The United States is not occupying Alabama
By Steve Benen Wednesday Apr 09, 2008 7:00pmThe argument for maintaining a decades-long presence for U.S. troops in Iraq invariably leads conservatives to draw a comparison to post-World War II Germany and Japan. It’s a fundamentally flawed argument, but it tends to dominate the discourse.
At least Germany and Japan, though, are foreign countries.
RedState, a prominent conservative blog, has been pushing aggressively of late against the notion that John McCain wants the war in Iraq to continue for another century, and urging readers to badger news outlets that get the story wrong. Bill Scher notes today that RedState’s new round of talking points, sent via email, includes an untraditional argument.
“Clearly McCain was talking about a peace time standing presence … Someone should ask the Democrats if they think we’re still at war with the confederacy, the Germans, and the Japanese given all the standing American armies in the South, Germany, and Japan.” (emphasis added)
Scher asks the only appropriate question: “[H]aving military bases in Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina does not constitute a permanent occupation. Does RedState really believe that 140 years after the Civil War, American troops have a ‘peace time standing presence’ in the American south?”
I’d just add that a recent survey found that nearly 60% of Iraqis still believe that attacks on U.S.-led forces are justified.
I’d bet the number is much lower throughout the Southeastern United States. Call it a hunch.
Login or Register to post comments.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2U9b__7Qxc
Here's my list of 10 products and companies that liberals should avoid. Can you guess number 1?
Grew up in N.E. Illinois.
Consider myself a northerner in geographical terms.
Have learned that southerners view me as a yankee.
Northerners no longer fight the civil war.
Southerners fight it every day.
So, are there two different countries here? You bet.
No, you'd be wrong. Plenty of the older folk down here seem to want to fight the government. The younger folk are occupied with cheetos and American Idol. I'm just fine with it that way, as no armed attempt to have an American fascism can succeed without a massive bulge in young men willing to play the SA game with it.
As for America's Civil War, yeah, some Southerners are still fighting it. So what? Those types are radically marginalized.
Redstate:
Clearly McCain was talking about a peace time standing presence
I don't think it was "clear" that McCain was saying any such thing. He wants us there for 100 years. That's what he said. Since then he has very unsatisfactorily tried to parse his comments to mean something else, like his fairytale idea that American military can occupy Iraq without people taking shots at them. How many soldiers have to die before that particular state of nirvana is achieved? I suppose that we will have to declare McIdiot correct if there are no deaths in year 100 of the occupation, even though it was a bloodbath for the previous 99? Is THAT his definition of success? Will his great grandchildren be fed to the meatgrinder to achieve his lil' pipe dream? And now Redstate is just carrying his jock for him. Bunch of crybabies.
Iraq is now like Alabama? First it was like Nazi Germany, then the newest democracy, then Japan, then Korea, now Alabama?
The only thing the nutcase Republicans don't think it is, is another Vietnam-a bloody waste and fiasco.
maybe the troops need to crack down on the bible thumping fascists down there who are undermining our country.
Red State and other right-wing bias networks are losing it. The numbers alone for them are chilling. People are registering Democratic in record numbers.Even in safe red states they are being challenged. So let them rant and rave and distort the truth. They are going to be a dying breed, people who arefull of hatred and watch Faux News.
Does Alabama have 200 billion barrels of oil?
RedState should conduct polls in Okinawa, Japan whether the US should stay or go. For more favorable polling results exclude Japanese victims of rape by US troops.
Oh, and ask Germans how they feel about a US presence. I have a few friends in Munich who would run to pack our bags and toss us on a plane.
P.D. @ 7:
You know what really bugs the shit out of me? The redstaters might be bitching now, but their lives will either stay the same or even improve if and when progressive candidates kick the redstaters' political familiars the hell out of office. They have nothing to fear from us except protection of their rights, efforts to get medical care for all, real diplomacy with our percieved enemies and on and on. We, on other hand, live in constant awareness of the fact that these kinds of idiots want to take a match to the Constitution just to start with.
Yeah, we win; we all win, even them. THEY win and we are all fucked, unless you dig fascism (and these morons might just find out that they don't and come crying to us saying "why didn't you tell us! Boohoo!"
Thank goodness they are in the minority.
We should drop a nuke on South Carolina, just to be on the safe side.
More proof that home schooling doesn't work.
I love it. Typical Repunklican strategy. If the facts aren't on your side, just make shit up.
The best comeback I heard to when McCain supporters try to put his 100 years argument into context is by Chris Matthews when he asks, "When will the 100 years of peace start?"
I mean even if you are willing to leave troops in Iraq indefinitely, you should still be able to provide a timetable for when the "non-combat" mission will start. To say that U.S. troops should remain there for 100 or 1,000 years to maintain peace, you first have to explain how peace will be achieved.
I agree with those who say that Bin Laden's beef with America was provoked by our long-term presence in Saudi Arabia. At this point, I don't believe a complete troops withdrawal out of Arabia will eliminate terrorism, but it should deal a serious blow to their recruiting pitch and will decimate terrorist ranks over time because the leader's rhetoric won't actually match reality. So it'd be hard to get fired up and willing to sacrifice yourself for something you can't personally recognize or relate too.
First of all, I'm not sure I'm clear on what a "peacetime, standing presence" means. If you're a nation that has invaded and occupied another country, a country I might add, whose people don't want you there, is it even possible to have such a presence? But leave it to the RedStaters - indeed to reichwingnuts in general - to come up with an utterly illogical, mentally retarded analogy. But watch, this bullshit will become a mainstream media talking point - just give it a week or two.
Zenrage @ 11:
Bill O'Reilly is monitoring your comments.....LOL
I'd have to categorically state that indeed the North has occupied the South for the last 140 years since the War of Northern Aggression Another mint julip please.
Gettysburg - fighting the Confederates there so that - oh shit! We ARE fighting them here!!
PNAC permanent military occupation sucks. Tax dollars to waste (and of course lives) and most Iraqis do not wish foreign troops there for an eternity. That's not freedom nor selfgovernance. U.S. is there to "influence" and protect its "interests".
I've lived all over this country, and yes, many folks in the south ARE still fighting the Civil War. The reverence some of these folks have for Robert E. Lee and other confederates is mind-boggling.
Best bumper sticker I ever saw (and it was on a Virginia-tagged car!):
A confederate flag inside a red circle with a red diagonal slash through it (the universal "no")
It read: "You lost. Get over it!"
Try this on some neo-confederate:
"Which enemy commander is responsible for the most U.S. soldiers deaths?"
Answer: "Robert E. Lee."
These neo-confederates seem to forget they fought AGAINST the United States of America. So their beloved flag belongs right beside the Nazi flag and the Imperial Japanese flag.
I wish some space aliens would come in and kick the United States ass to protect their interests, set up an occupation and establish a troop presence in Washington DC for a thousand years, maybe 25,000 according to McStupid. Maybe then Americans would learn to follow the golden rule, just maybe.
geneHUSSEIN214 @ 18:
HOLY SHIT! Confederofascism is HERE!? WE'RE FUCKING DOOMED!
Matt Hussein in Texas @ 20:
Here is an idea for a southern bumper sticker:
Using your best southern drawl..........."We honor our states Rats"
Wow, 60% of Iraqis think attacks on US troops are justified. That's wild. I wonder how many Japanese thought attacks on US troops were justified prior to August 15th, 1945. Could it be even higher? And, if so, what would that mean?
Al @ 8:
If Alabama did have 200 billions barrels of oil and we did not have WMD's to defend ourselves, somebody probably would have liberated us from George Bush and be occupying our homeland.
Well, since the end of the Civil War, the south has killed two US presidents and started an insurgency in the form of the KKK. They also bombed the Atlanta Olympics and let's not forget the Oklahoma City bombings. I also suspect they were behind the anthrax attacks of 2001 that targeted northern democratic senators and northern media outlets. By wingnut logic, I do believe this means we should "bomb them back to the stone age".
JTM @ 24:
I'm surprised the 60% is so low, the other 40% were probably too scared to answer just in case BlackWater turned up waving the stars and stripes and raped their children to death in the night or something akin to that.
I think it's perfectly fine, you're an aggressive force hostilely occupying a sovereign country, which you have destroyed, I fully support the Iraqis efforts at liberating their own country from the US, by what ever means that takes.
And to think the numbers of people in the US that have no idea what 9/11 was really about ....... and all you're doing now is generating generations of more people who will do anything they can to destroy the US.
Chickens, home, roost.
JTM @ 24:
Frankly, I am surprised that the number is that low. Imagine if a foreign country occupied the US, regardless of their intentions or claims to be here to help Americans. Certainly a very high percentage of Americans would feel that attacks on the troops were justified. Occupiers are never held in very high regard. Now add a different religion and completely different way of life that people could view as being imposed upon them. It would not be a very popular group.
This must be the reason Bush failed to report for duty to the Alabama National Guard. Come to think of it, if the US Army was there all this time, why didn't they bust out POW Don Siegelman?
Al @ 8:
I don't think they have 200 billion barrels of anything. Perhaps pork rinds, but even that is questionable.
Are these guys the biggest idiots in the world or what? They must be sitting on their brains!
“Someone should ask the Democrats if they think we’re still at war with the confederacy…given all the standing American armies in the South.”
The solution is very simple. Close all military bases in the south and move them to the north. We sure don’t want the poor souls to feel threatened or anything like that. Besides, we sure could use those satellite jobs military bases provide up here, and evidently they don’t need them down there. Everybody comes out ahead that way.
It can't possibly take 100 years to pump up that oil.
The Northern occupation of the South only lasted a few years. The troops came back when Reconstruction ended.
gonzalez @ 31:
That assumes the RedStaters have brains. Not bloody likely.
Is there an insurgeancy in Basra...I mean, Birmingham that we're not aware of?
What is that wily Moqtada Al-Robert Lee up to now?
We should have been showered with rose petals after we sieged Fallujah...er, Ft. Lauderdale.
Is there really peace in the Sunni Triangle...I mean the Redneck Triangle between Jackson, Montgomery, and Memphis?
Why hasn't the Iraqi...I mean Georgian government met all 18 of Congress' benchmarks, like a lemon tea bill, the fried chicken bill, and the Georgian army bill?
Will Kurdistan...I mean Texas, push out the Sons of the Confederacy/KWP?
Will the Shiites...I mean the Southern Baptists listen to Ayatollah Khameni, I mean Ayatollah Hagee, and lay down their arms.
let's re-consider letting the south secede.
Al @ 8:
No, but I heard Bin Laden was hiding in a cave there. Fox News told me so.
I'm not so sure your hunch is correct. I count myself as one of many non-repentant Southerners who wouldn't care a bit if Yankee military bases were attacked in Dixie. Hell, if I wasn't 180 years old, i'd join in the fight! Hey, by the way, when did the South become so Republican? Friggin' LINCOLN was a REPUBLICAN! Free Tibet?!? Free Virginia and Mississippi first!!!
Col. Beauregard T. Hamhock (Ret.)
Army of the Potomac
(Hiding somewhere in the woods between Chancellorsville and the Wilderness---they don't call it "Wilderness" for nothin)!
Your hunch is on the money. Out east here in NC, the number is only about 55%.
Monitors -
Stop deleting the troll's posts; they're too funny. The one saying that the Army of the Potomac was (only) Union was particular good, since it told us to read some history ... where anyone could find that both the Union and the Confederacy had an "Army of the Potomac."
Troll @ 34:
samdog @ 41:
Dear Red State
Well, hell, I live in Georgia, and if Moody Air Force Base, Robins Air Force Base, Fort Benning, Fort Gillem, Fort Gordon, Fort McPherson, Fort Stewart, Hunter Army Airfield, Lawson Army Airfield, Albany Marine Corps Logistics Base, Atlanta Naval Air Station, and King's Bay Naval Submarine Base are all bases of occupation by the Yankee government and we just didn't know it, there'll be no doubt another civil war.
Come and TEAR DOWN THOSE BASES!!!!! We don't need no stinkin' Yankee bases in our land. We'll build our own, thank you very much.
Troll @40: I know this is the big event of your day: getting on a liberal website and acting out all your Bad-Ass fantasies, so go ahead...
And I must complement you on your knowledge of American history: the Army of the Potomac was the Union army. The gentleman meant to say the Army of Northern Virginia, I believe.
And I will complement you again on the dexterity of your one-handed typing. Take your time, Troll. Think of baseball. Take your time...
Given the ongoing reluctance in some quarters of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama and other places in the South to stop flying the traitorous flag of the Confederacy, I'm not so sure The United States didn't end Reconstruction a little too soon.
That said, I assume that note was meant to read "South Korea". I could be wrong, though...
Well with the politics being two parties that are basically the same on a lot of points, and a third party needed ....... looks like you finally have that in civil war now .... going back to the Union vs Confederate ..... at least you have blackwater now as the third party ;)
RedState sayeth the former Confederacy is an occupied territory?
Goodness gracious! If only! If only ...
If only William Tecumseh Sherman hadn't be such a sentimental sissy, if he had done his job correctly, there would be no former Confederacy left to speak about.
But it always was the problem with Sherman. Too soft. Way too soft. Big softy, that good olde Sherman.
Back when I was stationed at Fort Benning, Ga, we had a joke ribbon made for service in the CSA Army of Occupation. It was a ribbon the right size to fit on your ribbon display (all those things over the left breast pocket in photos of General Petraeus for you civies) looking like a Confederate Battle Flag.
I knew a few guys who actually wore it for inspections.
Does RedState really believe that 140 years after the Civil War, American troops have a ‘peace time standing presence’ in the American south?
That question shouldn't be rhetorical. Ever seen a still-used textbook for history classes that refers to the Civil War as the War of Northern Aggression? There are still many people who maintain that the federal government had no right to invade the sovereign states. (Ron Paul and other paleo-conservative, orthodox Libertarians argue as much.)
Al @ 8:
If someone tells George Bush that it does, maybe he'll bring the troops back home -- to invade Alabama.
tr @ 36:
That thought has crossed my mind. And I laughed when Bill Maher suggested it.
Naturally, it's not a genuine proposition, especially since there are wonderful southerners, many of whom are on our side politically.
Seriously, though, the Senate needs to be completely revamped. Southern states are vastly overrepresented. With comprehensive electoral reform, we can maintain equal votes for each state in the Senate, but dramatically change the dynamics of the Senate so that it actually represents each state's whole population, not just the plurality of a particular election.
All my family came straight from Ireland to the west coast over a hundred years ago. Southerners consider me a northerner, while I consider them "east coast sissy boys." Alabama, Vermont, whatever it's all the same to me.
geneHUSSEIN214 @ 18:
Hilarious!
It's a bit daunting to read the comments here. So-called liberals engaging in stereotypes, wishes for wholesale death and destruction, and general vitriol towards the Southern states. Not that some of the irritation isn't deserved.
However, there was a lot more to the Civil War than slavery, and the Southern states weren't necessarily "traitorous". Most Southerners did not own slaves. Much of the tension arose from regional differences, and differences in economic interests, and philosophy of government, culture, etc.
The entire country benefited from slavery. It wasn't just the South. The Mid-Atlantic and New England in particular depended on the cheap agricultural goods from the South. Cheap due to slave labor. New England mill and factory owners did not want to see slavery end.
Abe Lincoln was an abolitionist, but he was no saint. He suspended habeas corpus, quashed dissent in the press, and other oppressive tactics, similar to George Bush today that anger so many liberals and progressives.
What Tecumseh did was outright destruction, similar to what we've visited on Iraq. To wish that on the millions of people in the South is pretty harsh.
I know all you folks don't really mean the mean things you've said about the South. You just were never taught history very well.
The South has given a lot to the rest of the country. Great music, great food, great athletes...
And you know, in a way, having a Federal military base in any state is a bit like being occupied.
mcjeff @ 53 - excellent response, I agree. I'm not terribly fond of the south myself, having spent a couple of very miserable years in Georgia in my callow youth where I was beaten up regularly by white boys in my class for being a 'n*gr-luvin' Yankee' until I 'larned ta speak raht' and stopped playing with the black girl down the road. Where we rented a house from the local sheriff who offered to have 'the boys' come round to mow the lawns, saying 'Ya cain't own slaves in this country no moah, but ya kin still rent 'em, hardyharharguffaw.' (My father - born and raised in South Carolina - declined the offer).
But this is just anecdotal memories of a ten-year-old, hopefully long out of date. The adult is better read, and less inclined to knee-jerk generalized hatred. Yes, there are a lot of ignorant bigots in the South. I've met a few from the North as well - there's no lock on stupidity or nastiness. I'll save my vitriol for those who deserve it - like Mr Bush - who is SO not from the South, no mattah whut kinda fake down home countryboy accent he tawks with. Believe me, my fake southern accent is MUCH better...
I think it's misdirection.
I think that the people in the media are now getting the American people accustomed to the idea of withdrawing troops from Japan and Germany, to augment the war in Iraq. That way, the voting public again won't feel the pain directly.
They don't have enough public support to institute a draft, yet there's NO WAY they're going to just WALK AWAY from twenty trillion dollars worth of oil. Get over it. You have no real control over it... and you never did.
As for those of you who wish to desoparage the land of Washington, Jefferson, Madison, and Jackson, I would only ask you to read a few more history books, and then look in the mirror.
I'm astounded by northerners, who wish to foist the idea upon people, that something magical happens when one crosses north of the Mason-Dixon line, and suddenly PEOPLE STOP FINDING REASONS TO HATE EACH OTHER...
That's a load of horse shit.
As if race riots have never occurred in New York. As if there weren't slave auctions in Washington D.C.. At least the south is honest about the past. And we don't take down memorials, just because the heroes who died in the fight lost. And remember, a hero doesn't have to be RIGHT to be a hero, he just has to be willing to, or actually give, his life for what he believes in.
Have any of you actually ever READ the fourth debate between Stephen Douglas and Abraham Lincoln?
Be careful, you may find your faith in human deities to be shaken afterwards.
No, they didn't have slavery in Illinois before the War, but then again, black folks were second class citizens there.
Yeah, I suppose it was a little silly for the southern states to think that they could ever voluntarily leave a Union that they had VOLUNTARILY JOINED!
Many of you have bought into the only reason that's been given to you concerning the cause of the war: slavery. But I tell you that it was more so about resisting central, authoritative government, and rejecting the money-changers, who wanted to print as much money as they could get away with...
How's that working out so far?
Is Alabama under military occupation? Well, it does seem pretty peaceful down here if you're white (and I'm guessing most of you reading this particular blog are). If you're black, however, they've got "roving checkpoints" for you whenever you travel and most areas are most definitely off-limits. Maybe it's not actually such a bad question.
And the anti-South vitriol here is disgusting. You'd think there were only middle-class white rednecks here in the South to listen to you liberals. As DuBois said, as goes the South, so goes the nation. You think poor people and people of color here don't want progress? As a political activist, I think it's great to be in such a strategic place in the country. Yes, white supremacy is strong here, but it's headquarters has always been in D.C. To see all of you liberals gleeful when Obama threw Rev. Wright under the bus shows that many of you still have trouble recognizing the truth he was preaching. Don't join in by throwing us under the bus too.
I'm a Southerner. My family has been southern since at least 1676, as some of them participated in Bacon's Rebellion in Virginia. Oh Lord am I glad we lost the Civil War - otherwise those Redstate idiots would be 100% in charge, instead of the 60-odd percent they are now (depends on location - much less in cities, much more in deep rural counties). However, having lived almost all my life in the South, many years in very rural counties, I have never met anyone who thought we were occupied territory. The reality is there is much pride here in military service. There are of course neo-confederates, but to be frank, I've seen their books, and I know they have a rally or two, at least the ultra-racist ones do, but it just doesn't have much of anything to do with the average southerners's life. I suspect this is a one-off comment from a whacky Redstater (as opposed, of course, to the sane ones........never mind), not to be taken too seriously.
redstate still bemoans that the north won and the darkies and women have the right to vote
what a bunch of maroons
So many comments are just being unfair to the South. Its like all the South ever did was hate blacks. Not true. The South hates Mexicans, Catholics, Jews, atheists, Yankees, scientists, gays (outside of Atlanta), higher education, voting rights, mentioning slavery instead of "states rights," intelligible grammar, accurate history books, evolution, federal anti-lynching statutes, the use of the same word for both the second person singular and the plural, organized labor, having to pay for labor, non-white women in labor, desegregation, civil rights, literacy tests for law enforcement, 8 out of 10 amendments in the Bill of Rights...
When the world wants to ridicule America, it uses the South. Sure, stereotyping is BS and there are plenty of educated, informed, progressive southerners. But until scum like Trent Lott aren't the most (and only) powerful people in Mississippi; the "Southern Strategy" is no longer 100% effective for the Republicans; and the "stars and bars" isn't considered a noble and acceptable tradition; The South will have to live with being The South.
In a way they are right. I mean Mexico still occupies Texas even though the Mexican-American war finished in the 1850s.
samdog @ 41:
We need to demilitarize. We should start with the South.
Al @ 8:
If only it were spelled Al' Abama.
Ah yes the confederacy, a perfect example of conservative government at work.
So, how does Senator McBoob plan on determining when we're a "peace time standing presence." Body count, wounded, $$$ spent per week/month/quarter, 3-month rolling average of body count, wounded, $$$ spent per week/month/quarter, # of benchmarks satisfied in a period of time................. The choices are endless. So will be the Iraq war if we elect McBoob!
I can I shall I am Obama08
Does this mean that Washington State, with the 4th largest Military Base in the US is also occupied? I didn't know that the Pig War (not the bay of pigs), in which 4 soldiers died in a fight over pigs in the Puget Sound, could cause the US government to put a military base in our rebelious "tree hugging" state.
Isn't our troop presence in Iraq is more analogous to the Chinese troop presence in Tibet?
Anon @ 67:
Nah...the Chinese hat least have a pretense of protecting their own people in Tibet.
Lonny @ 17:
They miss their slaves. See what happens to one's mind when you can't go to those fun lynchings anymore?
Theron @ 57:
Rent the 2004 movie "The Confederate States of America", a faux documentary of what our country woild be like if the Rebs had won. Hilarious and disturbing.
yakfitguy @ 70:
Look way NORTH if you want to see what a modern Confederacy would look more like. Canada, that is. A nation where the Central Government has little power and the Provinces hold the lion's share of power. I have no idea what the social and religious and political landscape in the south would be like today had the Confederacy been allowed to exist, but I do imagine that Richmond would never have gained the power over the Confederate States that Washington has over the united States.
Login or Register to post comments.