I'd agree broadly with Nathan on this but, not all of The American Conservative regulars are racist, paleo-con nativist yahoos. A.J. Bacevich, a great writer vs. militarism ("The New American Militarism, " from Oxford Univ. Press is a great read on the neo-cons, the Vietnam War in which he fought and Iraq. There were two positive reviews of the book on Portside, thelist of the Committees for Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism, the '91 split from the CPUSA.) appears regularly in THe American Conservative and The Nation. Has a recent piece in New Left Review too.
Thee has been a tipping point on Iraq withdrawal from sectors of the Elite and the broad "masses" sick and tired of the mass slaughter there. However, ultra-left comments by Carrol or other marxmail regulars or UfPJ ultras I see on their lists, that six months is too long reflect a irreality as to the logistics and political and moral difficulties here and there, as to how to bring this about as quickly but also as humanely as possible, for the sake of the Iraqi secular left political and trade union forces we, all of us, except for partisans of the "Victory to the Iraqi Resistance!" line, support. UfPJ and Labor Against The War hosted a tour of some of these sectors recently. David McReynolds, last night passed on, note from a Japanese democratic socialist, of material by secular leftists in Iraq in an coalition called the Iraqi Freedom Congress.
With death squads by SCIRI and Da'wa militias on the rampage there ("The Salvador Option, " http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20051118/our_monsters_in_iraq.php and Peter Maas in the NYT Sunday magazine [Maas also wrote a book on the slaughters of Milosevic], with the covert guidance doubtless of Reagan/Nixon era ambassador in thuggery, John Negroponte, in the U.S. Embassy there), this recent story on the Interior Ministry torture chambers, the Sunnis, understandly feel great threat at a Sh'ia/Kurdish dictatorship, motivated by the latter's rage at Sunni/Saddammite slaughter of Sh'ia and Kurds, anywhere from 65,000 to 300,00 in extant.
This will be an even more difficult withdrawal than the one from Vietnam by the USG in '73-'75 as there isn't a unified (or remotely progressive in any left-wing context, except a simplistic "anti-imperialism") national liberation front like in Vietnam, for the Iraqi provisional regime and the USG to surrender to. It isn't entirely a, "Social Imperialist, " Democrat illusion to be very concerned that U.S. withdrawal, which I favor ASAP, as it feeds the insurgency and slaughter of masses of civilians, could, after we get the fuck outta there, lead to a an even more vicious (if that is possible! but, it is, if you are a realist) civil war. Being cavalier about this like Carrol does is irresponsible.