Far East Cynic

Some things remain constant in the universe

Such as the fact that on any given issue, Mark Steyn will be wrong about it. How do you know Steyn is lying? His lips are moving or his fingers are touching a keyboard.

Over at The Atlantic. Conor Friedersdorf points out the latest example of Steyn's hypocrisy by examining his unaplogetic defense of the decision to invade Iraq. You should read Steyn's self serving blabber first, then read Friedersdorf's skilled dissection of it.

He exposes Steyn as the complete hypocrite he has always been.

What neoconservatives never seem to understand is that you go to war with the citizenry that you've got. Urging a war of choice that requires more years of fighting to win than the citizenry will permit is itself an error. If guys like Steyn didn't realize, when they were calling on the U.S. to invade Iraq, that Americans would tire of fighting there after a decade of conflict, thousands of troops killed, and hundreds of billions of dollars spent, they should blame themselves for missing the obvious. If America looks weak for failing to win the war, we have Iraq hawks to blame for urging a war that required far longer to win than a democratic citizenry was ever likely to want to fight (and that might well have been unwinnable regardless of how long we remained an occupying force).

The Iraq hawks would be culpable even if they'd encouraged war without making any predictions about its likely cost. Instead, the hawks spent the pre-war period assuring Americans that victory would be sure and swift; proclaimed "Mission Accomplished" soon after the invasion; and started speculating in those heady days about regime change in Iran and Syria. It isn't ADHD that caused so many to support the invasion only to turn against the occupation. Many of the Americans who changed sides were misled by the faux-assurance of writers like Steyn, who puffed themselves up as if they were speaking obvious foreign-policy truths, openly mocked academics and pundits who warned of impending calamity, and most incredibly, continue all these years later to act as if subsequent events have vindicated their analysis. The hawks who say we'd do well to stay in Iraq and secure Bush's victory aren't winning converts in part because their predictions about how the war would unfold have been proven so spectacularly wrong by events — without their admitting it — that no one takes them seriously.

Some things just never change can always be counted on.  The sun coming up every day, for example, and the fact that you can always count on Mark Steyn to be a douchebag.