As Brian Williams becomes the first person punished for lying about the Iraq War, Dick Cheney is about to headline a fundraiser for the National Republican Congressional Committee. Benjamin Netanyahu is about to speak to a joint session of Congress and George W. Bush’s brother — who has “never disagreed” with any of W.’s policies — is the frontrunner for the GOP presidential nomination. One of Jeb’s biggest backers and favorite advisors? Condoleelza Rice.
Any rational person has given up any hope that there will be any real punishment for those who lied us into the Iraq War — and still are unrepentant of their support for the lies that led to that disaster, which they carefully hit until after the 2004 election. Mitt Romney’s foreign policy team was made up almost entirely of pro-Iraq War Bush/Cheney veterans. And that barely hurt him.
But let’s at least stop the exact same people who mislead us into a war with Iraq do the exact same thing with Iran.
America’s hawks are freaking out. This isn’t because America is at any more risk than we have been over the last decade. It’s because we’re closer to peace. They know their cries for putting American ground troops back leading the charge in Iraq will conjure up memories of a failed strategy that will fail us again. And their greatest fear is that detente with Iran will actually work.
Media, you don’t have work hard to make the connections here.
“There is no question whatsoever that Saddam is seeking and is working and is advancing towards the development of nuclear weapons — no question whatsoever,” Netanyahu said in 2002. “If you take out Saddam, Saddam’s regime, I guarantee you that it will have enormous positive reverberations on the region.”
Today Netanyahu is doing his best to stop any deal with Iran as his fellow hawks push the lie that Iran’s leadership is eager for martyr-hood.
The peace process may not work. Even if it does, Iran may violate the conditions. And even then we would have to answer the question: Why does Iran requires a preventative war but North Korea — which became a nuclear state thanks to George W. Bush — doesn’t? And those who are necessitating another war with another Middle Eastern country, this one larger and better defended than Iraq, need to make the case that it could even work, since experts don’t think it would — unless we invested trillions of dollars and tens of thousands of lives in an occupation that would have to last for decades.
The exact same people who rushed us to war with Iraq say we’re rushing to peace with Iran. Why the hell would you believe them?
