Maureen Dowd is Still An Idiot

NOTE: If you came here looking for MoDo nudity, please seek psychological help NOW.

Holy crap, the new Maureen Dowd column is one of the dumbest things she's ever written. EVER. I haven't fisked anyone for a long time, and I think this would be a good way to get back to that. Let's get started right now:

Escape From the Green Zone

By MAUREEN DOWD

You'd think that President Bush would have learned by now to keep those snappy aphorisms to himself.

Pot, kettle, etc., etc...

Gonna get Osama dead or alive. Or neither.

Yeah, because Bush is over in Afghanistan personally looking for him. Besides, judging by the fact that we haven't heard from him in a couple years, I still think he's already dead. In any case, what exactly is he going to do? We kinda killed a lot of his friends.

Gonna smoke Osama out of his cave. When exactly?

Okay, now she's just repeating things to fill up space.

Bring 'em on. Please don't.

MoDo, MoDo, MoDo...you're thinking of France. Come on, you can do better than this. Wait, no you can't. Sorry.

Mission Accomplished. Not.

Which mission? The mission to overthrow Saddam? Or to kill his sons? Or to give Iraqis control of the government? Or rebuild schools and hospitals? Or arrange for elections? Those goalposts have been moved so many times, I don't even think they're on this planet anymore. Literally. Next we'll be hearing:

"The war won't be a success until Iraq has a SPACE PROGRAM!"

Then, when they get a space program, the left will accuse Bush of trying to take over the Moon and steal its oil.

Let freedom reign. Couldn't Karl Rove and his minions at least get that "ad-lib" right about freedom ringing?

I love the double implication here. First of all: You are a conspiracy believing idiot, Dowd. Can you consider, just for one tenth of a second, that maybe Bush actually does things on his own without the eeeeeeevil Rove puppeteer controlling him from the shadows? This is DU stuff, appearing in a major newspaper. And you wonder why we don't take your side seriously.

Second: How do you know it was supposed to be freedom ringing? I know that's the common expression, but for all we know, Bush could've been alluding to the previous reign of a murderous dictator. Mind-reading is bad, Mauron. It makes a Democrat out of the University of Maine.

Not gonna cut and run. We can't cut, but we certainly ran.

Because "we" obviously means "Bremer!"

Paul Bremer scuttled out of Baghdad so fast, he didn't even wait for the new ambassador, John Negroponte, to arrive so he could pass along some safety tips.

The administration can't win, can they? If we hand over government control, the criticism is focused on the behavior of the guy who handed it over. You know, Bremer did give a speech before he left. But your friends in the "unbiased" media didn't feel that it was important enough to report. In fact, some outlets just plain lied about it.

Mr. Negroponte, assuming the most perilous diplomatic post in the world, is going to need all the security advice he can get if Iraq keeps slouching toward Islamic fundamentalism and rampant terrorism.

See, that's why we're giving them self-rule. They have the power to stop terrorism themselves now, or vote out Islamic fundamentalism. It's true that they still need U.S. troops there for now, but since it looks like we won't be stealing their ooooooiiiiiiil, they'll be out as soon as possible. And then you'll accuse them of being scared.

The administration went from Shock and Awe to Sneak and Shirk. Gotta run, guys — keep chins up and heads down.

Apparently, you missed the part where we kept our military in the country.

The Bush crowd pretended the country was free and able to stand on its own, even as the odd manner in which Mr. Bremer scooted away showed that it wasn't.

Let's examine this logic: The Iraqi government no longer needs Bremer to be there, and this is a sign that they can't stand on their own.

...Have you been messing with 'shrooms again?

The president acted as if Iraq was in control, but our forces can't come home because Iraq's still out of control.

AHA! There's that contradiction everyone was waiting for. Once again, it's time for a review:

Point #1: Paul Bremer left Iraq as quickly as possible, and it seems like we're cutting and running. Therefore, the war is a failure.

Point #2: We can't bring the troops home yet. Therefore, the war is a failure.

Kerrytastic.

As Paul Bremer was sneaking out, Ahmad Chalabi, the swindler who has bilked America out of millions, was sneaking in. He was smiling from ear to ear at the swearing-in ceremony for the new prime minister, Iyad Allawi (a ceremony so secretive that coalition officials confiscated reporters' cellphones to enforce an embargo on the news for security reasons).

Yeah, that's why there were p1ctures and accounts all over the news about an hour after it happened. And as for the cell phone thing, do you remember the story about reporters who knew that an attack was coming, and didn't tell U.S. forces about it? That's probably why they don't trust them. A story about the swearing-in ceremony being attacked by "insurgents" would be much more exciting, after all.

If Americans needed any more confirmation that they're viewed as loathed occupiers, not beloved liberators...

I covered this yesterday, so I won't go into the whole "of course they're occupiers, you idiot, what else can we liberate them from?" screed, but I do want to point to the wonderful projection going on here. See, nobody ever said that they loathe us just because we're occupying them. Dowd is assuming that they feel the way she does about the war. At least that's the only logical explanation I can come up with. I hope there is a logical explanation.

...it came with the sad little spectacle of a hasty, heavily guarded hand-over that no Iraqi John Trumbell will memorialize in an oil painting of the Declaration of Iraqi Independence.

You do realize that we were at war when the U.S. Declaration of Independence was signed, right? In fact, the fighting went on for a couple more years afterwards.

OH NO! AMERICA IS A FAILURE!

Dick Cheney and the neocons...

I still can't get over how hilarious it is that "mainstream" media types are using this word. This is why I no longer believe that the fringe left is in the minority.

...had once hoped for a grand Independence Day celebration, no doubt, where Saddam's toppled statue once loomed, dreaming of a parade of Iraqi high school pep squads and the Iraqi Olympic bobsled team...

You have a really warped perception of progress. That's all I'll say.

...sky boxes for Halliburton executives...

Couldn't leave that out, could ya? I swear these morons have a meme quota they have to fulfill before they can get published.

...grateful Iraqis, cheering and crying...

Read the Iraqi blog I linked for that one. Some of them actually are happy about this.

President Bush making a surprise drop-in from the NATO summit meeting in nearby Turkey, with "Mission Accomplished" pen sets for the new government; Katie, Matt and Diane beaming it back to proud Americans.

See? There's another meme. They might as well just use this thing.

Instead, there was no real transfer of power because there was no power to transfer.

And with that sweeping and inaccurate generalization, the MoDoPoodle lost all remaining credibility. Fortunately, nobody noticed the change.

It was a virtual transfer, just the way the rationale for war was virtual and the shift of Saddam's custody to Iraq is virtual.

And the way your writing ability is virtual! Right? RIGHT?!

The Bush team is not going to trust Iraqi security to hang onto Saddam because it doesn't even know yet whether Iraqi security can hang onto the country.

For someone who is so averse to symbolism, you sure seem upset about the fact that Saddam is in the most secure location possible instead of in custody of the Iraqis, who probably don't even want to deal with him until they get the country up and running. Maybe you're afraid they'll make a naked pyramid out of him and his buddies.

With rumblings in Iraq that a strongman may be needed to tamp down the anarchy, what if the old Baathist crowd rushed to crown Saddam, instead of his foes storming the prison to "hack him to pieces," as Mr. Bremer speculated on the "Today" show?

Well, that's why we're killing the Saddam loyalists. But of course, you're against that as well, because it was Bush's idea.

Mr. Bremer's escape from the Green Zone was uncomfortably reminiscent of the last days of Saigon.

ANOTHER MEME! This is making my head hurt.

No one was hanging onto the skids of helicopters, but the mood was furtive, not festive. American troops are still trapped in Iraq and being killed there, and 5,600 ex-soldiers are being involuntarily recalled in America's undeclared draft.

Holy crap, I'm not even in the military, and I know that there's no draft. In case you haven't figured it out, the word "reserve" actually means something. They signed up for a certain amount of time, and they're being called in because they're still in the service. The same thing happened during Desert Storm, but there's still no draft, is there?

(Read this for more.)

The White House pretended that the sovereignty was real.

Can you say "elitism," children? Believing that it's fake doesn't make it fake.

The administration that is loath to share information and presidential papers — even to help the 9/11 investigation find ways to make the country more secure...

ANOTHER FRIGGIN' MEME! This time, it's the "secretive administration" one. You did use the Lefterator, didn't you?

...quickly turned over a ph0to of Mr. Bush's handwritten "Let freedom reign!" comment on Condi Rice's note to him announcing the transfer.

More double standards. Wonderful.

But it rings — or reigns...

Ah ha ha. Ha.

(/Paul Shaffer)

...hollow in a week when Sandra Day O'Connor and the Supremes — except the Bush family fixer Clarence Thomas...

Did she just call him an Uncle Tom? Because that's sure what it sounded like.

...slapped the commander in chief for torturing without a license.

I don't recall seeing Dubya in those p1ctures that the media shoved in our faces for a month.

"A state of war is not a blank check for the president," the court ruled.

Since Bush agrees with that, I don't see the problem here.

Still, Mr. Bremer put the best foot forward. Noting that the ex-proconsul was standing on the White House lawn still in the boots he wore with suits in Iraq, Charlie Gibson of ABC asked the escapee how he felt.

"Well, it's like having a rather large weight lifted off my shoulders," he said. "I'm delighted to be back."

If only our soldiers could say the same.

But as soon as they leave, you'll use that as proof that we can't handle the occupation, right? Because in your mind, nothing done by a Republican president can possibly be a good thing.

Just wait. It'll happen.

Posted by CD on July 1, 2004 04:04 PM
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