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Come on, was "the Surge" all that important? Jesus didn't direct Sarah Palin to pay much attention to that whole thing...
[quote]“I’ve been so focused on state government, I haven’t really focused much on the war in Iraq. I heard on the news about the new deployments, and while I support our president, Condoleezza Rice, and the administration, I want to know that we have an exit plan in place.â€

The "actual Surge" vs. "the Re-Defined Surge"

As a legislator, Obama opposed something very specific - a rapid increase in US troop deployments to Iraq to increase the total number of troops there by about 20,000. (It ended up being an increase of about 28,000 by June 2007.) The debate about "the Surge" was very specific - a troop increase. That was the subject of House Concurrent Resolution 63, and an identical bill in the Senate, which read:

Congress disapproves of the decision of President George W. Bush announced on January 10, 2007, to deploy more than 20,000 additional United States combat troops to Iraq.

The resolution passed the House on 2/17/07 by 246 to 182, and faced a cloture vote in the Senate, which was 56 to 34 - a majority, but not the 60 needed. So, two points: First, Obama opposed something very specific - the increased deployment. Second, the majority of our federal legislators felt the same way.

The problem is that "the Surge" has been redefined to include the "Anbar Awakening" and a set of tactical changes that put US troops into much more direct contact with Iraqi communities. But these simultaneous changes weren't "the Surge" - and I don't know of anyone who opposed those, including Obama.

McCain first tried to stake out a political advantage on this point in mid July '08, but he fucked it up. He gave an interview where he hyped his support of "the Surge" by claiming that the increase in troop levels created the opportunity for the "Anbar Awakening" - Oooops! Mr. "Foreign Policy Expert" and "Military Expert" couldn't remember the sequence of events - the shift of Anbar Sunni leaders started in August '06 - before the increase in US troop levels (aka "the Surge") How did McCain respond to that major gaffe? On July 23, '08, in an interview with CBS, he attempted to simply redefine the words "the Surge" to include the troop increase along with all the other changes in counterinsurgency tactics. Bullshit. It didn't go over well at the time, so he dropped it. Now, a month or so later, they have re-rolled it out again and seem to be succeeding in this newspeak move, at least among those who understand the world through the Snake Oil media.

We have always been at war with Ociania! The "Surge" has always meant to include changes in counterinsurgency tactics, along with the increase in troop levels!

The spin is that Obama opposed all the changes that have been made in Iraq - bullshit.

The definition of "Success"

The other magic language trick has been the creative use of words like "success". El Presidente Shrubbo himself defined how to judge the success of the troop increase (aka "the Surge") In his January '07 State of the Union address, he made it clear that the increase in troops was to create 'breathing space' for the Iraqi government to make political progress. A reduction in violence would be a nice side-effect, but "the Surge" was done to allow for political progress. Has that happened? Somewhat, but not much.

So, "the Surge" hasn't quite worked based on Bush's own standards - but, the spin goes, "the Surge" has reduced violence and "defeated al Qaeda!" On the point of violence - yes, there has been a major reduction in violence during the last 16 months. But ... there is still a tragic amount of sectarian violence and suicide bombings. As recently as May of 2008, suicide bombers killed over 100 people - for ordinary Iraqis, that's hardly peace or stability.

Compared with the levels of violence in Iraq at the beginning of 2007, many many fewer people have been killed, and that's a form of "success".

Just this week, a report of Baghdad:

Small scale bombings and shootings persist in the capital — each a reminder that the war is not over and that Baghdad remains a place where no trip is routine and residents are still guided by precautions. Most won't drive at night. Many try to avoid heavily clogged streets, remembering that suicide bombers and other attackers intent on killing large numbers of civilians favor traffic jams or congested areas . . . [in August] at least 360 civilians were killed and more than 470 wounded in violence throughout the country

At the current levels of violence, Iraq is worse off than Sri Lanka with it's ongoing civil war, and it's worse than the levels of violence in Kashmir. The current levels of violence are actually closest to the Lebanese civil war that raged through the 1980s - remember that? (about 5000 civil war deaths a year!) Yep - the "success" in Iraq has been to lower violence so that it is only as bad as the motherfucking Lebanese Civil War!

Its an improvement - but there is a long way to go.

Congratulations tomdarch! You've just broken your own record for the most incoherent posts ever. And three in a row, no less. Simply amazing.

Ahem, perhaps it should be pointed out that for the last several months roughly twice as many Americans have died violent deaths in Chicago as have died in Iraq. Still tomdarch denies the success of the surge. What do you say tommy? Should we pull out of Chicago now and leave Obama's paradise to it's own miserable ends?

And while I haven't kept count lately, last time I looked, the vast majority of the "benchmarks" for success had been met. Still, according to you, no success. That's only because for you, success in Iraq means you were wrong, and that, of course, is impossible.

LK Day, real statistics and data almost always work against libs.

Number of military deaths during the Clinton administration:
1,245 in 1993;
1,109 in 1994;
1,055 in 1995;
1,008 in 1996.
That’s 4,417 deaths in peacetime but, of course, who’s counting?

Maybe we should have pulled out of the clinton administration; thats when i served in the military.

Kentucky Highway deaths in 2007 = 864
Worst year in Iraq (2007) American Military losses = 904

Shitty either way but not bad for a warzone..

Executive summary:
1. Larry/bloggers use obvious logical fallacy
2. Comparison makes you realize just how fucked up things still are in Iraq despite claim of "success"
3. Linking Obama to crime in Chicago is a credit to Obama - murders down almost half while he has been in office
4. Palin really is responsible for crime while she was mayor - and Wasilla was called "the meth capital of Alaska" by area paper after she left office

L K Day wrote:Ahem, perhaps it should be pointed out that for the last several months roughly twice as many Americans have died violent deaths in Chicago as have died in Iraq.

Wow - Larry really does live in the la-la land of the Snake Oil media and the fact-check free miasma of right wing blogs - it didn't take long to find that "argument" echoing around the right-wing blogosphere.

some dolt right-wing blogger of the sort Larry reads wrote:So how is the Barack Obama gonna stop the violence? Not in Iraq, but in his own back yard? What Obama did while state senator in Chicago was tie the hands of Chicago Police. He voted to prevent juvenile gang bangers from facing the death penalty for their murders and stopped police from pulling over suspected gang members. So is this going to be the "new" ways he is going to be fighting crime and gangs, by siding with the gangs and tieing the hands of the police? Fix your own back yard first Barack before you even try to fix the problems in Iraq and in the nation.

Do I really need to point out the logical fallacy? I guess I do - the right-wing blogosphere/Larry is comparing the number of locals killing locals to the number of locals killing occupying troops. He's also comparing killings which are primarily business-based killings (drug dealing gang members killing competitors) versus a slow-simmering ethno-sectarian civil war. (Finally, I guess I also need to point out that the overwhelming majority of killings in Chicago are gun violence - and Larry thinks it's just fine for everyone to run around with guns. You think Chicago is bad - let's see what things are like in Iraq, where everyone really does run around with a gun...)

So - yes, more Americans killed fellow Americans in Chicago over the last three months than Iraqis killed American occupying troops. It's a very good thing that fewer American troops are being killed in this tragic mistake of a war. But soldiers, are, well, soldiers - the huge problem in Iraq has been the fact that any given civilian has been at huge risk of being blown up by a car bomb, a suicide bomber or even kidnapped, mutilated and beheaded because of their religious or ethnic affiliation. Those aren't exactly problems here in Chicago.

Now, let's try to compare apples to apples - There were about 120 violent deaths over the summer here - about 40 per month. As a point of comparison the last three months for which there are statistics for Iraqi deaths are March/April/May '08. For those three months, the death total is 3,547 - and that's just civilian deaths - it doesn't include all the Iraqi police and military that have been killed. So, that's about 600 per month nation-wide (again, comparable to the Lebanese Civil War.) If Baghdad is about 25% of the national population, then a city to city comparison number would be about 150 per month, or almost 4 times the death rate.

Remember, though, that we're comparing the Chicago number, which is mostly "gang soldiers" and "domestic incidents" against a civilian-only number in Iraq, which I think excludes "domestic incidents".

A different way of looking at the rate of killing of civilians is that for 2008 so far, there has been an average of about 27 civilian killings per day from shootings, executions, car bombs and suicide bombers. 25% of that is about 6.75 per day for Baghdad versus the Chicago rate of about 1.33 per day. So, in over the summer in Chicago, there was about one gang killing or domestic killing per day and so far in 2008 in Baghdad there are almost 7 people killed every day for being the wrong religion, being kidnapped and beheaded or blown up by a suicide bomber. What was Larry's point in bringing up that comparison?

The "success" of the surge means that Iraqis still live with terrifying, insane violence every day of their lives. (I still haven't posted the last part of my previous postings - what all has been going on in Iraq for the last year and a half and how Obama has "simplified" his response to the bogus "Surge" "criticism". It's not good that Obama is rolling his eyes and saying "OK, ok, let's call 'the Surge' a 'success.' " - it's politically effective but he knows that it's less than entirely truthful.)

Just to show how stupid the right-wing noise machine is - if you want to try to relate Obama to the crime rate in Chicago, then fine - he deserves credit for reducing the crime rate! When he entered the IL Senate in 1997, there were 759 murders in Chicago. Over the following years as a state and then federal senator, the murder rate here has consistently fallen year after year, to 442 in 2007. Using the standards for logic and honesty in Larry's reposting of the right-wing blogger argument we can say that Barack Obama was responsible for reducing the murder rate in Chicago by over 40% and saved hundreds of lives!

It's not like he's the mayor of Chicago. - let alone the mayor of "the meth capital of Alaska"
http://www.juneauempire.com/stories/030 ... 8002.shtml

The Juneau Empire wrote:Caseworkers report little children complaining of breathing problems from toxic fumes rising off chemicals such as acetone, ammonia and hydrochloric acid. During a 2003 bust at a house outside Wasilla, officers discovered five children living inside, all younger than 8 years old. The calls about meth to children's services in Wasilla accounts for as many as 40 percent of the agency's total monthly child protection calls.

(Do these right-wingers give the slightest thought to the cans of worms they open?)

Tom. You really are too easy. You know that don't you?

It's incredibly unlikely that Larry is some sort of Stephen Colbert wanna-be - he's so deep into the right-wing blogoshphere that it's unlikely it's some sort of shtick (his posting the day before the Romney/Giuliani/Palin speeches at the RNC was an amazing point-by-point preview of their attack points that clearly came through the right-wing media and Larry took the time to transmit it in his own words), and when I pointed out the links between the right-wing positions he supports and the racist underbelly of our culture, he took it pretty damn personally, rather than saying something like "hey - hold on, this is all just a big joke."

So this guy skulks around the runoff ditches of the internet full of "Obama is a secret muslim" types and then slaps up handfulls of that crap here. I rip it to shreds, and all Larry can say is "You're an asshole" or "that's bullshit." No counter-argument based in logic - no facts or citations.

So here's what happens when Larry does sort of try to respond:
- Larry attempts to bolster the claim that there's been this great "success" in Iraq.
- I point out that the claim of "success" rings hollow given how many Iraqi civilians are still being killed in horrible ways (beheadings, suicide bombings, etc.)
- Larry attempts to undercut that reality with some tangential, fallacy-based crap he read on a right-wing blog
- I point out the fallacy, use real information to reiterate the point that the "success" still leaves Iraqis in a living hell, and that his very argument makes Obama look better and the right-wing look worse
- Larry replies with some mumbling that has nothing to do with the issue

I really doubt that Larry is "developmentally disabled" or "cognitively impaired", so ...

Larry: What's so easy? You're out in Montana - my impression is that folks out west speak their minds and stand by their statements. If you believe the stupid crap you post here, then stand up for yourself - defend your positions. If you don't believe the preposterous baloney you're spewing, then what benefit do you get by littering?

So, this whole thread is based on "the Surge" - Larry, do you define "the Surge" to specifically mean the additional 28,000 US troops who were deployed to Iraq during early 2007?

I found some interesting comments on a Fox "News" page commenting on Obama and the "surge":

praise them then bring then down. Oabama always find ways not to give our military any credit on anything. And he want to run this great army of ours to the ground.

Without the surge there would have been no councils. the councils are in fact a RESULT of the success of the surge. In his arrogance Obama will not and can not admit he was WRONG. This speaks volumes on this mans lack of humility and his abundance of political arrogance. This man is no new style of politician but the same Chicago style guano wrapped in a silver facade.

Sound familiar?

Yep - that's a "well informed" Fox "news" fan claiming that our troops have time machines! Hmmm ...

The troop deployment increase (aka "the Surge") started in Feb. 07 and was fully implemented in by July 07. The inklings of the "Anbar Awakening" started in November 05 when the US started supplying the Abu Mahal tribe. By September 06 Sheik Abdul Sattar Buzaigh al-Rishawi began the "Awakening Councils" in earnest. That's about 6 months before "the Surge" actually started. By August 07 (two months after "the Surge" had been fully implemented), he was assassinated. It wouldn't be so bad for someone who gets their news from Fox to be so off, the problem is that John McCain made a similar claim:

Sen. McCain: I don't know how you respond to something that is a -- such -- such a false depiction of what actually happened. Colonel MacFarland was contacted by one of the major Sunni sheiks. Because of the surge, we were able to go out and protect that sheik and others. And it began the Anbar awakening. I mean, that's just a matter of history. Thanks to General Petraeus, our leadership, and the sacrifice of brave young Americans. I mean, to deny that their sacrifice didn't make possible the success of the surge in Iraq, I think, does a great disservice to young men and women who are serving and have sacrificed. They were out there. They were protecting these sheiks.

(Of course, viewers of the CBS evening news had the particularly stupid parts of that statement edited out for them. After all, McCain makse stupid statements like this all the time and his campaign "clarifies" for him after the fact, so why trouble the viewers with this stuff that will be "clarified" anyway? "Liberal media bias" my ass.)

"that's just a matter of history." What the fuck!?! Just imagine if Obama had said something so obviously wrong, and added in comments like that?

We've established that what Obama opposed was the increase in troop deployments. We see here that the "Anbar Awakening" was actually in full swing before the increase in troop deployments. I'd say that Obama is exactly right when he says that having more troops there certainly helped support those Anbar Sunnis.

The other side of that situation is the fact that the folks who took on the al Qaeda franchise in Iraq (AQI) were sick fucking nutjobs who really, really pissed off the Sunni tribes. (For people who, like McCain, are confused on this whole thing: The Anbar Councils are Sunni, al Qaeda is Sunni, Saudi Arabia is Sunni (overwhelmingly) and Iran is Shia (overwhelmingly).) There were reasons that al Qaeda weren't in Iraq prior to the invasion - and many of those same reasons applied after the invasion. As far as I know, the Saudi/Whabbi version of Islam that is the root of al Qaeda is pretty foreign to most Iraqi Sunnis. The al Qaeda wannabes in Iraq stepped on toes, got the politics wrong and beheaded the wrong people - and the tribes got sick of it and banded together to throw them the fuck out. It has helped immensely that the US rewarded them with cash, weapons and training. It has also helped that there were a few more US troops to help with those tasks (aka "the Surge") But the big question on this point is: Would we be in about the same position vis a vis the Anbar Awakening and the routing of AQI with out the several thousand additional US troops?

But Obama's whole argument is that we have other priorities to weigh against the Iraq troop deployments - in part, we needed those soldiers in Afghanistan, which is getting worse, and we need to look at that money and how it can help our domestic economy. (If Larry thinks the Surge is so great, he can write a check for $10 BILLION each month to pay for it.)

I will say, though, it's nice to hear Larry and Bill O'Jerkoffwithaloofah agree (how surprising!) that McCain/Bush's original idea of invading Iraq was a major fuck-up.

OK - now that we agreed that Bush and McCain drove us into a ditch, let's get back to arguing over whether it's better to drive out of the ditch or to gun the engine!

Like I said, way to easy. A few keystrokes from me and you go F'n nuts. I can't even make myself read it anymore. I'll quit yanking your chain for a while now..., promise.