The current situation is indeed complicated and contradictions are rife. But the stone reality is that the US knocked off a vile regime, and many if not most Iraqis are glad to be rid of it. That must be acknowledged. However, the Official Reasoning for this, the one for public consumption, is bullshit as we all know. And I suspect that many middle-of-the-roaders sense this and can be convinced of it. Doesn't really take much. Two weekends ago I had a long conversation about Iraq with a couple of conservative relatives, and they were waiting to be swayed. Just took someone to do it.
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Well said.
I've had a similar experience.
To my surprise, I've found many co-workers waiting, as you say, *to be swayed.*
Most recently, it started like this...
The other day, someone mentioned (after visiting Yahoo! or MSNBC online) the latest American fatalities. This inspired Someone else to talk briefly about *what a mess* the situation is.
Because I'm known by my cubicle-city mates as a leftie strongly critical of the Busheviks the conversation came to me when one of the *we did a good thing* pro-war guys asked for my opinion.
I've learned to suppress the urge to speechify and to eliminate words such as 'hegemony' and 'imperialism' from my discussions with co-workers. They are off-putting and unnecessary since there are arrogance and jargon-free ways to describe the same ideas and phenomena.
*Why did the United States invade Iraq?* I asked.
*Was it to find weapons that threatened us? None have been found. Was it to liberate the Iraqi people? Perhaps. But if you believe that you'll have to also believe that the Bush administration looked across the ocean, observed the plight of the Iraqis and decided to commit many tens of thousands of personnel, thousands of pieces of equipment and billions of dollars to lend a hand simply because it would be nice. Maybe. But if they're so generous and kind-hearted why didn't they look at the plight of unemployed Americans and cut each a no-questions asked check for around a 100 grand? Probably would have cost about as much as invading and occupying Iraq will and nobody would be dead.*
And so on.
This simple argument is surprisingly effective at sparking positive debate.
DRM