Getting it wrong again.

This post at Whiskey Fire tears apart the spurious argument that "liberal hawks", whatever that means, are intellectually dishonest in their opposition to this administration's increasingly dangerous foreign policy towards Iran. It's important to counter the argument that the initial support for the war in Iraq exists as some immutable piece of one's DNA that therefore categorizes the individual to a mission of supporting this administration's foreign interventions to no end. I naively saw the invasion of Iraq as a parallel to Clinton's policies in Yugoslavia, and supported it at the time as an honest attempt to act on behalf of the oppressed Iraqi people, much in the same way that the UN led forces in Bosnia had. I was stupendously wrong, but smarter people than I were not. In responding to an essay making the case that individuals are either inherently pacifist or militarist, WhiskeyFire points out:

The essay is crazy. The guy thinks the primary debate about foreign policy is between "pacifists" and "militarists" -- as if the primary reason anyone opposed the war in Iraq was from a position of committed pacifism. Well, maybe a small minority did, and good for them. But most of us opposed the war in Iraq because it was obviously a stupid fucking idea. The administration was clearly spouting bullshit about why it was necessary and how much it would cost in money and lives.

But more importantly, looking forward, the point he makes is this:

This is all my balls. Ezra Klein is perfectly right to judge people writing on foreign policy primarily on their stances towards real world issues. A discussion of "underlying beliefs or theories" in this context is absurd, given the horror of the Iraq debacle. If your "underlying beliefs or theories" made you stick your dick in the blender, even "reluctantly," and you haven't thoroughly reassessed these concepts, I frankly don't want to hear your advice about what to do with the weed whacker.

A little colorful, but the point is well taken. And if we step away, we can see that the even larger issue is that if you take such a black and white stance, the consequences are horrible. You have to dig deeper to get out of the hole, and with each and every tragic event, you double down your bets. You read this:

Kabul, 18 June (AKI) - At least seven children have been killed in a US-led coalition air raid in eastern Afghanistan. In a statement released on Monday, the multinational forces said that Sunday night's raid was against a suspected al-Qaeda hideout in Paktika province near Pakistan and that a number of militants died in the attack. The children who were killed in the raid are believed to have been students at a madrassa or Islamic school near a mosque at the targeted compound. The US military said that intelligence information showed that the madrassa was being used as a refuge for al-Qaeda militants.

The statement said that residents in the area, in the district of Zargun Shah of Paktika province, confirmed that al-Qaeda fighters were present in the area all day.

"This is another example of al-Qaeda using the protective status of a mosque, as well as innocent civilians, to shield themselves," said coalition spokesman Major Chris Belcher.
The mosque is said to have been slightly damaged in the air strike.

and you are forced to stiffen your lip and press on, because you are a committed hawk, and you see events through the prism of militarism and pacifism. Ideological cowards like Bill Kristol, who's blood drips from his teeth at Fox News are one thing, but for ostensibly sensible people who supported our invasion of Iraq to stick to their guns with regard to Iran, and ignore the tragic consequences of our actions in Iraq seems to me to be something even worse.