Yeah, I think this about sums it up.

Lieberman's one beef with his own party was what he saw as a disastrous policy on defense.

Given that defense is the first and most critical responsibility of the central government, how could he not but push back?  How could he possibly support the Obama stated policy of precipitous withdrawal from Iraq?

If you wish to punish Lieberman for that, fine.  He'll caucus with the GOP.  Depending on the makeup of the senate after all votes are counted, that may or may not be an ongoing problem for the Dems.  

It will certainly be a problem on certain days on certain critical votes.

So careful who you punish.

"For a Senator to endorse a member of the opposing party is extremely rare. The last instance I'm aware of is 1964..."

How about Zell Miller in 2004? Miller was retiring, though, so there wasn't any question of what would happen after the election.

I didn't know Jamie intended his original post to be serious. I thought it was a Colbert-esque takedown, in line with Jonathan's Stevens analogy. Does that mean Jamie's being serious the rest of the time? Wow.

Jon Chait is correct. Lieberman did not merely question the orthodoxy of his party, he raised all of the innuendos that McCain refused to do directly. When Lieberman was in trouble in his own race in Conn., he asked Obama to campaign for him which BHO did. Lieberman repaid this kindness by stabbing Obama in the back repeatedly. Frankly I find Lieberman to be despicable. I realize his vote may be needed on issues, but you must build a majority with reliable and honorable members. Lieberman is neither. As Mel Brooks says, if Joe wants to go caucus with the Neanderthals if he gets stripped, loessem gain.    

chait,

if I am ever in another knife fight, can you fill in for me? Man, you sure know how to shred the kirchickian argument. You've almost convinced me though I do believe that there is an argument to be made that demanding that JoeWeasel beg publicly for his forgiveness takes the onus off of the Dems and places it right where it belongs, on the Weasel.

PS - now that you've flattened poor hapless kirchick, do refrain from grinding your heal in his battered face. Bad form kicking someone when they're down...

"For a Senator to endorse a member of the opposing party is extremely rare."

I presume you mean for the presidential election only.  Several Democratic senators endorsed Lieberman against Lamont in 2006, for example.

"That's why Lieberman asserted that Obama "has not" put his country first, speculated that Hamas would favor his election, and said that it's "a good question" whether Obama is a socialist. These statements were more extreme than even many Republicans were willing to make. To give subpeona power over the Executive Branch to somebody who endorses wild partisan criticisms of the president would be very risky for Obama."

You were wise not to provide links to any of these allegedly "extreme" statements.  All of them were blown extremely out of propotion, on par with the "bitter" comments from Obama.

First, as for the country first point, the full context of the statement Lieberman made (only once, by the way) demonstrates that Lieberman was talking only about McCain's past experience in working on bipartisan matters and putting country first in that regard and contrasting it with Obama's slim, to nonexistent, record on that front.

Second, Lieberman didn't speculate that Hamas would favor Obama's election.  He quoted a Hamas spokesman that said that.  Once Hamas spokespeople said that Obama would be no better for them than McCain, Lieberman never revisited the point.

Finally, what Lieberman said was a "good question" was actually a response to two questions, the other being whether Obama is an elitist.  In any case, if you listen to the audio of this question and answer you can hear Lieberman audibly laughing at the suggestion that Obama might be a Marxist (not socialist, Jon).

thinkprogress.org/.../lieberman-its-a-good-question-to-ask-if-obama-is-a-marxist

Complain about Lieberman all you want, but you're way off base to present him as some Palin-esque hatchet man for McCain.

Chan writes,

"If you wish to punish Lieberman for that, fine.  He'll caucus with the GOP.  Depending on the makeup of the senate after all votes are counted, that may or may not be an ongoing problem for the Dems.  

It will certainly be a problem on certain days on certain critical votes.

So careful who you punish."

I'd argue that it won't be a problem for the critical votes, since on those votes (cloture votes on the Dems' domestic agenda), he's fully on board.  He's not going to vote against universal health care because the Democratic leadership hurt his feelings.  And it doesn't actually matter who he officially caucuses with since he won't be the one making them the majority party anymore.  It matters how he votes, and he won't suddenly become a conservative on domestic issues simply because he starts caucusing with the Republicans.  Lieberman has essentially no leverage here.

The whole issue of who you caucus with only really matters when organizational control of the chamber is at stake, which it isn't right now. Assuming that Begich wins, which now seems likely, but that the Dems lose the GA and MN seats,  THe makeup (without Lieberman) would be 57-42. Lieberman caucusing with the Reps makes it 57-43. Big deal!!  It isn't going to threaten control of the leadership,and I doubt that the one seat will even make a different in the partisan majority of the committees.  When it comes to individual votes, who you caucus with isnt' THAT important. The Dems aren't going to get Lieberman's vote on Iraq issues, regardless of who he caucuses with. He'll still vote with them on abortion, etc. and on other issues, he'll vote how he would have anyway. So let him caucus with the GOP if he wants. It will just make it harder for him to win re-election next time but it won't hurt the Dems. He SHOULDN'T get to keep his chairmanship, however.

Some simple questions to be answered in the course of making up one's mind:

1) Has Lieberman been an effective chairman of the Homeland Security Committee?

2) The chairman of the Homeland Security Committee has access to some of the most sensitive classified information in Washington, and the rest of his party caucus must trust him at least enough to take him at his word on many issues. Would any sane Democrat trust Lieberman to the degree required of that chairmanship?

3) Is there any significant political price to be paid for disciplining Lieberman?

Since the answers to all three questions are inarguably "No," this is a pretty easy controversy. There are really no good reasons not to discipline Lieberman; it's a question of just how many cheeks do Senate Democrats feel like turning this week. If they're feeling particularly generous, they'd be within their rights to bury the hatchet and let Lieberman go on undermining U.S. homeland security with his poor performance as chairman. He's certainly not the only committee chair who isn't actually any good at his job. But if they're not feeling particularly generous, Democrats really don't have any cause to hesitate in disciplining Lieberman.

Personally, I've grown increasingly fond of the idea of offering him the small business chairmanship. It's a committee assignment that would actually better serve the people of Connecticut, and it forces Lieberman to be the asshole in turning it down and leaving the caucus. Always better to force the other guy to take the affirmative step of escalation. Anyway, the ruthlessness of offering Joe a different chairmanship that would better serve his constituents but that he will probably refuse is the kind of spine I'd like to see more of from Democrats in general.

Chan --

Lieberman's influence is now nil. Democrats don't need his vote. On the other hand, he'd have a pretty miserable time in the GOP. What happens when troops are eventually withdrawn, as is inevitable to happen? What else does he agree with the Republicans on, other than video game censorship and the occasional capital gains tax cut? There's a reason the Republican base would have flipped out at McCain if he had been chosen as Mac's running mate. Lincoln Chafee came to be despised by conservative Republicans, and Lieberman would suffer a similar fate.

Didn't Zell Miller endorse Bush?

You know what, do as you please with Lieberman.  He was right about Iraq.  You were wrong.  History will bear his stance out.

Still, as he doesn't hurt you in the present situation, why humiliate him?  There will be days when you need his vote.  No matter what numbers you quote today.

"There will be days when you need his vote.  No matter what numbers you quote today."

And on those days, I expect him to do his damn job and vote based on what he thinks is best for the country and not on based on his hurt feelings

Chan,

This argument about history bearing Lieberman's view on Iraq out is beyond ludicrous. What benefit has the United States derived from our little venture, a venture that has cost on average 10,000,000,000 a month for five years, 4,000 GIs and countless Iraqis? It was a fool's errand.

But you're right on one point: History has way of fleshing these things out. You see, nations are not plastic things, easily shaped into liberal democracies. They are not mechanical, they are organic creations of the peoples and places they encompass. Once we leave, whether in five months or three years, the Iraqi people we get to the business of deciding their own future. If you think that future will look like 19th century New England, you will be disappointed in the extreme. If you think it will look like a Shiite dictatorship that crushes its enemies, doesn’t recognize minority rights and allies itself with Iran, you will be a happy man. That's what history will bear out

Winston Churchill said, "...in defeat, defiance;  in victory, magnanimity."

Since ignoring Lieberman's trespass would be the manly thing to do, I don't expect it of the Democratic Party.

mpatrickhndri writes, "...What benefit has the United States derived from our little venture, a venture that has cost on average 10,000,000,000 a month for five years, 4,000 GIs and countless Iraqis? It was a fool's errand."

We removed a hostile and very dangerous tyrant from the most strategic (and very large) piece of real estate in all the Middle East.

We have created the potential for Iraq to be a peaceable and reasonably Democratic state.  Or, at least not a tryanny threatening all its neighbros.

We have also eliminated the very real possibility that Saddam would have created a safe harbor for Al Qaeda, where they could prepare and train with impunity and could be well funded to do vast mischief against the West.

For starters.

Lieberman should definitely be stripped of his two important committee chairs.  

And I love Rhubarb's idea  of fobbing him off with a  significantly less important committee chair!

In the words of Senator Byron Dorgan, "Joe is a friend of mine; but actions have consequences."

BTW bigm, the Republican Party candidate in Lieberman's 2006 Senate run was Alan Schlesinger not Lieberman.  So an endorsement of Lieberman by a Democratic Senator was not an "endorsement of a member of the opposing party."  

How embarrassing for TNR that its intelligent writers have to repeatedly rebut, in the most embarrassing way possible, The Stupid Guy On Staff.

By the way, Chan is absolutely right that future historians will regard our invasion of Iraq as a great success.

The only problem is that these future historians will be writing in Farsi.

Historians who are not Iranian will almost certainly accord the Iraq invasion a status somewhere between the U.S. occupation of the Philippines and the last five years of the Vietnam War. At best, a largely indifferent exercise in damage-control; at worst, a disaster of the sort capable of ending a dominant power's hegemony. Only time will tell, and the leading indicator will be the occurrence (or not) of any threats to U.S. national security on a par with the Sept. 11 attacks or German belligerence against U.S. shipping prior to our entry into WWI. Without such an acute crisis, we may yet recover. But if we face any such crisis before at least 2015, the United States will almost certainly be finished as a true superpower, and if that happens it will be seen to have been the result of our misadventure in Iraq.

The problem with the Iraq war deadenders is that they are unwilling to face up to the iron arithmetic of the situation, in terms of brigade-level combat readiness and materiel replacement. For the foreseeable future, even with a very rapid withdrawal from Iraq, the United States will have a greatly diminished ground warfighting capability. As long as we don't face an international crisis that requires the deployment of more than about 34,000 combat troops in the next seven years, we should be fine. If we do face such a crisis, we will be very badly screwed.

So. Anyone who hopes to see the Iraq invasion vindicated by the long sweep of history had better spend a lot of time in the coming decade praying that the United States does not meet a challenge it cannot meet through the judicious application of surface naval power and cruise missiles.

kerFuFFler writes, "Lieberman should definitely be stripped of his two important committee chairs."

A sentiment befitting the name you have chosen for yourself, kerFuFFler.

Rhubarbs writes, "...But if we face any such crisis before at least 2015, the United States will almost certainly be finished as a true superpower, and if that happens it will be seen to have been the result of our misadventure in Iraq."

In January 1942, Rhubarbs, our fortunes were far lower than they are now.  After Midway, our dire circumstances were essentially reversed and the path to our ultimate victory could be gleaned.

Don't be in such a hurry to write us off.  Outside of the media, Americans are not made of sugar candy.

Rhubarbs writes, "...As long as we don't face an international crisis that requires the deployment of more than about 34,000 combat troops in the next seven years, we should be fine. If we do face such a crisis, we will be very badly screwed."

This is perhaps true is we must rely only a volunteer force.  But, if circumstances become as dire and critical as you predict, there is always the option to return to a draft.  

Draftees would probably not be soldiers as excellent as our current volunteers.  But, if manpower is what is required, we have more than twice the population we had in 1942 when we began building a military that was to reach more than 10,000,000.

Our current male population ages 18 to 49 is 72,715,332.

P.S., Rhubarbs, as recently as the late 80s and into the 90s we had a military supposedly prepared to fight 2 1/2 wars, including one in Europe against the Russians.

If a confrontation came with China within your time frame, I'm sure we would avoid any or most confrontation by land and emphasize our naval and air force assets.

Chan write:

"If a confrontation came with China within your time frame, I'm sure we would avoid any or most confrontation by land and emphasize our naval and air force assets."

Our unrivaled Naval and Air Force assets have been (mostly) rather conspicuously absent from any successful strategy in Iraq, Afghanistan and nor would they likely help very much in Pakistan.  They are very unlikely to play much of a role in any near future conflicts (except against perhaps Iran) precisely because they are unrivaled.  Just what exactly do you think will be the next challenge to face the US?  Open war with Russia or China or a movement of the current Afghan ground war in Pakistan?

And "Our current male population ages 18 to 49 is 72,715,332."

Equipment Chan, equipment.  Costs money.  Needs to be built.  I'm sure a similar logic went through the Tsar and Stalin's minds when faced with oncoming Germans and while it worked out in the end, I'm sure there's plenty of dead Russians who would disagree.  While find it difficult to imagine any conflict that we can't eventually gear up for and ultimately succeed in, there would likely be a VERY costly interim period because we were screwing around in Iraq this decade.

"We removed a hostile and very dangerous tyrant from the most strategic (and very large) piece of real estate in all the Middle East."

The problem with thsi statement being that our own intelligence services didn't believe a word of it. Indeed, the adminstration had to create their own intelligence service to manufacture "the clear and present danger." Hussein was murderous thug, but there is no evidence his regime could pose any threat to American strategic interests.

"We have also eliminated the very real possibility that Saddam would have created a safe harbor for Al Qaeda, where they could prepare and train with impunity and could be well funded to do vast mischief against the West."

Nonsense. There was no operational alliance or hint of cooperation between Saddam and Al Qaeda. And to have funded and provided support for Al Qaeda would most certainly have drawn the United States into Iraq. Aside from the obvious hostility that existed between the two, there's the simple matter of survival - Hussein was barely holding to power as it was, to invite the US into a confrontation would have meant sure defeat.

As for your swipe about Democratic lack of manliness, I'll remind you that sending other people's kids to war doesn't make you man. This narrative of Democrats being Alan Aldaesque, ice coffee sipping weiners may suit your macho daydreams, but rarely reality.

Chan also writes:

"We have also eliminated the very real possibility that Saddam would have created a safe harbor for Al Qaeda, where they could prepare and train with impunity and could be well funded to do vast mischief against the West."

What evidence exists that this was remotely likely, let alone was "a very real possibility"?  Saddam was many things, but why would he be interested in harboring a bunch of nutjobs who had not only just attacked the United States (with it's predictable response) but would also vie for power with him?  

Please clarify for me the history between the two gulf wars that indicated that he was interested in provoking the US sufficiently for us to attack him directly?

Rhubs: pre-Iraq war analysis in Iran was quite interesting.    There was, of course, the fear that the US would install itself on the other side of Iran and in a pincer movement seek to isolate the regime and topple it.  That was at a Grand Strategy level of abstraction, though, and the realities of the removal of Saddam soon gave the lie to the public tsk-tsking of the Iranian government.

I supported the invasion, for two reasons, neither of which had anything whatever to do with the security of the United States.  Most non-Americans and non-Israelis who supported the war (most Iranians living in Iran and about three or four non-Iranians in the rest of the world) had more or less the same reasons - again, nothing whatever to do with the safety or security of the US, neither of which was in any way threatened by Saddam.  One was a basic humanitarian reason - it is difficult to be in the region and not be moved by the plight of the Iraqi population - and the other, sheer revenge.

I confess, with a large measure of humility (and apologies to the families of the dead), that we were basically amazed that Bush was willing to put young Americans' lives at risk for the sake of the removal of a local tyrant and quenching our thirst for revenge.  Happy, but still.  Those of us outside Iran, and opposed to the regime, had a nagging feeling - unfortunately, since justified - that a screw-up would strengthen the regime - but we thought, First Iraq War, competently managed but strategically fucked up, this one would at least be comptently managed ... and how much worse could the strategic fuck up be?

I read Channy and I shake my head at my own naïvete.  As bad as all that: Five years after the invasion and this joker is talking about Al Qaeda finding a footing in Iraq.

It requires not just a breath-taking ignorance of the region and its history, but a uniquely malignant blindness of the brain to continue to spout this sort of nonsense.  Or to drool out the word "democracy" in relation to Iraq.  Or to pretend that W.'s Daddy Complex was, in fact, a genuine concern for the sufferings of the Iraqi people under a tyrant ... even as five million people have died in Congo and genocide continues unabated in Darfur and Somali pirates ravage the Red Sea and the US has lifted not one finger to help any of them.  To trot out this canard now, after all that has come to the open, is a sick joke.

I knew something had gone horribly awry with the invasion when the Baghdad Museum was looted.  It became clear that a pride of macaque monkeys could have managed the war better and more seriously than Rummy when they issues the Wanted playing cards.  The appointment of Garner - "what's Eye rack?" - and then Bremer dazed me for days.  The only winner, so far, had been the Iranian regime ...  Then came Abu Ghraib, and out went my emails of apology to all friends.

Ahmadinejad is a direct consequence of the US's Iraq misadventure.  You don't need the broad sweep of history to understand that, you just need to be able to read Farsi.

Chan - since Lieberman was terrible at his job, narcissistic, utterly incompetent and motivated entirely by mindless partisanship, of course I expect Republicans to embrace him.  

Chan

"Draftees would probably not be soldiers as excellent as our current volunteers.  But, if manpower is what is required, we have more than twice the population we had in 1942 when we began building a military that was to reach more than 10,000,000.

Our current male population ages 18 to 49 is 72,715,332."

You're sounding like an old fool who wants to relive the glory days of WW II.  If you're 85,  enjoy a stroll down memory lane.

If you are young, get your head out!   And remember, that  hostile and dangerous tyrant  we deposed was mostly causing problems for Iran.

How is it "manly" to ignore Lieberman's perfidy? And, if it were, is 'manliness' the key quality to which our representatives should aspire?

Btw, all the people defending Lieberman's chairmanship seem to be anti-Obama.  That sure seems to indicate that Lieberman isn't the right person for the job under the coming administration.

kerFuFFler-

"And remember, that  hostile and dangerous tyrant  we deposed was mostly causing problems for Iran."

Well, the Kuwaitis might have a slightly different opinion.  In any case, the reason we had to station so many troops in Saudi Arabia was because of the instability posed by Saddam.  As I recall, the location of our troops on such purportedly holy land was a chief complaint of Al Qaeda.

Lieberman's attacks on Obama were outrageous and cannot be rewarded with a committee chairmanship.  That is obvious.  It is also obvious that he has no more leverage than would any other Republican.  I'd rather cozy up to Senator McCain.

bigm

Kuwait's problems with Iraq were before the Desert Storm.  It's not clear that we needed such a buildup afterwords to continue to contain Saddam.   His military never recovered.  

Chan reveals himself to be dangerously naive on the most fundamental issues of national defense.

Some facts that Chan, and other Pollyanna conservatives who want to whistle Dixie and pretend that their own tough talk and happy fantasies are a substitute for the simple arithmetic at the basis of all strategy:

1. The United States is no longer committed to the notion of fighting multiple major wars. Our current force structure is nearly 1 million men smaller than in the late Cold War, and our new brigade-based order of battle is based on fighting a single Iraq-level war at a time, and not more than one per decade, along with multiple smaller peacekeeping or policing deployments. Under current U.S. doctrine, we are supposed to be prepared to deploy 50,000 troops to a single hot crisis.

2. On a draft. Yes, that's an option. But the equipment to arm draftees does not exist, has not been ordered, and cannot be purchased and built in any timeframe that would allow us to deploy new draftees within a year (more likely two, but wartime materiel buildup is usually faster than expected). Furthermore, modern combat doctrines and equipment is radically more complex than it was at the end of our last draft. Cutting short the training time of incoming soldiers does not make them marginally less effective; it would make them unable to fight alongside trained soldiers entirely.

3. The military, particularly the Army and Marine Corps, have simply used up a significant percentage of their warfighting and infrastructural materiel. Most of our combat brigades are below the established requirements for force readiness. It's not simply a question of resting the force; our ground forces must be rebuilt. The Army in particular faces a multiyear crisis similar to what it faced after 1974. Eight years into the force rebuilding effort, the military was barely able to defeat a Caribbean island's police department. Fourteen years into the rebuilding effort, the military performed below expectations in critical operations in Panama. The rebuilding effort took a full fifteen years to restore American military supremacy across the battlespace. The current rebuilding will not take as long, as long as we have wound down the mission in Iraq by 2011, but I would expect conservatives in particular to be mindful of the lessons of the past. Rebuilding military forces after a major war takes time, and during that time force readiness and capability will necessarily be compromised.

4. The air and naval forces we have maintained in an effective power-projection stance are an important strategic asset, and can be applied successfully in many threat scenarios. But these are tools for the destruction of particular facilities or individuals, or for the persuasion of existing governments. We cannot destroy a national government with air and naval power alone. Destroying and replacing national governments require the defeat of national armies and the occupation of national territory. That means ground troops, in numbers and with equipment we do not now have and will not soon have, and we do not and will not have the men and equipment solely because of our adventure in Iraq.

I could respect a conservative who argues that the effective disarmament of the United States in the coming decade is a price worth paying for removing Saddam Hussein. I would not agree, but it would be a valid argument based on real costs and benefits, and one that might be proved correct in the long run. What infuriates me is that instead, most conservatives pretend that there have been no costs resulting from the Iraq adventure, and even if there are costs, then we can wish them away if we concentrate really hard and ask the world's tyrants very nicely not to threaten our interests in any manner that hits us where we may temporarily be vulnerable. And, apparently in Chan's case, if we draft 10 million Americans, arm them with bolt-action rifles and wool coats, and send them into battle with a few weeks training, like we did in WWII.

kerFuFFler-

Let me see if I understand you.  Saddam was causing problems for Iran, but not for Kuwait or Saudi Arabia even though the latter two have significantly less military power?

Makes sense to me.

Apparently, gentlemen, Sen. Reid has seen the wisdom of my advice.

Hotheads don't prosper in the Senate, boys.

Actually, bud, I said all along that keeping Lieberman in the Senate made sense. Frankly, most of posters on this board did too. The later debate was about the veracity of your statements on Iraq, which clearly were drawn directly from a 2002 AEI study.

Great news:

Politico.com Breaking News:

-----------------------------------------------------

Senate Democrats allow Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman to remain chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee despite his criticism of Barack Obama during the presidential campaign.

For more information...http://www.politico.com

Politico 's Glenn Thrush makes an intelligent point in a blog post titled, "Isn't it ironic"

mpatrickhendri, I read a lotta posters who wanted to punish the son of a bitch and remove him from his chairmanships.

In the 6-year senate, it doesn't make sense to gratuitously make enemies.  Homeland Security isn't actually a very exciting position.  

And since sooner or later, somebody is going to get through and blow something big up, who wants to catch crap for that?

In defense of Channy, lets lay off on the invective against him. We need sane intelligent conservative voices here, do we really want to drive out the intelligent opposition and be stuck with idiots like Jacob? I agree with him on many points about Lieberman. The time to have driven him out was before the election when it had real consequences for the Dems, not after the election is won.

Meanwhile, mcpatrickhendri, all the arguments pro and con the Iraq invasion have been made over and over here and everwhere around the world.

I have no doubt that we will bitch at each other over it again.

But, according to the papers, Hillary Clinton who voted for the Invasion is up for Sec of State.  Colin Powell's endorsement was happily accepted by Obama, and Powell was the chief travelling salesman for the Iraw invasion.

John Kerry voted for it before he voted against it, or some damn thing.  

We are now at the point where Iraq has been to a great extent pacified and stabilized.  But as Petraeus' former deputy points out, it is and will remain a delicate thing.

None of us is really going to know who was right for at least a decade.  Unless there is a sudden disaster in Iraq and it turns into a spectacular failed state.

So, we ought to give it a rest.  But, we won't.

What I don't think is that Obama will actually pull our troops out of there in any kind of hurry if everyone who ought to know advises him that a precipitous withdrawal will create an instant disaster.

Obama can not afford a disaster in Iraq caused by keeping an unwise campaign promise.  

Besides, once he had the Kozzies under his belt, he stopped making that promise.

Obama is smart.  A smart politician.

kerFuFFler writes, "...How is it "manly" to ignore Lieberman's perfidy? And, if it were, is 'manliness' the key quality to which our representatives should aspire?"

The answer to the first is, it is unmanly not to be magnanimous.  It is even more unmanly to willfully be unwise.

Is "manliness" a key quality to which our representatives should aspire? Yes.  Every successful civilization and nation has cultivated masculine virtues.

That is not to say we ought to eschew the feminine.  Everything in balance.  But to throw out the wisdom of the ages concerning honorable behavior-- just because some 60s vintage idiot or 70s vintage "feminist" says we should, that is neither mart nor in the interest of our long-term survival.

kerFuFFle , you should review aspect of your belief system that are of a foolish, once fashionable indoctrination.