The Iraq Study Group (ISG), also known as the Baker-Hamilton Commission, issued its report two weeks ago. The President’s neoconservative policy leaders have incrementally rejected the report’s conclusions. These leaders include Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice. Some neoconservative foreign policy “experts” reject the conclusions on ideological grounds, while others reject them on more practical grounds. For these reasons, it appears that the report’s conclusions are unlikely to be adopted.
But the ISG report has provided one significant accomplishment. It created an irrefutable fact set from which policy debates can occur. For the first time in three and a half years, Americans are united in their understanding of what’s going on in Iraq. Smokescreens issued by ideologues on all sides have drifted away and dissipated: Media underreporting “the good things” in Iraq, media acquiescence in not showing the dead and injured American soldiers returning home, Dick Cheney propaganda such as “the insurgency is in its last throes”—all these characterizations are debunked. Even the president has finally acknowledged that his project in Iraq is not going well.
The result is a palpable change in the kitchen table discussions across America (at least in homes where such conversation is still allowed). On the topic of Iraq, the facts can no longer be written off. There is a consensus that the situation is bad and we are losing the war. While most of the specific facts do not arise in the conversation, the consensus has changed the discussion from this argument over facts—is there a problem, are we winning or losing, is it bad or good—to a discussion of how we should solve it. In other words, the rhetorical debate over whether we are winning or not is over. Citizens cannot demonize each other for being stupid or uninformed anymore. The ISG report pushed America beyond its self-inflicted blindness and significantly altered this debate. This change is the report’s greatest and very valuable contribution.
