The unblinking Ðìçk Cheney (as we saw in last night’s “Colbert Report”), along with various stalking horses, keeps saying we must stay in Iraq “until the job is done.”
Now I know it was a long time ago–four years–but as I recall, the job was to get Saddam out of power and to find the WMDs.
Saddam is dead and there’s no WMDs.
Mission accomplished. The job, as delineated by the Bush administration, is done. Saying that departing now is “cutting and running” is like saying that punching out the time clock at 5 PM is “bailing out.”
PAD
• 
What spinning, lying, and wishful thinking on the left are you referring to?
Posted by Micha at January 28, 2007 12:05 PM
“It’s amazing that the Scots and English have kept seperate identities for so long”
Not entirely… It’s arguably more amazing that the relationship hasn’t had the same problems as still beset Northern Ireland.
Even with a simplistic version of British history, the Scots have been a distinct race for over 2000 years, while the English have been forged over the same period by layers of Romans, then Angles, Saxons and Jutes, and then Normans.
The Union was very much a marriage of mutual convenience, and the religious ups and downs of the last 300 years have been more within both nation than between nations.
As for Braveheart… I live 12 miles from the site of the Battle of Stirling. It was fun at the time the film came out, mentioning it to a local and watching him get totally locked between the absolute outrage at the liberties taken with history and the thought of all that Yankee tourist money…
Though it has recently been one in the eye for all those who said Mel Gibson couldn’t play a convincing Scot. Ten years on, and he’s a drunken loud-mouthed religious bigot… 🙂
Cheers!
I usually ignore Mike for obvious reasons, but I think I should address this because I misspoke, and I should correct myself.
I wrote:
“there has been too much spinning, lying, and wishful thinking both from the right and left”
The experience with left-wing politics comes from my support and later involvement with the Israeli left. Although I still support its positions, the Israeli left have been guilty at times of wishful thinking and intellectual dishonesty that greatly harmed our credibility (especially with regard to taking terrorism seriously). This has made me very wary of certain left wing attitudes, if for no other reason because I find the right wing spins easier to spot. I’ve also encountered some intellectual dishonesty and naivity coming from left wing circles outside Israel, but I’m not that familiar with the American left, so I was wrong to use such a wide brush, especially since my point was that we should analyze the threats and benefits of withdrawl in Iraq cautiously and rationally with intellectual honesty.
On the general level my experience has taught me that intellectual dishonesty can occur both in the left and the right. I’m very cautious with the left because this is the side I usually instinctually support.
Micah, I have to ask because I can’t seem to lock down a reliable answer: What happened to the captured Israeli soldiers who were the trigger for the war six months ago?
PAD
Anyone who thinks their side doesn’t engage in some spinning, lying, and wishful thinking is probably simply too dumb to recognize it or too dishonest to admit it.
A thinking person has the responsibility to at least try to see the falsehoods even when they come from the side that has one’s sympathies. Some partisans on both sides will refuse to do this but that’s part of what makes it hard to take them seriously.
And I think in the long run it opens an opportunity–right now a candidate who is able to come across as a straight shooter, willing to speak what they see as the truth even if it goes against the conventional tenents of their party has a good chance of appealling to the independents and thinkers on both sides–a hard combination to beat.
“Micah, I have to ask because I can’t seem to lock down a reliable answer: What happened to the captured Israeli soldiers who were the trigger for the war six months ago?”
Gilad Shalit, the soldier who was taken into Gaza is still captive. There are talks involving the Hamas, Israel and Egypt about prisoner exchange going on all the time, with one side or the other making optimistic proclamations. But the soldier is still captive, and it seems that the reason we have not been able to get him back in exchange for Palestinian prisoners has more to do with internal Palestinian politics than anything else. It is also a great embarassment for Israel that no intelligence is available for a rescue attempt. For all we know they could have smuggled him into Sinai.
The two soldiers that were taken by Hizballa are also still captive. We have some (not many) Hizballa prisoners from the war, but I don’t know of any negotiations. Both Nasseralla and Olmert have their hands full right now. The Hizballa is a very tight organization, so a rescue attempt does not seem to be an option (not that I would know if it was).
Of course the reason for the war wasn’t really the kidnapped soldiers, any more than a murder in Sarajevo was the reason for WWI. There were two interrelated reasons for the war:
1) The HIzballa has built a mini state in Southern Lebanon, armed to the teeth, and were attacking across the border (in a disputed area) repeatedly without impunity ever since the unilateral withdrawl from Lebanon.
2) The Israeli prime minister won the elections on a platform of unilateral withdrawl. The fact that in a brief time after his victory Israel was attacked from both areas it withdrew from, put him in a very difficult situation.
Since the war was conducted badly now he is in a very bad situation, and the support for withdrawl or peace has diminished.
Peter, I should also add that the families of the soldiers have been capaigning in Israel and abroad to get something moving, including a demonstration, I think. But the truth is there is little that they can do except extort promises from European politicians that they will try to do something.
Peter J. Poole, don’t let the Scots put you down. The Scots were not a distinct race 2000 years ago.
Here is what the Britannica has to say:
“From about AD 400 there was a long period for which written evidence is scanty. Four peoples–the Picts, the Scots, the Britons, and the Angles–were eventually to merge and thus form the kingdom of Scots.
The Picts occupied Scotland north of the Forth. Their identity has been much debated, but they possessed a distinctive culture, seen particularly in their carved symbol stones. Their original language, presumably non-Indo-European, has disappeared; some Picts probably spoke a Brythonic Celtic language. Pictish unity may have been impaired by their apparent tradition of matrilineal succession to the throne.
The Scots, from Dalriada in northern Ireland, colonized the Argyll area, probably in the late 5th century. Their continuing connection with Ireland was a source of strength to them, and Scots Gaelic and Irish (Goidelic Celtic languages) did not become distinct from one another until the late Middle Ages. Scottish Dalriada soon extended its cultural as well as its military sway east and south, though one of its greatest kings, Aidan, was, in 603, defeated by the Angles at Degsastan near the later Scottish border.
The Britons, speaking a Brythonic Celtic language, colonized Scotland from farther south, probably from the first century BC onward. They lost control of southeastern Scotland to the Angles in the early 7th century AD. The British heroic poem Gododdin describes a stage in this process. The British kingdom of Strathclyde in southwestern Scotland remained, with its capital at Dumbarton.
The Angles were Teutonic-speaking invaders from across the North Sea. Settling from the 5th century, they had by the early 7th century created the kingdom of Northumbria, stretching from the Humber to the Forth. A decisive check to their northward advance was administered in 685 by the Picts at the Battle of Nechtansmere in Angus.”
“Viking raids on the coasts of Britain began at the end of the 8th century, Lindisfarne and Iona being pillaged in the 790s. By the mid-9th century, Norse settlement of the western and northern isles and of Caithness and Sutherland had begun, probably owing largely to overpopulation on the west coast of Norway. During the 10th century, Orkney and Shetland were ruled by Norse earls nominally subject to Norway. In 1098 Magnus II Barefoot, king of Norway, successfully asserted his authority in the northern and western isles and made an agreement with the king of Scots on their respective spheres of influence. A mid-12th-century earl of Orkney, Ragnvald, built the great cathedral at Kirkwall in honour of his martyred uncle St. Magnus.
The Norse legacy to Scotland was long-lasting. In the mid-12th century there was a rising against the Norse in the west under a native leader, Somerled, who drove them from the greater part of mainland Argyll. A Norwegian expedition of 1263 under King Haakon IV failed to maintain the Norse presence in the Hebrides, and three years later they were ceded to Scotland by the Treaty of Perth. In 1468-69 the northern isles of Orkney and Shetland were pawned to Scotland as part of a marriage settlement with the crown of Denmark-Norway. A Scandinavian language, the Norn, was spoken in these Viking possessions, and some Norse linguistic influence is discernible in Shetland to the present day.”
“Up to the 11th century the unification was the work of a Scots Gaelic-speaking dynasty, and there is place-name evidence of the penetration of Gaelic south of the Forth. But from then on, the Teutonic English speech that had come to Scotland from the kingdom of Northumbria began to attain mastery, and Gaelic began its slow retreat north and west. This is not obscured by the fact that, from the 12th century onward, Anglo-Norman was for a time the speech of the leaders of society in England and Scotland alike.”
“David I was by marriage a leading landowner in England and was well known at the English court. He was, nevertheless, an independent monarch, making Scotland strong by drawing on English cultural and organizational influences. Under him and his successors many Anglo-Norman families came to Scotland, and their members were rewarded with lands and offices. Among the most important were the Bruces in Annandale, the de Morvilles in Ayrshire and Lauderdale, and the Fitzalans, who became hereditary High Stewards and who, as the Stewart dynasty, were to inherit the throne, in Renfrewshire. (After the 16th century the Stewart dynasty was known by its French spelling, “Stuart.”)”
The Scots have their layers too. Just like the English. Everybody does.
It seems to me that the divide with Ireland is the result both of the religious difference — Ireland was subjugated at a time where the difference between Catholics and Protestants was an important political issue — and the socio-economic difference — English landlords dominated Irish pesants.
I’ve visted Scotland 5 or 6 years ago. The tour guides sure like to make fun of Mel Gibson even then. One of them mentioned that next to the William Wallace monument there is now a monument for Mel.
You tell them — the Scots were not a distinct race 2,000 years ago!
Huh. Doesn’t have the same ring to it…
Bill, it works better if you say it in a fake scotish accent while wearing a kilt and brandishing a big sword. Everything said under these circumstances sounds tough.
Bill, it works better if you say it in a fake scotish accent while wearing a kilt and brandishing a big sword.
You could also hold a weapon. F’nar! F’nar!
I’m also told the Scotts did not do the blue makeup stuff by the time of Wallace either. Too bad. Don’t know why they would have given that up. Frankly, we ought to be trying it in Iraq.
Sigh… Micha, I really should be at the drawing board right now. But I really feel compelled to respond to one of your posts (or I feel really compelled to procrastinate; it’s one or the other).
Posted by: Micha at January 28, 2007 12:03 PM
Americans went to Iraq as a result of a Republican spin.
That’s overly simplistic.
The U.S. was not the only nation to believe that Iraq may have had secret stockpiles of W.M.D.s in violation of the terms of its 1991 surrender to the U.S. And it’s not like the suspicions were unreasonable. Hussein had used chemical weapons in the past; and he had either refused arms inspections or played games with U.N. inspectors on several occasions, making it difficult at best to know for sure whether he continued to have such an arsenal.
Soon after the fall of Hussein’s regime, I read a newspaper article about an Iraqi scientist who was either captured or surrendered. He told an interesting story, claiming that he and his fellow scientists were basically bûllšhìŧŧìņg Hussein. They allegedly fooled him into believing they were working on chemical and biological weapons for him, while he indulged a new hobby of writing romance novels. If they could fool Hussein into believing he had an active W.M.D. program, it’s reasonable to believe they could have also fooled foreign intelligence agencies as well.
(As an aside, the whole bit about Hussein writing romance novels to this day still cracks me up.
(“He took her in his strong, sinewy arms. His firm yet gentle hands removed her veil, revealing her supple and firm… uhm, face.”)
Anyway, it is true that George W. Bush cherry-picked intelligence to exaggerate the evidence of W.M.D.s. The evidence we had of W.M.D.s prior to the invasion was certainly nowhere near as strong as Bush portrayed it. But neither did the evidence disprove their existence.
After Sept. 11, 2001, people were scared. Moreover, I believe there was a desire for national unity that led many Democrats to rally ’round the president and give him the benefit of the doubt. These two were part of the mix that resulted in the U.S. once again marching off to fight a questionable war.
The argument, by the way, that we cannot wait for a “smoking gun” that may come “in the form of a mushroom cloud” was not entirely without merit. The attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were made possible in part by the inability of our law enforcement, intelligence-gathering, and military organizations to foresee an attack using commercial jetliners as weapons. At the time of the attacks, all of our responses were based on the idea that an attack would come in the form of missiles fired from ships near our shores. In fact, when those in command attempted to instruct U.S. fighter jets to protect the capital many pilots mistakenly flew towards the ocean, because all of their training conditioned them to expect a conventional attack. Cheney soon gave the order to fire on any civilian jets that did not obey orders to make an emergency landing, but that order never made it to the pilots, because no one could wrap their mind around the idea that such a thing could be necessary.
The point is that we were taken unawares. And in the age of biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons, we can’t afford to be taken unawares again. Because the next attack could be even more devastating.
Before anyone jumps down my throat, however, let me be clear: I opposed the idea of an invasion from the very day Bush first began talking publicly about it. Moreover, I believe Bush’s distortion of the evidence — whether it was a calculated act or the result of being blinded by an obsession with Iraq — was unconscionable. We should never have gone to war over evidence that was so thin. It wasn’t sensible, and it wasn’t moral.
Nevertheless, I believe that saying the invasion was solely the result of a “Republican spin” is far too simplistic.
Posted by: Micha at January 28, 2007 12:03 PM
I would prefer it if you decide to remain or leave Iraq based on reliable considerations.
So do I. As I have repeatedly stated in multiple threads in this blog, I believe the decision to invade Iraq was based on flawed premises resulting from a failure to gather the necessary facts and assess them objectively.
Posted by: Micha at January 28, 2007 12:03 PM
As I see it, the only direct risk to the US as a result of withdrawl from Iraq is that oil prices may rise ever further.
I doubt many people predicted that the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand would have been the domino that led to two World Wars. Or, if you prefer a more recent example, I don’t think many people predicted that the assistance we gave to resistance fighters in Afghanistan would eventually come back to bite us in the ášš in the form of Sept. 11, 2001.
History is to me like a game of chess, only much more complicated. One move can have many unforeseen ramifications. Therefore, I stand by my assertion that a rapid pullout from Iraq could in fact have significant consequences for the United States.
Posted by: Micha at January 28, 2007 12:03 PM
Yes the terrorists will be extremely proud of their victory, but it’s not like they lacked motivation to attack US targets before, and the tools to prevent such attacks remain the same.
Again, in my view you’re being too simplistic. Iraq was not a “third world” country when we invaded. Granted, we trashed a lot of the infrastructure when we invaded. But there’s a lot there that terrorists could use. If Iraq were to be taken over by a radical Shiite government sympathetic too — or controlled by — Iran, I believe there could be deadly repercussions for the U.S., especially in light of Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
I believe our invasion of Iraq was an abuse of our power. We have put an already unstable region of the world at risk of further destabilization. We had no business doing so. The world is not our playground. But what’d done is done. The question now is whether we’ll cause more damage to Iraq, to the Middle East, and to our own national security by pulling out rapidly.
I wish I knew the answer.
Peter J. Poole: As for Braveheart… I live 12 miles from the site of the Battle of Stirling. It was fun at the time the film came out, mentioning it to a local and watching him get totally locked between the absolute outrage at the liberties taken with history…
Luigi Novi: Yeah, kinda hard to have the Battle of Stirling Bridge……….without the bridge.
It’s still one of my favorite war movies though.
Watching the (apparently realistic) depiction of the killing power of the long bow it’s a wonder to me that the gun ever had the chance to take off. Until fairly late in the game guns were innacurate, took a long time to load and pretty vulnerable top the elements–factors the longbow didn’t have to face.
Then again, the gun had psychological impact, required far less training and skill and after seeing the way compound bows are made I’m not so sure that the guns were even more difficult to build. I guess the impact of the solid ball bullets also did more damage than the arrows did.
But dámņ, that had to be terrifying, hearing those things coming at you.
An aspiring graphic storyteller — especially with the comics industry in decline — may do well to acquaint himself with the 1,001 (Arabian) Nights.
The attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were made possible in part by the inability of our law enforcement, intelligence-gathering, and military organizations to foresee an attack using commercial jetliners as weapons.
I don’t buy this at all.
We knew such an attack was possible, we just preferred to remain ignorant of it.
Bill Myers, you’re preaching to the choir when it comes to the justifications for Iraq. I’ve used the same arguments myself.
But do you think the word ‘spin’ is too strong a word to describe a situation in which certain considerations (supporting war), combined with the understandable fears of a nation, are highlighted, while other important considerations (why going to Iraq is a mistake) are ignored? It may not be out right lying — Bush and the neocons were probably sincere. Perhaps you feel the word ‘spin’ creates to strong an impression of lying. But my intent was not to be oversimplistic (in the constraints of posting in a blog), but to warn about considering different considerations of an issue, and that different groups have a tendancy to highlight one consideration while ignoring others. What would be a better word than ‘spin’?
As for the fact that other countries supported the war. That’s true, but Bush lead and they followed. So they accepted Bush’s arguments or had other considerations, but the initiative and justifications/spin came from the White House.
“History is to me like a game of chess, only much more complicated. One move can have many unforeseen ramifications.”
That’s true. It is very difficult. But you have to play the game. What the right (especially in Israel) sometimes does is play on justified fears of negative forseen and unforseen ramifications in order to paralyze the willingness of the people to examine other options. In the US you call it “stay the course.” Of course the left is sometimes guilty of ignoring possible negative ramifications of their actions (just like the right), so it is important to take all considerations into account, which is very hard, and be willing to take risks, but not too much. It’s a hard game, especially when, aside from all the wishfull thinking and spinning you have people who outright lie (like Saddam and his people, or Shalabi).
It is in the spirit of taking all considerations into account that I try to examine the different ramifications of withdrawl from Iraq.
“Iraq was not a “third world” country when we invaded. Granted, we trashed a lot of the infrastructure when we invaded. But there’s a lot there that terrorists could use. If Iraq were to be taken over by a radical Shiite government sympathetic too — or controlled by — Iran, I believe there could be deadly repercussions for the U.S., especially in light of Iran’s nuclear ambitions.”
What would radical Shiites gain after capturing Iraq (assuming they can do that) except oil and coming closer to the other Arab countries, that they don’t have in Iran right now? The military equipment they might gain will not be a direct threat to the distant and better armed US. anymore than the arms of other nations. Although the US should try not to leave expensive US equipment behind. There is the threat that oil revenues might purchase more weapons, but even that is not such a great direct threat to the US, although you may want to pressure Russia and China not to sell weapons to such a regime, assuming the Shia are actually able to take over and fix the country enough to rebuild an army. When I try desperatly to look for a silver lining in all of this, I hope Iraq will become an economic drain on Iran.
The lesson of wars like Iraq and Vietnam is that guerillas armed with light weapons can cause many problems to a large and heavily armed army like the US’s. Such tactics can be used against other American targets abroad, and maybe even reach the US. But since the US is so distant, the advantage diminishes the furter they get from Iraq. Anyway, the ability of terrorists to reach you is not significantly diminished by being in Iraq except that they have closer targets in the form of American soldiers. And worrying about the fact that they may have more guns or more missiles or more bombs, considering the amount of weapons terrorists around the world have, seems pointless. Maybe a year from now a plane in Italy will be shot down by a rocket that will originate from Iraq. Or an American diplomat wil be murdered by an Iraqi. But is it worth remaining in Iraq to keep this missle or this terrorist busy hitting Americans in Iraq?
You should note that I speak of direct threats to the US to distinguish them from threats to countries in the Middle East. As a person living in the middle east it is probably better for me if the US stays, but it is important to me to seperate my considerations as an Israeli from your considerations as Americans.
That’s simply untrue as, like Bush’s infamous “Bin Laden Determined To Strike In US” memo, it has since come out that Rice was briefed on such a scenario. In the news it was contrasted with her televised statement that no one predicted the use of planes as weapons.
In July 2001, flight schools were reporting Arab students who weren’t interested in learning how to land airplanes, local FBI offices were asking to do surveillance, and the DC office arbitrarily told them no.
Here is a good example for the spins, the counter-spins, the chess game, the risks and so on.
We had a little sucide bombing in Eilat (Southen tip of the country). 3 dead. First suicide ttack in quite some time. The guy came from Gaza. Since he couldn’t get directly into Israel he probably went to Sinai and from there crossed to Israel, althogh his organization — the Iranian backed Islamic Jihad — claims he came throgh Jordan, and that this was a the result of 7 months of perparations. The Jordanians deny. Apparently there was no specific intelligence of the attack. It seems that he operated the bomb earlier than planned, maybe bercause he thought he was spotted, resulting in less deaths. I don’t know if he acquired the explosived from the 30 tons allegedly smuggled into Gaza from Sinai.
These are the facts, now begin the spins:
Why was the border with Egypt not better secured?
Why did we withdraw from Gaza?
Why did we withdraw from Sinai?
Peace s impossible?
If we negotiated peace the attack wouldn’t have happened?
The attack is legitimate resistence to the occupation?
The attack is by the an extremist minority?
The attack is by Iran?
And so on….
Posted by: Micha at January 29, 2007 08:19 AM
But do you think the word ‘spin’ is too strong a word to describe a situation in which certain considerations (supporting war), combined with the understandable fears of a nation, are highlighted, while other important considerations (why going to Iraq is a mistake) are ignored?
No, I don’t think it’s too strong a word. Not at all. I was just trying to point out that the “spin” existed in a historical context that one must consider in order to truly understand how we got to where we are today.
Posted by: Micha at January 29, 2007 08:19 AM
It may not be out right lying — Bush and the neocons were probably sincere.
I suspect there was some outright lying, actually, including some by George W. Bush himself. But I also believe there were many —
including some in Congress — who truly believed, albeit foolishly, that invading Iraq was the right thing to do.
Posted by: Micha at January 29, 2007 08:19 AM
As for the fact that other countries supported the war. That’s true, but Bush lead and they followed.
Actually, what I was referring to was the fact that even some of the countries that opposed the war believed that Hussein may have possessed stockpiles of W.M.D.s.
Posted by: Micha at January 29, 2007 08:19 AM
What would radical Shiites gain after capturing Iraq (assuming they can do that) except oil and coming closer to the other Arab countries, that they don’t have in Iran right now?
Greater influence in the region, for one thing. Iran, Iraq, and Syria could form a true “Axis of Evil” and one that could be dangerous to the U.S.
Posted by: Micha at January 29, 2007 08:19 AM
As a person living in the middle east it is probably better for me if the US stays, but it is important to me to seperate my considerations as an Israeli from your considerations as Americans.
Why, exactly, should that not be a consideration for the U.S.? We blundered into Iraq, unprepared for consequences that were easily foreseeable. We created a mess that endangers people in your region. Why should we not at least consider staying to clean up the mess we made?
Posted by: Craig J. Ries at January 29, 2007 01:01 AM
I don’t buy this at all.
We knew such an attack was possible, we just preferred to remain ignorant of it.
You have a point there, Craig. It would probably be more accurate to say that our leaders weren’t agile enough to adjust their thinking in response to evidence of the threat of an unconventional attack. I think my basic point still stands, though: we got caught with our pants down because all of our defense strategies and tactics were geared toward repelling a more conventional attack. I believe one of the lessons of Sept. 11, 2001, is that we cannot discount the possiblity of certain types of attacks merely because they haven’t happened before.
Unfortunately, Bush took this very reasonable assertion and spun it into a not-so-reasonable rationale for invading Iraq.
“Micah, I have to ask because I can’t seem to lock down a reliable answer: What happened to the captured Israeli soldiers who were the trigger for the war six months ago?”
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3358831,00.html
Reuters Published: 01.30.07, 13:30:
“Nasrallah says Israel prisoner swap talks still on
Hizbullah chief tells supporters in Beirut that negotiations are underway to liberate kidnapped Israeli soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev. Nasrallah stresses ‘resistance has not weakened,’ as crowd chants ‘Death to Israel’
UN-mediated indirect talks for a prisoner exchange between Israel and Hizbullah are still going on, the Hizbullah’s head Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah said Tuesday.
The secretive negotiations are designed to secure the release of two Israeli soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, whose capture in a cross-border raid on July 12 last year ignited a 34-day war between Israel and Hizbullah, in return for Lebanese and Arab prisoners.
“The captives, we are negotiating and the negotiations are underway to liberate them,” Nasrallah told a large crowd attending the annual Shiite Ashura religious ceremony in Beirut’s southern suburb.
Nasrallah, who had claimed the war was a divine victory for Hizbullah, reiterated that Hizbullah’s will to fight Israel would never be weakened.
“I stress that the resistance is ready… And those who think that the resistance have been weakened or it’s now in despair or tired, those are delusional,” he said to chants of “Death to Israel”.
Nasrallah announced in November that indirect talks, through a UN-appointed German negotiator, had begun to broker an exchange deal.
Very little have been heard on the talks since. Israel says the soldiers were seriously wounded when they were seized and Hizbullah has refused to say whether the men were dead or alive.”
————-
Of course, Nasseralla has his own internal political considerations — he must also explain to his people where are their captives, and what the war has acheived for them. So, as usual, you have to take his words with a grain of salt.
Belated perhaps, but here’s a link to an article published yesterday which looks at Tony Blair’s prospects. I’d laugh, were it not more appropriate to weep for my nation…
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/columnists/columnists.html?in_article_id=434127&in_page_id=1772&in_author_id=322
Cheers