debunk the notion that a rising GNP shows that everything is great. "GNP is the total price . . . of all traded goods and services in a country during a year. Any economic activity that does not involve a monetary transaction is not included. On the other hand, any activity that involves the spending of money is included even if it has a detrimental effect in socioeconomic terms."Today, I saw a column by Kevin McCullough arguing that we must be winning in Iraq -- their economic growth is through the roof!
The nation and economy known as the new Iraq is succeeding, and those who dispute this are simply lying.
Call it whatever you'd like - a quagmire, a country torn by violence, the next Vietnam, etc. - but it is dishonest to say is that this nation is not a success. Government corruption, uncontrolled militias, and (as the drive-by media likes to remind us) daily attacks using improvised exploding devices - but it is not an economy going under.
McCullough doesn't dwell on how much of the economy is devoted to providing security, selling burial plots, or procuring the weapons of war and terror. If somebody in Baghdad sells a stick of dynomite or a blasting cap, that adds to the Iraqi economy but will greatly detract from the wealth and well-being of Iraqis.
There is a class of people in the punditocracy who will never admit that the Iraq war was a failure of the Bush administration, the neocons and the broader political Right. They will attempt to blame the media, antiwar activists and Democrats (too many of whom shamefully went along with the war). I find it encouraging that many Townhall commentors don't buy McCullough's argument -- although Freepers, being willing to swallow any rightwing crap imaginable take a much more positive view of the article.
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