Hate politics

Just once you think politics can't get any more disgusting, someone goes and kills a bear and staples Obama signs on it, then dumps it on a NC campus.

A dead bear was found dumped this morning on the Western Carolina University campus, draped with a pair of Obama campaign signs, university police said.
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Maintenance workers reported about 7:45 a.m. finding a 75-pound bear cub dumped at the roundabout near the Catamount statute at the entrance to campus, said Tom Johnson, chief of university police.

“It looked like it had been shot in the head as best we can tell. A couple of Obama campaign signs had been stapled together and stuck over its head,” Johnson said.

This is just disgusting. I honestly cannot believe how vile people can be. What's the message even supposed to be? I'm guessing along the lines of the sick bastards saying things like "kill him!" at McCain campaign rallies (there is just no way Obama supporters did this).

How about this doozie:

Leroy C. McLaughlin finished his workday on Friday and was cooking dinner when a family member phoned.

The 4-foot-by-8-foot Barack Obama campaign sign that McLaughlin had posted in the front yard of his Chesterfield County home was gone.

A Confederate flag hung in its place.

Simply unbelievable.

The Legend of a Heretic

Here's a great piece on Robert Ingersoll from a NYT blog. The piece gives an overview of his life, and talks briefly about faith in public life. It is quite amazing to me that Ingersoll could be so prominent in politics while holding those views. The idea of the Republican party consulting Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, or PZ Myers is pretty laughable.

Which is too bad

Irrational Voters

Jonah Lehrer has a cool article on the irrationality of voters. It's actually kind of scary, but definitely interesting.

I especially love the statement about how misguided the talking heads on the TV news channels are, as though we needed any more proof of that.

It's 3 AM, and John McCain needs to read an E-mail

I don't particularly think that being computer-savvy should be high on the list of qualifications for becoming President, but it is something to think about. And the parody of the 3 AM ad is priceless.

Collins on Obama

This is the smartest Op-Ed I've read in a while. The main point:

But if you look at the political fights he’s picked throughout his political career, the main theme is not any ideology. It’s that he hates stupidity. “I don’t oppose all wars. What I am opposed to is a dumb war,” he said in 2002 in his big speech against the invasion of Iraq. He did not, you will notice, say he was against unilateral military action or pre-emptive attacks or nation-building. He was antidumb.

Most of the things Obama’s taken heat for saying this summer fall into these two familiar patterns — attempts to find a rational common ground on controversial issues and dumb-avoidance.

This does seem to be true, and it's a decent way of rationalizing his FISA vote, (which which I still disagree, but it's a lemon at this point since the damn thing would have passed no matter what. We we're failed by Obama, we were failed by the Democratic House and Senate leadership). I think this is worth remembering, since some people seem to think that Obama should hold perfect positions (which is insane, because that will differ drastically among the people who support him), and some of the time you're going to disagree with him. But Collins's last point is worth remembering:

Meanwhile, Obama has made it clear what issues he thinks all this cleverness and compromising are supposed to serve: national health care, a smart energy policy and getting American troops out of Iraq. He has tons of other concerns, but those seem to be the top three.

I think that, setting aside all of the other things we disagree with, accomplishing those three things would make an Obama presidency wildly successful.

HuffPo on FISA

This sums up my thoughts on FISA perfectly. Best part:

How can even one senator on either side of the aisle in good conscience vote in favor of this law that does nothing to enhance our security and everything to diminish our rights as a free people?

Damn right.

A little list

I'm finding it very hard to disagree with this list of things Obama should do to remind himself of what got him to where he is, and what he should be doing now.

Obama's flip flops

For some reason, our political culture disdains the so-called "flip-flop", as though changing one's mind on an issue were the worst thing ever. Labeling a true change of mind brought about by new evidence as a "flip-flop" is both asinine and counterproductive, as demagogues are made into saints by their consistency, while the thoughtful are smeared.

That being said, when a politician changes their position on an issue because of simple political expediency, there's something wrong. Those issues need to be addressed, and the politician needs to be called out on them.

So that's what I'm doing. But first, I want to say a couple of things.

Obama did not flip-flop on the recent Supreme Course child rape case. He came out in favor of the death penalty for child rapists in The Audacity of Hope (from here, as I don't have access to my copy):

"While the evidence tells me that the death penalty does little to deter crime, I believe there are some crimes — mass murder, the rape and murder of a child — so heinous, so beyond the pale, that the community is justified in expressing the full measure of its outrage by meting out the ultimate punishment."

The other flip-flop he's been accused of is on Iraq, which is absolutely absurd. Here's the argument:

Only weeks ago, the Democrat was calling for an immediate and rapid U.S. withdrawal. When General David Petraeus first testified about the surge in September 2007, Mr. Obama was dismissive and skeptical. But with the surge having worked wonders in Iraq, this week Mr. Obama went out of his way to defend General Petraeus against MoveOn.org's attacks in 2007 that he was "General Betray Us." Perhaps he had a late epiphany.

This might just be me, but I think that condemning MoveOn for an add isn't showing support for the person they condemn, simply a distaste for MoveOn's actions (which I think Obama shares with many people). The article continues to say that, due to the surge, the situation has changed enough that Obama will modify his withdrawal proposal. Fair enough, it may happen (although I doubt it, for several reasons beyond the scope here), but citing a possibility for the future as evidence of his flip-flopiness is absolutely inane. I wonder if the Editorial board at the WSJ has had their brains removed recently, as that's the only explanation I can see (as for The New Republic employing a guy who fails to see through this charade, I can only hope his previous work was better).

Now, the real change of mind (I'm not going to bother arguing about the gun-rights stance, as I totally agree with both Heller and Obama's tepid take). Obama has completely reversed his opinion on the FISA compromise, which he voted against previously, but now would support this virtually unchanged bill. To be fair to Obama, due to its support from the leadership in the House and Senate, it makes opposition difficult. Difficult, but still right. It's incredibly disappointing that he can't use his new-found eminence in the Democratic party to take a stand against Republican fear mongering. With telecom immunity, we will almost certainly never find out the sordid details of Bush's spying program. Making them pay for their complicity is a secondary concern, and to many (including myself) not a priority at all. The American people deserve answers about what happened.

In the meantime, the President is perfectly capable of conducting all the surveillance he needs to in order to prevent terrorist attacks. If you don't think so, just look at the 911 Commission's findings, of which I was totally unaware until recently. It's simply a matter of fact that the Bush administration's incompetence allowed the 9/11 attacks to happen (see, for example, under the "Criticisms" section of the Wikipedia article). The new FISA bill is nothing more than a power-grab, it's entirely unnecessary, and we need some Democrats to grow spines and explain this to the American people and the fear mongering Republicans.

Bias in Science

This month The American has a great article about gender bias in science. It's pretty much exactly what I thought: there might be some bias, but if there is it's small. The lack of women in science, math, and engineering isn't due to biased behavior but the same kind of things that result in a lack of men in social sciences and education (etc). For some reason people have a hard time accepting that men and women prefer different things (according to distributions, of course), and that would seem to be the utterly logical and predictable cause of this oft-decried disparity. The article also discusses attempts to "title-nine" the sciences, which would be disastrous. I know for a fact that title nine results in odd (and arguably discriminatory) situations like women's teams in obscure sports (like crew) getting much more money than men's teams to offset things like football programs, at least at Stanford (unless my friend who used to be on Stanford women's crew was lying/wrong).

The article is quite long and goes into great depth. Here's the punchline in case you're pressed for time:

The power and glory of science and engineer­ing is that they are, adamantly, evidence-based. But the evidence of gender bias in math and science is flimsy at best, and the evidence that women are relatively disinclined to pursue these fields at the highest levels is serious. When the bastions of science pay obsequious attention to the flimsy and turn a blind eye to the serious, it is hard to maintain the view that the science enterprise is somehow immune to the enthu­siasms that have corrupted other, supposedly “softer” academic fields.

Few academic scientists know anything about the equity crusade. Most have no idea of its power, its scope, and the threats that they may soon be facing. The business commu­nity and citizens at large are completely in the dark. This is a quiet revolution. Its weapons are government reports that are rarely seen; amendments to federal bills that almost no one reads; small, unnoticed, but dramatically con­sequential changes in the regulations regarding government grants; and congressional hearings attended mostly by true believers.

American scientific excellence is a precious national resource. It is the foundation of our economy and of the nation’s health and safety. Norman Augustine, retired CEO of Lockheed Martin, and Burton Richter, Nobel laureate in physics, once pointed out that MIT alone—its faculty, alumni, and staff—started more than 5,000 companies in the past 50 years. Will an academic science that is quota-driven, gender-balanced, cooperative rather than competitive, and less time-consuming produce anything like these results? So far, no one in Congress has even thought to ask.

8 Presidential Losers Speak Their Piece

The NYTimes today has an interesting collection of what drop-out candidates would be talking about if they were still in the race. The contributors are Biden, Brownback, Dodd, Thompson, Richardson, Hunter, Kucinich, and Tancredo.

The interesting thing is the disparity between what the Democrats talk about and what the Republicans talk about. According to the Democrats our priorities should be: securing Afghanistan and its border with Pakistan, fixing crumbling infrastructure, enacting comprehensive mortgage reform, and helping to stave off the foreclosure crisis. According to the Republicans our priorities should be: fixing eroding "family values", FDA and health care reform and increased medical research grants, bringing back manufacturing jobs, and border security.

With the exception of Thompson's piece, the Republican positions are either idiotic or delusional: you can't legislate "family values", no matter how hard you try; our economy has to transition into something besides manufacturing, the days of high-school grads powering our economy though their strength are way gone; and border security is little more than xenophobic frenzy, immigrants (legal or illegal) aren't nearly as dangerous as most think, from what I've read they're more likely beneficial.

The Democrats at least have worthwhile proposals that would benefit people, even though I have doubts about Kucinich's foreclosure plans, I'm not sure a government bail-out is possible or wise, but at least he wants to help people.

I think the most useful one to add to the discussion is the infrastructure piece, we really do need to re-think our commitment to our infrastructure. If we keep on the path we're on we might have some serious trouble down the road.

But all of these pieces are valuable, if only as a snapshot of what people are thinking right now.

Does the Magic Matter?

I generally like the NYTimes Op-Ed page. While I don't always agree with the editorials they print, they're generally high-quality, well-written, thought-provoking pieces. However, there's one today that is little but unadulterated garbage. I'm speaking about When the Magic Fades by David Brooks.

Let me start with the easiest point, and that is his attempt to show Obama as partisan:

The Gang of 14 created bipartisan unity on judges, but Obama sat it out. Kennedy and McCain created a bipartisan deal on immigration. Obama opted out of the parts that displeased the unions. Sixty-eight senators supported a bipartisan deal on FISA. Obama voted no. And if he were president now, how would the High Deacon of Unity heal the breach that split the House last week?

First of all, calling the FISA bill bipartisan is a laughing stock. That was nothing but the Democrats in the Senate capitulating to Bush, and passing a god-awful piece of legislation. The House's actions the next day in allowing the bill to die were almost universally hailed as the right thing to do, and every sane person agrees. Voting against that insidious bill is a point for Obama, not against. If Brooks' point here is that Obama should back every measure that has bipartisan support just because he supports transcending party lines to get stuff done then Brooks is completely and utterly wrong. That line of thinking says that the Iraq War authorization was a good idea, and it's clearly bullshit. What Obama means by bringing people together is bringing them together to do good, not just bringing them together for its own sake. The fact is that sometimes playing the partisan game is correct, at least when one side is right and the other isn't.

And I'm honestly confused about the disdain some people are showing for Obama's supporters. Is it really a bad thing that people are inspired by him? Is it a bad thing that young people are voting in droves? Is it a bad thing that he attracts moderates and Republicans? Because to me these seem like great, even necessary attributes for the Democratic candidate. That is, unless you want to see a John McCain presidency.

I'm also tired of these low-blows about him being "messianic". For starters, don't we kind of need someone to take charge and save our sorry asses from the fuck-up of historical proportions that is the Bush administration? I'm not going to say we need a messiah, but I also think that knocking Obama for using grand rhetorical is just foolish. The best leaders of all time are almost universally great speakers, and it's because inspiring people with language indicates a great mind, which a good leader needs. The same people who mock Bush relentlessly for his "Bush-isms" don't see that it works the other way too: someone who knows how to use words to inspire is exactly the kind of intelligent, clear-thinking person we need.

And this is just insane:

Up until now The Chosen One’s speeches had seemed to them less like stretches of words and more like soul sensations that transcended time and space. But those in the grips of Obama Comedown Syndrome began to wonder if His stuff actually made sense. For example, His Hopeness tells rallies that we are the change we have been waiting for, but if we are the change we have been waiting for then why have we been waiting since we’ve been here all along?

Yes, and MLK's "I have a dream" speech was about an actual dream. Is Brooks serious? Does he really think that Obama means "we" as in the collection of individuals? It clearly means the movement, the people coalescing behind one person and demanding an end the insanity, demanding something better. Misinterpreting that means you're either an idiot or being disingenuous.

Then there this:

Obama says he is practicing a new kind of politics, but why has his PAC sloshed $698,000 to the campaigns of the superdelegates, according to the Center for Responsive Politics? Is giving Robert Byrd’s campaign $10,000 the kind of change we can believe in?

Nice job not noting that Hillary gave a bunch of money to those people too, that information is totally not pertinent. Regardless, I liked the Obama camp's response to this idiotic accusation, "They've discovered that we support the Democratic party," (paraphrased). I'll admit, this could look like he's trying to buy their vote, but I very much doubt it. First because no superdelegate is stupid enough to be bought, and second because who would be bought for $10,000? It seems to me far more likely that they're just supporting other Democratic candidates, and even if they're not, knocking Obama for doing this seems odd because the Clinton camp has done it too.

In the end, I'm as bemused by the Obama-knockers as the Hillary-haters. Personally, I'll vote for whichever candidate the Democrats put up, even though I prefer Obama. But it's starting to look pretty clear that the people prefer Obama, and he has a better chance of winning against McCain is every recent poll I've seen, I'm thinking it's time for others to support him too. But some don't, and I can respect that without needing to call them delusional or idiotically bash Clinton.

In any event, I hope this stupid "Obama's supporters are a cult!!!!111" thing ends soon, because it's moronic beyond words. Of course, that's the very reason it'll likely keep up until the fat lady sings.

White men pay more.

I remember a while back, there was some furor of college republicans doing bake sales and charging white males more than anyone else (here's one article with a negative reaction), as a way of protesting Affirmative Action. Well, now there's some feminists charging white males more to protest pay differences.

"It's just to raise awareness," NOW @ SDSU Co-President Amanda Whitehead said. "A lot of people don't realize that white women make 75 percent of every dollar a white man makes or Hispanic women make 50 percent. It's pretty ridiculous. When they actually have to buy the cookies, it puts it into perspective."

Now, the article doesn't say anything about a negative reaction to this, so it's safe to assume there wasn't one. Which makes me wonder, how is this so different from the AA protest? If I recall correctly from a couple years ago, it caused quite the hubub. Why isn't the feminist one having the same reaction?

Personally, I don't think there should be a reaction to either one. If you disagree with the point they're making, engage them in dialog, or hold your own event that counters their point. If you disagree with someone, you don't try to shut them down. But all too often that's what happens (like this incident at Columbia).

It's really too bad that we can't have civil dialog about so many topics, and that people (even those who believe strongly in tolerance) can't tolerate

My government needs to lose some weight

Here's an interesting essay on government size, telcos, and privacy from Radley Balko. He talks about how the governments' sheer size makes it difficult for companies to say no for fear of losing its business.

It's a good argument, but not flawless. Still, I don't think anyone would say that the government should employ 3 million people (that's 1% of the entire country). It's time to face the fact that we need to drastically shrink our government. There has got to be tons of waste that we could cut out, leaving the machinery operating better than before. Besides, people are always the most expensive part of any project, and we could save tons of money with some massive layoffs.

But it'll never happen.

Why we have to let Ahmadinejad visit the WTC

These stories about the furor over Ahmadinejad wanting to lay a wreath at ground zero are ridiculous. Absolutely, totally ridiculous. For the sake of argument, let's just say the Iran really is as evil as the rhetoric suggests (which I highly doubt), that they export terrorism and help build IEDs in Iraq and all that jazz (which again, I doubt is all true, and is kind of funny given that not a single 911 hijacker was Iranian). Even after all that, he should still be allowed to lay his wreath.

Why? BECAUSE THIS IS A FREE COUNTRY!

Seriously people, do you value free speech or not? Do you value freedom of expression or not? Do you value the right to go what you want and do what you want or do you not? You can't have it both ways. You can't have freedom of speech and deny holocaust deniers their right to speak. You can't have freedom of assembly and deny the KKK marching permits. You can't have freedom while restricting other people's freedoms.

Granted, he isn't a citizen. But so what? Are we fighting for freedom or not? Because denying a foreign dignitary the right to visit a site that any American is free to visit is just insane (I'm assuming that Americans are in fact free to visit Ground Zero, I haven't been there and can't find any contrary or confirmatory information). Let him lay his wreath! Let him pay his respects! Even if he actually intends to dishonor the memory of the dead (which I personally doubt), so what? We are so much stronger, so much better than that. As a country, are we really so weak that we can't even take one person mocking a terrible tragedy? Is our skin really that thin, our confidence that depleted? Even if he intends to dishonor us, we should let him, because in allowing him to dishonor us, we are honoring everything this country stands for, we are proving our strength!

And telling Columbia not to allow him to speak is ludicrous. His opinions are just as worthy of expression as anyone else's, even if they're wrong, even if they're hateful, even if they're bigoted. Again, we are better than this! Words do not hurt us! We can beat the spread of hate, bigotry, and untruth with the perfect truth. Let him speak his piece regardless of his opinions, and then utterly destroy his untruths (if he even utters any).

I just can't fathom the narrow-minded people who would rather dictate what a man can do that let him perform actions or say words that they don't like. For the last time, are we really that weak? Have we fallen that far from our ideals?

Republican hypocrisy and other thoughts

This story about Quotes from Republicans when Clinton was president is interesting, but not surprising. Basically they're saying the things that the Democrats are saying (and being heavily criticized for) now. This was happening before I paid attention to politics at all, so I'm wondering if Democrats were using the same rhetoric Republicans are using now. Frankly, I'd be more surprised if they didn't than if they did.

It's just another sad commentary on our ridiculous partisan politics. I've never really researched it, but I've always felt Washington was right when he urged no political parties in his farewell address, and thought we'd be much better without the dumb loyalties they demand. It seems to me that in a party system, ideas lose to allegiance to the party, whereas without them ideas dominate. Of course, that could be wrong, and a representative system without parties is hard to imagine (although I'd be interested in knowing if one exists). Oh well, we're stuck with what we've got, might as well make the best of it.

The Religious Right still hates Hindus

Via Ed Brayton comes the news that the same chaplain that offered a Hindu prayer in the House a few months ago offered the same prayer in the California Senate, with more or less the same telling reaction from the religious right:

Tim Wildmon, president of the American Family Association, told the San Francisco Chronicle that it remains a mystery to whom Zed was praying.

"I don't know if he even knows who he's praying to," he said. "We're not opposed to the ability of people to worship their own gods or god, but when it comes to our civil government ... it's always been the recognition of the God of the Bible. Every religion is not equal. That's my belief. That's logic."

I don't know about you, but I'm thrilled that they're finally admitting their bigotry. Every religion, presumably including no religion, is worse than Christianity to these nutjobs. But coming out directly and saying it makes it harder for the appeasers to make the case that if we just pussyfoot around with these people then they'll play nice. Newsflash, they won't. They won't be happy until the United States is a full-fledged theocracy, not that it's ever going to happen (which doesn't mean we should let our guard down, the theocrats are well-connected and very motivated, but as long as we're vigilant they can't win).

It's really funny to me that this reaction comes from something so innocuous, that people can get so inflamed by someone talking to an imaginary man in the sky is laughably absurd. But then again, so is everything else involving religion.

Huckabee on Evolution

I was reading The Economist's summary of last night's debate, and came across this gem:

Huckabee: If he were in contention for the nomination he would've been declared the debate's winner. He certainly had the best answers of the night, including a thoughtful response to a question on evolution.

I believe there is a God. I believe there's a God who was active in the creation process. Now, how did he do it and when did he do it and how long did he take, I don't honestly know. And I don't think knowing that would make me a better or a worse president.

That's not a thoughtful response, it's a cop-out and it's admitting his ignorance. He's saying that he's entirely ignorant of the fundamental principle of modern biology. How could we trust him to make thoughtful, informed decisions on biological matters? His opinions on everything from medical to ecological to scientific questions would all be invalid because of his ignorance.

Not understanding evolution undoubtedly makes someone a worse president, and the fact that his answer passes for "thoughtful" shows how unbelievably shallow the public understanding of science truly is.

For the record, I don't have anything in particular against theistic evolutionists (like Ken Miller). It would be nice if they would just man up and take a rational look at their religious beliefs, scrutinizing them as they would any other belief, but at least they accept evolution (and presumably the rest of science). Huckabee wasn't admitting that he's a theistic evolutionist, he was admitting that he knows nothing of evolution and doesn't care to learn about it. He was also admitting his aforementioned ignorance on a subject crucial to many modern issues, and said that he didn't think it would affect his performance. This goes beyond theistic evolution into something more dangerous and sinister: scientific decisions being made based on bad science (or no science). That lack of informed decision-making is exactly why we're in such bad positions in so many ways, from climate to Iraq, and that a presidential candidate can actually be applauded for a statement that he will perpetuate this situation testifies to the extent of the problem.

Hooray police state!

Every time I read a story like this I get more depressed about the state of this nation, and more convinced that we're headed down a very, very bad path.

Not that it is particularly bad, but even a cursory review finds that we are drifting inexorably into a police state, a nanny-state, and that's somewhere we don't want to go. I hope I'm wrong, and I hope we're not going to end up being a nation afraid of those who protect us, where the people have no power over their "protectors", but that appears to be where we're going.

Religious Discrimination

Via Reason, Newt Gingrich, speaking at Falwell's aptly misnamed Liberty University, drops this incredible bomb:

"Basic fairness demands that religious beliefs deserve a chance to be heard.... It is wrong to single out those who believe in God for discrimination. Yet, today, it is impossible to miss the discrimination against religious believers."

First, religious beliefs don't deserve to be heard. All religious people instantly dismiss all other religions; they only want fairness when it comes to other people respecting theirs. Second, who is discriminating against religious believers? Ronald Bailey gets it right when he says:

Discrimination against religious believers in the United States? Give me a break! "Discrimination" in country in which a Newsweek poll on March 31st found that 91 percent of Americans say they believe in the Big Guy in the Sky and 82 percent say that they are Christians? The good news is that only 26 percent think that an atheist can't be a moral person.

Remember folks, there's currently one open atheist in the entire House, and as soon as he announced his atheism there were calls for him to be removed. The rank hypocrisy of these people is simply astounding. But it's nothing new, and it's not even surprising. How sad of a testament to the state of our nation is that?

The case for staying in Iraq

I plan to make a coherent, logical, factual case for why pulling out of Iraq is a bad idea. This is not the argument of some fringe Bush-loving lunatic, it’s the academic argument for keeping troops in Iraq. It comes to me second-hand from Larry Diamond, who served on the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq.

The main point can be summed up in one word, “Somalia”. The problem with withdrawing the troops is the same problem we had back then, that the country would destabilize and hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people would die. (As an aside, the same characters who are refusing to “cut and run” now wanted to back then, and vice-versa. It appears that politicians only want to get out of wars the other side started.) Somalia is the only place in the world (besides Antarctica) that has no government. It is in a perpetual state of civil war. 25% of children don’t see the ripe old age of five. It is hell. If we leave Iraq now, it will end up like Somalia.

Look at it this way, if we leave Iraq, we’ll create another Darfur (we didn’t actually make Darfur into what it is now, but the situation there would be very similar to the one in Iraq). The same thing will happen, with one ethnic group massacring the other. If we pull out, without any kind of stabilizing force in our place, the Mahdi Army (the Shiite militias run by Sadr) will sweep into Baghdad and kill all the Sunnis. That’s five million people, nearly another Holocaust. Every day I see T-shirts and fliers saying “Help Darfur!” The very same people would almost certainly want to pull out of Iraq and condemn all those people to death; they want us to be responsible for another Holocaust.

Beyond the fact that five million people would die, the country would have no stabilizing force. It could quite easily start a regional war. It wouldn’t take much for Iran to go in. If the Muslim countries starting fighting each other, there’s a decent chance that Israel could fly off the handle and get into the fight (it’s happened for less). This situation is more speculative, but it’s definitely possible that pulling out right now would lead to a Middle-East brawl. No one wants that.

I understand that no one wants to be there. It seems pointless. It seems stupid. And it was. We overthrew a stable government for no good reason, which is completely and totally stupid. Our leaders were incompetent, we took many missteps, most of which trace back to Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bush, or Bremer. We shouldn’t be there because we never should have invaded. But we can’t leave now, not yet. There’s still too much at stake, and we have to wait until there’s some form of stable government. I know people will disagree with me, but remember, five million people, innocent people who have done nothing wrong, will likely die if we leave too soon, will die because of our actions. Just remember that when talking about withdrawing from Iraq.