Re: Left Behind

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Joe Klein, cranky? Alert the media!

While I don’t feel like I’ve personally done enough homework to have a respect-worthy opinion on the idea of a surge, the theatrics of this debate are playing out at a level I’m very comfortable with: the lowest one. I left out a critique of Joe Lieberman’s presentation in my post on the Iraq surge forum at AEI, mostly because there was absolutely nothing about it worth mentioning, at least as a substantive part of the debate. What was weird, almost eerie, about Lieberman’s argument for the escalation of war in Iraq was its (literally) word-for-word repetition of Bush’s arguments for the invasion of Iraq. “Axis of evil”? Check. “Al Qaeda bases in Baghdad”? Check. “The Iraq war is part of the global war on terror”? Yup.

I can’t be as certain as Joe is that a surge is a bad idea; what I can be certain about is that talking about a surge as though the past three years — and 3000 deaths — hadn’t happened, certainly is. — Ana Marie Cox