If a year ago, Bush had said he was going to bring democracy to Iraq?

[kentuck]

How many Repubs would have agreed with him? I ask, because that is the argument that they are now using. The WMDs and nuclear threat excuse is long gone. We are there to bring "democracy" to Iraq.

How many Repubs would have agreed with that reason to invade Iraq? In my opinion, it would not be 50%. And the number of Democrats that would have supported a policy like that would have been minimal.
What does it prove?

It proves that most of the Repubs now supporting Bush's Iraq war are hypocrites. They support him now for the same reason they would not have supported him a year ago. They would have said he was delusional. No matter how tyrannical Saddam may have been, Republicans would not have agreed to put the lives of our troops on the line just to bring "democracy" to the people. If they say otherwise, they are lying thru their teeth. What's the difference now and then?

[salinen]

1. Cheney's secret energy meeting

"Yes Ken, we are going to get you your oil."

[Sandpiper]

2. This whole war has been a huge bait and switch

If Bush had said from the very start that he wanted a war with Iraq so that we could install a "democratic" government, no way would have mustered any popular support for it.

So instead, he and his handlers said it was about WMD, and terrorism, and they invoked the spectre of 9/11 as often as possible.

Here we are 1 year later, and the rationale has changed to "democratizing the greater middle east."

[MAlibdem]

3. It's true...most conservatives are isolationist by nature

Vietnam weirded things up in politics in terms of foreign policy, because anti-war dems and pro-progressive internationalist dems sort of split, and the prog internationalists in war dept. went repug.


Disclosure: I consider myself a progressive internationalist and believe spread democracy and human rights to be one of the great missions of the US. And I believe force can be appropriate to advance that goal.

[Sandpiper]

4. So you're a warmonger?

n/t

[kentuck]

5. Can they not see how much they have changed their own positions?

A year ago, it was about WMDs and nuclear material from Africa and an "imminent threat" to our nation. Today, it's about giving the Iraqis the opportunity to live in freedom and to have a democracy and set an example for the rest of the Middle East...Consistent, aren't they?

[maggrwaggr]

6. GOPers will follow their leaders blindly over a cliff

which is what they're doing right now.

I say "go!"