Author: Matt Barganier

Jonathan Schwarz and Sam Husseini aren’t letting Colin Powell get away with it.

We like to publicize the sunny prewar forecasts of big-shot warbots, and rightly so. Most of these fools have yet to shut up, and despite their staggering record of entrails illiteracy, many are now assuring us of further “victories” to be had. Of course, the perpetually bellicose, when confronted with their cakewalks-and-candy Iraq predictions, sputter something like, Oh yeah, well you peace freaks were wrong about a lot of stuff, too!

Let’s slay this canard once and for all.

Yes, millions of people opposed the Iraq invasion, and I’m sure that at least a few of them offered highly specific predictions that were way off. But let’s skip the outliers and focus on the broad sweep of antiwar thought. The gist of pragmatic arguments against the Iraq invasion (we’ll set aside the whole mass-murder-is-wrong moral case for now) was that so many things could go horribly wrong that almost certainly some things would go horribly wrong.

At this point, I’d like the pro-war people reading this to eliminate all distractions in their surroundings, take a few deep breaths, and concentrate really, really hard, because I’m about to throw a brain-buster out there. Ready? OK: We didn’t say that all of the bad things that could have happened were going to happen. In fact, some of the nightmare scenarios we offered were mutually exclusive. The Iraqi army could either stand up and fight the invaders to the death conventionally, inflicting horrific casualties for a few months before ultimately losing, or they could slink away and regroup as guerillas, bleeding the occupiers slowly. Obviously, they couldn’t do both, but they probably would do one or the other. Either way, many lives would be lost, the ensuing occupation would be brutal for soldiers and civilians alike, and the U.S. triumph would likely turn increasingly Pyrrhic over the long term.

Still too hard? Fine. Let’s say you and I are walking down a crowded street. You point out some random guy and announce, “I’m going to go kick his ass.” I grab your arm and say, “Wait! I’m not sure what good you think will come of this, but I assume you foresee some twisted ego boost in it. Whatever. What will most likely happen in the world outside your cranium, however, is one of the following: One, your would-be victim turns out to be more of a badass than he looks, and, win or lose, he knocks your teeth out. Or two, you successfully pummel him – then somebody calls the cops, you go to jail, and he launches a civil suit against you for all you’re worth.”

You proceed to purée the guy with ease. Later, when you call me from jail, your life ruined, your property liquidated, you chuckle, “You moron – you said he would knock my teeth out.”

Sound familiar?

Ed Koch, a member of the board of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, has called for the dismissal of Dennis Prager from the Council, citing his recent anti-Muslim comments. Which raises a profound question: Ed Koch and Dennis Prager are on the board of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council??? Seriously?

And who named them to that solemn post? The Decider, of course.

Any guy who can’t manage the ribbon-cutting duties of the presidency without impaling himself on the big wacky scissors is probably not The Right Man to lead a crusade. Might wanna jot that down on a Post-It for future reference, Frum.

Via Reuters:

Robert Gates, the incoming U.S. secretary of defense, won plaudits in Washington this week for his candor on the Iraq war.

Some Israelis were less pleased, however, to hear Gates mention with equal frankness what U.S. administrations have long avoided saying in public — that the Jewish state has the Middle East’s only nuclear arsenal.

To be fair, it was pretty oblique.

During his Senate confirmation hearing on Tuesday, Gates mentioned why Iran might be seeking the means to build an atomic bomb: “They are surrounded by powers with nuclear weapons: Pakistan to their east, the Russians to the north, the Israelis to the west and us in the Persian Gulf,” he said.

The remark led Israeli news bulletins. State-run radio suggested Gates may have breached a U.S. “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that dates back to the late 1960s.

“It’s quite unprecedented,” a retired Israeli diplomat told Reuters on Thursday when asked about Gates’s testimony. “I can only assume he has yet to get to grips with the understandings that exist between us and the Americans.”

Oh, those sophisticated neocons!

Via Jonah Goldberg.

In what must count as one of the slowest epiphanies of the post-Soviet era, Glenn Reynolds seems to have concluded that maybe, just maybe, the Iraq war has not been the f*cking awesomest thing ever. So what’s a shameless, logorrheic warmonger to do? Host a “blog symposium on Iraq, Iran, and Syria,” of course! Sez Glenn:

I want some new ideas – beyond “cut and run” or “stay the course” – on things we’re not doing that we should be doing.

And where’s the first place he looks for new ideas? Duh! Charles Krauthammer’s latest essay at National Review.

For more reasons than you would ever need to ignore Glenn Reynolds for the rest of eternity, click here.