The Dish

I asked it. A reader offers one answer:

The big question:

"Was this project always doomed or did the execution doom it?"

The project was always doomed because our strategy was the result of philosophical hogwash.

Back before the war there were many of us who asked a simple question: When in recorded history have human beings reacted to the sudden toppling of their systems of governance the way Iraqis are supposed to react after we topple Saddam, by peacefully and immediately creating an entirely different system of governance?

The answer: Never

We asked a second question: When in recorded history has a change of government in one nation led to a peaceful and spontaneous change of governments in neighboring nations?

The answer: Never.

The operating assumption of the Bush administration was that Iraqis would not act in historically predictable ways because our motives were pure. The notion other human beings will defy human nature if our hearts are pure must be called what it is: new-agey poppycock.

Our motives were pure; we were going to liberate Iraqis from an awful dictator, period. The people of Iraq, upon experiencing this act of selflessness on the part of ‘good guy’ America, would then be guided by peace and love and immediately start rebuilding their society in our image, or something close enough that we could be proud of it. Their neighbors, seeing how the Age of Aquarius had broken out next door, would then rush to join the love-in…and the world would live as one. Thus we would be able to bring most of our troops home very quickly after toppling Saddam, leaving behind only enough to protect Iraq from its evil neighbors until they, too, saw the light.

The effort was doomed from the start because it was based upon magical thinking.

So question one: When in recorded history have human beings reacted to the sudden toppling of their systems of governance the way Iraqis are supposed to react after we topple Saddam, by peacefully creating an entirely different system of governance? Answer: Japan and Germany after the Second World War. Question Two: When in recorded history has a change of government in one nation led to a peaceful and spontaneous change of governments in neighboring nations? Answer: the collapse of the Soviet Union was followed by an astonishing transformation in many neighboring countries. The creation of the European Union also caused an amazing shift in its periphery. The rationale behind the Iraq war was not magical; it was much too optimistic. And that’s where the debate now has to start.

Jon Stewart teed up the ball …

And the president just hit himself in the face. It’s getting pathetic now, isn’t it?

One other thing: please don’t send me a batch. I do not have an intern. One is enough. Pick your best.

It’s unsettling to watch a nasty blogfight over gays from a safe distance. I feel left out. So here’s my take. Glenn Reynolds is about as gay-friendly a Republican as you’ll ever find. It doesn’t exactly take a genius, however, to note that homophobia in general is far more widespread among Republicans than among Democrats, and almost a staple of the far right. Karl Rove uses it knowingly, cynically and deftly to win elections (and Reynolds has never criticized Rove or Bush for it). But it’s also true that there’s a very nasty streak of far-left homophobia that usually targets gay conservatives or Republicans (especially the closeted ones) for particularly vicious assaults that they would never countenance for any gay liberal or Democrat (closeted or otherwise). A few of these far left trolls actually join forces at times with the Christianist right to demonize and out some gay people. And some of these far left homophobes are also … gay.

Is all that clear now?

I might add that, given the huge issues we are now dealing with, Glenn Reynolds’ citation of this issue as one of two defining reasons he voted for Corker over Ford is, well  …  absurd bordering on unhinged. In fact, Glenn’s post about how he voted is one of the lamest pieces of rationalization I’ve read in a very long time. Here you have a "libertarian" who patently couldn’t care less about habeas corpus, torture, and massive government spending and borrowing, but who takes a stand for the Republicans on the question of gay dignity! It would be funny if it weren’t so bloody sad.

Capitalism at work on eBay:

I asked what today’s religious right would think of the great Founding Father’s view of faith. The blog, Civil Commotion, fills the picture in. Today’s Christianists despise Jefferson, and the religious liberty and conscience he championed. Here’s Albert Mohler:

Jefferson‚Äôs confidence in his ability to extract a ‘real’ Jesus from the Gospels is supreme evidence of hubris and arrogance.

And here’s what American evangelicalism used to be about:

Sir David Frost: Is this still a Christian Country?

Billy Graham: No! We’re not a Christian Country. We’ve never been a Christian Country. We’re a secular Country, by our constitution. In which Christians live and which many Christians have a voice. But we’re not a Christian Country.

Bill Graham and Thomas Jefferson or Albert Mohler and James Dobson? I know which two I pick as true representatives of Christian faith.

I’m in a hotel room watching ’80s videos on my laptop. (Yes, we will soon have some winners in the best and worst categories, but if you send me any more I’ll call the whole thing off.) Sadly, I didn’t realize Stephen Colbert had done his own parody of the genre. I do now:

The Washington Post review is here. Money quote:

[If you] have ever read anything by Ann Coulter, this is not a book for you. It is written by a card-carrying intellectual and aimed at card-carrying intellectuals. Sullivan wades deep into the high grasses here; he is more interested in Hegel, Hobbes and Leo Strauss than anyone you’ve seen arguing on television, much less voted for. Further, the book doesn’t really explain how conservatism lost its soul, just that it did, and it doesn’t offer any real prescription for getting it back.

The only fair response is to say that he’s mistaken, in my view, about the first point about how conservatism lost its soul. I have a whole chapter devoted to the slow implosion of principled conservatism in the 1990s and under Bush – and the necon and theocon intellectuals who helped transform it. In fact, it’s the central, pivotal chapter.

But he’s right on the second point. I see no easy political way to get the soul of conservatism back in the near future. McCain is, at best, a tenuous hope. But I do try and describe a positive, skeptical conservatism that is a vibrant alternative to what "conservatism" has now become: a "conservatism of doubt" and a "politics of freedom". This is a book about ideas, not political prescriptions. But I do believe ideas matter in the long run. This is a philosophical and theological analysis, not a political manifesto. (Real conservatives don’t write manifestoes, by definition. Burke and Oakeshott wrote reflections and essays, not prescriptions.) It’s an attempt to start the long road back to conservative intellectual clarity. Before we can change anything, we need to be clear about what our principles are again. The book is an attempt to restate them in stark contrast to what they have become. If you still care about those first principles, and why they are more relevant today than ever, you can buy the book here.

I’m traveling and want time to absorb, mull over and respond to David Brook’s review in the NYT. I’ll try to comment tomorrow.

Maui, Hawaii, 6 am.

The Sunday Times of London reports the following:

American officials held secret talks with leaders of the Iraqi insurgency last week after admitting that their two-month clampdown on violence in Baghdad had failed.

Few details of the discussions in the Jordanian capital Amman have emerged but an Iraqi source close to the negotiations said the participants had met for at least two days.

They included members of the Islamic Army in Iraq, one of the main Sunni militias behind the insurgency, and American government representatives. The talks were described as ‘feeler’ discussions. The US officials were exploring ways of persuading the Sunni groups to stop attacks on allied forces and to end a cycle of increasingly bloody sectarian clashes with members of the majority Shi’ite groups.

According to the source, the key demand of the Islamic Army was the release of American-held prisoners in allied jails.

We’ll see. The Baker commission is studying various options, it would appear. My own take on the dynamic situation can be read here. At some point, Washington may have to talk to Iran and Syria – or face meltdown.

(Photo: Yuri Kozyrev for Time.)