McCain's Flack Attack
In response to criticism from John McCain regarding his "no" vote on the Iraq supplemental, Barack Obama fired back today, calling attention to McCain's now infamous "stroll" through a Baghdad market last month:
McCain wasted little time firing back:
Second, how cosmically stupid is McCain's retort? As if Senator Obama personally spell checks all the transcriptions of his speechs. Moreover, there's nothing wrong with the spelling "flack jacket." Lots of people spell it that way, including all those pansies over at the Defense Department (see here, here, here) and the Marine Corps (here, here, here). I suppose they don't know an RPG from a bong either.
Of course, the sheer stupidity of this insult didn't stop major right-wing blogs like The Corner and Powerline from cheering it on. Which is more than a little hypocritical given that McCain's response was nothing more than a crude and obnoxious example of the chickenhawk argument, which these same blogs routinely get bent out of shape over when employed by anyone on the Left.
On a tangential note, I want to highlight an argument from Andy McCarthy's post that seems to have become THE talking point among the war's supporters:
Al Qaeda fighters make up only a small percentage of the Sunni insurgency, which is primary composed of Sunni nationalists and ex-Baathists. And obviously the Shiite militias and death squads are not composed of al Qaeda members. The majority of our troops in Iraq are busy with the difficult task of occupying the country and keeping Iraq's Sunnis and Shiites from killing each other.
In other words, our primary mission in Iraq has very little to do with fighting al Qaeda. If all we want to do is fight al Qaeda, we don't need to continue occupying the country. We could leave a small over-the-horizon force in Kurdistan or somewhere else nearby tasked with the job of keeping al Qaeda in check. Maybe, just maybe, that's what Senator Obama means when he mentions "redeploying" our troops and focusing on al Qaeda. In fact, I'm sure that's what he means.
Moreover, as I've noted before, there is every reason to believe that al Qaeda's continued presence in Iraq is a direct result of our presence there:
McCain wasted little time firing back:
While Senator Obama's two years in the U.S. Senate certainly entitle him to vote against funding our troops, my service and experience combined with conversations with military leaders on the ground in Iraq lead me to believe that we must give this new strategy a chance to succeed because the consequences of failure would be catastrophic to our nation's securityAn anonymous McCain aide added:
By the way, Senator Obama, it's a 'flak' jacket, not a 'flack' jacket.
Obama wouldn't know the difference between an RPG and a bong.A few quick observations. First, under what possible standards of journalistic practice is it considered acceptable to grant anonymity to an aide for the sole purpose of mouthing an obnoxious insult? Either make them say it on the record or don't print it. Bang up job, Politico.
Second, how cosmically stupid is McCain's retort? As if Senator Obama personally spell checks all the transcriptions of his speechs. Moreover, there's nothing wrong with the spelling "flack jacket." Lots of people spell it that way, including all those pansies over at the Defense Department (see here, here, here) and the Marine Corps (here, here, here). I suppose they don't know an RPG from a bong either.
Of course, the sheer stupidity of this insult didn't stop major right-wing blogs like The Corner and Powerline from cheering it on. Which is more than a little hypocritical given that McCain's response was nothing more than a crude and obnoxious example of the chickenhawk argument, which these same blogs routinely get bent out of shape over when employed by anyone on the Left.
On a tangential note, I want to highlight an argument from Andy McCarthy's post that seems to have become THE talking point among the war's supporters:
Good for Senator McCain on his sharp rebuttal to Senator Obama. May I add one point, though, that continues to make me nuts?Yes, al Qaeda is in Iraq. It wasn't before the war, but it is now. But here's what the Andy McCarthys of the world always omit from their analysis: the vast majority of our troops in Iraq are not fighting al Qaeda.
Senator Obama says: " It is time to end this war so that we can redeploy our forces to focus on the terrorists who attacked us on 9/11 and all those who plan to do us harm." . . .
Folks, let's not let these guys get away with this. By "redeploy," they don't really mean move the troops to where they say al Qaeda is. They don't want to fight al Qaeda. If they wanted to fight al Qaeda, al Qaeda is in Iraq — that is indisputable. Bin Laden has said repeatedly that Iraq is the central battle. You can argue about whether al Qaeda has been in Iraq all along or whether they are there only because we've drawn them there. Reasonable minds differ on that. But however they got there, they're there.
If you really want to fight al Qaeda, you stay in Iraq.
Al Qaeda fighters make up only a small percentage of the Sunni insurgency, which is primary composed of Sunni nationalists and ex-Baathists. And obviously the Shiite militias and death squads are not composed of al Qaeda members. The majority of our troops in Iraq are busy with the difficult task of occupying the country and keeping Iraq's Sunnis and Shiites from killing each other.
In other words, our primary mission in Iraq has very little to do with fighting al Qaeda. If all we want to do is fight al Qaeda, we don't need to continue occupying the country. We could leave a small over-the-horizon force in Kurdistan or somewhere else nearby tasked with the job of keeping al Qaeda in check. Maybe, just maybe, that's what Senator Obama means when he mentions "redeploying" our troops and focusing on al Qaeda. In fact, I'm sure that's what he means.
Moreover, as I've noted before, there is every reason to believe that al Qaeda's continued presence in Iraq is a direct result of our presence there:
The only reason al Qaeda is thriving in Iraq is because it has allied itself with other groups, mainly Sunni nationalists and baathists who have a common goal: ending the American occupation. To the extent these groups have tolerated the presence of foreign nutjob jihadists in their midst, it's because they perceive themselves to be fighting a common enemy. Take that enemy away and al Qaeda has no natural constituency in Iraq.There is no reason we have to continue occupying Iraq in order to deal with al Qaeda.
In other words, al Qaeda is in Iraq because we are. So it makes very little sense to argue that al Qaeda's presence in Iraq is the reason we have to stay. That's like turning on your porch light and claiming that it needs to stay on until all the moths are gone.
posted by A.L. at 11:59 PM
7 Comments:
sir,
senator' mccain's main point, which is that his combined military experience and senate experience on national security issues dwarf senator obama's, is a devastating riposte to sentaor obama's ill-considered swipe at senator mccain.
you are clearly a passionate man, with strong views about the war, which i respect. but please do not confuse your passion with obama's inartful attack on possible the one man in the us governement who has earned the right with his blood to comment on this wa and its conduct, without being subject to the opinions of a frankly inexperienced snator, who really should spend 4 -- 10 years in the senate, or run illinois as governor, before he decdes to run for president.
freedom lover,
I'm sure you feel the exact same way when John Kerry, Jim Webb, Wesley Clark, Max Cleland, and others express their opinions about the war, that each of them has "earned the right with his blood to comment on this war and its conduct, without being subject to the opinions of a frankly inexperienced" people like, say, George Bush, Dick Cheney, and Rudy Giuliani.
Please. And I fail to see what was so "inartful" about Obama's response. McCain was attempting to twist Obama's vote into being something that it clearly was not. After all, McCain had himself voted against a funding bill a few weeks ago. But somehow when Obama does the exact same thing, he's failing to support the troops. What a load of bull. McCain deserved to get smacked back for that sort of rank demogoguery. He deserves to get mocked for his embarrassing photo-op in Baghdad. And he started it, so he can hardly complain.
McCain would do well to remember the old adage that before you decide to throw something at somebody it's best to check that it is not a boomerang.
freedom lover-I too have great respect for McCain's service to this country, I only wish he had more respect for it.
I have found an interesting rule on the Internet. If you make a point of criticizing another poster's punctuation or style, you yourself are doomed to make a puntuation or style mistake yourself.
I think the McCain camp has just set itself up for a doozy.
"senator' mccain's main point, which is that his combined military experience and senate experience on national security issues dwarf senator obama's, is a devastating riposte to sentaor obama's ill-considered swipe at senator mccain."
Nuts to that. McCain's experience is poopie so long as he's throwing in with the current president. Criticizing McCain for being delusional isn't "ill-considered." It's probably a good idea. We need to overthrow these delusional utopians and install some realists, and, presently, the Democratic Party and the liberals have cornered the market.
We need to overthrow these delusional utopians and install some realists, and, presently, the Democratic Party and the liberals have cornered the market.
Its pretty hard to be honest when you are doing the dirty work for a band of thieves that are stealing BILLIONS AND BILLIONS OF DOLLARS while committing war crimes, crimes against humanity, and treason.
It does get tiring, year after year, to hear well-meaning folks continue to frame this all as being based on character defects - lets get real, the players BEHIND the bozos in front of the cameras and microphones are laughing all the way to the bank.
In the meantime - much of the online community refuses to talk about the real economic reasons for war.
As a liberal I usually despise much of what is written on the right wing boards. However, I have to admit that I don't think Andy McCarthy's post is that off the mark. Al Qaeda thrives best in anarchy (e.g. Somalia) so I don't think it's unreasonable to believe they may be able to establish themselves and recruit in a chaotic Iraq. Sure they'll have more enemies once the U.S. leaves, but it's easy to imagine them finding some backwater somewhere, paying off the right people and building the organization. Once the U.S. leaves Iraq, I also question how easily we could continue rooting out Al Qaeda. Would like to hear AL's thoughts, because I also don't think an unbounded commitment in Iraq is the right answer either.
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