Another Way to Undermine the War
I guess that when you are an armchair warrior, doing your best in the blogosphere to undermine the war effort as much as possible, even bashing on Bush and Cheney from your laptop in the comfort of your living room must get old after awhile. So it must be fun to take a little diversion and assassinate the character of one of our finest generals instead.
At Salon.com, Glenn Greenwald portrays General David Howell Petraeus, commander of coalition forces in Iraq, as a partisan hack for the Bush administration (and Andrew Sullivan agrees). This is simply because, -gasp- he allowed himself to be interviewed by Hugh Hewitt (a conservative writer for the Weekly Standard), and because he is -double gasp- optimistic about the War in Iraq!
For the partisan issue, I would like to point out that earlier this year, Petraeus was unanimously confirmed to his position and rank of four star General by a heavily Democratic US Senate.
And more importantly, would it make any sense to appoint an anti-war general to command the Iraq theater? Wouldn't it be irresponsible for Petraeus, or anyone else in command, to go around telling all the troops the war is lost? Has it ever occurred to either of these posers that no matter what his personal feelings are, the reality is that American troops are on the ground in Iraq, and the Generals are not the ones who decide when/if we can bring them home. So while we are there, for the sake of the lives of the men in theater, Gen Petraeus needs to give us, and the enemy, the impression that we are determined to win. Of course, common sense doesn't come easily to some people. Frankly, I feel like nothing would satisfy people like Greenwald and Sullivan other than a General who will turn rebel and set his guns on Bush himself.
Incidentally, laughably, Greenwald describes himself as "neither liberal or conservative", despite the fact that he writes for the most liberal magazine in the country, continually bashes on Bush and the war from his blog (and in two best selling books), and is openly gay and considers himself married to a Brazilian man.
But really who has more credibility? Well, I will be happy to stack up the military experience of Glenn Greenwald, and Andrew Sullivan against General Petraeus any day. Not only have Greenwald and Sullivan never gone to war, they have never served in the military, and as far as I can tell have never visited a combat zone, nor is it likely that they personally know anyone who has. I also have yet to find any evidence that they have ever even visited the Middle East or have even studied it in any meaningful manner. Opposing the war is one thing, but baseless attacks on generals and soldiers (see next post) are something else. Exposing pseudo-experts like these is one of the reasons why I created this blog in the first place, and boy it feels good (even if I don't have anywhere near their readership yet).
Like what you see? Click on any of the labels below to read related articles, bookmark this site, or subscribe to my RSS Feed
1 comments:
I actually like Andrew Sullivan, however, I would agree that his opinions change with the winds of war.
If it comes out, that the Iraq war has benefited humanity and America, and that we are actually winning, he'll flip-flop quicker than a cheap pair of sandals.
Post a Comment