Disengaging as quickly as possible was the mistake.

Don't get me wrong, GWB's strategy and actions in Iraq are the driving factor and direct cause of what is happening in the region. The evolution under Obama hasn't been effective. Because I am not on the Obama PR team, I am not going to indulge in simply blaming a previous administration for all failures.

I am hopeful that he actually says "some of my best friends are black" in one of the debates. Or all 3 debates.

Taylor Swift is awesome. Seriously. The best. Just terrific.

Drumpf has finally started spending money. I bet it's a lot easier for a video tape to stay on script.

I think a case can be made for remaining in Iraq. The problem is that Obama ran on getting the troops out of there, and the Bush administration towards the end of their term also believed disengagement was correct. Digging in would've been a complete political disaster.

The single biggest thing America could do, in terms of foreign policy, is to stop their self-serving imperialism. Stop invading other countries and messing with their internal politics. The history of the 20th century is America fighting people they originally armed.

I am a fan of Canada's foreign policy (I know shocking). We use our military as a peace keeping force for the most part.

From the New Yorker

I mean, lolCanada free rides on the USA #1 military.

I used to be on the stay the **** out of it side, but that doesn't really work when you're #1. That Atlantic article someone linked about Obama's FP was really illuminating.

What does non-support of Israel if they keep building settlements look like?

I'd like to be able to tell Iran and other countries that if they can establish a stable democracy for ten years and they still want to attack Israel, the US will not stand in their way.

Lol Bachman is back son. The best people.

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/...foreign-policy

Lol Bachman on foreign policy akin to Dids on masculinity. Sup Dids

Trump supporter Kirstie Alley blasts Obama over Louisiana floods

There has to be some sort of deep, sociological study of what is driving so many washed up white celebrities to Trump. Scott Baio. Antonio Sabato Jr. The casts of the 1990s iterations of The Real World. Kirstie Alley. It feels like almost the perfect microcosm of the Trump movement and the American political zeitgeist right now.

Like there's this trope that Trump is appealing to the downtrodden white masses but it's probably a bit of a miss, since Trump isn't really doing THAT well with that group of working class whites.

But that doesn't mean there isn't a lot of suffering and shame in white American right now. Even among celebrities you haven't heard from since the 1990s. That they are all finding their way to Trump is just utterly fascinating.

Oh yeah, that was Cheney's job alright. Also, I'm calling BS. The refinery next to my house has it's own power station that supplies enough to keep it limping along. I suggest oil refineries are not going to explode because there's a power outage. Cheney's call had nothing to do with safety.

The problem with post 2003 Iraq was we did all we could to set different groups against each other. I don't know how much of that was locked up before Obama took office, but I expect it was too late for him.

All the different groups have been set against each other for decades. Its like a bunch of rowdy children who go the parent (the US) lying about who hit who, etc. and try to use the parent's discipline as weapons against each other.

Whenever you have a majority group being suppressed by a minority group, hell is going to be unleashed whenever you implement democracy because the democratic sentiment will be for vengeance. I mean just look at the vitriol and hate here in the US towards groups that are the OPPRESSED. The major criticism of Bush, other than intervening in the first place, is removing the Bathists from government but how do you morally justify keeping a group who literally raped, tortured and murdered in a just government? I mean maybe you try to pick the few good ones to stay, but imagine that would be difficult, its all ****ed.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/...ctrine/471525/

Atlantic article I posted that Riverman was referring to.

Because you don't treat every mid-level bureaucrat as a war criminal. See de-Nazification and how it never really happened.

Also, supposedly Iraq was not *that* sectarian before 2003. Neighborhoods were mixed. People didn't even know who was Shia and who was Sunni at least to some degree.

How?

The common narrative is that the US was fairly successful in incentivizing Al-Maliki to put the interests of the country first when we has a strong presence in Iraq. We left and Al-Maliki turned to Iran and the country unraveled along sectarian divisions.

People want to compare Iraq to something medieval because of Islam or something, but breaking up empires and ending dictatorships went through an awful lot of testing from 1914 to 1994 in Europe. Some people must have had a pretty good idea how to handle Saddam's removal.

Setting groups against each other? Neighbors need no help with that.. whether it be Israel & Palestine, Sunni and Shia or Kansas and Missouri, Cubs / Cardinals Neighbors hate, therefore geographic rivals

Could be, but that would just go to show how insane the invasion was in the first place. We never really left Germany or Japan. We could have by now, but it had to be a commitment for decades. That was never going to happen in Iraq.

Although, maybe this was all inevitable anyway since Sykes-Pikot and it's the British, French, and Russian's fault.

Obviously no correct answer, but what does the world look like today if America responds to 9/11 without invading any nation?

This is an area I don't have much experience so I'm interested to learn more.

Gulf states via Iraq and Iran had an eight year long war and the primary dividing line was the Sunni/Shiite split. So Iran's covert (and now extremely overt) involvement probably complicated matters for us.

And if you read that article, Obama is very pessimistic towards the ME and primary reason is his belief that they are very tribalistic.