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Maureen Dowd's Words on Fighting
The Weekly Standard ^ | 07/25/03 | Katie Blixt

Posted on 07/25/2003 6:18:45 PM PDT by Pokey78

The New York Times columnist is often at odds with the administration, the facts, and herself.

DOES MAUREEN DOWD know what she's talking about? Her New York Times column specializes in highly personal attacks on George W. Bush and his aides. Clearly she knows how to be snide. But Dowd also has written in recent months about the war in Iraq, Saddam Hussein's strategy, the aftermath of the war, the mood of American troops, and the alleged lack of an occupation plan for Iraq. On these subjects, she hasn't got a clue.

Back on March 12, she wrote that the Bush administration had "managed to alienate our last best friend." Really? She was referring to British prime minister Tony Blair, who stuck proudly with Bush for the entire Iraq war and then visited Washington last week to praise the president, his country, and the American people.

Not only was she wrong about our treatment of allies, Dowd also contradicts herself on the facts of the war. Early in the war Dowd did not believe we had enough troops to fight the Iraqis. On March 30, she wrote, "[Rumsfeld] overrode the risk of pitting 130,000-strong American ground forces--the vast majority of the front line troops have never fired at a live enemy before--against 350,000 Iraqi fighters, who have kept their aim sharp on their own people." She continued on April 2: "The president and his war council did not expect so much heavy guerilla resistance in Iraq. You can't pound the drums for war by saying Saddam is Hitler then act surprised when he proves ruthless on the battlefield."

Dowd talked about all of this unexpected resistance, yet on June 22, she wrote, "Could we have been at war with someone who wasn't fighting back?" She continued, "U.S. troops sped through Iraq, meeting surprisingly little opposition except for fedayeen harassment." We somehow went from not enough troops to very little resistance.

In her July 20 piece she attempts to make soldiers' complaints look like a rebellion within the troops. But we are in a time of war, and soldiers will always complain. This does not mean troops are overly bitter or doubting their cause.

She also said that "the coolly efficient Bush commanders have now been exposed as short-term tacticians who had no strategy for dealing with a war of liberation that morphed into a war of attrition," and also that the administration "overreached while trying to justify the reasons for going to war." The recent deaths of Saddam's sons show just how committed this administration is to a long-term commitment to helping Iraq.

Dowd attempted to guess at Saddam Hussein's strategy when she imagined that "Maybe Saddam has been chortling from the sidelines as his guerrillas and Islamic militants kill enough soldiers to make Americans queasy." There is, presumably, less chortling now that U.S. troops have killed his sons. At least from Saddam.

Katie Blixt is an intern at The Weekly Standard.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: dowd; maureenapplepandowdy
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1 posted on 07/25/2003 6:18:46 PM PDT by Pokey78
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To: Pokey78
Does Dowd hit the bottle alot?
2 posted on 07/25/2003 6:28:13 PM PDT by b4its2late (I am a partisan. Part right and the other part right.)
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To: b4its2late
I once knew a writer who insisted that he wrote his best stuff after a few drinks.

Trouble was, he also liked to go to bars, get drunk and argue with people. They found him beat-up, dead, behind a bar one morning! Absolutely true story.
3 posted on 07/25/2003 6:33:35 PM PDT by spoiler2
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To: b4its2late
"Does Dowd hit the bottle alot?"

Naaa....she's just naturally stupid!
4 posted on 07/25/2003 6:33:36 PM PDT by Arpege92
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To: Pokey78

For some odd reason Spiro Agnew's quote about 'effete, intellectual snobs' comes to mind...


5 posted on 07/25/2003 6:40:07 PM PDT by Fintan (This space available.)
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To: Pokey78
There is, presumably, less chortling now that U.S. troops have killed his sons. At least from Saddam.

ZING! I think poor old Dowdy is going through the change, she's just so irrational lately.

6 posted on 07/25/2003 6:42:10 PM PDT by McGavin999
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To: Pokey78
She still writing? Haven't read her scribbles in years.
Hate to waste time on inconsequential blatherings.
7 posted on 07/25/2003 6:46:52 PM PDT by OpusatFR (Using pretentious arcane words to buttress your argument means you don't have one)
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To: Pokey78
A nice dressing down of the bitc* from the NYT. And it looked so easy.
8 posted on 07/25/2003 6:51:51 PM PDT by thegreatbeast (Quid lucrum istic mihi est?)
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To: thegreatbeast
Katie Blixt is an intern at The Weekly Standard

Yup, it is so nice to have Conservative women on our team who can go toe to toe with the dingbats on the left without being called sexist.

Anne and Michelle are both good, and of course there are others, but it is still nice to see a new up-and-coming Conservative pundit stretch her wings.

I will be looking for more from this writer in the future.

9 posted on 07/25/2003 7:15:33 PM PDT by Ronin (Qui tacet consentit!)
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To: Pokey78
Katie Blixt is an intern at The Weekly Standard.

Put her on the permanent staff.

So9

10 posted on 07/25/2003 7:20:13 PM PDT by Servant of the Nine (A Goldwater Republican)
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To: thegreatbeast
Certainly Ms. Dowd is a leftist, but she did have some biting commentary about Mr. Clinton. For the life of me I cannot remember any of the specifics, but I do remember emailing a couple of them to friends, commenting that everyone must realize what a crook Clinton is if even the left wing columnists (not Safire) were blistering him as much as Dowd was doing.

I do not mean to take issue with Ms. Blixt or with the Weekly Standard on anything she says in the column. In fact, I suppose that I am agreeing that Ms. Dowd can be snide. In some fairness to her, she has discharged her snideness in both directions.
11 posted on 07/25/2003 7:20:21 PM PDT by Tom D.
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To: thegreatbeast
A nice dressing down of the bitc* from the NYT. And it looked so easy.

Discrediting Dowd is shooting fish in a barrel. It's easy for anyone who is willing to take on the disgusting task of reading through her columns over time and comparing them.

12 posted on 07/25/2003 7:22:59 PM PDT by squidly
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To: Fintan
For some odd reason Spiro Agnew's quote about 'effete, intellectual snobs' comes to mind...

So does Buchanen's line delivered by Agnew...Nattering Nabobs of Nihilism....

13 posted on 07/25/2003 7:23:17 PM PDT by leadhead
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To: leadhead
Nattering Nabobs of Negativism...and that was by Safire!
14 posted on 07/25/2003 7:26:28 PM PDT by PianoMan (Ignore anything I post after midnight)
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To: Pokey78
Allow me...


15 posted on 07/25/2003 7:27:31 PM PDT by PianoMan (Ignore anything I post after midnight)
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To: PianoMan
That's Dowdy?

Gosh, I never realized......

She is an identical twin to Zeta, right?
16 posted on 07/25/2003 7:44:57 PM PDT by Ole Okie
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To: Pokey78
the coolly efficient Bush commanders have now been exposed as short-term tacticians who had no strategy for dealing with a war of liberation that morphed into a war of attrition

Dowd is ignorant of how the miltary works.

Underlying a specific plan or strategy is a doctrine that covers wide contingencies....to include doctrine of peacemaking inside newly liberated, hostile nations.

Besides there has long been a plan for restoration in Iraq. The first hint of that was when the initial overseer of reconstruction (Gen. Garner?) showed up. Reconstruction involved a variety of issues: infrastructure, commercial systems, oil production systems, governmental systems, social service systems, medical systems, educational systems, etc. If someone would bother putting the charts up on these subjects, we'd see that amazing progress has been made in all of these. But no one will report on them. Because of that, Dowd gets a free pass with her lying. No one has the info to counter her.

17 posted on 07/25/2003 8:13:34 PM PDT by xzins
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To: McGavin999
Dowd is a dried up old maid and she knows it. Very, very bitter woman. Poor Maureen.....
18 posted on 07/25/2003 8:47:55 PM PDT by Patriotic Bostonian
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To: Patriotic Bostonian
What she needs is a man. But no man will have her, for more than an hour or so, maybe less.
19 posted on 07/26/2003 8:49:40 AM PDT by Search4Truth (When a man lies he murders some part of the world.)
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To: Pokey78; Miss Marple
Somebody here has a quick and easy explanation of Dowd's pshychosis. Is that you Miss Marple?
20 posted on 07/26/2003 9:16:19 AM PDT by Rodney King (No, we can't all just get along.)
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