TPMtv Guide: Thursday, May 31
TPMtv has kept itself pretty busy in its early days with the US Attorney purge scandal. But to assuage the clamoring masses, today’s episode of TPMtv decides to shift gears and take a stab at Iraq, particularly the recently completed war spending bill.
A lot of people have expressed tremendous disappointment in how that standoff between the President and congressional Democrats over the Iraq funding bill turned out. But setting aside whether the compromise was a good idea or a bad idea, what surprises us, frankly, is how many people were surprised at what happened.
If you remember back in mid-April, TPMtv interviewed Senator John Kerry and asked him specifically what the next step would be if the President were to veto the timeline bill that was being worked out at the time. Kerry’s answer – representative of what a lot of Democrats were saying around then – was essentially exactly what ended up happening.
Okay, so the President vetoes a timeline bill. What then? “I think we’ll come back and try to create a series of benchmarks and a series of measurements,” Senator Kerry said, “that are very specific about what ought to happen, and put that to him, see if he’ll change the policy to meet the benchmarks.”
So there you go. What Kerry said was going to happen is pretty much exactly what did happen. Right idea, wrong idea – that’s another question. The thing that struck us was the surprise. Something happened where people lost track of what a lot of Democrats were actually telegraphing was going to be the denouement of their standoff with the President.
We know we haven’t talked a lot about Iraq on TPMtv, but we plan to get into it more next week. If you’ve been reading TPM the last couple days then you’ve been following an ongoing debate over Bush’s long-term Iraq policy – sparked by the president’s recent announcement that he envisions a sustained U.S. troop presence in Iraq like the one in South Korea. We’ve been talking a lot about how much the Iraq war is fundamentally about securing the world’s oil supplies. If you plan on being dependent on fossil fuels - particularly oil - for the next half century or century, then there's actually a fair amount of need to have control over where those fuels are.
So what we’ll be looking at next week is the 2008 presidential field and how each candidate comes out on the grand strategy – not just the exit strategy itself or how many soldiers we want in the country, but how what we do in Iraq affects oil dependence, where we get our energy supply, and the future of the war on terror.
Please include each candidate's position on global warming and how it fits into this long-term vision for the economy in a world 'we' are 'making.'
May 31, 2007 11:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
What a treat for TPMC readers: a condescending and dishonest post that rubs salt in the wound of a Congressional sellout by saying "you should have seen it coming."
If this is the flavor of the Iraq coverage to come, why bother?
Kerry's mid-April statement is exceedingly general, and covers a huge range of outcomes. Readers might be forgiven for believing that he was, for example, referring to tough readiness standards for units deployed to Iraq, not the utterly toothless supplemental that the leadership put together. Kerry's phrase is "see if he'll change the policy to meet the benchmarks."
The fact that Kerry himself voted against the cave-in supplemental put forward by the leadership is an indication that he was, in fact, referring to something much tougher.
The 'benchmarks' in the supplemental that passed, even if they were worthwhile goals -- affect only 1% of the funding in the bill, and have nothing to do with any changes in Bush's policy. They're pure rear-end covering for Republicans who want to look as if they're "holding the President accountable for success in Iraq".
If you plan on being dependent on fossil fuels - particularly oil - for the next half century or century, then there's actually a fair amount of need to have control over where those fuels are.
Gosh, is this what the Serious People are saying now? Why have the Serious People been mocking anyone who considered this a core objective of the Bush invasion and occupation up until now?
And, if you believe that a need to control oil supplies justifies a permanent U.S. military presence in Iraq, why the hell have you not made that argument before now?
Maybe Ben has, and maybe he's backing and providing cover for a presidential candidate who supported this war all along.
May 31, 2007 1:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Seems to me Nell is taking the K. Olbermann view, ranted the night after the p.o.s bill was signed- as in "Why couldn't the Dem Leadership say 'yes, we know it's politically risky to send up a bill we know will be vetoed, just before a Memorial Day Recess, knowing the Repubs will hammer us for leaving the 'troops unfunded', but they'll have what they need; we just have to make a stand here!!!" Telling us the leadership was covering their butts in advance b/c they didn't have the votes to overturn a veto, and we should have seen it coming, is in fact correct...they were, and some of us did. But it does sound like TPM is covering for them here. What say you? YD
May 31, 2007 4:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
On Mr. Bush's Latest Switch in Rationalizations for His Iraq Strategy
Mr. Bush now says that he believes that US troops should remain in Iraq for the long haul and charaterizes that intention with a deeply flawed analogy to this country's long-term presence in South Korea.
I believe that this site has accurately identified the underlying motive for this occupation as a an attempt to maintain the US military in positions from which they can quickly control the region's oil fields. Those forces presence in the region would create, either, a permanent counter to anything that might be perceived as an anti-American move against those petroleum deposits, or a constant threat against the governments that actually control the oil fields. This threatening force would, presumably, provide the US government with significant leverage against that region's governments.
This strategy can easily be seen as a derivative of the one set out in the PNAC. It is, for all intents and purposes, the military response to the oil embargoes of the 1970s.
As an election note, I would like to observe that this is what Sen. Gravel identified as the motive behind the Iraq war and its continuation either at, or in an interview shortly after, the first Democratic candidates' debate.
May 31, 2007 5:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
May I add that its not just about controlling the oil-producing countries, but also controlling those countries that buy that oil. with a strong military presence in Iraq, we can pretty much control the distribution of mid-east oil. ANY potential type of action that is viewed as unfavorable to the US can be responded to with the threat of an oil embargo by the US.
That's why Venezuela and Russia are viewed as such threats - they are suppliers of oil that we can't control. Its not the money. Its the power. Always has been. Control the oil, you control the world.
May 31, 2007 6:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, one more thing. When Bush says that 'history will vindicate' him? Can you envision this scenario: The oil is running low, prices are sky-high, some countries have severe oil shortages. But not the US. Since we control the oil in the mid-east, the US has plenty. Our prices are very much higher than they are now, but we have plenty of oil. Can you hear people saying "Thank God Bush invaded Iraq back in 2003. If he hadn't, we wouldn't have enough oil now."?
Do you think people in the future are going to care how many Americans/Iraqis died so they can have that oil? Or will they be more concerned with the latest Hummer, the latest American Idol, the latest I-Pod?
May 31, 2007 6:56 PM | Reply | Permalink