Mad Social Scientist

After the Sadr uprising and Abu Ghraib, it looks like there's a shift in the cutpoint among American pundits on the question: "Has the war been worth it?"

First, I'll crudely categorize the opinions into four clusters, based on intellectual cases for and against war (but not including any electoral calculations):

War Mongers: pro-war, to demonstrate American strength, get revenge against America's perceived enemies, and generally "kick-ass"

Pro-war idealists: pro-war, partially for the above reasons, but more to stop the spread of WMD and to bring democracy and a new order to the Middle East

Anti-war internationalists: mostly anti-war, though willing to consider it on security ground, but skeptical of the need for war, its successful prosecution and conclusion, and worried about the effect of unilateral war on international cooperation

Peaceniks & Isolationists: anti-war, period

So here's my read on the "War worth it question" (sorry about the ugliness of the graphics, but blogger deletes blank space, so the dots are just filler; the |'s mark cutpoints)

...........................War-..............Pro-war...............Anti-war.................Peaceniks &
...........................Mongers......Idealists......Internationalists..........Isolationists
Old cutpoint...............................................|............................................................
New cutpoint.......................|.................................................................................
<- pro-war................................................................................................antiwar ->

Note this is different from the cutpoint on the "Cut and run question":

...........................War-..............Pro-war...............Anti-war.................Peaceniks &
...........................Mongers......Idealists......Internationalists..........Isolationists
Cutpoint..............................................................................................|........................
<- stay in Iraq........................................................................................get out ->

fyi, I'm on the border of the third and fourth categories (call me a Peacenik Internationalist), and I'm still in favor of sticking around in Iraq, but gradually wavering towards a "find an acceptable strongman fast" position...