Posted on 08/26/2007 7:16:27 PM PDT by george76
In a “Web-exclusive” commentary posted Thursday, Newsweek Senior Editor Michael Hirsh ridiculed President George W. Bush's warning that a precipitous pull-out from Iraq could lead to the humanitarian horrors that followed the American pull-out from Vietnam.
Recalling a trip he made to Vietnam in 1991, Hirsh reported that he found a nation looking to the West and capitalism, adding that “today Vietnam remains” only “nominally communist.”
He then snidely asserted: “This was the 'harsh' aftermath that George W. Bush attempted to describe this week when he warned against pulling out of Iraq as we did in Vietnam.” James Taranto, in his Friday “Best of the Web Today” posting for OpinionJournal.com, asked: “Could that last sentence be any more disingenuous?
To Hirsh, the 'aftermath' of America's withdrawal from Vietnam didn't begin until 1991, more than 16 years after Saigon fell. About events between 1975 and 1991, he has only this to say: 'Yes, a lot of Vietnamese boat people died on the high seas; but many others have returned to visit in the ensuing years.'”
To that, Taranto astutely observed: “Never mind Vietnam's and Laos's 're-education' camps; never mind Cambodia's killing fields. It is as if one visited West Germany in 1960, found a prosperous democracy, and reached positive conclusions about the 'aftermath' of Nazi rule. It misses the point by a light-year.”
from 1975 to 1978 the three broadcast network evening newscasts, as well as the New York Times and Washington Post, virtually ignored the ongoing massacre by the Khmer Rouge: “Over the four-year period of the Khmer Rouge rule, the three networks devoted less than sixty minutes on weeknights to the human rights situation in Cambodia. That averaged out to less than thirty seconds per month per network.”
(Excerpt) Read more at newsbusters.org ...
"For liberals, history begins today."
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These reporters are disgusting.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
And how many hundreds of thousands were put to death so Vietnam could become "nominally communist"?
Sheesh!
Why America’s Pullout From Vietnam Worked (Unbelievable! Ultra Barf Alert!) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1885714/posts
And the victims of Southeast Asian Communism remain only "nominally" dead.
I don’t think I’m even gonna look at that. This reporter is bad enough. How many hundreds of thousands of people have to die before he acknowledges it? Oh wait, he’s a liberal, nevermind, most of them ignore the fact that 100 MILLION died under Stalin.
Hirsh can have his own opinion but he can’t have his own set of historical facts.
I will give the Communists credit for one thing. Within mere days of over running South Vietnam they had rounded up and executed the Viet Cong cadre. They weren’t going to take a chance on anyone being able to resist their plans.
No other President can drive the left crazy like Bush. Not even Reagan could get them to howling like this. If I didn't know better I think he does it just for his own amusement.
This is a classic case. He takes what the left hates, the war against Islamo Fascism and compares it their self abuse time of glory, defeat in Vietnam and not fondly. Then sits back and I'm sure with a smile on face watches the predictable explosion.
I think it’s so funny...the libs are going bonkers...HA One can do nothing with the FACTS...They’ve tried but TRUTH always wins in the end....
No other President can drive the left crazy like Bush. Not even Reagan could get them to howling like this. If I didn't know better I think he does it just for his own amusement.
This is a classic case. He takes what the left hates, the war against Islamo Fascism and compares it their self abuse time of glory, defeat in Vietnam and not fondly. Then sits back and I'm sure with a smile on face watches the predictable explosion.
The Surge is Working and PravdABDNC is in the Trap
Pray for W and Our Freedom Fighters
Being a communist country is like being pregnant. There aren’t degrees of either. It’s all or nothing.
“these reporters are disgusting.”
it goes beyond disgusting now. try, treacherous, hateful, disdainful, hubris laden, self-endowed with intellectual superiority, dismissive of any atrocities committed by communists, filled with contempt for anyone who is not a brilliant marxist, and last, but not least; these scu&bag left-leaning reporters are disgusting.
This is the second instance I’ve seen in the last few days of some leftist claiming nothing bad happened in Vietnam after the commies took over. The other one was john kerry.
The dead never had that chance, did they.
Hirsh is not even nominally a reporter. His facade is "editor"; his core is Democrat operative.
I think it’s so funny...the libs are going bonkers...
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When we knew that lots of people were drowing trying to escape, the main concern was with who would have to accept the refugees...it would have been possible to put ships in international waters to rescue the fleeing "boat people" but that would have just increased the number of unwanted refugees needing resettlement. Jimmy Carter was big on human rights, or so he claimed, but the Vietnamese didn't attract his notice.
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