NY Times Letters to the Editor in response to Krugman's column yesterday

[La_Serpiente]

Krugman had a column entitled Who's Nader Now? (Free Registration Required)

Here are the Letters to the Editor in response to his column.

One of the writers goes by the name of Dr. Michael O'Hanlon.

He says he is a Democrat. I have heard him publicly say this on CSpan, so he sure is not a right-wing neo-conservative.

Here is what he wrote.

Paul Krugman (column, Jan. 2) thinks that Karl Rove and the Republican National Committee could attack a centrist Democrat just as easily as they could attack Howard Dean in this fall's presidential race. That makes no sense.

Dr. Dean is a Northeasterner from a small liberal state who avoided the draft; who wavers in his commitment to win the peace in post-Saddam Hussein Iraq; who continues to stand by the absurdity that we are no safer with Saddam Hussein in custody; and who wants to offer North Korea a sweeter, softer deal to come back into compliance with its denuclearization commitments.

Mr. Krugman is letting his disdain for President Bush cloud his political judgment.

MICHAEL O'HANLON
Washington, Jan. 2, 2004
The writer is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

He also had another column that was published in the Wall Street Journal. It is entitled Will Iraq be Howard's End?

Kos had a take on it here

There is also another article entitled The Things They Carry which mentions Dr. O'Hanlon and other foreign policy analysts. It will be coming out in the magazine if you subscribe to it. If not, read it for free (Free Registration Required) It is very long, so it will take some time to read.

We had an earlier thread on the magazine article here

From what I have read, I am not sure as to whether he supported the War or not. However, I think he is more concerned about Dr. Dean's electability than his platform. I think he too is afraid of having Bush re-elected.

[DrBB]

1. Glad he's adding his Brookings Inst. prestige to the damage being done

A sarcastic header, obviously. But I'd like to know why we can't defend our own, the way the Reich wing does?

Why does a "Democrat," so-called, jump on the reichpundit bandwagon, chiming along about Dean's "absurd" statement that the capture of Saddam hasn't made us safer? As a Clark supporter, I think Dean's position is wholly defensible, as the immediately following LTTE points out.

Yep, I'm a Howard Dean supporter. And he was correct in saying that the capture of Saddam Hussein did not make us safer. You just have to read the newspaper about all the canceled and escorted flights into the United States the last few days.

Want to know why we lose elections? Because we won't rally 'round and fight back as if we were all on the same side. Case in fucking point.

[aquart]

2. O' Hanlon is a Brookings Fellow?

And doesn't believe the Republicans could attack a "Centrist" the way they could Dean?

He's either so naive he could be in Congress, or a plant. Please. Seventy million dollars to find something, ANYTHING they could hang on the obscenely honest Clintons? Calling the Boy Scout of the earth, Al Gore, a liar? Let's be real here. There is no lie too tenuous for the Republican "spin" machine.

As for avoiding the draft, which will put Mr. Dean in sympathy with a great many young Americans who don't want to die in Iraq, George Bush should really avoid that topic. Really. Avoiding is so much less offensive than actual desertion during time of war, don't you agree?

And, of course, it is demonstrably clear that nobody is safer with that old murderous deposed man in custody. He was toothless and irrelevant from the day he was deposed. Our problems in Iraq do not stem from Saddam, they stem from our unprovoked invasion of a sovereign nation.

Mr. O'Hanlon seems to believe Republican publicity implicitly. You would think that someone funded by a "think" tank would take the trouble to actually think.

[asjr]

3. Bravo

You have stated it exactly.

[wakfs]

4. With Democrats like this....

...who needs Republicans?

[papau]

5. Bravo - well said :-)

:-)

:toast:

:-)

[spooky3]

11. beautiful!

[glitch]

14. Please write this to the editor! nt

[BiggJawn]

6. They "get Saddam", the level goes to "Orange", flights get cancelled...

And we're supposed to be "safer" now?

Than why did the "Threat Level" increase instead of decrease? Why is BA cancelling flights? I figured the Air France cancellations had some "Freedom Fries Syndrome" behind them, but the Poodle's national airline?

And how can you work at the Brookings Institute and be a Democrat? O'Hanlon is a plant.

Try this: George Bush is Carpetbagger from Ct. who grew up in Texas, where his Granpappy and Dad got him an appointment to the Texas Air National Guard while less well-connected young men (and a young fellow from TN named Al) were slogging around in rice paddies, then he went AWOL instead of taking a piss-test...And STAYED AWOL for more than 30 days, thus actually being a Deserter, but since his Dad was high up in the CIA, nobody was interested in pursuing it...

Oh, by all means, lets talk about ANY of the Dems' military experience....

[BootinUp]

8. Personally I make no claim

as to whether we are safer or not with Sadaam captured. I believe the jury is out on what the ultimate impact of the Iraq invasion will be. Short term we are not safer, that case is easy to make.

Long term who knows what Sadaam "may" have done in the future. This is the argument you really can't win, and is what the Republicans will use to counter the short term argument. Long term also depends on the ultimate success of the Iraq democratization, as well as our ability to get co-operation from Arab states to reduce money going to terrorists.

The bottom line is that you will never convince some Americans we are not safer for having captured Sadaam, so why pick the fight on those terms?

[spooky3]

12. as a LTTE in today's WPost pointed out

the fact that Dean opposed the preemptive invasion does not mean that he opposed the removal of Saddam Hussein by other means, e.g., waiting for the weapons inspections to be completed, getting the cooperation of many more nations and pressuring him to step down. So it can't be said that the choices are merely Howard Dean & SH stays in power forever vs. someone else and SH is removed.

Also, please correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Dean was responding to a reporter's question, which I distinguish from "picking a fight" (i.e., proactively). After SH was captured I believe he and other Dems were asked "now aren't you sorry/now don't you believe Bush did the right thing?/hasn't Bush made us safer?/etc." and it was necessary to respond and explain why, if the answer was negative. I would not think that Clark or Kucinich would have agreed with these reporters if asked the same questions.

[spooky3]

10. Brookings is a centrist (not repug) org. But it sounds to me

as if O'Hanlon may be a DLC type. Being in Washington, he may be a McAuliffe buddy or otherwise in with the "establishment" folks who support Kerry, Lieberman, Gephardt, or one of the other candidates.

He obviously has not spent much time analyzing Dean's positions on the issues because they are quite similar in many ways to those of many of the people this guy probably supports. Maybe we should send him Tom Tomorrow's cartoon, which says it as simply and as clearly as it can be said, for those who don't want to become better informed (Tom T. is a genius). He also should heed John Edwards' words about the costs and inappropriateness of the sniping.

[otohara]

7. Speaking of NYT's Where's Mo Dowd???

I know she's on vacation, but it's been a few months - Is this unusual?

[The Zanti Regent]

9. Who cares about Whoreen?

Hopefullly, Whoreen is gone and preferably forgotten!

[papau]

13. I like Mo - and her writing style-but don't forgive her nutty anti-Clinton

attitude over the years.

But I still like her writing.