So , I have a casual acquaintance who thinks we should stay in Iraq

[hedgehog]

because of "all the good we're doing over there and because all the bad things we see on television are blown out of proportion". I mean, why should a couple of dead soldiers make us lose our resolve, right?

So, is this a totally lost cause (he's been talking to someone who was over there and is eager to go back) or can you refer me to some literature or pictures I should drop off with him?

[lisa58]

1. If he actually knows someone that's been there and....

...wants to go back and thinks it's going really well and accomplishing the objective - he's probably not going to believe anything "in print"

[RazBerryBeret]

2. maybe you should encourage him to enlist...

or send his kids over there.

there's no explaining it, I have a coworker who seriously thinks condi rice would be a great VP!!!

[ColbertWatcher]

3. When the acquaintance said this, was he in Iraq? n/t

[nichomachus]

4. Definitely

Go to the local recruiting office. Get literature and an application to join. Give the recruiters your friend's name, phone number, and address. Tell them he is really interested.

[Arctic Dave]

5. Lost cause with some people.

Especially if they are a "believer" or a "glory seeker", you're wasting your time. After all there are people today that think Nazi Germany wasn't all that bad.

[ingac70]

6. The acqaintance is a lost cause...

he/she obviously listens to alot of FAUX News and right wing radio, not to mention doesn't give two shits about the financial cost of all this.

[KSinTX]

7. These guys are like athletes in many ways

They go to practice every day, train hard and don't like ending up on the bench watching from the sidelines. It's why teams employ coaches from outside the team and you rarely see player-coaches at most levels of sports (the intramural ones aside). In the military, it's much the same. Many of those guys want to stay in the game and that's why we put 'outsiders' in charge - civilian leadership. The problem in Iraq is that the entire effort is being led by a player-coach, Petraeus. He has been issued a special letter ceding many of Ambassador Crocker's role (the President's civilian oversight on the ground) to him. Much of the mess we're in over there stems from this very convoluted mix.

Back to your point, it is this rally-round-the-flag, military mindset that pretty much makes your friend's friend a lost cause. And since your friend is taking his cues from a "legitimate" source, he too is probably lost as well. I'll see if there's anything besides the usual photos of what's really happening on the ground that might help you.

[CJCRANE]

8. Take the financial angle...

mention off-hand how many billion$ have gone into Iraq...

ON edit: If you take the reverse psychology route and actually agree with him: "yes, it's great that we've poured 500 billion dollars into Iraq to help them out". If he's a RWer that'll annoy him because it sounds like socialism on a massive scale.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

9. To me that misses the whole point.

Just because some good is being done there (highly subjective) or some soldier wants to get back to his unit is no justification for our continued presence. That's all those excuses he's making are, distractions and justifications. The invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq were illegal and immoral, period.

[izquierdista]

10. Lost cause

People who are "eager to go back" have a Patton like psychosis that makes them long for combat and war. They need mental health care to learn to tame their bellicose nature and value peace over war. If your acquaintance accepts first-hand reports from this nutball, it is unlikely that he will be swayed by numbers that indicate the damage the US has done to Iraq, not the number of dead, number of injured, number of homeless, infant mortality, etc.

One thing that the US should have done after Vietnam is to re-educate the dead-enders who thought that the military was undercut and had they stayed just a little bit longer, they could have "won". The Germans were fortunate in that regard, for in 1945, all their dead-enders capped themselves in the head. It is a task that logic cannot do, for they hang on to their belief in war regardless of the cost, the facts, and the reality of the situation. They will always be able to find one ounce of "good" and put it on the scale and claim that it balances out a ton of "bad".

You might get a better result by asking him how much crude oil Iraq is exporting. If he can connect the fact that Iraqi production is way down, and because of that, he is putting more money into his gas tank every week, he may begin to put it together. That the longer the US stays in Iraq, the longer the oil production will be effectively cut off and the longer that he will pay at the pump. And the bigger that Halliburton's payments to Cheney will be.

[nichomachus]

11. Some people become "institutionalized"

People who acclimate themselves to an institution -- whether prison, the military, school, whatever -- sometimes become "institutionalized." That is, they function very well in the institution, but have trouble with life outside it. That's why you'll see some grad students who make you think they came with the school. They never seem to get their dissertation or research finished. I once worked at a juvenile detention center. The saddest cases were the kids, released weeks ago, who would show up at the door at 3 a.m., asking if they could come back in. They could handle life in the detention center. They couldn't handle life outside. The same thing happens in the military.

[mdmc]

12. tell him he is right

in for a penny, in for a pound.