In her diatribe against Jeb Bush, Laura Ingraham suggests that Jeb Bush should play into the media stereotype of the conservative:
First, she's assuming that her opinion about this part of the Iraq War is "fact."
Second, she adopts an opinion that plays into the media stereotype of the conservative. She offers a solution based on the opinion that there were "no WMD" in Iraq.
Again, George Bush's argument about WMD in Iraq was justified repeatedly throughout the Iraq War.
Why is it that far too many people in the general population don't know this? It's because the mainstream media did not emphasize these WMD discoveries. If anything, they tried to downplay it. It's also because too many people are too busy to research the facts.
The mainstream media went into overdrive about the inspection teams not finding WMD. They went in the opposite direction when it came to articles involving WMD in Iraq being found.
Even FOX News, where Laura Ingraham has commented on occasion, generated related articles. In these articles, soldiers were described as being injured with sarin, mustard, and blister agent laced IEDs.
Under asymmetrical warfare, when you have somebody not coming clean with his WMD programs... In a similar camp as somebody else who has already successfully perpetrated attacks on US soil... You don't have room to maneuver.
I still see the decision, to go into Iraq, as the right decision to make. I say that knowing what I know now.
Laura Ingraham leverages her opinion about that argument, misdiagnoses the problem, and gives an erroneous solution. The solution entails partially accepting the media stereotype of the Republican/conservative.
Her statement about being a Republican, but not being stupid, ratifies the liberal's opinions of conservatives.
As a conservative, what I see as stupid is accepting as "fact" media propaganda... then turning around and suggesting the following as a tactic: "I'm a Republican but I'm not stupid, I could learn from my mistakes."
That's like saying, "I live in Washington D.C., but I'm not stuck up." Or, that's like saying, "I may live in the 'boondocks' in the "Deep South", but I'm not a bigot." Both these hypothetical statements, and the Laura statement, ratifies the traits that the speaker is distancing himself from.
To make this clear, we could restate Laura's statement as saying this, "Republicans are 'stupid' and 'don't learn' from their mistakes; I'm a Republican but I'm not stupid and I do learn from my mistakes."
Real conservatives don't allow the opposition to describe them.
Real conservatives stick to the facts, and stick to their decisions. They will continue to stick to this decision when the facts dictate a scenario not supported by mainstream media or by the general public.
Those advisers that she criticized made decisions within a geostrategic environment. They had access to the facts that Laura Ingraham did not have access to. Their arguments, as presented in the months leading up to the Iraq war, as well as presented into the United Nations, still hold.
WMD were consistently discovered in Iraq post invasion. The Iraqis rapidly embraced the change that we were bringing about. Together with improving conditions in Afghanistan, those countries contributed to major changes that took place in the Middle East.
This contributed to the "ripple effect" that the Bush Administration, and its supporters, argued about last decade.
It was up to Washington D.C. to keep aware of what was going on in the areas impacted by the Arab Spring. It was on them to leverage that movement in favor of supporting factors that would facilitate rapid economic and democratic developments.
The current administration failed to do that. This led to rolling back the progress that the Bush Administration delivered to the Obama Administration. Heck, the United States military handed over a straight cut victory in Iraq over to the US government... specifically the State Department.
The military had a plan in place to sustain our gains and to build on it via the Iraqi military. There was no will in Washington D.C. to preserve the victory. The results of this lack of will should not be used to downplay the decision to enter Iraq in the first place.
Again, a real conservative sticks to the facts regardless of the number of people that ignore those facts.
Originally stated by Laura Ingraham
You can't just do, you have to have someone who says, "look I'm a Republican but I'm not an idiot!" I'm not, I'm not stupid! I am a conservative and I learn from the past, I am prove myself, I don't bring in the same people who made the same stupid decisions in the 2000's ah to to get us into the 21st century, the the next part of the 21st century I should say, so, common, I mean we could learn but it's hard...
First, she's assuming that her opinion about this part of the Iraq War is "fact."
Second, she adopts an opinion that plays into the media stereotype of the conservative. She offers a solution based on the opinion that there were "no WMD" in Iraq.
Again, George Bush's argument about WMD in Iraq was justified repeatedly throughout the Iraq War.
Why is it that far too many people in the general population don't know this? It's because the mainstream media did not emphasize these WMD discoveries. If anything, they tried to downplay it. It's also because too many people are too busy to research the facts.
The mainstream media went into overdrive about the inspection teams not finding WMD. They went in the opposite direction when it came to articles involving WMD in Iraq being found.
Even FOX News, where Laura Ingraham has commented on occasion, generated related articles. In these articles, soldiers were described as being injured with sarin, mustard, and blister agent laced IEDs.
Under asymmetrical warfare, when you have somebody not coming clean with his WMD programs... In a similar camp as somebody else who has already successfully perpetrated attacks on US soil... You don't have room to maneuver.
I still see the decision, to go into Iraq, as the right decision to make. I say that knowing what I know now.
Laura Ingraham leverages her opinion about that argument, misdiagnoses the problem, and gives an erroneous solution. The solution entails partially accepting the media stereotype of the Republican/conservative.
Her statement about being a Republican, but not being stupid, ratifies the liberal's opinions of conservatives.
As a conservative, what I see as stupid is accepting as "fact" media propaganda... then turning around and suggesting the following as a tactic: "I'm a Republican but I'm not stupid, I could learn from my mistakes."
That's like saying, "I live in Washington D.C., but I'm not stuck up." Or, that's like saying, "I may live in the 'boondocks' in the "Deep South", but I'm not a bigot." Both these hypothetical statements, and the Laura statement, ratifies the traits that the speaker is distancing himself from.
To make this clear, we could restate Laura's statement as saying this, "Republicans are 'stupid' and 'don't learn' from their mistakes; I'm a Republican but I'm not stupid and I do learn from my mistakes."
Real conservatives don't allow the opposition to describe them.
Real conservatives stick to the facts, and stick to their decisions. They will continue to stick to this decision when the facts dictate a scenario not supported by mainstream media or by the general public.
Those advisers that she criticized made decisions within a geostrategic environment. They had access to the facts that Laura Ingraham did not have access to. Their arguments, as presented in the months leading up to the Iraq war, as well as presented into the United Nations, still hold.
WMD were consistently discovered in Iraq post invasion. The Iraqis rapidly embraced the change that we were bringing about. Together with improving conditions in Afghanistan, those countries contributed to major changes that took place in the Middle East.
This contributed to the "ripple effect" that the Bush Administration, and its supporters, argued about last decade.
It was up to Washington D.C. to keep aware of what was going on in the areas impacted by the Arab Spring. It was on them to leverage that movement in favor of supporting factors that would facilitate rapid economic and democratic developments.
The current administration failed to do that. This led to rolling back the progress that the Bush Administration delivered to the Obama Administration. Heck, the United States military handed over a straight cut victory in Iraq over to the US government... specifically the State Department.
The military had a plan in place to sustain our gains and to build on it via the Iraqi military. There was no will in Washington D.C. to preserve the victory. The results of this lack of will should not be used to downplay the decision to enter Iraq in the first place.
Again, a real conservative sticks to the facts regardless of the number of people that ignore those facts.
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