Anti-War Arguments in Salon

I catch crap because I read this online magazine almost every day. I find it interesting on two fronts. Sometimes they have really good articles on interesting topics. Other times, it's good to know what those you disagree with are saying. The article today, addressing the 10 questions on the war and the answers to it falls into the latter category. It's also quite bad. It's a bunch of assumptions and some facts, but with no links or comments to the sources of those facts. Therefore, it's pretty much all suspect. I'm going to try my hand at giving this one a thorough fisking on at least on of his points.

1. Nothing was mentioned about improvements in Iraq (elections, water and energy, schools). No Saddam to fear! Water and energy delivery as well as schools are worse off than before the U.S. invasion. Ditto for the state of hospitals (and medical supplies), highways and oil production.

Logically, this doesn't make sense, but I'm going to check it out. First thing I found, is that he's right. Oil production is not quite up to pre-war levels, but soon will be. Of course, when you look at the 25 year production, the pre-war levels were also part of the Oil-For-Food program and when one considers the how's, why's & wherefores of that debacle, should it be counted? Academics can argue that one for a while. I'll concede the point. As to electricity production, I wanted to get the latest figures. Indications are, we're ahead of pre-war levels, but not meeting demands. Unless you prefer to listen to the military, then we're well ahead of pre-war levels, but still not meeting demands.Not stated is that we're not meeting demands because the Iraqi economy is growing by leaps & bounds and more & more people need more & more energy for their televisions, air conditioners and cell phone chargers. I can't seem to find pre-war/post-war water production, but the links I can find, seem to suggest that the main cause of the problems was poor http://www.cfr.org/publication/9185/iraqs_reconstruction_ailments.html?breadcrumb=defaultprior to the invasion. Every indication is, while things may not be as good as they should be, they're better than they would have been without our direct aid, had Saddam been left in power. Note, that last link talks about rebuilding 120 hospitals. Since we weren't bombing them, rebuilding them must mean we've improved the hospital system since the invasion. As to schools, well this document, probably slanted since it's from someone who actually worked over there, paints a picture that sounds pretty night & day. That's not say things are perfect, but they're clearly improved and improving. On the whole, the story seems the same, Saddam Hussein let things slide while he funded his military and built palaces and lined the pockets UN & French officials.

One more before I give up:

6. Nothing was mentioned about what fundamentalist Muslims would like to achieve. I assume that, when you refer to "fundamentalist Muslims," you are referring to terrorists, including those in Iraq and those who attacked the World Trade Center, the London tube, and the Madrid trains. First, I have to disagree with this identification of the terrorists (who are indeed fundamentalist) with all fundamentalist Muslims. That would be the same as characterizing those who bombed the Oklahoma City Federal Building as "fundamentalist Christians" and then implying that the destruction of such buildings is what all fundamentalist Christians yearn to achieve.

Um, well, yeah. Certain strains of fundamentalist Christians did believe that. That's why the term Islamo-fascists is a bit better because it differentiates between those the nice fundamentalist Muslims who simply want women in burka's and the not so nice ones that want to blow people up. Most of the time I see as "radical fundamentalist Muslims" which does differentiate. Let's face it, radical fundamentalist Christians are just as bad.

Read it. It'll keep the blood pressure up. I also loved the deal on how Iraqis want us to leave their country (yeah, eventually, not tomorrow) and how the military isn't retaining veterans (despite record setting reenlistment rates that even make the NY Time). It's kind of like a weird-other world, just slightly skewed from this one.