Below is an exchange I had with a kid on The facebook. His text appears in this color and my facebook replies in this color to make things easier to read. There are some editorial notes enclosed in [brackets].

I will identify him only by the surname “Bailey” To preserve his privacy. I believe reproduction of his correspondence below constitutes fair use and is in no way infringing on either Mr. Bailey's privacy or potential copyright claims (which he has not made).

He apparently was inspired to write to me because I started an “Impeach Bush/Cheney” facebook group some time back. He didn't like it:

07.12.06 11:33pm

Hi, I dont know you personally but I came across your little group that you created and I must say I'm very interested...interested in trying to figure out how you liberals can continue to undermine the current administration after liberating 50 million people in Iraq and Afghanistan, removing a demagogue from power who ordered the deaths of hundreds and thousands of people, with mass graves with bodies stacked upon bodies on each other, torture rooms and rape rooms and someone who defied UN sanctions for years. You want to claim our president lied to the public about WMD..500 WMD filled with mustard and sarin gas were just discovered with more sure to be found...this after Saddam lied to the UN and the world that he had destroyed all traces of WMDs. The economy is the best its been in decades, with an unemployment rate of 4.6%, better than the average of the past 4 decades, inflation is extremely low, and the crime rate is down. I could go on but let me just say there is a difference between debating and disagreeing with someone and undermining them for your on political agenda and that is what most liberal democrats have done and continue to do to the current administration and to our brave service men who are fighting communism. They are fighting bravely and for a just cause for this country so that not just the west can have a free society, but the middle east as well. America has faced evil before, from Nazi Germany to the Soviet Union in the twentieth century and each time we have had to overcome opposition from within as part of our battle against these enemies. There are two types of people when it comes to confronting evil, those who are willing to fight it, and those who try to excuse it or deny it even exists. Appeasement is the name of the game for liberals, dating back to Neville Chamberlain who wanted to cut deals with Adolf Hitler, thank God for Winston Churchill. To Jimmy Carter who refused to confront the Soviets, thank God for Ronald Reagan. And now the modern democratic party, thank God for George W. Bush!

Wow. Yeah. My response was rather terse and rude:

07.17.06 7:32pm

Can you (1) give a subject line next time so I don't have to read as far as "you liberals" to determine that you're wasting my time? and (2) summarize your book for me if you actually want a response?

Thanks,
CMP

To his credit, the kid added a subject line: Political Rhetoric

07.17.06 8:35pm

That was about the expected response I would expect from a liberal democrat who talks alot of political rethoric but can't back it up...I did, I know that upsets you. Sincerely, [initials redacted for privacy]

First off I swear I'm not making that up. Faking that would take far too much effort. Mail like this has a way of finding me. :)

Beyond that... “Talks alot [sic] of political rethoric [sic]?” Kid, what political rhetoric? Are you talking about my facebook group? You've already written more than I did for that group. Try googling for stuff I've written. There's plenty (both political and non-) to make fun of. But jeez, way to pigeonhole a guy.

Moving on, re: Political Rhetoric

07.17.06 9:59pm

If you were less insulting I might be more inclined to listen.

Please note that you didn't actually summarize your point. You sent me an insulting email that didn't even attempt to find common ground, and then you blame me for my not coming around to your point of view.

If you actually want to convince me of anything, try demonstrating some good will.

You obviously care a lot about your position. If you want _me_ to care about your position, you need to be a little nicer.

Good luck,
CMP

At that point I started writing this webpage and the more complete response you'll see below, but I pooped out and went to bed instead of finishing. I awoke to this:

07.17.06 11:42 pm

I'm not sure what I said that insulted you, I refered to you as a liberal, if that is insulting to you then you might want to re-consider your political affiliation. I was compelled to write to you after seeing your group and your group description is really what struck me most...I very much disagree with you political point of view but I respect your opinion. What I truly feel strong about though is the upcoming elections in 06 and 08...i dont believe the democrats will take the majority or win the white house due to their lack of ideas and horrible track record on homeland security. This is my last message, take it easy and I'll leave you with a quote from, in my opinion the greatest president.

"Today we did what we had to do. They counted on America to be passive. They counted wrong"
-Ronald Reagan

Nice try, kid. I was pissed at your accusing me of “Political Rhetoric” in your second message.

Nice try on the Reagan quote, too. Too bad you got that wrong, too. It's from a national address after he ordered Operation El Dorado Canyon, a bombing mission which, according to Libyan (over?)estimates, killed 37 people and injured 93 others. See http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/target/etc/cron.html under the heading “Bombing of La Belle Discotheque” for a detailed summary. Props to the White House of the time for an apparently effective deterrent to future Libyan attacks. See http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1986/41486g.htm in the last full paragraph for the quote young Mr. Bailey came so close on.

Back to his message: Kid, don't worry about the Democrats. “Horrible track record on homeland security?” Kid, last I checked, 9/11 happened on Bush's watch, and both Afghanistan and Iraq are Bush's wars. The failure to capture Osama over the last five years? That's been Bush's watch, too. All three Federal branches have been in Republican hands since 2002, kid. What Democratic track record?

What follows is what I was writing to him before I went to bed:

Given that you took the time to write to me, I figured I would listen to my own advice and give you a point-by-point response. My initial response wasn't polite. I'm sorry. If your intention was to annoy me, then shame on you, but congratulations on succeeding. Perhaps you feel especially precocious, still being in high school and all. Spelling and grammar errors aside, your arguments are simplistic at best. If you go to college, your professors will expect much better. In all seriousness, I wouldn't bother writing such a long response if I didn't harbor a small grain of hope that you might learn some World History and see that your very one-sided view of the 43rd President is a bit off. Come to think of it, you might want to read up a bit on the 40th President, especially the Iran-Contra parts.

Please note that I make no assertions about where you got your arguments or what kind of people make those arguments. That would be a tit-for-tat response to your “liberal democrat” claim that doesn't really mean anything.

Please also note that, unlike you, I bothered to provide some citations. Some are stronger than others. I tried to cite primary sources (the White House, Congress) where I could, but used reputable news outlets like Reuters, MSNBC, NPR and the Christian Science Monitor in places. In other places I used editorials from sources like CounterPunch ( http://www.counterpunch.org/ ) that are clearly biased. Some would say that all of them are weak in that they are URLs and not print resources. To that I say: bah. This is the internet age. If someone else wants to annotate this more fully, enjoy.

If you (Mr. Bailey) choose to respond, I hereby offer to publish your response on the web along with the rest of this conversation.

Here goes:

(1) “liberating 50 million people in Iraq and Afghanistan”

Liberating? In June our president flew unbidden into Iraq at night and summoned their highest elected official to a meeting with only minutes of advance notice. Do you think Bush could do that in London with Blair (an ally)? The answer is clearly no. The Iraqis do not have sovereignty. See http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/06/20060613.html for a press release. For a news report, see http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5481744 (right after the news broke) and see also an (obviously biased editorial) essay here: http://www.counterpunch.org/alberts07132006.html.

Liberating? Over 40 people were killed in one attack in Baghdad today (Monday 17^th of July 2006). In a market. Civilians. Many populated areas in Iraq are similarly unstable. You call that free? See: http://tinyurl.com/lxled (reuters).

(2) “removing a demagogue from power who ordered the deaths [...] torture rooms and rape rooms and someone who defied UN sanctions for years.”

As to the first part: Abu Ghraib. Haditha. Steven Green in Mahmoudiya. Look those up. Hussein was a monster, yes, but at times we've been little better. Have you seen http://www.iraqbodycount.net/ yet? Do yourself a favor and read a little about their methodology.

Please note that all the atrocities I've just mentioned are from after we invaded and are a direct consequence of our invasion. Please also note that I'm not blaming our men and women in uniform as a group. There are many, many honorable men and women who serve in the various branches of the U.S. Armed Forces.

Back to the topic at hand: if we must invade sovereign nations when there is torture and genocide, tell me: why have we not yet invaded the Sudan? Did you know that there's a genocide going on there?

As to the UN sanctions: firstly, Hussein was a sick nut and a tyrant. There's no question. What he was not was a threat to the U.S. Beyond that, individuals in (if not the governments of) the U.S. and the U.K. were clearly involved in the Oil-for-Food corruption that allowed oil to be smuggled to Jordan and Turkey (both U.S. allies), so you can hardly say it was all Saddam. Let's go further back. You know we supported Saddam in the Iran-Iraq war, right? http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/press.htm.

You know the U.S. has violated UNGA resolutions, right? You know that the U.S. lost Nicaragua v. U.S. when it was heard before the ICJ in 1986, right? See: http://www.un.org/documents/ga/res/41/a41r031.htm.

And before you point out that UNGA resolutions are less weighty than those of the Security Council, let me counter that the U.S. has a veto there, so talking about the SC is a bit pointless when it comes to your argument about violating resolutions.

You should look up Iran-Contra in a history book. Why do you think the U.S. refuses to accept the ICCt?

(3) “You want to claim our president lied to the public about WMD..500 [sic] WMD [...] just discovered with more sure to be found...this after Saddam lied to the UN and the world that he had destroyed all traces of WMDs. [sic]”

Your 500 WMD claim is rather laughable. Easy googling turns this up near the top: http://www.wpxi.com/news/9415763/detail.html. Those 500 were from the 1980s (so we funded them) and were degraded (i.e. not working).

You actually believe we found WMD in Iraq? You truly believe that? I mean real, live, dangerous-to-Iraq's-enemies, working WMD? I find that incredibly odd. How 'bout citing some sources on that? How about the depleted-uranium munitions that we used on the Iraqis in the first Gulf War? Try googling for “depleted uranium gulf war” (without the quotes).

As for the lying, there are ridiculous statements like the last two paragraphs here: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030714-3.html.

What's wrong with those paragraphs? Firstly there's the glaring problem that Iraq did allow Hans Blix to lead a team of weapons inspectors into Iraq. Secondly there's the fact that the speech “cleared by the CIA” contained several key pieces of intelligence that had already been refuted by the CIA, specifically the aluminum tubes and the “16 words” about Uranium from Niger.

Have you heard of the “Downing Street Memo” before? Find me some news sources of Bush personally refuting the contents. Find Blair doing the same. Good luck.

The White House demanded a new NIE (National Intelligence Estimate) on Iraq done in under a month in late 2002. That NIE was flawed and condemned by many at the CIA, yet Bush gave Tenet a medal after he resigned. Note that as of December 2001 the NIE on Iraq stated that Iraq had no nuclear capacity and that any efforts to develop one would require foreign assistance and would take one year for a “crude” weapon (presumably a dirty bomb) and five to seven years to produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon. Let's not forget that Iraq didn't have the rockets to be able to hit the U.S. That assessment hadn't changed from 1998, when IAEA inspectors left.

http://tinyurl.com/bhmrc (PDF file). See the second page for the bulk of my reference. The PDF is from a larger release, http://www.gpoaccess.gov/serialset/creports/iraq.html which is a congressional report released in 2004.

That was released by a Republican-controlled Congress.

(4) “The economy is the best its [sic] been in decades, with an unemployment rate of 4.6%, better than the average of the past 4 decades, inflation is extremely low, and the crime rate is down.”

The crime rate is down? Since when? Crime rates dropped all over the country in the 1990s. They bottomed out around the turn of the century and rose in 2002: http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0625/p02s01-usju.html. If you want to thank somebody for decreased crime, thank William J. Clinton.

(5) “I could go on but let me just say there is a difference between debating and disagreeing with someone and undermining them for your on political agenda and that is what most liberal democrats have done and continue to do to the current administration and to our brave service men who are fighting communism.”

Fighting Communism??? Dude, the Chinese and the North Koreans are the ones who still claim to be communists. No sane person calls al-Qaeda communist. They're fringe Sunni jihadists. You do remember Bush saying that that al-Qaeda was responsible for 9/11, right? They're the reason we went to Afghanistan, remember?

Speaking of Bin Laden, where is he?

As for our brave “service men” who are (hopefully) fighting al-Qaeda abroad, I have nowhere said or done anything to undermine them. I hope we speedily return them to bases on our shores. I personally find your using them as a plank in your argument to be despicable. I have a close friend in the Navy and a cousin in the Air Force. I care for them deeply and wish them all the best. I think arguments like yours—blind ones in support of White House policy—put them in significantly more danger than arguments like mine.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5889435/

Worldwide terrorism is on the rise. Post-9/11 we've seen it in London, Madrid, Bali—to say nothing of Iraq. Have you been paying attention to what's happening in Gaza and Lebanon? This spike is looking worse than the Intifada back in 2001 http://web.amnesty.org/wire/November2001/Israel_OT. We've already passed the death toll listed in the amnesty link. You think Bush is making the world safer? You think supporting Bush blindly will make the world safer?

I defer to the noted historian, Howard Zinn, who said “Dissent is the highest form of patriotism,” and to Benjamin Franklin, to whom “Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety,” is attributed.

(6) “They are fighting bravely and for a just cause for this country so that not just the west can have a free society, but the middle east as well.”

To the extent that they are fighting al-Qaeda and similar groups, you're right. Again, why have we not invaded the Sudan to free the people there? Why have we not invaded North Korea, which is clearly more of a threat than Iraq ever was? Why have we not invaded Europe's last dictatorship, Belarus? East Timor? The West Bank? Gaza?

Make no mistake: I am a pacifist. I believe we should avoid war. I believe we should heed the prescient words of President Eisenhower (a Republican), whose televised address to the nation in 1961 was an admonishment to be wary of the Military-Industrial Complex: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Military-industrial_complex.

Eisenhower was not one for appeasement. He was a decorated general. See also his “Atoms for Peace” address: http://www.eisenhower.archives.gov/atoms.htm.

Let us not forget the aversion the founding fathers had to standing armies, which can so easily be used for repression as well as defense: http://usinfo.state.gov/products/pubs/democracy/dmpaper12.htm. Let us thank them for the Second Amendment.

What I'm driving at is that one doesn't promote freedom, peace and democracy by invading sovereign nations or disputed territories, especially not while displaying blatant disregard for the UN and IAEA. Even if you could promote democracy and freedom that way, Bush certainly hasn't proven that it's possible in Iraq. That country, three years on, is a quagmire.

You go on to make a comparison to Nazis, so by Godwin's Law ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law ) I guess it's time to stop.

Finally, my message to him about this page:

07.18.06 7:45am

Please find a more complete reply to your first and most recent messages here:

http://www.ils.unc.edu/~cmpalmer/correspondence/exchanges.html

I sincerely hope that you read it and take something positive away from it. If we're both lucky, you'll have a great time with the rest of your schooling and go on to do great things for our great nation.

Please forgive the occasionally-sarcastic tone. I enjoy writing :)
-CMP

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