The American Spectator

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Sobriety Tests

3.6.03 @ 12:01AM

Reactions to John Corry's case against war, A Sober Dissent, with a special reply by Mr. Corry:

About your article, "Bull."
-- J. Gedroic
Landrum, SC

I wish that those that say "don't attack, we'll only make 'em madder than they already are" would just start drinking.
-- Brad McKee
Holbrook, NE

Kudos to Mr. Corry. As a longtime conservative and American Spectator reader, I was (and am) a strong supporter of the Cold War and the (first) Persian Gulf war and I'm hardly a leftist, peacenik etc. However, I am shocked by the President's Iraq policy.

Conservatives should be anti-war in general, though not pacifists. After all, war costs a good chunk of change (conservatives should be frugal), permanently expands the federal government leviathan, and degrades the culture (witness the huge changes for the worse during WWI and Vietnam, and to a lesser extent WWII). The income tax made its first appearance in the Civil War, and grew tremendously in WWI and WWII.

Mr. Corry is absolutely right. We will pay dearly for this war in both blood and treasure if the President follows through with an attack on Iraq.
-- Sean Fama
Front Royal, VA

Methinks you doth protest too much, Mr. Corry. Protest too much and by the way, where is your solution? By way of omitting your solution, you reveal yourself as a liberal disguised as a conservative with a yellow streak down your back a meter wide. Of course, commies like yourself oppose the war against Iraq in any case where American arms would triumph, because just like your Fuerher, Hillary Rodham Hussein, it doesn't matter what ultimately happens, as long as we lose. I find it difficult to stomach your protestations of conservatism with all that nonsense about the dearth of dissent within this country, because every punk who did it during Vietnam did it again. I volunteered and served in combat there, and cowards are the same today as then. I remember them well. "I didn't like the war," "I didn't think it was right," and on and on. A coward is a coward and this country is full of them. One day, men (I use the term loosely in your case) will dangle at the end of a rope arranged by a brute like Saddam Hussein in this land because they couldn't manage the intestinal fortitude it took to keep it free.
-- Brian Barfield

John Corry has been spending too much time with the Wine & Brie crowd. Blah, Blah, Blah, if we attack they'll use their weapons, he writes, but like the rest of do-nothings he offers no solutions only opposition and then hides behind the label of intelligent conservative. Sounds a little elitist to me! John needs a little deprogramming and the title of Hostage of the Week, but not quite enemy of the week. Don't worry John, we won't give up on you.
-- Aftan Romanczak

I don't think John Corry is a coward but then again I'm not a bully boy. He gets to write his dissent in a conservative forum and then implies that conservatives are branding him a peacenik or a lefty and that his view is somehow being stifled. I heard his argument months ago. A criticism of his arguments is not a stifling of dissent. Now that he brings it up, this is a common claim of leftists and peaceniks. Being in the minority requires toughness and his whining is distracting from his argument.

Disagreements between civilian and military leaders on tactics or the aftermath of war historically do not make the case for always listening to the military leaders. I would rather hear General Shinseki's and Professor Wolfowitz's arguments than merely appealing to authority by calling one General Eric and the other merely Paul.

Setbacks in war are not arguments against war. The fact that Turkey has different interests than the United States is not an argument for our government not protecting us. The fact that many in the world are willing to fight to the last American doesn't impress me at all.

Mr. Corry's argument seems to be to bide our time and hope that something really bad will not happen (something bad already happened!). Unlike him I won't put my faith in the rationality of Saddam Hussein. In fact the premise seems so flawed by his past behavior that any reasoning that goes forward from this premise is delusional. We have spent over twenty years ignoring the alarming rhetoric coming out of the Middle East. We have seen an escalating attack on Americans and American interests which led to the massacre of nearly 3,000 innocent Americans on American soil. These attacks were facilitated by Nations like Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Pakistan, and of course France.

The fantasy that nation states don't play the pivotal role in terror needs to be abandoned. These states must change or be wiped out. Inaction will only encourage bolder and more ruthless attacks. I believe Mr. Corry has pointed out legitimate dangers ahead. These dangers however came about through our past appeasement and "head in the sand" foreign policy. If we fail to act we will face far greater threats in the not to distant future.

I have noticed among dissenters of both the left and right an interesting case of projection. In their view we are not considering the consequences of our actions. This of course is not true. There has been at minimum a very public discussion of many risks and attempts to mitigate them. This process is useful. What I don't hear from the dissenters is what are the consequences of inaction. Mr. Corry offered nothing to replace the government's policy other than the implied Clinton approach to radical Islam and North Korea.
-- Clif Briner

Your theme, that the "bully boys" are bound to have their way, was repeated far too many times. You want to be taken seriously, as an "intelligent conservative," and then you besmirch the freedom-bringers by repeatedly referring to them as ""bullies." As for your contention that the poor backward people in the Middle East can't embrace democracy, which you say is, what, a day dream -- just before reading your con article, I read the WSJ online's "On the Ground," in northern Iraq, up-to-date which sure tells me you are out to lunch, and if truth be told, an elitist.

Letter to the Editor

topics:
Foreign Policy, Bill Clinton, Business, Religion, Islam, Constitution, Law, Military, Iraq, Iran, Israel, Pakistan, North Korea, Conservatism, Nuclear Weapons, Oil