The Left and Iraq

David Gelber wonders at TPM Cafe if the Democratic Party is not headed for a 2008 convention that repeats the turmoil of their 1968 convention over the issue of Iraq. He thinks that so many progressives want out of Iraq that they will cause all sorts of hell and that Hillary may be the 2008 version of Hubert Humphrey. Comments to the post are all over the map. My thoughts are that such a move may or may not be a good political move, but it's a terrible moral move. It could well be that in another 3 years, things in Iraq have improved enough that US troops do not need to remain. I think that's unlikely, but even if they are still there, do that many people on the Left care so little about the fate of the people of Iraq that they would want the US to just pull out? Polls suggest that a lot of people think the US should get out of Iraq. Maybe that's just a knee-jerk reaction to our military actions there. I hope it is. Because at this point, we have a serious and long-term obligation to the people of Iraq to reconstruct their nation and help it along in so many ways. To pull out not would be almost as morally questionable as the decision to go in there in the first place.

UPDATE, 6/14/05--A Pew Research Center poll shows that 46% of Americans favor immediate withdrawl. That is very disturbing to me. Obviously much needs to change in our Iraq policy but immediate withdrawl is a dreadful idea and one that I think will lead to civil war in Iraq, something that will only increase the amount of blood on our hands.