Batfink's Beep -- 11-18-05

Archive: What's REALLY going on with Murtha?

November 18, 2005

A funny thought occurred to me as I was puzzling over the Murtha thing. Had he flipped his lid? I wondered why such a formerly staunch military man would suddenly go all Kucinich-wobbly and call for surrender, and suddenly I thought: what if he didn't?

What if this is the dropping of a shoe I have been waiting on for a while now, namely, the Dem attempt to take some credit for what even they now perceive as unavoidable victory in Iraq?

Think about it: it was always clear that, as long as Bush didn't get scared into pulling out, we would eventually win in Iraq. Al Zawahiri himself said that the only way the terrorists can win is if the American left gets us to give up the fight. So that has been the approach all these years. But by now, even the most stupid among anti-American leftists will have to admit that, with the 3rd election next month, time is getting awfully short for a pullout to result in US defeat. And after that, Bush can start bringing the troops home in glory, and at a nice, even pace that will keep the warm fuzzies going right through the November election. They can just smell the GOP victories that would result, and this is the last electoral chance they will have to give a sitting Bush a black eye at the polls.

So what's plan B? Well, to set up the field to say that THEY forced the administration to pull out, since he soon will anyway. The final election is next month, after all -- after that, it's Mission-Acomplished-Let-The-Parades-Begin time, with troops rotating home all through the year. The Democrats need a way they can go into November 2006 saying that it was THEM who brought the troops home, not Bush. Crazy? There is a precedent, and a recent one at that: Consider what the Palestinians tried to do when the Israelis unilaterally pulled out of Gaza a little while ago: claim that they had forced it by lobbing a couple rockets during the pullout, and that the credit for it was therefore theirs.

Sure, it's a dirty trick. And sure, nobody was fooled when the Palestinians tried it. But since even the hard left doesn't have the nerve to predict a fiasco in the coming Iraqi election (they were pretty thoroughly embarrassed the last 2 times, after all) all they have left is to try to make lemonade from what to them is the lemons that are the looming US victory of a functioning, freely elected democracy in Iraq, and our troops coming home to well-earned cheers and parades. As I said: Time is running out, and desperate times call for desperate measures.

At least they got a Marine to lead the charge.

UPDATE: Well, that didn't take long. Today, 11/20/05, on 'Meet the Press', Mr. Murtha told host Tim Russert "Let me predict this: We're going to be out of there, we're going to be out of there very quickly, and it's going to be close to the plan that I'm presenting right now. "

"You think we'll be out of Iraq by the end of 2006?” asked Russert. "I think we'll be out of there; if not completely out of there, we'll be very close to being out of there,” said Murtha. "I think we could be out -- yeah, I predict we'll be out of there -- it'll be 2006."

Doesn't this belief beg the question of why, if he believed that the administration was going to be pulling out anyway, and in a way that's "very close" to his suggestion, he felt the need to demand it? If anyone can think of a reason besides that he wanted to be in a position someday to make believe that it happened because of him rather than because it was Bush's plan all along, I'd sure like to know what it is. Use the E-mail link at the upper left of this page if you can think of a plausible alternative, and I'll post it here as an update.

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