They'll follow us here?

Before I start, the Moyers/Stewart video can be seen here. I would hope the righties give it a look.

Skydiverick leaves a love note to yours truly. It's interesting in that it's basically a rehash of right wing pro-war talking points. Let's parse it.

I enlisted. I am out of the military now. I fought on the sands of Kuwait. I would be there in Iraq if I could. But it's not about that - it's about doing what is right. The Right didn't cause that bombing, just like your bitching didn't cause it. The assholes with the bombs did it, and if we weren't there it would still be there because that is what they do - and they would also be hitting us here, as well. We didn't cause it, we have minimized it by our presence. People die. That's a fact. I don't like war anymore than you, but the death of the few to prevent the death of the many is sometimes a necessary evil.

Doing what is right? That's an interesting way to look at war.

Doing what is right means you enter war for a just reason. It is obviously the most serious thing that can be done, and we all know now that every justification for invading Iraq turned out to be total bullshit. So what do they have left now? Liberating an oppressed people.

That's right. The reason our military went to Iraq was to topple a madman's regime and bring freeance and democracy to.. a region that has never had either.. in their thousands year history. Now we're surprised the Iraqi's have no idea how to suddenly throw up a democracy and govern themselves? Go figure...

My favorite talking point, and one the right uses over and over, is this notion that if we don't have our military in Iraq, Abdul and his mad bombers will suddenly show up "here". Last week McCain used that one again when Jon Stewart ripped him to shreds. It's simply the rhetoric of fear.

In any case, let's consider that supposition. Put yourself in the shoes of a crazed Islamofascist. You can attack a highly armed group of American soldiers.. or.. you can just go to America and blow something up. Let me think. Deadly soldiers.. versus soft and decadent Americans. Hmmm.. What would Abdul do?

Let there be no doubt. There are some seriously bad people out there that want to do us harm. It's always been that way. It always will. However, this notion that somehow having the vast majority of our military bogged down in an "unwinnable" situation in a Muslim nation in order to "keep us safe" here is just fucking retarded.

Iraq had NOTHING to do with 9/11. Remember Afghanistan?

Then Rick goes on to use the Star Trek philosophy. Spock said it much better. "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.. or the one.."

They actually believe the slow (and sometimes not so slow) bleed of our military is somehow necessary to prevent.. what? How long does it go on? Since there will always be nuts looking to do us harm, the right would insist that our military remain on the other side of the planet as some sort of nut magnet in order to "keep us safe"? For how fucking long? 10 years? 20 years? What is "winning"?

These are all questions they will not answer because they have a simplistic view of the world and wars in general. They have a "win" or "lose" mentality. Staying is "winning" and leaving is "losing". That's all there is to it in a simplistic mind.

As I've said before. I have the perfect solution.. Declare victory and get the fuck out. The Iraq war was supposedly started in order to topple a bad man, remove the Iraqi WMD capability, and remove the "imminent threat" to America. YaY! We won! All those conditions have been met.

Realistically, we all know the military is going to be leaving very early in the next President's term. The right understands how botched this war has become and Chimpy is merely "running out the clock" until the next President cleans up the mess. Then the right will simply say "if we had only given the military a little more time. We were about to turn the corner. The insurgency was in it's last throes. This is the liberal's fault."

Meanwhile.. how many of our finest are going to die? Right wing loons like Rick think a few American soldiers have to die in Iraq so that we don't have more die here?

The synaptic damage that must exist to come to that conclusion is stunning.