{"id":470,"date":"2006-08-22T08:54:03","date_gmt":"2006-08-22T12:54:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/000af36.netsolhost.com\/wordpress1\/2006\/08\/22\/you_say_tomato_\/"},"modified":"2006-08-22T08:54:03","modified_gmt":"2006-08-22T12:54:03","slug":"you_say_tomato_","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/2006\/08\/22\/you_say_tomato_\/","title":{"rendered":"You Say Tomato, I Say Disaster"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The headline on the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/wp-dyn\/content\/article\/2006\/08\/21\/AR2006082100209.html\">A1 story<\/a> in The Washington Post:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Bush Says Iraq Pullout Would Be \u201cA Disaster\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Isn\u2019t that what it is now?<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;If you think it&#8217;s bad now, imagine what Iraq would look like if the United States leaves before this government can defend itself and sustain itself,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;&#8221;If we[withdraw], there will be horrific sectarian cleansing in the mixed areas, particularly in Baghdad, and civil war,&#8221; [former ambassador <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/wp-dyn\/content\/article\/2006\/08\/21\/AR2006082101490.html \">Peter Galbraith] said<\/a>. &#8220;If we stay the course, there will be horrific sectarian cleansing in Baghdad, and civil war.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Ah, but then we get into that old definition of a \u201ccivil war.\u201d  Last week <a href=\"http:\/\/commonwealthcommonsense.typepad.com\/commonwealthcommonsense\/2006\/08\/sunnis_vs_shiit.html \">I ridiculed the debate<\/a>.  But it turns out I wasn\u2019t far off.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld argued that Iraq would not have civil war until the Confederates attack Fort Sumter. &#8220;It seems to me that it is not a classic civil war at this stage,&#8221; Professor Rumsfeld argued. &#8220;It certainly isn&#8217;t like our civil war.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>No, so to help us keep things straight in our mind, let\u2019s ask Sen. George Allen if he could lend his confederate flag to one side in the conflict.  Then we\u2019ll know who to root for &#8212; and who he\u2019ll root for.<\/p>\n<p>Footnote:  From today\u2019s stories in The Post, it\u2019s clear we have achieved a nexus.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Several prominent Democrats <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/wp-dyn\/content\/article\/2006\/08\/21\/AR2006082100209_2.html \">rejected Bush&#8217;s call<\/a> for staying the course in Iraq, saying <strong>the problem there is not a lack of will but lack of a winning strategy <\/strong>(emphasis added).<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;ABC News&#8217;s Martha Raddatz <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/wp-dyn\/content\/article\/2006\/08\/21\/AR2006082101490_2.html \">was not satisfied<\/a> [with Bush\u2019s defense of the war]. &#8220;The violence has gotten worse in certain areas,&#8221; she reminded him. <strong>&#8220;Is it not time for a new strategy?&#8221; <\/strong>(emphasis added)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>When the press and one political party ask the same question, it\u2019s safe to say the other political party is in deep doo-doo, as W\u2019s father might say..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The headline on the A1 story in The Washington Post: Bush Says Iraq Pullout Would Be \u201cA Disaster\u201d Isn\u2019t that what it is now? &#8220;If you think it&#8217;s bad now, imagine what Iraq would look like if the United States leaves before this government can defend itself and sustain itself,&#8221; he said. &#8230;&#8221;If we[withdraw], there&hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/2006\/08\/22\/you_say_tomato_\/\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=470"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}