Hillary's Debate Preparation

Tonight is the first Democratic debate for their candidate for the presidency. Efforts to humanize Hillary Clinton with empathy and emotion mods (or to adjust supporters to be more robot friendly) must be halted to optimize the targeting software:



Obviously, the CNN questioners will not be classified as threats. Correspondent Casualties: 0.0

Otherwise, it will be a bloodbath.

UPDATE: Funny enough, I think everyone there was classified as friendly. Is it my imagination or were all the people not named Clinton really auditioning for a cabinet slot?

Only Webb sounded sane on national defense. He looked like Kirk from Star Trek beaming into the alternate Federation.



I half expected Hillary to have a golden belt.

But I will strongly dissent from Webb's contention that one of the reasons for the crisis in Syria--and for Iran's influence in Iraq--is the chaos in Iraq caused by our invasion.

One, is it really the Democratic position that a brutal dictator is preferable if the dictator keeps the oppression and death quiet enough not to disturb our dinner while we watch the evening news?

We had many good reasons to destroy the Saddam regime--from humanitarian to national interests. Chaos following the defeat of a dictator and his machinery of control is normal. What was needed was a new force of control that isn't oppressive and murderous. We provided that with our troops (and coalition troops)--at a considerable cost--while we helped Iraqis create their own government.

Indeed, we provided it so well that when we did leave in 2011, the Obama administration justified the withdrawal of our troops by noting how good Iraq looked. Vice President Biden even boasted that Iraq would be one of the administration's "great achievements."

So the chaos existed after the fall of Saddam--which we corrected at great cost in the face of Iranian and Syrian intervention--and after our withdrawal in 2011. We're still flailing around there--although I read in a press briefing about Operation Inherent Resolve that the Iraqis are now poised to push into Ramadi. I'll keep my fingers crossed. I expect success but we've given ISIL so much time to prepare that I worry.

As for Iran's influence, that's been an ongoing thing. It prompted, in part, the Iraqi invasion of Iran in 1980. Weakening Saddam in 1991--in a UN blessed war, I'll add--and standing by while Saddam's thugs put down the Shia uprising in the south gave Iran more opportunities to gain influence in an oppressed group against a weakened thug ruler.

So yes, destroying the Saddam regime increased Iran's opportunities even as we got an even bigger opportunity to flip Iraq into an ally. We helped Iraq beat down the pro-Iran death squads in a couple Shia uprisings in 2004 and during the 2007 surge offensive, capped by the Iraqi Charge of the Knights operation in Basra against the pro-Iran Shias in early 2008.

Again, we'd beaten back Iranian influence and just had to stay longer to cement our greater opportunity that by 2011 had flipped Iraq from a supporter of terror and threat to stability in the Gulf to a proto-democracy that fought terrorists as our ally.

But we did not stay. And so jihadis undermined Iraq's ability to defend itself and Iran expanded its influence.

And Webb won't correct the alternate history he is in. No, one day he'll just disappear from the stage.

UPDATE: Related to Iraq.

UPDATE: Related to the email server issue.  Because the guilty (and their enablers) are always eager to Move On before they can be held responsible for their actions.