Since the crackdown began Feb. 14, U.S. military officials have spoken of encouraging signs that security is improving in the capital but have cautioned against drawing any firm conclusions until at least the summer.
Figures compiled by the AP from Iraqi police reports show that 1,586 civilians were killed in Baghdad between the start of the offensive and Thursday.
That represents a sharp drop from the 2,871 civilians who died violently in the capital during the two months that preceded the security crackdown.
Outside the capital, 1,504 civilians were killed between Feb. 14 and Thursday, compared with 1,009 deaths during the two previous months, the figures show. ----------------------------------------- Doesn't sound much like improvement to me.
Are things improving? ********************************************************** 04-15-07, 06:48 PM hippolips Hi Frank:
40 American troops died this week...doesn't sound to me as though it's working.
But General Zinni said this morning on "Meet The Press", we should be out in 5 to 7 more years...not to worry.
hippolips
********************************************************** 04-15-07, 06:55 PM DorianGreyed I think more time is needed to determine if any "surge" is working, but the stats available are not encouraging.
Hippo, a snapshot of one week's deaths doesn't tell any story. Trends must be looked at. A large number of US deaths is to be expected when the number of US troops increases. The same holds true for a week in which no US deaths are reported. Simply put, one week is not the war.
quote: A large number of US deaths is to be expected when the number of US troops increases.
That sounds like a counter productive reason for a "surge". Confused
********************************************************** 04-15-07, 07:25 PM hippolips [QUOTE]Originally posted by DorianGreyed: I think more time is needed to determine if any "surge" is working, but the stats available are not encouraging.
Hippo, a snapshot of one week's deaths doesn't tell any story.
_____________________________________________________________________________________ Hi dg:
Any time 40 Americans die in one week ,it tells me that too damn many good Americans are dying in Iraq.
Sorry to disagree with you on this one.
hippolips
********************************************************** 04-15-07, 07:51 PM DorianGreyed Frank, I agree with you, but if the surge gets us out of Iraq sooner (either by succeeding or failing), then it may be a good thing.
Hippo, I don't know if you had that position before the war started. I know I did, as so did quite a few in here. But whether one agrees or disagrees with this war has no bearing on trying to get an accurate assessment of the surge's effectiveness. There have been over 200 weeks in this war, and the death toll of one week represents less than 1% of the total picture. Citing one week as proof of anything is just not using any common sense. If there was a week in which there were no US deaths, would you agree with those that say that the war was going well?
********************************************************** 04-15-07, 09:40 PM sid1114 The larger question is whether the "war on terror" is working; episodes around the world are on the increase.
Here's the part that's really distressing to me, as one who thinks the war in Iraq has been the worst mistake the US ever made: as troops were pulled out of other areas to surge in Baghdad, there's more sectarian violence in the areas left behind. Which could be seen as a microcosm of what happens if we leave altogether. It's hard to argue that if we do pull out -- which I'd like to think we could do -- there'll be no increase in violence. Evidence is abundant that there will. So what do we do? bush has damaged us, Iraq, the world in ways that it may not ever recover from. I see no way out. One would hope that if we indeed set a deadline, the other countries who have an immediate stake will step in to prevent immolation. Could that happen?
********************************************************** 04-16-07, 07:37 AM Kendor
quote: Originally posted by frankvan: ...but have cautioned against drawing any firm conclusions until at least the summer.
So why are you posting this on April 15?
A little pre-mature speculation, frank?
********************************************************** 04-16-07, 10:11 AM frankvan The military people who were cautioning about drawing conclusions before summer are the ones who still have their jobs. The ones who are more realistic find themselves replaced, prematurely, Kendor. IMHO.
********************************************************** 04-16-07, 01:15 PM hippolips [QUOTE]Originally posted by DorianGreyed: Frank, I agree with you, but if the surge gets us out of Iraq sooner (either by succeeding or failing), then it may be a good thing.
Hippo, I don't know if you had that position before the war started. I know I did, as so did quite a few in here. But whether one agrees or disagrees with this war has no bearing on trying to get an accurate assessment of the surge's effectiveness.
If you take the time to re-read any of my statements ,you'll find that I did not agree with the idea of invading Iraq in the first place.
I also have stated that we should get out of Iraq as soon as possible ,and we should just let the Sunnis and Shias keep killing themselves until they get tired of doing it.
Call me heartless,but I don't think the loss of one single American life is worth staying in Iraq for one more day.
And don't worry about the oil companies losing money,they haven't so far.
Oil is the real reason we went into Iraq in the first place.
hippolips
********************************************************** 04-16-07, 01:29 PM babthrower It is not 'heartless', Lips. The civilian death toll in Iraq is horrible. The nation's a mess but that's for the Iraqis to solve.
Even if you believe that the U.S. invaded Iraq for the betterment of the lives of the Iraqis, the point is, it's not working, it's getting worse.
Throughout history, foreign intervention accomplishes AT BEST a "Roman peace", a cease-fire which only lasts while the invading 'cops' are there. When they leave, the native people settle things in the time-honored way, by genocide which eventually ends in stability. It happened in south-eastern Europe when the Soviet Union collapsed, and it is happening in Africa since the departure of the European colonial rulers.
quote: Originally posted by babthrower: Even if you believe that the U.S. invaded Iraq for the betterment of the lives of the Iraqis, the point is, it's not working, it's getting worse..
I'm sorry babs, I didn't realize that you were an Iraqi. Nice to know that someone here is 'in the know' when it comes to how things really are in Iraq. Thanks for the enlightenment.
quote: Originally posted by babthrower: The U.S. should just get out.
And then move on into British Columbia. That'd be ok with you, eh?
********************************************************** 04-17-07, 01:19 AM newnickname Sadr's Rising Star to Eclipse Bush's Surge?
********************************************************** 08-08-07, 09:31 AM newnickname The surge: a special report by Patrick Cockburn
********************************************************** 08-08-07, 10:21 AM coldfuse A War We Might Just Win
This is a recent article from The New York Times, hardly a pro-Bush publication.
********************************************************** 08-08-07, 12:20 PM DorianGreyed The New York Times, like most major newspapers, often publishes pieces by contributing editors, pieces which generally disagree with the paper's positions.
Below from WIkipedia -
On July 9, 2007, O'Hanlon said during a panel discussion in Washington that a "soft partition" of Iraq is already occurring that would break the country up into three autonomous regions - Kurdistan, "Shi'astan" and "Sunnistan." "Iraq is being ethnically segregated. Ethnic cleansing is on its way, it's happening, and at least a couple million people have been displaced. It's becoming Bosnia in some ways,' he added.[1]
In a July 30, 2007 op-ed piece in the New York Times O'Hanlon and co-author Kenneth M. Pollack, just back from eight days in Iraq, found progress being made. "As two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq, we were surprised by the gains we saw and the potential to produce not necessarily 'victory' but a sustainable stability that both we and the Iraqis could live with." [2]
Critics however, have called into question the veracity of O'Hanlons claim to have been a harsh critic of the Bush administration's handling of Iraq, arguing that it was a deceitful assertion intended to lend the article increased credibility. In reality, according to attorney, columnist and strong critic of the Bush administration Glenn Greenwald, O'Hanlon and Pollack "were not only among the biggest cheerleaders for the war, but repeatedly praised the Pentagon's strategy in Iraq and continuously assured Americans things were going well." [3] There is no question, however, at the very least, that O'Hanlon has publicly gone on record as being skeptical of the Bush administration's approach to the war in Iraq. For instance, in a piece he wrote for the Washington Post on March 27, 2006 about potential civil war, O'Hanlon stated "initial indications are that American thinking is on the wrong track," "[t]his approach, which mirrors the relatively passive approach U.S. troops took to the reprisal violence after the Feb. 22 bombing [....] is akin to our decision to stand aside and allow wanton looting after Saddam Hussein fell in April 2003, and it could have comparably disastrous consequences" and "as a full indication of what our military plans would be for any incipient civil war, it is not the right strategy. Now is the time to reassess."
O'Hanlon signed a letter and a statement on postwar Iraq published by the Project for the New American Century ---------------------------- The letter was to the US Congress, urging an increase in troops. So, in effect, O'Hanlon's recent article is saying that the Surge that he wanted is working. His opinion seems to fly in the face of well-known statistics. ---------------------------- Again, from Wikipedia -
In government, Kenneth Pollack has served in a variety of roles. From 1988 until 1995, he was analyst on Iraqi and Iranian military issues for the Central Intelligence Agency. He spent a year as Director for Near East and South Asian Affairs with the United States National Security Council. In 1999, he rejoined the NSC as the Director for Persian Gulf Affairs. He also served two stints as a professor with the National Defense University.
Outside of government, he worked for the Brookings Institution as the director of research at its Saban Center for Middle East Policy. He previously worked for the Council of Foreign Relations as their director of national security studies. He has also written four books, the first two both being published in 2002. The first, Arabs at War, looks at the actions and lack of effectiveness of six Arab nations in the years between World War II and the Persian Gulf War. The second, The Threatening Storm: The Case for Invading Iraq details the history of United States actions against Iraq since the Persian Gulf War. He discusses the need to invade Iraq, and the possible ways of going about it. Pollack argued that Saddam Hussein was simply too volatile and aggressive in his policies to be trusted not to begin another conflict in a volatile region. Many have criticized his support for the Invasion of Iraq, including war reporter Robert Fisk.
A U.S. government indictment alleges that Pollack provided information to former American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) employees Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman during the AIPAC espionage scandal.[1]
---------------------------- So Pollock, like O'Hanlon, is giving his opinion on a position that he had previously endorsed. While this does not mean the men are wrong, it certainly should be no surprise that they come to the conclusions that they did in this recent article. Not doing so would mean admitting that their previous strongly-stated positions were in error. Not too many people, on either side of an issue, have been willing to openly admit that they were wrong in error to positions they had previously taken in books and articles. The most notable example I can remember is George Romney saying he had been "brainwashed" (by the US government) into believing the US was winning in Vietnam. Many of us remember how that played put for his already slim presidential hopes.
Maybe we are winning in Iraq. Maybe the Surge is working. Maybe Patraeus will do better at winning in Iraq than he did at keeping track of weapons issued to Iraqis. But the numbers, the statistics, and the Iraqis expressing their opinion with their feet seem to indicate otherwise. If we are to depend on someone telling us when we've won, why didn't we just pull out when bush declared "Mission Accomplished"? I think the most logical way to determine what is happening is to look at the numbers, the real numbers, not someone's wish list. Look at the articles that NewNickname and Fuse linked to. Which one gave numbers rather than generalized terms? Which one offered facts as opposed to observations of a week's stay in Iraq? Anyone can go to Iraq and find people to support a pre-conceived position. When Iraqis start moving back to Iraq or to their homes, when Iraqis stop complaining about no electricity and bad water, when Iraqis are not killed on the street for their religious beliefs will mark the time what we are winning, not the viewpoint of selected US military and Iraqi officials.
But the article itself provides them Big Grin The authors recommend that the US stay at least into 2008 (see the last paragraphs of the same). Apparently 'we just might win' is to mean 'we must give it another twelve months or so'. Then what? And we note that the authors say there won't be a victory. They choose to define success only in terms of the hope that there might just be some arrangement which both sides could live with. That is 'win' to them.
********************************************************** 08-09-07, 06:43 PM Charles B Wikipedia founder admits to serious quality problems
Yes it's garbage, but it's delivered so much faster!
By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco Published Tuesday 18th October 2005 03:48 GMT
Encouraging signs from the Wikipedia project, where co-founder and überpedian Jimmy Wales has acknowledged there are real quality problems with the online work.
Criticism of the project from within the inner sanctum has been very rare so far, although fellow co-founder Larry Sanger, who is no longer associated with the project, pleaded with the management to improve its content by befriending, and not alienating, established sources of expertise. (i.e., people who know what they're talking about.)
Meanwhile, criticism from outside the Wikipedia camp has been rebuffed with a ferocious blend of irrationality and vigor that's almost unprecedented in our experience: if you thought Apple, Amiga, Mozilla or OS/2 fans were er, ... passionate, you haven't met a wiki-fiddler. For them, it's a religious crusade.
In the inkies, Wikipedia has enjoyed a charmed life, with many of the feature articles about the five-year old project resembling advertisements. Emphasis is placed on the knowledgeable articles (by any yardstick, it's excellent for Klingon, BSD Unix, and Ayn Rand), the breadth of its entries (Klingon again), and process issues such as speed.
"We don't ever talk about absolute quality," boasted one of the project's prominent supporters, Clay Shirky, a faculty tutor at NYU. But it's increasingly difficult to avoid the issue any longer.
Especially since Wikipedia's material is replicated endlessly on the web: it's the first port of call for "sploggers" who create phoney sites, spam blogs, which created to promote their clients in Google.
Wales was responding to author Nicholas Carr, who in a dazzling post on the transcendent New Age "hive-mind" rhetoric that envelops the "Web 2.0" bubble, took time out to examine the quality of two entries picked at random: Bill Gates and Jane Fonda.
He wasn't impressed by what he saw.
"This is garbage, an incoherent hodge-podge of dubious factoids that adds up to something far less than the sum of its parts," he wrote.
Something that aspires to be a reference work ought to be judged by the quality of the worst entry, he said, in response to the clock-stopped, right-time defense of the project, not by the fact it's got some good articles.
"In theory, Wikipedia is a beautiful thing - it has to be a beautiful thing if the Web is leading us to a higher consciousness," writes Carr.
Only it isn't.
"An encyclopedia can't just have a small percentage of good entries and be considered a success. I would argue, in fact, that the overall quality of an encyclopedia is best judged by its weakest entries rather than its best. What's the worth of an unreliable reference work?"
Why, as an Emergent Phenomenon™ it provides a subject that can be used for countless hours of class study for people like Clay Shirky, of course. Good for him - but what about the rest of us?
Uncountable
Surprisingly, Wales agreed that the entries weren't up to snuff.
"The two examples he puts forward are, quite frankly, a horrific embarassment. [sic] Bill Gates and Jane Fonda are nearly unreadable crap. Why? What can we do about it?" he asked.
Traditionally, Wikipedia supporters have responded to criticism in one of several ways. The commonest is: If you don't like an entry, you can fix it yourself. Which is rather like going to a restaurant for a date, being served terrible food, and then being told by the waiter where to find the kitchen. But you didn't come out to cook a meal - you could have done that at home! No matter, roll up your sleeves.
As a second line of defense, Wikipedians point to flaws in the existing dead tree encyclopedias, as if the handful of errors in Britannica cancels out the many errors, hopeless apologies for entries, and tortured prose, of Wikipedia itself.
Thirdly, and here you can see that the defense is beginning to run out of steam, one's attention is drawn to process issues: such as the speed with which errors are fixed, or the fact that looking up a Wikipedia is faster than using an alternative. This line of argument is even weaker than the first: it's like going to a restaurant for a date - and being pelted with rotten food, thrown at you at high velocity by the waiters.
But the issue of readability poses even greater challenges. Even when a Wikipedia entry is 100 per cent factually correct, and those facts have been carefully chosen, it all too often reads as if it has been translated from one language to another then into to a third, passing an illiterate translator at each stage. (Possibly if one of these languages was Klingon, the entry might survive the mauling, but that doesn't appear to be the case very often).
Here the problems begin, because readability is a quality that can't be generated by a machine, or judged by one. It's the kind of subjective valuation that the Wikipedians explicitly hate: subjectivity is scorned for failing the positivist's NPOV test.
As a delicious illustration, Wikipedia appears to have a quality problem with the word "quality" itself. While Merriam Webster online offers us eight major definitions, including "a) degree of excellence : GRADE ... b : superiority in kind", and the Cambridge Dictionary three, of which two are "how good or bad something is and of a high standard" Wikipedia's sister project Wiktionary definition begins this. "1 - (uncountable) general good value"
Now is that General Good Value as in something plucked from a Wal-Mart sale? And "Uncountable"? Yes, indeed.
If this was a Marvel Comic, our superhero Objectivity would by now be ensared in the evil coils of Subjectivity. There appears to be no escape. Or is there?
Not good enough - so what do we wikkin' do?
Re-working Wikipedia so it presents the user with something minimally readable will be a mammoth task. Although the project has no shortage of volunteers, most add nothing: busying themselves with edits that simply add or takeaway a comma. These are housekeeping tasks that build up credits for the participants, so they can rise higher in the organization.
And Wikipedia's "cabal" has become notorious for deterring knowledgable and literate contributors. One who became weary of the in-fighting, Orthogonal, calls it Wikipedia's HUAC - the House of Unamerican Activities prominent in the McCarthy era for hunting down and imprisoning the ideologically-incorrect.
So right now, the project appears ill-equipped to respond to the new challenge. Its philosophical approach deters subjective judgements about quality, and its political mindset deters outside experts from helping.
This isn't promising.
One day Wikipedia may well be the most amazing reference work the world has ever seen, lauded for its quality. But to get from here to there it will need real experts and top quality writing - it won't get there by hoping that its whizzy technical processes remedy such deficiencies. In other words, it will resemble today's traditional encyclopedias far more than it does today.
For now we simply welcome the candour: at least Wikipedia is officially out of QD, or the "Quality Denial" stage.
Bootnote Of the many, many atrocious entries, we'd like to bring one more to the HUAC's attention, and it's our very favorite. As of the time of writing, whoever wrote the entry for soul legend Baby Washington has no idea who she is, but makes a wild guess, then gives up completely with the less-than-helpful advice: "Many have written inacurate information about Washington. She IS NOT "BABY WASHINGTON" from James Brown." (sic).
Indeed. But note that this entry has been edited no less than seven times and can be found replicated at Biography.com, Answers.com, Reference.com, InfoMutt, The Free Dictionary and hundreds of other sites.
You've got to love the web. Just bask in that collective intelligence. ®
This message has been edited. Last edited by: DorianGreyed,
Rather than look for negative information, which can be found about anything or anybody, you could have looked for just plain information, which would have turned up the fact that a sampling of both Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica showed WIkipedia to have fewer errors than Britannica. Fuse posted that over a year ago on AP.
Originally posted by DorianGreyed: Rather than look for negative information, which can be found about anything or anybody, you could have looked for just plain information, which would have turned up the fact that a sampling of both Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica showed WIkipedia to have fewer errors than Britannica. Fuse posted that over a year ago on AP.
Note that Fuse's link is dated almost two months after yours.
DorianGreyed, even you looked for what you called "negative information" and discredited your own post above in on that topic.
Second, you again looked up "negative information" against O'Hanlon and Kenneth M. Pollack in order to discredit what I posted. Just what is it that I don't understand here.
Posted 12-24-05 04:06 PM Hide Post Now the owner and co-counder of Wikipedia may be trying to alter some facts.
The latest salvo came this week thanks to Rogers Cadenhead, who did a bit of cybersleuthing and reported on Workbench that the founder of Wikipedia, Jimmy Wales, had altered his own Wikipedia biography. Wired News picked up Mr. Cadenhead's discovery, and a heated debate ensued on Wikipedia discussion boards. New York Times -------- The fun never stops, does it.
I just posted bios of O'Hanlon and Pollock. If factual information about them is negative, whose fault is that?
If you are trying to negate a source, facts are important. But the facts must be the most recent ones that reflect current conditions, not "old news" such as you posted. The more recent news about Wikipedia (that I posted) shows Wikipedia to be a better source than Britannica, which certainly is contrary to what you posted. If you are going to use an incident to prove a point, you should make sure that incident actually does prove your point. Not posting the outcome of such an incident shows either shoddy research or the intent to deceive when doing so negates your point.
Posts: 17271 | Location: Lincoln Place, Granite City, IL, USA | Registered: 06-03-02
Originally posted by DorianGreyed: I just posted bios of O'Hanlon and Pollock. If factual information about them is negative, whose fault is that?
If you are trying to negate a source, facts are important. But the facts must be the most recent ones that reflect current conditions, not "old news" such as you posted. The more recent news about Wikipedia (that I posted) shows Wikipedia to be a better source than Britannica, which certainly is contrary to what you posted. If you are going to use an incident to prove a point, you should make sure that incident actually does prove your point. Not posting the outcome of such an incident shows either shoddy research or the intent to deceive when doing so negates your point.
I guess you missed my link. I think this about sums things up.
Britannica attacks Nature in newspaper ads By Nate Anderson | Published: April 05, 2006 - 12:44PM CT
The Encyclopedia Britannica has stepped up its attacks on the journal Nature by taking out large ads in both the New York Times and the London Times this past week. The unusually public dispute began last year when Nature published a study showing that Britannica and Wikipedia had almost the same level of accuracy. Britannica was obviously not pleased with this conclusion, but made no objections until March, when it at last published a set of objections to the study. Not pleased with Nature's response, Britannica is now taking the controversy to the masses.
The ads call on Nature to issue a "full and public retraction of the article," and the Britannica editors give five major reasons why they believe the methodology of the study was deeply flawed.
1. You reviewed text that was not even from the Encyclopedia Britannica. 2. You accused Britannica of "omissions," on the basis of reviews of arbitrarily chosen excerpts of Britannica articles, not the articles themselves. 3. You rearranged and re-edited Britannica articles. 4. You failed to distinguish minor inaccuracies from major errors. 5. Your headline contradicted the body of your article.
At the end, the editors of Britannica call on Nature to "renew its long-standing commitment to good scholarship and send us the complete, unabridged reviewer reports on which the study was based." They also suggest that a "complete retraction of the article is in order. Nature should make the retraction promptly, if not for Britannica's sake, then for the sake of Nature's reputation and in the interest of good science."
Britannica is certainly not holding anything back in this battle, which is understandable, as it goes to the very heart of their corporate mission (and profit margins). Their criticisms certainly do make the Nature study sound flawed. Britannica claims, for instance, that "several of the articles you sent to reviewers were not from the Britannica at all. In one case a reviewer criticized us for text that we simply cannot identify. We do know, however, that it was not ours." How could Nature make such egregious mistakes as these?
Nature's response is simple and direct—they are standing by their original results. In their view, it is Britannica that is simply mistaken.
"Another Britannica criticism concerns the fact that we provided material from other Britannica publications, such as the Britannica Book of the Year. This was deliberate: the aim of our story, as we made clear, was to compare the online material available from Britannica and Wikipedia. When users search Britannica online, they get results from several Britannica publications. They have no reason to think that any one is less reliable than the others. In the case of some year-book entries, Britannica itself asks readers to reference the articles as coming from 'Encyclopaedia Britannica Online'—-exactly the source we set out to compare.
"Other objections are simply incorrect. The company has, for example, claimed that in one case we sent a reviewer material that did not come from any Britannica publication. When the company made this point to us in private we asked for details, but it provided none. Now Britannica has identified the review in question as being on ethanol. We have checked the original e-mail that we sent to the reviewer who looked at the Britannica article on ethanol, and it is clear to us that all the reviewer's comments refer to specific paragraphs from Britannica."
Nature's larger point is that, in the end, specific mistakes do not matter much anyway, since the study was conducted blind. Errors made by the reviewers would have tended to affect both Britannica and Wikipedia equally.
"Our reviewers may have made some mistakes--we have been open about our methodology and never claimed otherwise--but the entries they reviewed were blinded: they did not know which entry came from Wikipedia and which from Britannica. We see no reason to believe that any misidentifications of errors would adversely affect one publication more than the other. And of the 123 purported errors in question, Britannica takes issue with fewer than half."
Britannica's biggest gripe, though, has still not been addressed. They mention several times in their advertisements that Nature has been unwilling to turn over all of the documentation behind the study, and Nature's response does not indicate that they will do so.
The battle underscores the way in which projects such as Wikipedia can undermine established authorities and business models. Whether this is wholly a good thing remains to be seen, as Wikipedia's own founder has told users not to cite his online encyclopedia as a source due to concerns over its accuracy. Hopefully, the competition between the two models will serve to improve both.
Yes, I did. Bit the link also shows that Britannica addressed less than half of what they called errors, and it also points out that the test used was a blind test. It's hard to argue with the results of an objective blind test. In any case, the fact that EB is debating the point is an indication of just how good Wikipedia is. Further, the bios I used were similar to bios of the two men on other sites, and I was not really discrediting them, just showing that it is generally not a surprise to see that people often support results of actions that they earlier supported. Apparently, it take a bit of courage to openly admit that one was wrong. (v.s. My George Romney reference)
Fortunately, I have never had a problem admitting that I was wrong in error.
Posts: 17271 | Location: Lincoln Place, Granite City, IL, USA | Registered: 06-03-02
Originally posted by DorianGreyed: Yes, I did. Bit the link also shows that Britannica addressed less than half of what they called errors, and it also points out that the test used was a blind test. It's hard to argue with the results of an objective blind test. In any case, the fact that EB is debating the point is an indication of just how good Wikipedia is. Further, the bios I used were similar to bios of the two men on other sites, and I was not really discrediting them, just showing that it is generally not a surprise to see that people often support results of actions that they earlier supported. Apparently, it take a bit of courage to openly admit that one was wrong. (v.s. My George Romney reference)
Fortunately, I have never had a problem admitting that I was wrong in error.
No sweat, doesn't mean a thing. What got me, is that "Nature" who did the study evidently has not published the study or will give it to Britannica as quoted here "They mention several times in their advertisements that Nature has been unwilling to turn over all of the documentation behind the study, and Nature's response does not indicate that they will do so."
In my book, there would be only one reason not to turn over or publish the whole study.
You may be right about the refusal to publish the whole study. (Maybe they are claiming that to tell the truth would weaken national security.) What does your book say about the majority of the EB errors that the EB did not address?
Posts: 17271 | Location: Lincoln Place, Granite City, IL, USA | Registered: 06-03-02
Originally posted by DorianGreyed: You may be right about the refusal to publish the whole study. (Maybe they are claiming that to tell the truth would weaken national security.) What does your book say about the majority of the EB errors that the EB did not address?
I have not idea about what they didn't address, but then again, what out there doesn't have errors in it! I think what has been proven, is that all though Britannica does have errors in their information, it isn't on the same level as Wikipedia.
While I don't see that what you claim has been proven, it doesn't matter. What does matter is that O'Hanlon and Pollock, whose Wikipedia bios match their bios on other sites, are on record sa saying that something which they urged is now a success, despite scant evidence indicating that and despite most evidence indicating that they are wrong. What next, Barry Bonds being quoted as a source for the wholesomeness of steroid use?
Posts: 17271 | Location: Lincoln Place, Granite City, IL, USA | Registered: 06-03-02
Originally posted by DorianGreyed: While I don't see that what you claim has been proven, it doesn't matter. What does matter is that O'Hanlon and Pollock, whose Wikipedia bios match their bios on other sites, are on record sa saying that something which they urged is now a success, despite scant evidence indicating that and despite most evidence indicating that they are wrong. What next, Barry Bonds being quoted as a source for the wholesomeness of steroid use?
I understand now. Their BIO you posted negates what they said about winning in Iraq.
No, but it shows that neither is what could be called an objective observer of events. Both have a vested interest in saying that the Surge is working, since both thought it a good idea before it started. Meanwhile, Iraqis, who see what is happening on a daily basis, continue to voice their opinion with their feet.
Posts: 17271 | Location: Lincoln Place, Granite City, IL, USA | Registered: 06-03-02
Originally posted by DorianGreyed: No, but it shows that neither is what could be called an objective observer of events. Both have a vested interest in saying that the Surge is working, since both thought it a good idea before it started. Meanwhile, Iraqis, who see what is happening on a daily basis, continue to voice their opinion with their feet.
They have been there, and along with many others coming out of Iraq, the "surge of troops" is working. I think the worst thing that can happen, is that prior to the election with the surge working the Generals start pulling troops out of Iraq. It is positively true that anyone out there that says the surge is working most of you put the messenger and or the the person that said it down. If and when it does work and most of the troops are out of Iraq, most Liberals will continue to say it didn't work. All it takes, is one bombing, and the Liberals point their finger and say see, I told you so.
Just like going into Iraq, it was said by many, that if we did find WMD, it will have been planted by the CIA.
O'Hanlon and Pollack may have 'been there', but it seems they only saw "Green Zone Iraq". This looks like an even-handed report on the surge and its progress, maybe.
'...for Mr Bush, the main point of the surge is political, and it is mostly directed at American opinion.
The White House wants to be able to declare victory and start withdrawing. It claims that civilian casualties in Baghdad have halved as a result of the surge.
Yet a careful examination of the figures does not necessarily support that.
The McClatchy group of newspapers, part of the American mainstream media, with a considerable reputation for honesty and painstaking accuracy in its Iraq reporting, says there were 5% more car-bombings in Baghdad in July than in December, before the surge began.
It also says the number of civilians killed in explosions is about the same.
The BBC's own monitoring of the surge also indicates that the position is less satisfactory than the White House and the Pentagon say.
Still, if the Bush administration can persuade Americans that things in Iraq are improving, then the figures are irrelevant.
It's all about politics. And according to the Los Angeles Times, next month's assessment about the surge's success will be written by the White House, instead of by the two men we were previously told would make the judgement: General David Petraeus, the US commander in Iraq, and Ryan Crocker, the American ambassador there...'news.bbc.co.uk
Originally posted by newnickname: '...for Mr Bush, the main point of the surge is political, and it is mostly directed at American opinion.
The White House wants to be able to declare victory and start withdrawing. It claims that civilian casualties in Baghdad have halved as a result of the surge.
Yet a careful examination of the figures does not necessarily support that.
The McClatchy group of newspapers, part of the American mainstream media, with a considerable reputation for honesty and painstaking accuracy in its Iraq reporting, says there were 5% more car-bombings in Baghdad in July than in December, before the surge began.
It also says the number of civilians killed in explosions is about the same.
The BBC's own monitoring of the surge also indicates that the position is less satisfactory than the White House and the Pentagon say.
Still, if the Bush administration can persuade Americans that things in Iraq are improving, then the figures are irrelevant.
It's all about politics. And according to the Los Angeles Times, next month's assessment about the surge's success will be written by the White House, instead of by the two men we were previously told would make the judgement: General David Petraeus, the US commander in Iraq, and Ryan Crocker, the American ambassador there...'news.bbc.co.uk
VFW, American Legion back Iraq war Groups urge patience to let 'surge' work By Bryan Bender, Globe Staff | August 16, 2007
WASHINGTON -- The American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the nation's oldest and most influential veterans' organizations, have broken their relative silence on the merits of the Iraq war, joining some of the staunchest war supporters to lobby Congress and the public to give the military "surge" more time to work.
This month, the American Legion issued an "action alert" to its three million members, declaring "the war in Iraq is not lost." Last week, the commander of the VFW, Gary Kurpius, reported that troops he met on a recent fact-finding trip to Iraq want "a little more time and patience" for the stepped-up US offensive to succeed.
