He Was Expendable
By Mitch Berg
Five years ago, former Marine General Anthony Zinni became every liberal’s favorite general (also the only general they could name) when he came out against the Bush Administration’s strategery in Iraq.
You knew there had to be limits. Ed Morrissey writes:
When General Anthony Zinni publicly criticized the Iraq War, he became a darling of the Left. Now that the Iraq War has all but ended in victory, he’s apparently dispensable. Zinni had been offered the position of Ambassador to Iraq, accepted it, and had even received a congratulatory phone call from Barack Obama. While he made arrangements to live in Iraq, though, Obama and Hillary Clinton changed their minds — and never bothered to tell him:
And why?
…So what happened to the man Democrats used repeatedly to bolster their efforts to undermine George Bush’s efforts in Iraq? Zinni works for a company that does a lot of business in Iraq, and supposedly the Obama administration worried about how that would look in a confirmation hearing. Another source told FP that the Obama team worried about the optics of sending two former generals as ambassadors to Iraq and Afghanistan simultaneously.
However, neither of those explanations make much sense. Given how hard Obama fought to keep Tom Daschle and his $5 million worth of work for the industry he would soon regulate, the Dyncorp position would have been hardly a burp in a Democratic-controlled Senate. Obama’s appointed 12 lobbyists to key positions already, and an ambassadorship even to a key post like Iraq wouldn’t raise an eyebrow. And who cares whether one general or two becomes Ambassador to war theaters?
Rumor also had it that Zinni had his taxes all paid up.
Let me get this straight – Bush was the dumb, fumbly one?
February 6th, 2009 at 9:19 am
Really, the only General ANY liberal could name?
Let me try a few out on you – off the top of my head.
Eric Shinseki
Anthony Taguba
John Shalikashvili
David Patreaus
ALL criticized this war and/or its prosuction, ALL of them. Your comment is slanderous and dead wrong. I have enough friends in the military to tell you without hesitance that while they see value in helping Iraqis, they feel a bond with some that they developed over time, ALL of the people I know feel the method of prosecution was horribly wrong until Bush lost the 2006 elections. All of them – as the saying goes “F- you and how’s the family” because this was a pretty offensive thing you just said Mitch, and profoundly profoundly wrong. I know MANY liberal members of the military, MANY who could name prominent and powerful generals who opposed our actions, lack of planning, and poor and pathetic execution in Iraq.
February 6th, 2009 at 9:20 am
BTW, yes Bush was an IS the dumb one – that, or he was criminally malfeasant, and the economy has the skid marks to prove it.
February 6th, 2009 at 9:23 am
BTW – slanderous is MY term – I certainly don’t mean legally obviously, it means I find your comments utterly demeaning and insulting of the reputation and knowledge of liberals. Clearly there are libs who don’t know peanuts from CWIS, but then again, that’s MORE than true about a VAST number of conservatives. I wonder how many of your readers could tell you who Omar Bradley was, or William Westmoreland – I’m sure many could, but MANY couldn’t. Knowledge of military history and military tactis Is NOT the sole province of conservatism, and ignorance of it is certainly the province of the ignorant, of which the right does not lack for members.
February 6th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Peev, you may now remove the hook from your mouth. 😀
February 6th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
As usual, peev is profoundly profoundly wrong.
Yet it is fun watch him have a tantrum. It’s not hard to picture him holding his breath until he turns blue, kicking and screaming.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
During the Dubya Bush administration we not only won the war in Iraq but we also won the peace in Iraq. They said it couldn’t be done, yes we can and yes we did!!!
Now hang on tight, the Obama Depression might be a very bumpy ride.
February 6th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
K- you’ve never been capable of sustaining a discussion with me, don’t confuse yourself now, it will only make you look more the fool.
Mitch was talking about some issues with Anthony Zinni, but he made a manifestly insulting comment that liberals can’t identify any other generals, and moreover that there really weren’t any, who disagreed with the Iraq policy – there were dozens, and I named those off the top of my head. But more, there were many hundreds of thousands of liberals who fought in Iraq, and his comments were demeaning to their service.
Let me ask you K, did you serve? If not, perhaps you finding it funny when someone is offended by the insensitive and profoundly wrong remarks of someone else then we can consider your lack of understanding born of your ignorance of the sacrifices involved which were so basely insulted.
The Right does not ‘own’ military strength, I’d argue it did a damned good job wrecking the military over the past 8 years, and many people I know in the military agree.
K-Rod, if you think the ‘war’ in Iraq is over, or that it is at peace, I suggest you go there, or perhaps attend the burial of a US soldier killed there in the past 6 months, and tell the family that Iraq is at peace. Things are better there, and why? Because Patreaus understood that Al Qaeda WAS NOT WELCOME IN IRAQ, in short, the reason for our invasion was BS – and used the culture of payments for help with tribal leaders to roust out a group that NO ONE WANTED. It’s too bad the right denied this for 3.5 years, it’s too bad you had to lose the 2006 election to be forced/willing to change, because hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died in the interim due to your profound ignorance and ethnocentric arrogance.
You’ve (K-Rod) have shown time and again you have nearly zero understanding of issues, if you choose to act like a clown, change your name to Bozo, or mabye Bonzo, it would be temporally appropriate.
Brad – I don’t think that was intended as a hook, I think it was part of what has been a constant stream of message that the right ‘gets’ military issues while the left is ‘weak’ – if Mitch said it to yank chains – ok – then let him say so, and I’ll apologize, but then I’ll ask him to cease, because it really truly is profoundly insulting.
February 6th, 2009 at 12:49 pm
Sorry, to be fair to Mitch, I suppose I should have said “that there weren’t any THEY COULD NAME who disagreed with our Iraq policy” – it creates an inference that there weren’t any – or that libs were ignorant – OR BOTH – and if he meant the former, the words were uncareful about potential inference. Regardless, it wrongly accused libs of ignorance in greater amounts than cons about the military. I’ve met MANY cons who were profoundly ignorant of the military.
February 6th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
Peev,
Thank you for your service. Should have said that before.
The main point of the post is that Team Obama treated Zinni poorly. Based on what I’ve read here and elsewhere, there’s no doubt about that being true.
February 6th, 2009 at 1:24 pm
Ha ha ha ha ha ha
Peev certainly is doing his best whining today.
Excellent tantrum by peev, crying, kicking, & screaming. Next, watch him hold his breath until he turns blue.
Nice try at censoring discussion to only those that served in Iraq. Millions of men and women have served so that ALL Americans can voice their opinions, not just those that served.
Peev, remember the last time I virtually kicked yer ass and there was nothing you could do about it. 8)
You would make a great Black knight!!!
February 6th, 2009 at 2:00 pm
K-Rod, your aggressive stupidity and lack of any line of logic in your posts puts you in grave danger of a shunning. Angryclown prefers only to shun one wingnut at a time – the stupidest of the stupid – but you are making a serious play for the title. Angryclown is considering whether to put two wingnuts on the shun setting or to grant early parole to Mr. Shi(r)t and replace him with you. Please don’t make all this necessary. Use your brain or restrain your fingers.
February 6th, 2009 at 2:13 pm
Project much, assclown?
February 6th, 2009 at 7:17 pm
Oh, your doomed, K-Rod. Doomed. The best you can hope for is a “bracketed shunning”. That’s where Angry Klown still responds to your comments, but he surrounds his words with square brackets to indicate that you are shunned.
I would suggest countering his shunning by calling down upon him a Plague of Toads and Weeping Boils.
February 7th, 2009 at 8:04 pm
“BTW, yes Bush was an IS the dumb one – that, or he was criminally malfeasant, and the economy has the skid marks to prove it.”
Oh please. The blame goes all around, not just on Bush. #1 was Alan Greenspan for printing way too much money for many, many, years. He also failed to regulate independent mortgage brokers and he was the only one in place to do it. #2 was various versions of Democrat and Republican laxness in financial regulation. We have an ignorance of finance and economics and finance in this country that is killing us and congress isn’t responding to the problem. #3 was and incredibly greedy something-for-nothing, risk ignorant culture that permeated everything and was arguably caused by Greenspan printing too much money. #4 The “ownership society” garbage promulgated by both Bush, Democrats, and ACORN as a solution to inequality in society. All it did is get people into risky housing loans. The real solution is a massive revamp of fiscal and monetary policy, but of course this is too complicated for anyone to grasp so it doesn’t get any political recognition as worthwhile in the long run.
What won’t be complicated to grasp is inflation and interest rates going to the moon if Bernanke and Geitner don’t pull a freaking rabbit out of their hat.