Everyone finds justification for his or her views in logic and analysis, but a personal philosophy often emerges from some archaic part of the mind, an early idea of how the world should be.
George PackerRead
The Iraq war was always a long shot. But it was made immeasurably longer by its principal architects in Washington, including Douglas Feith, who ignored expert advice, reserved most of their effort for fighting each other in ideological battles, and regarded the Iraqi people as an afterthought.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The Iraq war was a risky endeavor exacerbated by poor decision-making from its planners.
George Packer highlights that the Iraq war faced significant challenges from the outset, but its duration and difficulties were greatly increased by the misguided actions and conflicts among its key decision-makers in Washington. He emphasizes that the lack of attention to expert advice and the disregard for the needs and opinions of the Iraqi people contributed to the war's extended hardships.
Themes
IraqWarPoliticsDecision MakingExpert AdviceConflict
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about the implications of decision-making in military conflicts, one might reference this quote to highlight the importance of expert advice.
More from George Packer
All quotes →Ideology knows the answer before the question has been asked. Principles are something different: a set of values that have to be adapted to circumstances but not compromised away.
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At the heart of the matter is a battle between wish and fear. Fear generally proves stronger than a wish, but it leaves a taste of disappointment on the tongue.
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As America has grown less economically equal, a citizen's ability to move upward has fallen behind that of citizens in other Western democracies. We are no longer the country where anyone can become anything.
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The invisibility of work and workers in the digital age is as consequential as the rise of the assembly line and, later, the service economy.
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Abstract sympathy with the working class as an economic entity is easy, but the feeling can vanish on contact with actual members of the group, who often arrive with disturbing beliefs and powerful resentments - who might not sound or look like people urban progressives want to know.
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If we insist that public life be reserved for those whose personal history is pristine, we are not going to get paragons of virtue running our affairs. We will get the very rich, who contract out the messy things in life the very dull, who have nothing to hide and nothing to show and the very devious, expert at covering their tracks and ambitious enough to risk their discovery.
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Government proposes, bureaucracy disposes. And the bureaucracy must dispose of government proposals by dumping them on us.
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A properly functioning democracy depends on an informed electorate.
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Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed there are many rewards, if you disgrace yourself you can always write a book.
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Government ought to be as much open to improvement as anything which appertains to man, instead of which it has been monopolized from age to age, by the most ignorant and vicious of the human race. Need we any other proof of their wretched management, than the excess of debts and taxes with which every nation groans, and the quarrels into which they have precipitated the world?"
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