Transterrestrial Musings

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So what satire do you hav for the 30th anniversary of the
fall of saigon?

Perhaps a bitter complaint that had more hippies joined
the fight, that Saigon would today be a capitalist city?

Posted by anonymous at December 22, 2006 04:39 PM

Your logic is pretty flawed, but nothing new there. Pointing out the MSM desire to show the war as a losing effort isn't the same as supporting the need for more troops (hippies). Indeed, it is really the MSM that has pushed the more troops or withdrawal as the only two options, while many people (including Rand) have noted the many success with current troop levels.

General McAuliffe was facing a losing battle. If John Kerry was there, he would have sued for peace. If John Murtha was there, he would have tried to move his forces to Moscow. If Dennis Kucinich was there, he have shared wine with the Nazis and written up impeachment papers on FDR. In all cases, the MSM would have been pointing out McAuliffe failures and discussing the positive merits of the other various options. In the background, the rest of the country would be inspired by the McAuliffe's actions and would note the positive aspects of his situation and try to exploit them. Fortunately, that is exactly what happened in 1944.

Posted by Leland at December 23, 2006 06:33 AM

Leland

McAuliffe was facing a losing battle in a war the allies were
winning.

Even had the German push in the Ardennes of 1945
achieved all their success criteria, the war was lost
for the Germans. 9 Russian armies were crossing the frontier
from the east. Norway had fallen to the allies. Italy was
lost. An american invasion of Vichy france was
in play.

Had the 101'st and the others at Bastogne died to the man,
had the germans broke through to sack and burn calais
and cut supplies to Ike and montgomery, the Allies would
have been able to hunker in, hold the line and
re-establish lines of supply and communication.

The problem in Iraq like Vietnam is that the Americans
win every battle, while losing the war. Most americans
are smart enough to realize that and pull out,
it's the neo-cons who are too stupid to
realize this.

Simberg cheering on the 4th battle of Ramadi.
That sounds like cheering the 8th battle of the
Somme

Posted by anonymous at December 24, 2006 09:46 AM

Well hardy har har, Rand! Quite a leaden satire there. An obvious reference to media coverage of the Iraq war.

I got news for you, buddy. The media didn't launch the Iraq war. They didn't make disasterously bad decisions about troops levels. They didn't go in there with no strategic plan on how to get out. They didn't appoint a moron like Paul Bremer as procounsel.

Bush did these things. And Cheney. And Rummy. And Rice. And Wolfowitz. And Feith. And Pearle. And Franks. And all of those government and military officials who led us to where we are today. THEY are responsible for the mess we're in.

YOU don't hold any of these guys accountable. None. Instead you create a scapegoat and then throw all of your bile at them and hope it sticks.

Grow up, Rand. Take some responsibility. Your party led us into the mess we're in. Stop blaming everyone else.

Posted by at December 24, 2006 10:59 AM

None of that is news to me, Anonymous Coward.

Your party led us into the mess we're in. Stop blaming everyone else.

Stop making such stupid assumptions. I'm not a Republican. I'm not blaming anyone for anything. I'm simply pointing out that we probably wouldn't have won WW II with today's media.

Posted by Rand Simberg at December 24, 2006 11:04 AM

Sorry Rand. You're one of those "libertarians" who do nothing but attack liberals and whose positions don't vary an millimeter from Republicans on anything of real importance. My mistake.

You still rarely hold Bush or his cronies responsible for much of anything.

While we're on the subject, I can only assume you're going to put your pen where your mouth is and you will be spending time in Iraq. I figure a year on the front lines would do it. We can then judge the fairness and accuracy of your own reporting. (My guess is that you would do very little of either.) And we'll get to see how good you are at dodging sniper fire and avoiding IEDs.

Merry Christmas, Rand.

Posted by at December 24, 2006 11:13 AM

You still rarely hold Bush or his cronies responsible for much of anything.

I hold Bush responsible for a great deal. I think he's been a terrible president on many issues. I just think that the Dems are incapable of offering a better alternative. They certainly haven't so far. And as for "attacking liberals," I am a liberal. But most who call themselves one are not--they're leftists.

And the ad hominem "chickenhawk" argument grows no less fallacious (or tedious) through repetition, sorry to say.

Merry Christmas to you, as well.

Posted by Rand Simberg at December 24, 2006 11:19 AM

Oh, OK. Well, perhaps it's the content of your blog that's confusing. It seems to be very right wing and include constant attacks on Democrats and main stream media outlets deemed to be too liberal.

If you could address the reasons why you don't go to Iraq, then perhaps the questioning about why you constantly attack the media for its coverage of a war you won't risk your neck to cover would stop.

Posted by at December 24, 2006 11:38 AM

It seems to be very right wing

That's because, in your simple mind, anything that isn't leftist is "right wing."

and include constant attacks on Democrats and main stream media outlets deemed to be too liberal.

No, not too liberal. Too leftist, and (like you, apparently) too deranged from Bush hatred. There are many legitimate criticisms of Bush, but they get lost in all the leftist nuttiness.

If you could address the reasons why you don't go to Iraq,

I don't have to "address the reasons why I don't go to Iraq." You don't seem to understand that that's completely irrelevant to the points I make. What would you say if I told you that you have no right to criticize George Bush unless you run for president yourself? Or to criticize me as a blogger unless you get your own?

But then, logic can't be a strong suit of anyone who uses the "chickenhawk" argument.

Posted by Rand Simberg at December 24, 2006 11:55 AM

simberg won't discuss why we aren't winning in Iraq.
He'll attack the media for writing about how bad the
battles are. He seems to want the media to cheerlead
even more, about how the body count is
leading us to victory.

Simberg thinks that what is losing this war is bad PR,
and that if he had a large contract from OSD he could
rally the people of the United States to invade Iran
and Syria.

Posted by anonymous at December 24, 2006 01:13 PM

It looks like the moonbats were lonely on Christmas Eve. Thank you Rand for providing the moonbats a place to vent their hate. Considering the violence in their writing, the thought of them unable to vent is scary.

Maybe instead of challenging them, we should encourage them to vent. Sort of like a mother helping an infant to burb to release the gas pressure. For example, instead of pointing out how unliberal some of their ideas are (like imprisoning bloggers for speech they disagree with), we could turn the phrase into encouragement:
"Yes, jailing dissidents and forcing them to serve on the front line has some merits. Stalin did it, so maybe you have something. For now, we will just have to deal with the volunteer service. By the way, do you support increasing the amount of GDP spent on the military to allow the service to accept more volunteers?"

Posted by Leland at December 26, 2006 12:58 PM

leland

given the GOP in 6 years never submitted a balanced budget,
don't you think it's your responisbility to discuss how to
pay for the war?

Posted by anonymous at December 26, 2006 07:48 PM

Yes, that's why I opposed the Medicare Prescription Drug Plan. It is why I opposed the Republican party during the previous election. However, since we are at war and a war that has already killed over 3,000 civilians on American soil, I cannot support the Democrat party, which continues to put idiots like Kerry, Kucinich, Waxman, and Lamont at the top of the ticket. A balanced budget didn't win the cold war, and once the cold war was won, it didn't take long to balance the budget. We have a shooting war now.

These reasoned discussions would be more common if we didn't have trolls making personal attacks against the host and his family. Indeed when ever such trolls are absent, the discussions are rather well reasoned and discussed.

Posted by Leland at December 27, 2006 05:08 AM

From Ann Althouse:

"I also suspect that the Democrats' talk about 'fiscal responsibility' is just a setup to demagogue about the war."

Posted by Leland at December 27, 2006 05:21 AM

LeLand

Personal attacks against his family?
Suggesting that his wife/partner/SO/domestic partner
would be willing to travel long distances to visit him
is an attack?

Sure, in a just world, Simberg will be in a cage with
Wolfowitz and cheney and feith and krauthammer
and bush answering charges before a judicial panel.

But, how is that a personal attack on his family?

It's not like Dick Cheney is a bad guy because his
daughter is Gay and pregnant.

It's not like George Bush is a bad guy because his
daughters are drunken sluts down in Argentina.

It's not like Karl Rove was affected by his father's
homosexuality and his mother's affair with the
neighbor who was his biological father.

Posted by anonymous at December 27, 2006 07:12 AM

Well that proves my point, I rest my case.

Posted by Leland at December 27, 2006 08:00 AM

I don't have to "address the reasons why I don't go to Iraq." You don't seem to understand that that's completely irrelevant to the points I make.

Yes. What, precisely, is the relevence between the endless attacks you make on the media coverage of the war to (a) your experience as a journalist; (b) you're actual experience in Iraq; or (c) your ability to draw reasonable conclusions based on the bulk of the evidence?

Do journalists make mistakes? Are there biases? Yes to all this. But, you blow up these flaws to epic dimensions, apply it to practically all media coverage coming out of Iraq, and then conclude that things are going fine. What sort of logic is that?

These are the talking points coming out of the WH for the last three years. They have become increasingly silly as things have gotten worse and worse over there. Even the WH's allies in the punditocracy critized Laura Bush for making those claims recently.

Posted by at December 27, 2006 06:30 PM

Wow. The above comment is a study in what happens when a person fails to identify pronouns before their use. Even the first person pronouns are unidentifiable, and that is just profound.

The one thing that is obvious is that the author is:
Not a journalist, or at least not a professional journalist, because their english skills wouldn't pass first grade.
Never been to Iraq, based on the first person comments in the first paragraph.
Is unable to draw reasonable conclusions based both on the author's own opinions in the second paragraph and the bulk of evidence provided by the entire comment.

Posted by Leland at December 28, 2006 11:29 AM

Good one, Leland. Unable to address the actual substance of a post, you attack the messager for the improper use of pronouns. In a blog discussion posting, where grammar and spelling are often not very good anyway.

If only you and Rand were as critical on the Bush Administration for the tens of thousands of deaths and injuries that have resulted from its policies as you are of everyone else for covering this mess or for using improper pronouns.

Thank you Leland. You proved the point precisely.

Posted by at December 29, 2006 05:18 PM

"If only you and Rand were as critical on the Bush Administration for the tens of thousands of deaths and injuries that have resulted from its policies as you are of everyone else for covering this mess or for using improper pronouns."

Yes, considering the scope of operations since 9/11, the total number of casualties is incredibly small by historic standards. Thanks for remind us of this point.

If this is a mess, imagine what sucess would look like. Imagine what sucessful sentence structure would look like too.

Posted by at December 30, 2006 07:00 PM

Thank you for the grammar lecture. You must be a professional grammarian. In the blogosphere, that's probably a life-long job. Can't imagine it pays very well.

"Yes, considering the scope of operations since 9/11, the total number of casualties is incredibly small by historic standards. Thanks for remind us of this point."

Yeah, if you count only U.S. and coalition deaths and ignore everyone else. Such as the 21,000 wounded, many of whom won't be able to return to duty due to missing limbs and other severe injuries they will live with for the rest of their lives.

And, oh yes, you discount the tens of thousands of Iraqis who are now dead and wounded. This is SOP for the Bushies. Iraqis who are alive are supposed to be grateful. Once they die, however, Bush doesn't see them as worth counting. Thank you for reminding us of that point.

Thanks for reminding everyone of that

Posted by at December 31, 2006 03:23 PM

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