Yuhas writes: "Ivy Ziedrich challenged the likely
presidential candidate after he blamed the militant group's formation on Barack
Obama for withdrawing troops from Iraq."
University of Nevada student Ivy Ziedrich challenges Jeb Bush during a town hall meeting in Reno. (photo: screengrab)
Student Who Told Jeb Bush "Your Brother Created
ISIS" Speaks Out About Incident
By
Alan Yuhas, Guardian UK
16 May 15
Ivy Ziedrich challenged the
likely presidential candidate after he blamed the militant group’s formation on
Barack Obama for withdrawing troops from Iraq
A college student who confronted Jeb Bush about the Iraq
war has spoken out about the incident, which made headlines around the world,
saying of the former Florida governor’s position: “It was like somebody
crashing their car and blaming the passenger.”
Ivy Ziedrich, a 19-year-old University of Nevada
student, addressed the likely presidential candidate after he spoke at town
hall event in Reno, telling him: “Your brother created Isis.”
She questioned him amid a flock of reporters about his
assertion that the jihadi group developed because Barack Obama had overseen the
withdrawal of US forces from Iraq.
“You stated that Isis was created because we don’t have
enough presence and we’ve been pulling out of the Middle East,” Ziedrich said,
shifting blame instead on to the consequences of George W Bush’s invasion of
Iraq. “The threat of Isis was created by the Iraqi coalition authority, which
ousted the entire government of Iraq.
“It was when 30,000 individuals who are part of the
Iraqi military – they were forced out. They had no employment, they had no
income, yet they were left with access to all the same arms and weapons. Your
brother created Isis!”
Bush patted her on the arm and asked: “Is that a
question?”
“You don’t need to be pedantic to me, sir,” Ziedrich
shot back. “You could just answer my question.”
“Pedantic? Wow,” Bush replied, taken aback by the
rebuke.
“When we sent young men to die for the idea of
American exceptionalism,” Ziedrich asked, “why are you spouting nationalist
rhetoric to get us involved in more wars?”
“We respectfully disagree,” Bush answered. “We had an
agreement that the president could’ve signed that would’ve kept 10,000 troops,
less than what we have in Korea, and could’ve created the stability that
would’ve allowed Iraq to progress. The result was the opposite occurred because
the void was immediately filled.”
The likely candidate for the 2016 presidential
campaign told Ziedrich: “We can rewrite history all you want, but the simple
fact is we’re in a much more unstable place because America pulled back.”
Ziedrich is a political science major and member of
the Young Democrats at her university, was a nationally ranked debater in high school and has campaigned against an open-carry gun
law for college campuses. She told ABC News, which
captured the confrontation on camera, that she did not mean to sound hostile.
“I think he’s telling the truth as he understands it,”
Ziedrich said. “I see his response as a lack of perspective. We deserve more
than this as voters.”
Ziedrich has emphasized that she wants more
accountability from leaders and to get them to interact with a wider range of
voters, tweeting that day about the
ways “candidates for presidency talk at small ticketed events instead of
speaking to university students and getting them involved”.
“It’s frustrating to see politicians ignore the
origins of our conflicts abroad and use current foes as excuses for creating
new ones,” she added.
“A Bush was trying to blame Isis on Obama’s foreign
policy,” Ziedrich told the New York Times.
“It was like somebody crashing their car and blaming the passenger.”
“I think it’s important when we have people in
positions of authority, we demand a dialogue and accountability.”
Bush has struggled with his brother’s legacy
in recent days, particularly with regard to the former president’s hugely
unpopular war in Iraq. He first drew criticism by telling Fox News that he
would have invaded Iraq even knowing what Americans know today – that there
were no weapons of mass destruction and that Iraqis and Americans would pay
enormous costs in lives and treasure.
After criticism from the left and the right, Bush then
tried to backtrack, saying that he misheard the question as “knowing what you
knew then” and that “given the power of looking back, of course anybody
would’ve made different decisions”.
Finally on Thursday he said that with knowledge of
Saddam Hussein’s weapons programs: “I would have not gone into Iraq.”
Should Bush declare his candidacy as expected,
Ziedrich’s question is probably a foreshadowing of one of the former governor’s
greatest challenges: the deep disillusionment and simmering anger of many
Democrats and Republicans surrounding the invasion and occupation of Iraq,
which seems inextricably tied to the Bush name...
2015
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