions were up to the challenge posed by Saddam and which were not.
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Cat got his tongue? Or is his ashamed of being a pro-war cheerleader?
March 26th, 2008 at 10:03 amPerhaps if he tiptoes quietly around no one will notice his skipping over Iraq. Perhaps he feels that he said all of the right things and history will judge his prescience as brilliant. Whatever he feels, he was one of the ones who was glaringly WRONG then, and continues to be so now.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:07 amI’m so filed with hate for these stupid elitist A$$HOLES that have destroyed my country in the last 8 years Im sitting here grinding my teeth and growling.
Enough talk. No more talk.
How many people does it take for a serious protest in washington ?
March 26th, 2008 at 10:10 amI think David Brooks is ashamed of his earlier pro-war stance. He has been proven wrong about Iraq, but he would rather be silent than issue a mea culpa.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:17 amRepugs would rather focus on Dems squabbling, the Medicare crisis, or even the sinking economy under GWB. But they are loathe to say that W’s costly war has anything to do with the sinking economy, or the corporate shift to outsourcing jobs — rather they will blame John Q. Public for his financial woes.
caredmanI Says:
Notice how quickly he attempts to change the subject?
March 26th, 2008 at 10:18 amJust Like BoBo, he doesn’t like being reminded that the war was and is a horrible mistake.
He wouldn’t want to look like toO big of a jacka$$ if he mentioned the 5 year anniversary in light of his trumpeting of the lies that it wouldn’t last more than a couple months and it wouldn’t be any burden on the US taxpayer.
FCUKING LYING A$$HOLE, GO TO HELL.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:19 amIf we are truly “at war” (and as much as I decry the phrase “war on terror”, the fact that 4k American servicemen have died in addition to many more Iraqis along with coalition troops and american mercenaries indicates a conflict) then it naturally follows that a 5-year anniversary would be noted. Without question.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:20 amI entirely agree with Brooks’ statement that “history will allow clear judgments about which leaders and which institutions were up to the challenge.”
And the clear judgment of history is that neither Bush nor any of his advisors or his cronies was up to the challenge…. I’d list them, but the list is too long.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:20 amPlease stop calling this a “war” - it’s an occupation!
March 26th, 2008 at 10:21 amWell, the escalation was a big flop. What next? Destroying town and cities in order to “save” them?
March 26th, 2008 at 10:23 amwell, he’s been preoccupied with the next challenge:
March 26th, 2008 at 10:24 amHillary’s “Audacity of Hopelessness”
…
overlap 10:10a
How many people does it take for a serious protest?
It’s a very sad situation when people that have been walked all over and their Constitution is used as toilet paper cannot as much as boycott any ONE thing to demonstrate their displeasure with corporate fascism. And now back to American Idol.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:24 amBrooks is a grinning jackass. He isn’t much better than Kristol.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:28 amFrom Robert Graves’ “Claudius the God”:
And Silius [who slept with Claudius’s wife Messalina, and attempted a drunken coup]? And Messalina? Silius attemped no defence: but when I questioned him he made a plain statement of fact giving an account of his seduction by Messalina. I pressed him: “But why, I want to know why? Were you really in love with her? Did you really think me a tyrant? Did you really intend to restore the Republica, or just become Emperor in my place?”
He answered: “I can’t explain, Caesar. She made me see you as a tyrant. My plans were vague. I talked liberty to many of my friends and, you know how it is, when one talks liberty everything seems beautifully simple. One expects all gates to open and all walls to fall flat and all voices to shout for joy.”
March 26th, 2008 at 10:32 amSkimadsa, I have called it the Iraq Invasion from the beginning.
It’s barely even an occupation, really…
March 26th, 2008 at 10:35 amAnd now they’re trying to soften the definition of WMD to make Dumbya look less like a tard?
Explosives near Capitol go undetected for weeks
LINK
GIVE ME A FCUKING BREAK.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:36 amConsidering we aren’t at war, but in fact invaded and are now occupying a country that had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11/2001, what should he say?
March 26th, 2008 at 10:40 amPlease make ‘Iraqi Invasion‘ part of your permanent vocabulary, TP. War was never declared.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:40 amPoint taken, but I’d ask this question:
What’s more annoying? War advocates who bang on about the war as if they are experts, or those that STFU?
If they’re not going to apologize - virtually none have - I guess I’ll settle with having them shut up.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:40 amJesus tapdancing christ on a cracker…by that definition a weapon of mass destruction goes off in Iraq every freaking day.
And another angle to consider on this story…if the Bush administration is doing such a great job protecting us from Turrists, how the F did they let this happen? 3 WEEKS? ARE YOU KIDDING ME? AT THE CAPITOL BUILDING?
March 26th, 2008 at 10:48 amMore of Brooks’ inescapable brilliance:
“What matters, and what ultimately sprang the U.N. trap, is American resolve. The administration simply wouldn’t let up. It didn’t matter how Hans Blix muddied the waters with his reports on this or that weapons system. Under the U.N. resolutions, it was up to Saddam to disarm, administration officials repeated ad nauseam, and he wasn’t doing it. It was and is sheer relentlessness that has driven us to where we are today.
Quite a large chunk of crow to consume in just one sitting. Perhaps if he does mini-mea’s, singly apologizing for past irrationales, instead of just one big “God, I was wrong about everything!” That way, he’ll get to keep his cozy perch, and continue condescending to the Times’ readers.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:50 amDumb_Hussein_Fox at 10:40 am
If they’re not going to apologize - virtually none have - I guess I’ll settle with having them shut up.
excellent point…
March 26th, 2008 at 10:54 amThat’s a great link, Die Now For Peace, thanks!
From the article:
“The device was made of a can of gunpowder taped to a box of shotgun shells and a bottle with buckshot or BB pellets, according to court documents.”
LOL
Better check Dick Cheney’s hunting clothes for WMD’s…
March 26th, 2008 at 10:55 amone last thing … i remembered finding this on monday:
My Iraq War Retrospective
By: John Cole March 21, 2008 at 6:36 pm
I see that Andrew Sullivan was asked to list what he got wrong about Iraq for the five year anniversary of the invasion, and since I was as big a war booster as anyone, I thought I would list what I got wrong:
Everything.
[…]
http://www.balloon-juice.com/?p=9942
must read.
March 26th, 2008 at 10:58 amThe next new defintion of WMDs will be if you have a slingshot and more than one stone for ammo.
March 26th, 2008 at 11:10 amI gave up watching the News Hour on PBS many years ago, in part due to Brooks. Every time he made some jackass statement backing the Regime, he would duck his head and had the look of a doe stuck in head lights. I think his conscience got the better of his payola.
March 26th, 2008 at 11:21 amWhen Brooks fails to mention the 5 th. anniversary of this war, by this o-mission he states the obvious. As a Vietnam veteran, this 5 th. anniversary was a sad day for me. What could he say about the thousands of brave souls that have been lost ?
March 26th, 2008 at 11:22 amDaddy-O Says:
March 26th, 2008 at 10:35 am
Skimadsa, I have called it the Iraq Invasion from the beginning.
It’s barely even an occupation, really…
You invade and then stay it becomes an “occupation”!
March 26th, 2008 at 11:23 amDavid Brooks is one of Bush’s strongest supporter and has spin/lie/blame to cover up the truth. As he givens his opinion every Friday on PBS it is clear. Once he got to have a private interview with Bush and he talked about it like a man who had just made love to a woman. Even the other reporters looked at him strange. Brooks and other reporters looked to be an insider to the Bush Administration to advance their careers. No thought was given to being an honest reporter just ask David Gregory, Chris Matthews, Andrea Mitchell and Tim Russert. All have openly used their jobs to push the White House agenda with the full support of the Executives. It’s all about ratings and being on the right team of power. Even ABC used a show about Prostitutes to continue the attacks on Spitzer as if he was the only Law Maker who had ever hired one. Diane Sawyer gave her interviews like she was clueless to this profession, even going so far as to ask a 20 dollar prostitute should Mrs. Spitzer leave her husband, while making sure nothing was said about Senator Vitters or Senator Craig. It was a joke as ex Mayor Rudy makes Spitzer look like a saint. Rudy not only uses New Yorkers money for his mistress but he moves her in with his family and does cross dressing on the side.
To bad for David that Rudy dropped out we might have had a President and First Lady all rolled in one. David could have had the interview of the Century.
March 26th, 2008 at 12:10 pmFYI, from the NEWHOUR of March 21st transcript. Contast what Mark Shields has to say….
Five years later, many regrets
JIM LEHRER: Finally, your thoughts, five years of the Iraq war, what are you thinking about right now, about the war and the rest? What needs to be said about it? Let’s put it that way.
DAVID BROOKS: Well, it’s been a searing experience for the country and for a lot of us. I would say it’s changed my view of the world quite dramatically, as I look back.
And I think what I knew but didn’t practice was the sense that societies are complex, organic organism, more complex than we can possibly understand. And if you’re going to intervene…
JIM LEHRER: You mean other societies than our own?
DAVID BROOKS: Ours, too. Ours, too.
JIM LEHRER: Oh, OK.
DAVID BROOKS: And if you’re going to intervene in a society, you have to respect the complexity and respect your own ignorance of that complexity. And that’s something every conservative should really know, but sometimes those facts were held in abeyance in the enthusiasm of the moment.
JIM LEHRER: Mark?
MARK SHIELDS: We know, Jim, we went to war against a country that had never attacked us, that never threatened us, on the bogus claim that that country had weapons of mass destruction which were a threat to us.
And it was not a moral war, and it was not a just war. It was a war in which the United States sullied, stained and repealed one of the great American values, that is that, in wartime, war demands equality of sacrifice.
All the sacrifice in this war has been borne by the 1 percent of Americans who are in uniform and their families. The rest of us have been quietly by, especially those of us who opposed the war, and been moral defectors.
We haven’t protested the fact that this is a war that our children and grandchildren will pay for. We haven’t even — we’ve blithely accepted tax cuts, and no draft, and no burden, paid no price, bore no burden, and accepted leadership that demanded nothing of us, and we’ve demanded nothing of them.
JIM LEHRER: David?
DAVID BROOKS: Well, I do think that desire to sacrifice is hanging out there. It’s still an unmet need in the body politic. There are still thousands of young people, people of all ages, who want to do some sort of service.
And for the next president, that will be something to pick up, not to draft them. We’re not going to have a draft. But to increase national service is something McCain has talked about, Obama, Clinton. They’ve all talked about it. And I think it will emotionally help heal some of the unwanted desire to actually rally together after 9/11.
JIM LEHRER: Gentlemen, thank you both.
MARK SHIELDS: Thank you.
March 26th, 2008 at 12:51 pmThe evil men do lives after them et in saecula saeculorum!
March 26th, 2008 at 1:15 pmHe should be made to eat every article he wrote ever since the illegal invasion and occupation started.
March 26th, 2008 at 2:28 pmRE: # 18 DieNowForPeace,
Why not. They parade around the term IED like it is some sort of new thing. If I remember correctly, the ancient Chinese also improvised explosive devices.
Shame the resistance folks in WW II never heard of homemade explosives. If they had only known about the Molotov Cocktail, perhaps things would have been different.
March 26th, 2008 at 5:22 pm