In this thread, we discuss Political Implications of the Capture of Saddam
 

Saddam is now Captured. The Iraqi people are dancing in the streets, and France and Germany have issued statements about how great this is. The world will have justice.

As well, this will affect the economy greatly - Stocks and Equities are bound to skyrocket tomorrow, and the U.S. Market is already closed right now from Friday at above the pyschologically sensitive 10,000 mark, and will go even higher over the next week.

So, lets discuss the Presidential race. The President's approval ratings will undoubtedly raise, a main objective in the war in Iraq has been accomplished. The economy has been reaching new levels over the past few months, with the earlier raise in the GDP, the Dow above 10,000, etc.

Do the Democrats have anything left to use against the President? Howard Dean's platform - being against the war in Iraq - has been dealt a major blow.

Has President Bush just recieved a great chance at Four More Years?

It won't be used in any of the platforms, that's a given - but it will still have wide-ranging implications. Bush can campaign on the positive news coming from Iraq. The pictures do itself. But the economic boost, etc...all are factors.

This will have little impact on the Presidential race. Any rise in the stock market will not be due to rational stock valuations, therefore it won't last 3 1/2 quarters. The one thing that will determine whether or not President Bush is reelected is the state of the economy in the next two quarters. There needs to be sustained growth of over 3.5% in each of these quarters, and job creation must begin in the second quarter. If this happens, then the election is over and President Bush is reelected.

Internally (US)- probably nothing. In the end, it's all about local economics.

As for the other internal (Iraq) - 4 possible outcome

1. The rebellion will be disfranchised. Decrease of attack.
2. Consolidation of the rebellion. Since it's no longer "Saddam" attack, people might be more willing to join it.
3. Status quo and eventually democrazation after 10 to 15 years of occupation
4. Worst case scenario - Quick historical background:

Iraq is a totally artificial creation, carved by the Brits out of the remnants of the Ottoman empire. And the Brits had quite a time holding it together (the Shi'ite uprising of the early 1920s was the BIG colonial war they had to deal with right after World War I).

The Ba'athists held the country together by brute force--because that was the only way it could be held together

[Just a Stalin held the USSR together, and Tito held Yugoslavia together, and Ataturk held Turkey together: by crushing any whisper of separatism & smashing any uppity ethnic groups]

And Saddam held the Ba'athists together.

Subtract Saddam, subtract the Ba'athists and what do you get?

Sectarian civil war

It may be not be an event, but, on Tuesday a Sunni mosque in baghdad was attacked. On Wednesday a Shi'ite mosque was attacked. On Friday sermons throughout Sunni & Shi'ite mosques made much reference to these attacks. Perhaps Wahhabi fanatics are organising these attacks. perhaps not.

When Dick Morris spoke at my school in the spring (he's an astute political analyst who strategized Clinton's success), he said that if the war started succeeding, people would get bored and not vote for Bush. He said the novelty was in defending Bush constantly. So who knows!

I agree. I think most people are more concerned about the US economy and job market than the war in Iraq. The capture of Saddam may make people a little bit happier with Bush but I don't think it will effect his overall candidacy for reelection. If Bush can successfully turn this economy and job market back around, people will have enough faith in him to reelect him for another 4 years.

This is probably right unless Bush did something to piss people off besides the economy. I think most people are giving the military the credit not Bush. It was bound to happen as long as he decided to stay and hide in Iraq. Bush might try to use it in the race but I doubt he would because people would bring up he started the war because of the WMD's he never found.

This is beyond "probably right." I didn't make up those metrics that condition his reelection. Unless he runs a pathetic campaign, like Al Gore did, and if those metrics are met, then George Bush will absolutely be reelected. No "ifs" "ands" or "buts" about it.

Glad you can tell the future. So if he met those metrics and lost would you come up with another reason to prove you were not wrong? :p

Saddam is in US custody. It's not too much to think that before long he will have revealed where the WMD's were and have been moved to.

If nothing else, after Saddam's trial and when his horrific abuses have been laid bare, Bush will be justified.

Now that we have Saddam, more of those special units can be shifted back to Afghanistan and we can locate UBL. If they can capture him before the election, Bush is re-elected.

Kitso
KS 361

I won't be wrong. Period. I don't regurgitate the crap that CNN, Fox or party DTPs feed most people. I don't claim to be able to predict the future, I merely claim to be educated. 11 months until I'm proven right.

I seriously doubt that WMDs will be found. Iraq maintained the capability, but may not have the finished product. Besides, we did not go into Iraq for WMD. We went in for geopolitical realignment in the region.

Finding Usama bin Laden will have nothing to do with Bush's reelection prospects. If bin Laden is found, and we are experiencing 2% growth with 5.5% unemployment, Bush will be a 1 term president. Guaranteed.

So anyone this disagrees with you is uneducated? Classy

No, any one who choses to ignore 3/4 century of metrics in favor of diatribe is indeed uneducated.

I also doubt that hard WMDs will be found. What i believe will be revealed that they did have them at one time and that they were shuttled to Syria.

And i do think that UBL being found will give Bush more momentum going into the election.

Like you've said though, "It's the economy, stupid".

Kitso
KS 361

Well I pretty much agreed with you earlier that if Bush met those metrics he would be relected unless he did something to piss the people off but you got all offened someone didn't 100% agree with you so they are uneducated. So if someone from any party disagreed with what the great Russell formulated then they are uneducated? Even if the roles were reversed and let say Bush was a Democrat?

I didn't formulate the correlation between macroeconomic performance and presidential elections. And yes, it applies to the reverse political situation as well.

The only time this did not bear out was in 2000 because Al Gore (what an idiot) distanced himself from Bill Clinton, and forfeited his association with the state of the economy.

The only reason I never 100% agree with anything because of chance and hope. I agree the economy is the factor just like it was in Clinton's upset of Bush. If having hope and believeing in against the odds chances is uneducated, so be it.

Hopefully, people will open their eyes and not see this event as a reason to vote for Bush

And most of the voters in the United States have a high school diploma or less.

The economy is the most important issue we face right now in my opinion -- but there are a miriad of things that can happen to affect the election in the next year.

A lot of folks, unfortunately, vote one way or the other because of some word that they may or may not understand -- like Republican or Democrat -- no matter who the candidate is.

To assign ANY single issue or outcome as the absolute reason that any given person or party will win an election is, again in my opinion, misguided.

THANK YOU! :D

That comment standing alone seems just bitter and with all due respect.. pointless (as in, what was the point of that comment?).

What are the people opening their eyes to?

1. Our foriegn policy is doing just fine?
2. Our economy is improving after it declined at the tail end of the Clinton presidency?

What vast right wing conspiracy is there to open our eyes to?

Well a lot of Arabs are sad that Saddam was caught.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/14/in...D-ARAB.html?hp

Perhaps the leaders of these countries should stop worrying about Iraqi self-rule and about the power of their own citizens.

-Rudey
--Caught in a hole like a dirty rat.

I loved the quote from one of ABC TV's reporters which alluded to not only the place of capture, but the famous deck of cards:

He called Saddam, "An Ace in the hole."

1. Our foreign policy is horrible. Every other country hates us with a passion (even Britain). Bush has alienated everyone.
2. Millions and millions of people still have no jobs and are getting laid off.

As far as the conspiracy check out http://www.newamericancentury.org. Plans for the United States to achieve complete global domination, which, in my opinion, is wrong. Power breeds corruption. All empires must fall.

In case anyone was wondering, Howard Dean has NOT yet won the Democratic nomination, nor will the party platform be based off of his ideals.

Just a friendly reminder from Babs the Fembot.

huh? How did Howard Dean get involved?:confused:

Dream on, brother. I would hope that this would remind people that it was this administration that got us into the unwinnable, unfixable mess in the first place (Saddam's capture notwithstanding - Osama Bin Laden anyone?).

Hopefully people will remember those young men and women who gave their lives in what's shaping up to be the Viet Nam of the 21st century.

Reading it, it talks about democracy achieving global domination. The United States being a force for freedom and prosperity for everyone in the world. I guess global domination would be one way of looking at it.

Stating that our foriegn policy is "horrible" and that every other country hates us is silly. It's simply not true. The US is viewed as a powerful country in the world and for many is their only hope of getting out of desperate situations. The UN currently is a failure. It was given every opportunity to stand by its own resolutions. It allowed Iraq to ignore 17 separate resolutions with little more than a slap on the wrist. The most irresponsible thing for the US to do in this situation would be to not use its power for the betterment of the world.

As far as the economy.. yes.. millions are out of a job. The only way the government can directly influence that situation would be to create more government jobs. Fortunately, they're not pursuing that course of action. We've created a better situation for businesses here in the US to stimulate the economy and job growth. The DOW seems to be trending upwards. This tends to be an indicator that precedes (and is followed) by unemployment numbers.

In the past 3 years, I don't care who the president was or his politics. The economy was trending downwards after Clinton's presidency. 9/11 didn't help it much. To be shooting upward like we are in such a short time is actually pretty impressive.

For the resolution, the failiure is not only the UNs, but also the members of UN. In order for a resolution to be enforced, it need the country of the world. There are various resolutions that have not been enforced. Look at the West Sahara resolution that have not been enforced because nobody cared.

Nope.

Not really.

Not in the same ballpark, not even the same damn sport.

Vietnam started as advisors and escalated into a full-blown guerilla conflict.

Iraq is currently a nation-building mission. Major conflict is over. Guerrilla hit and run tactics are ocurring, but with NOWHERE near the loss of life in Vietnam.

It will take a while to build the nation that is Iraq, Bush wants to turn the government over to the Iraqis next summer, but we will still have troops there. BUT, i highly doubt that 5 years from now we will have 1/100th of the troop presence that we did 5 years into the Vietnam conflict.

Kitso
KS 361 throwaway comments like this we can expect from the Dems

This is true. The worst thing we can do to ourselves and the future of this nation is to stick to party lines just because we like to put ourselves in tiny little boxes with great big labels. When someone doesn't agree with what we're saying, they often brand them as the opposite (see above post for prime example).

Depending on the issue, I have voted and will continue to vote regardless of the little letter in parentheses next to the candidate's name. After all, isn't that what politically savvy people do, anyway? :confused:

I don't know why the Republicans think we should worship Bush for this. Of course republicans worship him and want him four more years but you wanted that before Saddam was captured anyways. I mean no matter what reason Bush invaded Iraq, wmd's, terrorism,ect.... at the very least catching him should be expected and not a nice suprize or bonus like everyone is acting.

Or maybe we are supposed worship him because he flew to Iraq joined the 4th infrantry and grabed a hand gun hoped in the spider hole and pulled Saddam out of it himself. :p

I am happy Saddam is captures but I don't feel the need to kiss Bush's butt for something that was expected of him anyways. Just like we expect him or the next president to capture Osama.

No one said anyone should worship him. However, admitting he's doing a decent job would be a start:D

But for a lot of us, he's NOT doing a decent job. And there are a lot of Republicans out there who seem to want to throw him a parade every time he does something that he should have been doing in the first place.

Okay, so we caught Saddam. (Okay, in actuality WE didn't catch Saddam. But he's in our custody, which is the important part.) Yay! Now wait: shouldn't this have been a given? To me, catching Saddam is not a "reward," it's a necessity that should have been accomplished a while ago. Not to mention that bin Laden is still missing, the WMDs (our entire justification for going to war!) are still missing, and even if Bush fixes those two, it doesn't excuse the fact that it's now clear that he blatantly lied to the American people to justify this war.

Okay, so the economy is improving. But wait -- weren't Republicans the same ones that were just telling us that the crappy economy wasn't Bush's fault? That the economy was Clinton's fault? But now the fact that the economy is improving IS because of Bush? Talk about having our cake and eating it . . . Let's just pretend this one isn't even an issue.

Okay, so Bush managed to pull the country together after 9/11. Even I will give him that. But did anyone read the reports that said that the White House received warnings in August 2001 that the attacks on the WTC might happen in September, and that they were ignored? Possibly because Bush was on vacation for the vast majority of August? Now granted this is probably a nonissue. Chances are that even if Bush was semi-competent and not the laziest president we've ever had, the attacks still would have happened. But the fact of the matter is that if Bush hadn't spent all of August on vacation, there wouldn't even be the possibility of suggesting a link between the two.

Not to mention that even if 9/11 and the war on Iraq had never happened and the economy was still in great shape with unemployment levels hovering around 4 percent -- that is, even if Bush was doing an unarguably decent job at being president -- he has passed a number of laws that I don't in any way agree with that would make it tough for me to subjectively call him a "good president."

When he starts doing one I will admit it. ;) :p

Please re-read the transcripts of the presidential addresses leading up to this war. WMDs were not the entire justification for going to war.

In the original post docetboy talked about Howard Dean's platform being dealt a blow. Well, there's other candidates besides Dean. :p

I don't generally look for the truth in presidential transcripts. ;) There were multiple ways Bush tried to gain support for the war. Overblowing the threat of Iraq's WMDs was the only really successful one (others, such as Saddam being a tyrant, were only mentioned as justification to make us sound noble and less self-involved) that drew people to the cause. Most Americans really did not care that Saddam was killing and torturing Iraqis, evidenced by the fact that most of us knew that this was going on for years and never attempted to do anything about it. Bush preyed on the fear and paranoia that was rampant in this country after 9/11 by pushing the threat of WMDs. He took advantage of the fact that people trusted him to take care of us! If anything had actually been found I would not be nearly so upset over this, but the fact that Bush lied to us and took advantage of people's post-9/11 fears for something that was ultimately of little to no gain to the American people -- that scares me, and it worries me that more people are not upset about it.