After we got back from our travels Mel took a nap and I wrote the recap of our trip “Till the cows come home.” After Mel read it he sent me a column from one of my favorite middle east commentators, fellow Minnesotan Thomas Friedman. It so perfectly echoed my contempt for the Bush Administration’s war efforts that I must share a bit of it.
Because the New York Times now charges people to read their contributors I don’t read it much anymore. The column can be found, however, in its entirety here.
Here’s a sample:
“Not only is there no honest self-criticism among Republicans, but – and this is truly contemptible – you have Dick Cheney & Friends focusing their public remarks on why Mr. Lamont’s defeat of Mr. Lieberman only proves that Democrats do not understand that we are in a titanic struggle with ‘Islamic fascists’ and are therefore unfit to lead.
Oh, really? Well, I just have one question for Mr. Cheney: If we’re in such a titanic struggle with radical Islam, and if getting Iraq right is at the center of that struggle, why did you ‘tough guys’ fight the Iraq war with the Rumsfeld Doctrine – just enough troops to lose – and not with the Powell Doctrine of overwhelming force to create the necessary foundation of any democracy-building project, which is security? How could you send so few troops to fight such an important war when it was obvious that without security Iraqis would fall back on their tribal militias?”
