By Jeremy
With a petty little jibe about it being the “final insurgent holdout”, News Ltd typist Andrew Bolt revels in the New York Times reporting that
Violence in all of Iraq is the lowest since March 2004. The two largest cities, Baghdad and Basra, are calmer than they have been for years. The third largest, Mosul, is in the midst of a major security operation. On Thursday, Iraqi forces swept unopposed through the southern city of Amara, which has been controlled by Shiite militias. There is a sense that Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki’s government has more political traction than any of its predecessors… American military commanders are seeing a new confidence among Iraqi leaders.
Andrew concludes that this must be a slap in the face for those critical of the war.
Okay, the figures are only positive compared with the chaos which followed the American invasion in 2003. Sorry, intervention. Sorry, militarily-enhanced goodwill visit. Yes – “Calmer”! “More political traction”! Things aren’t absolutely rock-bottom any more! We’re on the way back slowly towards things in Iraq being not vastly worse than we made them by going in in the first place!
And remember, Saddam’s dead now! You didn’t love Saddam, did you?
See, if you set the hurdles our side has to overcome down so low that you can practically slide over them, and exaggerate them for the other side (they only win if the entire country of Iraq is literally vapourised into nothingness!), you can define the debate so that it’s very difficult for us to lose. No matter how badly we screw up. No matter what we do. No matter that the central issues in this debate are the not entirely inconsequential questions of in what circumstances should our governments take us to war and to what levels of accountability (if any) will we hold them afterwards?
So forget all your concerns about the wisdom of going to war, about the thousands who’ve died on our side and the countless more on the Iraqi side (seriously, we’re not keeping a genuine count), about the ridiculous sums of money it’s cost, about how it let Al Qaeda off the hook in Afghanistan… THAT’S NOT THE POINT ANY MORE. Why are you people still on about our horrendous mistakes? Why can’t you focus instead on our minor achievements? And our minor achievement in Iraq is that it’s moving away from “catastrophe”. Take that, critics.
Well, I salute the Coalition’s minor achievements. If only I had such low standards as Andy in what I expect of our governments in respect of when they decide to go to war – if all I required was the certainty that they were going to blow up some people we could probably be certain were likely to have been bad guys (or at least live in the same town as some bad guys) – I guess I’d have been cheering much sooner.
39 Comments
23 June, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Bolt’s understanding of reality is so unbelievably skewed that he actually sees the main journalistic failure in relation to Iraq as being that the media wasn’t compliant enough with its reportage of Government claims.
Surely he’s the laughing stock of all Australian reporters by now. I’m waiting for his name to actually become a synonym for ‘idiot commentary masquerading as journalism’.
23 June, 2008 at 12:54 pm
“I’m waiting for his name to actually become a synonym for ‘idiot commentary masquerading as journalism’.”
I thought it already was. Bolt = Creative typist.
23 June, 2008 at 2:29 pm
[...] Jeremy’s take on this can be found at BoltWatch. Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)Hank’s Another Year OlderChillin’ At [...]
23 June, 2008 at 2:54 pm
You are missing the point of Bolt’s article.
he is making fun of the media’s claims that Iraq had descended into civil war.
Where is that civil war that the Age‘s Australian Journalist of the Year, atrocity-mongering Paul McGeough, so eagerly predicted, again and again and again. Where is that catastrophe Fairfax readers were assured was already obvious?
Bolt is correct when he states
Iraq is a standing indictment of Western journalism. Nothing we see there today remotely matches what the vast bulk of Western reporting told us to expect
The so called civil war that the media were preaching never happened.
23 June, 2008 at 3:01 pm
No, I’m not missing the point of Bolt’s article at all. It is to concentrate on some media outlet’s putting their most terrible fears as a means of deflecting from the real disaster Bolt has supported for five years.
As I noted – he’s portraying the other side at its most extreme for the purpose of having what looks like a victory, where he knows that he can’t possibly win an argument about the war on its merits. Particularly not on the merits as he originally sold it to us. So he doesn’t try.
23 June, 2008 at 3:11 pm
“Nothing we see there today remotely matches what the vast bulk of Western reporting told us to expect. The so-called civil war that the media were preaching never happened”.
Well, what would you call the four years after the declaration of victory by GWB you fucking moron? Tens of thousands dead and trillions of dollars pissed up against a wall. You’d call that what exactly?
23 June, 2008 at 3:13 pm
Go and tell Bolt MR – you’re preaching to the choir here, I’ve made a few posts in that one today.
23 June, 2008 at 3:14 pm
Andrew concludes that this must be a slap in the face for those critical of the war.
Uhm, isn’t that the point, that we started a fucking war?
23 June, 2008 at 3:38 pm
The comparisons with WWII actually piss me off, Boltists can’t tell the difference between a war of choice were we are the aggressor and what I would consider a just war where we had no choice (from the allies point of view – For sure, there were plenty of nasty things done by the allies (Dresden) )
23 June, 2008 at 6:36 pm
Actually RobJ, drawing parallels between issues of the world today and WW2 politics, seems to be behavior synonymous with right-idiots today, a group Bolt and his followers clearly belong to. Bolt’s recent efforts, attempting to attribute George Bush Junior with the mantle of the Winston Churchill of the “War on Terror”, is a prime example.
It’s the sort of infantile, moronic behavior that leads any discussion regarding the merits of military forces in today’s contexts, too the perpetrator making some predictable comment along the line of “if we had appeased Hitler and not engaged the NAZI’s militarily in WW2, we wouldn’t have the freedoms we have today”.
It is engaged in by fools, who think of themselves as informed experts on international security issues, and world affairs, because they have watched a few WW2 documentaries. Some particularly extreme right idiots take the behavior even further, accusing those who make the obvious critique, and point out that it is stupid to bring irrelevant WW2 politics into discussion regarding today’s issues, as just feeling guilty regarding the past acts of their fellow ‘lefties’.
23 June, 2008 at 7:03 pm
Sorta like Bush’s bald rationalisation in London last week — that he didn’t consider the Iraq War a mistake because (unlike his opponents) he didn’t believe that Iraqis were incapable of democracy. Ah, so that’s it! All of us who were opposed to war are RACISTS! And we supported Saddam!
23 June, 2008 at 7:29 pm
Despite previously being exposed to efforts of utter stupidity by Bolt, when he posted this effort a little while ago
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/i_told_you_cnn_was_of_the_left/
I was skeptical. I though surely such an effort was too stupendous even for Bolt, and that he must be taking the piss. Surely his obsession with the evils of ‘the left’ couldn’t run this deep
After an unusually large numbers of posts, criticising Bolt’s (genuine or otherwise) attributing of the weird sexual practices of the journalist mention in Bolt’s linked news article column above, too ‘the left’, in his subsequent columns section, Bolt attempted to argue that his post was all just a “ruse to flush out those on the Left who can’t tell when someone’s pulling their chain. Or rope”. And I actually believed his stated intentions.
But then today he posts an article attributing deaths due to AIDS in Africa, as being largely the fault of the “lifestyle left” of Western Society, clearly displaying his mindset that sexual impropriates and excessivenesses are a characteristic of ‘the left’. With this subsequent comment” “And we’d rather let blacks die than interfere with white pleasures.”
He really is an idiot of monumental proportions. The drover’s dog could do his job.
23 June, 2008 at 7:49 pm
You are missing the point of Bolt’s article.
he is making fun of the media’s claims that Iraq had descended into civil war.
Iraq quite clearly did descend into civil war for about a four year period following the invasion. I think the reason Andrew missed it was that he was looking for an ‘American’ style civil war, where two opposing governments form and engage in formal hostilities. That didn’t happen – so Bolt will now hysterically insist that Paul McGeough was wrong.
They guy is borderline insane if he thinks this kind of dribble will fool anyone but his loyal army of dickheads.
23 June, 2008 at 7:57 pm
Iraq quite clearly did descend into civil war for about a four year period following the invasion.
Majority elements from each of the sects engaged in the political process in an attempt to form alliances and government, while minority elements (including foreign fighters) sought to undermine that process. It therefore wasn’t a civil war but, more correctly, an insurgency. Civil war usually requires a complete break down in political structures.
They guy is borderline insane if he thinks this kind of dribble will fool anyone but his loyal army of dickheads.
Reasonable and rational as ever, Mondo.
23 June, 2008 at 8:32 pm
I think the most disgusting element of Bolt’s cheer- squad behavior when it comes to the Iraq intervention/invasion, is his insinuation that those opposed too it, are glad and eager to see news regarding chaos, disorder and human suffering occuing in Iraq, due to their overriding interest in seeing people like him proved wrong.
It has been a continual theme of his in the years following the initial decision to go into Iraq, particulary whenever anyone argues with passion that his continual declarations of victory are stupid and misplaced, and that the overall consequences of the intervention in Iraq have involved tremendous human suffering, chaos, disorder and
strategic disasters.
Bolt’s new logic: There has been less deaths and less disorder this month, than the last. Therfore the entire Iraq campaign has been completely justified.
23 June, 2008 at 8:37 pm
To discover the real story behind Iraq, it’s worth reading actual mid east experts (as opposed to right-wing columnists).
Here’s some highlights -
- An average of 500 Iraqis killed per month
- Pentagon busted for underestimating deaths
- Millions of refugees stuck in Syria and Jordon
- 40% of the Iraqi Middle class lives outside of the country
Oh, but the surge is working!!!
The moral vacuousness displayed by neocons and their apologists is so appalling, I can barely even consider them without feeling ill.
23 June, 2008 at 9:05 pm
albi: was your post a parody? You dismiss right-wing columnists then cite a left-wing blogger.
Well done. And finished off with a nice line in irony:
The moral vacuousness displayed by neocons and their apologists is so appalling, I can barely even consider them without feeling ill.
Which could as easily have bene redrafted as:
The smug sense of moral superiority displayed by Left-wing and their apologists is so appalling, I can barely even consider them without feeling vindicated.
23 June, 2008 at 9:25 pm
“Nothing we see there today remotely matches what the vast bulk of Western reporting told us to expect.”
I was ordered by the Howard lovin’ media to expect Osama and Saddam to be caught with a huge amount of WMD under the bed … But when the expecting stopped and the reporting began I was shown horror after horror being committed under my name in Iraq.
Expected reporting – The oxymoron for the Age of Terror.
MR well said
23 June, 2008 at 9:41 pm
“He really is an idiot of monumental proportions.”
the sexual partners/HIV stuff = leftists effort today was the final straw for me, no more bolt. the man is a tool and an embarrasment to what passes for the commercial media in this country. it used to be that you could laugh at his ridiculous assertions and equally ridiculous cheer squad. but he’d becoming more and more deranged. is australia really that hard up for conservative viewpoint that they have to put him on insiders?
“The drover’s dog could do his job.”
unfortunately tim blair is no better either.
23 June, 2008 at 9:55 pm
“…when it comes to the Iraq intervention/invasion, is his insinuation that those opposed too it, are glad and eager to see news regarding chaos, disorder and human suffering..”
chris this is conservative thought-process 101, lecture 1. the same deranged logic is applied to refugees (if you dont want them locked up you support terrorists) and the NT intervention in aboriginal communities (if you don’t support it your backing the pedophiles). add to this the supreme irony that it’s always the conservatives who cry foul about others trying to shut out their view point. the iraq debacle has really shown up conservative columnists like bolt who gave no critical reporting of the war from the beginning except of those who DID give critical reporting. all they can do now is clutch at straws in the hope of saving any shred of credibility they may have left.
23 June, 2008 at 10:45 pm
Hello Abu.
My post would have been humorous if I had indeed just linked to some blogger. But I didn’t. I linked to an internationally recognised expert in the fields of Middle East and Islamic Studies. He has been writing and lecturing these subjects for years. He is also appears as an expert commentator on dozens of American news programs and writes columns for several newspapers. Additionally, he references most of his comments as can be seen simply by reading his site.
Read his resume here if you like.
23 June, 2008 at 10:52 pm
Oh I get it now. You’re saying Juan Cole is a Left-leaning ‘expert’ on ME matters in the same way that this guy is a conservative-leaning ‘expert’:
http://jihadwatch.org/spencer/
Thanks albi.
23 June, 2008 at 10:58 pm
Yet May was also the month of the alleged great coalition victory in Mosul.</a? One of two things has happened here. Either it wasn’t the great victory as claimed, or the death figures aren’t correct.
23 June, 2008 at 10:59 pm
oh shit, sorry about my html failure
23 June, 2008 at 11:07 pm
AC: “albi: was your post a parody? You dismiss right-wing columnists then cite a left-wing blogger.”
That’s pretty lazy stuff Abu, seriously. Cole clearly has more credentials than both B1 and B2 put together along with their entire flock of winged monkeys.
23 June, 2008 at 11:11 pm
What’s your point, Abu? Of course Spencer is an expert in Islam, just as Daniel Pipes is. So what?
We’re talking about the legitimacy of the war in Iraq and the resulting loss of life, whilst challenging Bolt’s claims that a drop in the death rate for one month justifies a million previous deaths. I linked to Cole as he provides an excellent round up of news that challenges this point of view (with links).
Oh, and if you think I’m a apologist for Islam, think again. I’m an atheist and find all religion repellent. I find Islam particularly repulsive especially because of the way women are treated.
24 June, 2008 at 6:36 am
You said:
To discover the real story behind Iraq, it’s worth reading actual mid east experts (as opposed to right-wing columnists).
Which I agree with. Then you linked to a Left wing ME expert. So I presented the opposite side of the spectrum.
Why? Because if we compare left and right wing bloggers, we won’t resolve the issue. But if we escalate the discussion to actual ME experts, guess what? That’s right – yet more disagreement.
Presenting a link to a single ME ‘expert’ does not resolve the issue or prove a case. It’s just another voice with an opinion. That was my point.
By the way, we have something in common. I’m also an atheist. It’s not a lot, but it’s a little. Don’t tell my mum.
24 June, 2008 at 6:40 am
Bolts’ main problem is, he actually believes everything he writes ( and his fan club hangs on every word without finding things out for thenselves )
24 June, 2008 at 9:09 am
Ok Abu, fair enough.
I won’t tell your mum, but make sure you don’t tell my boss!
24 June, 2008 at 9:48 am
Spencer is an expert on Islam Abu – he’s quite clearly not an expert on the Middle Eastern political spectrum and history like Cole is. Offering him up as an ‘expert’ on the Iraq situation is about as sensible as offering up Richard Dawkins as an expert on the conflict in northern Ireland.
As Albi ably points out, we’re talking about the accuracy of Middle Eastern reporting and the reliability of information being presented to the mainstream western audience, specifically in relation to the Iraq war. Your ‘response’ to this is to belittle Albi and then present the resume of an Islamic scholar as some sort of counter?
Your contribution to this discussion is, as always, utterly insipid.
24 June, 2008 at 10:09 am
I don’t entirely agree with you Abu, but to be sure, no one news source can necessarily be trusted to provide a totally unbiased view.
I do believe that the theme of Bolt’s piece is disingenuous. One month of lower than average deaths doesn’t vindicate his pro-war position, especially in lieu of the terrible death toll to this point.
I’m pleased to hear that you’re a atheist. No doubt if there were more of us we wouldn’t be in the horrendous situation we find ourselves in now.
.
24 June, 2008 at 11:18 am
Over and over we see Abu heroically standing up for his hero AB. Repeated attempts to belittle with his trademark psuedo articulation. Never painting a picture of his own beliefs.
Sorry Abu (Hello! Hello!), when I see your name above an entry, record, note, listing, memo, memorandum, account, whatever…like seeing that Adam Sandler is starring in the film….Skip.
Warmest regards,
Id
24 June, 2008 at 2:39 pm
adam sandler. perhaps he’s a comedians brian brown!!!!
24 June, 2008 at 4:45 pm
Look I concede I could have the wrong end of the stick here but if someone is saying that a civil war has not been in progress then I assume that there exists a pretty robust definition of what constitutes a civil war.
I had assumed that a collapse of a constitutional/political consensus, competeing militias and the inability to gaurantee the security of your capital city notwithstanding the efforts of your own national army and a huge American military prescence would go some way to indicate that the civil war that everyone was saying might occur in fact actually has occured.
24 June, 2008 at 6:30 pm
I’m pleased to hear that you’re a atheist. No doubt if there were more of us we wouldn’t be in the horrendous situation we find ourselves in now.
Amen to that, aldi.
24 June, 2008 at 6:37 pm
Marco: there were many provinces that were relatively stable, while there were issues in Baghdad and in the Sunni Triangle. But by and large, the majority of sectarian interests attempted participation in the democratic process. It hasn’t been perfect, but there hasn’t been a complete break down in the civil system, with open warfare.
There has been a lot of violence with insurgent groups trying to kick off civil war by bombing Shia religious festivals and of course targeting coalition personnel. Nonetheless, there is significant participation by key interests in the system as it stands.
Therefore I would categorise it as an insurgency rather than civil war. We don’t see main stream discussion of civil war in the media or political or academic circles (with some exceptions), so I don’t think I’m alone, even if some bloggers want to paint it as a horse of a different colour.
24 June, 2008 at 6:38 pm
Sorry Abu (Hello! Hello!), when I see your name above an entry, record, note, listing, memo, memorandum, account, whatever…like seeing that Adam Sandler is starring in the film….Skip.
The irony of your post appears to be lost on you, idlaviv. But I enjoyed it!
24 June, 2008 at 6:39 pm
Your contribution to this discussion is, as always, utterly insipid.
Thanks, Mondo! The evidence that there is a dialogue occurring with others suggest otherwise, but thanks so much for your views, which are important to me.
24 June, 2008 at 7:55 pm
Abu, I suppose that part of the problem for me is that the threshold that seperates insurgency and civil war seems more a judgement of ideological disposition than a test of more objective indices.
The sectarian participation in parliament seems at times to have had the character of a bet both ways in that many of the represented groups have maintained the use of their militias to bolster militarily their political ambitions. Thus their prescence in parliament is not so much a vote of confidence in the institutions that parliament represents but a tactical consideration, another arrow in the quiver so to speak. Many commentaries about the easing of violence in Baghdad put this down to the success the militias have enjoyed in ‘cleansing’ the neighbourhoods of rival sects, a sort of ‘Mission Accomplished’ in reverse.
Look I welcome any abatement of violence in Iraq and any legtimate progress in democratic process. To be arguing about what is an insurgency, what is a civil war from the comfort of my armchair does induce a certain selfconsciousness. I persist only because the goal posts as to why this war was necessary have been shifted so many times and that a rekoning of its cost in life, treasure and displacement are continually contested in order to obscure the (to me at least) obvious fact that this war from the start was a fiasco.
However as Colin Powell stated ‘you break it, you own it’. That Australia was an original belligerent, and that this act of belligerence was given popular legitimacy at a subsequent general election makes me uneasy about the withdrawal of Australian troops. Everyone one is entitled to change their mind but a change of opinion does not diminish responsibility.
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