{"id":7726,"date":"2006-06-19T14:29:15","date_gmt":"2006-06-19T18:29:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=7726"},"modified":"2006-06-19T14:29:15","modified_gmt":"2006-06-19T18:29:15","slug":"joe-klein-on-embracing-defeat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/joe-klein-on-embracing-defeat\/","title":{"rendered":"Joe Klein on ’embracing defeat’"},"content":{"rendered":"

I know challenging Time’s Joe Klein has become something of a parlor game lately, and I don’t mean to pile on, but this week’s column<\/a> is just, well, confusing.<\/p>\n

What can the Democrats do? They can play politics or be responsible. The political option is to embrace “cut and run”<\/b>; call for an immediate withdrawal, as Kerry did; and hope the public is so sick of Bush and sick of the war that it will punish the G.O.P. in the fall.<\/p>\n

But embracing defeat<\/b> is a risky political strategy, especially for a party not known for its warrior ethic. In fact, the responsible path is the Democrats’ only politically plausible choice: they will have to give yet another new Iraqi government one last shot to succeed.(emphasis added)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

OK, so to hear Klein tell it, leaving thousands of U.S. troops in the middle of a civil war is not only wise, it’s the only<\/i> “responsible” choice. Klein, in other words, is just parroting GOP talking points. As Judd at ThinkProgress put it<\/a>, “This is the same false choice presented by Bush and Rove. Those who want a new direction in Iraq and a timeline for withdrawal are not ’embracing defeat.’ The way to embrace defeat, as the last three years have demonstrated, is to stick with this administration’s approach.”<\/p>\n

Putting that aside, Klein argues that Iraq’s “last shot” should include six more months in order to see if it “succeeds.” Of course, he doesn’t define success, nor does he explain what happens after the six months are up. Greg Sargent suggests<\/a> Klein meet a certain, self-imposed challenge.
\n<\/p>\n

Mr. Klein, If it does become clear to you by your own lights<\/i> that the new government hasn’t succeeded, and that Operation Foward Together hasn’t stabilized Baghdad, will you then<\/i> stop declaring that Dems who say the war may be lost are “embracing defeat”? Somehow I have my doubts, don’t you?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s a reasonable question. In fact, as Atrios has noted on multiple occasions, there’s always a call for another six months. Thomas Friedman has perfected the never-ending cycle — when six months elapses, it’s time to give Iraq another<\/i> six months. If you agreed to wait six months before, you have to again, indefinitely — or you want to “cut and run,” whatever the hell that means.<\/p>\n

Like Greg, I suspect in December very little will have changed. Iraq will still be a nightmare, and critics of the president’s policy will, as far as Klein is concerned, still be “embracing defeat.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I know challenging Time’s Joe Klein has become something of a parlor game lately, and I don’t mean to pile on, but this week’s column is just, well, confusing. What can the Democrats do? They can play politics or be responsible. The political option is to embrace “cut and run”; call for an immediate withdrawal, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7726\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}