This self-flagellating column by Jonathan Rauch about what he got wrong on Iraq made me go looking at the Iraq Index from Brookings to see just how guilty I should feel this month. (Who doesn't enjoy a spot of self-flagellation?) Instead, I got a happy surprise. The security statistics (other than coalition soldier deaths, which are sharply down), are spotty, and I wouldn't know enough to interpret them even if they weren't. But they do have two objective and easy to verify economic statistics that happen to be closely tied to the security situtation: electricity and barrels of oil pumped.
Barrels of oil pumped had been drifting steadily downwards thanks to insurgent attacks, but in September it popped back to where it was in September of last year. This is, mind you, still below its pre-war level, so this isn't exactly a rousing endorsement of the invasion. But electricity, which has been the metric that generally induces in me the greatest sense of despair, soared in September. The country is now producing more electricity than it ever has before--an average of almost 5,000 megawatts in September. That's 25% more than the prewar level, and also, 6% more than the previous peak in August of 2004. This is a very, very welcome sign . . . although also a very, very tenative one, as these numbers tend to fluctuate quite a lot.
But, hey, what's a little cholera among friends, right?
http://clusty.com/search?input-form=clusty-simple&v%3Asources=webplus&query=cholera+in+Iraq
Mark,
I'm still trying to figure out what your point is. Read the articles your search referenced; cholera is not new to Iraq, and by WHO's own comments, the outbreak is probably attributable to people moving around. Some of these people may be moving to escape wartime conditions, but others may be moving to relcaim areas they were previously chased out of by Ba'athist persecutions or war conditions that have since calmed back down; it may also indicate that people are traveling more because of trade or other economic opportunities. I would suggest we really don't know what that cholera outbreak means, apart from revealing some widespread water and sewer problems that may or may not have been better before, but in any case are now being exposed by the greater movement of people.
In any case, the stabilizing and increasing of electricity production is highly positive, even in the case of this cholera outbreak, because electricity is generally the precursor for all other infrastructure -- including hygienic water and sewer systems.
anony-
p.48 in the Brooking .pdf should help clue everyone in.
no doubt electricity generation is important, but the water infrastructure has been greatly compromised/yet to be rebuilt. Hard to do much sans eau.
I recalled myself as an agonized fence-sitter, more anti-anti-war than pro-war (an important distinction, you understand), maybe marginally in favor but more worried than convinced.
I'm in the same boat (at least in my recollection) but would dispute his identification of the problem. The fact is that Bush and Rumsfeld did a great job in Afghanistan, in a war that pretty much everyone supports in hindsight. Sure, you have various leftists insisting that they would captured bin Laden, no sweat, but relative to the Soviet-like disaster that was the issue raised at the time, things worked out quite well.
What I simply didn't consider is that the WMD threat could be so badly distorted, either to further some Ziohallineoburtonist scheme that even in hindsight doesn't make any sense, or to make the data fit existing conclusions.
This is also encouraging: It looks like something analogous to the "Anbar Awakening" is starting to happen among Shiite tribes. From "Relations Sour Between Shiites and Iraq Militia", The New York Times:
Well, probably not more electricity than ever before. I'm sure it's way below 1979 or 1990 levels.
Brookings lists 19 indicators. You pull out two, and highlight the one that's higher than pre-war. Hey, that's analysis. And, going back a few posts, you don't believe in rent control but do believe in farm subsidies. Frankly, Megan, I'm starting not to take you seriously.
Don't be coy Alan. You never did. That whole "I'm starting..." crap is just a nice rhetorical ploy.
Jeez, you just can't please some people. What is the point of saying "such-and-such hasn't recovered to pre-war levels" on the assumption, of course, that pre-ware estimates from Saddam's gov't were reliable? How does that have any relevance to what we do NOW?
Is an upward trend a good thing, or a bad thing? Or, are the naysayers just trying to get their jabs in before the trends push beyond the pre-war levels and invalidate the entire argument? Judging by the way things are looking now, I have to admit it would be smart to unload everything you can while you can.
The electricity situation has been frustrating. A combination of Saddam-era neglect and post-invasion sabotage means we have to rebuild a lot just to stand still. Some of the steady rebuilding is starting to bear fruit.
My understanding is that the electricity is priced way below market -- which doesn't help the shortage problem. Also a lot of the demand is met by off-grid generators. Iraqis are starting to buy much more electronic equipment. The stats on mobile phones are amazing. I'd like to see stats on tv, dvd and the like.
I'm very grateful that Brookings is willing to be such an honest broker with their Iraq Index data -- it's a nice antidote to the typical context-free bloviating from all sides.
I heard a soldier on the radio, back from Iraq, who says that the electricity is free for Iraqis, so they use it like gangbusters.
They want hot water? They wrap some copper wire around a car wheel rim, dunk it in a tub of water, and turn on the juice.
They also have A/C a lot of the time, which they didn't necessarily have under Saddam. And of course, as Chris points out, they're buying lots of consumer electronics.
So the reason the power isn't on 24/7 is in part because Iraqis are not being exactly conservative in the use thereof.
ELECTRICITY -- Remember, too, that according to some, electricity was not evenly distributed in Saddam's Iraq; Baghdad got the lion's share. This has changed, post-war. So while Baghdad may not be getting as much as before, there is indeed more electricity available overall in Iraq and it is being more widely distributed.
The ongoing problem is infrastructure: a decayed, Soviet era piece of junk that was not well maintained and then left to neglect in many areas.
Electricity distribution will require a long-term swap-out of electrical substations, new power lines (due to increased demand) and actual new generation capability. The old generators had been natural gas fired, but Saddam had them converted to crude oil use in the 1990s. A vigorous petro-industry captures natural gas not only from well heads (not all oil is, properly, just oil, and segregation and filtration of crude oil gets methane and other hydrocarbons coming out of solution) but from refineries. Not only did USACE have to see if they could get any of the old plants running, they then had to look to convert them back to natural gas as the oil pumping and refining system came back online. The first major part of the new system will be newer refineries as the old ones are just not working at anything like design capacity due to age. Currently Iraq needs to utilize Syrian refineries and, with the pipeline now opened to Turkey, it can be expected to help in that during the interim.
The lack of maintenance and needing to swap in new equipment means that there is an effective cap on Iraqi crude oil production until that can be done. As newer and higher capacity pipelines, pumps, pumping stations and distribution facilities come on line, older ones need to be removed from the system, so the petro-system gets a marginal but sustainable boost, overall, even when older equipment causes drops in production. As natural gas was *flared* by Saddam, that entire revenue stream is now slowly coming on line with LNG facilities and sales on the open market. Further, the IHS review of Iraqi total reserves re-examined the older geological data in Western Iraq in conjunction with those structures in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and what is known in Syria after their late 1990's prospecting boom. Overall reserves shifted Iraq into the #3 position in the world, shifting it past Iran, and the majority of that is in Anbar and other Sunni provinces, and that change made each of the major factions (Arab Shia, Arab Sunni, Kurds) have co-equal portions of the reserves and the Western portions remaining largely untapped. That got Japan and India interested in investment and the first long-term trade and production agreements are still in the works, but each of those has a lot of money to spend that they had not spent in Iran.
The USACE and Iraqi timelines for complete overhaul of the electrical system runs to 2015, and gets a reliable production and management system in place. Pre-war, Saddam managed the electrical system to the tune of 4,300 MW nationwide with 12-14 hours of electricity/day for Baghdad in 2002, residents in surrounding areas got at most 8 hrs/day. The 5,000 MW seen today is nominal load capacity with peak capacity a bit higher. The 4,300 Saddam era is peak, maximum productive capacity and the nominal load was in the 3,900 to 4,000 MW/day. You can get those figures from USAID, USACE, COMTEX, and a number of other aid and development agencies working with Iraq to bring it a modern era electricity network.
As noted above electricity is paid for via a flat rate, across the board, income tax at 15%. It is not metered. You pay one price for all you can use from the government via that single income tax, which results in folks buying refrigerators, stoves, lighting, televisions, audio systems, computers, VCRs, DVD players, air conditioners... the day the first meters are put into Iraq will be the day that electricity usage finally *drops* to set a supply/demand price-point. You want a key stat, that will be it and don't expect that any time soon as there are bigger fish to fry...
On the clean water front: Saddam also shut down water and sewage plants and let them go into disrepair. This was a weapon used by Saddam against his own people: limit both to those that would toe the line to him, and remove it from those that did not. Water projects for agriculture are even more important than for potable water, and have received more attention so that Iraqis can actually *eat food grown in Iraq*. Saddam destroyed the agricultural system, ripped up such things as date palms, and left to neglect and disrepair the agricultural farming water distribution system. Before Saddam Iraq had a vibrant agricultural system and even before 1991 it was a regional exporter of goods. Saddam turned that around, evicted farmers and made everyone queue up for government handouts.
Municipal water supplies are now being put into towns that have *never* had *any* reliable and clean water supplies. In the cities getting old mains repaired and cleaned, along with sewage treatment facilities is taking forever due to nearly 15 years of war time damage, neglect and purposeful non-maintenance. Photos taken inside one of the sewage facilities serving Baghdad to have concrete settling ponds that were dry and the concrete broken by plants growing up through them. Repairing that has been a hell of a problem. The Nasiriyah sewage facility had never been completed by Saddam, so re-fit and final construction and maintenance were key concerns going forward there.
Dams had been left in disrepair and a major concern early on was actually repairing the Mosul Dam to ensure that catastrophic flooding would not be seen due to dam failure. Basra, in particular, needs new water supplies and maintaining the Sweetwater Canal has been an undertaking, it being 240 km long. It needs maintenance to replace sections of it where gypsum had been used in the embankments and that was crumbling. Additionally the pumping plants on the canal needed not only refurbishment but electricity, so getting reliable electricity in-place is a double-purpose endeavor.
Similarly the overland transport network was in high states of disrepair outside the major cities, with some major towns still having dirt roads. Getting reliable roads for transport of food and other goods is critical, and such towns also needed to serve as a set of supply points, and thus, got other infrastructure to help maintain that. The rail system needs a complete overhaul and major repair across all of Iraq. Locomotives were left in the desert or just derailed, sometimes derailed in the desert and left to rust.
This does not even begin to address the outlying airport system, of which the old military airports are being converted to civilian or dual-use facilities once the Iraqi Air Force gets stood up. That is a major military logistical headache and while the transport aircraft are being delivered pilots are being found and trained and certified to fly them... another year or two for that at least.
Once infrastructure is stood up and reliable, even if only partially functional, manufacturing jobs can come back. In Ramadi, in JAN 2007, the first agreements to start re-opening factories there this year had been settled. While the number is modest, per factory, the jobs needed for supply chain, infrastructure, plant maintenance, costing, accounting, etc. is enormous. Each factory looks to employ 3,000 or more people, with, if memory serves, some 59 factories to be rehabilitated. That is already having an effect on double-digit unemployment slowly moderating downwards and allowing for the Central Bank of Iraq to put out numerous small business loans. Even without reliable branch banks, this is causing a moderating of unemployment in Baghdad and that is stretching to Ramadi and Fallujah. Baqubah was the major grain milling city in Iraq and the re-opening of the flour mills means that Iraq can now produce its own flour... and when the agricultural system is up and running a bit better, that now puts a reliable processing point into the mix.
These are the things one needs to dig through many sources to get, not only aid agencies, but places like TMC.net news and finding reliable local translation services and individuals interested in moving news into the english realm of the net. There are lots of newspapers, magazines, weekly and monthly publications in Iraq, along with commercially owned television and radio stations manned by local crews. They compete with the satellite networks on that basis: local news is very important in Iraq and most people have been starved of information on the goings-on elsewhere in their own Nation since the early 1990's. And the majority of journalists killed in Iraq are Iraqi, also... yet the Western news agencies never tell you about that, either. You know, Iraqi's reporting on the insurgents getting killed for that reporting?
Too bad no Western news agency can be bothered to do this work. I guess we are waiting for the Iraqis to do that for us. They already know our television news sources and what lazy sorts we are and scratch their heads at the disconnects between our Military and Civilian populations... apparently our Civilian population isn't reflecting well on the military, and Iraqis do wonder at that.
Here's a 2x4. Beat yourself up.
I think mark's point is "look, here's something bad happening in Iraq, there can't have been any progress!"
Megan,
The most interesting simple stat that nobody talks about:
A much greater percentage of Iraqi oil is now used internally.
Pre-War, Saddam used to export almost all of Iraq's oil. Now, much of it is used internally. That is a very good sign...
Yes, things finally seem to be improving. Let's hope it is not too late and this is not just an example of placing too much emphasis on a few recent observations. There have been earlier example of things appearing to improve for short times.
Why is it happening? Maybe the important causal relationship is that finally the professionals in the Pentagon, Foggy Bottom, Treasury and other parts of Washington are finally displacing the
Bush political appointees so that competent, knowledgeable individuals are making decision and implementing practical rather then ideological driven policies.
Or, maybe after so long the death, disruption, displacement and ethic cleansing has gone so far that it has reached a natural peak.
Who knows?
Yes! After 5 years we have finally raised the level of electricity! We rock. I bet if we invade Iran we can increase their electricity output in only 2.5 years! Rock on!
"My Fellow Americans, not only is Iran really bad, and, um, our enemy, but also, more importantly, they are rationing gas. We believe that if we liberate them, we can increase their gas consumption by 25% over a 5 year period if we invade today. I do not take this decision lightly, but as the saying goes, the consumer is king. Oh, and, I am being told to mention democracy. We will be liberate them and bring democracy, electricity and gas."
ajacksonian,
Thanks for that post. That's the sort of homework professional bloggers should do. Maybe there's room for one more here at the Atlantic.
Mark Hoffman's point is completely mistaken. The Brooking's statement on water is based on the January 2006 and July 2006 reports from SIGIR. From the latter report (p. 41):
Water availability in Iraq is 30 - 50% higher than it was before 2003.
Let's all hope that life really is improving for Iraqis. Of course, all this has absolutely nothing to do with Washington's winning the war, given that the original goal (for which WMD, terrorism, and overthrowing a tyrant were just cover stories, and cover stories that fooled only the ideologically blinkered) had nothing to do with improving the lot of ordinary Iraqis, and everything to do with establishing a Washington-friendly regime that would allow Iraq to be turned into a giant platform for economic and military domination of the Middle East. That goal -- the only one that counted -- seems further away than ever.
Let's not forget Megan's ever so consistent position on the importance of sample size.
ajacksonian: 0.0 just...amazing. *subscribes to blog*
spencer: Is it, just maybe, possible that Bush appointed people who knew what they were doing? Since I don't have any background knowledge on this (anybody got some? I'd love to learn), I can't make any educated comments, but casting all of his appointees as ideological know-nothings seems like a bit much.
d: How long did it take to stabilize Japan? I'm not being sarcastic, I really don't know. But expecting everything to happen quickly and cleanly in a war means you'll often be disappointed. Could that be a major reason why so many people call Iraq a disaster these days?
mijnheer: Ok, you got me. If it wasn't WMDs (which could have been shipped elsewhere in the time it took us to invade), terrorism, or overthrowing a tyrant (which we did do), then what was it? I'd like to hear more on this. Somehow the theory that it was all to establish complete domination over the Middle-East seems far-fetched.
math_mage asks: "How long did it take to stabilize Japan? I'm not being sarcastic, I really don't know. But expecting everything to happen quickly and cleanly in a war means you'll often be disappointed. Could that be a major reason why so many people call Iraq a disaster these days?"
Perhaps you should actually learn something before you offer your wholly-unqualified opinion.
The fact is that there was no significant violent unrest in Japan after the American occupation began. You could have found that out with a very brief search, but like most of those looking to make excuses for the unbelievably incompetent Bushpigs, you don't really want to have such information.
"If it wasn't WMDs (which could have been shipped elsewhere in the time it took us to invade), terrorism, or overthrowing a tyrant (which we did do), then what was it? I'd like to hear more on this. Somehow the theory that it was all to establish complete domination over the Middle-East seems far-fetched."
There is absolutely no evidence that WMDs were "shipped elsewhere" - that's a Hannity-esque fantasy which is believed only by boneheads. And why is it "far-fetched" to think that establishing control of a Middle Eastern beachhead (and access to oil) was the bottom-line actual reason for the invasion?
It's a far more likely reason than any of the ones you seem likely to swallow.
for some reason, I think this op/ed by Frank Rich is apt to this thread..
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/14/opinion/14rich2.html?_r=3&ref=opinion&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
The statement "There is absolutely no evidence that WMDs were 'shipped elsewhere'" is simply false. An Iraqi Air Force general named Sada told the New York Sun and Monica Crowley of WABC that Saddam shipped his chemical weapons to Syria. The former chief of staff of the Israeli army and his boss Ariel Sharon have said the same, and Israel knows quite a bit about what's going on inside Syria. (All three quoted here and many other places.) Of course, they may all be lying or horribly mistaken, so that's not proof, but it is evidence.
Weevil writes: "The statement "There is absolutely no evidence that WMDs were 'shipped elsewhere'" is simply false. An Iraqi Air Force general named Sada told the New York Sun and Monica Crowley of WABC that Saddam shipped his chemical weapons to Syria. The former chief of staff of the Israeli army and his boss Ariel Sharon have said the same, and Israel knows quite a bit about what's going on inside Syria. (All three quoted here and many other places.) Of course, they may all be lying or horribly mistaken, so that's not proof, but it is evidence."
My bad. I should have said "credible evidence," or "evidence which could be said to be convincing by someone who did not have his head deeply ensconced in Dick Cheney's fundament."
Some people understand the difference between unsubstantiated claims made by individuals and evidence which should be taken seriously, and others do not. I thought I was speaking to people who fit the first definition, but I should have taken Weevil into account.
(Those last eight words are completely insincere.)
Foul-mouthed Moe once again thinks he can turn a bad case into a good one by adding insults. Whom should we believe: Ariel Sharon, the chief of the Israeli general staff, and an Iraqi Air Force general with personal knowledge of events in Iraq, or a single anonymous troll who has never demonstrated the slightest knowledge of any pertinent subject, but boldly asserts that they are not "credible" while implying that he is? So hard to decide . . . .
Re: Mark E. Hoffer's post at 4:10 -
Great piece. I may forgive some two-time Bush voters, but I will never cease regarding them as moral retards, poor citizens, or revolting greedheads. The ones who never acknowledge the grotesque mistake they made in 2004 and STILL continue to defend Dumbya can all choke on their own vomit.
(There's a small - and I mean VERY small - element of humor in that comment.)
(These parenthetical endnotes are a sop to stupid people who lack the ability to figure such things out for themselves.)
Weevil again: "Foul-mouthed Moe once again thinks he can turn a bad case into a good one by adding insults. Whom should we believe: Ariel Sharon, the chief of the Israeli general staff, and an Iraqi Air Force general with personal knowledge of events in Iraq, or a single anonymous troll who has never demonstrated the slightest knowledge of any pertinent subject, but boldly asserts that they are not "credible" while implying that he is? So hard to decide . . . ."
Not for you it isn't, chuckles. Like all of the other Cheney groupies, your default position is to believe whatever you're told to believe, even if that means swallowing whole the unsubstantiated claims of parties with obvious axes to grind.
Now take your head out, breathe in some fresh air, and reconsider what amounts to credible evidence.
If you can.
(But of course you don't have that capability unless your masters clap their hands twice and say the magic word.)
Dr. Weevil - I'd love to read that link you're trying to get at, but you linked it wrong. Could you try again, please?
MLJ - Sorry for asking here about something off-topic, then. Next time I have a question that may or may not be relevant, I'll do that Google search first. Now I know that even without any insurgent resistance, it took years to rebuild Japan. See here for some details:
http://duckwriter.typepad.com/Essays/Postwar%20Japan%20and%20modern%20Iraq.htm
Now, Iraq didn't have anything like the kind of devastation Japan had, but the Americans weren't fighting every step of the way in Japan either. Whatever, it's a bad analogy, let's drop it.
As for the WMD thing - again, I don't know much, but if your country has a bunch of illegal weapons, and somebody's coming to take them away, wouldn't it be reasonable to ship them elsewhere?
Meanwhile, my comment about "far-fetched" was in relation to mijnheer's allegation that the US was trying to establish "economic and military domination of the Middle-East." You use it to support your comment about a war for oil. We're just talking past each other at this point, so I'll shift over to your point. If this war was fought for oil, why haven't we seen any oil? Why do posters like Boghie (1:30 PM) comment that Iraq's oil is now being used internally? How does that align with the arguments of the "no blood for oil" types? Bill Whittle explains this better than I ever could, here:
http://www.ejectejecteject.com/archives/2006_11.html
Here's the post I tried to link to: http://r-thinking.blogspot.com/2006/01/reports-of-iraqi-wmds-in-syria-what.html. It's a right-wing blog, which will be enough to discredit it in the eyes of some, but it provides lots of links. I found it and a lot more by Googling 'Sada chemical Crowley'.
math_mage writes: "I don't know much, but if your country has a bunch of illegal weapons, and somebody's coming to take them away, wouldn't it be reasonable to ship them elsewhere?"
Are you really this stupid or is it an act? From Iraq's point of view the weapons would not have been "illegal." They would have been "their weapons." And why bother shipping them elsewhere? What would Hussein gain by doing that? He'd just be giving things away for no apparent purpose. He wasn't a jihadist, he was a thug. In the absence of any credible evidence of such a ridiculous "transfer," I'll assume it didn't happen as I assume there is no Santa Claus.
The entire scenario is senseless and only makes sense, as I have said before, to those who kneel before Bush and Cheney and perform obsequious services whenever asked.
By the way, Weevil's "r-thinking.blogspot" link doesn't work, but he's linking to a crackpot blog which just repeats the non-evidentiary nonsense Weevil himself was bleating about earlier. Even the Bushpigs aren't shameless enough to claim such crap is true, and since they have the same respect for truth that demented crack whores do, draw your own conclusions.
I like how the moron at r-thinking presents his nitwit plan for securing the Mexican "boarder" and spells it that way consistently - and how the poor stupid bastard deifies the husk of Terri Schiavo. I'm not surprised Weevil likes a blog like that - he probably roomed with the author at Ovine State Junior College.
The output of electric generation plants rebuilt probably with American money isn't a good measure of our progress or lack thereof in Iraq.
Also, why stay? Why not leave? What do we hope to gain by staying?
Randall Parker asks: "Why not leave? What do we hope to gain by staying?"
Control over the Iraqi oil production, of course. Any other claim is bullshit.
(This is Weevil's opening to call me "foul-mouthed" or "troll" again and demand a link. Be still my heart.)
In a sense, the war in Iraq was about oil, among other things. The Middle East is and has been unstable for a very long time. Unfortunately, it is also the source for a large percentage of the world's oil. If the Middle East were to collapse into a bloody war that cut off the oil, the entire world would suffer.
If we can establish stable and relatively friendly regimes in Afghanistan and Iraq and maintain a strong local military presence, we can do a lot to stabilize the region and prevent the region from collapsing into chaos and protect the world economy (and our own).
The war is not about stealing the oil for the US, though. It would have been much cheaper to simply buy the oil if that's all we wanted. Saddam would have been quite happy to sell us oil if we'd left him alone and in power.
EI
moelarryandjesus
are you older than 12 years old? do your parents know you are not in school today?
my god, you may personally be able to create a permanent republican majority with the meaness, ignorance and lack of the slightest wit in your remarks. please leave this site to the adults and update your facebook profile.
Sorry about the link, it was valid when I put it in, but the Atlantic blog software screwed it up by moving the period inside the link.
I'm not surprised that Foul-tongued Moe lies again. I don't believe I've ever linked to Right-Thinking before, and I'm fairly certain it's never been on my blogroll, an assertion that can easily be checked with the Internet Wayback Machine. In fact, I'm not sure I'd even heard of it until I found it via Google. The reason I quoted it is that it gathers all the information in one place with links to respectable sources like the New York Sun and the Middle East Quarterly. If Moe would spend more time reading and thinking and less time trying to associate his opponents with various bodily fluids, he would know that.
If he would even think for one minute about the questions he asks himself, he would be able to answer them, too. As he says about Iraqi WMDs: "And why bother shipping them elsewhere? What would Hussein gain by doing that?" Maybe Hussein guessed that he would get far more political advantage from not having any WMDs than from having them. If so, he guessed right, though I doubt that he ever dreamed of the levels of gullibility displayed by Moe.
At the time that Saddam would have been shipping WMDs out of the country, he probably didn't think that he'd be captured and executed. He probably figured that he'd make his escape and get refuge in whatever country he shipped them to.
It's hard to know what he was thinking, but for a civilian American citizen, it will probably be very difficult to get inside his head and really be able to think like him. I have found, though, that assuming that any given individual will do the logical thing is often wrong.
EI
I think I expected Iraq to be more united and stable than it was a year ago, but when I hear "5 years later Iraq is...", I think "wow, it's only been 5 years. Not bad."
normalguy writes: "my god, you may personally be able to create a permanent republican majority with the meaness, ignorance and lack of the slightest wit in your remarks."
Get back to me when you learn to write a decent English sentence, chuckles.
Weevil replies: "The reason I quoted it is that it gathers all the information in one place with links to respectable sources like the New York Sun and the Middle East Quarterly."
The New York Sun is a hard-right rag and about as respectable as Ann Coulter's used tampons.
"Maybe Hussein guessed that he would get far more political advantage from not having any WMDs than from having them. If so, he guessed right"
He's dead, chuckles. It made the news and everything. Some advantage.
EI writes: "At the time that Saddam would have been shipping WMDs out of the country, he probably didn't think that he'd be captured and executed. He probably figured that he'd make his escape and get refuge in whatever country he shipped them to."
Are you cons all playing Dungeons & Dragons with this nonsense? How many times do the BUSHPIGS THEMSELVES have to admit that they blew it on WMDs before you'll abandon these "they had them all along, we wuz right" fantasies?
Your masters screwed up. They're either warmongering liars or warmongering idiots or both. They ripped up a Third World nation and wasted thousands of lives and what will amount to trillions of dollars for a dimwitted scheme that would embarrass all of you if you had any sense.
But of course you're all still putting aside $5 a week to save up for the big Baghdad Disney opening in 2012.
(I'm betting Weevil spends the whole day in the teacups.)
math image -- after our troops arrived it took about one hour to stabilize Japan.
P.S. While we are at it, according to the official US Army history of the occupation of Germany there was not a single documented case of the Werewolfs killing US troops either.
Here's what is likely a stupid question (the answer for which I haven't been able to find on the intertubes): Does electricity production equal electricity distribution? In other words, is it possible that Iraqi power plants are cranking out the kilowatts but they aren't getting to any one?
The reason I ask is because Western reportage indicates that there's lots of juice being generated, but local reports seem to indicate that the majority of those hot-selling electronics are being run off of home generators.
Just curious.
redjellydonut wonders: "Here's what is likely a stupid question (the answer for which I haven't been able to find on the intertubes): Does electricity production equal electricity distribution? In other words, is it possible that Iraqi power plants are cranking out the kilowatts but they aren't getting to any one?"
Or they're getting to US personnel in the Green Zone at the expense of actual Iraqis. Somehow I don't think the hacks and dummies the Bushpigs sent over there are going without air conditioning.
I love how the people being so sanguine about "improvements" in Iraq are the same people who've been trumpeting our "success" there since Day One. You really do wonder when they'll wake up.
"I love how the people being so sanguine about "improvements" in Iraq are the same people who've been trumpeting our "success" there since Day One. You really do wonder when they'll wake up."
Nailed it.
"I think I expected Iraq to be more united and stable than it was a year ago, but when I hear "5 years later Iraq is...", I think "wow, it's only been 5 years. Not bad.""
It'll all be over by Christmas.
spencer: Thank you for the info. I know Japan was easy to stabilize, though I didn't know that Germany's rebuilding happened so smoothly...on the west side, anyway. My point with my last post was that even though stabilization per se was easy to establish, rebuilding Japan to pre-war levels (i.e. the electricity measure McArdle quotes) took a while in despite. But like I said, I've learned from posters here that it's a bad analogy to begin with, so dropping...now.
MoeLarryandJesus writes:
"Are you really this stupid or is it an act?"
Not stupid. Ignorant, but not stupid. And you know the difference: Ignorance can be cured, but stupid is forever. That's what I'm working on now.
"From Iraq's point of view the weapons would not have been "illegal." They would have been "their weapons." And why bother shipping them elsewhere? What would Hussein gain by doing that? He'd just be giving things away for no apparent purpose. He wasn't a jihadist, he was a thug."
Let's assume he had them for a second. I don't actually know whether he had them, and neither do most people, but let's play with this thought experiment. Assuming he had them, why would he want to ship them elsewhere when he found out the US would get involved?
Well, for one thing, by keeping the WMDs out of American hands, he would raise doubts as to whether they were there or not. This fits with reality, as far as it goes. Second, by keeping them out of US hands, he would give someone else an opportunity to use them. Syria with WMDs, to Saddam's mind, would be better than Americans with the WMDs. Sounds reasonable, let's continue...Third, if he managed to escape, he could make his way to Syria and regain control of the WMDs. So to conclude our little thought experiment, IF Saddam had WMDs (I'll grant you it's quite an if, since nobody actually knows), he would have shipped them elsewhere.
"In the absence of any credible evidence of such a ridiculous "transfer," I'll assume it didn't happen as I assume there is no Santa Claus."
Agreed. Without credible evidence, it's pointless. However, Dr. Weevil provides some in the personages of General Sada, Ariel Sharon, and the Iraq Survey Group (via the Right Thinking blog you so despise, but don't blame the messenger), though the evidence is not as conclusive as one would hope.
"The entire scenario is senseless and only makes sense, as I have said before, to those who kneel before Bush and Cheney and perform obsequious services whenever asked."
Uh, actually, it makes perfect sense. What's questionable is the premise that WMDs were present to begin with. I don't pretend to know the answer to that question.
And I don't give a rat's behind one way or the other about Bush or Cheney. Stop calling everyone who disagrees with you a stooge for the White House, and maybe you'll have yourself some constructive discussion.
"Get back to me when you learn to write a decent English sentence, chuckles."
If you want him to take English classes, it's only fair of him to want you to take some logic classes.
"Weevil replies: "The reason I quoted it is that it gathers all the information in one place with links to respectable sources like the New York Sun and the Middle East Quarterly."
The New York Sun is a hard-right rag and about as respectable as Ann Coulter's used tampons."
Leaving the used tampons aside, the New York Sun managed to actually quote people and use evidence in the article Dr. Weevil links to, which is more than you're doing. The main body of evidence is provided by WABC, though.
""Maybe Hussein guessed that he would get far more political advantage from not having any WMDs than from having them. If so, he guessed right"
He's dead, chuckles. It made the news and everything. Some advantage."
Yeah, because Hussein was totally planning on dying. And again, to go back to the little thought experiment, assuming he had WMDs, the lack of actual WMDs in Iraq has indeed damaged the US position.
Thanks, math_mage. You've saved me some trouble. I would add two things to your analysis:
1. You're a little naive thinking that Moe is accusing me of being merely a "stooge" for the White House. He's actually implying fellatio, as with a couple of references to "kneepads" in a previous comment thread. Like the "used tampons" remark, this shows us more about his disgusting little mind than most of us probably wanted to know. He really does need to seek professional help for his rage issues, obsession with bodily fluids, urge to defile and degrade others, and general psychosexual anxieties. (And please don't compare him to a 12-year-old, either, as 'normalguy' did: I taught kids from 10 to 17 last year, and even the youngest ones were far more mature and clean-mouthed than Moe. His problems are not the sort one simply grows out of.)
2. If I'd quoted The New Republic, he could rightly have dismissed the evidence as coming from a source known to have printed lies on more than one occasion. If Moe has any evidence that the New York Sun, Middle East Quarterly, or WABC is in the habit of making stuff up, he needs to provide it.
math_mage writes: "Well, for one thing, by keeping the WMDs out of American hands, he would raise doubts as to whether they were there or not. This fits with reality, as far as it goes. Second, by keeping them out of US hands, he would give someone else an opportunity to use them. Syria with WMDs, to Saddam's mind, would be better than Americans with the WMDs. Sounds reasonable, let's continue...Third, if he managed to escape, he could make his way to Syria and regain control of the WMDs. So to conclude our little thought experiment, IF Saddam had WMDs (I'll grant you it's quite an if, since nobody actually knows), he would have shipped them elsewhere."
You start with a bad assumption and then make some mind-reading moves and you think you're using logic?
How on Earth would Hussein "regain control of the WMDs"? Do you think he had magical powers or superhuman strength? Even on the (wildly stupid) assumption that significant quantities of WMDs were transferred to Syria, why would the Syrian government give them back? Or do you suppose Hussein was able to hide them all in some U-Haul self-storage unit in Syria?
If you made a movie based on this crap you'd have to get Carrot Top to star in it, and the only positive review would be on Weevil's blog.
What you're also forgetting is that Hussein could have left Iraq before the invasion and saved himself a whole lot of trouble. Once the invasion occurred he was toast. But he couldn't get anyone to guarantee his safety or allow him to leave with much of his fortune - how much less likely is your absurd scenario?
Such nonsensical crap is right up there with fantasies about Hitler escaping to Argentina. He didn't, and there was no WMD transfer.
"Weevil provides some in the personages of General Sada, Ariel Sharon, and the Iraq Survey Group (via the Right Thinking blog you so despise, but don't blame the messenger), though the evidence is not as conclusive as one would hope."
The evidence is non-existent. It amounts to opinions by people with an axe to grind, or an opportunity to exploit, and nothing more. Where is the hard evidence of such a transfer? We went to war in Iraq based on such opinions about WMDs, and look at how that turned out.
The whole "WMDs were moved" claim is nothing but a cover-your-ass maneuver by people who have never been able to admit that they were wrong. Judge it accordingly.
Weevil bleats: "If Moe has any evidence that the New York Sun, Middle East Quarterly, or WABC is in the habit of making stuff up, he needs to provide it."
Here's a good one about the New York Sun's mildly retarded columnist Alicia Colon. By the way, no retraction was ever printed. Like all right-wing rags, spreading bullshit is the primary objective. (Much like Weevil's inane claims about WMDs.)
http://mediamatters.org/items/200702230005
There are more, of course, but this will do for now.
Poor Moe seems to be unaware that in the first Gulf War Hussein sent his Air Force to Iran to keep it from being destroyed by the coalition air forces, despite having recently fought a long and bloody war with Iran. They never gave the 100+ planes back, and kept the pilots for years. Nevertheless Moe is quite certain that Hussein would never have considered doing the same thing again with an actual Ba'athist ally like Syria who would be rather more likely to give the stuff back if and when he needed it, or at least to use it against their common enemies if anything happened to him. According to Moe, such a thought could never possibly have occurred to Hussein, though he had had much the same thought before and acted on it.
Moe also seems to think that any newspaper that would publish a columnist's tendentious apples-and-oranges comparison can be assumed to have simply made up interviews with people like General Sada and Ariel Sharon and the chief of staff of the Israeli Air Force, who were perfectly capable of objecting to having words put in their mouths, and even suing the newspaper, if that had actually happened.
Someone once remarked that there are people in the world who believe that professional wrestling is real and the moon landings were faked. Moe thinks Sidney Blumenthal is a trustworthy source, but the New York Post, Middle East Quarterly, and WABC are not.
MoeLarryandJesus:
Media Matters is a hard-left advocacy group. Linking to them does nothing to prove your point, since they are so ideologically biased.
Weevil replies: "Moe is quite certain that Hussein would never have considered doing the same thing again with an actual Ba'athist ally like Syria who would be rather more likely to give the stuff back if and when he needed it, or at least to use it against their common enemies if anything happened to him. According to Moe, such a thought could never possibly have occurred to Hussein, though he had had much the same thought before and acted on it."
He sent the planes to Iran openly, and there's no reason to think he ever expected to get them back. Syria wanted no part of them at the time, for obvious reasons. Why would anyone think they would take the great risk of taking in WMDs, then?
In the paranoid minds of some, it's because all Muslims are in it together - and the wretched remnants of some WMD program would entice Syria to risk an American invasion.
What utter bullshit.
"Moe also seems to think that any newspaper that would publish a columnist's tendentious apples-and-oranges comparison can be assumed to have simply made up interviews with people like General Sada and Ariel Sharon and the chief of staff of the Israeli Air Force, who were perfectly capable of objecting to having words put in their mouths, and even suing the newspaper, if that had actually happened."
No, that's not it. The Sun published the statements of those people as though they were fact, despite the complete lack of evidence supporting the statements. It's an obvious distinction which never seems to occur to wingnuts. It's why they have believed each and every claim made by the Bushpigs during the entire course of this misbegotten war.
And they continue to defend claims the Bushpigs themselves have abandoned as untenable. It would be hilarious if it weren't so pathetic.
Juan writes: "Media Matters is a hard-left advocacy group. Linking to them does nothing to prove your point, since they are so ideologically biased."
Just keep cashing your checks from Fox News, Juan.
Hey, hey, now, let's at least get right what it was the Sun got wrong. According to your link, when Alicia Colon compared the number of deaths in the military during the war to during the Clinton Administration, she made the mistake of leaving out the peacetime deaths during the Iraq War. Nonetheless, her numbers were correct as far as they went. Furthermore, the mere fact that 2/5 of the casualties in the military during the war have been unrelated to the war is an interesting figure in itself. One wishes she had reported on that instead of erroneously (or purposely?) misrepresenting the statistics on deaths in her comparison.
As for the comments about the planes and Iran: Syria was willing to risk a nuclear reactor with North Korea, according to this article:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/13/AR2007101301154.html
What makes you think they're unwilling to risk a little extra on the side with Saddam? And if they were openly willing to give planes and pilots to people they don't religiously align with (Saddam's government was Sunni, Iran's is Shi'ite), why wouldn't he be willing to give weapons to Sunni-majority Syria? As for the claim that this idea came about because we feel that "all Muslims are in it together," that's just false. Syria is known to be a terrorist haven, so it's not just a "ZOMG they're both Muslim countries and therefore they hate us" idea.
On the issue of the Sun having "published the statements of those people as though they were fact, despite the complete lack of evidence supporting the statements" - so study groups and Israeli officials and members of US intelligence agencies are all lying to you. Rather than consider the possibility that there actually was "movement of banned materials between the two countries," you say there's a vast conspiracy theory set up just to satisfy Bush's boot-lickers. Which is more likely? Hint: the conspiracy theory is always wrong. Oh, and did you ever consider that these statements themselves are evidence, rather than simply statements requiring more evidence to back them up? Well, as much as it might detract from your theory that we're all a bunch of crackpots split down the same line, you do have to keep in mind that you might be incorrect.
I must be missing something because I thought we did find a program
to develop weapons of mass destruction by Iraq. As a side-effect of the
Gulf War where Saddam Hussein was pushed out of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and the
Iraqi army was decimated, we discovered that Iraq had a large program
for the development of weapons of mass destruction, including
biological, chemical, and the real issue, nuclear weapons. Somehow
the CIA and other western intelligence agencies had totally missed
noticing a nuclear program larger than the Manhatten Project (the crash U.S.
effort to develop the atomic bomb in World War II), at least as measured
by the amount of money spent by Saddam Hussein. In retrospect they
estimated him to be a year short of succeeding.
As the terms of Saddam's defeat worked their way through, all the
accumulated Iraqi nuclear infrastructure was destroyed. Or at least
so we believe. But the most valuable part, the most important, the
Iraqi scientists, that had come so close, remained.
Ten years later, within months of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003
we found a program to develop nuclear weapons in Libya -- a joint project
of Libya, North Korea, and Iraq -- staffed mainly by scientists of what
nationality? Does anyone here not know? Can you not guess?
Didn't we find right there what we feared to find? Weren't all the
suspicions of a WMD effort justified right there? Does it really matter that
the Iraqi nuclear weapons development scientists were in Libya,
and not Iraq? And isn't that a minor detail, in essence?
And briefly don't we face the same issue today? How are we going
to avoid seeing New York, Washington, DC, and other american cities,
and the millions of people in them, annihilated as these weapons
spread to actors that will use them?
What can we do to try to prevent this?
math_mage writes: "Rather than consider the possibility that there actually was "movement of banned materials between the two countries," you say there's a vast conspiracy theory set up just to satisfy Bush's boot-lickers. Which is more likely? Hint: the conspiracy theory is always wrong."
Hint: Saying Hussein smuggled the weapons across the border thinking Syria would give them back to him later, or that he'd somehow escape to Syria and get them back himself, IS A CONSPIRACY THEORY. Saying that intelligence officers and politicians might be wrong or lying isn't a conspiracy theory, it's a well-established pattern of behavior for both professions.
Colin Powell has been basically ashamed to show his face for the past few years because he knows he was part of a massive fraud or a massive screw-up. You keep making excuses for this, for reasons known only to yourself.
"But intelligence and congressional officials say they have not seen any information — never "a piece," said one — indicating that WMD or significant amounts of components and equipment were transferred from Iraq to neighboring Syria, Jordan or elsewhere. " http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/09/16/iraq/main643989.shtml
Mark Amerman uses a lot of question marks: "Didn't we find right there what we feared to find? Weren't all the
suspicions of a WMD effort justified right there? Does it really matter that
the Iraqi nuclear weapons development scientists were in Libya,
and not Iraq? And isn't that a minor detail, in essence?
And briefly don't we face the same issue today? How are we going
to avoid seeing New York, Washington, DC, and other american cities,
and the millions of people in them, annihilated as these weapons
spread to actors that will use them?
What can we do to try to prevent this?"
Just ask your doctor to adjust your prescription and you'll be okay.
Megan you really don't get it do you.
We are long past the point where metrics can justify this war of choice.
I am surprised that you don't understand the problem.
MoeLarryandJesus: By the by, that article you quote also says this:
""What I can tell you is that I believe we know a lot of materials left Iraq and went to Syria. There was certainly a lot of traffic across the border points," [Charles Duelfer] said. "But whether in fact in any of these trucks there was WMD-related materials, I cannot say.""
In other words, there's nothing that would sway a jury because they couldn't actually check the trucks.
Conceded that my guess that Saddam might somehow be able to regain control of the weaponry is pretty silly. However, I love how you focus excessively on my third (thus least important) point to the exclusion of the others: that had Saddam had WMDs, he'd probably have shipped them somewhere else to make people doubt that they were there, and so that they wouldn't be completely wasted, to his mind. I also like that when we refute your other arguments, you return to the one that nobody can answer conclusively (were Sharon and his generals lying about Syria getting WMDs from Iraq?) and state that obviously they must have been lying because they're politicians, and because were they telling the truth, you might actually be wrong - and that's a completely untenable position for you, isn't it?
One last thing - next time you want to refute Mark Amerman, you might want to actually look at the content of his post instead of looking at the question marks and deciding he's not worth listening to. Grammar is only there to clarify the logic - thus disparaging his grammar doesn't mean anything for the content.
math_mage replies: "MoeLarryandJesus: By the by, that article you quote also says this:
""What I can tell you is that I believe we know a lot of materials left Iraq and went to Syria. There was certainly a lot of traffic across the border points," [Charles Duelfer] said. "But whether in fact in any of these trucks there was WMD-related materials, I cannot say.""
In other words, there's nothing that would sway a jury because they couldn't actually check the trucks."
Well, no kidding. In other words, there's NO EVIDENCE of what was on the trucks. Imagine, there were vehicles crossing a border between two countries. Jeezus, round up the usual suspects!
"I also like that when we refute your other arguments, you return to the one that nobody can answer conclusively (were Sharon and his generals lying about Syria getting WMDs from Iraq?) and state that obviously they must have been lying because they're politicians, and because were they telling the truth, you might actually be wrong - and that's a completely untenable position for you, isn't it?"
No, it is not. Why wouldn't an Israeli hawk want to apply some pressure to Syria, even with a complete lack of hard evidence to justify such a stance? Again, you and Weeble haven't offered a single bit of substantiation for any of this crap. Over 4 years later and not a sign of these "smuggled" WMDs anywhere. Are you even aware that chemical and biological weapons (for example)degrade over time, anyway? And not even the worst Bushpig wackaloon has said Iraq had nuclear weapons, which could be maintained over a longer period of time.
As for Mark Amerman, there was nothing in his post to refute. Paranoia does not respond to reason, and his post was pure paranoia. I'm entirely sick of my country being driven by idiotic fear, and I'm sick of worthless leaders who take advantage of the fears of idiots. If you're still supporting Dumbya, that's what you're supporting.
I'd ask MoeLarryAndJesus just why he thinks we shouldn't worry about
nuclear weapons, but I'd guess the reason he hasn't already offered
such an explanation already would either be:
(A) it's just so obvious and it's too much work to offer an explanation,
and anyone that doesn't get it is an idiot; or
(B) his words won't come together to make the sense they should be saying.
(So what does our MoeLarryAndJesus do then? See above.)