Wagering on War

On February 8, 2005, Jonah Goldberg's smugly absurd form of journalism landed him into a situation that forces him to backpedal now. (surprised?) He was in the midst of arguing issues regarding Iraq with Middle East scholar Juan Cole. In the summation to his article, seen here, Goldberg says: "I do think my judgment is superior to his when it comes to the big picture. So, I have an idea: Since he doesn't want to debate anything except his own brilliance, let's make a bet. I predict that Iraq won't have a civil war, that it will have a viable constitution, and that a majority of Iraqis and Americans will, in two years time, agree that the war was worth it. I'll bet $1,000 (which I can hardly spare right now). This way neither of us can hide behind clever word play or CV reading. If there's another reasonable wager Cole wants to offer which would measure our judgment, I'm all ears. Money where your mouth is, doc." 2 years has come and gone; let's see how Goldberg has fared. 1 - Iraq won't have a civil war Does anyone really want to argue this? 2 - The majority of Iraqis and Americans will agree the war was worth it Well Jonah, it seems that you don't even agree with yourself. In this LA Times article written October 19, 2006, your sub-headline reads: We know now that invading Iraq was the wrong decision, but that doesn't vindicate the antiwar crowd. Oops. I do have to say that Cole's response to Goldberg's bet offer seems a little lame. Taking the wager proposal and turning it into political commentary on the motivations of his ideological adversaries may be a stretch. To me, though, the important action that should come of this is to question the professional responsibility of the media outlets who choose to elevate Goldberg's message into the national consciousness. Goldberg contends that "my judgment is superior to his (Juan Cole is a noted middle east scholar) when it comes to the big picture". This is categorically false, as can be seen now that the 2 years are up. However, the LA Times article referenced above still has 1,000 words from Goldberg justifying the Iraq war. he closes the article with: "Finishing the job is better than leaving a mess. And if we can finish the job, the war won't be remembered as a mistake." So, even in the face of Goldberg's proven inferior judgement as compared to top scholars on the subject, Goldberg still continues to receive high-visibility publicity, and his poor big picture judgements are continually thrust in the face of the American populace. In the LA Times article, Goldberg also references the justification for going to war that I spoke of in my article The Case for Iraq. Goldberg says: "The failure to find weapons of mass destruction is a side issue. The WMD fiasco was a global intelligence failure, but calling Saddam Hussein's bluff after 9/11 was the right thing to do." The WMD fiasco was a global intelligence failure? We know from my previous blog that this is untrue. We saw that Tenet, Feith, and various ranking members of the administration are backpedaling on pre-war recommendations as fast as they possibly can. We also saw significant evidence delivered to Congress by the intelligence community that the administration had an agenda; this was nothing to do with flawed intelligence (re-cue the YouTube video from the last post). Failure to find WMD is a side issue? Refer to Bush's Press Conference from March 6, 2003, regarding issues in Iraq. The said: we have arrived at an important moment in confronting the threat posed to our nation and to peace by Saddam Hussein and his weapons of terror. In New York tomorrow, the United Nations Security Council will receive an update from the chief weapons inspector. The world needs him to answer a single question: Has the Iraqi regime fully and unconditionally disarmed, as required by Resolution 1441, or has it not? After his speech, he the received questions like this one: "Mr. President, you have, and your top advisors -- notably, Secretary of State Powell -- have repeatedly said that we have shared with our allies all the current, up-to-date intelligence information that proves the imminence of the threat we face from Saddam Hussein, and that they have been sharing their intelligence with us, as well. If all these nations, all of them our normal allies, have access to the same intelligence information, why is it that they are reluctant to think that the threat is so real, so imminent that we need to move to the brink of war now?" Bush's answer: "Saddam Hussein is a threat to our nation. September the 11th changed the strategic thinking, at least, as far as I was concerned, for how to protect our country. My job is to protect the American people. It used to be that we could think that you could contain a person like Saddam Hussein, that oceans would protect us from his type of terror. September the 11th should say to the American people that we're now a battlefield, that weapons of mass destruction in the hands of a terrorist organization could be deployed here at home. So, therefore, I think the threat is real. And so do a lot of other people in my government. And since I believe the threat is real, and since my most important job is to protect the security of the American people, that's precisely what we'll do." Wow. That didn't seem strange to people then? We were also prepared to act unilaterally, even then. The Question: "Mr. President, are you worried that the United States might be viewed as defiant of the United Nations if you went ahead with military action without specific and explicit authorization from the U.N.?" The answer: "No, I'm not worried about that. As a matter of fact, it's hard to say the United States is defiant about the United Nations, when I was the person that took the issue to the United Nations, September the 12th, 2002. We've been working with the United Nations. We've been working through the United Nations. Secondly, I'm confident the American people understand that when it comes to our security, if we need to act, we will act, and we really don't need United Nations approval to do so. I want to work -- I want the United Nations to be effective. It's important for it to be a robust, capable body. It's important for it's words to mean what they say, and as we head into the 21st century, Mark, when it comes to our security, we really don't need anybody's permission." With so many questions regarding WMD's, the issue invariably turned to North Korea. The question: "Another hot spot is North Korea. If North Korea restarts their plutonium plant, will that change your thinking about how to handle this crisis, or are you resigned to North Korea becoming a nuclear power?" Answer: "This is a regional issue ... So, therefore, I think the best way to deal with this is in multilateral fashion, by convincing those nations they must stand up to their responsibility, along with the United States, to convince Kim Jong-il that the development of a nuclear arsenal is not in his nation's interest; and that should he want help in easing the suffering of the North Korean people, the best way to achieve that help is to not proceed forward." So, the North Korea weapons are "a regional issue", but the supposed Iraq weapons are our problem alone? So, before I made this massive digression into the statements Bush made to get us into the Iraq war, I was talking about Jonah Goldberg's horribly inaccurate assessment of our situation in Iraq. Can a reasonable person, after reading all of the above quotes and the entire Bush speech as linked, really say that "the failure to find weapons of mass destruction is a side issue" in good conscience? Can a person who does say that be considered a source worthy of widespread publication across the country? Here's one vote for no.