[B-Chan]

"Even now, with the airlines disintegrating and gasoline over $4 (diesel over $5) I haven't heard any of these crybabies even raise the issue of restoring the US railroad system."

Food for thought.

Opinions expressed in articles linked by me on FR do not necessarily represent my own opinions.

[denydenydeny]

For my money, the "we were lied to" chorus only represents the obdurately self-righteous cluelessness in every band of the American political spectrum. We lied to ourselves. We continue to lie to ourselves every day. The US public barely understands the first thing about the energy predicament we're in, and what it means for how we live in this country -- or how we get along with the rest of the world -- and the news media tragically reflects that ignorance. We fantasize about being "energy independent" and still being able to drive to the mall three times a day to eat caesar salads grown on the other side of North America. Get this: we deserve exactly what is happening to us. We might as well keep on lying to ourselves to pretend that we are not descending into a dark phase of our own history. After all, the true basis of American life these days is to feel good about yourself no matter what you do.

I'm amazed that someone who could write a paragraph this perceptive could still vote for Obama, the candidate for people who don't want to think about anything other than how self-righteous voting for Obama makes them.

[Jack Hammer]

Wasn’t it Confucius who said that people get the government they deserve? Politicians and civil servants are drawn from the population at large, and will ultimately reflect the views, values, and beliefs of that population. It’s a frightening thought, when one pauses to reflect that William J. Clinton was elected to office not once, but twice by that very same population. In a society the pepople of which, broadly considered, are capable of such as that, any sort of nightmare is possible, and social decay and ultimate disaster become not only understandable, but rather likely.

[metesky]

Pretty good from a liberal. As you said, food for thought. The man wants to “get it” and he almost makes it all the way, except for the Obamessiah thing.

[Skooz]

bump

[CharacterCounts]

But all the backward-looking crybaby complaints that "we were lied to" still does not answer the basic question: what should have been the appropriate response to the extreme injury of 9/11?

Was Obama ever asked this question in any debate?

We all know he "has always been against the war" but what wouldhis response have been. I do not think Obama, even with the benefit od 20/20 hindsight can provide an adequate answer.

[RoadTest]

” which Arab Nation?

The answer was Iraq, for a number of strategic reasons. Iraq had the largest untapped oil reserves outside Saudi Arabia and it would benefit the oil-guzzling US to have something to say about its disposition.”

This article made a lot of sense, sounding carefully thought out, until the tired old line about oil. It’s a disappointing reversion to the old Democrat saw, “Aw, it’s just about oil”.

Never mind that it was here in Iraq that al Qaeda, the perpetrator of the atrocities that are the subject of this article, was defeated, that a tyrant was put away and that a Democracy was created in the Middle East,

Oh, no, it has to be all about oil. Ridiculous. Myopic, too. If it had been about oil, wouldn’t our victory in Iraq have produced more plentiful oil supplies and hence lower prices?

[LZ_Bayonet]

Very close to what Thomas Friedman, NYT, said on PBS in 2003.

"THOMAS FRIEDMAN: It's not there as all. A friend told me a friend told me a friend of his in Egypt had just called him and said the mood is that people see Saddam as a hijacker. He's like the guy who's hijacked a country. If American commandos can liberate those people being hijacked without hurting of the passenger, i.e., the Iraqi people, I think this war is not going to be wildly applauded but people will, I think, accept it. There's a little bit, I believe, of every Arab in the Middle East today, Margaret, who is rooting for George Bush to go in there and punch Saddam in the nose and remove him. Now, there is also part of every Arab that is very uncomfortable with the United States going in, stomping around their region and doing it. But there is a little bit of them that wishes he would do it to Saddam and 22 other Arab leaders at the same time. "

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/jan-june03/friedman_1-16.html

[Lorianne]

A liberal with integrity. How rare.

[Straight Vermonter]

ome of it, such as rumors of a transfer of yellowcake uranium ore from Africa to Iraq, proved to be erroneous, even though it was used as the basis for our ultimatum.

It's erroneous because Joe Wilson couldn't find evidence of it from his hotel room in Niger?

The State Department now confirms (and knew all along) that Saddam was in fact trying to buy yellowcake.