William Kristol

Not that I know a whole bunch about William Kristol, but cartoonist Tom Tomorrow has gone to the trouble of rounding up a lovely sample of quotes showing what we might expect from the NYT's newest columnist. My personal favorite? From March 1st, 2003: "Very few wars in American history were prepared better or more thoroughly than this one by this president." Even Ol' Rummy was agreeing that "you go to war with the Army you have...not the Army you might want or wish to have at a later time" by the next year.

Oh, look who wrote that article I just linked to quoting SecDef! Right up there in the Google results. William Kristol opens with the quote then goes on to explain why he disagrees (rather disrespectfully: "Actually, we have a pretty terrific Army. It's performed a lot better in this war than the secretary of defense has."), and apparently is under the impression that he is a more competent judge of the army's strength than the fucking Secretary of Defense. No matter how lacking that Secretary may or may not have been. Kristol goes on to highlight Rummy's failings by saying:

"Leave aside the fact that the issue is not "the number of troops we had for the invasion" but rather the number of troops we have had for postwar stabilization. Leave aside the fact that Gen. Tommy Franks had projected that he would need a quarter-million troops on the ground for that task -- and that his civilian superiors had mistakenly promised him that tens of thousands of international troops would be available. Leave aside the fact that Rumsfeld has only grudgingly and belatedly been willing to adjust even a little bit to realities on the ground since April 2003. And leave aside the fact that if our generals have been under pressure not to request more troops in Iraq for fear of stretching the military too thin, this is a consequence of Rumsfeld's refusal to increase the size of the military after Sept. 11."

Gosh, don't you think some of that would have been, you know, prepared for?

Anyway, I digress: my point is, William Kristol. Writing for the New York Times. Yesterday's column goes something like:

"Some of us would much prefer a non-liberal and non-Democratic administration. We don’t want to increase the scope of the nanny state, we don’t want to undo the good done by the appointments of John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court, and we really don’t want to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory in Iraq."

I am all for balanced perspectives in the media but isn't this why God in His infinite wisdom invented Fox News?