Richardson on the Other Dems' Footdragging

Bill Richardson hits on a few of the reasons that we can and should get out of Iraq ASAP. I tend to think we'd need to plan it a little more thoroughly in conjunction with those nations we expect to lend assistance once the U.S. is out, but I see him working and at least he's making progress which most of the other Dem Presidential aspirants will barely acknowledge.

This paragraph contains what I think is his strongest argument for a quick pull-out.

Why We Should Exit Iraq Now

By Bill Richardson
Saturday, September 8, 2007; Page A15

***

The presence of American forces in Iraq weakens us in the war against al-Qaeda. It endows the anti-American propaganda of those who portray us as occupiers plundering Iraq's oil and repressing Muslims. The day we leave, this myth collapses, and the Iraqis will drive foreign jihadists out of their country. Our departure would also enable us to focus on defeating the terrorists who attacked us on Sept. 11, those headquartered along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border -- not in Iraq.

The longer we stay, the longer this Civil warring, you remember, the Civil War President Bush 41 and current VP Cheney said was reason not to remove Saddam Hussein back in the early 90s, is going to linger on. The bottom line is that we do not have a compelling National Interest to have invaded and monumentally destabilized this country in the heart of the historic cradle of civilization.

For a while there, the West has led the way in progressive ideals of Democracy, personal and political Freedom, and utilization of technology for the advancement of Science, thus for the advancement of all of our species. Bu$hCo, like ALL dictators before him, whether truly benevolent, or profoundly imperialist, see only their own ideology as a beacon of Faith and Hope for a world in which they will be in charge, because, after all!, no body else could possibly do the job.

Well, not and ensure that the overwhelming majority of the Earth's natural resources end up producing profits for them and their cronies.

Richardson does make what is extremely likely to be a faulty comparison to Vietnam, and how the U.S. took its time getting out of there.

By hastening the peace process, the likelihood of prolonged bloodshed is reduced. President Richard Nixon withdrew U.S. forces slowly from Vietnam -- with disastrous consequences. Over the seven years it took to get our troops out, 21,000 more Americans and perhaps a million Vietnamese, most of them civilians, died. All this death and destruction accomplished nothing -- the communists took over as soon as we left.

The difference we face today is that there is not a single, unified enemy to pour into the vacuum of our leaving. Be not deluded; when we pull out of Iraq, things for the Iraqis are not going to clear up, clean up and straighten themselves out right away. Those folk are in for a time!

But, again unlike in Vietnam, Richardson himself has already proferred that other nations will be able to lend their support to the Iraqis once the U.S. is gone. They can't do so now because, well, we know best and they would just get in the way; of our securing those gods damned oil fields, that is.

The place where I agree, perhaps most strongly, with this candidate's sentiments is right there at the end.

Let's stop pretending that all Democratic plans are similar. The American people deserve precise answers from anyone who would be commander in chief. How many troops would you leave in Iraq? For how long? To do what, exactly? And the media should be asking these questions of the candidates, rather than allowing them to continue saying, "We are against the war . . . but please don't read the small print."