The blame game, ad infinitum

Though it's become the centerpiece of the Beltway argument for troop withdrawal, it still never fails to nauseate me:

The only way to get the Iraqis to accept responsibility for their future is by no longer extending them an indefinite blank check, intensifying diplomacy and withdrawing our troops swiftly, responsibly and safely.

-Lee Feinstein, national security director for the Clinton campaign

Putting the specter of terrorism into perspective

Olbermann talks about the "myth of the omnipresent enemy" and provides a platform for the voice of reason on this overblown non-story.

We saw about three years ago, General Richard Meyers, head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, say that the threat of terrorism was the greatest threat we face in this country, in the U.S., since the Civil War. And what we know factually is that fewer than 50,000, not just Americans, but all people worldwide, have died from international terrorism since 1968. We lose 50 million people plus in WWII and we have someone like General Meyers saying that this is the greatest threat? It’s a threat, but we need to put it in its proper perspective and go back and remember the words of FDR—it’s the fear! If we allow the fear to conquer us and drive us to do things like allow Guantanamo, like allow torture, we ourselves become victims of the very things that we say we’re trying to fight. You know, I think big deep breaths, remain calm, and let’s stop with some of the alarmist behavior. --Larry Johnson, counterterrorism expert

And let's not legitimize xenophobes by breathlessly reporting that the perpetrators are of Middle Eastern descent, or make unsubstantiated allusions to Al-Qaeda. The BBC doc "The Power of Nighmares" and Seymour Hersh both view Al-Qaeda as a convenient fiction--in reality little more than a looseknit "phantom of the U.S. national security apparatus." As Jason Burke, author of "Al Qaeda" contends in the film:

The idea—which is critical to the FBI’s prosecution—that bin Laden ran a coherent organisation with operatives and cells all around the world of which you could be a member is a myth. There is no Al Qaeda organisation. There is no international network with a leader, with cadres who will unquestioningly obey orders, with tentacles that stretch out to sleeper cells in America, in Africa, in Europe. That idea of a coherent, structured terrorist network with an organised capability simply does not exist.

Without a simple, distinct enemy, there'd be no conduit in which to channel hatred and fear. Unprocessed political realities are often much too complex and abstract for this. Buzzwords are more accessible and successful in arousing the type of emotion needed to promote warmaking. It's this kind of soundbyte-ready fearmongering and cable news complicity that Al Gore assails in the first chapter of The Assault on Reason. Started it today--definitely a timely read.

Blame the Victim: Democratic Presidential Candidate Edition

I keep harping on politicians' quickness to fault the Iraqi people themselves for the chaos wrought by invasion and occupation. It's an abhorrent excuse, and its bipartisan popularity is sickening.

This morning Hillary Clinton was booed by the "hard left" (nice touch, ABC) at the Take Back America conference for passing the buck on Iraq:

"The American military has succeeded. It is the Iraqi government, which has failed to make the tough decisions that are important for their own people."

Andre Banks points to the racist underpinnings of this rationale:

Her story of a successful military operation rendered a failure by the intransigence of Iraqis who don't love democracy like we do relieves the American conscious from the guilt becoming a war of terror. And in its place she leaves a racist stereotype our nation is accustomed to: a lawless Brown person who deserves to be abandoned to their uncontrollable vice.

I'm not surprised to hear Clinton use the same ignorant rhetoric employed by her fellow hawks on both sides of the aisle. But from Edwards?

In order to get the Iraqi people to take responsibility for their country, we must show them that we are serious about leaving, and the best way to do that is to actually start leaving.

It's extremely disappointing to hear this unaccountable beltway rationalization echoed by the only candidate who has taken responsibility for a war authorization vote, the only "first tier" Democrat to boldly deconstruct the logic behind the fabricated "war on terror," the only one to issue substantive diplomatic foreign policy solutions aimed at regaining the confidence of the international community, and one who isn't afraid to confront racism head on. Such misdirected tough talk is out of character given this record of courage and leadership. Edwards' candid admission that his vote for the war was wrong positions him as the candidate best able to lead us out of Iraq by taking responsibility and making reparations. But he's squandering this opportunity by toeing the line.

I understand that it's important for politicians advocating withdrawal to dodge the backlash that would ensue from admitting that the reality is a U.S. failure. But rhetorical arguments for withdrawal cannot be couched in terms of punitive measures for those that have already experienced unimaginable suffering. This is not just irresponsible, but morally reprehensible.

If Democrats want a justification for withdrawal that is both honest and politically viable, they should talk about withdrawal as an opportunity for the Iraqi people to at last claim their inhibited right to self-determination, wrested from imperialists and despots that ruled the country since it was loosely conceived as a nation state. This is the language of empowerment, not the coward's "blame the Iraqis" tack.

The U.S. is not leaving as punishment (in fact prolonging the occupation would be just that), but because Iraq is their country--not the base of future U.S. military operations in the Middle East, as neocons would like. The U.S. has no more right to stay and decide Iraq's future course than it did in invading, no more right than Germany did to decide the fate of post WWII Europe.

Assertions that the Iraqi people brought this chaos upon themselves or that Iraqi lawmaker's lack of political will instigated the country's descent into failed state status are abhorrent. And the notion that Iraq can become a sovereign nation within the bounds of foreign occupation is laughable. This is just another manifestation of the backwards "Iraqis stand up, we'll stand down" line. The occupation must end before the Iraqi people have the opportunity to self-govern, not vice versa.

Jonathan Steele sums it up in the Guardian

...the essential point about the Iraq tragedy remains what it has been since April 2003. Bush and Blair bear the prime responsibility for the chaos their ill-conceived invasion unleashed. The problem of sectarian violence can only be solved by Iraqis. National reconciliation, if it happens, has to be Iraqi-led. But the US and Britain are not innocent bystanders, good Samaritans, or neutral guarantors against a civil war. There have been too many occasions already - from the so-called transfer of sovereignty in June 2004 to the inauguration of the first elected government in May this year - when they have said "it's up to the Iraqis now" while remaining in ultimate charge. Only when they leave Iraq will sovereignty truly revert.

Blame the victim

Caught the tail end of Meet the Press yesterday, and this utterly indefensible argument by Republican strategist Mike Murphy:

MR. MURPHY: Yes. Absolutely. Nixon’s spinning in his grave. We used to be the very competent guys that run wars. Now I—my view is, our magnificent military and the Bush administration won the war, the Iraqi people have lost the politics and the peace, and now we’ve got to figure out a way to protect American interests and move on. Very big...

MR. RUSSERT: You’re blaming the Iraqi people?

MR. MURPHY: Yeah! I think it’s the truth.

MR. SHRUM: I mean, they don’t keep the troops there.

MR. MURPHY: No, but the troops are there for security so they can grow up and have a democracy, and that’s what they’re horrible at.

MR. CARVILLE: Are we—but, Mike, are we surprised that we found Iraqis when we went there?

MR. MURPHY: The war is...(unintelligible)...they light up.

MR. CARVILLE: Were we shocked when we found Iraqis when we went to Iraq? We didn’t know there were going to be Iraqi people there?

MR. MURPHY: No, no.

MR. SHRUM: Some of them don’t like us occupying their country.

MR. CARVILLE: They’re intelligent.

MR. MURPHY: Well, yeah, but we didn’t feed them the democracy, and that they’re having trouble.

MS. MATALIN: Well, what all Americans do not like is Democrats saying or anybody in this country saying, even those who are anti-war, do not like when Democratic leaders say, “This war is lost.” We are determined people. We cannot believe that this enemy that stones women and sends 12-year-olds out to behead innocents are people that are better than us.

MR. SHRUM: Mary, we’re going to stay and stay and stay and stay.

MR. CARVILLE: Correct.

MR. SHRUM: And when is it going to, when is it...

MS. MATALIN: You’re going to stay on Iraq.

MR. SHRUM: Give me some indication...

MS. MATALIN: What is your...

MR. SHRUM: Give me some indication of when persisting in a failed policy is going to yield success.

MS. MATALIN: Give me some indication of what your foreign policy positions against this 21^st century enemy, what is the Democratic plan?

MR. SHRUM: Mine would be, mine would be a lot closer to the current secretary of defense who said we got to draw down the troops next year...

MR. CARVILLE: Right.

MR. SHRUM: ...to send a very clear message to the Iraqis that they have to get their act together, they have to make the government work.

Shrum legitimizes Murphy's despicable claim by using similar language, framing Iraq's collapse as the result of its peoples' irresponsibility--not the fruit of U.S. invasion and occupation. But don't hold your breath for hawks to own up to these fatal mistakes. What matters most to them is preserving their own reputations; admitting fault and accepting defeat is politically out of the question.

It's this hubris that paved the way for the despicable "blame the victim" strategy. I wrote about it last November, as did Thomas Ricks & Robin Wright from WaPo. Since then, the argument has reared its ugly head much more frequently. Too few are defending Iraqis and placing blame where it's due.

Rolling Stone columnist Matt Taibbi lays it out:

I can do without having to listen to American journalists, as well as politicians on both sides of the aisle, bitch and moan about how the Iraqi government better start "shaping up" and "taking responsibility" and "showing progress" if they want the continued blessing of American military power. Virtually every major newspaper in the country and every hack in Washington has lumped all the "benchmarks" together, painting them as concrete signs that, if met, would mean the Iraqi government is showing "progress" or "good faith."

"President Bush will not support a war spending bill that punishes the Iraqi government for failing to meet benchmarks for progress," was how the AP put it.

"Among the mile markers that should be used to measure Iraqi progress is a finalized revenue-sharing agreement on current and future oil reserves," was the formulation of the Savannah Daily News.

Still other papers, like the Baltimore Sun, cast the supplemental as a means of exercising "tough love" with the lazy and ungrateful Iraqis, who to date have failed to show interest in governing their own country. "The talk around Congress," wrote the Sun, "was of putting together a bill with (probably nonbinding) benchmarks, designed to hold the feet of the Iraqi government to the fire -- or at least near the fire."

As Juan Cole put it,

"I see. The US invaded their country, abolished their army, gutted their civil service, occupied their cities, and now it is the Iraqis' fault."

Alternatives to sensationalism & scapegoating

Some significant dialogues that mainstream outlets have sidestepped in order to deliver their breathless, sensationalist coverage of the tragedy at Virginia Tech:

Let's not make this about race. Already Korean-Americans (or Asians in general since the many races are often lumped into one category), are anticipating the backlash to come. When teenagers shot up Columbine and when Timothy McVeigh bombed babies in Oklahoma City did we blame white males?

Does race play a role in all that goes down in this country? Of course. Discrimination, cultural values and norms, race is one of many things that contributes to who we are, the good and the bad. But there are actual substantive issues to deal with here, issues that don't lead us to easy, bigoted conclusions.

DKos: A Setback for the Blame Islam First Crowd

In the first hours after the Virginia Tech shooting, the internet was rife with frothing speculation about the "Asian connection" with Islamic jihad, as in the following typical instapinion:

First it was Johnny Muhammad, now it was Cho Sueng Hui aka Ismail Ax. Precisely how many mass shooters have to turn out to have adopted Muslim names before we get it? Islam has become the tribe of choice of those who hate American society.

Alas, the "tribe of choice" may have turned out to be ... well, let's just take a look at today's Bloomberg headlines:

Virginia Shooter Compared Himself to Christ in Video
By Nick Allen

April 19 (Bloomberg) -- The Virginia Tech university student who killed 32 people in modern America's worst mass shooting compared his own impending death to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

"I die like Jesus Christ, to inspire generations of the weak and defenseless people," Cho Seung Hui, 23, said during a rambling video message that he mailed to NBC News after killing his first two victims.

Somehow I don't think we're going to see a lot of speculation from the same sources in the coming days about whether Jesus Christ is a Rambo role model and Christianity is the "tribe of choice of those who hate American society."

Perhaps the dynamics of a tormented mind are little more complex than being reduced to a simple religious categorization, yes? Perhaps we can hope for a little more restraint – and information – before we leap to sweeping "evil doer" conclusions in the future?
(Note on breath: Don't hold.)

BoingBoing reader comments

I agree with BoingBoing reader Doyle's comments about predicting the religion of the shooter. Speculating him as Muslim, based on the finding of wording "Ismail AX", leans toward the islamophobic thoughts. The character Ismael belongs not only to a single but to various Abrahamic religions i.e. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, etc, and most of these religions predates Islam. More news is surfacing about the shooter's social interactions, which could lead to the fact that he was a psychotic, and may not have had much religious influence at all. Perhaps he just took the story of Abraham in a mythological way (even if it is remotely related). Has anyone thought or come up with a non religious explanation of 'Ismail AX'? It is amazing to see how people quickly connect anything bad with one religion. It's like they are looking for an excuse, not the answers.

And finally, Juan Cole provides some international perspective:

The profound sorrow and alarm produced in the American public by the horrific shootings at Virginia Tech should give us a baseline for what the Iraqis are actually living through. They have two Virginia Tech-style attacks every single day. Virginia Tech will be gone from the headlines and the air waves by next week this time in the US, though the families of the victims will grieve for a lifetime. But next Tuesday I will come out here and report to you that 64 Iraqis have been killed in political violence. And those will mainly be the ones killed by bombs and mortars. They are only 13% of the total; most Iraqis killed violently, perhaps 500 a day throughout the country if you count criminal and tribal violence, are just shot down. Shot down, like the college students and professors at Blacksburg. We Americans can so easily, with a shudder, imagine the college student trying to barricade himself behind a door against the armed madman without. But can we put ourselves in the place of Iraqi students?

Arab League Summit

King Abdullah insisted at today's summit in Riyadh that "the 'real blame' for Arab woes lay with squabbling Arab rulers, who could only prevent 'foreign powers from drawing the region's future' if they united." However "unlike past summits that at times saw overt feuds break out, the gathering showed unusual public unity."


Arab leaders unite to reintroduce 2002 Beirut Declaration:

Under the plan, Arab nations would recognise Israel if Israel withdrew from land occupied in the 1967 war, accepted a Palestinian state, and agreed a "just solution to the Palestinian refugee problem".

Saudi monarch calls U.S. occupation illegal

"In beloved Iraq, blood is flowing between brothers, in the shadow of an illegitimate foreign occupation, and abhorrent sectarianism threatens a civil war," said the king.

Juan Cole's analysis:

King Abdullah followed up on these harsh criticisms of the US by cancelling his planned appearance at a White House dinner in April. The Saudi royal family is fit to be tied that Bush gave Iraq away to fundamentalist Shiite parties that have close ties to Iran.

Although the Saudi statement is remarkable for its brutal frankness and coldness toward the United States, its real significance is its slam of the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. Abdullah has not only said that the US presence is an illegal occupation, he has said that the al-Maliki government is nothing more than Shiite sectarian hegemony. The Saudis are known for their behind the scenes diplomacy and their public discretion. King Abdullah is hopping mad, to talk this way. It augurs ill for US-Saudi relations. Abdullah is also angry that Bush is letting the Palestine issue fester and that he pushed for open Palestinian elections but then cut off the Hamas government once it was elected. Abdullah thinks Bush is pursuing irrational policies, the effect of which is to destabilize the Middle East.

Our "wasted treasure"

McCain "stumbles out of the gate," perhaps unintentionally delivering one of the most candid and meaningful comments to come out of the "Straight Talk Express."

"Americans are very frustrated, and they have every right to be," McCain said. "We've wasted a lot of our most precious treasure, which is American lives."

Obama, as a Democrat, was raked over the coals for a similar remark:

“[The Iraq war] should have never been authorized, and should have never been waged, and on which we've now spent $400 billion, and have seen over 3,000 lives of the bravest young Americans wasted.''

If McCain were a principled candidate (and he's not), and truly disapproved of Bush's handling of the war (he voted for it, before he...didn't show up to vote against it), he should have stuck by the remark. That goes for Obama, too--especially running on an ostensibly antiwar platform (minus his suggestion to increase defense spending post-withdrawal).

One simply cannot simultaneously advocate withdrawal on the grounds that the invasion was illegal, the "mission" ill-defined, and the occupation a bloody disaster and still defend the notion that such a debacle somehow warranted the loss of thousands of lives. If you believe the war is unjustified, a cause not worthy of death, then the sacrifices made in prolonging it are also tragically unjust.

Those demanding apologies from Obama and McCain lambast their remarks as callous and unsympathetic of the grieving families and friends of soldiers killed. But it's Gold Star family members, in the tradition of Cindy Sheehan, that make the most compelling arguments for calling it like it is--no matter how heart-renching that realization may be--if it will prevent the senseless loss of one more life :

Two painful questions remain for all of us. Are the lives of Americans being killed in Iraq wasted? Are they dying in vain? President Bush says those who criticize staying the course are not honoring the dead. That is twisted logic: honor the fallen by killing another 2,000 troops in a broken policy?

I choose to honor our fallen hero by remembering who he was in life, not how he died. A picture of a smiling Augie in Iraq, sunglasses turned upside down, shows his essence -- a joyous kid who could use any prop to make others feel the same way.

Though it hurts, I believe that his death -- and that of the other Americans who have died in Iraq -- was a waste. They were wasted in a belief that democracy would grow simply by removing a dictator -- a careless misunderstanding of what democracy requires. They were wasted by not sending enough troops to do the job needed in the resulting occupation -- a careless disregard for professional military counsel.

But their deaths will not be in vain if Americans stop hiding behind flag-draped hero masks and stop whispering their opposition to this war. Until then, the lives of other sons, daughters, husbands, wives, fathers and mothers may be wasted as well.

This is very painful to acknowledge, and I have to live with it. So does President Bush.

And so do we. It ends once America owns up to it.

Friedman at his finest

O.K., boys, party’s over: we’re leaving by Dec. 1. From now on, everyone pays retail for their politics. We will no longer play host to a war where we’re everyone’s protector and target. If you Sunnis want to go on resisting, we’ll leave you to the tender mercies of the Shiites, who vastly outnumber you. You Shiites, if you want to run Iraq without compromising with Sunnis, fine, but you’ll have to fight them alone and then risk having to live under the thumb of Iran.

You Saudis and other Arabs, if you don’t use your influence to delegitimize Sunni suicide bombers and press Iraq’s Sunnis to cut a deal, we won’t protect you from the consequences. And Iran, you win — yes, if we leave, you win the right to try to manage Iraq’s Shiites. Have a nice day.

Mature foreign policy strategy--play vindictive martyr, blame the victim, collectively address all Arabs as children. He's right about a timetable and withdrawl--as a means for diplomatically leveraging support from regional powers. Unilateralism failed. By no means should withdrawal be used as a punitive measure against an already broken country.

Like Johnson & Nixon, Bush could still be constrained

Congress has historically been loath to cut funding for a war waged by the executive for fear of being blamed for its failure. The Vietnam funding cutoff passed only after peace accords were signed and troops withdrawn. But despite timid non-binding resolutions against escalation from Congress, Bush could finally be feeling the heat. His own party is beginning to hold his feet to the fire in a way Dems couldn't. Republicans are beginning to think they'll be more likely to lose a re-election bid for clinging to Bush's sinking ship than for supporting a watered down resolution against that failed policy and running the risk of appearing decisive.

Bush has two years left in office and enormous -- though not unlimited -- power to continue the war. He does not face re-election. Republicans in Congress do, however, and could brake Bush if they abandon him in large numbers.

And away they go--11 Republican House members speak against Bush troop boost.

"Obviously the president still has a lot of muscle and is still doing what he wants, but the evidence is that this administration is starting to feel a bit checked," said Julian Zelizer, a Boston University historian who outlines congressional resistance during the Vietnam War in the March issue of the American Prospect.

An effective system of checks and balances. Go figure.

Of course Congress would not be taking action were it not for grassroots actions like today's student initiated strike at universities across the country working to build a movement capable of generating the political will to challenge Bush's war. Go UCSB!! Wish I could be there.

The height of Rumsfeldian condescension

From his departing memo:

Begin modest withdrawals of U.S. and Coalition forces (start "taking our hand off the bicycle seat"), so Iraqis know they have to pull up their socks, step up and take responsibility for their country.

...and if they don't have socks?

Rumsfeld urging responsibility--beyond hypocrisy.

Nir Rosen on Democracy Now!

There's been a shift lately since the Americans realized that Iraq is a failure, of blaming the Iraqi’s. The Iraqi’s need to step up, the Iraqi’s have to choose democracy, the Iraqi’s have to choose freedom. It is very popular for us to blame the Iraqi’s for the chaos that we’ve brought upon them. And, I think this will perhaps be something for the cameras in the US’s intent by Bush to show that he’s going to make Maliki, you know, seize the reigns of his country, or something absurd like that, because Maliki has no power of his own. The Iraqis actually did chose democracy, we just never gave them that democracy that they were demanding.

...

There was no civil war in Iraq until we got there. And there was no civil war in Iraq, until we took certain steps to pit Sunnis against Shias. And now it is just too late. But, we need to know we are responsible for what’s happening in Iraq today. I don't think Americans are aware of this.

--Nir Rosen, freelance writer and fellow at the New America Foundation. His latest article is called "Anatomy of a Civil War: Iraq's Descent into Chaos."

This is why it's so frustrating to hear Washington play the blame game. Democrats at least have expressed that deescalation is now beyond the scope of U.S. military influence, and nothing will be accomplished through protracted occupation. But this in no way absolves the U.S. of responsibilty for the chaos its brought on Iraqi civilians and on the region. The only way to stem the violence and save face would be to acknowledge mistakes and appeal to regional powers for help building stability. I doubt we'll see that anytime soon, given the hubris of our leadership.

"We cannot save the Iraqis from themselves."

This from Carl Levin, newly anointed Senate Armed Services Committee Chair, the congressman in control of legislative oversight of the military. Levin, like other Dems, wants to demonstrate that conditions in Iraq are beyond the scope of an armed solution, and the sooner the military draws down, the better.

I agree. But he could've said it differently--maybe something along the lines of "we cannot mend the chaos caused by negligent Bush administration policy." But instead his statement comes off as patronizing, imperialist, and irresponsible. We are to believe that Iraqi civilians--a sovereign people stripped of their rights by dictators and democracies alike--are little more than petty children, the U.S. playing the "father knows best" figure, though he'd abandoned his own flesh and blood when he was needed most, and now he'd really do well to let his kids be.

Alright, that's a pretty bad extended metaphor.

The point is that I'm pretty fed-up with the bipartisan buck-passing on Iraq. So few in Congress can claim total innocence on Iraq that I guess it's understandable why it'd be a touchy subject.

Don't get me wrong, I trust we'll see a true foreign policy shift with the Dems' move towards a timetable for phased redeployment. The final nail's been driven into the coffin for "stay the course," which roughly translated to a pig-headed, faith-based refusal to admit they could've misjudged.

Unfortunately an inability to accept responsibility for failed policy seems to be more than just an isolated republican pathology, and leaves Dem leadership vulnerable to charges of "republican lite." Rather than placing blame where blame is due--squarely with a deceptive White House and PNACers--and owning up to wrongly backing their invasion, they externalize the problem. It's far more convenient for politicians to blame the victim, hanging their own puppets for failing to bring stability to a country hobbled by bloody occupation. Reminds me of the way Israel blames the Palestinian Authority for failing to truly represent the Palestinian people though it does everything in its power to deter sovereign governance.

The only way Democrats will prove they're different to a public hungry for new leadership (though skeptical of its competence) is if they disengage from the blame-game rhetoric. Even hawkish Republicans like White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten start to sound empathetic when even they suggest easing off Iraqi leadership by refusing timetables, pretending like it's always been a humanitarian mission. It's an ugly game of good-cop-bad-cop, and Dems scrambling to sound "tough on terrorism" stand to lose by sounding callous and delinquent.

Dems have some measure of moral high ground on this one, and it would do them well to talk about Iraq as our mess, not just Iraqis'. This would convince the international community that our new leadership is unlike the old--it's willing to seek diplomatic solutions, compromise, and will reassure apprehensive Iraqi civilians and government officials that the U.S. won't unilaterally disengage. A timetable will also bring regional players into the fold--it's in neighboring countries' best interests to secure a stabilized Iraq.

And all this talk of victory? Democrats need to bring that into question, too. If victory is not achievable (and it isn't) and foreign presence is only instigating more violence (after all, a fundamentalist's wet dream is extended occupation--a justification for battle), then swift redeployment is the optimal answer.

The pendulum's shifted. The dialogue and policy need to catch up to prove that we've truly witnessed what's been touted as a revolution channeled through the electoral process.

Juan Cole gives plenary address at UCSB ME Studies Conference

Interview with Prof. Juan Cole posted at SBIndymedia.