What Will Happen Tuesday

We will learn that the illegal war in iraq for halliburton remains a disaster and a crime against humanity and that no amount of spin regarding the so called "splurge" will EVER make it right and that betrayus will try to keep things at status quo on orders of Shrub and that it will take a Demcoratic President (particularly Obama) to end the mess once and for all. That is what we will learn.

The question is, will Joe Klein remember what we have taught him here at Swampland and use intelligence in his reporting or will he revert to his old ways?

“Al Qaeda in Iraq will proclaim victory and increase its efforts to provoke sectarian tensions in Iraq into a full scale civil war that could descend into genocide and destabilize the Middle East.”

What utter nonsense! Why would Al Qaeda provoke sectarian tensions once the US is on its way out? How does that square with Al Qaeda's stated or even implied goals?

Exactly - the only reason al qaeda is in iraq is to fight for the oppressed iraqi people our soldiers are killing on a daily basis. Once we leave and give true freedom to iraq the violence will end. You are totally right, Independent. totally right.

Independent, McCain's idea is that it AQ would continue to see a failed state in Iraq as better than a Shia-controlled state. So it would continue to inflame the civil tensions, as it has done in the past, which would allow it to establish a base of operations in the country.

You ARE quick to defend Maverick, I gotta give you points for loyalty if nothing else.

What does Maverick say regarding troop levels, and how we'll get sufficient enlistments to meet the needs of his policy? Especially after this:

"The current demand for our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan exceeds the sustainable supply, and limits our ability to provide ready forces for other contingencies. . . . Soldiers, families, support systems and equipment are stretched and stressed. . . . Overall, our readiness is being consumed as fast as we build it. If unaddressed, this lack of balance poses a significant risk to the all-volunteer force and degrades the Army’s ability to make a timely response to other contingencies."
- Army Vice Chief of Staff, Gen. Richard A. Cody

Michael, that's completely illogical. If it inflames civil tensions, it can use the country as a base of operations. Al qaeda is inflaming tensions in afghanistan, but it could only use it as a base of operations when it was part of the government. Bin Laden used the Sudan as a base of operations, because he had worked out a deal with the government.

Leave aside that no Iraqis are going to permit the presence of foreign terrorists killing Iraqis for the purpose of "inflaming civil tensions," there's no way that the US leaving Iraq will give the minuscule number of al qaeda an opportunity to further gain power in Iraq.

The US is their source of power, a place for Sunni nationalists to fight back.

But, even if you don't believe the last two paragraphs, there is no way that al qaeda can use Iraq as a base of operations, any more than they can use Saudi Arabia, which is the real population base for al qaeda operatives.

"Binary debates", Schrodinger's cat...what is this, a Sci-Fi convention?

McCain's idea is that it AQ would continue to see a failed state in Iraq as better than a Shia-controlled state.

Does anyone we'll see something other than a failed, Shia-controlled state? Seriously.

For McCain, the political argument is grounded in a vision of the future.

Michael,
I think your assessment of Senator McCain's political argument is incorrect. He is using the same fear tactics that the current administration used to get us into war, and to keep us in the war this long. I have never heard Senator McCain's "vision of the future" regarding Iraq. "Victory" is not a vision.

My questions about the war from the beginning, and particularly with Senator McCain's rhetoric about victory and surrender, have always been the same: What does victory look like? What is our strategic goal and what can we measure to determine whether we have met the goal? What is our exit strategy once we have met our goal? What is our long term strategy to maintain stability after our occupying military force has left?

Nobody, has answered those questions sufficiently to justify the blood and treasure we have lost in Iraq.

This "US Institute for Peace" is basically a PR agency for America's plutocratic permanent government. Nowhere in their Iraq analysis does controlling oil or securing US "national interests" figure. When reading their paper, one would think that the Iraq invasion was divinely inspired and immaculately conceived. Their paper is thus silly and useless, attempting to clothe in respectability a disastrous neo-imperial smash and grab, and pretending that we are solicitous about the Iraqi people. We will never leave Iraq until we are forcibly expelled by the Iraqis or until our economy collapses. These outcomes are no longer remote possibilities.

Please note than Condoleezza Rice and Robert Gates are "Ex-officio" members of the United States Institute for Peace.

Perfectly empty "he said she said" Beltway journalism, with the obvious choice being going down the middle -- just as it has been since "Mission Accomplished" day. Such thinking has done a good job of leaving us stuck there, which is probably the point of it all. At least the link will probably be good for, if nothing else, some chuckles.

Independent, McCain's idea is that it AQ would continue to see a failed state in Iraq as better than a Shia-controlled state. So it would continue to inflame the civil tensions, as it has done in the past, which would allow it to establish a base of operations in the country.

Posted by Michael Scherer | April 7, 2008 5:40 PM

They did an awesome job of "destabilizing" Baathist Iraq under Saddam, didn't they? And look how destabilized Iran is. And Saudi Arabia. And Egypt. Jordan is on the brink of civil war right now. And as for Syria! Pish, that country is about to boil over! Al Qaeda, the all-powerful "destabilizer." We'd better invade Mexico, too, before Al Qaeda decides to destabilize them. And I've always had my suspicions about the stability of Canada....

I am not defending McCain's argument. I am just answering Independent's question about what he says.

We all know what will happen tomorrow - without either the Centcom head or the SecDef there, it will be a rehash of the dog and pony show we saw last September; focusing on tactics and metrics which haven't been met (but which Petraeus will pretend that we are making progress towards meeting). It will change nothing, because the lying Republicans will sustain any action Bush takes until next January. The MSM will react by praising Petraeus and sliming Democrats.

Meanwhile, another $80 billion will be spent; no progress will be made in Iraq and certainly not in Waziristan where bin Laden is. And more troops and civilians will die.

Last September, at least there was a "hope" that "moderate sensible" Republicans were going to help force a policy change. Now, there is no such hope because we know for certain what the lying sliming Republicans will do. Last September, Swampland's columnists relentlessly traitor-baited Move.on and ridiculed anti-war Democrats. Will there be a change this time??

What, "Fewer People Dying" isn't a National Interest?

Whatever. This will all become moot when the Republicans find an ad to get hissy about.

McCain's view, by the way, is not "rooted in the future." It is rooted in the past - with Korea, Japan and Germany serving as his models. Despite the fact that those examples are inapt analogies because they were "post-war" occupations and we are still in the midst of a "war." In Korea, Japan and Germany, we could rebuild electricity capacity; we could produce commodities, we could establish the rule of law; we could certainly drive from the principal airports to the capital without armored convoys - all because the security situation was under control. It isn't in Iraq - the militias infiltrate the security forces; armed thuggery dominates most neighborhoods. It is a terrible situation - all triggered by and exacerbated by the U.S.'s unprovoked military invasion and occupation based on baldfaced WMD lies.

But the underlying point is clearly valuable, and too easily lost in the political debate. There are sure to be painful costs of any strategy that is adopted after the Bush Administration leaves office. And instead of just calling each other “irresponsible” or “wrong," it would be valuable for the country to face these trade-offs with nuance, head-on, with our eyes open.

Michael, you can't be serious to think that most all the people of swampland could possibly ever bring themselves to the point of thinking in these terms??? Sane and intelligent opinions do not exist on this site.

Thanks for the post, MS. I've got some criticisms of their list, but it's nice to at least see the various options and their possible effects laid out.

Awesome! I just proved RustyDog wrong without even trying!

am not defending McCain's argument. I am just answering Independent's question about what he says.

Posted by Michael Scherer | April 7, 2008 6:15 PM

Shouldn't points like the ones I made be an automatic part of the critical thinking that is the hallmark of good journalism? Sorry, just reciting what are supposed to be McCain's arguments for him, without pointing out that those arguments aren't just flimsy, but downright dumb given the empirical evidence, isn't good journalism. It isn't even journalism at all.

Has any journalist, anywhere, challenged McCain on the arrant dumbassness of his claims? If so, I'd like to see that transcript, rather than stuff like this, which is entirely unconstructive.

If the US withdrawls from Iraq, I believe the violence would escalate not end. But it wouldn't be from al-qaeda but the radicals from both the Sunni and Shiite sides. There actually is a very logical argument for the US staying in Iraq for the time being but McCain and the Republicans insist on using exaggerations and ridiculous slogans (support the troops, al-qaeda will declare victory if we leave) instead of giving an honest assessment.

“It’s a failure of leadership to support an open-ended occupation of Iraq that has failed to press Iraq’s leaders to reconcile, badly overstretched our military, put a strain on our military families, set back our ability to lead the world, and made the American people less safe. John McCain was wrong about the war from the beginning, he’s wrong to call for more resources in Iraq while the American people are struggling, and he’s wrong to support a 100 year occupation of a country that needs to take responsibility for its own future. No amount of tough talk will change the Bush-McCain record of poor judgment, or bring us one day closer to ending a war that is not making us safer,” said Barack Obama.

Its a failure of leadership when you stick your head in the sand, and "hope" for an outcome which you have absolutely no experience to back it up with, beside "just words".

Is it a requirement now in order to declare yourself a democrat to first cite the passages of "Chicken Little"???

Thank you for responding to commentary, Michael Scherer.

McCain and his two chief surrogates, Graham and Lieberman, endlessly push the "al Qaeda" button when discussing Iraq. Lieberman has even invented a group called "al Qaeda in Iran", which I suspect was an intentional slip of the tongue. Liebercrat Harold Ford said not long ago that he does not believe al Qaeda will "allow us" to leave Iraq.
AQI has been estimated at between two and six thousand people. Their only connection to Osama is that using the name "Al Qaeda" is a publicity boost for AQI, for OBL, and for GWB. The Anbar sheikhs that we're pretending are our allies still hate AQI.
Could we challenge his assertions that this group, whatever emails they may send out if we announce withdrawal, nothing that occurs in Iraq is going to be a victory for Al Qaeda in any of its manifestations?

I am just answering Independent's question about what he says.

And if he said that al qaeda in Iran was going to join up with them, would you report that, too?

If he reported that they were going to win the next election, would you report that, too?

Isn't there a point where when they something that's absolutely illogical or false that you observe that, in the following sentence?

" It is rooted in the past - with Korea, Japan and Germany serving as his models.

The correct referrent is the Philippines.

Rustydog,
Thank you for quoting Senator Obama. His "words" always sound reasoned, measured, and well informed.
His words are in sharp contrast to the inflammatory language used my Senator McCain when he speaks of "surrender" and when you equate a withdrawal strategy to "Chicken Little."

"I am not defending McCain's argument. I am just answering Independent's question about what he says."

There's been a lot questions raised here regarding McCain...I don't remember you answering with such lightning speed. I'm just sayin'.

U.S. Institute for Peach, eh? That outfit has Condoleeza Rice and Robert Gates on their boards as members ex officio and a washed up B list actor on their board. Sounds like a great outfit, Mike.

The point of the post isn't to hammer a particular candidate on their policy statements.

Actually, I'm not sure what the point is. Is it about the Peace Institute's document? Is it about how the candidates need to calm down and take a look at the effectiveness of various approaches? If so, that's common sense - I already knew that. I'd love it if all three took a deep breath and gave us an in-depth examination of Iraq.

It won't happen. So why the post in the first place?

jay raises a legitimate question. Is there a place in your journalism, Michael, for saying that the speaker is wrong?
Or do you see you job as just relaying their arguments?
Is so then how does that square with your desire for a debate with eyes open?

"If" so . Sorry for the Freudian slip.

CDServais,

Obama's words repeat an agenda that has no substantiated proof, that his proposal would mean anything less than complete failure at a time when there is hope for the Iraqi people and potential positive outcomes for our country.

Obama himself has said many times since the start of his pursuit to become President, that full and total withdrawal from Iraq is not the most feasible plan. His strategy to immediately begin downsizing our forces will send a clear message to the various factions in Iraq the US has been rendered weak and does not have the fortitude to bring about a positive end to this conflict for all. I am confident that this strategy will further erode our world position, and the US will once again see pre-Reagan foreign opinion as a world power which is "the US is once again impotent".

This strategy will put us into an isolationist position, equal to our neighbors to the north and south. Weak, withdrawn and on the defensive.

Thank you for the substantive post, Michael. According to the paper you linked to,

"political progress is so slow, halting and superficial, and social and political fragmentation so pronounced, that the US is no closer to being able to leave Iraq than it was a year ago. Lasting political development could take five to ten years of full, unconditional U.S. commitment to Iraq."

One of the problems with the Iraq debate has been the war's supporters constant "turning-the-corner" refrain. If you listen to them, we're always six months from declaring victory.

Has McCain acknowledged that as president, he'd likely keep troops fighting in Iraq for the next five to ten years, or has he attempted to obfuscate his stance on how long he's willing to keep troops fighting in Iraq?

I also don't buy this "future vs. the past" framing. I learned a long time ago that the best way to predict the future is to look at what happened in the past. And I agree with Obama that giving power to the same people who made the bad decisions in support of this war for the past five years is the best way to guarantee that we'll keep making bad decisions for the next five years.

And of course it's worth noting that the candidate who doesn't want to talk about the past is the one who's shown the poor judgement to support this war whole-heartedly in the past (and the present).

Indeed, dwhite. It's always interesting how 5 seconds ago can turn into "the past." I remember when it was revealed that Pelosi saw "enhanced interrogation" in action. Within half an hour Joe Klein was here telling us to put all the partisan bickering to come behind us.

Telling us McCain = Future, Dems = Past is like saying up is down and down is up.

In other words, typical media-manufactured narrative building.

Oh, yeah...McCain is just so visionary for advocating we do the same thing over and over and somehow expect a different result.

And yes, McCain is just so future-oriented because he is refighting the Vietnam war in his own head.

But, hell, the guy serves great BBQ...so let's lionize him with BS memes.

I am not defending McCain's argument. I am just answering Independent's question about what he says.

Neither are you telling us anything new. The paper you reference is reheated leftovers from the Iraq Study group. A mind is a terrible thing to waste Mr. Scherer.

It has been about a week since you asked us for questions to put before McCain, Mr. Scherer. When are you planning to ask them?

Rustydog,
Thank you for the substantive response to my criticism. This is the exact type of reasoned argument that has been missing in the presidential campaign thus far.
I disagree with your determination that Senator Obama's planned withdrawal from Iraq will be a failure. I believe our military is severely overstretched, which leaves our security in a tenuous position to deal with current or future threats. A withdrawal will allow us to reallocate some of our limited military resources to Afghanistan where they are currently needed. A withdrawal will also
provide leverage for the diplomatic work of creating political progress to strengthen the Iraqi state and the military. These are two worthwhile objectives.

CDServais,

Thank you for your differing view on the conflict in Iraq as well. I whole heartely agree that our political candidates do need to provide the American voter, both sides of the argument.

However, current trends seem to indicate sound-bytes will get response from the media, rather than true discourse.

But our own history points to devastation when the end result is civil war. Civil war will not provide us with a greatly needed ally in a region of the world which screams loudly for peace and stability.

Michael's reference to the Institute of Peace's nine page brief, from my reading, indicates a withdrawal will have the highest percentage for the most negative outcome. But, as we know predictions are just predictions. Until you are willing or un-willing to go down that road, we will never know the ultimate end result.

As John McCain would say, let's "cut the bull$hit."

An occupation of Iraq bent on control of that nation's resources will not declare that intention. It will use any available cover story to mask its disreputable interest in resource control. The argument of preserving "stability" is a perfect cover story, because stability can be defined in infinitely elastic terms. Even if internecine violence in Iraq declined abruptly from current levels, the mere threat of future insurrection and instability could be used to justify an indefinite occupation.

Because the "stability" cover story is plausible, getting past it means accusing the US government of lying. Since the US government has lied and concealed its motives in many, many past foreign policy adventures, it is entirely reasonable to believe that the US government is lying now.

It is evidence of the extreme cowardice of the American press that, with a few exceptions, the Bush administration's lies about Iraq continue to be swallowed by the press and regurgitated to the public.

It's interesting that, while all 4 main players mentioned will attend in a professional capacity, only three are presumed to be so irresponsible as to undermine their dutie for political gain. Why not the fourth? Why is that insult of the first three OK, even?

Rustydog 6:46 PM:

"Its a failure of leadership when you stick your head in the sand, and "hope" for an outcome which you have absolutely no experience to back it up with, beside "just words"."

Given that nothing that has said about Iraq has turned out to be true, then couldn't that be said about the President as well? Since everything about Iraq has been pretty much wrong, even including the reason why we had to invade, isn't natural to be skeptical about what the conservatives predict about what will happen if we leave?

When McCain says "“Al Qaeda in Iraq will proclaim victory and increase its efforts to provoke sectarian tensions in Iraq into a full scale civil war that could descend into genocide and destabilize the Middle East," he is playing on the same fear argument that was used when we went it. We had to go in because there were WMDs which would be used against us and McCain's statement carries the same type of hyperbole that was used as the reason to invade. We can't leave or the whole region might explode into chaos.

I'm sorry, but I don't believe in the war of civilizations idea because I don't think that there is a Middle East nation militarily strong enough to confront any Western nation. I also find a contradiction in McCain's statement above and this war of civilizations idea that he also believes in. If the region is so fragile that the civil war in Iraq can destabilize the whole region, then how is possible to think that we are in a war of civilizations with a part of the world which can descend so readily into the chaos of a civil war? I don't think you can argue them together. Which makes more skeptical about McCain's positions because I see them as knee-jerked reactions instead of thought out ones.

I've also read that one of the reason why we got some success with the surge was because the Iraqis were tired of Al Queda and saw them as the enemy more than they saw us. So I am skeptical of McCain's base premise that Al Queda will be very influential in the post-America Iraq as well.

For McCain, the political argument is grounded in a vision of the future.

For Clinton and Obama, the political argument will be about the past, when the American people were repeatedly misled about progress, and the present, when Americans continue to pay a steep price in blood and treasure.

Jeeeeeesus. Grounded in a vision of the future, huh? Way to romanticize Big Daddy McCain, Michael. That's pretty amusing, actually. Sounds new-agey. What'd they do to you on that bus, anyway?

On the Bus:
//
Carlson goes on, at considerable length, about how Bush "bond[ed] with the goof-off in all of us" on that plane. Persistently, she portrays the press corps--and herself--as if they were feckless teen-agers. On the plane, "[Bush's] inner child hovers near the surface," she writes. And not only that; "Bush knows how to push the buttons of your high school insecurity." But then, "a campaign is as close as an adult can get to duplicating college life." Bush "wasn't just any old breezy frat brother with mediocre grades...He was proud of it," Carlson writes, approvingly. This seems to explain the press corps' preference. "Gore elicited in us the childish urge to poke a stick in the eye of the smarty-pants," she writes. "Bush elicited self-recognition." Yes, those sentences actually appear in this book, and yes, they seem to be Carlson's explanation of Gore's lousy coverage. "It's not hard to dislike Bush's policies, which favor the strong over the weak," she writes. "But it is hard to dislike Bush."
http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh061403.shtml......

Sound like anyone *we* know? Seems like deja vu all over again.

McCain's vision of the future is a boot perpetually on someone's neck.

Lots of unenlightened bashing and polemics in the comments here. But also some good discussions. Kind of a nice cross-section of where we all are. I agree that one of journalism's key responsibilities is to ask tough questions. But I believe another key responsibility is more simple: to clarify the situation. It's easy to get lost in the mire, and sometimes it's refreshing just to get a reality check on what the topic is, who the players are, and where they stand. For that, I think this is a good post, and I appreciate it. Thanks Michael.

My two cents is that there's far too much crystal ball work here to have any degree of certainty which side has the right idea going forward. I would like our troops to come home sooner rather than later. But I think that if we leave precipitously, Iraq will crumble and good people will die. Unfortunately, if we stay for years as we wait for Iraq to get its act together, good people will die. There is no magic bullet here, IMHO. It's why this war was a mistake from the beginning. But hashing & rehashing that point adds nothing toward figuring out what to do from here. It comes down to, whose idea do you think stands the best chance of having fewer good people die.

This is one reason I'm perpetually glad not to be a politician. Because at some point when the rhetoric and the grandstanding and the gladhanding are done, you're faced with a choice of which good people to leave dead.

It is fascinating that anyone could pretend to engage in an objective analysis of America's interests in Iraq and completely ignore the most important issues, facts, risks and consequences of leaving Iraq.

Fact: Oil is the essential life blood of the global economy
Fact: America consumes about 21 million barrels of oil per day
Fact: America imports about 13 million barrels of oil per day
Fact: America consumes 26% of global oil production
Fact: The USA only has about 2.5% of the earth's proved oil reserves
Fact: There are no ready, cost effective substitutes for oil
Fact: Increases in oil prices have a negative effect on the economy
Fact: USA annually pays over $600 billion more for oil than in 2003
Fact: 65% of the earth's oil reserves are in the area around Iraq
Fact: Iraq has at least 10% & perhaps 20% of the earth's oil reserves
Fact: Iraq exports about 2.5 million barrels of oil per day
Fact: Iraq oil exports represent the global demand/supply differential
Fact: A disruption of Iraq oil exports will cause oil prices to skyrocket
Fact: Removing 160,000 USA security forces will imperil Iraq exports
Fact: The security void left by the USA will be filled by Al Qaeda & Iran
Fact: Al Qaeda & Iran are America's worst global adversaries
Fact: Al Qaeda & Iran understand the USA's oil vulnerability
Fact: Al Qaeda & Iran would both enjoy wrecking the USA economy
Fact: A few USA special forces & airpower can't deter Al Qaeda or Iran
Fact: Al Qaeda & Iran might force a Saudi accommodation on oil
Fact: Iraq's oil infrastructure will be Al Qaeda's first target
Fact: Leaving Iraq to bloody chaos will earn the eternal enmity of Iraq
Fact: Iraq will at best become a hostile Iranian proxy state
Fact: Iran will control 20% to 30% of global oil reserves
Fact: The USA will be able to do nothing to stop Iranian nukes
Fact: Iran may become more aggressive & belligerant if it has nukes
Fact: Much higher oil prices would wreck the USA economy
Fact: Al Qaeda & Iran would both benefit from much higher oil prices
Fact: Higher oil costs paid by Americans would fund Al Qaeda & Iran
Fact: Higher oil prices enable the tyrannical Russian regime to thrive
Fact: A USA departure from Iraq would trigger a major oil price spike
Fact: A $17/bbl oil price rise would offset the $125b cost of staying
Fact: Oil prices will rise by a lot more tha $17 if the USA leaves Iraq
Fact: It is much cheaper to stay in Iraq than to leave Iraq to chaos
Fact: There is a serious risk that chaos in Iraq could spread to Saudi
Fact: If the USA leaves, Al Qaeda & Iran will be on the Saudi border
Fact: Al Qaeda will be well positioned to join forces with the Wahabi
Fact: Al Qaeda & the Wahibi inside Saudi both want to oust the royals
Fact: The Shia have wanted to oust the apostate Saudis for 1500 yrs
Fact: Serious threats to the Gulf States will cause oil prices to explode
Fact: Much higher oil prices will cause the USA economy to collapse
Fact: The economic damage of higher oil prices will dwarf the $125b
Fact: A retreat from Iraq will imperil the finances of all Americans
Fact: Iraq costs 75% of Americans less than $7 per month
Fact: The American way of life is worth defending
Fact: Liberals and Dems do not care about facts or consequences

By contrast, staying in Iraq and helping the Iraqis reach their 8 to 10 million barrels per day oil production potential would:

1) Cause oil prices to fall dramatically
2) Trigger an economic boom
3) Cause Al Qaeda & the Russian and Iranian regimes to collapse
4) Avoid a global economic catastrophe

Of course rational economic thought is beyond the reach of liberals.

Visit www.politicalrealityonline.com if facts matter to you.

A dysfunctional person with serious psychological problems will repeat unproductive behaviors. The American corporate press seems to fit this description. Michael Scherer is "covering" McCain just the way a gullible press corps covered Bush, shielding him from tough questions and spinning McCain's positions as bold, brave, and far-sighted.

Mr. Scherer seems to at least notionally recognize that he owes us a fair account of the candidate McCain's views on the issues, yet, curiously, he fails to detail these views, suggesting that this information will eventually be forthcoming, some day. Meanwhile, he writes one vague article after another in which McCain's faults are carefully screened from view.

One cannot become a writer for Time Magazine without an adequate command of the English language. Mr. Scherer is perfectly capable of taking 15 minutes out of his busy life to explain his approach to covering the campaign in a few paragraphs posted here. The fact that he does not do this suggests that he is being evasive, and thus Mr. Scherer's motivations remain mysterious, and, unfortunately, suspect.

This is one reason I'm perpetually glad not to be a politician. Because at some point when the rhetoric and the grandstanding and the gladhanding are done, you're faced with a choice of which good people to leave dead. Posted by Harry | April 8, 2008 7:31 AM

Very good post "Harry". This isn't Harry Truman, who is speaking from the grave is it?? Ha ha, just kidding.

Good commentary versus playground taunts are rare on this site, good to see someone else with some sense.

Of course rational economic thought is beyond the reach of liberals.

I readily accept most of these asserted facts (candidly confirmed by Alan Greenspan). What I do not accept is the concealment of control of Iraqi oil as a necessary pillar of US foreign policy. The ridiculous claim that we have killed, maimed or displaced millions of Iraqis to "protect" them from a civil war is obviously nothing but a screen for our desperate grab for Iraqi oil.

Dishonesty is a corrosive practice. When it becomes the Basis for our government's actions, it taints all sectors of society, because ever-widening circles of falsehood must protect the central lies. This is what the petroleum-fact-based plutocrats don't grasp: while chasing after Iraqi oil, they are destroying the vital social capital of America. They are fighting for fuel to supply a machine that is breaking down because of their lies.

For clarification, the best, clearest, unflinching stuff is in the Responsible Challengers' Plan.

This list:

1. Prevent Iraq from becoming a haven or platform for international terrorists.
2. Restore U.S. credibility, prestige and the capacity to act worldwide.
3. Improve regional stability.
4. Limit and redirect Iranian influence.
5. Maintain an independent Iraq as a single state.

is still full of wishful thinking about ponies in Iraq. It continues the illusion that the US has the ability to affect actors that it cannot affect.

The first is nonsensical continuation of lying fearmongering pretexts for the occupation. There is no terrorist threat from Iraq, never has been, and never will be. The terrorist actors are in Saudi Arabia, Yemen and transplanted to Afghanistan.

US credibility and prestige has been irreparably damaged, if only because the US military power has proven to be hollow. Improvements cannot come under this administration; we can be sure things will be made worse before Bush's term ends.

The best way to improve regional stability is for the US to leave. The US presence is endangering other US client states, like Egypt. And if this is coded language about providing military support for Israel, it is an indication of complete misunderstanding of the word "stability."

Limiting and redirecting Iranian influence is one of those wishful thinking items. The US, by cutting off diplomacy with Iran while simultaneously supporting Iranian clients in Iraq has eliminated its ability to affect Iranian influence in Iraq. There are no channels available for attaining this objective. And it is not clear why this is an objective. In the current situation, the US and Iran have many common interests that need to be explored. While it may not be what the Likkudniks want, it is clearly in the US interest to improve relations with Iran. Again, this cannot happen under this administration.

Number 5 is more wishful thinking. The US has no fulcrum for applying leverage on that issue. Nor is there any reason for that to be an objective. It may also conflict with the stability objective. The most stable resolution may be two states, one Sunni Kurd, one Shiite Arab, and a protectorate around Baghdad that is independent of either.

This kind of abstract, Mr. Micawber thinking has kept the US in an occupation that has no termination condition, serves no US interests and is taking money away from maintaining a crumbling infrastructure in the US.

jayackroyd:

Alan Greenspan said, the Iraq war was largely about oil. The "Peace Institute" paper referenced by Mr. Scherer does not even mention oil access as a vital US strategic interest. It mentions oil only in terms of "oil revenue sharing," from a proposed oil law that has US corporate control of Iraqi oil quietly tucked away in it. This is dishonesty on an enormous scale. A supposedly non-partisan "institute" has constructed a fairy tale about America's role in Iraq that completely ignores what informed observers agree to be our primary strategic motivation.

An unholy alliance of an ambition-crazed candidate, an accommodating press, and sock-puppet plutocratic "institutes" is working together to weave a fundamentally false fabric of conventional wisdom that the public is supposed to accept because multiple corrupt sources confirm the same lies.

From a social engineering perspective, one must admire the extent and cunning complexity of this edifice of lies, but from a moral perspective, it is more repugnant and destructive than the lowest falsehood uttered by a street criminal.

Sigh.

It's not about "oil."

Oil trades on world markets. Oil is fungible. It doesn't matter what country produces it, or what government is in charge of that country, whether the US thinks the government is friendly or not.

(Our foes are all of our own creation, by the way. Except maybe North Korea.)

The invasion and occupation is about the bases, nothing else. That's McCain's 100 years. That's Bush's status of forces agreement. The issues the Peace Institute raises are distractions.

Moreover, #5 is simply a lie. I focused on the wrong word. The key word is "independent." That is not an objective of anyone who wants to retain US forces in Iraq. The objective is an Iraqi client state.

Oil trades on world markets. Oil is fungible. It doesn't matter what country produces it, or what government is in charge of that country, whether the US thinks the government is friendly or not.

I usually agree with your analysis, but I don't think you appreciate the coming oil depletion scenarios. Oil is fungible as long as supplies are adquate. As soon as we move into a serious scarcity situation, which some experts think is just a few years away, oil exporting countries will use their oil to wield political power and discriminate among customers. The American plutocracy does not want to be under the thumb of a handful of oil-rich nations. That is why they want to make sure that control of our future oil supplies is in the safe hands of puppet governments held at gunpoint by American occupation forces. You can be very sure that US oil companies will get a "fair share" of future Iraqi oil exports.

The permanent US bases in Iraq aren't needed to protect Israel, but they are needed to keep the Iraqi oil under US control and provide a jumping off point for future oil grabs in the Mideast. The NeoCons have dreamed of seizing the Saudi and Iranian oil for years. An American expeditionary army in Iraq (if victorious) would be perfectly situated to scoop up all of the Mideast Oil - all in the name of "Energy Security," of course.

You're suggesting that entire world oil market will vanish rather than the price rising?

supplies are adequate

You're talking like the Limits to Growth people in the 70s. You're already seeing increased substitution for petroleum. At 100 dollars a barrel, there are a lot of substitutes that become economically viable.

The real risk is a disastrous collapse of the American economy, disrupting world markets in everything, and removing the dollar as the reserve currency.

But, no, peak oil is not going to end the oil marketplace.

You're suggesting that entire world oil market will vanish rather than the price rising?

Not at all, but it will become a two-tiered market. Preferred suppliers will have politically engineered long-term contracts with price protection. Everybody else will have to scramble for oil at astronomical spot prices.

The Limits to Growth people were correct, just premature in their time line. We will be lucky to keep the lights on if we start a crash program of building nuke plants tomorrow. But we are in for a very rough time in terms of expanding petroleum supplies. Even the oil companies are starting to recognize the peak oil phenomenon and are investing in alternate energies.

Worldwide petroleum production appears to have peaked in 2005, and has been on a wiggly plateau ever since. If conventional economic theory were applicable, $100 oil should immediately have brought forth a surge of supply that would have brought down the price. Where is the supply?

Look at some of the peak oil research, and you will see that no easily accessible giant oil fields have been discovered in the last few years. Moreover, the big existing fields are depleting in the North Sea, Mexico, and even Saudi Arabia.

Do you really believe that oil production is going to increase significantly in the future?

No, as I said, at these prices substitutes will become economic, and will be adopted. You'll first see, as you did in 1974, spontaneous conservation. Just talking to someone about the p&ls at his company. They're revising them to reflect increased energy and material costs, and are going to start running at lower production levels because of those increased costs.

Stuff like that is happening now. There are huge conservation gains to be made, and they will be. And then you'll see more solar, more wind.

*** It's not about "oil."...The invasion and occupation is about the bases, nothing else. ***

Hilarious. And why do you think the U.S. wants bases in the Middle East, brainiac?

It's not about "oil."

*** Oil trades on world markets. Oil is fungible. It doesn't matter what country produces it, or what government is in charge of that country, whether the US thinks the government is friendly or not. ***

Equally hilarious. Apparently you are too young to have been around during the oil embargo of the 70's.

Come back and comment again when you get out of high school.

No, as I said, at these prices substitutes will become economic, and will be adopted.

What "economic" substitutes do you see for the national vehicle fleet? Where is the liquid fuel going to come from? Please point me to an article that describes how the US economy can shift smoothly away from petroleum dependency without massive turmoil and an economic crash.

There appears to be no near-term technical solution, other than nuclear power, for coping with (soon-to-be) declining petroleum production. Zero-sum thinking will probably lead America into a series of progressively more destructive resource wars. Iraq was the second such petroleum war after Gulf War I, and it has been much more damaging and costly.

There is no reason that I can see for establishing a massive US military presence in Iraq other than securing access to Iraq's vast oil resources. I invite you to provide an alternative explanation.

HH--

The substitutes for the vehicle fleet are replacing humvees with hybrid minivans, moving closer to urban areas, living more densely and adopt more electric cars. Yes, I agree that there will be a sudden recognition of the need for more nuclear generating plants.

As for bases in the mideast, the US has military bases throughout the world, huge installations in Asia and Europe. The Iraq war was about establishing a reliable base in the middle east. The Saudi government is too unstable, and the US presence there was providing propaganda to al qaeda.

The only thing you can do with oil is sell it into world markets or sell it directly to the recipient country. But only in a world where all sales are made that way, and where there is no reselling onto world markets by subsidized recipients, the way Cuba used to do with Russian oil, does the scenario you outline make sense.

This would mean a massive collapse of the international financial and trading systems, a collapse that is not in the interests of the oil producing countries.

mci

The US wants bases in Iraq for the same reason it wants bases in Germany Korea and Japan--to project force forward, and to be prepared to move aggressively wherever it wants to in the world.

It doesn't make any difference to the United States which entity sells Iraqi oil or Saudi oil onto open markets. The oil related issue here is that Bush and Cheney wanted the profits to go to their American cronies, but there is no strategic benefit related to oil that requires an American puppet government. Iran's oil goes onto world markets. Venezuela's oil goes onto world market.

As for the embargo, it is certainly true that Saudi Arabia can stop production at any time. But that has nothing to do with troop levels anywhere. I strongly doubt that Saudi Arabia could get the rest of OPEC to agree to an embargo.

And, as I think about it, I don't see what your point is. How does the embargo affect the presence of world markets or the fungibility of oil?

Greg Palast has written about peak oil and the invasion of Iraq. He doesn't buy the theory. Let me just throw out his argument for your consideration.

What he points out is that there are huge tar sands and other reserves in Canada and Venezuela that are uneconomical to exploit when Oil is below a certain price. But at high enough prices those reserves are in play. In other words the Peak Oil Theory is really the Peak "Cheap" Oil theory. And in fact, he points out the first Peak Oil papers, by King Hubbert in 1956 analyzed "easy" oil, i.e. oil extractable at historical prices of $20 or so. One of King's arguments was to predict the "easy" oil peak so a society would have time to prepare the more advanced technologies needed to get at the harder to extract oil.

The other thing Palast points out about Iraq oil is that Iraq has always been the ugly stepchild of OPEC. Iraq's quotas have always been miniscule relative to other OPEC nations and Iraq's reserves. This was a long term and purposeful OPEC strategy to keep prices high, and policy was in fact first put in place by the British in the early 20th century. Part of the NeoCon plan longterm was to hurt OPEC by opening the Iraq oil spigots, bringing the price of Oil down, and weaken if not kill OPEC pricing power. I don't think he's exactly saying that this was Cheney/Bush's plan, but more a part of the Neocon's driving ideology.

A final argument Palast makes is that one of the strategic imperatives to get control of Iraq's oil, is that supply and demand, again at the existing prices and production capacities, had become tight enough that even Iraq's limited production was critical. And Saddam could disproportionately swing the price of oil via over and under production of Iraqi Oil. Too much power over the world economy for a jackal like Saddam.

In the context of the relatively stable oil prices of the Clinton administration, Saddam induced price swings probably were a strategic problem. Frankly, it is probably one the Bush regime would like to have back, but with those power hungry war mongers, who knows.

I'll try to scare up a link to a well written piece spelling this out in more detail.

The Iraq war was about establishing a reliable base in the middle east.

I just don't buy it, jayackroyd. America has been playing the great geostrategic power game for a long time. Oil is not just a commodity; in time of scarcity it is a weapon. That is why we have spent billions on creating a huge strategic reserve.

If we were building bases for the hell of it, we would have carpeted Africa and Latin America with them. Alan Greenspan is no fool. He was correct when he said that the Iraq war was "largely about oil."

alcatholic:

It is the Iraqi oil RESERVES that are the target of the NeoCons. That is why the draft "oil law," giving control of oil extraction to US corporations is being pushed so hard. Iraq has huge untapped reserves, estimated at 300 billion barrels (worth $30 trillion at current prices). This is the prize for which much blood has been shed.

All of the other BushCo arguments are deceitful rubbish. Israel does not need our protection, and we don't give a flying flip for the welfare of the Iraqis. It was always about controlling a critical resource.

Regarding tar sands and oil shale, these are a forever receding mirage. As the price of energy rises, the energy-intensive processes required to extract oil from these low-grade sources become less affordable. Moreover, the amount of CO2 generated by massive exploitation of tar sands would contribute to the increasingly dire warming problem.

Remember the infamous Cheney 1% doctrine about responding to serious low-probability security threats. Oil depletion is a much more probable threat than anything the Saddam/Al Qaeda combination could have posed.

HH:

"Oil depletion is a much more probable threat than anything the Saddam/Al Qaeda combination could have posed."

For someone who is usually so careful with words, I can't believe you just said that!

I know you don't mean to suggest that there's any connection between Saddam and al-Qaeda, but still!

HH:

I don't disagree with you about Iraq's oil reserves. Here's a link to a BBC article by Greg Palast pointing out the fight between the NeoCons and the Big Oil companies over what to do with Iraq's oil. What do you think?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/4354269.stm

Also, you may be right about tar sands and oil shale, especially in terms of the CO2 pollution and the uproar that would cause these days. But in terms of peak oil there is still Venezuela's heavy crude.

I think the only point I might disagree with you on is whether Peak Oil per se played a key role in motivating the Iraq invasion. I think Iraq Oil, it's strategic importance to OPEC pricing, and long term strategic oil power get NeoCons into Iraq without Peak Oil, per se. What do you think?

OK, no one will ever read this, but I found the excerpt from Greg Palast's book, "Armed Madhouse," that spells out what he was able to document as the reason why Saddam had to go and Bush invaded Iraq. It is great investigative journalism, a truly impressive first draft of history, if you ask me.

http://www.gregpalast.com/the-best-thing-in-the-world-for-big-oil/

Here's the bottom line I think:

Beginning just after Bush's Florida 'victory' in December 2000, the shepherds of the planet's assets got together to plan our energy future under the weighty aegis of the "Joint Task Force on Petroleum of the James A. Baker III Institute and the Council on Foreign Relations." The master plan makers included Paul Bremer's and Kissinger's partner, Mack McLarty, CEO of Kissinger McLarty Associates; John Manzoni of British Petroleum; Luis Giusti, former CEO of the Venezuelan state oil company (until Hugo Chavez kicked him out); Ken Lay of Enron (pre-indictment); Philip Verleger of the National Petroleum Council, and other movers and shakers crucial to such bi-partisan multi-continental group gropes -- all chaired by Dr. Edward Morse, the insider's insider, from Hess Oil Trading.

Their final report detailed Saddam's crimes. Gassing Kurds and Iranians? No. James A. Baker was the Reagan Chief of Staff when the U.S. provided Saddam the intelligence to better target his chemical weapons. Weapons of Mass Destruction? Not since this crowd stopped selling him the components.

In the sanitary words of the Council on Foreign Relations' report (written up by Jaffe herself), Saddam's problem was that he was a "swinger":

Tight markets have increased U.S. and global vulnerability to disruption and provided adversaries undue potential influence over the price of oil. Iraq has become a key "swing" producer, posing a difficult situation for the U.S. government.