I know of at least two others. Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul have never wavered in their opposition.

I did inhale.

What about Russ Feingold? i don't know his record, but i really like him now. one of the VERY few.
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If this were 1700, they'd be saying: "Since civilization began, slavery has existed. It's human nature." I would have believed it. If 1800: "Women will never vote. They are not born rational". I would have believed it.
2006: Make war irrelevant

I think there are some people, I don't know if they are still lurking around, that owe you and others an apology. I, formerly Lurkingfear, can't believe the kind of abuse people like you took at the beginning of the war. Now, disastor in hand, they are writing the same things we did.

pretty rapidly. Remember Warthog?

I also remember one person who was advocating that we start secretly support the Shias by forming death squads to take care of the Sunni insurgents. Pretty quiet on that one.

fairly quiet these days on The Agonist, I made my points herein I think but I'm not pleased I was forced to take such a position. I'm not one to gloat but happened yesterday for the first time in many months, years in fact, to look at the blog of the formerly arrogant Analyst and noted that he's more or less shut up shop. I remember the time, shortly after the invasion when he was gloating that it had been x-number of days since a US serviceman had died. That was when the total was about 170.

There seems to be quite a roll call of those no longer posting quite so forthrightly...then again a quick spin over to Little Green Footballs indict the armchair nutters are still out there, but just talking to themselves now.

that as ten years ago or so I could very well have been a supporter of the war. I voted for Bush in 2000. But all that has changed dramatically. Now I am in the Bernadene camp. The process of change was deeply painful--something like Neo's experience of being taken off the Matrix--I just about came apart. It started when my wife died after a short illness. I began to realize in a number of ways that I could no longer maintain the edifice of fictions that had been my life. Just couldn't do it.

Hopefully we learn from this catastrophe. But I fear that as the consequences play out, the future could quite well take some very negative directions. As we approach the end of the age of plentiful, cheap oil, the US and the world would be much better off with strong, competent, and moral leadership. But we will, I fear, continue to wander in our group delusions until the "apocalypse" comes knocking.

...become der commisar at Politbureau Diktat (I think that's right, but I devote very little focus to the issue of who became/begat whom)? If so, I think he looks to still be about.

As to the undertone I see in this thread, I just can't agree. It's not some sort of implicit victory when the other guy shuts up and goes away (annoying though one may find them) - the point of debate is to make one's understanding of the situation and one's ideas better. The fact that the blogosphere seems increasingly to be finding niches where the choir and preacher are indistinguishable is something to be lamented.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

I probably set that "tone," even though I don't feel much of sense of victory. Mostly I feel ill, and can only imagine that the pro-war voices must feel worse to have their dreams turn into this disaster. We (the US) have only begun to receive the consequences for our misguided actions.

BTW, I don't know if you were here when Warthog was foaming. It was like trying to talk to Dick Cheney's dark side. I am glad "he" has moved onto greener pastures.

...way of putting it - believe me, I was here!

Unfortunately, I don't think that a lot of the adamently pro-war crowd are actually going to feel "bad" about this. I don't think it'll be long at all until we have the Harry Summers analogues on this conflict - which worries me greatly, especially given that this type of conflict will be predominant. We (the west broadly defined) have really screwed the pooch on this one and more and more I'm seeing this as possibly being only the opening acts in something that will rend the fabric of the middle east and reverberate from end to end in the broader muslim world (man that's a ponderous sentence in need of ominous theme music, but you know what I mean). It was going to be hard to deal with things anyway, but this makes it just insane. Externally mucking with the delicate implicit accomodation between Sunni and Shia, reached over the centuries, was a Real Bad Idea [tm].

If we're going to (somehow) manage the damage control on this one it's going to take a lot of dialogue from a lot of viewpoints, not least those in the Arab world. What to do and how is way above my pay grade, but I do know that I'd rather the folks were spending their time increasing their understanding the nature of the societies that we've f*cked over and how to work with them more effectively, rather than who's fault it is here at home and how they might most justly be punished (I'm thinking particularly here of the thread on dKos that Escher references below).

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

Justice is necessary to being fixing things Dave. You think Muslims don't want to see Bush tried or impeached? You think that if he isn't they'll just laugh it off.

One of their biggest complaints is that we get all worked up about deaths of Westerners but don't care about their deaths.

Justice is necessary, and it is necessary to help deal with the problems caused.

And any society which doesn't hold people responsible for screwing up (let alone hold them responsible for gross illegalities) does not have the ability to learn from its own mistakes.

Fixing things requires taking responsibility. If you don't take responsibility, you don't learn.

...that justice is important, but I'm very uncertain that hanging Bush is the central focus for most in the Middle East. Near as I can tell (and this comes through the filter of Western scholarly studies, which is a real limitation) the desire for different policies towards the region and some indication that we as populations and electorates actually have some understanding of them, their region and its history are held to be much more important.

Would they like to see administration personalities punished? Sure, but my read is that they'd trade it for something more enduring in a flash.

I'm also sympathetic to the notion that we as societies have to hold leaders who screw the pooch accountable, but I'd have a lot more faith that that's what's actually happening (i.e., accountability) if I didn't have the distinct impression that many don't even begin to understand what they're holding the guy accountable for, other than being wrong in glorious technicolour. I look at it and I don't see folks taking responsibility - I see them to some extent trying to transfer responsibility and that doesn't seem to me to be something likely to lead to changed behaviour (i.e., to "learning") on the part of society. I'll trade learning in the sense of attempting to increase knowledge about the folks we screwed over focussing on domestic politics any day of the week.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

for most in the ME. But when did America ever think of framing its action in terms of their interests?

Impeachment is not about abstract justice. It's got enormous FP implications.

When one counts the number of national elections worldwide in the last four years where American-friendly politicians have been replaced with non-aligned or even antagonistic ones, one quickly sees that if that flow is not stanched, America's troubles will deepen.

Even a team of idiots like the Bush Administration understood that, although predictably they attempted to address it by coercion, by funding internal dissent (with exquisite irony - "funding democracy" almost exclusively in nations already practicing it), and by flexing and deploying military and economic might. And they've left a hell of a sour taste. Flipping their own government is the only way the non-American street has of voting for or against Bush himself and the massively intrusive policy direction he presides over - which presumably will continue without some sort of large, easy-to-read "period" at the end of the sentence.

It's the people who vote for those politicians who need convincing, not the politicians themselves. And for that you need broad, easy-to-read symbolic language. Without the gesture of Bush's impeachment or censure - or something that equally effectively communicates renunciation and change of direction to the world street (and frankly I'm at a loss to imagine anything remotely plausible that would even be close) government after government will simply continue to flip.

So giving Bush's head on a platter will give vital cover to American-aligned politicians worldwide by giving a clear, easy-to-understand symbol of change of a vastly unpopular direction to the street by whose consent they largely rule.

Also, in purely domestic terms, I think the impeachment of Bush is likely shaping up as a desirable from the perspective of a not-insignificant faction within the GOP, in order to blow the explosive bolts between Mr. 30% and the party, and regain credibility in 2007 as an "ethical party" preparatory to the 2008 cycle. Bush is an albatross, not merely in the sense of a heavy dead weight, but also a symbol of bad luck and bad judgement and failure - and this faction knows even uglier revelations are coming down the pipes, and they know what they don't want to be shackled to.

I'm waiting for the tipping point, and that point will not be defined by balance between Dem and GOP but internally within the GOP, between those still throwing good money after bad defending Bush, and those who want to cut their losses and symbolically burn him as a firebreak. That will be defined by a numerical calculation of votes for success of impeachment rather than polical suicide, and I would wager many discussions of the sort have already taken place.

That's why I think Kos and others are disingenuous when they say "we don't have the votes". It takes about three seconds to see the flaw in that statement - what they're saying is they don't have the seats, which only translates to votes if we assume party-line vote. They can't know how many votes they'd have.

...folks in other countries view their vote specifically as a vehicle for protest against Shrub personally (i.e., that it'll stop when he's no longer in power) isn't just a little bit too US-centric? Though I do think he makes an absolutely wonderful target for any nationalist with half a brain, and has got to be good for a couple of points in lots of the world, my take would be that this is far, far bigger than just Shrub. This is primarily about the transition to a multi-polar world and the "discovery" that there are real, enduring limits to American power - it just happens to be wearing Shrub and Iraq as its public face. That probably makes it worse, but the notion that any of this can be firewalled by offering up a Presidential impeachment strikes me as unlikely.

If America would like make the ride for itself a little less bumpy it better get used to "framing its action[s]" in terms of the other guy's interests, and quickly. Nothing says that you push someone else's interests over your own, but recognizing what their interests are is an efficient step.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

We (the west broadly defined) have really screwed the pooch on this one and more and more I'm seeing this as possibly being only the opening acts in something that will rend the fabric of the middle east and reverberate from end to end in the broader muslim world (man that's a ponderous sentence in need of ominous theme music, but you know what I mean).

Only the Muslim world? This war is triggering a global realignment of power relations. If my friends over at www.theoildrum.com are correct, the year over year decline in oil production known as "peak oil" may be all set for next year. Two experts (westexas and Robert Rapier) are debating whether this unhappy event will begin next year or not until 2010. Whether or not they are both wrong, I do believe we are seeing a re-positioning of nations in the light of an obviously weakened US with regards to basic materials. China for example is securing long term contracts for oil. We are losing friends and emboldening enemies while we dither in Iraq.

...in that realignment, I don't think that it was determinative (as in, I think a major realignment of power was going to happen anyway, even if the specific "lexicon" of that realignment is going to end up being heavily affected by this war).

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

The fact that the blogosphere seems increasingly to be finding niches where the choir and preacher are indistinguishable is something to be lamented.

I know you hold that assumption as an article of faith, but I think you need to question it. Look at the evidence of your own eyes; in the thread I referenced here, Markos is literally getting the shit kicked out of him two to one - and this is on DKos, an avowedly rabid partisan site!

What you're describing more correctly is what the media has morphed into today (where you can leave FOX on all day and essentially receive only propaganda).

...on the preacher because he preached something they didn't want to hear. Doesn't change the nature that it's largely a choir.

I'll admit it's an over broad characterization, but it's not without it's truth either. Seems to me that the number of locales where folks can disagree about policy (or even discuss it) without it devolving into partisan group think seems to be growing smaller.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

The blogosphere (and the social internet in general) is, and always has been, a place where individual sites tend towards self-reinforcement and where people go to get confirmation, not to learn. There are some partial exceptions, but not too many. What makes the internet useful is that there are many, many different sites and you can go find all the different viewpoints if you choose and that you can get a full immersion in a particular world view if you choose - which is not worthless as long as you remember it's one world view.

I have never, however, believed that the truth is something that is found by splitting the difference between positions. Call that a holdover from being a conservative. The truth is the truth, and places like Little Green Footballs, or Red State, are simply wrong about far more than they are right about, even given their stated values. (Well no, if you actually believed in small government and liberty, you wouldn't actually support the policies that you support. So you're hypocrities.)

That doesn't mean that it isn't worth listening to what they think - there's a sociological maxim that runs as follows, "incorrect beliefs have real consequences". Believe the Iraqis are going to shower you with flowers, and you go to war because you think it'll be a cakewalk, among very many other examples.

Moving on....

Kos is not the biggest blog because his audience agrees with him, he is the biggest blog because he understood the nature of blogging sooner than anyone else and set up a diary site that worked. There was a powerful first mover advantage. This is what a lot of people outside the blogosphere don't understand about Kos, he's not representative of the people who go to his blog.

that people underwent a transformation, which is my observation about most of the Agonistas. My point is: they just don't realize how much they've changed because people who said the same thing a couple years ago endured all kinds of verbal abuse from the likes of MadDog who seems scarce these days. Meanwhile, the moderates would sit back and watch or say, well we just disagree.

BTW, there is no victory. Before the war began I walked with 350,000 of my fellow human beings down the streets of San Francisco in peaceful protest of what was about to happen. So many knew the war would be a mistake but all of them lost; the only victory being prevention of the war. The war started and now we are all screwed; and not just Americans.

and I may have overstated the closing up of his shop as such..he's still there but what was a formerly rampant daily lecture is now a three times a month post on as often light humour based stories as anything else. As this blog is evidence over the years, the choir and the preacher can rarely co-exist in the world we now live in if they don't agree, or at least have common ground, and as often as not end up at each other's throats.

Wasn't that one of the reasonings behind the move from the old BB...to move on from that.

I suspect the fact that we no longer have the likes of Warthog, Analyst, RRabid and the like here (even Maddog seems to have gone very quiet after all these years of the snarling one liner) is that it is not a comfortable place to be when the essence of what you have been arguing, often with rather blind faith, is no longer sustainable. We have for example, had no statements of victory from Ranger of recent (whose posts, even if you didn't agree were often fascinating and never less than well argued).

Of course, detail, detail, detail at TPM Cafe, but here's a TPM thread on on the general discussion dilemma:
The Advocacy and Activism issue

_{"at some point I'm hopeful I'll figure out something to put here"}

try and tell ourselves that this is only limited to the blogosphere. I'm old enough to remember the Vietnam War (in NZ the pro and anti war elements had a third argument to deal with, in that "what are we doing there, tagging along on the US coat-tails"...an argument which basically ended in 85 when NZ withdrew, or allowed itself to be excluded from, the ANZUS treaty and the Western Alliance).

And then in 81 I watched the country tear itself apart over the Springbok Rugby tour. There was no common ground, no points of discussion, no reasoned to and fro at dinner parties and in classrooms. Some things take us beyond the point of discussion. I don't want to go over to LGF and try to understand, or have a reasoned argument with Warthog or the others. I'll say what I want to say, as politely as I can, but can't stomach any attempt to defend the indefensible. I'd rather walk away, as I did with Maddog at times.

I guess the big issues are eternal.

"We declared war on terror, it's not even a noun, so, good luck. After we defeat it, I'm sure we'll take on that bastard ennui." - Jon Stewart.

qui est fort courte. La voici: Mon Dieu, rendez nos ennemis bien ridicules! Dieu m'a exaucé."

"I always made one prayer to God, which is extremely short. Here it is: 'O my God, make our enemies ridiculous!' God granted it."

- Voltaire, letter to Étienne-Noel Damilaville (1767-05-16)

truly would have been relieved to have been wrong. but i just could not see the people i know fairly well in so many respects allowing what this group of arrogant, racist, crime syndicate thugs planned to do to go on. they have shucked and jived the Americans out of everything they can, they have done what anyone without power in another way would do...infiltrate, beat the idiot at his own game, in your own way, especially in your own land FGS. Now killing our sons and daughters with guns bought with our money, freely given. this is the final, blackest, sickest irony, and will be chronicled and remembered.

and all my tears and protests will not bring back one innocent Iraqi child, one idealistic American young person who was betrayed so callously at the beginning of their hopeful future. As a spiritual person and an opitimist, all i can say at this juncture is that i hope we as a nation have learned, finally, the lessons we need to keep this from happening again. that would be a good thing, and will make any deaths, perhaps, redeemable.[Cindy Sheehan looks at Casey's death this way.] The parties in the ME have their own lessons to learn, and i hope their suffering and deaths will be redeemed as well.

that great good and progress comes from great suffering and tragedy is well known. let this be the case in this.

thanks for your note.
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If this were 1700, they'd be saying: "Since civilization began, slavery has existed. It's human nature." I would have believed it. If 1800: "Women will never vote. They are not born rational". I would have believed it.
2006: Make war irrelevant

including my wife, my son, my brother and his wife in San Francisco to protest what we knew was about to happen in Iraq. Before that I thought Bush was another Reagan but that day taught me what we are really up against. That day, as hundreds of thousands streamed over the bridges to join the march, Homeland Insecurity declared an Orange Alert and shutdown the Bay Bridge to stop the people; how many would there have been? A million? That day 350,000 that made it had their voice taken from them as CNN filmed only the few lunatics planted in the crowd; I had never seen their like; waving huge beautifully made hammer and sickle flags standing on top of a truck parked in front of CNN's cameras. There were a hundred thousand young mothers pushing baby carriages in that crowd and they did not appear on television. That day I knew that fascists had won and we had all lost. Folks, this aint over yet. To paraphrase "V", something is seriously wrong with our government.

Not What the American or Iraqi People Want

For all the hype, the Iraq Study Group offers two fundamental recommendations that the president might even be able to implement: The group calls for the United States to engage Iraq's neighbors, specifically Iran and Syria. The group recommends a shift in U.S. military force posture and approach from "combat" to training and advice to Iraqi forces.

The Iraq Study Group should be thanked for its service to America in throwing a bucket of cold water on the White House. But post-election, the Commission's many recommendations are merely the opening salvo of a barrage of recommendations that will now emerge from the government, the think tanks, and the politicos.

The wise men have confirmed what the American public has known for some time: Iraq is finished. Our strategy, whatever it is, isn't working. It is mighty disappointing, but not surprising, though that the Study Group couldn't see that there is nothing left that the United States can do to really influence what will happen there. What is more, what it actually is proposing in its two fundamental points isn't necessarily going to make any difference.
...
I understand that this "new" solution is Washington's way of withdrawing without saying it is withdrawing. But there is too much hope associated with the shift: hope that if we just redouble our effort with the Iraqis, they will all of a sudden get it and transform. In here as well is the strange article of faith that less capable Iraqi military units will succeed where more capable U.S. units failed. It seems to me that if we are admitting that there is no military solution to the problem, there is no Iraqi military solution either.

And then there is the question of Americans in uniform being thrust into an impossible position. I know that the embedded American will be there to teach their Iraqi counterparts how to shoot straight, as show an example of camaraderie, and to school them in human rights and the laws of war. But it is only a matter of time before Americans are thrust in the middle of blood letting and abuse.

Here's how I see Iraq playing out in the short term: The president makes an announcement within a month about his "new" plan. Washington is ever so pleased with a new approach. But the a la carte plan is seen by the Iraqis for what it is; it is not a U.S. timetable for withdrawal. It is not an unequivocal pledge not to establish permanent bases. It is sovereignty and authority in name only for Iraq with continued American control behind the scenes. I can't see who any of this equivocation will deflate the insurgency or stem the hatred for America that is fueled by our presence.

The "plan," in other words, is neither what the American people nor the Iraqi people want.

LINK

Rather grim stuff, that...but, after all, this from a close student of the Pentagon, Junior's war, and what "realism" usually brings forth in such circumstances.

Cynicism is the true great enemy of all people everywhere. To me, it means giving up and losing hope.
I am posting this here as a repeat, since i don't post that much anymore anyway...[see: "The Worst Congress Ever" thread]

The only way we won't get 109th Politburo [nice term] lite, in the 110th, [as in Kerry was "Bush lite" -Chomsky] is to *continue* loud and long to scream "bloody murder, rape, pilliage and fire" as they are contiuing to happen, support those that do and who have hands and feet on the ground and their bodies on the line [lot of flesh and bones being worked out there] with $, and work, such as CREW [Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington http://www.citizensforethics.org/ ]who *actually* exposed and pushed for prosecution of Cunningham, Ney and Delay,[now they are going after DEMOCRATS -yay]
and if you believe in peace for all people, as i do, organizations such as Cindy Sheehan's GSFP, http://www.gsfp.org/ and CODE PINK http://www.codepink4peace.org/

WE AS CITIZENS MUST TAKE BACK THIS COUNTRY!
EDUCATE. AGITATE. ORGANIZE. EMPOWER. WE HAVE AN OBLIGATION TO DO THIS!

Simple numbers say there are more of US than THEM!
Change has NEVER come from the top in dysfunctional organizations [not actually doing the work, of what they have a duty, mandate and the power to do, but causing actual harm] and if i have to argue for that term then there really is no hope.

here at the Agonist, i am sure i am preaching to the choir...now, if we want true change, all of us, every one, must sing in the streets. those that have ears to hear will, and the others, well, they will have to come along for the ride. THERE REALLY ARE MORE OF US THAN THEM.

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If this were 1700, they'd be saying: "Since civilization began, slavery has existed. It's human nature." I would have believed it. If 1800: "Women will never vote. They are not born rational". I would have believed it.
2006: Make war irrelevant

that when people are angry about US interference, the best way to solve it is with new and improved interference.

I clearly stated that the foreign presence needs to remove itself by withdrawing support, both to Israel and Iraq.

the great decider still thinks it's within his power, and he has the moral authority, to try and set the rules of engagement with Syria and Iran.

I would've thought that a drop to his knees and a begging stance would've been more appropriate. He's playing to his support, what's left of it in the USA, and f**k the Iraqis....

Nothing's gonna change and god knows how many are gonna die as American domestic politics take precedence over sorting this out, or at least trying to...

Commissions, schmissions...

If this were 1700, they'd be saying: "Since civilization began, slavery has existed. It's human nature." I would have believed it. If 1800: "Women will never vote. They are not born rational". I would have believed it.
2006: Make war irrelevant

the Conservatives will build legislature that has the least amount of transparency. But a nincompoop usually makes their theft very evident. Thieves and corrupt officials are not as clever as they believe they are. Miscalculations on the part of dishonest people and politicians of their expertise is probably why prisons are increasing in size. :-) For every crook, there are thousands of well-trained police and prosecutors that put them in jail.

Last night I watched a programme on the history channel. It was about guy in Toronto that blew up his house and half of the neighbourhood. He planted skin-head Natzi, white supremacy, hate messages that the police eventually tracked back to him. His business was failing and he intended to collect the insurance. He was sentenced to fifteen years.

Crime may pay big bucks, but the risk factor is extremely high.

Capone thought he was impervious to prosecution, but he was sent to jail because of income tax fraud. There are numerous ways courts and prosecutors skin cats and hang them up to dry.