Webb v. Allen

After reading Dean Barnett's posts on the Allen v. Webb debate, I read the transcript of the Webb-Allen debate. Far from agreeing with Mr. Barnett's analysis that "If it was a prize fight, it would have been stopped at the first commercial break", what I read is that Webb made a number of reckless and indefensible statements. Here's the list I came up with:

We didn't go into Iraq because of terrorism, we have terrorists in Iraq because we went in there.

Does Mr. Webb intend on defending that stupid of a comment? Does he think that Ansar al-Islam was a civic group? Does he think that Abu Abbas and Abu Nidal were just misunderstood souls? Does Mr. Webb think that Salman Pak was a training school for flight attendants? Ansar al-Islam was in northern Iraq during the Clinton Administration. Salman Pak was a training sight for hijackers, bombmakers and suicide attacks.

Now, that's where this administration seems to have blinders. They're not talking to Syria, they're not talking to Iran.

Imagine that!!! President Bush isn't looking to the Syrians and Iranians to be part of the solution to the Middle East. This statement comes straight from the Democrat playbook that stems from the belief that things would be better if we just talked with our enemies. Then they'd understand us and agree with us. That's what Jimmy Carter did in 1979. All that did was start the state-sponsored global terrorism movement.

MR. RUSSERT: My question is $300 billion in Iraq. Could it have been better spent?

MR. WEBB: Yes. We could have, we could have contained Iraq. If you want to take out Saddam Hussein, there are ways to take out Saddam Hussein. We did not need to go into a country, decapitate the government and inherit the, the responsibility of rebuilding it. And eventually that is going to fall to the other countries in the region. It's just going to.

That opinion is so stupid it hurts just reading it. Considering the fact that Saddam wasn't contained because of all the bribes he made in the Oil-For-Food scandal, the thought that he was contained was an illusion created so that politicians could avoid dealing with reality.

As for Webb's statement that "there are ways to take out Saddam Hussein. We did not need to go into a country, decapitate the government and inherit the, the responsibility of rebuilding it", just how would we have "taken Saddam Hussein out" without Iraq being taken over by one of his Baathist loyalists? Does Mr. Webb think that Saddam's loyalists wouldn't have objected to the installation of a government that would've taken away their positions of power? Or does Mr. Webb think that these Baathists would've been more gentle on Iraqis than Saddam?

MR. RUSSERT: Where do you come down on this? Are you with the Sen. Warner-McCain version, or President Bush's version of dealing with interrogating and prosecuting enemy combatants?

MR. WEBB: I'm with Sen. Warner on this, and I think in terms of what Colin Powell is saying, that's a very important piece of how we view, how we deal long-term with the Islamic world particularly, that we have to stay on the moral high ground. And what you're seeing here is a split between the theorists, who have controlled so much of the policy in this administration, theorists who have never been on a battlefield, who have never put a uniform on, and who are looking at this thing in a totally different way from people who have had to worry about their troops and themselves possibly coming under enemy hands. This is a very easy issue for me to decide on.

Thank you, Mr. Webb, for clarifying the fact that you'd hamstring the interrogators who've used aggressive interrogation techniques to capture KSM and to prevent no less than 8 attacks against U.S. interests at home and in theater. As I've said here, Democrats seem more worried about "about the 'World Community's' opinion" than they are about "getting every bit of information from the terrorists."

If Mr. Webb wants to stand his ground on that, that's his option. He just shouldn't be surprised when he gets run over by Virginia voters this November.

MR. WEBB: But you have to worry about one thing also here, that tainted evidence often comes from torture, and I think John McCain has made that point very well. If we're coercing...information, not all, you don't always have the right information. That's how we ended up in Iraq.

That isn't what I heard when Bill O'Reilly talked to the interrogators stationed at Gitmo. They said that the information they get is very reliable. Does Mr. Webb want to defend his position that this information isn't accurate in light of the president saying that the methods currently being used have led to the capture of Khalid Sheikh Muhammed and the prevention of 8 terrorist attacks against American interests, both here in America and also in Iraq?

It's also a sign that he's reciting Democratic talking points by trying to bring up Iraq whenever possible. Why else would he say that relying on coerced interrogation is what got us into Iraq? No serious person believes that. Only moonbat Democrats buy into that nonsense.

When the summary is written on the Allen-Webb debate, it'll show that Webb made one misstatement after another and that Webb sounded good making a slew of foolish statements. If that's all it takes to win by TKO, then Republicans don't stand a chance because every Democrat can make foolish statements.

I'd hope that Mr. Barnett would base his future opinions more on substance than on style. Hopefully, he'll do that after this.

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Posted Monday, September 18, 2006 8:44 AM

August 2006 Posts

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