What to do about Both Side rhetoric

Chris Hedges has written another excellent (if not perfect) essay about the War in Iraq and how the "Pimps" of that war need to be held accountable.

Chris brings it up to the present by calling the war in Ukraine another Proxy War, and calling the expansion of NATO both provocative and unnecessary (with links to other articles backing up those points).  Bravo!

But then he follows the convention of nearly all antiwar voices.  He equates the crimes of Bush, Cheney, and their ilk with Putin.  He says it would be fine if Putin were in prison for war crimes, but only alongside Bush, Cheney, and the others.

Fairly well informed and tireless commenter Feral Finster (so tireless on a wide variety of blogs you wonder if it's just one person) refuses to call out Hedges for this both-sides rhetoric, but clearly states what is also my opinion on the matter:

As I said, the war is entirely intentional on the part of the United States.

The idea was to put Russia in a situation in which it had no choice but to react. Ukrainians were the patsies.

(Not that I always agree with Feral Finster either.) 

I liked the essay by Chris anyway.  It's not like I have a spectrum of people like Chris Hedges to choose from.   There are many commenters like me (in a vast world) but relatively few qualified journalists and leading commentators who say what I say.  I can't demand or expect 100% agreement.  I seek whatever level of useful agreement I can get, and IMO Chris' essay is near perfect (except the one both-sidesing sentence).

It's true that those who don't do the both-sidesing thing include some of my most valued sources.  But there aren't many of them to choose from:

Scott Ritter (who may differ from me on a number of social issues he doesn't publicly talk about anymore--he's basically a conservative guy who happens to agree with me completely on issues of war and peace, which makes it clear to me that my ideas of war and peace are both intuitive and correct)

MoonOfAlabama "b" (who is also a conservative guy fundamentally, but not into the latest "conservative" con jobs like anti-masking and anti-vaxxing (which he unsuccessfully attempted to keep his comments section clear from) though he's not the most friendly towards LGBTQ+ either, judging from a few occasional asides he makes as it's something he doesn't write essays about).

And a number of others I had little patience with on other issues, but noted their rectitude on war and imperialism, including;

TheSaker (now retired, and a tireless supporter of anti-woke etc, and obviously pro-Russian)

Will Schriver and numerous blogger/tweeters like him

I can't think of one commentator I agree with 100%.   Which is why I must write this blog.