Howard Dean just said it: "Declare victory and get out." Shades of Aiken

[madfloridian]

I just watched Dean's appearance on MSNBC this morning. I was surprised to see him quote the Vermont Republican who famously said these words about Vietnam.

http://www.williamgreider.com/article.php?article_id=24

The Aiken Solution...by William Greider.

"It was this period when Senator George Aiken, Republican of Vermont, uttered his famous solution: "Declare victory and get out." The great tragedy was that Lyndon Johnson, either too willful or too worried about history's judgment, would not yield. Instead, it destroyed his presidency."

"George Aiken was a conservative Republican of the old school -- a conservator of cherished values and regular order in governing institutions, not a radical right-winger like the present crowd. In private life, Aiken was a nurseryman He wrote a celebrated book in the 1930s, "Pioneering in Wild Flowers," in which he described his self-learned methods for propagating the rare species of wild flowers hiding in his native woodlands. It's still in print and still a charming and educational book to read.

Aiken could see the future even then. Eventually, he realized, development and aesthetic tastes would put unbearable pressure on the pink lady slipper and other natural gems. To prevent their extinction, he explained, Vermont and other forested states needed laws prohibiting their harvest in the wild (those laws are now standard). Instead, people could cultivate the plants for sale from seed or cuttings, thus multiplying the supply and protecting the species in wild places from human predators.

He was, in other words, a wise, plain-spoken environmentalist before that term came into usage. One misses his type in public life, especially in the Republican party."

Dean managed a sort of smile, but he was serious. Will find the manuscript later when it is up. Good interview. But it reminded me way too much of the Vietnam years...and we are there again.

[Warpy]

1. Before Ronnie gave the party to the religious nutcases,

Repugs were often more liberal than their Democratic opponents. This was especially true in New England. I confess I've voted for more than one before 1980.

That year changed everything, though. The party of the rich and conservative became the party of the bullies and the haters.

No vote of mine will be spent on that party until they change drastically, from the ground up, and eject these anti American neocons, theocons, and robbers.

[John Gauger]

2. Why should we declare victory?

Why can't we just admit that we can't succeed? Be honest for once. My father says that every day about the war. Didn't know he got it from a quote about Vietnam.

[madfloridian]

4. That was one of those serious/sad/not so serious statements...

that you don't really take at face value because there is so much other stuff involved.

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

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[madfloridian]

3. And more Vietnam quotes from that sad era.

Ho Chi Minh to the French, late 1940s
You can kill ten of my men for every one I kill of yours, but even at those odds, you will lose and I will win.

Richard M. Nixon, speech, April 16, 1954.
If in order to avoid further Communist expansion in Asia and particularly in Indo-China, if in order to avoid it we must take the risk by putting American boys in, I believe that the executive branch of the government has to take the politically unpopular position of facing up to it and doing it, and I personally would support such a decision.

Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1954
You have a row of dominoes set up; you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is that it will go over very quickly.

John F. Kennedy, speech, New York Times, October 13, 1960.
Should I become President...I will not risk American lives...by permitting any other nation to drag us into the wrong war at the wrong place at the wrong time through an unwise commitment that is unwise militarily, unnecessary to our security and unsupported by our allies.

John F. Kennedy, 1961
Now we have a problem in making our power credible, and Vietnam is the place.

Barry M. Goldwater, Why Not Victory?, 1962.
Once upon a time our traditional goal in war and can anyone doubt that we are at war? - was victory. Once upon a time we were proud of our strength, our military power. Now we seem ashamed of it. Once upon a time the rest of the world looked to us for leadership. Now they look to us for a quick handout and a fence-straddling international posture.

Gen. Curtis LeMay, May 1964
Tell the Vietnamese they've got to draw in their horns or we're going to bomb them back into the Stone Age.

Lyndon B. Johnson, statement after Gulf of Tonkin incident, August 4, 1964.
We still seek no wider war.

Lyndon Johnson, Oct. 1964
We are not about to send American boys nine or ten thousand miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.

Ronald Reagan, 1964
We are at war with the most dangerous enemy that has ever faced mankind in his long climb from the swamp to the stars, and it has been said if we lose that war, and in so doing lose this way of freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening.

Lyndon B. Johnson, 1964
This is not a jungle war, but a struggle for freedom on every front of human activity.

Ronald Reagan, interview, Fresno Bee, October 10, 1965.
It's silly talking about how many years we will have to spend in the jungles of Vietnam when we could pave the whole country and put parking stripes on it and still be home for Christmas.

http://www.vietnam-war.info/quotes/

[madfloridian]

5. Video up: Dean says yeh, there will be a national wave.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3096434/

Look down under Battleground America

[hedda_foil]

6. Thanks, mf!

Will it be on again? I missed it and would love to see it.

[welshTerrier2]

7. the OP gives the wrong impression of what Dean conveyed

Dean was asked by Gregory point blank about whether he's saying that we should leave Iraq immediately and whether it's important for Democrats to give a specific date ...

Dean said very clearly that he did NOT think it was important for Democrats to provide a specific date and further pointed out that there is widespread agreement among Democrats that we should have all our troops out of Iraq no later than the end of 2008 ...

to give the impression, as i believe the OP does, that Dean is now calling for Democrats to "declare victory and leave", is a serious distortion of Dean's intent ... it distorts by omission ... yes, Dean said we should "declare victory and get out" but when pressed to clarify the statement, he refused to provide any timeline at all for withdrawal ... he also clearly stated that "declare victory and leave" did not mean immediately ...

[MaineDem]

9. What did Dean mean by that???

Has he changed his views? I can't believe he's saying we should, in effect, cut and run.

Very odd.

[madfloridian]

11. Please read up on what I posted about Aiken.

I put up the video, transcript coming.

It is a sad way of saying how to get out of a war you can not win.

I don't know what form of speech you would call it, but it is subtle. It is how to get out of wars you can't win.

It was also a dig at Bush.

If you listen to the video...he did not say get out and run home, just national guard to do that.

It is a very famous way of saying we have failed. So let's pretend we won and leave. Only in this case he feels we should redeploy which is not the point of what he said.

I often feel I must apologize for "subtle" here sometimes. I thought it would be understood.

I do so apologize.

[welshTerrier2]

13. "It is a sad way of saying how to get out"

but it does not say WHEN to get out ...

when Gregory asked Dean about the WHEN, Dean refused to give him an answer ...

[madfloridian]

14. The congressional democrats are deciding that.

I think you did not present what he said fairly. But I am tired of arguing and trying to convince people who want perfection.

You win. Backing off rather than have another arguing session with you while trying to figure what ages some are here at DU.

:crazy:

[welshTerrier2]

15. fairly???? ... your OP was a TOTAL DISTORTION

your subject line leaves the clear impression that Dean was calling for withdrawal NOW ... it says: "declare victory and leave" ...

it does not say "leave in 6 months or leave in a year or leave by the end of 2008 or leave when things in Iraq are stabilized" ... it just says "LEAVE" ...

and your use of the phrase "just said IT" makes it seem like that's what many of us have been waiting for ... Dean said "IT" ...

you're tired of arguing with people who want perfection????? bwahahahahahahaha ...

yeah, i want "perfection" ... is it "perfection" to point out that Dean refused to give Gregory an exit date??? how does that translate to my "wanting perfection"??? how about just wanting posts that don't distort the truth ... post your little transcript and let's review exactly what Dean really said ... that will give anyone reading this the truth about Dean's full statement instead of the distortions by omission that you started this thread with ...

you keep promising me you won't respond to me anymore but you never follow through ...

[Cha]

10. KNR! That's exactly what

we should do but that wouldn't settle well with the greedy oily prevaricators. They couldn't take their oil with them.

Thanks for this, mad. I've just been reading about the effects of Viet Nam on so many Soldiers and how they ended up in prison. I was thinking.."I hope we don't have a whole new crew of inmates due to the Veterans from the war on Iraq."

[madfloridian]

12. Ok, a lesson in subtlety and wry humor.

Aiken was a VT Republican who famously declared Vietnam a mess and said "Let's declare victory and get out."

Sad humor wry humor.

In the video Dean also says redeploy but get the reserves out now.

I am going to go and hide my head under a pillow somewhere. :shrug:

[madfloridian]

16. I put "shades of Aiken" in the subject line. That was a giveaway.

This place is crazy.

[madfloridian]

17. And the You Tube link to the video.

Back to pulling the pillow over my head.

[madfloridian]

18. I think Dean was speaking for himself, then speaking the party view.

I did a little transcribing from the video, and it sure sounds like that to me.

When George Aiken said those words to Nixon, it was years before we left Vietnam. It was said sort of in wistful way by him in the 60s, like he knew it would not happen. I believe Dean said it the same way, wistfully, like he knew it would not happen. It was hard to explain this today, and I was surprised how hard the statement is to explain to some here.

I transcribed a portion, in which Dean sort of gives a look at his personal thoughts on leaving.

Dean mentions what Mehlman said just before him...
Gregory pumping him for time frame, and Dean said:

"I was very interested to hear Chairman Mehlman previously echo the Bush line. The Bush line is essentially we can't leave Iraq because it would make us look weak. So essentially the president is saying we have to stay forever. That's just patently ridiculous.

The president has put us in a bad situation...continue to be in the war in Iraq, having our brave soldiers killed. Or...we can leave. Neither one of those is now a good option...but I'm with George Aiken, the wonderful Vermont senator who once said about Vietnam....'declare victory and get out.'

Eight years later we did, it cost us 25 thousand more troops."

David Gregory goes on to pump him about when. Dean then takes the party line of redeployment and all troops out by 2008. National guard and reserves home now.

A little more about George Aiken's statements, a moderate Republican from Vermont.

Is It 1966 Again?

"FLASH BACK TO 1966: Just as the United States was sinking ever deeper into the quagmire known as Vietnam, Vermont Sen. George Aiken delivered a famous speech in which he said that We should declare victory and get out. Unfortunately, the war dragged on for six more years, and eventually North Vietnam won."

..."At the time, "staying the course" was posed as a test of American credibility. I was in the seventh grade at the time. Our science teacher, Harry Don Wirth, told us, "I do not think we should have entered this 'conflict,' but it's too late to pull out now." As Lyndon Johnson liked to say: Who would follow the lead of a superpower who "tucked tail and ran"?

..."Public sentiment changed against the war in 1968 and Nixon decided to masquerade as the "peace candidate," on a "peace with honor" campaign. By the time I reached senior year in high school, however, the stupid war was still going on. Then on Jan. 23, 1973, Nixon gave his "peace with honor" television broadcast announcing the initialing of the Paris "Agreement on Ending the War and Restoring Peace in Vietnam."

http://www.howestreet.com/articles/index.php?article_id=1756

Peace with honor could be construed as declaring victory and leaving.

It seems to be following the same path as Vietman...stay a little longer, we'll win. We won't.