US security, Iraqi freedom are unrelated

[struggle4progress]

<snip>
In the current version, we went to war to defend our security. Without the weapons of mass destruction, where was the threat to our security? Have we created a new threat in the effort to stamp out a nonexistent one?
<snip>

Even less are we being true to ourselves in the broader war on terror. This does not mean we should abandon it - only that we should narrow our objectives. In the same speech - indeed, in the same paragraph - in which the president said he sent troops to Iraq to defend our security, the president also said he sent them there to make "its people free." American security and Iraqi freedom are unrelated. Iraqi freedom is probably unattainable as a part of US policy.
<snip>

What we do know is that in the White House there is a dismissive attitude toward the Geneva Conventions regulating treatment of prisoners. In a memo for the president, White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales wrote off some of these provisions as "quaint." That is part of the abandonment of American values in the name of realism. Abandoned simultaneously are protections for Americans who may be prisoners.
<snip>

By tarnishing the world reputation of the US, the war on terror has seriously reduced American influence. It will take a long time to bring it back. One way to do so would be to follow the prescription of John Quincy Adams who was secretary of State (1817-1825) and president (1825-1829): "Whenever the standard of freedom and independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will be America's heart.... But she does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own."

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0603/p09s01-coop.html

Probably a good indication of where mainstream moderate-liberals currently stand on the Iraq war.

[saigon68]

1. Don't tell that to the CHIMPANZEE

Or the sheep who follow him their every waking moment.

[struggle4progress]

2. Sheep follow the flock: if the flock turns, so do the sheep.