A First? All 7 'NYT' Columnists -- From Left to Right --Agree on Something (The 'Surge')

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003528647

With Paul Krugman today hitting President Bush's plan to dramatically increase U.S. troop levels in Iraq -- which he labels a "surge" but others call an escalation-- this completes perhaps a first: All seven regular opinion columnists at the paper (Krugman, David Brooks, Thomas Friedman, Maureen Dowd, Nicholas Kristof, Bob Herbert and Frank Rich) are in agreement on a vital issue.

Brooks, in a bit of a surprise, had come out against the "surge" on Sunday, joining his colleagues on this. Friedman, a firm supporter of the war until recently, also attacked the idea last week. "Iraq has become a quagmire of the vanities," Krugman, an opponent of the war from the beginning, declared today.

Among the many newspaper columnists questioning President Bush's plan to send 20,000 or more fresh troops to Iraq are quite a few conservatives breaking with the White House on this.

Oliver North, for example, attacked the idea in his syndicated column on Friday and on Sunday, in the Washington Post, George Will commented that the "surge" idea is basically too little and too late, and will only lead to a "protracted" U.S. struggle. The column is titled, "Surge, or Power Failure?"

On the same day, Brooks at The New York Times commented, "Unfortunately, if the goal is to create a stable, unified Iraq, the surge is a good policy three years too late." Its chance for success is almost nil, he explained.

The Cons now want out of Iraq because they know that this CAN LIKELY sink them in 2008.
That is the only reason we see Brooks, North, and a whole bunch of other Conservatives opposing Bush in such a manner.

Nobody else, not even most of the WH advisors, support this. Since when did Bush think for himself? I hope he goes on TV Wednesday night and tells us all that he's reconsidered in light of all the really smart people telling him that escalating the war is a bad idea, but I know better by now.

I think the longer dimson is prez, the dumber he looks, but he's dangerously dumb.

Fredrick: Would you mind telling me whose brain I did put in?
Igor: And you won't be angry?
Fredrick: I will *not* be angry!
Igor: Abby Someone.
Fredrick: Abby Someone. Abby Who?
Igor: Abby Normal.
Fredrick: Abby Normal.
Igor: I'm almost sure that was the name.

But apparently few of his advisors, the people who normally tell him exactly what to do, are behind him on this. I'm sure it's no coincidence that the one decision that seems to be truly and completely his own is the worst decision he could possibly make.

but to secure windfall profits from iraqi oil for his oil associates (exxon etc..) and sell more arms and military services for his class cartel (carlyle group, halliburton). Take a look at the following analysis. Mr. Floyd puts it all in a different light and makes the surge make sense for BushenDick's true cynical aim:


Chris Floyd | New Oil Law Means Victory in Iraq for Bush
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/010807A.shtml

Chris Floyd reports: "The reason that George W. Bush insists that 'victory' is achievable in Iraq is not that he is deluded or isolated or ignorant or detached from reality or ill-advised. No, it's that his definition of 'victory' is different from those bruited about in his own rhetoric and in the ever-earnest disquisitions of the chattering classes in print and online. For Bush, victory is indeed at hand."

The GOP didn't make it clear enough that he was only to be a puppet.

:grr:

...the Maladministration bait, "surge," and call it what it really is, an escalation. This word needs to be chewed over like a worried rat in a terrier's mouth until the entire nation ties Vietnam, Texas Presidents, Iraq and troop casualties to Little Monkey's and his flacid, fatfuck puppet master's (Small Dick "Fucking" Cheney) "plan."

Rove's escape hatch. Everything that happens goes back to Rove. It's all politics and no policy. The war was started to provide political cover for Bush in 04. Some repubes I thought to be rational said they were voting for Bush because we're at war. That factor may have been enough to keep the election close enough to rig. Rove needs to be arrested and jailed for the nation's well being. Treasury looting is unpatriotic. Rove is Goebbels with modern technoligy and therefore more dangerous.

...to be made clear, especially by writers who know the difference :hide: :yoiks:

Definitions of surge on the Web:

billow: rise and move, as in waves or billows; "The army surged forward"

soar: rise rapidly; "the dollar soared against the yen"

rush: a sudden forceful flow

tide: rise or move forward; "surging waves"
a sudden or abrupt strong increase; "stimulated a surge of speculation"; "an upsurge of emotion"; "an upsurge in violent crime"

scend: rise or heave upward under the influence of a natural force such as a wave; "the boats surged"

billow: a large sea wave

1. See storm surge. 2. See surge current. 3. See surge line. 4. In hydrology, a sudden change in discharge resulting from the opening or closing of a gate that controls the flow in a channel, or by the sudden introduction of additional water into the channel. 5. The fore and aft movement of the center of gravity of a ship. See heave, sway, ship motion. 6. Water transported up a beach by breaking waves.

Definitions of escalation on the Web:

Escalation is the phenomenon of something getting worse step by step, for example a quarrel, or, notably, military presence and nuclear armament during the Cold War. (Compare to escalator, a device that lifts something to a higher level.)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escalation

The right reserved by the lender to increase the amount of the payments and/or interest upon the happening of a certain event.
www.sanderco.com/Glossary%20Pages/E.htm

The right of a lender to increase the rate of interest in a loan agreement.
www.trustors.com/Glossary/finance_glos.htm

an increase to counteract a perceived discrepancy; "higher wages caused an escalation of prices"; "there was a gradual escalation of hostilities"
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

An escalation would mean that he's putting more troops into the country. There are no other troops. Our peace time military is virtually maxed out with the crazy Iraq mission. There are no more troops to escalate into the country.

As you point out, a surge is a wave like motion. Waves, you may recall from your physics classes, don't involve actual increases in volume or mass. There's no addition troop strength being added to Iraq, only the same old troops being rotated in faster (longer deployments, shorter recuperation and re-outfitting periods). This will actually produce a drain in our overall force strength by stretching their energies and equipment out further.

Waves go in ebbs and flows. The equal and opposite reaction from this surge will, probably in the next twelve months, see a corresponding diminishment of our country's fighting strength. Besides the personnel drain (by which I mean guys who are dead, mutilated, 4F'd out, or arrested for war crimes because of the circumstances Bush is putting them in), there is also the mostly unreported capital losses.

No one is talking about it in the media, but costs in equipment, transportation, expended or damaged ordinance are escalating, as the war starts to eat into our defense supplies as well. Our surpluses are shot and our standing equipment is going to need to be replaced in the near future. Long after the immediate nightmare is over, we will continue to pay for this little adventure.

I have no particular love of conservatives, but I at least know what the word means. It means one who believes in order, who believes that the cultural traditions of the country are at least as important as the liberal traditions (liberty, rationality, and evolving social justice) of a liberal democracy. A conservative is a person who upholds the law, protects the sanctity of the family unit, and holds the country and its social order to traditional, often religious, moral precepts.

Oliver North is not a conservative by any stretch of the imagination. His political ideology is militarism; his political loyalties are crypto-royalist. He's right that the surge is wrong, but that doesn't make him conservative, or even sane for that matter; it means only that he's smarter than George W Bush.

They are not going to be fresh troops. They will make troops already in Iraq stay longer, and make troops going to Iraq leave earlier.

...but I refuse to go with their program to charge for their content.

I haven't intentionally accessed the New York Times ever since they started this draconian plan, where they make you pay AND give you ads. Besides, the Times is not the newspaper of record for me any more; Salon.com is. And I don't mind paying for Salon, since I avoid ads by doing so.

Too true.

I'll have to steal it!

Someone had to ask it.