It depends on what you mean by ‘courage’

May 21, 2007

I’ve been a little tough on the WaPo’s David Broder lately. OK, more than a little. In column after column, the “dean” of the DC media establishment has been wildly off his game for months — with odd observations, silly predictions, and tired rehashes of far-right talking points.

Yesterday, Broder wrote a relatively inoffensive piece about Tony Blair and George Bush, appearing together in the White House Rose Garden, left with little more than their “shared convictions.” Broder concluded:

History will record that both of them saw the threat to the West posed by terrorism and responded courageously. The wisdom of their policy and the conduct of their governments are not likely to be judged as highly.

Now, in this case, Broder’s point is obviously a critical one — Bush and Blair, he concludes, made the wrong call. In the future, people will look back with scorn at their decision making.

I’m hesitant to blast Broder for an observation that’s largely correct, but I have to take issue with the notion that somehow Bush and Blair were “courageous.” That’s utter nonsense. There was nothing “courageous” about launching an invasion of a country under false pretenses. There was nothing “courageous” about doing so with absurd and overly-optimistic assumptions, without a strategy for success. There was nothing “courageous” about abject dishonesty about what the war was about, what it would cost, and what it would produce. There was nothing “courageous” about deemphasizing the fight against Afghanistan, only to make the terrorist threat worse by invading Iraq.

As Broder sees it, Bush and Blair were “courageous” because they rushed head-first into a disastrous conflict that never needed to be fought. But starting a fight, especially a reckless and irresponsible one, does not require courage. Just the opposite is true — it takes courage to be patient and prudent, taking the time to do what’s right.

As Churchill once said, “Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.”

Post Script: At the risk of being overly picky, there was one other point in Broder’s column that stood out. He wrote:

While the American president cannot be forced out of office against his will, he can be humiliated daily — not only by his political adversaries but also by the incompetence of his own appointees.

The relative merits of impeachment are certainly open to debate, but let’s not forget that an American president can be forced out of office against his will. Article II, Sec. 4 of the Constitution explains that a president “shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

Whether a president wills it or not is irrelevant.

May 21, 2007 at 9:55 am

I think sticking with an unpopular cause does require political courage. Maybe it’s just the Bush bubble and the right-wing echo chamber such he doesn’t have to listen to or deal with the reality of his policies, but they do pay attention to polls, so it requires at least a little willingness to stand by your convictions (perhaps conviction is the right word for both of its meanings)

Tin ear, pig headed, corrupt, not bright, chicken hawk – i agree with all of that. Timid, vacillating, risk averse? I don’t really see it.

It was your post-script part of his piece that made me say: “What a “f*cking deceitful maroon.” Like he forgot all about the Clinton impeachment which he supported. And he wonders why, when he makes such unsupported, baseless, careless and wrong assertions such as these, folks have decided to give him absolutely no respect.

It is never courageous to lie, to act with impunity, to threaten, to torture, to do the hundreds of other things this administration has done.

Courage is going to Iraq for the first, second or third time or to fight any war.
Our “courageous” president and administration did not fight in any war. He is a failure and this administrationmay have actually fulfilled the religious rights dream and brought us closer to Armageddon(sp?)!

Virtually everyone thought that Iraq had WMD.

It seems to me to be a FACT that the military was preparing for the possibility of various WMDs being used against them.

Obviously, invading turned out to be a terrible idea but, if Shinseki had been in charge and we had rallied world opinion to our side then maybe invading might have been the right thing to do.

Notice the two weasal words: ‘maybe’ and ‘might’.

It seems to me that CB is falling into the trap of saying that anyone who disagrees with his OPINION is wrong. Decent people can look at the same situation and have different opinions.

we are all entitled to our own opinions but we are not entitled to our own facts.

Dave, if I’m too stupid to know I should be scared in a given situation, my failure to act doesn’t make me courageous. It just a manifestation of my ignorance.

Courage is telling the truth. Courage is admitting mistakes. Courage is fessing up to the lies foisted on the American people. Courage is running an open government instead of constantly hiding behind a veil of secrecy to cover up all the crap Bush and his cronies are pulling. Courage is going to at least one funeral of the warriors you put into their grave. Courage is not going to a secret undisclosed location when the going gets tough.

Throwing the red meat of dead bodies to a populace primed for revenge took no courge at all. A courageous response to 9/11 would have been reigning in the bloodlust after that tragedy and pursuing a police action against those truly responsible instead of grabbing a bullhorn and talking crap about “dear or alive” and “bring it on.” Likewise, it takes no courage for Broder to continue to defend the staus quo so he and his buddies can keep power in the hands of the usual suspects. Chickensh*t.

“Virtually everyone thought that Iraq had WMD.” (neil wilson @4)

too bad you insisted on presenting this as a fact, because there were very many of us who firmly believed there were no such things in iraq. kinda casts a shadow over the rest of your comment.

imo, real courage would be congress impeaching this administration.

“Virtually everyone thought that Iraq had WMD.”

Um, no. One of the administrations lies, and a solid nutty right talking point. As you state, you can have your opinion on the matter, but not your own facts.

neil, it is not a “fact” that “nearly everyone” thought Iraq had WMD. There was ample evidence within our own intelligence community to raise significant doubt. The inspectors on the ground did not think Iraq had WMD. The people who did tended to be people who had never been there first-hand, who were in the war-making machinery of various countries and had a bias toward finding provocation, or were in portions of the intelligence community that were politically appointed. It may be true that a majority of Western governments’ official position was a belief Iraq had WMD, but there was generally no excuse for that belief, when the contrary opinion was also well established within the Western intelligence community and among the UN inspectors. The UN inspectors were in the best position to know. Everyone else was being selective and believing what they wanted to believe. That hardly makes it reasonable.

This reminds me again of the argument that Ashcroft was ‘heroic’ in his actions. I tend to think of heroism and courage and qualities that are associated with risk and/or sacrifice: Ashcroft wasn’t particularly ‘heroic’ because he didn’t do anything that endangered his livelihood.

I feel the same way about the Bush team: they didn’t view this action as any sort of sacrifice or risk. They attacked a country that they were certain they could wipe off the map (even though it turned out not to be as simple as they though), leaving much more dangerous countries to grow stronger and develop nuclear weapons. At every step since then, they’ve refused to accept any responsibility for their mistakes, or acknowledge any, and their actions continue to cause others to suffer, both Americans and Iraqis. I have yet to see Bush or anyone in his administration do anything I would call ‘courageous’.

There’s a word for picking on the weakest entity in a group, hoping to scare the others into line, but it isn’t ‘courage’: it’s ‘bullying’.

I’d be interested to know what specifically Broder thinks has been courageous about the way Bush has acted. Doing “what you think is right” doesn’t really qualify, does it? I think a willingness to deal with reality, harsh as it may be, is generally more courageous than living in a comforting, self-insulating fantasy world. That sounds more like cowardice to me, actually.

Ordering the military to undertake the added expense of preparing for contact with an opponent who possesses WMDs—when the FACTUAL intelligence already had pointed out that this threat was minimal, at best—would suggest that the Bu$h administration was creating its “own set of facts” to further justify the Iraqi Expedition. A further FACT to consider is that most American forces injected into Iraq during the opening weeks of the campaign were not equipped with adequate biohazard suits; many had no such equipment issued, and some of the stuff actually issued was low-grade stuff issued to hospital emergency rooms for reduced-exposure situations to chemicals that are nowhere near as dangerous as the “stuff” purported by the administration to be in Iraq at the time. Yet another FACT is that forward units—infantry and armor both—were in Baghdad before “the hazard-suit guys” were even in Iraq.

In short—the WMD issue was just another part of the ruse.

Other than that, the “spleen” of the DC media should revisit the meaning of the word “courage.” Obviously, he’s spending too much time near the WaPo presses; the fumes from all that ink, and the cleaning solutions, must finally be taking their toll on his ability to think clearly….

Courage – diving into shark-infested waters to rescue another person.

Stupidity – diving into shark-infested waters for fun, hoping to come out alive.

Criminality – leading a nation to shark-infested waters, telling people it’s their patriotic duty to swim.

Insanity – cheering on criminality.

Bush and his gang wanted to invade Iraq before he took office. It’s certainly not courageous to use the memory of 9/11 to pursue his pre-existing objective.

If the Iraq mess has shown anything, it’s that the Bushistas had an unrealistic belief about how easy it would be, and an overweening (irrational) confidence in their own capability.

Courage isn’t doing something you expect will be easy; courage is doing something you expect will be hard.

The Bushistas refused to believe that attacking Iraq would even really work up a sweat – there’s no way they can be called courageous for attempting it.

Frightened bluster and overreaching prideful arrogance are more accurate descriptions of Bush than courage. Real courage would mean facing truth and admitting error.
Strutting around in a flight suit is only pretending to be brave.

And courage would not be the term I would have used either.

Bush–frightened little arrogant mamma’s boy attacking a defenseless nation because he was too much of a p***y to take on those really responsible for 9/11.

Cheney–greedy opportunist. Satan.

Neil wrote: “Virtually everyone thought that Iraq had WMD.”

I remember watching Colin Powell at the U.N. with interest, because I wanted to see the ‘ironclad proof’ the administration had that Saddam had WMDs. Afterwards, I was stunned; “Is that it?” was all I could think. I became very suspicious after that, but still felt that Saddam MUST have the weapons. Why? Because the President insisted it was true, and I (foolishly) thought at that time that the President of the United States would never lie about such a serious matter.

Every time I hear someone say that ‘everyone’ thought Iraq had WMDs, I suspect it’s a bit of circular reasoning: lots of us had our doubts, but mistakenly put our trust in a dishonest man.

Bush was hardly “courageous” to invade Iraq on false pretenses. Thuggish and tyrannical are more like it for his illegal act.

I don’t know if Brown sees this as courage so much as a much needed blow for the tattered concept of common sense.

via TP: Incoming Prime Minister Gordon Brown reportedly plans to cut British troop numbers in Iraq from 7,000 to 2,000 over the next 12 months, and have all troops removed by spring 2008.

http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=782222007

Shruby got tarted up in his flight suit and then manufactured “facts” to fit the plan. If Shruby showed any courage, it was a corrupted courage demonstrated in his willingness to stand in front of the world and remorselessly lie his ass off without any consideration whatsoever for the lives to be lost, the resources wasted and the damage to be done to the reputation and structure of the U.S. while he and his neo-con puppet masters hid behind a curtain of B.S.

ShrubCo’s courage was the courage that comes from being drunk with power. Belligerent. Swinging wild. Talking trash. What all of the assholes who started this mess know about real courage would fit on the pointed end of a pin.

How about a quick little in and out to the Green Zone to serve a little turkey? Anybody want to go? Courage. Like hell. Like f’n hell.

What would take more courage: for Bush and his faithful 29% to admit to the nation and the world that the signature decision of his presidency (invading Iraq) was a stupid, tragic mistake, or for Bush to continue to be Bush?

There are many adjectives that would describe Bush accurately. Many of them have been used above. “Courageous” is not one of them.

OK, I think calling bullshit on Broder has become downright unsportsmanlike. It’s easier than shooting fishsticks in a barrel.

Was it “brave” to blame 9/11 on a regime that al-Qaeda hated? Was it brave to help the Saudis flee America after 9/11, and completely ignore the way the Saudi and Pakistani regimes supported al Qaeda? Was it brave to bamboozle the American people into believing that Saddam was a threat and then to use that bamboozlement to shortcircuit the oversight that should have been in place in the runup to the war? And how brave was it to use 9/11 and the Iraq war as political weapons in 2002 and 2004?

The only way to call the Iraq war “brave” would be to assume that BushCo actually thought about the long-term damage to the Republican party which would almost inevitably result from using lies to get America into a quagmire. But I think we can all agree that political opportunism is their strong suit, not long-term thought.

And what kind of policy is Broder advocating, anyway? Broder wants us to keep supporting a stupendously “unwise policy” that (he claims) was made by courageous / stupid people. Does he really think this is a good idea in general, or just when Republicans make the stupid decisions? What happens if a Democrat makes a “bold” but stupid decision? Do we all line up to support it because the dumbass was so “brave”?

And I love it when serial bullshit spreaders like David ~~“the Dean”~~ “the Dunce” Broder make such categorical assertions about what they think “can’t be done”.

When a serial liar tells you something can’t be done, it probably means that it can and should be done.

But that would take courage. Ms. Nancy Pelosi, I’m looking at YOU.

Put impeachment back on the table. NOW.

Reading Broder’s article, I see that he took Bush’s own words to describe the Bush & Blair. From earlier in the article:

“…a grateful Bush spoke from the heart when he said, “What I know is the world needs courage. And what I know is this good man is a courageous man.””

And from this article:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/19/AR2007051900843.html

we read that: “Two intelligence assessments from January 2003 predicted that the overthrow of Saddam Hussein and subsequent U.S. occupation of Iraq could lead to internal violence and provide a boost to Islamic extremists and terrorists in the region, according to congressional sources and former intelligence officials familiar with the prewar studies.
The two assessments, titled “Principal Challenges in Post-Saddam Iraq” and “Regional Consequences of Regime Change in Iraq,” were produced by the National Intelligence Council (NIC) and will be a major part of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence’s long-awaited Phase II report on prewar intelligence assessments about Iraq. The assessments were delivered to the White House and to congressional intelligence committees before the war started.”

Hmmmmm, but I thought “no one could have imagined” that things would get so rough in Iraq?

gg (#17) echoes my sentiments. It will be very hard to believe any president who wants to take the country into war again. LBJ lied about the Gulf on Tonkin; Bush lied about WMDs. The clue that the president and his administration lied is the resistance of other countries to join us. We owe a huge apology to France for impuning its courage for not participating in this blunder.

The Darwin Awards are jam packed with bold and reckless acts like checking a gas tank with a match, or riding up in a weather balloon with an attached lawn chair.

Is it courageous to be a fool?

It seems to me that CB is falling into the trap of saying that anyone who disagrees with his OPINION is wrong. Decent people can look at the same situation and have different opinions. we are all entitled to our own opinions but we are not entitled to our own facts.

I don’t want to belabor the point, but I think it’s worth noting just how wrong Neil is here. This has nothing to do with anyone’s “opinion,” least of all mine, and everything to do with known, established facts.

To this day, the White House line, which Neil echoes, is that there was a systemic intelligence breakdown that led to unreliable information. It’s not Bush’s fault, the argument goes, that he relied on intelligence that turned out to be flawed.

But for the umpteenth time, veteran CIA officer Tyler Drumheller made clear, quite a while ago, that this argument is a fraud. Bush and other top administration officials were warned, repeatedly, to reject nonsensical information from highly unreliable sources, but the White House simply didn’t care. Accurate warnings were ignored, obvious lies were embraced. It’s the difference between a mistake and a lie — the Bush gang’s falsehoods were deliberate.

As Kevin Drum summarized, “They knew Saddam didn’t have a nuclear program. They knew he didn’t have mobile bio labs. They knew he didn’t have drones. They knew.”

I love you guys.

go back and find how many blogs, newspaper articles, columns, etc. came out and said that Iraq didn’t have WMDs.

Also remember that the main reason, in my opinion, that the inspectors were let into Iraq is that we threatened to invade if Iraq didn’t comply.

If you took a poll now, I bet a huge majority would tell you they voted for Gore in 2000. I bet a huge majority was against the Iraq war. I bet a huge majority believed there were no WMD.

However, only a small majority in the US as a whole, and Florida in particular, voted for Gore; and far less than a majority of the people were against the war and believed there were no WMD.

This is absolute Crapola!

History will record that both of them saw the threat to the West posed by terrorism and responded courageously.

What history will record is that for the entire summer prior to 9/11 The United States and George W Bush were repeatedly warned of an impending terrorist attack. It took George Bush getting hit in the face with a frying pan (WTC attacks) to realize that CIA briefers weren’t just “covering their asses” and the Aug 6 PDB wasn’t a “what if” document.

And once the threat was known and real, Bush was unrelenting in conflating Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.

What history will really record is that in the dark hours Bush created a leadership vaccuum by channelling the strenght of the nation into a fearful response; convincing too many that they aren’t strong enough to face this challenge and that they need an abusive parent to ‘look after them’

Neil-
Those who knew were active in a pervasive criminal misinformation campaign misusing the power of the administration to mislead the “blogs, newspaper articles, columns etc.” about WMD for political gain. Polls of the brainwashed on their belief in WMD’s do not reflect the actual intelligence available to the President. He knew and he lied.

Niel: You need to get your facts straight before you can fool the people who contribute to this sight. In point of fact there were many informed voices who said that the WMD threat wasn’t true, especially the inspectors on the ground. Two days before the invasion I downloaded twenty-one pages of pictures of demonstrations world-wide. Millions of us knew it was BS, including many of my students. One young woman said two days before the invasion that if we invade Iraq we will destabilize the region and get our military into an intractable quagmire. If a seventeen year old girl knew that in 2003, what was the matter with the President?

The truth of the matter is that the war was planned from the beginning of the Bush presidency, and they used 9-11 as the excuse they needed to invade. Check out the Project for a New American Century if you doubt what I am saying, or read Paul O’Neil’s account of what was going on.

I love you guys.

I really don’t want to pick on Neil here, but he raises a common argument that deserves scrutiny. If Neil is making the mistake, chances are, a lot of people are making the same mistake.

Let’s briefly summarize:

* I specifically accuse Bush of misleading the nation before going to war.

* Neil accuses me of having my facts wrong, noting the generality: “Virtually everyone thought that Iraq had WMD.”

* I respond with specific evidence to support my assertion about the administration.

* Neil responds with another general comment, arguing that unnamed “blogs, newspaper articles, columns, etc.” all believed Iraq had WMD.

Neil, you’re missing the point of our little discussion here. I’m pointing to specifics about Bush, you’re pointing to generalities about everyone.

Let’s try this a different way: you accuse me of getting the facts wrong as they relate to Bush. Fine. Here’s a question: can you rebut the assertion that administration officials knew their claims were wrong?

I love you, Carpetbagger.

Thanks for taking care of the rash generalizations and unfounded claims.

I am not the one who built the strawman.

CB wrote in the original post
There was nothing “courageous” about launching an invasion of a country under false pretenses. There was nothing “courageous” about doing so with absurd and overly-optimistic assumptions, without a strategy for success. There was nothing “courageous” about abject dishonesty about what the war was about, what it would cost, and what it would produce. There was nothing “courageous” about deemphasizing the fight against Afghanistan, only to make the terrorist threat worse by invading Iraq.

I am not denying that Bush made the suspect information about WMD into a far bigger thing than it was.
I agree that Bush went to war with absurd assumptions. I also think he had a religious reason for invading. I think he wanted to show those non-believers that Iraq could become a great democracy with help from the great Christian nation and make peace with Isreal. I think he wanted to break up OPEC. I think Bush had all sorts of absurd reasons for wanting this war.

I am not disagreeing with that.

I am saying that very few people thought that Iraq had ZERO WMDs.

I said It seems to me that CB is falling into the trap of saying that anyone who disagrees with his OPINION is wrong. Decent people can look at the same situation and have different opinions.

CB responded To this day, the White House line, which Neil echoes, is that there was a systemic intelligence breakdown that led to unreliable information. It’s not Bush’s fault, the argument goes, that he relied on intelligence that turned out to be flawed.

I am in no way echoing Bush’s line. In fact, I think that your statement shows that you are not as objective as you should be. I never said I thought it was a good idea or a bad idea to go to war. I have said that Iraq let in the inspectors because Bush threatened to invade.

In post 30, CB says that I accuse him of having your facts wrong. I don’t see where you can back up that statement.

Did writing Virtually everyone thought that Iraq had WMD. say you had your facts wrong?

Did writing It seems to me to be a FACT that the military was preparing for the possibility of various WMDs being used against them. say you had your facts wrong?

Did writing It seems to me that CB is falling into the trap of saying that anyone who disagrees with his OPINION is wrong. Decent people can look at the same situation and have different opinions. say you had your facts wrong?

Obviously, very few people reading your blog, and even fewer people who take the time to post comments think that Bush is right about Iraq. I have little doubt that Bush decided on a course of action and then tried to massage the facts to support his opinion. It seems that Bush often decides on what is right and then finds whatever support he can for that decision even when almost all the facts show that his decision was wrong.

CB, I think you have missed my point. I didn’t accuse you of getting facts wrong. I accused you of falling into the trap of saying that anyone who disagrees with his OPINION is wrong.

I think my original assumption has been supported by the posts on this thread.

neil wrote: “Did writing Virtually everyone thought that Iraq had WMD. say you had your facts wrong?

Well, yes, actually, or at least that’s the read most of us have probably taken away from your initial post. Your first statement, ‘Virtually everyone thought that Iraq had WMD,’ is either a complete non-sequitur or an indirect defense of Bush by disputing CB’s assertion that the war was fought on false pretenses.

Your statement also doesn’t make it clear what ‘opinion’ you are referring to. The only obvious choice is again that CB’s statement about ‘false pretenses’ is opinion, not fact. WMDs were a false pretense for war; there were none in Iraq! You can quibble about how deluded Bush was when he made the WMD argument, but it is a fact that it was a bogus reason to go to war.

Anyway, I think any reasonable person would have read your statements as above. If that’s completely wrong, feel free to enlighten us, and in the future, be more specific about what ‘opinions’ you are disputing.

Don’t feed the trolls.

Make a statement or state an opinion that can be emprically disproven. Hedge your bets and say you were misquoted or misunderstood.

Rinse and repeat.

Don’t feed the trolls.

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