Drop Kicking
Juan Cole and Marc Cooper: Will The Real Leaders
Stand Up?
By Joshua Frank
26 August, 2005
Countercurrents.org
"I'm tired
of waiting on a ship that won't leave shore The water's bloody with
the ones, who came before"
-Sleater-Kinney, Steep Air
Go
ahead and get excited about Cindy Sheehan's overnight popularity. It
really is a incredibly important development for the antiwar movement.
But before we drop what we are doing and follow her lead, we better
take a sobering step backward and recognize Sheehan, alone as a one-woman
show, has very real limitations.
First, we should
start listening to what she is actually saying, which is that this is
not about her or her loss. It's about the war. It's about the slaughter
taking place in Iraq right now. She's also calling for troops to come
home right now. Which is exactly what the antiwar movement should be
calling for. But isn't. Not yet anyway.
Liberals like Marc
Cooper and Juan Cole are calling for a phased withdraw ala Senator Russ
Feingold's exit December 2006 proclamation. Writing for his blog Cole
explains his lofty perspective: "I think 'US out now' as a simple
mantra neglects to consider the full range of possible disasters that
could ensue. For one thing, there would be an Iraq civil war. Iraq wasn't
having a civil war in 2002. And although you could argue that what is
going on now is a subterranean, unconventional civil war, it is not
characterized by set piece battles and hundreds of people killed in
a single battle, as was true
in Lebanon in 1975-76, e.g. People often allege that the US military
isn't doing any good in Iraq and there is already a civil war. These
people have never actually seen a civil war and do not appreciate the
lid the US military is keeping on what could be a volcano."
Yep. Those are pro-longed
occupation excuses from an "antiwar" scholar. Cole's thesis
is a non sequitur. Funny how the tenured Prof's rationale mirrors that
of the Bush administration - "stay the course" he effectively
says. Keep the occupation steaming onward. Forget the mounting death
count. Forget that the US does not have any intention of running Iraq
justly. If we "cut and run" a "volcano" (obviously
Cole isn't a geologist) will erupt for Christ's sake! Those damn Arabs
are not smart enough to be able and figure out their future all by their
lonesome! We've got to show them! That's the American way damnit!
Oh, how noble of
Professor Cole. If we are to accept his putrid rhetoric, however, then
we are not acknowledging the voices of dissent in Iraq that have been
ringing in unmistankingly clear these past months. They want the US
out yesterday. Occupiers like Cole don't listen, though. They impose
whatever they think is best on those they occupy.
Can you imagine
someone defending slavery in this manner? "No, no, no, don't end
slavery!" they'd scream. "The slaves will just turn against
each other. It'd be civil war! The savages! We'll give them their freedom
in due time! When we say so!"
Well, I hate to
say it, but Cole isn't accepting democracy no matter how much he claims
to believe in its principles. The Iraqis voted and the majority that
did want their occupiers to leave now. They want to govern themselves.
Build their own infrastructure. Run their own government. Is that too
much to ask?
Prof Cole doesn't
want that. At least not yet. He'll let us known when. Good thing Cole
has the liberal huckster Marc Cooper who has chimed in to defend his
"stay the course" bullshit. As Cooper writes on his own conceited
blog, "Some of the more delusional responses predictably enough
come from the Idiot Right who accuse Cole of being a traitor. And, yes,
also from those who want immediate, unconditional, un-thought-out withdrawal
on the Unrepentant Idiot Left. One of the more prolific buffoons from
that corner -- Louis Proyect the self-described 'Unrepentant Marxist'--
can offer no
better response than to compare Cole with Dick Nixon and then further
suggest I undergo a lobotomy for having linked to Cole and to cure what
he diagnoses as my incipient [Christopher] Hitchens Syndrome."
I am pretty sure
I'd much rather be a buffoon than endorse the death of more innocent
civilians - which would surely happen under Cole and Cooper's rosy "eventual
withdraw" (read: pro-longed occupation) scenario. Staying the course
will only illicit more violence. More anti-US sentiment. This is a fact.
What we do not know for a fact is how Iraqis will deal with US exiting.
There is absolutely no way to know for sure. If a civil war breaks out
in Iraq after our exit - god forbid - that's the course Iraqis will
choose to take. On their own. But we don't have any moral authority
to impose our values on them and their decisions. I'm sure Prof Cole
(and maybe even Cooper) has heard what this imperial behavior is called
- we call it ethnocentrism.
So let's get back
to Cindy Sheehan, who is calling for an immediate withdraw of soldiers
in Iraq. She doesn't want any permanent bases in the country, which
is a far better position then both Cole and Cooper combined. But Sheehan
as a lone messenger has real limitations. She has been branded by
the media as a mother who is motivated by her own grief. She is not
thinking rationally, they say, she is just trying to make sense of her
son's death. All this, despite the fact that her message is purely political;
Sheehan is articulate and media savvy, heck she even has a "progressive"
publicist. Cindy lacks something important however - she has never served
in Iraq like her late son Casey.
The true leaders
of the anti-war movement are going to be Casey's fellow troops like
Kelly Dougherty, Pablo Paredes and Jason Gunn who have served in Iraq
and are now speaking out against the war. There are hundreds of them.
Perhaps thousands. They can't be discredited in the same manner as Cindy
Sheehan. They've seen the blood and smelled the death first hand. These
are the men and women who will become the leaders of the movement. Not
Cooper and Cole, thank heavens.
Joshua Frank
is the author of Left Out! How Liberals Helped Reelect George W.
Bush, just published by Common Courage Press. Visit www.brickburner
to learn more.