I'm sick of this Beinhart crap that the left doomed the Democrats

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

Being against a pointless war does not make you 'weak on defense' Unlike Beinhart, we didn't accept the word of people as fundamentaly dishonest as Bush and Cheney that we needed to go and attack a country unrelated to Bin Laden to protect ourselves from future 9/11s.

Are we supposed to abandon our principles and support any call to war just to have a strong image for voters?
The comparison to past conflicts is ridiculous. There was no Pearl Harbor to send us to Iraq.

Petey, with his psedo-intellectualising, is basically telling us he wants us to puff out our chests, talk tough and drop bombs, regardless of the facts, in order to look tough?

--I think I'll pass

The antiwar movement predicted house-to-house fighting, mass civillian casulties and an endless bloody occupation. Petey thought we'd be greeted with roses and candy and was giddy to go to war when he talked about every week on wlf blitzer's show. Who the hell is he to lecture us?

[AX10]

1. I am a moderate and I have felt the same discrimination towards...

me. It's not just the "left" Democrats who are being blamed by the Conservative Dems, but the moderates/independents too.

THE TRUTH: "The antiwar movement predicted house-to-house fighting, mass civillian casulties and un endless bloody occupation. Petey thought we'd be greeted with roses and candy and was giddy to go to war when he talked about every week on wlf blitzer's show. Who the hell is he to lecture us?"

[regnaD kciN]

4. But he now admits he was wrong to support the war...

...of course, that doesn't prevent him from saying that an American withdrawal would be disastrous, and that we "owe it" to the new "democratic" government to stay there to "help them carry out their goals." Only because they insist, of course. :eyes:

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

5. He basically says to surrender to the rhetoric of fear

and accept the agenda of militarization no matter what, rather than actually stand on principle

[Warren DeMontague]

10. Well, send him an enlistment form.

My standard reply to anyone who bloviates about how essential it is for "us" to stay over there: "You first, fucker."

[regnaD kciN]

2. I heard Beinhart on Franken a couple of days ago...

The man is a fool.

I notice how he was crediting American with "winning the Cold War against Communism," and gives particular credit to liberals for having done so. Too bad that the "winning the Cold War" claim is most often used by Reagan supporters. In truth, they have the better claim. Although it could be argued that the U.S.S.R. self-destructed under its own weight rather than because of American actions, if one argues the "it was the U.S.'s doing" premise, it would be far more credible to claim it was because Reagan's defense buildup (combined with the U.S. putting pressure on the U.S.S.R. through its backing of "anti-Communist" forces -- most of them brutally dictatorial -- throughout the Americas and Asia) forcing the Soviets into a similar activity that destroyed their economy, rather than anything Harry Truman, George Marshall, and Dean Acheson did.

[BillZBubb]

6. Your view of the demise of the Soviet Union is appalling.

It sounds just like Saint Ronnie Reagan RW spin. The Reagan "defense buildup" didn't harm the Soviets, nor did backing crypto-fascist anti-communists. Those items cost the US far more than they cost the Russians. In fact Truman and Marshall did FAR MORE than Reagan to bring about the eventual fall of the Soviet Union. Their containment policy coupled with economic stimulus for the Western countries ensured that the Soviet Bloc wouldn't have any economic gain through co-option of the productive part of Europe.

The Soviet economy was in shambles before Reagan came to office. The death of Brezhnev and Andropov and the rest of the old-time hardliners is what drove the nail in the coffin. The new, younger leadership didn't have the stomach for crushing any opposition the way the prior generation did. The new leaders realized the house of cards was not worth saving.

I really can't believe someone on DU is spouting the baloney you wrote.

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

7. Had there been no Gorbachev, there would have been no victory

for Poppy Bush and Ronnie to take credit for. The USSR ended due to decades of policy. The GOP happened to preside over its end when democratic-leaning leaders got into power in the Soviet Union

[heartofthesiskiyou]

11. Don't forget the Afganistan thingy

One of the main reason the economy colapsed was 10 years of Afg. One of the main reason for loss of faith in the government was Afg.

A world power can't take on an insurgency particularly in the middle east. Won't they all be suprised what Iraq will do to the USA?

In the end they'll all stand around saying stupis shit like 'who woulda known'? (which of course the answer is anybody that has half a mind and anybody not eaten up with a failed ideology like neocommism)

2+2=4

[riderinthestorm]

3. Nah, it's the atheists who have lost the Dem victories

The latest talking point....

:sarcasm:

[Warren DeMontague]

9. That's "Atheist Whackjob". Get your slams straight.

Or, as I prefer to be called, "Mr. Atheist Whackjob".

Along with the gays, pro-choicers, and peaceniks (Damn. If I wasn't straight, I could qualify as all four!) we are responsible for alienating Mr. and Mrs. Heartland Values Voter, who, in between sending checks to Pat Robertson and Focus on the Family, would totally consider voting for the Democratic Party- you know, if it wasn't so dang principled.

[Warren DeMontague]

8. Yep. In other news, children are being shot "execution style", pregnant

women gunned down in cars...

Gosh darn that loony left and their wacky ideas about peace! Can't they just shut up and leave the policy to the sensible grownups?

Yeah. All the "sensible" war apologists can go screw themselves. I was out there with 100,000 other people in San Francisco before this clusterfuck happened, and "We told you so" is pretty cold damn comfort as I watch the ever-mounting human toll.

The anti-war people were right in Vietnam, and we're right now. But I don't even need an acknowledgement of that basic fact. I just want the bastard to end. NOW.

[Hidden Stillness]

12. "D"LC, Inc. Has No Connection With Democratic Party History

Hi, Adenoid_Hynkel. I agree. The "D"LC's insufferable arrogance goes beyond just their opinion about this war; they have tried to attach themselves to Harry Truman many different ways, as if their corporatism had anything whatsoever to do with Truman. They even have an award, the Harry Truman Award for something or other, which they just gave to Representative Ike Skelton of Missouri. Truman invented the modern NSA, Secret Service, etc., Federal infrastructure, that the little wusses of "D"LC, Inc. like to pretend a connection with, but then they ignore completely the rest of the real Harry Truman. Truman actually had a chance to sign a GATT bill, (Clinton did, of course), and rejected it as a horror, while, meanwhile, trying over and over to pass universal health care. The real Truman would have kicked Al From and all the rest of the "D"LC assholes right in the ass and right out of the office. Only by Truman being dead, and unable to answer these distortions, do they continue.

As you mention, there is no possible connection between the present circumstance and Pearl Harbor, the Cold War, etc. It is bizarre to listen to these people sometimes, as if they feel they speak for Truman, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, etc., and we don't. Disgusting. The thing to keep in mind about "D"LC, Inc., is that they are not "moderate," or "middle of the road," or anything else they pretend. They are corporate lobbyists and corporate consultants, and their whole anti-government agenda is extremist; they just dress themselves up as Harry Truman.